"I pack my grub along," Bill assured him carelessly, "'n' roll up in a bunk in a shack that some one 'r other has left. If you've packed yer bed along, stay with me to-night. There's the floor," hospitably, "and I guess I can rustle grub enough fer both. Anyhow, there's two eatin'-houses where you could fill up." At five in the afternoon the stage crawled through the dusk over a yielding bridge built of hemlock saplings creaking under their coating of ice and snow, and stopped in front of a shack out of whose open door glinted a welcome light. Another light appeared high up on the side of the mountain. "Hold up there, Bill," was the shout which had brought the stage to a standstill. "Got a cold, hungry young chap inside there, name of Grant? Wishin' Wilson went through yesterday and said he'd be along with you to-day." Ross recognized the voice as belonging to Steele, and, opening the stage door, answered for himself in the affirmative. Steele shook hands cordially. "Better get out here, Grant," he invited in an offhand way; "I have some beefsteak ready to fry, and the spuds are bakin' in the oven." Ross climbed out with as much alacrity as his cold, benumbed limbs would permit. But no sooner was he on the ground than something queer occurred. His legs gave every indication of doubling up under him, while his head felt as large and airy as a balloon. He clutched the wheel, but not until Steele had clutched him. "Altitude!" exclaimed Steele. "Being a mile and a half above sea-level don't agree with most people just at first." Ross leaned against the wheel, looking up giddily at the strip of sky corralled between the towering summits of Dundee and Gale's Ridge. It seemed to him that it was the mountains and not the altitude which oppressed him, and bore down upon him, and shut off his breath. "My baggage," he began hesitatingly to the stage-driver, "where--if there's no hotel----" But Steele interposed. "Lend a hand here, Bill, with these trunks. I want Grant to put up at my hotel to-night, bag and baggage." Bill grinned, and laid hands on the emergency chest. "He'll git a better layout than at my old shack, I tell ye! Say! Is Uncle Jake in Camp?" Steele shook his head. "Nope. I'm going to see about packin' Grant over to the Creek myself in a few days," and a great wave of thankfulness surged over Ross. A few moments later Steele waved his hand around the one room of his little log shack. "This is the only kind of home you'll find up here, Grant, about the same as Weimer has over on the Creek. Things are rough and ready here, without any frills." As he spoke he glanced at the larger of Ross's trunks. If Amos Steele understood one subject better than mining operations, that one subject was men. He saw in Ross an overgrown, homesick boy, with a stout but untested "backbone." "And I wonder," thought Steele, "how far that backbone is going to take him when it gets a healthy development, and--how far is he goin' to develop it?"