develops human affection the way it does. Fifteen dollars! Why,
I tell you, sir, fifteen dollars was _more_ than enough for that woman."
He turned indignantly on the board-pile.

"I reckon," said Colonel Blount, "that you would say that about my
neighbor Jim Bowles' cow?"

"Certainly. I know about that cow, too. She was twenty years old and on
her last legs. Road kills her, and all at once she becomes a dream of
heifer loveliness. _I_ know."

"I reckon," said Colonel Blount, still more grimly; "I reckon if that
damned claim agent was to come here, he would just about say that
fifteen dollars was enough for my filly."

"I shouldn't wonder. Now, look here, Colonel Blount. You see, I'm a
railroad man, and I'm able to see the other side of these things."

"Oh, well, all right," said Blount, "but that don't bring my filly back.
You can't get Himyah blood every day in the week. That filly would have
seen Churchill Downs in her day, if she had lived."

"Yes; and if she had, you would have had to back her, wouldn't you? You
would have trained that filly and paid a couple of hundred for it. You
would have fitted her at the track and paid several hundred more. You
would have bet a couple of thousand, anyway, as a matter of principle,
and, like enough, you'd have lost it. Now, if this road paid you fifteen
dollars for that filly and saved you twenty-five hundred or three
thousand into the bargain, how ought you to feel about it? Are you
twenty-five hundred behind or fifteen ahead?"

Colonel Calvin Blount had now feverishly finished his julep, and as the
other stopped, he placed his glass beside him on the board-pile and
swung a long leg across, so that he sat directly facing his enigmatical
guest. The latter, in the enthusiasm of his argument, swung into a
similar position, and so they sat, both hammering on the board between
them.

"Well, I would like to see that damned claim agent offer me fifteen
dollars for that filly," said Blount. "I might take fifty, for the sake
of the road; but fifteen--"

"Well, what would you do?"

"Well, by God, sir, if I saw that claim agent--"

"Well, by God, sir, _I'm_ that claim agent; and I _do_ offer you fifteen
dollars for that filly, right now!"

"What! You--"

"Yes, me!"

"Fifteen dollars!"

"Yes, sir, fifteen dollars."

Colonel Blount burst into a sudden song--"On _Jor_dan's strand I'll
_take_ my stand!" he began.

"It's all she's worth," interrupted the claim agent.