As her brother sat beside the bed the day of the ice-storm and held Nell Blossom’s hand, Betty saw how it was with the Reverend Willett Ford Hunt. The only matter that puzzled her at all was Nell’s possible attitude. Unsophisticated as the mining-camp girl was, Betty could not know for sure what Nell’s feeling for the parson was. But Betty might have given Hunt a pretty correct explanation of why Nell did not go back to sing at Colorado Brown’s place. The girls were together almost every day after their adventure in the storm. Betty did not go to Mother Tubbs’. She scarcely left the hotel at all in the day time, though going out on the first Sunday following their perilous adventure to attend church service. But Nell came to the Wild Rose, and the two girls grew to know each other better than before. This because they both wished a closer understanding. Nell had begun to admire something about Betty Hunt besides her frocks and the way she manicured her nails. The parson’s sister now desired to know Nell better for the parson’s sake. “I’m sick to death, Betty, singing for those roughnecks,” Nell had burst forth on one occasion. “I used to think it was great to have ’em cheer me and clap me off and have ’em throw money at me. But I’m plumb sick of it.” “It’s a great gift to be able to move people with one’s voice so.” “It ain’t nothing of the kind!” Nell declared vehemently. “It’s because they ain’t got no brains—at least, what they’ve got are addled with hootch. I’ve only got just a nice, sweet, singing voice. Them fellers are so plumb ignorant that they hoot and holler for me because I please ’em. I’d love to be really able to sing!” “I am not so sure that you cannot sing, as you mean it,” was Betty’s sympathetic rejoinder. “Merely, you do not sing worth-while songs—altogether.” “I’m mighty ashamed about singing that ‘This Is No Place for a Minister’s Son,’” burst out Nell suddenly. “Why, I think it’s funny,” and Betty laughed. “I’ve often heard Ford humming it.” “Oh! I—I sang it at him, Betty. I did!” “I am quite sure it never disturbed Ford in the least.” “Well, no, I reckon not. Nothing a girl like me done——” “Did!” “_Did_—could bother a man like Parson Hunt.” “I am not so sure of that,” Betty rejoined, eyeing the other girl keenly. But Nell Blossom, if she had a secret, hid it successfully. Betty did not miss the opportunity, however, of trying to help her friend. “Suppose you learn some better songs—some really worth-while pieces? I brought my music with me, although I do not know if I shall ever touch a piano again.” She sighed. “But I sometimes sit and hum over my favorites. You read music of course, Nell?” “I don’t know a note—to speak the name of it, I mean,” confessed the singer. “But I never saw the piece yet that I couldn’t pick up pretty easy. Rosabell Pickett says I’m a natural sight-reader with a great ear for harmony.”