There was a portentous quietness in the little wooden town which did not exactly please Mr. Faraday Slocum, the somewhat discredited local agent of Grant Devine, as he ascended the steep street from the grocery store. The pines closed in upon it, but their sombre spires were growing dim, and the white mists clung about them, for dusk was creeping up the valley. The latter fact brought Slocum a sense of satisfaction, and at the same time a growing uneasiness. He had, as it happened, signally failed to collect a certain sum from the store-keeper, who had expressed his opinion of him and his doings with vitriolic candor, and it was partly as the result of this that very little escaped his notice as he proceeded with an ostentatious leisureliness towards his dwelling.

A straggling row of stores and houses, log and frame and galvanized iron, jumbled all together in unsightly confusion, stretched away before him towards the gap in the forest where the railroad track came in, but it was the little groups of men who hung about them which occupied his quiet attention. He saluted them with somewhat forced good-humor as he went by, but there was no great cordiality in their responses, and some of them stared at him in uncompromising silence. There was, he felt, a certain tension in the atmosphere, and it was not without a purpose he stopped in front of the wooden hotel, where a little crowd had collected upon the verandah.

"It's kind of sultry to-night, boys," he said.

Nobody responded for a moment or two, and then there was an unpleasant laugh as somebody said, "You've hit it; I guess it is."

Slocum remembered that most of those loungers had been glad to greet him, and even hand him their spare dollars, not long ago; but there was a decided difference now. He was a capable business man, who could make the most of an opportunity, and the inhabitants of the little wooden town had shown themselves disposed to regard certain trifling obliquities leniently, while they or their friends made satisfactory profits on the deals in ranching land and building lots he recommended. That, however, was while the boom lasted, but when the bottom had, as they expressed it, dropped out, and a good many of them found themselves saddled with unmarketable possessions, they commenced to be troubled with grave doubts concerning the rectitude of his conduct. Slocum was naturally quite aware of this, but he was a man of nerve, and quietly walked up the verandah steps.

"It's that hot I must have a drink, boys. Who's coming in with me?" he said, genially.

A few months ago a good many of them would have been willing to profit by the invitation, but that night nobody moved, and Slocum laughed softly.

"Well," he said, "I'm not going to worry you. This is evidently a temperance meeting."

He passed into the empty bar alone, and a man who leaned upon the counter in his shirt sleeves shook his head as he glanced towards the verandah.

"They're not in a good humor to-night. It looks very much as if someone has been talking to them?" he said.

Slocum smiled a little, though he had already noticed this, and taken precautions the bar-keeper never suspected.

"I guess they'll simmer down. Who has been talking to them?" he said.

"The two ranchers you sold the Hemlock Range to. There was another man who'd bought a piece of natural prairie, and it cost him most of five dollars before he got through telling them what he thought of you. Now, I don't know what their notion is, but I'd light out for a little if I was you."

Slocum appeared to reflect. "Well," he said, "I may go to-morrow.""I'd go to-night," said the bar-keeper, significantly. "I guess it would be wiser."

Slocum, who did not consider it necessary to tell him that he quite agreed with this, went out, and a few minutes later stopped outside his house, which was the last one in the town. A big, rudely-painted sign, nailed across the front of it, recommended any one who desired to buy or sell land and mineral properties or had mortgages to arrange, to come in and confer with the agent of Grant Devine. He glanced back up the street, and was relieved to notice that there was nobody loitering about that part of it. Then he looked at the forest the trail led into, which was shadowy and still, and, slipping round the building, went in through the back of it. A woman stood waiting him in a dimly-lighted room, which was littered with feminine clothing besides two big valises and an array of bulky packages. She was expensively dressed, but her face was anxious, and he noticed that her fingers were quivering.

"You're quite ready, Sue?" he said.

The woman pointed to the packages with a little dramatic gesture. "Oh, yes," she said. "I'm ready, though I'll have to leave most two hundred dollars' worth of clothes behind me. I've no use for taking in plain sewing while you think over what you've brought me to in the penitentiary."

Slocum smiled drily. "If you hadn't wanted quite so many dry goods, I'm not sure it would have come to this, but we needn't worry about that just now. Tom will have the horses round in 'bout five minutes. You don't figure on taking all that truck along with you?"

"I do," said the woman. "I've got to have something to put on when we get to Oregon!"

"Well," said Slocum, grimly, "I'll be quite glad to get out with a whole hide, and I guess it couldn't be done if we started with a packhorse train or a wagon. I hadn't quite fixed to light out until I got the message that Devine, who didn't seem quite pleased with the last accounts, was coming in."

"Could you have stood the boys off?"

"I might have done," said Slocum, reflectively. "Still, I couldn't stand off Devine. It's dollars he's coming for, and I've got 'bout half the accounts call for here."

"You're going to leave him them?"

