"Oh, I'm all right," she laughed; "an' I know my McGinty backwards. But"—she frowned with sudden anger—"it ain't Maudie's pretty way to interfere with cheechalkos gettin' fooled. I ain't proud o' the trouble I've taken, and I'll thank you not to mention it. Not to that pardner o' yours—not to nobody."
She stuck her nose in the air, and waved her hand to French Charlie, who had just then opened the door and put his head in. He came straight over to her, and she made room for him on the bench.
The Colonel went out full of thought. He listened attentively when the ex-Governor, that evening at Keith's, said something about the woman up at the Gold Nugget—"Maudie—what's the rest of her name?"
"Don't believe anybody knows. Oh, yes, they must, too; it'll be on her deeds. She's got the best hundred by fifty foot lot in the place. Held it down last fall herself with a six-shooter, and she owns that cabin on the corner. Isn't a better business head in Minóok than Maudie's. She got a lay on a good property o' Salaman's last fall, and I guess she's got more ready dust even now, before the washin' begins, than anybody here except Salaman and the A.C. There ain't a man in Minóok who wouldn't listen respectfully to Maudie's views on any business proposition—once he was sure she wasn't fooling."
And Keith told a string of stories to show how the Minóok miners admired her astuteness, and helped her unblushingly to get the better of one another.
The Colonel stayed in Minóok till the recording was all done, and McGinty got tired of living on flap-jacks at the gulch.
The night McGinty arrived in town the Colonel, not even taking the Boy into his confidence, hitched up and departed for the new district.
He came back the next day a sadder and a wiser man. They had been sold.
McGinty was quick to gather that someone must have given him away. It had only been a question of time, after all. He had lined his pockets, and could take the new turn in his affairs with equanimity.
"Wait till the steamers begin to run," Maudie said; "McGinty'll play that game with every new boat-load. Oh, McGinty'll make another fortune. Then he'll go to Dawson and blow it in. Well, Colonel, sorry you ain't cultivatin' rheumatism in a damp hole up at Glory Hallelujah?"