Page:J Allan Dunn--The Girl of Ghost Mountain.djvu/223

Rh and murder for Holiister eating his heart. Then had come the relief, a look in her eyes, a word or two, a softening of her independence that he thought of in retrospect.

But the present and immediate future claimed him. His brain dominated his heart, even if the pair worked in partnership. He was the type to whom life holds two prizes, success and love. Hitherto he had seen only the first trophy. Even as he glimpsed the second and noted its bright glint of promise, his pride forbade love the right of way until success seemed assured. Manlike, he wanted to go to the woman of his choice with more than hopes and theories. Then—both heart and brain hinted that it might be a wonderful thing to work out the details of success with Mary Burrows. Yet, while he appreciated her intelligent enthusiasm in his project, her subscription to his views of life, the brave spirit that had brought her out to the West, he was human enough, conscious of an underlying fount of passion enough, to want his wooing unmixed with other affairs. To which, he fancied, the Girl of Ghost Mountain would respond in kind. But these thoughts he set aside, as one shuts the door on a bright, beckoning, luring day when there is work to be done inside.

He had a talk or two with Quong and his confidence in the buried treasure grew. It was not the gold, but what could be done with it. It seemed so much the magic touch needed for his project that his will ran to meet it. And he flung himself into the details of opening up the treasure house.