"Yes--I guess so," she agreed half-heartedly. "You'd think so, but we don't seem to go."

"Is there anything I can do for you?" he inquired after a silence. "You know what I told you once, Virginia."

"Yes, I know," she answered bitterly, "but--Oh, I'm ashamed to let you help me, after the way I acted up about Charley."

"Well, forget it," he said at length. "I guess I get kind of ugly when anyone doubts my good faith. It's on account of my father, and calling him Honest John--but say, I forgot to tell the news!"

Virginia looked up inquiringly and he beckoned her into the corner where no one could overhear his words.

"Blount sent for me yesterday--trying to sell me the mine," he whispered in her ear, "and I made him show me his stock. And when I looked on the back of his promotion certificates--the ones he got for promoting the mine--I found by the endors.e.m.e.nts that he'd sold every one of them before or during the panic. Do you see? They were street certificates, pa.s.sing from hand to hand without going to the company for transfer, but every broker that handled them had written down his name as a memorandum of the date and sale. Don't you see what he did--he set your father against my father, and my father against yours, and all the time, like the crook he is, he was selling them both out for a profit. I could have killed him, the old dog, only I thought it would hurt him more to whipsaw him out of his mine; but listen now, Virginia, don't you think we can be friends--because my father never robbed anybody of a cent! He thought more of the Colonel than he did of me; and I've started out, even if it is a little late, to prove that he was on the square."

He stopped abruptly, for in his rush of words he had failed to note the anger in her eyes, until now she turned and faced him.

"Oho!" she said, "so that's your idea--you're going to whipsaw Blount out of his mine?"

"If I can!" hedged Wiley. "But for the Lord's sake, Virginia, don't tell what I said to your mother! It won't make any difference, because she's given me a quit-claim--but what's the use of having any trouble?"

"Yes, sure enough!" murmured Virginia, with cutting sarcasm. "She might even demand her rights!"

"Well, maybe you _like_ to fight!" burst out Wiley angrily, "and if you do, all right--hop to it! But I'll tell you one thing; if you can't be reasonable, I can be just as bullheaded as anybody!"

"Yes, you can," she agreed and then she sighed wearily, and waved it all away with one hand. "Well, all right," she said, "I'm so sick and tired of it that I certainly don't want any more. And since I've taken your money, as you know very well, I'm going to go away and give you peace."

Her eyes blinked fast, to hold back the tears, and once more the son of Honest John weakened.

"No, I don't want you to go away," he answered gently, "but--isn't there something I can do before you go? I have to fight my way, you know that yourself, Virginia; but don't let that keep us from being friends. I'm a mining engineer, and I can't tell you all my plans, because that sure would put me out of business; but why can't you trust me, and then I'll trust you and--what is it you've got on your mind?"

He reached for her hand but she drew it away and sat quiet, looking up the street.

"You wouldn't understand," she said with a sigh. "You're always thinking about money and mines. But a woman is different--I suppose you'll laugh at me, but I'm worried about my cats."

"About your cats!" he echoed, and she smiled up at him wistfully and then looked down at the kittens in her lap.

"Yes," she said, "you know they were left to me when the people moved out of town, and now I've got eight of them and I just know that old Charley----"

"He'll starve 'em to death," broke in Wiley, instantly. "I know the old tarrier well. You give 'em to me, Virginia, and I swear I'll take care of 'em just the same as I would of--you."

"Oh," smiled Virginia, and then she gave him her hand and the old hatred died out in her eyes. "That's good of you, Wiley, and I certainly appreciate it; because no one would trust them with Charley. I'm going to take the two kittens, but you can have the rest of them and--you can write to me about them, sometimes."

"Every week," answered Wiley. "I'll take 'em back to the ranch and the girls will look after them when I'm gone. We'll have to put them in sacks, but that will be better----"

"Yes, that's better than starving," a.s.sented Virginia absently, and Wiley rose suddenly to go. There was something indefinable that stood between them, and no effort of his could break it down. He shook hands perfunctorily and started down the gallery and then abruptly he turned and swung back.

"Here," he said, throwing her stock down before her, "I told you to hold onto that, once."

CHAPTER XIV

THE EXPLOSION

There are moments when his great secret rises to every man's lips and flutters to wing away; but a thought, a glance, a word said or unsaid, turns it back and he holds it more closely. Wiley Holman had a secret which might have changed Virginia's life and filled every day with joy and hope, but he shut down his lips and held it back and spoke kind words instead. There was a look in her eyes, a brooding glow of resentment when he spoke of his father and hers; and, while he spoke from the heart, she drooped her dark lashes and was silent beyond her wont. He gave her much but she gave him little--and the reason she was sorry to leave Keno was the parting with six suffering cats.

