d anyhow, what are her
possibilities?"

"I understand, from descriptions, that she is of the gypsy type--dark,
languid, glamorous. If she's all that, I can place her." Davy's reply
was slow and indifferent. Now he brightened up to add: "Say, when I
get on the phone, shall I tell him to send me a draft on a Denver bank
or shall I tell him to ship the cold cash by express, or wire it to
Cheyenne by Western Union?"

"Cold cash is never out of place in paying a bill, but if you have a
draft sent to the First National in Cheyenne, we can go there and make
the transfer. I need to go to Cheyenne anyhow."

"And I need some added cash," said Davy Lannarck. "I'll have 'em make
the draft for five thousand. The First National can split it as we
direct."

Davy made much of jotting down notes; Landy Spencer sat quietly, his
face immobile; Adine Lough went to the window ostensibly to dab on
make-up, but really to suppress smiles and stifle laughter. A man of
importance--a bank receiver, an arm of the court--was being kidded and
he didn't know it.

In the drive across country from the B-line ranch, the three in the
roadster planned and outlined their conduct at this proposed
conference at the bank. Landy related fully the incident as to why he
knew that Hulls Barrow and Maizie planned a quick getaway. Landy had
contacted Ike Steele only a day or two ago and Ike's story of the
wagon trade unfolded the plot. Stripped of inconsequential details,
Ike's story follows:

Ugly Collins, a former resident, was back on important business. Ugly
had left the country a decade ago, following his acquittal for petty
thieving. In his driftings about, he landed in Las Vegas. There he
contacted another former resident in the person of Archie Barrow.
Archie was in the money. He was sole proprietor of a big rooming house
in a community that was being congested with trainloads of steel,
cement, derricks, and cluttered with humanity who had come to build,
and were building, a great dam in the nearby Colorado River. Archie
needed help to carry on a business that had increased a hundredfold.
He recalled his brother Hulls, who might be useful, but he
particularly recalled the executive capacities of Maizie. She was
badly needed to prod the Mexican women in their labors of making beds
and sweeping rooms that were occupied twice daily.

But Archie knew it would be useless to write to a brother that never
went to the post office and was remote from rural