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Then she told him how Peanut had chased their dog in there and broke up their bridge party. They both had to laugh at that. "Their gardener, James, told me that Old Man Wisner ain't much, nor the old lady neither," says Bonnie Bell after a while. "It's just what I thought." "I don't know as he ought to talk that way about the people he works for," says her pa.
"Kind of a tall man with a sandy beard? Good talker? Kind of plausible talker? Used to live down east of Syracuse? Pretty well fixed? Went out west three years ago? Calls himself Doctor Rucker?" "I guess that's the man," said I; "do you know where he is now?" "Had a wife and no children?" asked Wisner. "And was his wife a quiet, kind of sad-looking woman that never said much?" "Yes!
I'll come round again tomorrow morning." He went on down the dock into their boathouse. I set down not far from the door, smoking and looking out over the lake. I heard someone in there begin to talk. It was him and Old Lady Wisner I'd heard her before once in a while. I couldn't help hearing them if I'd wanted to, and I did want to. "James," says she, "where have you been?
"Well, Colonel," says I, "I reckon we'll get back our ranch some of these days, won't we? I shore wish we would." "So do I, Curly; but I'm afraid not," says he. "Why not?" I ast him. "Well, it's Old Man Wisner that's the reason," says he. "You see, it's his money that they are working with now," says he.
He's got his funds tied up in cargoes of meat and grain that ain't cashed in. He's short, and damn short! And I know it; and these are times when banks ain't loosening much. War yes; I'll show him war! There can't nobody get title to a foot of that land till Old Man Wisner gets his title from me and he ain't never going to get it. If it's my last act I'll ruin him.
Yes," says Katherine. "They didn't speak for a while. You know, Honey, the Wisners are among our best people. But then, mommah's a Daughter of the Revolution and a Colonial Dame, and a Patriot Son, or something of the sort besides. Mrs. Wisner, she's only a Daughter and not a Dame; so she doesn't rank quite as high as mommah. Some said that she faked her ancestors when she come in too.
Can't you remember when you and me set on the gate of the big pasture, with our rifles acrost our knees, and waited for them sheepmen to come up and try to get them sheep through us? Did they get through? No; no one had us buffaloed. That was when you and me was men, Curly. "What have we done now? We let this damn hypocrite, Dave Wisner, get the best of us all the way down the line.
"You've heard something?" "I have a message from our consul at Puerto del Norte, Mr. Wisner." "For me?" asked the concessionaire. "Why, no," was the hesitant reply. "It isn't quite clear, but it seems to be for Miss Brewster." "Why not?" inquired that young lady coolly. "What is it?"
Oh, I see how you thought that! You maybe seen him pottering around in the flowers like he was always dotty about them things but no hired man; he wasn't hardly worth a salary." "And what do you think?" laughs Bonnie Bell at Old Lady Wisner then. "His mother thought once I was a hired girl!" Old Lady Wisner for quite a while she'd been playing a sort of accompaniment, talking to herself.
I reckon, taking fair values, I'm worth ten or twelve million dollars maybe twenty or forty most of it made in this here town in a couple of years or so, and all out of the Wisner money we got for the ranch, which we're going to get back pretty nigh clean of cost, you might say. I didn't mean to; but I'm rich awful rich!
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