lps is ready and waiting."

Annixter struck his heel into the ground with a suppressed oath.
Always these fool feemale women came between him and his plans, mixing
themselves up in his affairs. Magnus had been on the very point of
saying something, perhaps committing himself to some course of action,
and, at precisely the wrong moment, his wife had cut in. The opportunity
was lost. The three returned toward the ranch house; but before saying
good-bye, Annixter had secured from Magnus a promise to the effect that,
before coming to a definite decision in the matter under discussion, he
would talk further with him.

Presley met him at the porch. He was going into town with Phelps, and
proposed to Annixter that he should accompany them.

"I want to go over and see old Broderson," Annixter objected.

But Presley informed him that Broderson had gone to Bonneville earlier
in the morning. He had seen him go past in his buckboard. The three men
set off, Phelps and Annixter on horseback, Presley on his bicycle.

When they had gone, Mrs. Derrick sought out her husband in the office
of the ranch house. She was at her prettiest that morning, her cheeks
flushed with excitement, her innocent, wide-open eyes almost girlish.
She had fastened her hair, still moist, with a black ribbon tied at the
back of her head, and the soft mass of light brown reached to below her
waist, making her look very young.

"What was it he was saying to you just now," she exclaimed, as she came
through the gate in the green-painted wire railing of the office. "What
was Mr. Annixter saying? I know. He was trying to get you to join him,
trying to persuade you to be dishonest, wasn't that it? Tell me, Magnus,
wasn't that it?"

Magnus nodded.

His wife drew close to him, putting a hand on his shoulder.

"But you won't, will you? You won't listen to him again; you won't so
much as allow him--anybody--to even suppose you would lend yourself to
bribery? Oh, Magnus, I don't know what has come over you these last few
weeks. Why, before this, you would have been insulted if any one thought
you would even consider anything like dishonesty. Magnus, it would break
my heart if you joined Mr. Annixter and Mr. Osterman. Why, you couldn't
be the same man to me afterward; you, who have kept yourself so clean
till now. And the boys; what would Lyman say, and Harran, and every one
who knows you and respects you, if you lowered yourself to be just a
political adventurer