“Charley,” he began, when he came up that night, “did I understand you to say one time that you were acting as a kind of guardian to Virginia? Well, now here’s a bunch of stock that you sold to me once when you were slightly off your cabeza. There’s over twelve thousand shares and all you asked was four hundred dollars, when you knew they were worth eight hundred at least.”
“Yes, that’s so,” admitted Charley, blinking and rubbing his chin, “but you know them women, Wiley. They’re crazy, that’s all, and the Colonel 156he told me special not to let them lose their mine.”
“Well, never mind the mine,” said Wiley wincing. “I’m talking about this stock. Don’t you think it’s your duty, by George, as guardian, to turn around and buy it back? You’ve got five thousand dollars coming to you on those claims of yours and I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’m short, right now on account of buying machinery, and so I can’t pay you much cash; but if you’ll take this stock back in part payment of your claims I’ll give you four hundred more.”
“Well, all right,” agreed Charley after gazing at him thoughtfully, “but you ought to give back that mine. The Colonel, he told me─”
“What do you mean, give it back?” demanded Wiley, irritably. “It isn’t my property yet. I’ve got to pay for it first and get it away from old Blount before I can give it to anybody. That’s fifty thousand dollars that I’ve got to make clear between now and the twentieth of May; but believe me, Charley, if I once get it paid for I’m going to do something noble.”
“That’s good,” assented Charley, “but you’ve got to pay me, right off–there’s something going to happen!” His sun-dazed eyes opened up wide with excitement and he listened long and earnestly at the door before he tiptoed back to Wiley’s desk. “I can hear ’em,” he said. “They’re going to blow up the mine and shake the mountains down. They’re boring through the ground, but I can 157hear them working–it’s like worms eating their way through wood.”
“Is that so?” queried Wiley. “Well, maybe we can stop ’em. I’ll look after it, right away. But now about this stock─”
“It’s the Germans!” burst out Charley. “They’ve got boring machines that eat through mountains like wood. And then, bumm, it’s them mines, and the dynamite bombs─”
“Yes, it’s awful,” agreed Wiley, “but here’s your money, Charley; so maybe you’d better go. And you keep this stock now, until it comes Christmas; and then, Christmas Eve, you slip into the house and put it in Virginia’s stocking.”
“Oh–yes,” agreed Charley, still listening to the Germans and then he became lost in deep thought. “The Colonel will kill me,” he said at last. “It’s Christmas, and I ain’t brought his whiskey.”