A HUFF
The Colonel was sitting in the shade of a wild grapevine rapping out a
series of questions at Charley, but at sight of the young people coming
back hand in hand, he paused and smiled understandingly.
"What now?" he said. "Is there a new earth and a new heaven? Ah, well;
then Virginia's trip was worth while. But Charley here is so full of
signs and wonders that my brain is fairly in a whirl. The Germans, it
seems, have made a forty-two centimeter gun that is blasting down cities
in France; and the Allies, to beat them, are constructing still larger
ones made out of tungsten that is mined from the Paymaster. Yes, yes,
Charley, that's all right, I don't doubt your word, but we'll call on
Wiley for the details."
He laughed indulgently and poured Charley out a drink which made his
eyes blink and snap and then he waved him graciously away.
"Take your burros up the canyon," he suggested briefly, and when Charley
was gone he smiled. "Now," he said, as Virginia sat down beside him,
"what's all this about the Paymaster and Keno?"
"Well," began Virginia as Wiley sat silent, "there really was tungsten
in the mine. Wiley discovered it first--he was just going through the
town when he saw that specimen in my collection--and since then,--oh,
everything has happened!"
"By the dog!" exclaimed the Colonel starting quickly to his feet. "Do
you mean that Crazy Charley spoke the truth? Is the mine really open and
the town full of people and----"
"You wouldn't know it!" cried Virginia, triumphantly. "All that heavy,
white quartz was tungsten!"
"What? That waste on the dump? But how much is it worth? Old Charley
says it's better than gold!"
"It is!" she answered. "Why, some of that rock ran five thousand dollars
to the ton!"
"Five--thousand!" repeated the Colonel, and then he whirled on Wiley.
"What's the reason, then," he demanded, "that you're hiding out here in
the hills? Didn't you get possession of the mine?"
"Under a bond and lease," explained Wiley shortly. "I failed to meet the
final payment."
"Why--how much was this payment?" inquired the Colonel cautiously, as he
sensed the sudden constraint. "It seems to me the mine should have paid
it at once."
"Fifty thousand," answered Wiley, gazing glumly at the ground and the
Colonel opened his eyes!
"Fifty thousand!" he exclaimed. "Only fifty thousand dollars? Well! What
were the circumstances, Wiley?"
He stood expectant and as Wiley boggled and hesitated Virginia rose up
and stood beside him.
"He got the bond and lease from Blount," she began, talking rapidly,
"and when Blount found that the white quartz was tungsten ore, he did
all he could to block Wiley. When Wiley first came through the town and
stopped at our house he knew that that white quartz was tungsten; but he
couldn't do anything, then. And then, by-and-by, when he tried to bond
the mine, Blount came up himself and tried to work it."
"He did, eh?" cried the Colonel. "Well, by what right, I'd like to know,
did he dare to take possession of the Paymaster?"
"Oh, he'd bought up all the stock; and Mother, she took yours and----"
"What?" yelled the Colonel, and then he closed down his jaw and his
blue eyes sparkled ominously. "Proceed," he said. "The information,
first--but, by the gods, he shall answer for this!"
"But all the time," went on Virginia hastily, "the mine belonged to
Wiley. It had been sold for taxes--and he bought it!"
"Ah!" observed the Colonel, and glanced at him shrewdly for he saw now
where the tale was going.
"Well," continued Virginia, "when Blount saw Wiley wanted it he came up
and took it himself. And he hired Stiff Neck George to herd the mine and
keep Wiley and everybody away. But when he was working it, why Wiley
came back and claimed it under the tax sale; and he went right up to the
mine and took away George's gun--and kicked him down the dump!"
"He did!" exclaimed the Colonel, but Wiley did not look up, for his mind
was on the end of the tale.
"And then--oh, it's all mixed up, but Blount couldn't find any gold and
so he leased the mine to Wiley. And the minute he found that the white
quartz was tungsten, and worth three dollars a pound, he was mad as
anything and did everything he could to keep him from meeting the
payment. But Wiley went ahead and shipped a lot of ore and made a lot of
money in spite of him. He cleaned out the mine and fixed up the mill and
oh, Father, you wouldn't know the place!"
"Probably not!" returned the Colonel, "but proceed with your story. Who
holds the Paymaster, now?"
"Why Blount, of course, and he's moved back to town and is simply
shoveling out the ore!"
"The scoundrel!" burst out the Colonel. "Wiley, we will return to Keno
immediately and bring this blackguard to book! I have a stake in this
matter, myself!"
"Nope, not for me!" answered Wiley wearily. "You haven't heard all the
story. I fell down on the final payment--it makes no difference how--and
when I came back Blount had jumped the mine and Stiff Neck George was in
charge. But instead of warning me off he hid behind a car and--well, I
don't care to go back there, now."
"Why, certainly! You must!" declared the Colonel warmly. "You were
acting in self defense and I consider that your conduct was justified.
In fact, my boy, I wish to congratulate you--Charley tells me he had the
drop on you."
