The girl was smiling happily enough. Even in the silver of the moonlight it was obvious that the color had returned to her cheeks.
"I was going to ask you that," returned Gordon. "But I guess I best tell you things first." Then he began to laugh. "I was coming out to see you, but—not you only. Say, I'm just the weakest conspirator ever started out to trap a mouse. Look at me. Say, get a good look. It isn't the sort of thing you'll see every time you open your eyes. I was sick to death feeling the old dad was shut up a prisoner, and I felt I must get along, even if it was only just to get a peek, and be sure he wasn't suffering."
Hazel's eyes were tenderly regarding the great creature in the bright moonlight. She had been so recently angry at this son's heartless action, that his expression of contrition made her feel all the more tender towards him.
"He's in bed, and—I'd guess he's snoring elegantly by now," she said, with a smile. "I—I waited to start out till he was in bed." Then her eyes met his. "What were you coming to—see me for?"
The direct challenge very nearly precipitated matters. Gordon had excuses enough for seeing her, but only one real purpose. He hesitated before replying.
"We've made good," he said at last, by way of subterfuge, and the girl drew a deep breath of joyous content.
"You've—made—good?" she questioned, more in the way of reassuring herself than desiring a reply.
Gordon moved his horse so that she could turn about.
"Let's go back to the—prison," he said, his words charged with the excited delight stirring within him.
"Yes, we've made good." The girl turned her mare about and the two moved on the way she had already come, side by side. "Listen, while I tell you. Say, I could sort of shout it around the hill-tops—if they weren't so snowy and cold. Snake's Fall is just a surging land market for us at Buffalo. There are real estate offices opening everywhere, and everybody you meet on the sidewalk is a broker of some sort. The Bude and Sideley folk turned their holdings loose directly we got the surveyors and engineers of the railroad up, and the folks all jumped. Then the men at Snake's, who held in ours, followed suit. But your father, bless him, held tight. The boom fairly rose to a shriek, and we've been fighting to sit tight, and let the prices go up skywards. Then we had a meeting, and your father loosened up a bit. Just to keep the spurt on. Meanwhile I've handled things down east, and kept the wires singing. The railroad have started a great advertising campaign at my orders. The coal company, too, are talking Snake's Fall, and Buffalo Point. In a month there'll be such a rush as only America, and this continent generally knows how to make. Even now sites are changing hands at ridiculous prices. Meanwhile I've got the railroad busy. Already ten construction trains have come through, and they've started on the new depot." He drew a deep sigh of satisfaction. Then in a sort of shamefaced manner he went on. "But I've had to weaken in the old dad's direction. I can't make good and leave him out all together. You see, that play of Slosson's in Snake's will have to be made good, and my father will have to make it that way. So I've got your father to give me a six months' option on a stretch of land adjoining the coalpits which he hadn't ceded to the Bude people. You see, if there's coal there it'll put my father right with the game, and we shan't have hurt him any. Meanwhile things will go on, and we'll have to keep the old dad for another month. Then I sell, and——"