“You’ll not think it so much of a joke when you are behind the bars.”
“No, I daresay not. I expect I would better enjoy it while I have the opportunity. Try one of these peaches, Miss Gray.” He leaned against a rock and smoked the placid post-prandial cigar of him whose soul is at peace. I, too, had lit up, but my mind was far from equable. I was possessed by the vision of a headlong generous girl under the fascination of this charming young vagabond. Yet I confess that for myself I admired as much as I disliked his dare-devil indifference to consequences, though for the life of me I could not guess what his game was or how it could advantage him to detain the Copper King on this mountain top against his will.
He expounded his easy philosophy with airy candor. “After all, laws are made for man, not man for the laws. Mr. Gray is a capitalist, and he can tell you that laws are to be obeyed with discretion. There would not be any use in having them if somebody did not break them occasionally. Well, this is my day off. I’m playing ping-pong with the statutes of Colorado”
“But why?” I demanded. “What good does it do you?”
“Oh come, Damron! Mayn’t I have a secret or two of my own? I don’t suppose you ever explained publicly just why you happen to be spending your vacation in Colorado instead of Timbuctoo.”
I fear I blushed. Glancing covertly at my reason, I found it the fairest under the sun, but too present to admit of discussion.
Suddenly Simon Gray cut crisply into the talk for the first time.
“Of course I understand why you are holding me here, Halloway. You are working under instructions from your father to keep me until after the election this afternoon. But the thing is too barefaced. It won’t hold in law. It’s a conspiracy.”
Halloway’s masterful eves looked straight at him.
“I have not seen or heard from my father in two years, Mr. Gray. He does not have anything to do with his scalawag son. You do not need to look beyond me to place the responsibility for this. But you’re right in one thing. I intend that you shall not reach Denver in time for the Copper Consolidated meeting.”