s a lot of company always at
the house and every one seems to be enjoying himself, but
somehow it strikes me as not quite real. I want to be back
where nobody pretends.

I go automobiling a good deal, with Mrs. Keith and once in a
while with Donald, but I'd give anything, sometimes, for a
good gallop through the redtop and sage and rabbit-brush on
my pony. I can go riding here, but it is in the Park and you
should see the saddle! Imagine a real saddle with the cantle
taken away, the horn gone, the pommel trimmed down to almost
nothing, no skirts to it, just pared to the core. And the
poor horse bob-tailed and roach-maned, taught to go along
with its knees high, like a trained horse in a circus.
High-school gaited, they call it.

There was more talk of dinners and dances, of receptions and theaters,
with mention of Donald Keith here and there, chat of new clothes, kind
words for the elder Keiths. "Don't think I've changed," she said. "I'm
the same Molly underneath even if I have been revamped and decorated."

The famous _White Gold_ prospectuses and advertisements duly followed
the news stories. Three Star saw no copies of the last, nor, it seemed,
did Molly. Neither did prospectuses or advertisements come their way,
for that matter. Casey Town boomed with some bona-fide strikes that sent
Keith's stocks soaring high. The porphyry dyke at the Molly Mine began
to yield rich results almost from the first and dividends were paid in
such quantities as to stagger the Three Star outfit who saw themselves
in a fair way to become rich. All over the barren hills, where the first
futile shafts had been driven and abandoned, buildings sprang up like
mushrooms, housing machinery, sending up plumes of white smoke that
tokened the underground energies. The Keith properties were being
developed with much show of outlay, prices jumping at every report from
the Molly Mine or other successful developments. None of the investors
in these Keith undertakings knew that he owned forty-nine per cent of
the shares of the Molly and of none other, save for the space between
issuing them and selling them.

The three partners held consultation as to their disposal of the checks
that were sent them.

"Molly, she's gettin' the same amount we're splittin' both ways," said
Sam, "but somehow it don't seem right to me the way we come in. It was
her dad's mine. He found it. All we did wa