Her courage was coming back to her. Only a veritable frenzy of despair had forced her into the presence of that old man who had declared his unalterable hostility to her and hers. She found him singularly and surprisingly mild in this crisis. Wreathed in the tobacco smoke, his countenance was full of sympathy. It was an amazing alteration in Echford Flagg, so those who knew him would have stated, had they been there to behold. "I suppose you have to slap on a lot of deceit in that detective business." "I'm done with deceit. I've left that work forever." "So I reckoned whilst I looked at you and heard you talk. I've got quite an eye for a change of heart in persons. I hate to see young folks in trouble. 'Most always I'm pretty hard on people. I've grown to be that way. Had good reasons! But you seem to have caught me to-day in a different frame of mind. I didn't get a good look at you last evening. I've just been telling myself that you remind me very much of somebody I used to know. There was a time," he went on, wrinkling his forehead, "when I would have ordered you out of this house, simply on your looks. But to-day, somehow, I like to keep my eyes on you. Old age has a lot of whims, you know." She did not venture to speak. Tears were rolling down her cheeks. "It's too bad, sis! Too bad! 'Tis a tough thing to work out, this Latisan matter. You have started the old John devil a-roaring in him! And I reckon that now you're falling in love with the fool, even if you did come up-country to do something mean to him!" She nodded; her emotions were too deeply stirred to permit evasion or more deceit. "I have to depend on hired help, sis. And the trouble with any other drive master than Latisan is that the opposition crowd can hire away what Latisan wouldn't sell--I'll say that for the boy! It's a matter of principle with him--this fight for the independents." "But your men will keep on working, won't they, sir?" "They'll work--yes! But they won't fight without Latisan to lead 'em. That's why the Three C's folks are so hot on the trail of one man. They're going to trig my drive at the Skulltree dam unless we are through ahead of 'em. Conservation of water, that's what they will call it when they make their play for a court order," he snarled. "But it's only devilish theft of the rights I hold in common--and that's where lawyers have their chance to argue, when rights are common." He found himself becoming garrulous in his emotion. He frowned. "But why talk such matters to you; you can't understand!" "No," she admitted, sadly. "I haven't any knowledge about drives. I can only understand that through me a great mischief has been done."