“Pay you—pay you two hundred a month”—Hoag gasped—“pay you double what you now get so that you can spend it on a lazy, good-for-nothin' scamp? Not on your life! I'll see the last one of you dead first, an' laid out stark an' cold.”
“Then it is settled,” Paul answered, calmly. “I told Doran I'd let him have my decision in the morning. I'll leave you on the first of next month.”
“You can go an' be damned,” Hoag swore under his breath, and raised his clenched fist and shook it in Paul's face. “Git out o' my sight.”
And with that ultimatum Hoag stalked out to the platform. Paul looked at him regretfully a moment and then turned away.
He failed to see his employer at the supper-table. He was at work in his room near bedtime when he heard a heavy, dragging step on the stairs. The next moment Hoag leaned in the open doorway. His face was flushed with drink; there was a thwarted glare in his bloodshot eyes.
“I reckon you meant what you said about Doran?” he began, sullenly.
“Yes, I simply stated the facts,” Paul answered.
“You said you'd keep on with me for the price Doran's willin' to pay?”
“Yes,” Paul returned, with dignity. “I meant to put it that way.”
“Well, I reckon”—in blended chagrin and anger—“you are worth as much to me as you are to him. The offer comes through enemies of mine who want to injure me—fellers that stand in with Doran—a gang o' narrow church elders over there, who have got it in for me. You stay on, an' I'll try not to kick any more over your private matters. Do you understand?”