GARRY BALKS
The major was ready to see Garry Knapp at nine o’clock the next
morning. He was suffering one of his engagements with the enemy
rheumatism, and there really was a strong reason for his having put off
this interview until the shy Westerner had become somewhat settled at
The Cedars as a guest.
Dorothy took Garry up to the major’s room after breakfast, and they
found him well-wrapped in a rug, sitting in his sun parlor which
overlooked the lawns of The Cedars.
The young man from the West could not help being impressed by the fact
that he was the guest of a family that was well supplied with this
world’s goods—one that was used to luxury as well as comfort. Is it
strange that the most impressive point to him was the fact that he had
no right to even _think_ of trying to win Dorothy Dale?
When he had awakened that morning and looked over the luxurious
furnishings of his chamber and the bathroom and dressing room connected
with it, he had told himself:
“Garford Knapp, you are in wrong! This is no place for a cowpuncher
from the Western plains. What little tad of money you can sell your
ranch for won’t put you in any such class as these folk belong to.
“And as for thinking of that girl—Great Scot! I’d make a fine figure
asking any girl used to such luxury as this to come out and share a
shack in Desert City or thereabout, while I punched cattle, or went to
keeping store, or tried to match my wits in real estate with the sharks
that exploit land out there.
“Forget it, Garford!” he advised himself, grimly. “If you can make an
honest deal with this old major, make it and then clear out. This is no
place for you.”
He had, therefore, braced himself for the interview. The major, eyeing
him keenly as he walked down the long room beside Dorothy, made his
own judgment—as he always did—instantly. When Dorothy had gone he said
frankly to the young man:
“Mr. Knapp, I’m glad to see you. I have heard so much about you that I
feel you and I are already friends.”
“Thank you, sir,” said Garry, quietly, eyeing the major with as much
interest as the latter eyed him.
“When my daughter was talking one day about you and the land you had
in the market adjoining the Hardin tract it struck me that perhaps it
would be a good thing to buy,” went on the major, briskly. “So I set
our lawyers on your trail.”
“So Miss Dorothy tells me, sir,” the young man said.
“Now, they know all about the offer made you by those sharpers,
Stiffbold & Lightly. They advised me to risk a thousand dollar option
on your ranch and I telegraphed them to make you the offer.”
“And you may believe I was struck all of a heap, sir,” said the young
man, still eyeing the major closely. “I’ll tell you something: You’ve
got me guessing.”
“How’s that?” asked the amused Major Dale.
“Why, people don’t come around and hand me a thousand dollars every
day—and just on a gamble.”
“Sure I am gambling?” responded the major.
“I’m not sure of anything,” admitted Garry Knapp. “But it looks like
that. I accepted the certified check—I have it with me. I don’t know
but I’d better hand it back to you, Major, for I think you have been
misinformed about the real value of the ranch. The price per acre your
lawyers offer is away above the market.”
“Hey!” exclaimed Major Dale. “You call yourself a business man?”
“Not much of one, I suppose,” said Garry. “I’ll sell you my ranch quick
enough at a fair price. But this looks as if you were doing me a favor.
I think you have been influenced.”
“Eh?” stammered the astounded old gentleman.
“By your daughter,” said Garry, quietly. “I’m conceited enough to think
it is because of Miss Dale that you make me the offer you do.”
“Any crime in that?” demanded the major.
“No crime exactly,” rejoined Garry with one of his rare smiles, “unless
I take advantage of it. But I’m not the sort of fellow, Major Dale, who
can willingly accept more than I can give value for. Your offer for my
ranch is beyond reason.”
“Would you have thought so if another man—somebody instead of my
daughter’s father——” and his eyes twinkled as he said it, “had made you
the offer?”
Garry Knapp was silent and showed confusion. The major went on with
some grimness of expression:
“But if your conscience troubles you and you wish to call the deal off,
now is your chance to return the check.”
Instantly Garry pulled his wallet from his pocket and produced the
folded green slip, good for a thousand dollars at the Desert City Trust
Company.
“There you are, sir,” he said quietly, and laid the paper upon the arm
of the major’s chair.
The old gentleman picked it up, identified it, and slowly tore the
check into strips, eyeing the young man meanwhile.
“Then,” he said, calmly, “_that_ phase of the matter is closed. But you
still wish to sell your ranch?”
“I do, Major Dale. But I can’t accept what anybody out there would tell
you was a price out of all reason.”
“Except my lawyers,” suggested the major.
“Well——”
“Young man, you have done a very foolish thing,” said Major Dale. “A
ridiculous thing, perhaps. Unless you are shrewder than you seem. My
lawyers have had your land thoroughly cruised. You have the best wheat
land, in embryo, anywhere in the Desert City region.”
Garry started and stared at him for a minute without speaking. Then he
sighed and shrugged his shoulders.
“That may be, sir. Perhaps you _do_ know more about the intrinsic value
of my ranch than I do myself. But I know it would cost a mint of money
to develop that old rundown place into wheat soil.”
“Humph! and if you had this—er—_mint_ of money, what would you do?”
“Do? I’d develop it myself!” cried the young man, startled into
enthusiastic speech. “I know there is a fortune there. _You_ are making
big profits on the Hardin place already, I understand. Cattle have gone
out; but wheat has come to stay. Oh, I know all about that! But what’s
the use?”
“Have you tried to raise money for the development of your land?” asked
the major quietly.
“I’ve talked to some bankers, yes. Nothing doing. The machinery and
fertilizer cost at the first would be prohibitive. A couple of crop
failures would wipe out everything, and the banks don’t want land on
their hands. As for the money-lenders—well, Major Dale, you can imagine
what sort of hold _they_ demand when they deal with a person in my
situation.”
“And you would rather have what seems to you a fair price for your land
and get it off your hands?”
“I’ll accept a fair price—yes. But I can’t accept any favors,” said the
young man, his face gloomy enough but as stubborn as ever.
“I see,” said the major. “Then what will you do with the money you get?”
“Try to get into some business that will make me more,” and Garry
looked up again with a sudden smile.
“Raising wheat does not attract you, then?”
“It’s the biggest prospect in that section. I know it has cattle
raising and even mining backed clear across the board. But it’s no game
for a little man with little capital.”
“Then why not get into it?” asked Major Dale, still speaking quietly.
“You seem enthusiastic. Enthusiasm and youth—why, my boy, they will
carry a fellow far!”
Garry looked at him in a rather puzzled way. “But don’t I tell you,
Major Dale, that the banks will not let me have money?”
“I’ll let you have the money—and at a fair interest,” said Major Dale.
Garry smiled slowly and put out his hand. The major quickly took it and
his countenance began to brighten. But what Garry said caused the old
gentleman’s expression to become suddenly doleful:
“I can’t accept your offer, sir. I know that it is a favor—a favor that
is suggested by Miss Dorothy. If it were not for her, you would never
have thought of sending for me or making either of these more than kind
propositions you have made.
“I shall have to say no—and thank you.”