or suit to be instituted; so have the Land Office
men; have they done any good, Wayland? Has your boasted Federal
Government, so superior to the State, taken any action?"

"No," answered Wayland, "somebody has monkeyed with the wheels of
justice."

"Then, why do you distress yourself? You have played a losing game for
four years, cut your fingers on those same wheels of justice. Quit it,
Wayland! What good does it do? Come over to the right side and build
up big industries, big development! I've watched you fighting for four
years, Wayland! You are the squarest, pluckiest fighter I've ever
known. But you can't do a thing! You can't get anywhere! You're
wasting the best years of your life mouthing up here in the Mountains
at the moon; and who of all the public you are fighting for, my boy,
who of all the public gives one damn for right or wrong? If we turn
you down, who is going to raise a finger for you? Answer that my boy!
They are paying you poorer wages now than we pay any ignorant foreigner
down in the Smelter; that's a way the dear people have of caring for
their ownest! Chuck it, Wayland! Chuck it! Waken up, man; look out
for number one; and, in the words of the illustrious Vanderbilticus,
let the public be d--ee--d! Come down to my ranch where you'll have a
chance to carry out your fine ideas of Range and Forest! Hell, what
are you gaining here, man? A sort o' moral hysterics--that's all!
It's all very well for those Down Easterners, who have lots of money
and are keen on the lime light, to go spouting all over the country
about running the Government the way you'd run a Sunday School." The
Senator had become so tense that he had raised his voice. "Chuck those
damfool theories, Wayland! Chuck them, I tell you! Get down to
business, man! What are you howling about timber for posterity for?
If you don't look alive, you'll go lean frying fat for posterity! Oh,
rot, the thing makes me so tired I can't talk about it! Come down to
my ranch. I want a thorough man! I want a man who can fight like the
devil if he has to and handle that gang in the cow camp with branding
irons! I want 'em run out, do you hear? They're blackguards! I want
a man that's a man; and, for pay, you can name your own price. I'll
want a partner as I grow older. And don't you do any fool rash thing
that I'll have to fight and down you for! I like _you_, Wayland--"

Then three things happened instantaneously. Wayla