Larry smiled and kissed the penciled scrawl rapturously. "God bless you, I'll do it—Gretchen, dear," he said to himself.
That was a busy evening for Larry. It was six o'clock when he wrote a line to Gretchen and rang for a page, to whom he gave careful instructions—also, some money. Then he sat at his desk and with his code sent a long wire to Jeff. At half-past six he was dressing carefully in the intervals between packing a suit case and 'phoning to a legal friend of his, Dick Wetherall, about a minister and a license. At seven-thirty he dined with Wetherall. At eight he received Rita Cheyne's mysterious wire. At nine he found the cashier of the Tenth National Bank at his home and planned for the taking up of the Development Company's notes and arranging to deposit Mrs. Cheyne's money to Jeff Wray's account on the following morning. At ten he met Gretchen at the Shirley Hotel, and, at half-past ten, had married her.
* * * * *
In response to Larry's first telegram and speeding eastward on the early train, Jeff Wray read all this astonishing news in the sheaf of telegrams handed him at the station by Ike Matthews. His brow lifted, and the hard lines at his mouth relaxed in a smile. Good old Larry! He tried to conjure a vision of Curtis Janney's face as he heard the news. Larry was carrying the war into the enemy's camp with a vengeance.
It took Jeff longer to decipher the second telegram:
"Mrs. Cheyne has arranged with her Denver agents—deposit eight hundred thousand dollars your credit Tenth National to-morrow morning. Await instructions."
It seemed incredible. When had Rita done this? The grim lines that his long night's vigil had seared at the corners of his mouth grew deeper, but his eyes glowed with a sombre fire. There was still an even chance to win—for Larry was holding the fort awaiting reinforcements, and Rita Cheyne had restored the break in Jeff's line of communication. The astonishing information in Larry's last wire seemed to clear his mind of the doubts which had assailed it all night long. The possibility of success now gave his own affairs a different complexion. He could never have told the truth to General Bent (Jeff couldn't think of him as a father) unless he won the fight for the independence of the Saguache Smelter. Jeff was no man to come cringing in the hour of failure at the feet of his enemy, asking immunity on the strength of such a relationship as that which existed between them. It had been clear to Jeff all night long that if he lost his fight he could never face General Bent with the truth. That was the real bitterness of defeat.
But if he won? The long years of dishonor through which he had struggled, without a name, without kindred, without friends, loomed large before him—mute, merciless years of struggle, privation, and emptiness. If he won, there was more than one victory to be gained in this fight, a moral victory as well as a physical one—the triumph of an eternal truth, the vindication of a forgotten wrong. If he won he would tell General Bent the truth—not as a son to a father, but as one merciless enemy to another, asking no quarter and giving none.
The only connection for Kinney at Saguache was with the later train, but Jeff had arranged for a motor-car which took him over the Pass and landed him at Kinney in time for the twelve o'clock train for Denver, where he arrived at six o'clock that evening. Larry met him at the station, smiling broadly.
"I think we've put a spoke in their wheel, Jeff," he laughed. "But we must keep dark. To-morrow morning when the banks open you're going to take up that stock, then we're going to call on the General."