His wife came into the room, saying that the spare bedchamber was ready and that the gentlemen might wish to wash before supper, which would be ready in a little while.

On their way upstairs they encountered Ruhannah coming down. Stull passed with a polite grunt; Brandes ranged himself for the girl to pass him.

“Ever so much obliged to you, Miss Carew,” he said. “We have put you to a great deal of trouble, I am sure.”

Rue looked up surprised, shy, not quite understanding how to reconcile his polite words and pleasant voice with the voice and manner in which he had addressed her on the bridge.

“It is no trouble,” she said, flushing slightly. “I hope you will be comfortable.”

And she continued to descend the stairs a trifle more hastily, not quite sure she cared very much to talk to that kind of man.

In the spare bedroom, whither Stull and Brandes had been conducted, the latter was seated on the big and rather shaky maple bed, buttoning a fresh shirt and collar, while Stull took his turn at the basin. Rain beat heavily on the windows.

“Say, Ben,” remarked Brandes, “you want to be careful when we go downstairs that the old guy don’t spot us for sporting men. He’s a minister, or something.”

Stull lifted his dripping face of a circus clown from the basin.

“What’s that?” 58

58

“I say we don’t want to give the old people a shock. You know what they’d think of us.”

“What do I care what they think?”

“Can’t you be polite?”

“I can be better than that; I can be honest,” said Stull, drying his sour visage with a flimsy towel.

After Brandes had tied his polka-dotted tie carefully before the blurred mirror:

“What do you mean by that?” he asked stolidly.

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