ver, giving him
almost a cherubic air. But for all that he managed to appear tolerably
unmoved, quite as though this were not the first time he had been
offered such a position.

"How much is in it?" was what Barbee said, with vast indifference.

Steve hesitated. Then he frowned. And finally he laughed.

"You've got me there," he admitted frankly. "All the money I've got in
the world to-night is right here." He spilled the contents of his
pocket upon a table. "There's about seventy-five bucks. Unless I can
turn a trick somewhere before pay-day all you boys will have to take
your pro rata out of that."

Bill Royce shifted nervously in his chair, opened his mouth, then
closed it wordlessly. Barbee shrugged elaborately.

"I'll take a chance," he said. "It would be worth it if I lost; jus'
to put one across on Blenham."

"All right," and still Packard eyed young Barbee keenly, wondering just
how much ability lay hidden under that somewhat unsatisfactory
exterior. "You can go back to the boys now and tell them that you're
boss when I'm not on hand. Before they go to work in the morning you
show up here again and we'll talk a lot of things over."

Barbee ducked his head in token of acquiescence and perhaps to hide the
glitter in his eyes, and walked on his heels to the door. Packard's
voice arrested him there.

"Just one thing, Barbee: I don't want any trouble started. Not with
Blenham or with any of old man Packard's men. I know how you feel, but
if you work for me you'll have to let me be the one who starts things.
Understand?"

The new foreman paused irresolutely. Then, without turning so that
Packard might see his face, and with no spoken reply, he ducked his
head again and went out, slamming the door after him.

"I ain't sure he's the right man for the job, Steve," began Royce a
trifle anxiously. "An' I ain't sure whether he's square or crooked.
But I don't know the rest of the men any better an'----"

"I'll watch him, Bill. And, as I've said already, I'm here to do most
of the foreman act myself. We'll give Barbee his chance."

He came back to the table from whose top there winked up at him the few
gold and silver coins which spelled his working capital, and stood
looking at them quizzically.

"I got a yarn to spin, Stevie," came thoughtfully from Royce with a
great puff of smoke. "You better listen in on it now--while we're
alone."

Packard returned to his chair, made his own smoke,