"Married?" she almost screamed. "Jest that." She stood up, all her wonderful castles strewn before her. "Mon Dieu!" she groaned. "Mon Dieu!" There was a sound from behind, and a figure slipped from out of the gloom--Angela. She stood facing them, her breast heaving under her emotions. Jim, seizing the opportunity, vanished into the house sick at the thought that Angela should have heard. Angela approached Natalie and placed her arm round the latter's waist. "Natalie," she said, "I couldn't help hearing." "You--you heard?" "Yes. And I had a right to hear." "No one had a right----" "Yes, someone had--his wife." "You--his wife?" Angela inclined her head. "But he say you are his sister--and you act like that." The problem became clearer to her. "Ah, I see--he say that because he do not want to cause you embarrassment--because you do not love him." Angela turned to her in righteous indignation. "You don't understand--he bought me, with money. I--I can't explain.... But I am sorry this has happened." Natalie wiped away a tear, sniffed, and then composed herself. "I vill try to forget," she said. "I am verra glad eet ees you--for you are so beautiful.... But I vish it was me he bought," she added wistfully. CHAPTER XXII GOLD The one desire, obsessing Jim's mind, was to get away from Devinne's place. Natalie's unblushing overtures had scared him very considerably. Women had always puzzled him--they puzzled him even more now. He certainly had no use for women who ran at one in that way. Far better for them to be like Angela, cold and unapproachable, alluring yet repellent. One knew where one was with Angela, but never with Natalie. And Angela had heard, and perhaps seen, all that had taken place! He mopped his brow as he reflected upon her feelings in the matter. He was modest and foolish enough to think that jealousy was out of the question, but she would undoubtedly object to playing second fiddle to Natalie. So much he knew of her. Fearful of meeting Natalie at breakfast, he rose early and made his way out, determined not to return until Chips the half-breed arrived with his cargo. A little distance from the house he stopped, and returned for the shovel and pick and washing-pan, with a view to filling in his spare time and banishing from his mind the painful scene of last night. The red sun was just mounting the horizon as he strode off, and birds were singing gayly in the woods. Half an hour's walk brought him out of the timber into comparatively bare country. Aimlessly he wandered on, drinking in the fresh morning air and stopping to gaze at the brilliant landscape from time to time. Below him, to the west, a small creek made a junction with the Yukon, its red water foaming over broken boulders, and leaping ten perpendicular feet to join the parent stream. He sauntered down towards it, the washing-pan clanking against the shovel as he walked.