Grant nodded. A number of almost indigent men—small farmers ruined by frost in Dakota, and axe-men from Michigan with growing families—had settled on the land in his neighbourhood, and as every hand and voice might be wanted, levies had been made on the richer homesteaders, and subscribed to here and there in the cities, for the purpose of enabling them to continue the struggle.
“We want the dollars badly,” he said. “The cattle-men have cut off our credit at the railroad stores, and there are two or three of the Englishmen who have very little left to eat at the hollow. You have seen what we have sent out from Fremont, and Muller has been feeding quite a few of the Dutchmen.”
He stopped abruptly, and Breckenridge drew back his chair. “Hallo!” he said. “You heard it, Larry?”
Grant had heard the windows jar, and a sound that resembled a faint tap. “Yes,” he said quietly. “I may have been mistaken, but it was quite like a rifle shot.”
They were at the door in another moment, shivering as the bitter cold met them in the face; but there was now no sound from the prairie, which rolled away before them white and silent under the moonlight. Then, Breckenridge flung the door to, and crossed over to the rack where a Marlin rifle and two Winchesters hung. He pressed back the magazine slide of one of them, and smiled somewhat grimly at Grant.
“Well,” he said, “we can only hope you’re wrong. Where did you put the book I was reading?”
Grant, who told him, took out some accounts, and they lounged in big hide chairs beside the stove for at least half an hour, though it was significant that every now and then one of them would turn his head as though listening, and become suddenly intent upon his task again when he fancied his companion noticed him. At last Breckenridge laughed.
“It’s all right, Larry. There—is—somebody coming. It will be the man with dollars, and I don’t mind admitting that I’ll be glad to see him.”
Five minutes later the door opened and Muller came in. He looked round him inquiringly.
“Quilter is not come? I his horse in der stable have not seen,” he said.