we could find justice. And
the news of its decision was the worst, last blow of all. For Magnus it
was the last--positively the very last."

"Poor, poor Derrick," murmured Cedarquist. "Tell me about him, Pres. How
does he take it? What is he going to do?"

"It beggars him, sir. He sunk a great deal more than any of us believed
in his ranch, when he resolved to turn off most of the tenants and farm
the ranch himself. Then the fight he made against the Railroad in the
Courts and the political campaign he went into, to get Lyman on
the Railroad Commission, took more of it. The money that Genslinger
blackmailed him of, it seems, was about all he had left. He had been
gambling--you know the Governor--on another bonanza crop this year to
recoup him. Well, the bonanza came right enough--just in time for S.
Behrman and the Railroad to grab it. Magnus is ruined."

"What a tragedy! what a tragedy!" murmured the other. "Lyman turning
rascal, Harran killed, and now this; and all within so short a time--all
at the SAME time, you might almost say."

"If it had only killed him," continued Presley; "but that is the worst
of it."

"How the worst?"

"I'm afraid, honestly, I'm afraid it is going to turn his wits,
sir. It's broken him; oh, you should see him, you should see him. A
shambling, stooping, trembling old man, in his dotage already. He sits
all day in the dining-room, turning over papers, sorting them, tying
them up, opening them again, forgetting them--all fumbling and mumbling
and confused. And at table sometimes he forgets to eat. And, listen,
you know, from the house we can hear the trains whistling for the Long
Trestle. As often as that happens the Governor seems to be--oh, I don't
know, frightened. He will sink his head between his shoulders, as though
he were dodging something, and he won't fetch a long breath again till
the train is out of hearing. He seems to have conceived an abject,
unreasoned terror of the Railroad."

"But he will have to leave Los Muertos now, of course?"

"Yes, they will all have to leave. They have a fortnight more. The few
tenants that were still on Los Muertos are leaving. That is one thing
that brings me to the city. The family of one of the men who was
killed--Hooven was his name--have come to the city to find work. I
think they are liable to be in great distress, unless they have been
wonderfully lucky, and I am trying to find them in order to look after
them."

"You need looking