--{ To CARIBOO AND BACK }+-

him from one mining place to another. In
the end the news of the lost suit reached him
at the same time as that of the lost will.
And as yet fortune had brought him no gold,
only harder and harder experience. His friend
Harold quarrelled with him and left him
stranded. That was the worst blow of all and
the least foreseen.

How could he go back when he was penni-
less? Prospecting was no longer a romantic
adventure. ‘There was dire need of finding
money. If he did not “strike something good,”
how could he reach home and provide a living
for his wife and Betty?

He wrote later that he had found another
“nardner,” of a different stamp than Harold,
but a good fellow. For a while after that his
hopes rose high. Fortunes were being made
every day by others around them, why should he
not be a lucky one too?

Letters continued to come. They all told
of his golden hopes but of his bitter disappoint-
ments nothing was said. He would be home
soon; Violet was not to worry. He would build
them a finer house than the one they had lost.

ee a eee

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