Condit had folded up like a sick accordion.
"Have I killed him?"
"Hell, no!" And Larrabie had stared curiously while neither of them heard the applause.
Before an hour passed Larrabie wired the huge man who had an office in New York, an office lined with books. The books were never used; the office saw strange usage.
"A bear-cat," Larrabie wired. "What shall I do with him?"
And an answer had come back:
"Keep him under cover. Work him a little. Will send Devereau when the time is right."
So Blue Jeans had suddenly found his Dream in the process of coming true. For he had done, not happy at heart, just what the huge man had said he would do; he had decided to accumulate other and just as easy two hundreds.
"I'll herd by myself," was the way he argued himself to this decision. "I'm no lily, but I'll not soil myself worse with this bunch."
And Larrabie had kept him under cover, and worked him twice, until another telegram had finally come, advising them that Devereau was on his way West,—that the "time was right." But Larrabie had been perplexed again on this occasion by Blue Jeans' lack of enthusiasm. He reread the telegram aloud and emphasized the other's great luck.