n?" And at his agent's appraisal, Carrol
looked shocked and grieved. "Why, good Lord! Farwell," he said, "he
wants almost what his ranch is worth."

"Funny that he should, isn't it?" sneered Farwell, who stood in no awe
of Carrol. "Well, and that's what I want him to get."

"Can't do it," said Carrol decisively. "No money in it. Show me how I
could make a profit."

"Cut it up into little chunks and sell it to those marks back East,"
Farwell replied. "I don't have to tell you your business. Make another
Sentinel of it if you like."

The reference was to the town site of Sentinel, a half section of
prairie which had been bought for three thousand dollars and sold as
town lots on paper at a couple of hundred thousand to confiding,
distant investors. It was still prairie, and apt to remain so. Carrol
had engineered the deal, and he would have blushed if he had not
forgotten how. As it was, he smiled sourly.

"I wish I could. Is this McCrae a friend of yours?"

"Put it that way," Farwell replied, frowning at the quizzical
expression of Sleeman's eye. "He doesn't want to sell, but I want him
to have the chance of refusing real money. He may take it, or he may
not. Anyway, I make it as a personal request."

Carrol eyed him for a moment. He knew Farwell's reputation for
uncompromising hostility to any one who thwarted his plans,
accidentally or otherwise. Also Farwell was a good man. He was bound to
rise. Some day, he, Carrol, might require his help and he kept a sharp
eye on possibilities of that nature. So he said:

"It isn't business, but to oblige _you_, Farwell--all right, I'll take
the chance that he won't accept. But it's sudden death, mind. No
dickering. He accepts, or he doesn't. If not, he'll get just dry-belt
prices with the rest when they surrender."

And so a few days afterward Farwell, armed with a check representing
one hundred and fifty thousand dollars of lawful money, procured
because he considered it likely to have a good moral effect, sought
Talapus Ranch and Donald McCrae. And McCrae, as he feared, turned the
offer down.

Farwell had calculated on producing the check at the proper
psychological moment, in practically stampeding him. The trouble was
that the psychological moment failed to arrive. McCrae showed no
symptoms of vacillation. The issue was never in doubt.

"I told you before," he said, "I don't want to sell, and I won't sell."

"It's a hundred and fifty thousand cold cash--your own