She glanced at him quickly. “And it’s my job to find out if you were. That old prospector—I’d give a good deal to meet him. Isn’t there a chance that you may run across him again?”
“Just a chance,” she replied.
“Well, if you do, would you mind getting in touch with me at once. If it’s not asking too much—”
“Not at all,” she told him. “I’ll be glad to. Of course, the old man may be clear over in Arizona by now. When I last saw him he was moving fast!”
“All the more reason for wanting to find him,” Eden said. “I—I wish I could explain. It isn’t that I don’t trust you, you know. But—it’s not altogether my secret.”
She nodded. “I understand. I don’t want to know.”
“You grow more wonderful every minute,” he told her.
The minutes passed. After a time the car halted before Madden’s ranch, and Bob Eden alighted. He stood looking into the girl’s eyes—somehow they were like the eyes of Doctor Whitcomb—restful and comforting and kind. He smiled.
“You know,” he said, “I may as well confess it—I’ve been sort of disliking Wilbur. And now it comes to me suddenly—if I really mean all that about loving my freedom—then Wilbur has done me the greatest service possible. I ought not to dislike him any more. I ought to thank him from the bottom of my heart.”
“What in the world are you talking about?”
“Don’t you understand? I’ve just realized that I’m up against the big temptation of my life. But I don’t have to fight it. Wilbur has saved me. Good old Wilbur. Give him my love when next you write.”
