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Hurray for treason, strategy, and spoils!" He drank the liquid fire at one reckless gulp, and laughing again, in ghastly humor, lurched suddenly out at the open door and across to the nearest saloon. Rickart, in sudden apprehension for the "boy" he genuinely loved, called out to him shrilly, but in vain.
"Look here, boy," said Rickart, clutching the horseman's wrist in his hand, "do you know that Gettysburg, and Nap, and Dave are camping on the desert, waiting for you to come home?" Van looked at him steadily. He was far from being dizzied in his brain. Since the blow received at the hands of Beth had not sufficed to make him utterly witless, then nothing drinkable could overcome his reason.
He thought of the simplest thing to do hire a private survey of the reservation line, either to confirm or disprove the work that Lawrence had done, and then map out his course. The line, however, was long, surveyors were fairly swamped with work, not a foot could be traveled without some ready cash. He went to Rickart of the bank. Rickart listened to his plan of campaign and shook his head.
The cashier, Rickart, it was who had shouted the summons a little, gray-eyed, thin-faced man, with a very long moustache. "How are you, Rick?" said the horseman familiarly. "What's going on?" "Haven't you heard? you?" interrogated Rickart. "I thought it was funny you were loafing along so leisurely. Didn't you know to-day was the day for the rush?" "I did," said Van. "What about it?"
"Why a dozen men all mad to think they never got on," said Rickart, not without heat. "It's an outrage, Van! You might have fought them off if you'd been on deck, and made the location yourself! Where have you been?" Van smiled. The neatness of the whole arrangement began to be presented to his mind. "Oh, I was out of the way all right," he said. "My friends took care of that."
When Beth procured the transfer of her money from New York to Goldite, Rickart promptly reported the news. It appeared to Van a confirmation of all his previous suspicions. He could not fight a woman, and Bostwick and McCoppet remained upon the claim. Searle wrote nearly every day to Beth, excusing his absence, relating his success, and declaring the increase of his love.
Rickart gave him the bottle and a glass. He poured a stiff amber draught and raised it on high, a wild, fevered look in his eyes. "Here's to the gods of law and order!" he said. "Here's to faith, hope, and charity. Here's to friendship, honor, and loyalty. Here's to the gallant little minority that love their neighbors as themselves. Give me perfidy or give me death!
Rickart, like a brother and Rickart told him Searle is a four-flusher hasn't a bean and looks like a mighty good imitation of a crook. Searle! You put up thirty stung, Beth, stung, good and plenty!" Beth's hand was on her cheek, pressing it to whiteness. "Oh, I've been afraid that something was wrong that something terrible Why, Glen, that would be forgery obtaining money under false pretences!
To the loss of his claim was attributed all his pyrotechnics, and no one, unless it was Rickart, was aware of the old proverbial "woman in the case," who had planted the sting that stung. Rickart, like a worried animal, following the footsteps of his master, sought vainly all night to head Van off and quiet him down in bed.
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