"I did. Still, it seems scarcely likely that I'm going to do it again. If anyone has located timber-rights--which he'd get for 'most nothing on a patent from the Crown--he has never worried about them until the Canopus began to pay. Of course, one has to put in timber as he takes out the ore, and it seems to have struck somebody that the men who started it on the Canopus had burnt off all the young firs they ought to have kept. That's why he bought those timber-rights up." "Still there are thousands of them nobody can ever use, and you must have timber," said Barbara. "Precisely!" said Devine. "That man figures that when I get it he's going to screw a big share of the profits in this mine out of me." A portentous sparkle crept into Barbara's eyes, while Mrs. Devine, who knew her husband best, watched him with a little smile. "But that is infamous extortion!" said the girl. Devine laughed. "Well," he said, "it's not going to be good business for the man who puts up the game, but I don't quite see why he didn't strike Brooke for a few dollars as well. Men of his kind are like ostriches. They take in 'most anything." He might have said more, but Brooke appeared in the doorway just then and stood still with, so Barbara fancied, a faint trace of disconcertion when he saw the women, until Devine turned to him. "Come right in," he said. "Barbara tells me she has met you, but you haven't seen Mrs. Devine. Mr. Brooke, who is building the new flume for me, Katty." There was no avoiding the introduction, nor could Brooke escape with an inclination as he wished to do, for the lady held out her hand to him. She was older and more matronly than Barbara, but otherwise very like her, and she had the same gracious serenity. Still, Brooke felt his cheeks burn beneath the bronze on them as he shook hands with her. It was one thing to wrest his dollars back from Devine, but, while he cherished that purpose, quite another to be graciously welcomed to his house. "We are very pleased to see any of Barbara's friends," she said. "You apparently hadn't an opportunity of calling upon us in Vancouver?" Brooke glanced at Barbara, who was not exactly pleased with her sister just then, and met his gaze a trifle coldly. Still, he was sensible of a curious satisfaction, for it was evident that the girl who had been his comrade in the bush had not altogether forgotten him in the city. "I left the day after Miss Heathcote was kind enough to give me permission," he said. He felt that his response might have been amplified, but he was chiefly conscious of a desire to avoid any further civilities then, and because he was quite aware that Barbara was watching him quietly, it was a relief when Devine turned to him. "We'll get down to business," he said. "You brought a plan of the dam along?"