almly across the
horses' backs. S. Behrman came around to the other side of the buggy and
faced Magnus.

He was a large, fat man, with a great stomach; his cheek and the upper
part of his thick neck ran together to form a great tremulous jowl,
shaven and blue-grey in colour; a roll of fat, sprinkled with sparse
hair, moist with perspiration, protruded over the back of his collar.
He wore a heavy black moustache. On his head was a round-topped hat of
stiff brown straw, highly varnished. A light-brown linen vest, stamped
with innumerable interlocked horseshoes, covered his protuberant
stomach, upon which a heavy watch chain of hollow links rose and fell
with his difficult breathing, clinking against the vest buttons of
imitation mother-of-pearl.

S. Behrman was the banker of Bonneville. But besides this he was many
other things. He was a real estate agent. He bought grain; he dealt in
mortgages. He was one of the local political bosses, but more important
than all this, he was the representative of the Pacific and Southwestern
Railroad in that section of Tulare County. The railroad did little
business in that part of the country that S. Behrman did not supervise,
from the consignment of a shipment of wheat to the management of a
damage suit, or even to the repair and maintenance of the right of
way. During the time when the ranchers of the county were fighting the
grain-rate case, S. Behrman had been much in evidence in and about
the San Francisco court rooms and the lobby of the legislature in
Sacramento. He had returned to Bonneville only recently, a decision
adverse to the ranchers being foreseen. The position he occupied on
the salary list of the Pacific and Southwestern could not readily be
defined, for he was neither freight agent, passenger agent, attorney,
real-estate broker, nor political servant, though his influence in all
these offices was undoubted and enormous. But for all that, the ranchers
about Bonneville knew whom to look to as a source of trouble. There was
no denying the fact that for Osterman, Broderson, Annixter and Derrick,
S. Behrman was the railroad.

"Mr. Derrick, good-morning," he cried as he came up. "Good-morning,
Harran. Glad to see you back, Mr. Derrick." He held out a thick hand.

Magnus, head and shoulders above the other, tall, thin, erect, looked
down upon S. Behrman, inclining his head, failing to see his extended
hand.

"Good-morning, sir," he observed, and waited for S. Behrman'