Mrs. Seaforth smiled at him curiously. "It was right I did," she said. "Possibly the distinction is too fine for you, but I think the future will justify me."
Then she drew off her gloves, and endeavoured to remember only that she had been considered a capable business lady.
Forel went up to Somasco next day, and one afternoon sat with his wife and Miss Deringham upon the verandah of Horton's hotel. Horton himself was pacing up and down, and a group of bronzed bush ranchers stood in the dust below. They spoke more rapidly than was usual with them, their movements were curiously restless for impassive men, and their eyes were fixed upon the shadowy trail that led down the valley beneath the sombre pines. The afternoon was still, and a drowsy resinous fragrance hung heavily about the hotel. There was no sound but the low voices, and the murmur of sliding water in the distance.
Alice Deringham was pale and very quiet, though there was an intentness in her eyes, and when Horton stopped close by her she looked at him.
"They have heard nothing yet?" she said.
"No," said the storekeeper. "Still, some of them should have been here by now."
The little nervous tremor in his voice did not escape the girl, and though it had all been explained to her before, she said, "Then you expect more than Mr. Alton?"
"Well," said Horton, who seemed glad to find an outlet in speech, "I don't quite know. You see there was a man brought a wire in before Harry got through, and once the claim was posted vacant anybody could stake it. There's a holy crowd of jumpers hanging round the mine, and because there'd be such a circus nobody could be sure who'd got his pegs in first, the Crown people would probably listen to the man who got through and recorded. Oh, yes, they'll be pounding down the trail as if the devil was after them now, but there's none of them got the relays of horses we've fixed up for Harry."
Horton moved away, and the girl sat still listening, while Mrs. Forel stirred nervously, and her husband apparently found it necessary to light his cigar again every now and then. The voices had died away, and there was no sound but the faint song of water and the patter of restless feet. How long the silence continued Alice Deringham did not know, but a quiver went through her as a hoarse shout rose up, "They're coming!"
Then there was silence again, and she watched a bronzed man rubbing down a great black horse whose blood had not come from a Cayuse pedigree until a faint drumming grew louder down the trail. It swelled into a sharp staccato, and the murmurs commenced again. "Two of them. Another man behind. Riding like brimstone. Can you see them yet?"