Presently his worst fears were realized. Kate, genuine misery in her dark eyes, stared at him silently. Her hands were gripped together so that the knuckles showed white. Suddenly she turned side wise, flung an elbow over the back of the chair and buried her face in her hands. She began to cry softly. "Oh!" she wailed, her shoulders shaking. "Oh, I love you so! I love you so! And you don't care--you don't care a bit!" Sobs racked her whole body. She completely lost control of herself and burst into a storm of passionate weeping. To Loudon it seemed that this state of affairs endured for an age, but not more than five minutes elapsed before Kate swayed to her feet and stumbled from the room. She did not close the door, and Loudon could hear her muffled gasps as she strove with her distress. At that moment it seemed to him that the girl who had called him an ignorant puncher was a wraith of the dim and misty past. Certainly the present Kate Saltoun was a different person. She no longer flirted, she was plainly sorry for what she had done, and apparently she loved him utterly. No man can remain unmoved while a beautiful woman weeps for love of him. Loudon was moved. He was impelled to call to her, to tell her to come to him. But he hesitated. He was not at all sure that his feeling was any emotion other than pity. He had spent miserable weeks schooling himself to forget his love and her. Now he did not know his own mind, and he could not decide what to do. While he lay hesitating he heard the scraping of a chair being pushed back, the sound of her feet crossing the floor, and the slam of the kitchen door. Half an hour later Mrs. Mace came in like a whirlwind. She halted in the doorway and surveyed Loudon with unfriendly eyes. She opened her mouth as if to speak, but closed it without uttering a word, flounced back into the kitchen and shut his door. Almost immediately she opened it. "Want anythin'?" she inquired, ungraciously. "No, thank yuh just the same," replied the mystified Loudon. Mrs. Mace closed the door without comment. It was not opened again till Dorothy brought in his supper. She inquired politely after his health, but he could see that she was displeased with him. "What's the matter with everybody?" he asked. "What makes Mis' Mace look at me like I was poison, an' what makes you look as if yuh had a pain?" "You ought to be ashamed of yourself," said Dorothy, severely, and marched out, her back stiff as a rifle-barrel. "I've done somethin' desperate, whatever it is," he said, addressing the closed door. "I shore have. I might 'a' come to like that Dorothy girl real well--sometime maybe. But I never will now, an' that's no merry jest." Gloomily he ate his supper. When Dorothy entered to take away the dishes he demanded to know why he should be ashamed of himself. "Because you should!" she snapped. "I'm not going to bandy words with you! Just wait till mother comes home--just you wait!"