“I am sure of it,” remarked Buell Hampton quietly. “She has loved you for a long time—you were all in all to her before you followed to San Francisco, as the poor girl’s anguish showed during those days when we both thought that you had perished.”
“Then, Major,” cried Roderick, the light of great joy illuminating his countenance, “if I have won Gail Holden’s love I have won greater treasure than the treasure of Hidden Valley—greater treasure than all the gold claims in the world.”
“Spoken like a man,” replied Buell Hampton as he gripped Roderick’s hand. The latter continued, his face all aglow: “Everything has come out right When my Unde Allen refused to help me in my New York ventures he really saved me from cruel and accursed Wall Street where more hearts have been broken and lives of good promise wrecked than on all the battlefields of the world. When he handed me my father’s letter, he took me out of that selfish inferno and sent me here into the sweet pure air of the western mountains, among men like you, the Reverend Stephen Grannon, Ben Bragdon, Boney Earnest, and good old Jim Rankin too, besides our dear dead comrade Grant Jones. Here I have the life worth living, which is the life compounded of work and love. Love without work is cloying, work without love is soul-deadening, but love and work combined can make of earth a heaven.”
“And now you speak like a philosopher,” said Buell Hampton approvingly.
“Which shows that I have been sitting at your feet. Major, for a year past not altogether in vain,” laughed Roderick. “From every point of view I owe you debts that can never be repaid.”
“Then let me improve this occasion by just one thought, Roderick. It is in individual unselfishness that lies the future happiness of mankind. The age of competition has passed, the age of combination for profit is passing, the age of emulation in unselfishness is about to dawn. The elimination of selfishness will lead to the elimination of poverty; then indeed will the regeneration of our social system be begun. Think that thought, Roderick, my dear fellow, when I am gone.”
It was ever thus that Buell Hampton sought to sow the tiny grain of mustard seed in fertile soil.
“But why should you go away, Major?” asked Roderick protestingly.
“Because duty calls me—my work for humanity demands. But we shall come to that presently. For the moment I want to recall one of our conversations in this room—in the early days of our friendship. Do you remember when I gave it as my opinion that it would be conducive to the happiness of mankind if there was no abnormal individual wealth in the world?”
“That a quarter of a million dollars was ample for the richest man in the world—I remember every word, Major.”