Miss Violet seemed bound by no rules, subject to no conceivable laws, therefore, like that nonsensical abstraction, Religion, she was beyond the pale of reasonable study. Not being acquainted with the factors of the love problem, or dealing in the abstruse mathematics of whims, Mr. Burrows blandly ignored the whole subject for six weeks; consequently, when circumstances compelled him to bring to bear the forces of his intellect, he was just six weeks too late. So far as he could see, which was not quite to the end of his nose, he then found the facts somewhat as follows.
Miss Violet was in love, but whether with young Ramsay, or with that big policeman, or with both at once, was a matter of no moment. Inasmuch as Mr. Burrows had reached the age of fifty without loving anybody better than himself, Miss Violet's behaviour was at once ridiculous and unnatural. She was only nineteen, a child fresh from school, her vocation in life to cook his meals, make his bed, keep her tongue from chatter and her fingers from his ears. (The fact that his ears were large and seductively ugly could not palliate the young woman's mania for stroking them.) In short, Miss Violet had no right to love, and, as to marrying, her duty was to himself. Almost with tears in his eyes he pictured the loneliness to which she would selfishly consign him if she married. She should not marry—it would not be good for her.
Then there was the big policeman, who never failed to spend his Sundays hard by at the Tough Nut Claim. Mr. Burrows, priding himself on his powers of observation, found something furtive, something underhand and dishonourable in the way that policeman avoided his own hospitality. He had written to the Officer Commanding at Wild Horse Creek, protesting on behalf of the "mining population" against weekly visits of a disreputable character to the Throne Mining Camp. This took effect upon the Colonel, who counted any disparagement of his men as a personal affront to himself, and, pending the chastisement of the writer, saw that La Mancha never asked in vain for Sunday's leave.
And, last element of the love problem, Mr. Ramsay, who should have been making an exhaustive study of mine and mill for his father's firm, spent the time sulking about the hills. A workhouse pauper who has dropped a penny down a grating could not have looked more forlorn.
So two months went by. Miss Violet very demure, like a kitten after its first mouse; the Blackguard spending every Saturday and Sunday night in the saddle to snatch brief hours for courtship; the Tenderfoot perched in desolate places brooding on suicide.
Then of a sudden Mr. Ramsay became demurely expectant, and Miss Violet unnaturally gay. Some new absurdity was in the wind, so Mr. Burrows, with the gingerly air of one broaching a gift of untasted wine, had a few words with his niece.
"Come here, Violet."
"Yes, Uncle."
"What does all this mean?"
"Nothing, Uncle."