s were in a bluff about five hundred yards from the
track. Of course, once they got in the saddle they would make a
get-away, so far as we were concerned, and I thought if I could beat
them to the horses and turn the animals loose we would practically have
them rounded up. That's what I tried to do. But as I was running I
tripped, and went headfirst into a stump or a stone. Anyway, it knocked
me out, and when I emerged from dreamland the train was moving, and I
couldn't catch it. So I just tramped the ties to the next station. And
there I had a job explaining that I wasn't a holdup myself. It didn't
strike those boneheads that no sane holdup would come walking along the
track a few hours after a robbery."

Clyde was disappointed at the baldness of his narration. Almost any man
would have made some effort at description. Dunne had made none
whatever. He had confined himself to the barest of bare facts.

"You make a poor raconteur, Mr. Dunne."

"Really, that's all there was to it," he replied. "'We fit and they
fit; and they ran and we ran'--or at least I did till I tripped."

Mrs. Wade rose.

"After you have had your cigar we will continue our conversation, if
you care to," said Clyde.

"Just what I was going to ask. I hope Wade's cigars are small."

When the ladies had gone, Harrison Wade drew his chair beside Dunne's.

"I've been thinking over that matter of yours, Casey, and the more I
think it over the less I like it. That charter, backed by Airline money
and influence, will be a hard thing to get over. I hate to discourage
you, but the best advice I can give to you and your neighbours is to
put a fair price on your holdings, and offer them to the railway _en
bloc_."

"But we don't want to sell, Wade. Couldn't you get an injunction or
something, and tie up their operations?"

"No, I'm afraid not. You can't bring an action until you have something
to found it on--that is to say, some wrong to complain of--some actual
interference with your rights to water. And you can't get an injunction
unless you can show that your rights are beyond question. It's a
toss-up whether that charter takes precedence or not. I'm speaking
frankly to you. With an ordinary client I'd throw a professional front
of profound knowledge, but as it is I own up that it's a complicated
question, depending almost entirely on the court. And courts are just
as uncertain as other human institutions."

Casey Dunne frowned through the spreadi