“Don’t you want to forget your troubles, old man?” coaxed Shoup. “This is a sure cure for the blues.”
“No!” almost shouted Lenning, springing to his feet. “Try to push that thing into my face again and I’ll grab it and throw it into the water. You say you inherited an appetite for the stuff; well, I inherited a few things, myself, and I reckon they’re enough to stagger under without taking on any of your failings.”
“Maybe you’ll come to it, some time,” laughed Shoup.
He was, by now, an entirely different person from the Shoup of a few minutes before. His eyes gleamed, and while his face remained colorless and of a dead, waxen white, strength ran surging through him, and his nerves steadied. It was the influence of the drug, of course, and when that failed his condition would be more pitiful than ever. Lenning, shivering at the spectacle presented by his companion, turned moodily and looked down into the pool.
Shoup put away his morocco case. Getting up, he stepped to Lenning’s side and laid a hand on his shoulder.
“I’m a horrible example, eh?” he breathed. “All right. You’re a good deal of an example, too. You’re a cast-off; a week ago your uncle gave you a thousand dollars and kicked you out of the house. Where’s the thousand now, Lenning? ‘Rooly’ and faro have swallowed it up.” He laughed jeeringly.
Lenning whirled on him, red with anger.
“And who helped me lose the thousand?” he cried. “It was you! You might have the grace, seems to me, to shut up about the loss of that money. We’ve neither of us got a sou; but, if we can get to the gulch beyond Dolliver’s, maybe I can borrow enough to get us out of this country for good.”
“Who’s at the gulch?”
“A few friends of mine—at least, they used to be friends. They’re members of the Gold Hill Athletic Club, and they’re camping there.”