"She is," he said quietly, "selling a good deal of bread."
"At excellent prices! Still, she probably deserves all she gains. It would cost a good deal to bring flour up. How did she get it?"
Ingleby was a little astonished at the man's persistence, and Grace noticed it.
"Are you going to turn baker, too?" she asked.
Esmond laughed in a fashion which brought the blood to Ingleby's face. Still, he answered the man's question.
Just then the major's voice broke in again. "A very good fight, Mr. Sewell. I scarcely think I could have beaten you if you hadn't let me see your game. However strong your position is, that is very seldom wise."
"Major Coulthurst," said Esmond, "is now and then astonishingly accurate. One could generalize from such a speech as that. But to resume the topic, wasn't it a little careless of you, Ingleby? You invalidate your record when you leave a placer claim."
Ingleby, secure, as he fancied, smiled. "Leger," he said, "holds a share with me."
"Of course!" said Esmond, as though the subject had no longer any interest to him. "So you left Leger! Well, I must get back to the outpost now. Grace, you will excuse me."
He went out, and while Grace entertained Ingleby the major and Sewell, who lost again, played another game. Then she made and served them coffee with her own hands, and Ingleby, at least, went back to his tent filled with the memory of how she did it.
In the meanwhile Grace, sitting by the fire when he had gone away, glanced at her father.
"I wonder," she said, "what you think of Mr. Sewell?"
"The man," said Coulthurst, "is, in spite of the opinions he seems to hold, evidently a gentleman; I can't think of a more appropriate word for it. There is also, I fancy, a good deal more in him than any one who was not good at reading character might suppose. He plays chess exceptionally well. In fact, almost as well as I do."
Grace smiled a little. "I fancied he did," she said. "Were you equally pleased with his companion?"
"Yes," said the major reflectively. "He strikes me as sensible and solid--and one has a fancy that there's often a screw loose somewhere about brilliant men. They are apt to--double up unexpectedly--when the strain comes. The other kind I always find are more likely to wear well."