had not gone for an
operation, she had gone because she was mad. She was jealous, and that
was her way of showing it--she had gone off and left him in a hole. He
ought to have known from that look in her eye and the polite, smiling
way she talked. Now he was tied to the mast and if he went to New York
he would have to turn over the mine to Jepson! And that would give
Jepson just the chance he wanted to jump the Old Juan claim.

For a man who was worth fifty million dollars and could claim a whole
town for his friends Rimrock put in a most miserable night as he dwelt
on this blow to his hopes. He was like a man checkmated at
chess--every way he turned he was sure to lose if he moved. For the
chance of winning a hypothetical two thousand shares, which Stoddard
was supposed to have sold to Mrs. Hardesty, he had thrown away and lost
forever his control over Mary Fortune's stock. Now, if he followed
after her and tried to make his peace, he might lose his chance with
Mrs. Hardesty as well; and if he stayed with _her_ Mary was fully
capable of throwing her vote with Stoddard's. It was more than her
stock, it was her director's vote that he needed above everything else!

Rimrock paced up and down in his untidy room and struggled to find a
way out. With Mary gone he could not even vote a dividend unless he
came to an agreement with Stoddard. He could not get the money to
carry out his plans, not even when it lay in bank. He could not
appoint a new secretary, to carry on the work while he made his trip to
New York. He couldn't do anything but stay right there and wait until
he heard from her!

It was a humiliating position for a man to find himself in, and
especially after his talk with Mrs. Hardesty. Perhaps he had not
considered the ways and means very carefully, but he had promised her
to go back to New York. A man like him, with his genius for finance
and his masterful control of men, a man who could rise in a single year
from a prospector to a copper king; such a man was wasted in provincial
Arizona--his place was in Wall Street, New York. So she had said that
night when they sat close together and their souls sought the high
empyrean of dreams--and now he was balked by a woman. Master of men he
was, and king of finance he might be, but woman was still his bane.

He looked at it again by the cold light of day and that night he
appealed to Mrs. Hardesty. She was a woman herself, and wise in the
ways of