She could only despise him.
Dan Anderson sat, irresolute, staring at the breakfast dishes piled near the mess-box ready for packing.
Meantime, in the dining room at Sky Top hotel, there was a certain flutter of excitement as there entered, just from the train, the party of Mr.Ellsworth, president of the new railway company now building northward.

Ellsworth beckoned Porter Barkley to him for talk of business nature, so that Constance sat well-nigh alone when Madame Alicia Donatelli came sweeping in, tall, comely, sombre, and, it must be confessed, hungry.

Donatelli hesitated politely, and Constance made room for her with a smile and gesture, which disarmed the Donatelli hostility for all well-garbed and well-poised young women of class other than her own.
"And you're going up the country still farther ?" asked Donatelli, catching a remark made by one of the men.

"I wish I could go as well.
You go by buckboard ?" Constance nodded.

"I like it," said she.