But he had come in when she spoke of her journey to Canada—though even in this he came in only as “a friend, an old friend in whom I am interested.”
This happened when they talked about Sicamous one night.
“I am going as far as Sicamous, at any rate,” she had said. “And that reminds me, there are things I wanted to ask you about Sicamous.... Perhaps you remember—we were interrupted?”
“Something about mines, wasn’t it?” said Clement with a careful casualness.
“Yes.... I want you to tell me all about mines in that area.... Now—please tell me.”
Clement laughed with a touch of dismay.
“But all about them. That’s a terrifically large order. In the first place, there’s nothing to say about them—and then there’s everything.”
“That sounds enigmatic. You’ll have to explain.”
“I mean by that there are not so very many mines—those at Nelson, on Kootenay Lake—silver-mines, they are—are perhaps the most important. But, on the other hand, it’s always supposed that there are great possibilities among those rocky valleys.”
“Ah,” breathed the girl, “there are possibilities then.”