“His coming back?” Buck eyed his companion quickly.
“Yes.”
“Wher’ d’you reckon he’s gone?”
The elder man raised a pair of astonished brows.
“Why, to Leeson Butte,” he said decidedly. Then he went on quietly, but with neither doubt nor hesitation: “There’s a real big change coming here—when Beasley gets back. These men want drink, they are getting restless for high play. They are hankering for—for the flesh-pots they think their gold entitles them to. Beasley will give them all those things when he comes back. It’s a pity.”
Buck thought for some moments before he answered. He was viewing the prospect from the standpoint of his years.
“They must sure have had ’em anyway,” he said at last.
“Ye—es.”
The Padre understood what was in the other’s mind.
“You see,” he went on presently, “I wasn’t thinking of that so much. It’s—well, it amounts to this. These poor devils are just working to fill Beasley’s pockets. Beasley’s the man who’ll benefit by this ‘strike.’ In a few months the others will be on the road again, going through all—that they’ve gone through before.”