"You know a darn sight mo' about it than we do. I'm not takin' Keith's opinion on anything he wants to buy. He's tipped his hand already in showin' how far an' fast he came here. Probably had Plimsoll tied up on an option or he w'udn't have said 's much as he did."
"Then—there is no doubt in my mind that Patrick Casey picked the best side of the gulch. The indications are in sight there. This side the exposed reef may have been ground down below the sylvanite. There are glacial signs all around here. I would say sell these for cash, holding out on price until Keith refuses to offer more. He'll come back for a final bid. But let him organize with your claims."
"The Molly Casey Mine? With fifty-one per cent. of the shares, if we can't get more?"
"He'll squeal like a pig before he grants that," said Westlake. "But he'll have to come through to your terms. Those claims are the big bet of this camp, and he knows it."
It would have surprised Keith had he known how accurately the young engineer he had glanced at and dismissed as almost an amateur at the game, followed the trend of his scheming. There is not much variation in the methods of Mining Promotion, and Westlake was an observer and a conserver of the pith of what he had seen.
"Fifty-one per cent., an' the name's Molly Casey, then," said Sandy. "What's more, you're to be consulting engineer or whatever they call the fat job, Westlake. I'm dawg-tired. Sam, let's you an' me shack over to our claims. We'll leave Mormon where he is till he gits his sleep out, if you've no objection, marm?"
Sandy, Sam and Mormon returned to the Three Star with the papers drawn and signed and the shares of stock issued that gave twenty-six per cent. of the Molly property to her and twenty-five to the three partners. Keith returned to New York with his forty-nine per cent. to weave his plans for the full development of the claims he had acquired.
While he lacked the controlling interest, there was always, he fancied, a chance of division between the four who held control. Either he could get the girl to vote apart from the three partners or he might split them some way or another. But, wisely, he did not count on this. And he took up the task of exploitation with zest, Blake, primed with material and notes gathered on the spot, a ready and expert assistant.
When Wilson Keith made up his mind there was money in a plan—money for Wilson Keith—he lost no time in planning and carrying out all details. He loved the excitement of the gamble, he loved to evolve some play for which he could pat himself upon the back and tell himself how much cleverer he was than the public, swimming up to his golden-baited hooks like so many fish. Thornton, expert mining engineer, believed the prospects good for the new camp at Casey Town; but Keith, with Blake, who was a wizard at publicity, delighted most in the way it lent itself to exploitation.