he trunk as security? That, I
think, is a sporting proposition."

He eyed me up and down.

"Are you a surveyor? Connected with the road?"

"No."

"What is your business, then?"

"I'm a damned fool," I confessed. "I'm a gudgeon--I'm a come-on. In fact,
as I've said before, I'm out here looking for health, where it's high and
dry." He smiled. "And high and dry I'm landed in short order. But the
trunk's not empty. Will you keep it and lend me twenty dollars? I presume
that trunk and contents are worth two hundred."

"I'll speak with the porter," he answered.

By the lapse of time between his departure and his return he and the gnome
evidently had hefted the trunk and viewed it at all angles. Now he came
back with quick step.

"Yes, sir; we'll advance you twenty dollars on your trunk. Here is the
money, sir." He wrote, and passed me a slip of paper also. "And your
receipt. When you pay the twenty dollars, if within thirty days, you can
have your trunk."

"And if not?" I asked uncomfortably.

"We shall be privileged to dispose of it. We are not in the pawn business,
but we have trunks piled to the ceiling in our storeroom, left by
gentlemen in embarrassed circumstances like yours."

I never saw that trunk again, either. However, of this, more anon. At that
juncture I was only too glad to get the twenty dollars, pending the time
when I should be recouped from home; for I could see that to be stranded
"high and dry" in Benton City of Wyoming Territory would be a dire
situation. And I could not hope for much from home. It was a bitter dose
to have to ask for further help. Three years returned from the war my
father had scarcely yet been enabled to gather the loose ends of his
former affairs.

"Now if you will direct me to the telegraph office----?" I suggested.

"The telegraph into Benton is the Union Pacific Railroad line," he
informed; "and that is open to only Government and official business. If
you wish to send a private dispatch you should forward it by post to
Cheyenne, one hundred and seventy-five miles, where it will be put on the
Overland branch line for the East by way of Denver. The rate to New York
is eight dollars, prepaid."

I knew that my face fell. Eight dollars would make a large hole in my
slender funds--I had been foolish not to have borrowed fifty dollars on
the trunk. So I decided to write instead of telegraph; and with him
watching me I endeavored to speak lightly.

"Thank you. Now whe