"War loan!" says he. "It's a loan for his own self that he's looking for. He's lost four million dollars on that irrigation scheme of his when he bought our ranch. Now I'm going to foreclose and he knows it.

He's got his funds tied up in cargoes of meat and grain that ain't cashed in. He's short, and d.a.m.n short! And I know it; and these are times when banks ain't loosening much. War--yes; I'll show him war!

There can't n.o.body get t.i.tle to a foot of that land till Old Man Wisner gets his t.i.tle from me--and he ain't never going to get it. If it's my last act I'll ruin him. I trusted you, and you turned me down. I trusted her, and she threw me down. I won't trust n.o.body no more, except myself.

"What's it come to?" says he to hisself after a while, looking around at the big rooms. "What did it all come to, what I done for her? And I give up the ranch for her and give up the life I loved!"

"The sun was on the hills when I was out there, Colonel," says I to him, sudden, happening to think of something, "and the sky was blue as it ever was; and the wind was just carrying the smell of the sage, like it used to; and the river was running white on the riffles, same as it did before. And the cows----"

"Don't, Curly!" says he. "Don't!"

"I won't no more, Colonel," says I. "I won't be on your pay roll much longer; but them old days----"

"Don't!" says he. "I can't think about the old days no more. I'm closing the books now, Curly."

"So'm I," says I.

"What do you mean?" says he. "I ain't right clear about some things."

"No; you ain't," says I. "So long as it's fair war I'm in with you; but when it comes to making war on women and children--I ain't in."

"Children! Curly, what do you mean?"

"Children," says I, "is all there is to things. Buck the game the way you want to, Colonel," says I; "but when you buck the child game you're bucking G.o.d Almighty His own self. He's got it framed up so He can't lose. Them two couldn't help theirselfs. I've got to finish some day, same as you. All right; I'll finish with them."

Then I shooked hands with him and he done so with me. He looks me keen in the eyes and I looks him keen back. We didn't neither of us weaken.

This was a heap the hardest thing we'd ever faced together, but we didn't neither of us flicker. We'd both decided what we thought was right.

"Son," says he after a while, "you're some man after all." And he puts his hand on my shoulder; like he used to.

"She ain't got no ma," says I to him the last thing. "I'm half her pa, the only half she's got left; and I'll stick if her father don't. But she ain't got no ma. That's what makes me so sorry for the kid," says I.

He looks at me, with his eyes wide open, but he don't talk none.

"I seen her setting right there, Colonel," says I, "in this room, on our old hide lounge--her wringing her hands like she'd tear 'em apart. She was bucking a hard game then, and doing her best to play it fair--her just a kid, with no special chance to be so very wise, and not having no ma. She didn't have a soul to go to, and all that was worrying her was which side of the game she really was on. For she knowed, even if we didn't, like I told you just now--she must of knowed it somehow--there's one particular game that G.o.d Almighty plays so He can't lose."

He groaned like I hated to hear. But he didn't weaken. I knowed he couldn't quit.

XXIX

HOW THE GAME BROKE

Today was the day Old Man Wisner was to get home; and that evening me and Old Man Wright laid out to go over there and have a talk with him.

So a lot of things had to be done that day.

Old Man Wright he got up at sunup, and almost all day he was busy in the room he used for a office at the house; he hadn't hardly went downtown at all since Bonnie Bell run away. He had a desk full of papers here, and now he sent for his lawyer and his barber to come over early in the day.

"Why, Alderman," says the lawyer man, "you act like you was making your last will and testament, and getting ready to close up business."

He laughs then; but Old Man Wright don't laugh.

"I am," says he. "It's time; I've been dead more'n a week now."

They made out some papers about houses and lots and stocks and things, how they was to be distributed in case of the deemise of the said John William Wright. Then after a while they come around to the papers in the big case we had against Old Man Wisner for the last deferred payment on the Circle Arrow trade that hadn't been paid yet and wouldn't be. Old Man Wright sets back and looks at them papers right ca'm.

"I know what Old Man Wisner's been East for," says he. "He couldn't raise that much money--nigh on a million dollars--on anything as wildcat as strawberries and cream in Wyoming; not these times. Even the banks is wise onto that now. Stenographers and clerks and ministers and doctors don't bite like they used to no more; it's harder to find people that's willing to pay in so much a month for a bungalow in Florida or Wyoming while they set home engaged in light and genteel employment. Every oncet in a while the American people gets took with a spasum of a little horse sense. There's places for peaches and cream, and there's places for cows, but you don't want to get your wires crossed.

