The man sat down at his table and wrote a letter to himself. With young Kent's epistle for his model, he made an amazingly clever forgery of the enthusiastic writer's chirography, and at the bottom signed the young man's name.
This spurious document teemed with figures and assertions concerning a wonderful gold mine which Glenmore had virtually purchased. He needed sixty thousand dollars at once, however, to complete his remarkable bargain. Only two days of his option remained and therefore delay would be fatal. He expected this letter to find his friend at Goldite and he felt assured he would not be denied this opportunity of a lifetime to make a certain fortune. He would, of course, appeal to Beth—with certainty of her help from the wealth bequeathed her by her uncle—but naturally she was too far away,
Glenmore was unaware of the fact that his sister had come to the West. Bostwick overlooked no details of importance. Armed with this plausible missive, he went at once to Mrs. Dick's and found that Beth was at home.
CHAPTER XVI
INVOLVING BETH
Goldite to the Eastern girl, who had found herself practically abandoned for nearly a week, had proved to be a mixture of discomforts, excitements, and disturbing elements. Fascinated by the maelstrom of the mining-camp life, and unwilling to retreat from the scene until she should see her roving brother, and gratify at least a curiosity concerning Van, she nevertheless felt afraid to be there, not only on account of the roughness and uncertainty of the existence, but also because, despite herself, she had attracted undesirable attention. Moreover, the house was full of "gentlemen" lodgers, with three of whom Elsa was conducting most violent flirtations.
There were few respectable women in the town. It was still too early for their advent. Beth had been annoyed past all endurance. There was no possibility of even mild social diversions; there was no one to visit. While the street could be described as perfectly safe, it was nevertheless an uncomfortable place in which to walk. Bostwick's car had been recovered and brought into camp, but skilled as she was at the steering wheel, she had hardly desired or dared to take it out.
Crime was frequent in the streets and houses. Disturbing reports of marauding expeditions on the part of the convicts, still at large, came with insistent frequency. Altogether the week had been a trial to her nerves. It had also been a vexation. No man had a right, she told herself, to do and say the things that Van had said and done, only to go off, without so much as a little good-by and give no further sign. She told herself she had a right to at least some sort of opportunity to tender her honest congratulations. She had heard of his claim—the "Laughing Water"—and perhaps she wished to know how it chanced to have this particular name. If certain disturbing reflections anent that woman who had run to him wildly, out in the street, came mistily clouding the estimate she tried to place upon his character, she confessed he certainly had the right to make an explanation. In a purely feminine manner she argued that she had the right to some such explanation—if only because of certain liberties he had taken with her hands—on which memories still warmly burned.
Wholly undecided as to what she would do if she could, and impatient with Bostwick for his sheer neglect in searching out her brother, she was thoroughly glad to see him to-day when he came so unannounced to the house.