"Well, it is time to remember it," was the cool reply.
"What was I to remember?"
"That you were to turn around and help him out of his trouble when I gave you the word."
The president of the Farmers' and Merchants' tilted his chair to the lounging angle and laughed; a slow gurgling laugh that spread from lip to eye and thence abroad through his great frame until he shook like a grotesque incarnation of the god of mirth.
"I was to turn around and help him out of the hole, was I? Oh, no; I guess not," he denied. "It's business now, little girl, and the tea-fights are barred. I'll give you a check for that span o' blacks you were looking at, and we'll call it square."
"Does that mean that you intend to go on until you have smashed him?" she asked, quietly ignoring the putative bribe.
"I'm going to put him out of business—him and that other fool friend of yours—if that's what you mean."
Again the sudden lightning glowed in Margery Grierson's eyes, but, as before, the flash was only momentary. There was passion enough in blood and brain, but there was also a will, and the will was the stronger.
"Please!" she besought him.
"Please what?"