Riles chewed vigorously at his tobacco. "Explain how you're goin' to pull it off," he said, "an' then I'll tell you yes or no."
"Not on your life," said Gardiner. "I don't show my hand until I know who's sitting across."
There was silence for half a mile, while Riles turned the matter over in his mind. He was naturally a coward, but he was equally a money-grabber, and it was one instinct against the other. Avarice won it, and at length he extended his hand to Gardiner. "I'm in on anythin' you're in on," he said.
"That sounds like it," said Gardiner, with enthusiasm. "Now the whole thing's simple as A B C, and not half as dangerous as running a traction engine or breaking a broncho. It all rests on getting him out here with the money, and that's where you come in. I don't mind telling you if it wasn't for the help you can give there I'd handle the job myself, and save dividing the proceeds."
"Yes, that's the point, all right," said Riles, somewhat dubiously.
"How're we goin' t' get him out here with all that money?"
"Think, Riles," said Gardiner, puffing complacently at a fresh cigar.
"Think hard."
Riles wrinkled his forehead and spat copiously at the front hub, but the inspiration would not come. "I give it up," he said at last. "You'll have t' plan it, an' I'll carry it out."
"That's what comes of hard work, Hiram; you lose all your imagination. Right now you haven't any more imagination than a cabbage. Now, I could suggest a dozen schemes to suit the purpose if I had to, but one will do. Suppose this:
"These mountains up here are full of coal—more coal than can be burnt in a million years. It's a bad road in, but once you get here you'll see it lying in seams, ten, fifteen, twenty feet thick, and stretching right through the rocks as far as you like to follow it. That coal's going to make a bunch of millionaires some day, but not until you can get at it with something bigger than a cayuse. But railroads come fast in this country, and there's no saying how soon a man might cash in if he invested just now."
"You ain't goin't' wait till a railroad comes, are you? We'll like enough be dead by that time."