find Craig Winton and give him or his heirs a hundred thousand
dollars, which I've figured would be something like his percentage
of the profits if I had drawn an honorable contract with him. The
time he came to me he lived in Boston. I've always laughed at men
that talked about honor in business, but now that I'm looking back
from the end of the trail I guess maybe they're right and I've been
wrong....

CHAPTER XX

THE FAMILY COUNCILS

Uncle Johnny laid Peter Westley's letter down. A silence held them all;
it was as though a voice from some other world had been speaking to
them. Mrs. Westley shivered.

"How I hate money," she cried impulsively. Then, the very comfort and
luxury of the room reproaching her, she added: "I mean, I hate to think
that wherever big fortunes are made so many are ground down in the
process."

Graham was frowning at the letter.

"Of course you're going to hunt up this fellow?" he asked, anxiously, a
dull red flushing his cheeks. "Wasn't that as bad as stealing?"

"Maybe he's dead now and it's too late," cried Gyp, who thought the
whole thing full of intensely interesting possibilities.

"Uncle Peter cannot defend himself, now, Graham, so let us not pass
judgment upon what he has done. And I don't suppose I can act on this
matter until your father comes home."

"Oh, John, I know he will want to carry out his Uncle Peter's wish! You
need not wait; too much time has been lost already," urged Mrs. Westley.

Graham was standing in front of the fire, his back to the blaze. It
struck Uncle Johnny and his mother both that there was a new manliness
in the slim, straight figure.

"_I_ want to help find him. It's when you know about such tricks and
cheating and--and injustice that you hate this trying to make money. I
think things ought to be divided up in this world and every fellow given
an equal chance."

John Westley laid his hand on the boy's shoulder. "Real justice is the
hardest thing to find in this world, sonny. But keep the thought of it
always in your mind--and look out for the rights of the other fellow,
then you'll never make the mistakes Uncle Peter did."

"Poor old man, all he cared about in the world was making money, and
then in his old age it gave him no joy--only torment. And he'd killed
everything else in him that might have brought him a little happiness!
I'm glad you and Robert aren't like him," Mrs. Westley added.

"I am, too,"