But he finished at length, and then Chi Lu was summoned the table cleared, and the room restored to its usual order.
Mr. Abbot seldom had met a real gentleman since coming among the mountains; he had lived chiefly within himself and for his child. But now he found that he had not lost all interest in the outside world, and he enjoyed immensely Mr. Heath's account of his travels, and his descriptions of men and things.
Virgie had not seen her father so bright and animated in all the five years of their secluded life, and she began to hope that his fears regarding his failing health were groundless after all. She, too, enjoyed the young stranger's conversation, although she did not join in it. She sat by, with her dainty embroidery in her hands, listening, and showing by her expressive face and shining eyes how rare a pleasure such congenial society was to her.
But by and by she stole away to her own room, where she lay far into the night thinking of the handsome stranger—of his eager yet respectful glances when he looked at her; of the low, rich cadence of his voice when he spoke to her, and feeling that she should miss him more than she had ever yet missed anyone during the last five years, when he should go away on the morrow.
The two men talked some time longer after Virgie left; the Chi Lu was called again, the pretty lounge was converted into a comfortable bed, and Mr. Heath was told that the parlor was at his service for the night.
The young man was very thankful for the hearty hospitality of which he had been the recipient, and felt that he had been extremely fortunate in finding such a pleasant abiding-place; but, although he was very weary from his rough and tedious ride over the mountain, he found that slumber was hard to woo, and he, too, lay awake for long hours, wondering over the strange experience of the evening, and what hard fate—for hard he felt sure it must have been—could have driven a cultivated gentleman like Mr. Abbot, and his peerless daughter, who was so well fitted to shine in the most brilliant circles of the world, away from the haunts of civilization into that wilderness, and among the rude, uncultured, uncongenial people of a mining region.
Chapter III.
Mr. Heath Talks of Becoming a Miner.
The next morning broke fair and beautiful.
Every trace of the storm had passed away, save that the dust was laid and all nature looked fresher and brighter for the copious bath it had received.
Virgie Abbot, despite her sleeplessness during the first half of the night, was up at an early hour, superintending breakfast for her father and their guest.