“That’s a large order, Mr. Harrison,” he suggested, “and yet it’s in line with a matter I want to take up with you. My conspiracy won’t exactly separate O. H. Trabue from his scalp lock, but it may pull some pet feathers out of his war bonnet. I’m leaving to-morrow on a mission of reconnaissance—and when I come back——”
The eyes of the elder and younger engaged with a quiet interchange of understanding, and Spurrier knew that into Martin’s mind, as crowded with activities as a busy harbor, an idea had fallen which would grow into interest.
When dinner was announced, the adventurer de luxe—for it was so that he recognized himself in the confessional of his own mind—took in the daughter of his host, and this mark of distinction did not escape the notice of several men.
Spurrier himself was gravely listening to some low-voiced aside from the girl who nibbled at an olive, and who merited his attention.
She was tall and undeniably handsome, and if her 71 mentality sparkled with a cool and brilliant light rather than a warm and appealing glow, that was because she had inherited the pattern of her father’s mind.
If, notwithstanding her wealth and position, she was still unmarried three seasons after her coming-out, it was her own affair and possibly his good fortune. For when the Jack Spurrier of these days contemplated marriage at all, he thought of it as an aid to his career rather than a sentimental adventure.
“I’m leaving in the morning,” he was saying in a low voice, “for the Kentucky Cumberlands, where I’m told life hasn’t changed much since the pioneers crossed over their divide. It’s the Land of Do-Without.”
“The Land of Do-Without?” she repeated after him. “It’s an expressive phrase, Jack. Is it your own or should there be quotation marks?”
Spurrier laughed as he admitted: “I claim no credit; I merely quote, but the land down there in the steeps is one, from all I hear, to stir the imagination into terms more or less poetic.”
He leaned forward a little and his engaging face mirrored his own interest so that the girl found herself murmuring: “Tell me something about it, then.”