Rimrock Jones. Coolidge Dane

pointed jest and clambered back to the plank sidewalk where he sat down convulsed in his chair.

      "Aw, you make me tired!" said Rimrock shortly. "You know I don't owe no woman."

      "You owe every one else, though," came back Hassayamp with a Texas yupe; "I got you there, boy. You shore cain't git around that!"

      "Huh!" grunted Rimrock as he swung lightly to the ground. "Two bits, maybe! Four bits! A couple of dollars! What's that to talk about when a man is out after millions? Is my credit good for the drinks? Well, come on in then, boys; and I'll show you something good!"

      He led the way through the swinging doors and Hassayamp followed ponderously. The card players followed also and several cowboys, appearing as if by miracle, lined up along with the rest. Old Hassayamp looked them over grimly, breathed hard and spread out the glasses.

      "Well, all right, Rim," he observed, "between friends—but don't bid in the whole town."

      "When I drink, my friends drink," answered Rimrock and tossed off his first drink in a month. "Now!" he went on, fetching out his sack, "I'll show you something good!"

      He poured out a pile of blue-gray sand and stood away from it admiringly.

      Old Hassayamp drew out his glasses and balanced them on his nose, then he gazed at the pile of sand.

      "Well," he said, "what is it, anyway?"

      "It's copper, by grab, mighty nigh ten per cent copper, and you can scoop it up with a shovel. There's worlds of it, Hassayamp, a whole doggoned mountain! That's the trouble, there's almost too much! I can't handle it, man, it'll take millions to do it; but believe me, the millions are there. All I need is a stake now, just a couple of thousand dollars——"

      "Huh!" grunted Hassayamp looking up over his glasses, "you don't reckon I've got that much, do you, to sink in a pile of sand?"

      "If not you, then somebody else," replied Rimrock confidently. "Some feller that's out looking for sand. I heard about a sport over in London that tried on a bet to sell five-pound notes for a shilling. That's like me offering to sell you twenty-five dollars for the English equivalent of two bits. And d'ye think he could get anyone to take 'em? He stood up on a soap box and waved those notes in the air, but d'ye think he could get anybody to buy?"

      He paused with a cynical smile and looked Hassayamp in the eye.

      "Well—no," conceded Hassayamp weakly.

      "You bet your life he could!" snapped back Rimrock. "A guy came along that knowed. He took one look at those five-pound notes and handed up fifty cents."

      "'I'll take two of 'em,' he says; and walks off with fifty dollars!"

      Rimrock scooped up his despised sand and poured it back into the bag, after which he turned on his heel. As the doors swung to behind him Old Hassayamp looked at his customers and shook his head impressively. From the street outside Rimrock could be heard telling a Mexican in Spanish to take his horse to the corrals. He was master of Gunsight yet, though all his money had vanished and his credit would buy nothing but the drinks.

      "Well, what d'ye know about that?" observed Hassayamp meditatively. "By George, sometimes I almost think that boy is right!"

      He cleared his throat and hobbled towards the door and the crowd took the hint to disperse.

      On the edge of the shady sidewalk Rimrock Jones, the follower after big dreams, sat silent, balancing the sack of ore in a bronzed and rock-scarred hand. He was a powerful man, with the broad, square-set shoulders that come from much swinging of a double jack or cranking at a windlass. The curling beard of youth had covered his hard-bitten face and his head was unconsciously thrust forward, as if he still glimpsed his vision and was eager to follow it further. The crowd settled down and gazed at him curiously, for they knew he had a story to tell, and at last the great Rimrock sighed and looked at his work-worn hands.

      "Hard going," he said, glancing up at Hassayamp. "I've got a ten-foot hole to sink on twenty different claims, no powder, and nothing but Mexicans for help. But I sure turned up some good ore—she gets richer the deeper you go."

      "Any gold?" enquired Hassayamp hopefully.

      "Yes, but pocketty. I leave all that chloriding to the Mexicans while I do my discovery work. They've got some picked rock on the dump."

      "Why don't you quit that dead work and do a little chloriding yourself? Pound out a little gold—that's the way to get a stake!"

      Old Hassayamp spat the words out impatiently, but Rimrock seemed hardly to hear.

      "Nope," he said, "no pocket-mining for me. There's copper there, millions of tons of it. I'll make my winning yet."

      "Huh!" grunted Hassayamp, and Rimrock came out of his trance.

      "You don't think so, hey?" he challenged and then his face softened to a slow, reminiscent smile.

      "Say, Hassayamp," he said, "did you ever hear about that prospector that found a thousand pounds of gold in one chunk? He was lost on the desert, plumb out of water and forty miles from nowhere. He couldn't take the chunk along with him and if he left it there the sand would cover it up. Now what was that poor feller to do?"

      "Well, what did he do?" enquired Hassayamp cautiously.

      "He couldn't make up his mind," answered Rimrock, "so he stayed there till he starved to death."

      "You're plumb full of these sayings and parables, ain't you?" remarked Hassayamp sarcastically. "What's that got to do with the case?"

      "Well," began Rimrock, sitting down on the edge of the sidewalk and looking absently up the street, "take me, for instance. I go out across the desert to the Tecolotes and find a whole mountain of copper. You don't have to chop it out with chisels, like that native copper around the Great Lakes; and you don't have to go underground and do timbering like they do around Bisbee and Cananea. All you have to do is to shoot it down and scoop it up with a steam shovel. Now I've located the whole danged mountain and done most of my discovery work, but if some feller don't give me a boost, like taking that prospector a canteen of water, I've either got to lose my mine or sit down and starve to death. If I'd never done anything, it'd be different, but you know that I made the Gunsight."

      He leaned forward and fixed the saloon keeper with his earnest eyes and Old Hassayamp held up both hands.

      "Yes, yes, boy, I know!" he broke out hurriedly. "Don't talk to me—I'm convinced. But by George, Rim, you can spend more money and have less to show for it than any man I know. What's the use? That's what we all say. What's the use of staking you when you'll turn right around in front of us and throw the money away? Ain't I staked you? Ain't L. W. staked you?"

      "Yes! And he broke me, too!" answered Rimrock, raising his voice to a defiant boom. "Here he comes now, the blue-faced old dastard!"

      He thrust out his jaw and glared up the street where L. W. Lockhart, the local banker, came stumping down the sidewalk. L. W. was tall and rangy, with a bulldog jaw clamped down on a black cigar, and an air of absolute detachment from his surroundings.

      "Yes, I mean you!" shouted Rimrock insultingly as L. W. went grimly past. "You claim to be a white man, and then stand in with that lawyer to beat me out of my mine. I made you, you old nickel-pincher, and now you go by me and don't even say: 'Have a drink!'"

      "You're drunk!" retorted Lockhart, looking back over his shoulder, and Rimrock jumped to his feet.

      "I'll show you!" he cried, starting angrily after him, and L. W. turned swiftly to meet him.

      "You'll show me what?" he demanded coldly as Rimrock put his hand to his gun.

      "Never mind!" answered Rimrock. "You know you jobbed me. I let you in on a good thing and you sold me out to McBain. I want some money and if you don't give it to me I'll—I'll go over and collect from him."

      "Oh, you want some money, hey?" repeated Lockhart. "I thought you was going to show me something!"

      The banker scowled as he rolled