hecked suit, rather loud, and high boots. His legs were crossed and
with an air of elegant enjoyment he was smoking a similar cigar.

"Don't want it!" snarled L. W. and, rising up in a fury, he moved off
towards the far end of the car.

"Oh, all right," observed Rimrock, "I'll smoke it myself, then." And
L. W. grunted contemptuously.

They rode for some hours across a flat, joyless country without either
man making a move, but as the train neared Gunsight Rimrock rose up and
went forward to where L. W. sat.

"Well, what're you all bowed up about?" he enquired bluffly. "Has your
girl gone back on you, or what?"

"Go on away!" answered L. W. dangerously, "I don't want to talk to you,
you thief!"

"Oh, that's what's the matter with you--you're thinking about the
money, eh? Well, you always did hate to lose."

An insulting epithet burst from L. W.'s set lips, but Rimrock let it
pass.

"Oh, that's all right," he said. "Never mind my feelings. Say, how
much do you figure I owe you?"

"You don't owe me nothing!" cried L. W. half-rising. "You _stole_ from
me, you scoundrel--I can put you in the Pen for this!"

"Aw, you wouldn't do that," answered Rimrock easily. "I know you too
well for that."

"Say, you go away," panted L. W. in a frenzy, "or I'll throw you out of
this car."

"No you won't either," said Rimrock truculently. "You'll have to eat
some more beans before you can put _me_ on my back."

Rimrock squared his great shoulders and his eyes sparkled dangerously
as he faced L. W. in the aisle.

"Now listen!" he went on after a tense moment of silence, "what's the
use of making a row? I know I lied to you--I had to do it in order to
get the money. I just framed that on purpose so I could get back to
New York where a proposition like mine would be appreciated. I was a
bum, in Gunsight; but back in New York, where they think in millions,
they treated me like a king."

"I don't want to talk to you," rumbled L. W. moving off, "you lied once
too often, and I've _quit_ ye!"

"All right!" answered Rimrock, "that suits me, too. All I ask
is--what's the damage?"

"Thirty-seven hundred and fifty-five dollars," snapped back L. W.
venomously, "and I'd sell out for thirty-seven cents."

"You won't have to," said Rimrock with business directness and flashed
a great roll of bills.

"There's four thousand," he said, peeling off four bills, "you can keep
the change for _pilon_."

There was one thing a