between the Gold Run and Sulphur Valley. He had spent two years out there. Where in all this was there room for the penitentiary and the other things?

If he were telling the truth. But Valancy knew he was.

“Found no gold,” he said. “Came away poorer than when I went. But such a place to live! Those silences at the back of the north wind got me. I’ve never belonged to myself since.”

Yet he was not a great talker. He told a great deal in a few well-chosen words — how well-chosen Valancy did not realise. And he had a knack of saying things without opening his mouth at all.

“I like a man whose eyes say more than his lips,” thought Valancy.

But then she liked everything about him —