“It’s the electricity!” declared Charley. “It’s about us everywhere, and that’s what makes them crazy. All these desert rats are crazy, it’s the electric storms that does it–Nevada is a great state for winds. But when they comes a sandstorm, and Mrs. Huff she wraps up her head, I feel the power coming on. I can hear far away and then I can hear close–I make the electricity my slave. But the rest, they go crazy; they have headaches and megrims, and Mrs. Huff she always wants to fight; but I’m here to take care of ’em–the Colonel asked me to, so you keep away from that mine.”
“Oh, sure,” responded Wiley, “I won’t bother the mine. As soon as I’m well I’ll go home.”
“No, you stay,” returned Charley, becoming suddenly confidential. “I’ll show you a mountain of gold. It’s over across Death Valley, in the Ube-Hebes; the Colonel is over there now.”
“Is that so?” inquired Wiley, and Charley looked at him strangely, as if dazed.
“Aw, no; of course not!” he burst out angrily. “I forgot–the Colonel is dead. You Heine; come over here, sir.”
Heine crept up unwillingly and Charley slapped 46him. “Now–shut up!” he admonished and went off into crazy mutterings.
“What’s that?” he cried, rousing up suddenly to listen, and a savage look replaced the blank stare. “Can’t you hear him?” he asked. “It’s Stiff Neck George–he’s coming up the alley to kill you. Here, take my gun; and when he opens the door you fill him full of holes!”
Wiley listened intently, then he reached for the heavy pistol and sat up, watching the door. The wind soughed and howled and rattled at the windows, over which Charley had stretched heavy blankets, and it seemed to his startled imagination that someone was groping at the door. The memory of the skulking form that had followed him rose up with the distinctness of a vision and at a knock on the door he cocked his pistol and beckoned Death Valley to one side.
“Come in!” he called, but as the door swung open it was Virginia who stood facing his gun.
“O–oh!” she screamed, and then she flushed angrily as Charley began to laugh.