he date_--and everything else, you might say.

"'Wunpost Mine,'" he writes, "'John C. Calhoun owner. I claim fifteen
hundred feet on this vein.'

"And jest to show you, Mrs. Campbell, what an ignorant fool he is--he
spelled One Post, W-u-n! That's where he got his name!"

"I think that's a _pretty_ name!" spoke up Billy loyally, as her
mother joined in on the laugh. "And anyhow, just because a man can't
spell, that's no reason for calling him a fool!"

"Well, he _is_ a fool!" burst out Dusty Rhodes spitefully, "and
more than that, he's a crook! Now that is what he done--he covered up
that find and went back to the man that had grubstaked him. But this
banker was no sucker, if he did have the name of staking every bum in
Nevada. He was generous with his men and he give 'em all they asked for,
but before he planked down a dollar he made 'em sign a contract that a
corporation lawyer couldn't break. Well, when Wunpost said he'd quit,
Mr. Eells says all right--no hard feeling--better luck next time. But
when Wunpost went back and opened up this vein Mr. Eells was
Johnny-on-the-spot. He steps up to that hole and shows his contract,
giving him an equal share of whatever Wunpost finds--and then he reads a
clause giving him the right to take possession and to work the mine
according to his judgment. And the first thing Wunpost knowed the mine
was worked out and he was left holding the sack. But served him right,
sez I, for trying to beat his outfitter, after eating his grub for two
years!"

"But didn't he receive _anything_?" inquired Mrs. Campbell. "That
seems to me pretty sharp practice."

She was a prim little woman, with honest blue eyes that sometimes made
men think of their sins, and when Dusty Rhodes perceived that he had
gone a bit too far he endeavored to justify his spleen.

"He received _some_!" he cried, "but what good did it do him? Eells
give him five hundred dollars when he demanded an accounting and he
blowed it all in in one night. He was buying the drinks for every man in
camp--your money was all counterfeit with him--and the next morning he
woke up without a shirt to his back, having had it torn off in a fight.
What kind of a man is that to be managing a mine or to be partners with
a big banker like Eells? No, he walked out of camp without a cent to his
name and I picked him up Tuesday over at Furnace Crick. All he had was
his bed and a couple of canteens and a little jerked beef in a sack, but
to hear