good.
In the waiting-room they parted with warm handshakings and great
good-will.

"Do you suppose he's wise?" said Loring, on the ferry.

Mitchell guffawed. "That bumpkin? Not he. The poor, dumb idiot took it
all as a practical joke among friends. Naturally, just as he said, he
thought I'd give you your money back. Glad you had presence of mind
enough to go on through with the five-spot. It's fine business to be
able to think on your feet, especially for us moon-minions. Good
thing it turned out the way it did. He's got perfect confidence in me
now--he's seen me tried, and _knows_ I'm straight. We'll get more out
of him in the long run." He explained Steve's mining expectations at
length.

"I don't like it much," said Loring. "It's a bad sign. My experience
is that it's hard to overreach a man that isn't on the hog himself.
When they're eager to annex something dishonestly you get 'em every
time. Maybe you'll lose him. Why didn't you stay with him? He may not
go to the Cornucopia at all."

"Oh, yes, he will!" said Mitchell confidently. "I am going to play him
for all he's worth, and I want him to feel sure I'm O.K. It might make
him suspicious if I kept at his coat tails. Plenty of time. I won't
even look him up to-morrow. Rig the old joint as my office, and wait
there till he hunts me up. Let him make all the advances, d'ye see?
Teach him bridge, on the square, at night. Let him win a little--just
enough to keep him satisfied with himself--_you_'ll see. Wait till he
draws his wad, and we'll throw the gaff in him to the queen's taste.
If he won't nibble at one hook try another. But, I say, Billy,
you'll have to furnish the scads for bait, in case he don't? rise to
something easy. I know you're flush from that Manning job."

* * * * *

Meantime, with unspoiled and sparkling eye, the inlander saw, broad
sweeping before him, mist-bordered, dream-vast, dim-seen beneath the
lowering sky, the magic city whose pulsings send and call a nation's
life-blood.

The salt tang of the sea was in his nostrils; greetings, many-keyed,
hoarse-whistled by plying craft, were in his ears; creamy-foamed wakes
of turbulent keels, swift-sent or laboring, boiled their swirling
splendor against the black water. Mysterious, couchant, straining, the
bulwarked city rode the waves; a mighty ship, her funnels the great
buildings beyond, where sullen streamers of smoke trailed motionless
and darkling; the inde