with two-weeks' pay in my pocket, and a big envelope
full of them Glory Be shares, all printed in gold and purple ink, with a
picture of Dakota Dan in the middle.

I couldn't eat a bite of supper that night, and I puts in the evenin'
readin' over them pamphlets we'd been sendin' out until I knew every
word of it by heart. I'll bet I got up and hid them stocks in a dozen
diff'rent places before mornin', and an hour before bankin' time I was
sittin' on the steps of the Treasury Trust concern, waitin' to hire one
of them steel pigeon-holes down in the vaults. After I'd got the
envelope stowed away and tied the key around my neck with a string, I
goes back to the office. Sweetie and Miss Allen was there, with their
hammers goin'. They'd found their blue tickets and their week's pay and
was just clearin' out.

"I'd been planning to make a change for the last two weeks," says Miss
Allen. "I was looking for something like this."

"Me too," says Sweetie. "It's rough on Torchy, though."

"Say, don't you waste any sympathy on me," says I, "and don't let off
any more knocks at Mr. Pepper. I won't stand for it!"

With that they snickers and does a slow exit. That leaves me runnin' the
gold minin' business single handed; but me bein' one of the firm, as
you might say, it was all right. I'd always had a notion that I'd be a
plute some day; but honest, I wa'n't expectin' it so sudden. I was just
tryin' to get used to it, when the door opens and in drifts that guy
from the Marshal's office.

"Where's Mr. Belmont Pepper?" says he.

"Well," says I, "the last time I saw him he was headed west."

"Skipped out!" says the gent, doin' the foiled villyun stunt with his
face.

"Skipped nothin'," says I. "Mr. Pepper's gone out to look after the
mine."

"Oh, he's gone to the mine, has he?" says the duck. "See here, kid, I'm
a United States Deputy Marshal. Don't you try to tell me any fairy
stories, or you'll pull down trouble. We want your Mr. Pepper, and we
want him bad! He's a crook."

Well say, it was a hot argument we had. He tries to tell me that this
minin' business is all a bunko game, and that there's a paper out for
the boss. Then he camps down in the private office and says he'll wait
until Mr. Pepper shows up. He makes a stab at it, too, and a nice long
wait he has. I stuck it out for two weeks with him, tryin' to beat it
into his head that the Glory Be mine was a real gilt edged proposition.
I'd have been there yet, only