t you said about 'trusts.' That's it, 'trusts,' 'trusts'
and 'combines.' That's the way to get on to millions of dollars.
Better than scratching around, eh? Now here's an idea. I thought I'd
like to put it to you, finance and such things being your specialty.
There's Angel Gay. Now he's running a fine partnership with Restless.
Now you take those two as a nucleus. You yourself open a side-line in
drugs, and work in with Doc Crombie, and pool the result of the four.
The Doc would draw his fees for making folks sick, you'd clear a
handsome profit for poisoning them, Gay 'ud rake in his dollars for
burying 'em, and Restless?--why Restless 'ud put in white pine for
oak, and retire on the profits in five years. Say----"

"What you got in that sack?" inquired Smallbones, blandly ignoring the
other's jest at his expense.

"Well, nothing that's a heap of interest. I've been scratching around
at the head waters of the river, back there in the foot-hills."

"Ah, 'prospects,'" observed the other, with a malicious shake of the
head. "Guess you're allus prospectin' around. I see you diggin' Eve
Marsham's tater patch yesterday. Don't guess you made much of a
'strike' in that layout?"

"No." Peter shook his head genially. The little man's drift was
obvious. He turned toward the one attractive cottage in the
settlement, and saw a woman's figure standing at the doorway talking
to a diminutive boy.

"Guess though you'll likely strike more profit diggin' spuds fer folk
than you do scratching up loam and loose rocks the way you do,"
Smallbones went on sourly.

Peter nodded.

"Sure. You're a far-seeing little man. There's a heap of gold about
Eve's home. A big heap; and I tell you, if that was my place, I'd
never need to get outside her fences to find all I needed. I'd be a
millionaire."

Smallbones looked up into his face curiously. He was thinking hard.
But his imagination was limited. Finally he decided that Peter was
laughing at him.

"Guess your humor's 'bout as elegant as a fun'ral. An' it ain't good
on an empty stummick. I pass."

"So long," cried the giant amiably. "I'll turn that 'trust' racket
over in my mind. So long."

He strode away with great lumbering strides heading straight for
his humble, two-roomed shack. Smallbones, as he went on to the
boarding-house, was full of angry contempt for the prospector. He
was a mean man, and like most mean men he hated to be laughed at. But
when his anger smoothed down he fou