"So," says he, "I know I've got Old Man Wisner broke right now. He's been over to Holland to see if he couldn't form a Dutch syndicate for to unload on. The Dutch is the last resort of the American landboomer. When you can't sell out a bunch of greasewood land for a pineapple colony to no one else, go over and sell it to them Dutch; they're easy. I seen a man one time sell almost all the north end of New Mexico to a Dutch syndicate for a coffee plantation. It was good for cows; but he had pictures of steamboats and ca.n.a.ls and things out there in the sagebrush--you've got to have a ca.n.a.l on your blueprint if you sell anything to them Holland people. Like enough Old Man Wisner had pictures of ca.n.a.ls. But he couldn't sell this property none, following on the war over there; they're busy with other things.

"The result is he's come back here broke. He knows the banks has got wise and they ain't going to back him no further than they have. They're too busy lending a billion dollars or so to the folks over in Europe to help blow up some steamboats for us.

"Therefore," says he, jarring the paper weight on the table when he brings down his fist, "if times gets any harder, as like enough they will, Dave Wisner's got to let that property go on the market for what it'll bring inside his one year of grace after foreclosure. I know what that means; it'll mean I got a few thousand acres of land more to distribute among my heirs and a.s.signs, my executors, friends, faithful servitors, villagers and others--however you got that figured out in them papers.

"Let me see them papers," says he after a while. "Are you sh.o.r.e you got my girl's name spelled Katherine? And that she gets this city residence here?"

Then they went over it again. But after a while the lawyer got done, and so did the barber, and they both went away; and the old man turns to me.

"Curly," says he, "I'm rich. I'm awful rich. I didn't know how rich I was till I begun to figure it up with Fanstead, Maclay & Horn, my lawyers here. I reckon, taking fair values, I'm worth ten or twelve million dollars--maybe twenty or forty--most of it made in this here town in a couple of years or so, and all out of the Wisner money we got for the ranch, which we're going to get back pretty nigh clean of cost, you might say. I didn't mean to; but I'm rich--awful rich!

"And so, seeing I ain't got no heirs of my own blood and kin, I been looking around for a few others. There's that Katherine; she's a good girl. She kissed me right here once." And the old man put his hand on the top of his head. "I'm going to give her a little something after I'm dead; for instance, this house and the things here--half a million dollars maybe. Likewise, I've fixed up a few things for my faithful servitor aforesaid, Henry Absalom Wilson--which is you, Curly. I give you only enough for cigarette money," says he; "never mind how much. And as for them two," says he--"her and the Wisners' hired man--not a cent!

Not a d.a.m.ned cent! I'll show him!

"The old ranch," says he, "is going to be fixed up sometime--some of my heirs and executors'll get a hold of that. It's easy to get plenty of heirs if you have twelve or fifty million dollars. I've left instructions to make improvements out there. It'll sort of be the best apology I can make to the woman that's buried out there--Gawd bless her!--as good a woman as ever lived on earth. I can't see how she could have such a girl like she done. Well," he finishes, sort of sighing. "I done my best. I may not live more'n thirty or forty years more.

"So, now then, Curly," says he after a while, "since we've finished all our day's work and have a little time left, we can now engage in some simple pastime, such as mumblety-peg, or maybe marbles, till later in the evening. I'm through cutting her off, Curly, and I'm happy. I've left it as clean as I know how. Now I'll bet you a thousand dollars I can beat you three games out of five at mumblety-peg. My executor, without bond," says he, going right on, "is Old Man Kimberly."

"You're on, Colonel," says I; "though I don't know where I'll get a thousand till after your will is probated."

So we went outdoors and set down on the gra.s.s and played mumblety-peg--me losing that thousand, natural. Then we sort of fussed around outdoors one way or another till it come towards dark. He left me after a while and went into the house alone.

When I went in I seen him standing by hisself in our ranch room, looking at some things he'd picked up. They was a white silk scarf and a pair of long white gloves--he'd like enough found 'em back of the sofa, where Bonnie Bell probably dropped 'em the night when I seen her setting there wringing her hands because she didn't know what to do. We never let no one clean up the ranch room. He put 'em down soft on the sofa and smoothed out the scarf and folded the gloves; it was like he was laying 'em away in a drawer.

We didn't enjoy nothing much to eat, not even ham and aigs. It begun to get dark right soon after that and I sort of wandered out on the front walk to look around. Old Man Wright was in the house by hisself.

Right then I seen a car come in right fast and pull up at the sidewalk about halfway between our house and the Wisners'. Someone got out of the car and come running up our walk. I could see it was a woman. Not wishing no one to be bothered then, I went down to meet her.

It was Bonnie Bell! She'd come home then.

I run down the walk to meet her and pushed her away. I knew it wouldn't do for them two to meet now. But she run up and put her arms around my neck. She was alone, though there was someone in the car that hadn't got out.

"Curly!" says she, "Curly! I saw you standing there and I came in. Where is he, Curly?"

I nods behind me.

"In there," says I. "Don't go in--you mustn't."

"I must, sometime. Let me go now."