"The girl and the old man might like the things, and there's no reason they should know where you got them." The other man also laughed.

"You ride straight home, Harry, before you make it worse," said he.

"One might figure that you'd mixed things up enough already." Alton turned away, and found Seaforth awaiting him.

They mounted, and Alton rode in silence until when they were climbing out of the valley he said, "I wonder, Charley, if there's a man in the Dominion who feels as mean as I do." Seaforth smiled curiously, and there was bitterness in his voice which Alton was too disturbed to notice.

"I think there is," he said.