So it went on for a week. At the end of that time, the silence was broken between Bill and Doris. One evening, in a cape borrowed from her maid, Doris visited Bill at his camp. Bill thought that it was Tommy, until Doris had closed the rough door behind her and stood there looking around the crude little place with its canvas walls and roof (inside, the room was still nearly all canvas) and at Bill hunkered down before the cookstove, blowing up his fire. She stood looking at him in silence. Perhaps she remembered that other night when she had cried, "Bill! Bill Dale! Let me in!" Perhaps she remembered the light in Bill's eyes then, the happy quiver of his lips which he could not hold from smiling just because she was there---- "Oh, hello," he greeted involuntarily when she did not speak. "I thought it was Tommy." He stood up, looking down at her. There was no light in his eyes now. His lips were pressed together in a straight line, and he waited guardedly for her to speak first. She came up and held her ringed hands over the stove, for the night was cool. Perhaps, too, she wanted to be near him, to watch his face. "Well, Bill, since I am to be left a widow," she said lightly, "I'm going back to the Coast. Well, of course, I'm joking about the widow--though I'm sure I don't know what folks are saying about you not being home for days. I never saw such an ugly temper as you've got. I came to say that I'm leaving for Santa Barbara to-morrow. I want to be early so as to get a good suite before the crowd arrives. I suppose you'll at least help me get there and get settled?" Bill smiled darkly. "Any girl that's able to sling a pack on a horse and get out on this desert alone, and think nothing of it," he said, "ought to be able to take a train ride alone--with two hired women to wait on her." "Do you mean you won't go?" "I mean, I won't leave here. I might convoy you to your pet hotel, if you'll wait till I have time. But if you want to go now, you'll have to go alone." "Bill, sometimes I think I _hate_ you!" "Never mind. That'll soon settle into a fixed habit--soon as I'm broke." "You're the most stubborn man I ever saw in my life. No one knows what I have endured from you. Everything must be your way--nothing that I say or do is worth your consideration. You never would listen to me--I know now that you must have been making money on the side, that you never told me about. If you hadn't you never could have acted the fool and kept it up the way you have, buying in worthless stock." "_You_ didn't find it worthless," Bill could not refrain from reminding her. "You made a good thing out of yours, don't you think? There's not a man in the country can call Parowan stock worthless. What are _you_ kicking about?" Doris looked him over scornfully. "What a fool you are!" she said. "Beggaring yourself just so you may have the satisfaction of saying that Parowan stock is worth par."