Slocum laughed. "No," he said. "I guess they'll come in handy in Oregon. I'm going to leave him the boys to reckon with. They'll be here with clubs soon after the cars come in, and we'll be a league away down the trail by then."

A patter of horse hoofs outside cut short the colloquy, though there was a brief altercation when the woman once more insisted on taking all the packages with her. Slocum terminated it by bundling her out of the door, and, when she tearfully consented to mount a kicking pony, swung himself to the saddle. Still, for several minutes his heart was in his mouth, as he picked his way through the blacker shadows on the skirt of the beaten trail, until a man rose suddenly out of them.

"Hallo!" he said. "Where're you going?"

Slocum, leaning sideways, gave his wife's pony a cut with the switch he held, and then laughed as he turned to the man.

"I guess that's my business, but I'm going out of town."

"Quite sure?" said the other, who made a sudden clutch at his bridle.

He did not reach it, for Slocum was ready with hand and heel, and the switch came down upon the outstretched arm. Then there was a plunge and a rapid beat of hoofs, and Slocum, swinging half round in his saddle, swept off his hat to the gasping man.

"I guess I am," he said. "You'll tell the boys I'm sorry I couldn't wait for them."

Then he struck his wife's horse again. "Let him go," he said. "We'll have three or four of them after us in about ten minutes."

The woman said nothing, but braced herself to ride, and, while the beat of hoofs grew fainter among the silent pines, the man on foot ran gasping up the climbing trail. There was bustle and consternation when he reached the wooden town, and, while two or three men who had good horses hastily saddled them, the rest collected in clusters which coalesced, and presently a body of silent men proceeded towards the Slocum dwelling. As they stopped in front of it, the hoot of a whistle came ringing across the pines, and there was an increasing roar as a train came up the valley. That, however, did not, so they fancied, concern them, and they commenced a parley with the local constable, who came hurrying after them. His duties consisted chiefly in the raising and peddling of fruit, and he had been recommended for the post by popular acclaim as the most tolerant man in the settlement, but he was, it seemed, not without a certain sense of responsibility.

"What d'you figure on doing with those clubs, boys?" he said.

"Seasoning them," said somebody. "Mine's quite soft and green. Now, why're you not taking the trail after Slocum? The province allows you for a horse, and Hake Guffy's has three good legs on him, anyway."

The constable waved his hand, deprecatingly. "He fell down and hurt one of them hauling green stuff to the depÔt. I guess I'd have to shove him most of the way."

There was a little laughter, which had, however, a trace of grimness in it, and one of the men grasped the constable's shoulder.

"Hadn't you better go round and run Jean Frenchy's hogs out of your citron patch?" he said.For a moment the constable appeared about to go, and then his face expanded into a genial grin.

"That's not good enough, boys," he said. "I'm not quite so fresh that the cows would eat me. What've you come round here for, anyway?"

The man who had spoken made a little gesture of resignation. "Well," he said, "if you have got to know, we are going in to see if Slocum has left any of the dollars he beat us out of behind him."

"No," said the constable, stoutly. "Nobody's going in there without a warrant, unless it's me."

There was a little murmur. The man was elderly, and a trifle infirm, which was partly why it had been decided that he was most likely to find a use for the provincial pay, but he turned upon the threshold and faced the crowd resolutely. Had he been younger, it is very probable that he would have been hustled away, but a Western mob is usually, to some extent, at least, chivalrous, and there was another murmur of protest.

"Go home!" said one man. "They're not your dollars, anyway."

"Boys," and the old man swung an arm aloft, "I'm here, and I'm going to make considerable trouble for the man who lays a hand on me. This is a law-abiding country, and Slocum wasn't fool enough to leave anything he could carry off."

"We don't want to hurt you," said one of the assembly, "but we're going in."There was a growl of approbation, and the men were closing in upon the door when a stranger pushed his way through the midst of them, and then swung round and stood facing them beside the constable. He held himself commandingly, and, though nobody appeared to recognize him, for darkness was closing down, the meaning of his attitude was plain, and the crowd gave back a little.

"Go home, boys!" he said. "I'll most certainly have the law of any man who puts his foot inside this door."

There was a little ironical laughter, and the crowd once more closed in. Half the men of the settlement were present there, and a good many of them had bought land from, or trusted their spare dollars to, Slocum.

"Who are you, anyway?" said one.

The stranger laughed. "The man who owns the building. My name's Devine."

It was a bold announcement, for those who heard him were not in the best of humors then, or disposed to concern themselves with the question how far the principal was acquainted with or responsible for the doings of his agent.

"The boss thief!" said somebody. "Get hold of him, and bring him along to the hotel. Then, if Thorkell can't lock him up, we'll consider what we'll do with him."

"No," said another man. "He'll keep for a little without going bad, and we're here to see if Slocum left anything behind him. Break that door in!"

