“Well, neither had I; but I let Helen know I loved her, so she wouldn’t learn to care for some one else.”
“But you hadn’t anyone else to support, as I had,” Paul said. “I will go away before she comes back,” he continued. “I never could live here and witness that wedding. I don’t know when I began to love Scoris Vivian. Long before I saw her she was my ideal in imagination, and I knew her to be my fate when she appeared.”
“And you never told her this?” Charley asks.
“How could I, when I was not able to give her a home such as she deserves?”
“Paul Arling, the trouble with you is that you are too cautious. I didn’t even have a position when this Colony started, but I pitched right in and now I can take life easy. I was bound to win and nothing daunted me. I kept Helen posted all the time, and she encouraged me to succeed.”
CHAPTER XXI.
In thinking it over Prince Charley said to himself: “What a strange thing man is anyway! Some plod all their days and every one connected with them holds them in one place at the point of duty, while others are looking around for the chances that are sure to turn up if the mind is clear. You never catch me taking bracers to steady my nerves, nor smoking to derive comfort, as some say. Those things take money and when I made up my mind that I wanted Helen Vivian for my wife, not one cent was spent that didn’t count for necessities. My mind was clear because I had no habits to attract my attention and compel me to pander to them. I intended to succeed, and I did. The men who smoke may succeed in business if they have plenty of backing but I have never known one man start out with only his two hands and brain for capital succeed so that the world would hear from them if they were smokers.
“These brains of ours need to be kept clear by plenty of rest, good food to keep the body vigorous, lots of pure air, exercise, physically and mentally. If we are attending to these necessities and look upon our bodies as an instrument that must be kept in tune as we would a musical instrument, then harmony will result. Harmony is the secret of concentration. Concentration leads to success.
“Paul Arling is a pattern among domestic men and yet he has lost the one thing his inner nature craves for because he has allowed himself to be swayed by circumstances.
“I intend to look into this matter for them, for I’ll be blessed if I don’t think it is a mistake all around. Let me see,” he mused, as the machine slowly mounted a long hill going over the same ground that it did a few evenings before when Paul was with him. “Scoris is to stay a few days at the colony in Tripside. That is only two days’ ride from here. I shall persuade Paul to take the trip with me. He will never know what I am after. Then I will throw them together, for if I don’t get him away from here before she comes home and her engagement is announced then nothing can stop it.”