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CHAPTER XLV
BACK TO THE MOUNTAINS

IN the cottage in Boney Street, one year later, two women were waiting. It was ten o’clock at night.

“Isn’t it a shame to be disappointed like this?” complained Dicksie, pushing her hair impatiently back. “Really, poor George is worked to death. He was to be in at six o’clock, Mr. Lee said, and here it is ten, and all your beautiful dinner spoiled. Marion, are you keeping something from me? Look me in the eye. Have you heard from Gordon Smith?”

“No, Dicksie.”

“Not since he left the mountains a year ago?”

“Not since he left the mountains a year ago.”

Dicksie, sitting forward in her chair, bent her eyes upon the fire. “It is so strange. I wonder where he is to-night. How he loves you, Marion! He told me everything when he said good-by. He made me promise not to tell then; but I didn’t promise to keep it forever.”

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