“That you, Mr. Opp? Or is it Nick?” He blinked uncertainly.
“Why, it is me,” said Mr. Opp. [p306] “Come right in. I’ve been so occupied with engagements that I haven’t scarcely had occasion to see anything of you since you come back. You are getting improved all the time, ain’t you? I thought I saw you writing on a type-writer when I passed this morning.”
“Yes,” said Hinton; “it’s a little machine I got before I came down, with raised letters on the keyboard. If I progress at the rapid pace I have started, I’ll be an expert before long. Mrs. Gusty was able to read five words out of ten this morning!”
“Hope you’ll do us an article or two,” said Mr. Opp. “I don’t mind telling you that things has been what you might name as pressing ever since that trouble about the oil-wells. I’m not regretting any step that I taken, and I am endeavoring not to harbor any feelings against those that went on after I give my word it wasn’t a fair transaction. But if what that man Clark said is true, Mr. Hinton, the Union Syndicate will [p307] never open up another well in this community.”
“Your conscience proved rather an expensive luxury that time, didn’t it, Mr. Opp?” asked Hinton, who had heard as many versions of the affair as there were citizens in the Cove.
Mr. Opp shrugged his shoulders, and pursed his lips. “It’s a matter that I cannot yet bring myself to talk about. After a whole year and more of associating with me in business and social ways, to think they wouldn’t be willing to take my word for what I said.”
“But it wasn’t to their advantage,” said Hinton, smiling. “You forget the amount of money involved.”
“No,” declared Mr. Opp with some heat, “you do those gentlemen a injustice. There ain’t a individual of them that is capable of a dishonest act, any more than you or me. They just lacked the experience in dealing with a man like Mr. Mathews.”
Hinton’s smile broadened; he reached over and grasped Mr. Opp’s hand.
[p308]
“Do you know you are a rattling good fellow? I am sorry things have gotten so balled up with you.”