"Yes," the man replied with a touch of pride in the pure English name,—"Clark without the e. I'm Tom Clark. Father's name was Stanley Clark, same as grandfather's. Everybody about Sacramento used to know old Stan Clark!"
"My name was Clark, too, before I was married," Adelle remarked.
"Did you spell it with an e?" Tom Clark asked.
"No, the same as yours, without the e," she replied.
"We must be related somewheres," the mason laughed, with a sense of irony.
"Where did your family come from?"
"Somewhere East—Missouri, I think. But that was long ago—before the gold times. Grandfather Stan came out in forty-nine and settled on the Sacramento River, and that was where father was raised."
Adelle felt a slight increase in her interest in the mason from their having the same name, and she remarked idly,—
"So your family lived once in Missouri?"
"The Clarks came from Missouri—that's all I know. Mother's folks were Scotch-Irish, and that's where I get my red head, I guess!"