Page:Man's Country (1923).pdf/254



EFORE the president of Judson-Morris had time to think over what Simon Mumford had said to him, he heard Fay calling excitedly from the lower hall. He met her on the staircase, all dancing eagerness.

"What do you think, George?" she clamored with childish enthusiasm. "Sir Brian has invited the Hicksons, the Traceys, and us to go with him on his Big Horn hunt in the Canadian Rockies."

But George, though he had come quickly in response to his wife's call, had left his mind back there with Simon Mumford, and it was slow in overtaking him.

"Eh? Oh! What?" he stammered and, gazing past into the hall below, saw that the Hicksons' dinner party was breaking up.

Part of the guests had gone, others were departing. Near the foot of the stairs Sir Brian and the Traceys stood chatting animatedly.

"Oh, wouldn't it be wonderful, just to get off from the world like that?" Fay seized both her husband's hands where he halted on the step