"Yes, sure," grumbled Wiley, "but you aren't the judge--and there's a
whole lot more to the story. It happens that I took an option on
Blount's Paymaster stock, but when I offered the payment he protested
the contract and took the case to court. Now--he's got the town of Vegas
in his inside vest pocket, the lawyers and judges and all; and do you
think for a minute he's going to let me come back and take away those
four hundred thousand shares?"
"Four hundred thousand?" repeated the Colonel incredulously, "do you
mean to tell me----"
"Yes, you bet I do!" said Wiley, "and I'll tell you something else.
According to the dates on the back of those certificates it was Blount
that sold you out. He sold all his promotion stock before the panic; and
then, when the price was down to nothing, he turned around and bought it
back. I knew from the first that he'd lied about my father and I kept
after him till I got my hands on that stock--and then, when I'd proved
it, he tried to put the blame on you!"
"The devil!" exclaimed the Colonel, and paced up and down, snapping his
fingers and muttering to himself. "The cowardly dastard!" he burst out
at last. "He has poisoned ten years of my life. I must hurry back at
once and go to John Holman and apologize to him publicly for this
affront. After all the years that we were pardners in everything, and
then to have me doubt his integrity! He was the soul of honor, one man
in ten thousand; and yet I took the word of this lying Blount against
the man I called My Friend! I remember, by gad, as if it were yesterday,
the first time I really knew your father; and Blount was squeezing me,
then. I owed him fifteen thousand dollars on a certain piece of property
that was worth fifty thousand at least; and at the very last moment,
when he was about to foreclose, John Holman loaned me the money. He
mortgaged his cattle at the other bank and put the money in my hand, and
Blount cursed him for an interfering fool! That was Blount, the Shylock,
and Honest John Holman; and I turned against my friend."
"Yes, that's right," agreed Wiley, "but if you want to make up for it,
make 'em quit calling him 'Honest John'!"
"No, indeed," cried the Colonel, his voice tremulous with emotion. "He
shall still be called Honest John; and if any man doubts it or speaks
the name fleeringly he shall answer personally to me. And now, about
this stock--what was that, Virginia, that you were saying about my
holdings?"
"Why, Mother put them up as collateral on a loan, and Blount claimed
them at the end of the first month."
"All my stock? Well, by the horn-spoon--how much did your mother borrow?
Eight--hundred? Eight hundred dollars? Well, that is enough, on the face
of it--but never mind, I will recover the stock. It is certainly a
revelation of human nature. The moment I am reported dead, these
vultures strip my family of their all."
"Well, I was one of them," spoke up Wiley bluntly, "but you don't need
to blame my father. When I was having trouble with Mrs. Huff he wrote up
and practically disowned me."
"So you were one of them," observed the Colonel mildly. "And you had
trouble with Mrs. Huff? But no matter?" he went on. "We can discuss all
that later--now to return to this lawsuit, with Blount. Do I understand
that you had an option on his entire four hundred thousand shares?"
"For twenty thousand dollars," answered Wiley, "and he was glad to get
it--but, of course, when I opened up that big body of tungsten, the
stock was worth into millions. That is, if he could keep me from making
both payments. He fought me from the start, but I put up the twenty
thousand; and the clerk of the court is holding it yet, unless the case
is decided. But Blount knew he could beat it, if he could keep me from
buying the mine under the terms of my bond and lease; and now that he's
in possession, taking out thirty or forty thousand every day, I'm licked
before I begin. In fact, the case is called already and lost by default
if I know that blackleg lawyer of mine."
"But hire a good lawyer!" protested the Colonel. "A man has a right to
his day in court and you have never appeared."
"No, and I never will," spoke up Wiley despondently. "There's a whole
lot to this case that you don't know. And the minute I appear they'll
arrest me for murder and railroad me off to the Pen. No, I'm not going
back, that's all."
"But Wiley," reasoned the Colonel, "you've got great interests at
stake--and your father will help you, I'm sure."
"No, he won't," declared Wiley. "There isn't anybody that can help me,
because Blount is in control of the courts. And I might as well add that
I was run out of Vegas by a Committee appointed for the purpose." He
rose up abruptly, rolling his sullen eyes on Virginia and the Colonel
alike. "In fact," he burst out, "I haven't got a friend on the east side
of Death Valley Sink."
"But on the west side," suggested the Colonel, drawing Virginia to his
side, "you have two good friends that I know----"
"Wait till you hear it all," broke in Wiley, bitterly, "and you're
likely to change your mind. No, I'm busted, I tell you, and the best
thing I can do is drift and never come back."
"And Virginia?" inquired the Colonel. "Am I right in supposing----"
"No," he flared up. "Friend Virginia has quit me, along with----"
"Why, Wiley!" cried Virginia, and he started and fell silent as he met
her reproachful gaze. For the sake of the Colonel they were supposed
to be lovers, whose quarrel had been happily made up, but this was
very unloverlike.
"Well, I don't deserve it," he muttered at last, "but friend Virginia
has promised to stay with me."
"Yes, I'm going to stay with him," spoke up Virginia quickly, "because
it was all my fault. I'm going to go with him, father, wherever he goes
and----"
"God bless you, my daughter!" said the Colonel, smiling proudly, "and
never forget you're a Huff!"