u might have it treated with
invisible ink, or write something else in, up above. But--aw cripes,
dang these lawyers, I don't want to monkey around--gimme a hundred
thousand dollars and she's yours."

"The Stinging Lizard?" inquired Eells and wrote it absently on his
blotter at which Wunpost began to sweat.

"I don't _sign_ nothing!" he reminded him, and Eells smiled
indulgently.

"Very well, you can acknowledge it before witnesses."

"No, I don't acknowledge nothing!" insisted Wunpost stubbornly, "and
you've got to put the money in my hand. How about fifty thousand dollars
and make it all cash, and I'll agree to get out of town."

"No-o, I haven't that much on hand at this time," observed Judson Eells,
frowning thoughtfully. "I might give you a draft on Los Angeles."

"No--cash!" challenged Wunpost, "how much have you got? Count it over
and make me an offer--I want to get out of this town." He muttered
uneasily and paced up and down while Judson Eells, with ponderous
surety, opened up the chilled steel vault. He ran through bundles and
neat packages, totting up as he went, and then with a face as frozen as
a stone he came out with the currency in his hands.

"I've got twenty thousand dollars that I suppose I can spare," he began
as he spread out the money, but Wunpost cut him short.

"I'll take it," he said, "and you can have the Stinging Lizard--but my
word's all the quit claim you get!"

He stuffed the money into his pockets without stopping to count it, more
like a burglar than a seller of mines, and that night while the town
gathered to gaze on in wonder he took the stage for Los Angeles. No one
shouted good-by and he did not look back, but as they pulled out of
Blackwater he smiled.

CHAPTER XII

BACK HOME

The dry heat of July gave way to the muggy heat of August and as the
September storms began to gather along the summits Wunpost Calhoun
returned to his own. It was his own country, after all, this land of
desert spaces and jagged mountains reared up again the sky; and he came
back in style, riding a big, round-bellied mule and leading another one
packed. He had a rifle under his knee, a pistol on his hip and a pair of
field glasses in a case on the horn; and he rode in on a trot, looking
about with a knowing smile that changed suddenly to a smirk of triumph.

"Well, well!" he exclaimed as he saw Eells emerge from the bank, "how's
the mine, Mr. Eells; how's the mine?"

And Judson Eells,