themselves, and the most sceptical came back a
convert. The railroad folks began to talk of building a branch "in."
Eastern capitalists pricked up their ears and sent out experts.

One morning the last of February, half-a-dozen men, among them a couple
who had just come down from the camp, stood about Hillerton's office or
sat on the railing of the sanctum, giving rough but graphic accounts of
the sights to be seen at Lame Gulch. The company was not a typical
Western crowd. The men were nearly all well dressed and exhibited
evidences of good breeding. The refinement of the "tenderfoot" was still
discernible, and excepting for the riding boots which they wore and the
silk hats and derbys which they did not wear, and for an air of cheerful
alertness which prevailed among them, one might have taken them for a
group of Eastern club men. The reason of this was not far to seek. Most
of them were, in fact, Eastern club men, who had sought Springtown as a
health-resort, and had discovered, to their surprise, that it was about
the pleasantest place they had yet "struck."

Peckham sat somewhat apart from the others on his high revolving stool,
sometimes listening, without a sign of interest in his face, sometimes
twirling his stool around and sitting with his back to the company,
apparently immersed in figures.

Allery Jones, the Springtown wag, had once remarked that Peckham's back
was more expressive than his face. On this occasion he nudged Dicky
Simmons, with a view to reminding him of the fact; but Dicky, a handsome
youth with a sanguine light in his blue eyes, was intent on what Harry
de Luce was saying.

"Tell you what!" cried de Luce, who had only recently discovered that
there were other interests in life besides the three P's, polo, poker,
and pigeon-shooting. "Tell you what, those fellows up there are a
rustling lot. Take the Cosmopolitan Hotel now! They're getting things
down to a fine point in that tavern. There was a man put up there night
before last, one of those rich-as-thunder New York capitalists. You
could see it by the hang of his coat-tails. He came sniffing round on
his own hook, as those cautious cusses do. Well, Rumsey gave him one of
his crack rooms--panes of glass in the window, imitation mahogany
chamber-set, pitcher of water on the washstand, all complete. Do you
suppose that was good enough for old Money-Bags? Not by a jug-full. He
owned the earth, he'd have you to know, and he wasn't going to pu