Vance read the notice, while the crowd waited silently.
"What ye think of it?" asked some one, impatiently.
Vance smoked a moment. "Can't say. Where's Jim?"
"That's it! Where is he?"
"Best way to find out is to send a boy up to the house." He called a boy and sent him scurrying up the street.
The crowd now grew sober and discussed possibilities.
"If that's true, it's the worst crack on the head I ever had," said McIlvaine. "Seventeen hundred dollars is my pile in there." He took a seat on the window-sill.
"Well, I'm tickled to death to think I got my little stake out before anything happened."
"When you think of it—what security did he ever give?" McIlvaine continued.
"Not a cent—not a red cent."