Jim and Frank and Jack walked on ahead in order that they might have a few moments' conversation with the new miners; for no one had yet gone down the shaft into the mine. Before lunch they had been going over the machinery and seeing that the elevators for the men and for the ore were in good working order.
Now Ralph Merrit was insisting that he be lowered first into the mining pit and that his new men with their hammers and chisels and other mining paraphernalia follow after him. However, observing that Ruth and the other girls were coming nearer he went forward to speak to them. Not since the evening when he and his friend had taken dinner at the Rainbow Lodge had he seen any one of them.
"We are awfully pleased, Ralph, that affairs are straightening out so comfortably," Ruth began. "I think we owe you a vote of thanks." She had not known what had been making Ralph Merrit so unlike himself for the past few months, since neither Jim nor Jean had seen fit to confide Ralph's weakness to any one else; but she did recognize the change for the better in him today. She had never before thought of Ralph as specially handsome, yet he looked so fine and capable; his expression was so full of energy and ability that instinctively Ruth held out her hand.
"Go in and win, Ralph," she added, half laughing and half serious. "I don't just know what it is that you are fighting for, except to make more money for the girls who don't deserve it. But whatever it is I am going to put my money on you, even though betting is against my Puritan traditions; for you'll win in the end. Why, Ralph, you look like the famous statue of 'The Minute Man' near Boston, except that you have not his gun or knapsack. You're just as typical an American fighter and just as ready for action."
Crimsoning like a small boy at unexpected praise, Ralph crushed Ruth's hand in reply until she had to repress a cry of pain.
"I'm not worth the powder to blow me up if you really knew the truth about me, Mrs. Colter; but just the same any kind of fellow likes a compliment now and then, and I don't remember when I have had one," he returned.
A movement of Jean's graceful shoulders and a single glance from her demure dark eyes made the young man swing half-way around to face her.