"I guess not," said the Sergeant, drily. "They hitch a nice little weight to their ankles when it appears advisable, and a warder with a shot-gun keeps his eye on them." Then he turned to Leland. "I want a few particulars about that last fire you had." "You'll get them after supper. In the meanwhile there's something Tom Gallwey wants to talk to you about. Hadn't you better put up your horse?" Sergeant Grier appeared willing to do so, for the fare at Prospect was proverbially good. Presently he moved off to the stables. Carrie then remembered that she had several matters to attend to. The commissariat required supervision when there were threshers about. She, however, made Leland promise that he would do nothing further, and left him with Eveline Annersly. He turned to the latter with an apologetic smile as he took up one or two of the papers the Sergeant had brought. "I'm rather interested in the markets. You don't mind?" he said. Eveline Annersly said she didn't, and watched him with pleasure as he glanced at the papers in turn, for it was evident that the news was reassuring. "They've got the bears this time--screwed up tight," he said. "Two of the big men gone under--couldn't get the wheat to cover, and it looks to me as if there is a bull movement everywhere. I can't remember prices ever stiffening this way before when the wheat was pouring in, and, if the bulls can swing the thing over harvest, there's no saying what they may go to." "I'm glad you're satisfied," said Eveline Annersly. "Still, your observations are not very clear to me." Leland looked at her with a smile. "The fact is that it seems quite likely I'm going to be comparatively rich. I'm 'most where I stood this time last year already, and if the market doesn't break away under the harvest, prices are going up and up. One thing's certain--Carrie's going to have a month in New York." He stopped a moment and looked at his companion steadily. "It's rather a curious thing that, when I suggested she might like a run over to Barrock-holme, she didn't seem to want to go. And there's another point that's puzzling me. When I mention the crescent or the pearls, why does she want to change the subject?" Eveline Annersly decided to tell him. "The two things go together. It happens now and then that a woman has to choose between her relations and her husband. Carrie chose you. Those jewels are, you know, worth a good deal of money, and, while they belong to her, there is reason for believing that, unless she had shown herself resolute, Jimmy would have had them instead. In fact, I have a notion that her father found it distressingly inconvenient to send them. One can raise money on such things in England." A deeper hue crept into Leland's sun-darkened face. "I understand now--that is, some of it," he said. "It would be better if you made the whole thing clear."