According to Jack's ideas, indeed, the proper period had fully elapsed, and on this special evening he had walked over from his cabin with a definite purpose in mind; only to find, as sometimes happens when man proposes, that the girl in the case was in mood capricious, even frivolous, always somehow evading, by turn and twist of the conversation, the subject uppermost in his thoughts. Gradually the little frown between his eyes had grown darker and darker, and finally the girl's failure to be serious had provoked him to open wrath. "Dear me," mocked the girl, "more'n you're going to stand for. And I wonder what you're going to do about it. Are you boss over me? Haven't I a right to dress as I please, and act as I please, and treat you as I please? I guess I don't understand what you mean by not standing for it?" The young miner winced. Certainly he was not making the headway he had expected, nor was the conversation coming any nearer the desired end. Restlessly he fidgeted in his chair, uncrossed his legs, and immediately recrossed them again, swallowed desperately once or twice, and finally plunged headlong into the speech he had lately rehearsed so many times to himself. "Look here, Ethel," he began, his voice sounding strangely in his own ears, "this ain't no way for you to live, up here alone by yourself, an' you ought to make a change mighty quick. If things had broke different, and Jim hadn't gone so sudden, I'd have had plenty to say before this, but of course that went and changed everything. You're owner of the mine now, and whatever Jim might have meant to do for me, as it is, I'm nothin' but your hired man; foreman of your mine, workin' under you." He paused uncertainly for a moment; then, as the girl made no effort to break the silence, he continued, "You know what I think of you, Ethel; you know I've loved you from the day you first set foot in Seneca; you know I've always meant to ask you to marry me the minute I felt I was well enough fixed to have the right to ask; and now--well, everything's changed; you're rich and I'm poor, but, by God, Ethel--" and his voice rang vibrant with a strong man's pride--"I'm a man, and when the papers go through I'll be foreman of the mine for the company at the salary they meant to give Jim, and if you'll have me, I swear I'll never touch a cent of your money; I'll work my hands to the bone for you; and I'll look out for you every way I can, as true and faithful as a man could. I mean it, Ethel, every word; I love you, and if you'll marry me, that's all in the world I ask." Abruptly he stopped speaking. To the last few words the girl had seemed scarcely to be listening, as the faint sound of wheels, the sound she had been expecting, came to her ears. She leaned forward, speaking low and rapidly.