It was a critical moment, for there was a hoarse murmur of approbation, and the crowd surged closer about the pair. At any sign of weakness it would, perhaps, have gone hardly with them, but the elderly constable stood very still and quiet, with empty hands, while Devine fumbled inside his jacket. Then he swung one foot forward, and his right arm rose, until his hand, which was clenched on a dusky object, was level with his shoulder.

"Boys," he said, drily, "somebody's going to get hurt in another minute. This is my office, and I can't do with any of you inside it to-night."

"Then, if you hand our dollars out, it would suit us most as well," said the spokesman.

Devine appeared to laugh softly. "I guess there are very few of them there. Anybody who can prove a claim on me will get satisfaction, but he'll have to wait. Neither the place nor I will run away, and you'll find me right here when you come along to-morrow."

"Are you going to give every man back the dollars Slocum got from him?"

It was evident that the question met with the approbation of the crowd, and a less resolute man might have temporized, but Devine laughed openly now.

"No," he said, drily. "That's just what I'm not going to do. A man takes his chances when he makes a deal in land, and can't expect to cry off his bargain when they go against him. Still, if any one will bring me proof that Slocum swindled him, I'll see what I can do, but I guess it will be very little if some of you destroy the books and papers he recorded the deals in. You'll have to wait until to-morrow, while I worry through them."

His resolution had its due effect, and the fact that no man could reach the threshold until he and the constable had been pulled down counted for a good deal, too. The men also wanted no more than they considered themselves entitled to, and shrank from what, if it was to prove successful, must evidently be a murderous assault upon two elderly men.

"I guess there's sense in that," said one of them. "It's going to be quite easy to make sure he don't get out of the settlement."

"I'm for letting him have until to-morrow, anyway," said another. "Still, the papers aren't there. Where's John Collier? He picked up some books and truck Slocum slung away when he met him on the trail."

"I've got them right here," and another man stepped forward. "I was coming in from the ranch when I heard two horses pounding down the trail, and jumped clear into the fern. The man who went past me tried to sling a package into the gully, but I guess he got kind of rattled when I shouted, and dropped the thing. He didn't seem to want to stop, and, when he went on at a gallop, I groped round and picked the package up."

Devine lowered the pistol, and turned quietly to the crowd. "There are just two courses open to you, boys, and you're going to make mighty little but trouble for yourselves by taking one of them. This is my office, and so long as I can hold you off nobody's coming in until he's asked. I feel quite equal to stopping two or three. Now, if you'll let me have those books and go home quietly, I'll have straightened Slocum's affairs out by to-morrow, and be ready to see what can be done for you."

The men were evidently wavering, and there was a brief consultation, after which the leader turned to Devine.

"We've no use for making any trouble that can be helped, and we'll go home," he said. "You can have those books, and a committee will come round to see what you've fixed up after breakfast to-morrow."

Devine nodded tranquilly. "I guess you're wise," he said. "Good night, boys!"

They went away, and left him to go in with the constable, who came out in a few minutes with a contented grin, which suggested that Devine had signified his appreciation of his efforts liberally. The latter, however, sat down, dusty and worn with an arduous journey, to undertake a night's hard work. He had left the Canopus before sunrise, and spent most of the day in the saddle, but nobody would have suspected him of weariness as he sat, grim and intent of face, before a table littered with papers. He had just imposed his will upon an angry crowd, and the tension of the past few minutes would have shaken many a younger man, but he showed no sign of feeling it, and, as the hours slipped by, only rose at intervals to stretch his aching limbs and brush the cigar ash from his dust-smeared clothes. This was one of the hard men who, in building up their own fortunes, had also laid the foundations of the future prosperity of a great province, and a little fatigue did not count with him.

The settlement was very still, and the lamp-light paling as the chilly dawn crept in, when at last he opened a book that recorded Slocum's dealings several years back. There were several folded slips on which he had jotted down certain data inside it, and Devine smiled somewhat drily as he came upon one entry:—

"24th. 6,000 dollars from Harford Brooke, in purchase of 400 acres bush land, Quatomac Valley. Ref. 22, slip B."

Devine turned up 22 B, and read: "Mem. About 150 acres 200-foot pines, with gravel sub-soil, and very little mould on top of it. Rest of it rock. Oregon man bid 1,000 dollars on the 2nd, but asked for re-survey and cried off. 12th. Gave Custer four days' option at 950. 20th. Asked the British sucker 6,500, and clinched the deal at 6,000."

Devine closed the book, and sat thoughtfully still for a minute or two. The epithet his agent had applied to Brooke carried with it the stigma of puerile folly in that country, and Devine had usually very little sympathy with the men it could be fittingly attached to. Still, he felt that nobody could very appropriately term his contractor a sucker now, and he had just discovered that he had been systematically plundered himself. Several points which had given him food for reflection also became suddenly plain, and he lighted another cigar before he fell to work again. He had, however, in the meanwhile decided what course to adopt with Brooke when he went back to the Canopus mine.