ive. One day while they were eating lunch
in the dining-car and discussing the imperfect characters of several
of the boys at school, Percy suddenly changed his tone and made an
abrupt remark.

"My father," he said, "is by far the richest man in the world."

"Oh," said John politely. He could think of no answer to make to this
confidence. He considered "That's very nice," but it sounded hollow
and was on the point of saying, "Really?" but refrained since it would
seem to question Percy's statement. And such an astounding statement
could scarcely be questioned.

"By far the richest," repeated Percy.

"I was reading in the _World Almanac_," began John, "that there
was one man in America with an income of over five million a years and
four men with incomes of over three million a year, and--"

"Oh, they're nothing." Percy's mouth was a half-moon of scorn.
"Catch-penny capitalists, financial small-fry, petty merchants and
money-lenders. My father could buy them out and not know he'd done
it."

"But how does he--"

"Why haven't they put down _his_ income-tax? Because he doesn't
pay any. At least he pays a little one--but he doesn't pay any on his
_real_ income."

"He must be very rich," said John simply, "I'm glad. I like very rich
people.

"The richer a fella is, the better I like him." There was a look of
passionate frankness upon his dark face. "I visited the
Schnlitzer-Murphys last Easter. Vivian Schnlitzer-Murphy had rubies as
big as hen's eggs, and sapphires that were like globes with lights
inside them--"

"I love jewels," agreed Percy enthusiastically. "Of course I wouldn't
want any one at school to know about it, but I've got quite a
collection myself. I used to collect them instead of stamps."

"And diamonds," continued John eagerly. "The Schnlitzer-Murphys had
diamonds as big as walnuts--"

"That's nothing." Percy had leaned forward and dropped his voice to a
low whisper. "That's nothing at all. My father has a diamond bigger
than the Ritz-Carlton Hotel."

II

The Montana sunset lay between two mountains like a gigantic bruise
from which dark arteries spread themselves over a poisoned sky. An
immense distance under the sky crouched the village of Fish, minute,
dismal, and forgotten. There were twelve men, so it was said, in the
village of Fish, twelve sombre and inexplicable souls who sucked a
lean milk from the almost literally bare rock upon which a mysterious
populatory force had begotten