“I think I’m more disturbed than Mopsy is,” she said. “What I felt must be some excuse for me. I’m sorry for what I said; it was unjustifiable.”
“Anyway, it was perfectly natural; but I must confess that I felt some temptation to make a fool of myself. I might have jumped into those alders, but it’s most unlikely that I could have got out of them.”
Evelyn looked at him with a faint respect. She had not troubled to point out that he had not flinched from the leap, when it seemed likely to be of service.
“How had you the sense to think of that?” she asked.
“I suppose it’s a matter of practice,” Carroll answered with amusement. “One can’t work among the ranges and rivers without learning to make the right decision rapidly. When you don’t, you get badly hurt. The thing has to be cultivated, it’s not instinctive.”
Evelyn was struck by the explanation. This acquired coolness was a finer thing, and undoubtedly more useful than hot-headed gallantry, though she admired the latter.
“Wallace was splendid in the water,” she broke out, uttering part of her thoughts aloud.
“I thought rather more of him in the city,” Carroll replied. “That kind of thing was new to him, and I’m inclined to believe I’d have let the folks he had to negotiate with have the mine for a good deal less than what he eventually got for it. But I’ve said something about that before, and after all I’m not here to play Boswell.”
The girl was surprised at the apt allusion; it was not what she would have expected from the man. Since she had not recovered her composure, she forgot what Vane had told her about him, and her comment was an incautious one. “How did you hear of him?”
Carroll parried this with a smile.