Eliza colored faintly. "It was nothing. Please don't tell him." At the incredulous lift of his brows she hastened to explain: "Tom said you men 'belonged' to Mr. O'Neil and Dan was an outsider. That hurt me dreadfully."
"Well, he can't say that now; Dan is one of Murray's boys, all right, and you—you must be his girl."
At that moment Mellen and McKay burst into the bungalow, demanding the truth behind the rumor which had just come to their ears; and there followed fresh explanations and rejoicings, through which Eliza sat quietly, thrilled by the note of genuine affection and loyalty that pervaded it all. But, now that the general despondency had vanished and joy reigned in its place, Tom Slater relapsed into his habitual gloom and spoke forebodingly of the difficulties yet to be encountered.
"Murray don't say how MUCH he's raised," he remarked. "It may be only a drop in the bucket. We'll have to go through all this again, probably, and the next time he won't find it so easy to sting a millionaire."
"We'll last through the winter anyhow—"
"Winter!" Slater shook his bald head. "Winter is hard on old men like me."
"We'll have the bridge built by spring, sure!" Mellen declared.
"Maybe! I hope so. I wish I could last to see it, but the smallpox undermined me. Perhaps it's a mercy I'm so far gone; nobody knows yet whether the bridge will stand, and—I'd hate to see it go out."
"It won't go out," said the engineer, confidently.
"Maybe you're right. But that's what Trevor said about his breakwater. His work was done, and ours isn't hardly begun. By the way, Murray didn't say he HAD the money; he just said he expected to get it."