t Winton told me," he assented nervously.

"Then you'll be interested to know that a special field agent of the
Land Department sat opposite me last night and without batting an eye
came across with the glad news that he was here to investigate our
claims."

Selfridge bounced up like a rubber ball from the chair into which he had
just settled. "What!"

"Pleasant surprise, isn't it? I've been wondering what you were doing
outside. Of course I know you had to take in the shows and cabarets of
New York. But couldn't you edge in an hour or two once a week to attend
to business?"

Wally's collar began to choke him. The cool, hard words of the big
Scotchman pelted like hail.

"Must be a bluff, Mac. The muckrake magazines have raised such a row
about the Guttenchild crowd putting over a big steal on the public that
the party leaders are scared stiff. I couldn't pick up a newspaper
anywhere without seeing your name in the headlines. It was fierce."
Selfridge had found his glib tongue and was off.

"I understand that, Wally. What I don't get is how you came to let them
slip this over on you without even a guess that it was going to happen."

That phase of the subject Selfridge did not want to discuss.

"Bet you a hat I've guessed it right--just a grand-stand play of the
Administration to fool the dear people. This fellow has got his orders
to give us a clean bill of health. Sure. That must be it. I suppose it's
this man Elliot that came up on the boat with us."

"Yes."

"Well, that's easy. If he hasn't been seen we can see him."

Macdonald looked his man Friday over with a scarcely veiled contempt.
"You have a beautiful, childlike faith in every man's dishonesty, Wally.
Did it ever occur to you that some people are straight--that they won't
sell out?"

"All he gets is a beggarly two thousand or so a year. We can fix him all
right."

"You've about as much vision as a breed trader. Unless I miss my guess
Elliot isn't that kind. He'll go through to a finish. What I'd like to
know is how his mind works. If he sees straight we're all right, but if
he is a narrow conservation fanatic he might go ahead and queer the
whole game."

"You wouldn't stand for that." The quick glance of Selfridge asked a
question.

The lips of the Scotchman were like steel traps and his eyes points of
steel. "We'll cross that bridge if we come to it. Our first move is to
try to win him to see this thing our way. I'll have a casual talk wit