He put the first aside, and picked up another. It proved to be a list of the share-holders in the Benson and California Mining and Trading Company, with the number of shares each investor had taken, set down opposite his name. He glanced through this hastily, for he knew that it could have no bearing on the present situation, since the tragic failure of that enterprise had in the very nature of things cancelled all obligations.
There were other papers dealing with this luckless venture; accounts covering the expenses of the party from the time it left Benson until it reached Fort Laramie. When he put the last of these aside, only two papers were left. One of these proved to be a brief memorandum of the personal indebtedness of the Landray brothers.
Again Wade looked at Mrs. Landray. But her face told him nothing, and he turned his attention to the last paper on the table.
It gave briefly a description of the various properties owned by the Landrays. This he put aside with the others.
“What's wrong, Mrs. Landray?” he said, after a momentary silence.
“Did you see in that first paper—” He found it while she spoke, “—where something has been crossed out?”
“Yes, here, an item of twenty-five hundred dollars. What is it, 'Deferred payments on the—' what? I can't make it out.”
“On the distillery,” said Virginia.
“Oh, yes, that's it! 'Due from Levi Tucker—'”
“And now in the very last paper you looked at, my husband mentions two thousand acres in Belmont County.”