Gashwiler started. Not so Mrs. Hopkinson, who,
however, prudently and quietly removed her own chair
several inches from Gashwiler’s.
“Do you know Mr. Wiles?” she asked pleasantly.
“No! That is, I—ah—yes,
I may say I have had some business relations with
him,” responded Gashwiler rising.
“Won’t you stay?” she added pleadingly.
“Do!”
Mr. Gashwiler’s prudence always got the better
of his gallantry. “Not now,” he responded
in some nervousness. “Perhaps I had better
go now, in view of what you have just said about gossip.
You need not mention my name to this-er—this—Mr.
Wiles.” And with one eye on the door, and
an awkward dash of his lips at the lady’s fingers,
he withdrew.
There was no introductory formula to Mr. Wiles’s
interview. He dashed at once in medias res.
“Gashwiler knows a woman that, he says, can help
us against that Spanish girl who is coming here with
proofs, prettiness, fascination, and what not!
You must find her out.”
“Why?” asked the lady laughingly.
“Because I don’t trust that Gashwiler.
A woman with a pretty face and an ounce of brains
could sell him out; aye, and us with him.”
“Oh, say two ounces of brains. Mr.
Wiles, Mr. Gashwiler is no fool.”
“Possibly, except when your sex is concerned,
and it is very likely that the woman is his superior.”
“I should think so,” said Mrs. Hopkinson
with a mischievous look.
“Ah, you know her, then?”
“Not so well as I know him,” said Mrs.
H. quite seriously. “I wish I did.”
“Well, you’ll find out if she’s
to be trusted! You are laughing,—it
is a serious matter! This woman—”
Mrs. Hopkinson dropped him a charming courtesy and
said,
“C’est moi!”
A RACE FOR IT
Royal Thatcher worked hard. That the boyish little
painter who shared his hospitality at the “Blue
Mass” mine should afterward have little part
in his active life seemed not inconsistent with his
habits. At present the mine was his only mistress,
claiming his entire time, exasperating him with fickleness,
but still requiring that supreme devotion of which
his nature was capable. It is possible that Miss
Carmen saw this too, and so set about with feminine
tact, if not to supplement, at least to make her rival
less pertinacious and absorbing. Apart from this
object, she zealously labored in her profession, yet
with small pecuniary result, I fear. Local art
was at a discount in California. The scenery
of the country had not yet become famous; rather it
was reserved for a certain Eastern artist, already
famous, to make it so; and people cared little for
the reproduction, under their very noses, of that
which they saw continually with their own eyes, and
valued not. So that little Mistress Carmen was
fain to divert her artist soul to support her plump
