"This is the end of our holiday," Marcia said with a laugh. Neither she nor Cynthia paid attention to the man in the chair; he was hardly visible behind the high back. "Tod Greeley's shaft broke just as we were coming into The Way from the cross cut. We called and called, but finally we decided to find where we were--it is as black as a pocket out of doors--we were all completely lost. Cynthia and I felt our way along, while Greeley stayed with the horse--the beast acted like a fiend--and then we saw a light: your light! No other man in The Hollow wastes oil like you--and here we are!" At this Treadwell made himself evident. Turning sharply, he met the big, lovely eyes of the girl beside the talkative little woman. The fair, damp face was inframed by tendrils of light hair under a hood of dullish red; the long, coarse, brown coat clung to the slim figure, and the mouth of the girl was smiling. Treadwell had never seen a mouth smile so before. Sandy introduced his friend and then said: "Lans, make the ladies comfortable; I'll lend Greeley a hand." CHAPTER XXI Lance Treadwell did not leave the mountains the next day. The storm poured, and Sandy's words sunk deep in his light mind. "Yes," he thought to himself virtuously, "I'll let Marian have it out with her conscience or whatever it was that took her from me. I'll write and tell her I'm waiting up here!" In the meanwhile Treadwell took a new interest in the mountains, especially in that part of them known as Trouble Neck. Marcia Lowe and her "charm" appealed to him hugely. "Why, it's been introduced in many other places," he said to the little doctor; "why can't you get your representative at Washington to get an appropriation for you?" Marcia Lowe laughed long and merrily at this. "I really do not know who represents us at Washington," she replied; "it is some distant man, like as not, with axes galore of his own to grind, with these mystic votes of the mountains to help along. Doubtless he has a soul above names, and if a petticoat doctor should go to him and plead her cause for these people he would probably have me shut up as a maniac. The Forge doctor is making himself very unpleasant. He told me the other day that if I persisted in working my charm on many more people he would have me--investigated! Just fancy! investigating me! He used to laugh at me; it's got past the laughing stage now. When professional people step on each other's toes the atmosphere is apt to be electric. The Forge doctor has at last concluded that I am not a joke. A woman, to that sort of man, is either a joke or a menace."