“I never made any promise,” returned Wiley pacifically. “It was my father that made the offer.”
“Oh, fiddlesticks!” exploded the Widow. “Well, 86what’s the difference–you’re working hand and glove!”
“Not at all,” corrected Wiley, “the Old Man is raising cattle. You can’t get him to look at a mine.”
“Well, he offered to buy my stock!” exclaimed the Widow, badly flustered. “I’d like to know what this means?”
“It’s no use talking,” returned Wiley wearily, “I’ve told you a thousand times. If you send your stock to John Holman at Vegas, he’ll give you ten cents a share; but Iwon’t give you a cent.”
“Do you mean to say,” demanded the Widow incredulously, “that you don’t want that stock?”
“That’s it,” assented Wiley. “I’ve just sold my tax title for a hundred dollars, to Blount.”
“Oh, this will drive me mad!” cried the Widow in a frenzy. “Virginia, come in here and help me!”
Virginia came in with the steak slightly scorched and laid his dinner before Wiley. Her eyes were rather wild, for she had been listening through the doorway, but she turned to her mother inquiringly.
“He says he’s sold his tax claim,” wailed the Widow in despair, “for one hundred dollars–to Blount. And then he turns around and says his father will buy my stock for ten cents a share in cash. But he won’t lend me the money to pay my note to Blount and get my Paymaster stock back.”