Macartney nodded sympathetically. "If I come out a hundred cents on the dollar when harvest's over, it's rather more than I expect," he said. "My stake's in land and wheat, and I couldn't unload anything except at a smart loss just now. In the circumstances, it seems to me that Bruce is making you a reasonable offer." "I'm not likely to raise on it from anybody else," and Leland frowned as he glanced at the letter. "Still, if I let him have the cattle, I can't stock the ranch again. They should have cleared me quite a few thousand dollars, if I could have held on, and sold them fat in the fall." "If I were in your place and could hold on, I would. Still, you have to have some money in hand. The banks won't look at land, and I couldn't raise you anything on mortgage except at a crippling interest." "That's just my trouble, I haven't got any cash." The broker glanced at him reflectively. "Well," he said, "it's not my business, but you must have had a pile last year. Of course, you were over in the Old Country, but you could afford it, and you never struck me as an extravagant man." Leland smiled in a somewhat wry fashion. "I don't quite think I am, but that's not the question. I've got to have the money to go on with, and, as you say, I couldn't get it on a mortgage that wouldn't ruin me. Tell Bruce he can have the cattle, and, if he'll let me know when he wants them, we'll round them up for him. It's that or nothing, but I stand to lose 'most enough on the run to break me this year." "From what you told me, if you hang on to the run, you'll have to let Prospect go." Leland's face hardened. "Well," he said, "I guess I would, and that, if it has to be, is going to hurt me. If I stood as I did last fall, I could carry over, but now the market and the season are both against me. But I must be getting home. You'll fix it up with Bruce?" The ostler from the Occidental was waiting outside with a hired horse, and Leland, swinging himself wearily into the saddle, rode down the unpaved street. A blaze of light shone out from the verandah of the little hotel, and he could hear the laughter of those inside and the hum of merry voices. Further on, somebody was playing a fiddle in a house the door and windows of which stood wide open. He sighed a little as he rode by. A year ago, he would have spent the night there or at the hotel, taking his part in the pointed badinage with keen enjoyment. His good-humour had been infectious then, and everybody had had a pleasant word for him; but things were different now.