rever thryin' to run out, and can't.
Go and thry it yourself, Misther Frisbie, an' I'll stand at your back
till you're black in the face.' But when I went through the camp,
everything was quiet and orderly, and Jack Batters' bar was not only
closed--it was gone; vanished without leaving so much as a bad smell
behind it."

"And then?" said Ford.

"Then I got out my horse and rode up the creek and through some of the
camps on the Copah detour. The star-eyed goddess of reform had evidently
landed on that coast, too. Donahue's Hungarians were singing war-songs
around their camp-fire, as usual, and Contadini's Tuscans were out in
full force, guying the night-shift track-layers. But there was no bad
blood, and no whisky to breed it. You're done up again, Stuart."

"I don't see that," said Ford, who, besides being short on sleep, was
rejoicing in the thought that Alicia and the other women of the
private-car party would not have to be blind and deaf.

"Don't you? You've been protesting to beat the band about the
lawlessness and dissipation of the MacMorrogh camps. Accordingly, Mr.
Colbrith comes over here to see for himself: and what will he see?
Decency on a monument smiling reproachfully at her unprincipled
traducer. MacMorrogh will rub it into you good and hard. Can't you feel
the Sunday-school atmosphere right here in the headquarters this
morning? Look down yonder at the Nadia--wouldn't that soothe you, now?"

Ford looked and the scowl which was coming to be a habit transformed
itself into a cynical smile. A hundred or more of the MacMorrogh
laborers, hats off and standing at respectful attention, were clustered
about the rear platform of the private car, and Mr. Colbrith was
addressing them; giving them the presidential benediction, as Frisbie
put it irreverently.

"Don't you see how you are going to be hoisted with your own
ammunition?" the little man went on spitefully. "What becomes of all
your complaints of drunkenness and crime, when Mr. Colbrith can see with
his own eyes what truly good people the MacMorroghs are? And what
conclusion will he arrive at? There's only one, and it's a long-armed
one so far as your reputation is concerned: you are so desperately bent
on having your own way that you haven't scrupled to tell lies about
these angelic contractors."

"Let up, Dick," said Ford gruffly. "I've got about all I can carry till
I catch up on sleep a little. But you're right: this is the place where
the fir