There were girls that he knew who would have gone the limit and said something about missing Wiley Holman. So he gave her back her stock and put the cats in sacks and burnt up the road to the ranch. The next day the news came that he had bonded the Paymaster, but Wiley was far away.

He caught the Limited and went speeding east, and then he came back, headed west; and finally he left Vegas followed by four lumbering auto trucks loaded down with freight and men. The time had come when he must put his fortunes to the test and Keno awaited him, anxiously.

A cold, dusty wind raved down through the pa.s.s, driving even old Charley to shelter; but as the procession moved in across the desert the city of lost hopes came to life. Old grudges were forgotten, the dead past was thrust aside, and they lined up to bid him welcome--Death Valley Charley and Heine, Mrs. Huff and Virginia, and the last of ten thousand brave men. For nine years they had lived on, firm in their faith in the mighty Paymaster; and now again, for the hundredth time, the old hope rose up in their b.r.e.a.s.t.s. The town was theirs, they had seen it grow from nothing to a city of brick and stone, and they loved its ruins still.

All it needed was some industry to put blood into its veins and it would thrill with energy and life. Even the Widow forgot her envy and her anger at his deception and greeted Wiley Holman with a smile.

"Well--h.e.l.lo!" he hailed when he saw her in the crowd. "I thought you were going away."

"Not much!" she returned. "Bring your men in to dinner. I'm having my dishes unpacked!"

"Umm--good!" responded Wiley and, shrugging his shoulders, he led the way on to the mine. There were other faces that he would as soon have seen as the Widow's fighting mien, and he had brought his own cook along; but Mrs. Huff was a lady and as such it was her privilege to claim her woman's place in the kitchen. The town was part hers and the restaurant was her livelihood; and then, of course, there was Virginia.

Having bidden her good-by, and taken care of her cats, he had reconciled himself to her loss, but not even the smile in her welcoming dark eyes could make him quite forget the Widow. She was an uncertain quant.i.ty, like a stick of frozen dynamite that will explode if it is thawed too soon; and there was a bombsh.e.l.l to come which gave more than even promise of producing spontaneous combustion. So Wiley sighed as he fired his cook, and told his men that they would board with the Widow.

The first dinner was not so much, consisting largely of ham and eggs with the chickens out on a strike; but there was plenty of canned stuff and the Widow promised wonders when she got all her boxes unpacked. Yet with all her work before her and the dishes unwashed, she followed the crowd to the mine. That was the day of days, from which Keno would date time if Wiley made his promise good; and every man in town, and woman and child, went over to watch them begin. Up the old, abandoned road the auto trucks crept and crawled, and the shed and the houses that had been prepared by Blount now gave shelter to his hated successor. Only one man was absent and he sat on the hill-top, looking down like a lonely coyote. It was Stiff Neck George, that specter at the feast, the harbinger of evil to come; but as Wiley ordered the empty trucks to back up against the dump he glanced at the hill-top and smiled.

"We'll take back a load of tungsten," he announced to the drivers and the crowd of onlookers stared.

"Just load on that white stuff," he explained to the muckers and there was a general rush for the dump.

"What did you say that stuff was?" inquired Death Valley Charley, after a hasty look at his specimen; and Keno awaited the answer, breathless.

"Why, that's scheelite, Charley," replied Wiley confidentially, "and it runs about sixty per cent tungsten. It comes in pretty handy to harden those big guns that you hear shooting over in France."

"Oh, tungsten," muttered Charley, blinking wisely at the rock while everyone else grabbed a sample. "Er--what do you say they use it for?"

"Why, to harden high-speed steel for guns and turning-tools--haven't you read all about it in the papers?"

"How much did you say it was worth?" asked the Widow cautiously, and Wiley knew that the bombsh.e.l.l was ignited.

"Well, that's a question," he began, "that I can answer better when I get a report on this ore. It's all mixed up with quartz and ought to be milled, by rights, before I even ship it; but since the trucks are going back--well, if it turns out the way I calculate it might bring me forty dollars a unit."

"A unit!" repeated the Widow, her voice low and measured. "Well, I'd just like to know how much a unit is?"

"A hundredth of the standard of measure--in this case a ton of ore. That would come to twenty pounds."

"Twenty pounds! What, of this stuff? And worth forty dollars! Well, somebody must be crazy!"

"Yes, they're crazy for it," answered Wiley, "but it's just a temporary rage, brought on by the European war. The market is likely to break any time."

"Why--tungsten!" murmured the Widow. "Who ever heard of such a thing?

And it's been lying here idle all the time."

"How much would that be a ton?" piped up someone in the crowd, and Mrs.