“I wouldn’t butt in and speak to you if it wasn’t for the clothes.”
Once more I was having it impressed on me that a plug-hat and a
frock-coat seemed to be good reliable openers in the jack-pot of chance.
I reckoned I’d play the hand.
“You’re not a parson.”
“I’m far from it, sir.”
“The farthest from it I know is to be a lawyer. I spotted you for a
lawyer. If you are one I want to talk with you.”
“I’m a lawyer. Sit down,” was my cheerful lie.
The stranger hauled out his flask. “Do you ever indulge?”
“No.”
“So much the better. Lawyers ought to keep their brains cool. Seeing
that you’ve got the brains and propose to keep ’em cool, I’ve got
to keep up my nerve--and so I’ll take a drink.” He sucked at the flask
again. “Where do you live?”
“In the East.”
“Then you don’t know this country and the laws out in this section,”
said the stranger, showing his disappointment.
“Oh yes, I do; I used to live out here. That’s why I happen to be here
now. I’m investigating investments for Eastern capital.”
My new acquaintance leaned dose, so close that his whisky-saturated
breath left vapor on my cheeks.
“I have found out something that’s big. I thought I could handle it
myself. I have started out to handle it myself. But when I saw you I
said to myself, ‘There’s a squire, and he knows law and probably his
brains are cooler than mine.’ I’ve got the secret and I’ve got the grit,
but I need law, too--and I ain’t sure of all the fine points. I want you
to come along with me and stand at my back and hand me the fine points
as I need ’em. What do you charge per day for peddling law?”
“I’ll have to know what the deal is first.”
“Can’t tell you.”
I was getting a little shaky on the proposition and raised the paper in
front of my face and appeared to lose interest in matters of law. After
a time the red-faced individual tapped on the paper with his knuckle, as
one would tap on a door. I pulled my shield to one side.
“A chap hates to let go of a big thing to a stranger, even if that
stranger is a lawyer. I have walked past a dozen law-offices without
daring to go in. Perhaps you don’t realize what a big thing I’ve got.
Now listen here! Suppose you were a fellow like I am--a prospector--and
was digging around the record-books, looking up land titles, mineral
grants, and so forth, and got on to a trail that you followed up and
found that a new city had been laid out and lots sold off and buildings
going up, and all that--all on a location that wasn’t legal? Mind you, I
ain’t naming any place. But it’s on a section that land-grabbers got
hold of a long time ago. And they were such hungry land-grabbers that
they stretched lines to take in everything that was loose around those
parts. There was no one to make any holler about it. It was just so much
extra land and it didn’t look like real money.”
“I have so much business of my own that I’m not interested in making
guesses at the business of somebody else,” I remarked. I was in that
thing about as deep as I wanted to be.
“But how do I know anything about you?”
“Honors are even!”
The stranger knuckled his forehead, trying to think.
“I don’t want to trig the best thing I ever got hold of in my life
because I didn’t buy a little law for to grease the runway,” he said at
last. “I may as well tell you--without giving out names and places--that
those land-grabbers hooked in a section that belonged to a soldiers’
grant--and that’s why no one ever made a holler. There don’t seem to be
any particular heirs to side-tracked soldiers’ grants that have never
been thought worth much. No timber, you see; only plain land. But plain
land is mighty good property when a railroad takes a notion to build on
to it and comes to an end there and a city starts.” The client began to
show excitement. “They have laid out lots and built and they haven’t got
straight title. I have found it out.”
“That doesn’t seem reasonable,” I said. “Railroads and men who are
building cities do not make such mistakes.”
“But they have this time. The same money that grabbed the land has built
the railroad. They think they have got it all buttoned up. They didn’t
want to expose themselves by starting a movement to make their title
straight. They reckon they’ll be able to bluff it out with money and
pull and influence down to Boise. That will be easier than to chase
around and establish title to a soldiers’ grant. But, by thunder! they
can’t stretch or shrink the hide of old earth! There are set points that
have got to be measured from and the measurements will tell the story.
And re-locations will have to stand--for the law of the United States
can’t be built over when the holler is made.”
I guess I didn’t show much interest--I was afraid to show any. I hoped
the man would shut up and go away.
“Don’t you believe what I am telling you?” he demanded.
“I am merely wondering how it comes about that you know so much, more
than everybody else about a section of land that has been surveyed for a
railroad and a new city.”
“My father was a pioneer in this country. One day, after they began to
build the railroad, I was in the record-office and happened to remember
some of the things he told me about the days when they were grabbing
land in these parts. I looked up records, I did measuring, I did some
reckoning, and within the last two days I have made sure that I’ve got
the bind on the city of Breed.”
In his excitement he spat out the name. Then he promptly began to damn
himself. “I never ought to take a drink of liquor,” he declared. “But
when it came to me that I could run in there and re-locate the best hunk
of that land, I reckoned I needed to have my nerve with me, and so I’ve
been bracing my nerve. But the trouble with me is, when my nerve is
braced my tongue is loose. Now I suppose I’ve got to take you in! But
I’m dangerous. However, I’ll take you in.”