“Come over hyur,” he said, leading off to a distant fence. At the safe distance they halted. “I tell yuh just how ’tis,” he observed very secretively. “Thar wuz a feller come along hyur three er four weeks ago an’ at that time I didn’t know ez how this hyur now wuz min’l, see? An’ he ast me, ’thout sayin’ nuthin’ ez tuh whut he knowed, whut I’d take for it, acre fer acre. Well, thar wuz anuther feller, a neighbor o’ mine, had been along hyur an’ he wuz sayin’ ez how a piece o’ land just below, about forty acres, wuz sold fer five thousan’ dollars. Seein’ ez how my land wuz the same kind o’ land, only better, I ’lowed ez how thar bein’ seventy acres hyur tuh his forty I oughta git nearly twicet ez much, an’ I said so. He didn’t ’low ez I ought at fust, but later on he kind o’ come roun’ an’ we agreed ez how I bein’ the one that fust had the place—I wuz farmin’ hyur ’fore ever I married my wife—that ef any sale wuz made I orter git the biggest sheer. So we kind o’ fixed it up b’tween us, quiet-like an’ not lettin’ anybody else know, that when it come tuh makin’ out the papers an’ sich at the end uv the sixty days he was to gimme a shade the best o’ the money afore we signed any papers. Course I wouldn’t do nuthin’ like that ef the place hadn’t b’longed tuh me in the fust place, an’ ef me an’ my wife an’ chil’n got along ez well’s we did at fust, but she’s allers a-fightin’ an’ squallin’. Ef he come back hyur, ez he ’lowed he would, I wuz t’ have eight thousan’ fer myself, an’ me an’ my wife wuzta divide the rest b’tween us ez best we could, her to have her third, ez the law is.” The stranger listened with mingled astonishment, amusement and satisfaction at the thought that the contract, if not exactly illegal, could at least to Queeder be made to appear so. For an appeal to the wife must break it, and besides because of the old man’s cupidity he might easily be made to annul the original agreement. For plainly even now this farmer did not know the full value of all that he had so foolishly bartered away. About him were fields literally solid with zinc under the surface. Commercially $60,000 would be a mere bagatelle to give for it, when the East was considered. One million dollars would be a ridiculously low capitalization for a mine based on this property. A hundred thousand might well be his share for his part in the transaction. Good heavens, the other fellow had bought a fortune for a song! It was only fair to try to get it away from him.