hball." (Which, if you don't already know it, is the
signal for full speed ahead.)

Full speed ahead Casey gave him, and they roared on up the steep,
twisting grade to the summit of the Pass. Casey began to feel a
distinct admiration for this particular Ford. The car was heavily
loaded--he could gauge the weight by the "feel" of the car as he drove
yet it made the grade at twenty-five miles an hour and reached the top
without boiling the radiator; which is better than many a more
pretentious car could do.

"Too bad you've made your pile already," the young man broke a long
silence. "I'd like to have a guy like you for my pardner. The desert
ain't talkative none when you're out in the middle of it, and you know
there ain't another human in a day's drive. I've been going it alone.
Nine-tenths of these birds that are eager to throw in with yuh thinks
that fifty-fifty means you do the work and they take the jack. I'm
plumb fed upon them pardnerships. But if you didn't have your jack
stored away--a hull mountain of it, I reckon--I'd invite yuh to set
into the game with me; I sure would."

Casey spat into the dark beside the car. "They's never a pile so big a
feller ain't willin' to make it bigger," he replied sententiously.
"Fer, as I'm concerned, Casey's never backed up from a dollar yet. But
I ain't no wild colt no more, runnin' loose an' never a halter mark on
me. I'm bein' broke to harness, and it's stable an' corral from now
on, an' no more open range fer Casey. The missus hopes to high-school
me in time. She's a good hand--gentle but firm, as the preacher says.
And I guess it's time fer Casey Ryan to quit hellin' around the country
an' settle down an' behave himself."

"I could put you in the way of adding some easy money to your bank
roll," the other suggested tentatively.

But Casey shook his head. "Twenty years ago yuh needn't have asked me
twice, young feller. I'd 'a' drawed my chair right up and stacked my
chips a mile high. Any game that come along, I played 'er down to the
last chip. Twenty years ago--yes, er ten!--Casey Ryan woulda tore that
L. A. jail down rock by rock an' give the roof t' the kids to make a
playhouse. Them L. A. cops never woulda hauled me t' jail in no wagon.
I mighta loaded 'em in behind, and dropped 'em off at the first morgue
an' drove on a-whistlin'. That there woulda been Casey Ryan's gait a
few years back. Take me now, married to a good woman an' gettin'
gray--"