"Train's whistling, Tommy. Keep your own eyes open and look after the new house." It disturbed Bill to have Tommy voice something which Bill himself would not concede to his consciousness. He did not believe Al's story, because he refused to doubt the integrity of his partners. He refused to doubt them, because to do so would pull down his faith in the stability of Parowan, which he had chosen for Mary's home. It was a round-about way to fight a doubt, but it was the best Bill could do at that time. For, as is well known, nothing ever thrives quite so luxuriantly as the seeds of suspicion. * * * * * Doris was glad to see Bill, though she was not enthusiastic over the invitation to Parowan. She had thought that they might take a trip east, now that the baby was old enough to travel, and had cut her first two teeth. Of course, Doris would like to see her mother and dad, but Parowan---- "Well, you've got a hundred-thousand-dollar house to step into, honey, if you want to go." Bill looked at her wistfully. "I've heard several women wishing they could visit a real mining camp, and I thought maybe you'd like to take a party over for a week or two, and give a sort of house-warming. Mrs. Baker Cole helped me choose the furnishings, and she thought the plan of the house was perfect. You won't be ashamed to have your friends see it. And there are some nice folks in Parowan now." Doris considered the matter. If Sophy Cole had helped Bill, of course, that was different. The nice folks in Parowan, of course, did not appeal to her in the slightest degree; but the house-party idea was not a bad one. And she did want to see the old home again, she discovered. "We'd have to take servants from here, Bill--and you know I positively couldn't think of staying longer than a couple of weeks or so. And I'd have to see the place first, before I could ask any one over. You're a dear, and all that, but a man simply _can't_ know about the little things that count when one is giving a party. And besides, I'd have to arrange for amusements for the guests. There is so little that one can do in the desert for entertainment." "I'd like to have you go with me alone," Bill confessed. "I'd like to have you all to myself for a little while in the new home. Has it ever struck you, Doris, that we have lived before the public ever since we were married?" "I don't see how you can call this public," Doris retorted, glancing around the room. "And until you went back to Nevada on this wild scheme of yours, I'm sure we were together all the time--and by ourselves too, an awful lot." Bill extended an arm and tapped lightly against the wall. "Six or eight inches between us and our neighbors. I call that living in public. Well, shall we go over there together, just us two and the baby?" "I'll see," said Doris lightly. "Perhaps--with servants, of course. I'm rather curious to see what kind of a house you and Sophy Cole would build, anyway."