make a bet with
him--we'll fix the odds presently and they'll be heavy against us--that
Thurston successfully completes the job in the canyon. The other man
bets he doesn't. When it appears judicious we'll contrive something to
draw Thurston away for a night or two."

"But if you know the man, and it's so easy, why not make the bet
yourself?" Shackleby smiled pleasantly.

"Because I'm not secretary hoping to get my salary doubled and a land
bonus. There are other reasons, but I don't want to hurt your feelings
any more than I wish to lacerate those of my worthy colleagues.
They'll ask no questions and only pass a resolution thanking you for
your zealous services. Nothing is going to slip up the wrong way, but
if it did you could only lose your salary, and I'd see you safe on the
way to Mexico with say enough to start a store, and you would be no
worse off than before, because I figure you'd lose the berth unless you
chip in with me."

Leslie realized that this might well be so, but he made a last attempt.
"Suppose in desperation I turned round on you?"

"I'd strike you for defamation and conspiracy, publish certain facts in
your previous record, and nobody would believe you, or dare to say so.
Besides, you haven't got grit enough in you by a long way, and that's
why I'm taking your consent for granted. By the way, I forgot to
mention that confounded Britisher raked an extra hundred dollars out of
me. Said I'd got to pay for his traveling and hotel expenses. I'm not
charging you, Leslie, and you ought to feel grateful to me."

CHAPTER XXIV

AN UNEXPECTED ALLY

Winter was drawing towards its close at last, when, on the evening of a
day in which the result of a heavy blasting charge had exceeded his
utmost expectations, Geoffrey Thurston stood beside his foreman in his
workmen's mess shanty. Tin lamps hung from the beams blackened with
smoke, and sturdy men were finishing their six o'clock supper beneath
them. The men were the pick of the province, for, until tempted by the
contractor's high wages, most of them had been engaged in laying the
foundations of its future greatness by wresting new spaces for corn and
cattle from the forest. They ate, as they worked, heroically. The
supper was varied and bountiful, for Geoffrey, who was conscious of a
thrill of pride as he glanced down the long rows of weather-beaten
faces, fed his workmen well. They had served him faithfully through
howling gale and l