This time Mallow spoke up. "I'm bally-hooing for a new joint; Fulton's Fancy Waffle Foundry. Follow me and I'll try to wedge you in. But you'll have to eat fast and pick your teeth on the sidewalk, for we need the room." In answer to Stoner's stare, the speaker explained his interest in the welfare of Wichita Falls's newest eating place, and en route thereto he told how Margie Fulton came to be running it. "Gray did it. He got the Parker girl to help us, and we had the place all fixed up by the time Margie got here. She's tickled pink, and it'll coin money--if it isn't pinched." "Pinched?" "Sure! Bennie's the cashier, and he palms everything from dimes to dishtowels. Force of habit! Better count your change till I break him of short-changing the customers." "_You_--" Stoner stopped in his tracks. "Oh, I'm giving him lessons in elemental honesty." "My God! Are you turning honest, too?" the other man exclaimed. "Seems like that's all I hear lately." It was a blue day for Henry Nelson when Avenger Number One came in, for it made necessary immediate drilling operations on his part. And the worst of it was the well was not big enough to establish a high value for his holdings. It was just enough of a producer to force him to begin three offsets and that, for the moment, was an undertaking decidedly inconvenient. Bell Nelson was even more dismayed at the prospect than was his son, for upon him fell the necessity of raising the money. "Hell of a note," the old fellow grumbled, "when a wet well puts a crimp in us! A little more good luck like this and we'll go broke." "We can't afford to let go, or to sub-lease--" "Of course not, after the stand we've taken. There's talk on the street about the bank, now, and--I'd give a good deal to know where it comes from." The junior Nelson had heard similar echoes, but he held his tongue. "I never did like your way of doing business," the speaker resumed, fretfully. "We've overreached. You wanted it all and--this is the result." Now Henry Nelson was warranted in resenting this accusation, for it had ever been Bell's way to pursue a grasping policy, therefore he cried, angrily: "That's right; pass the buck. You know you wouldn't listen to anything else. If we're in deep, you're more to blame than I." "Nothing of the sort." Old Bell began a profane denial, but the younger man broke in, irritably: "I've never won an argument with you, so have it your own way. But while you're raising money for the Avenger offsets, you'd better raise plenty, for Gray is going to punch holes down as fast as ever he can." "Who is this Gray? What's he got against you?" Henry's eyes shifted. "Has he got anything against me? He bought a good lease and was wise enough to get somebody to make a well for him--" "Those crooks! Those wildcatters!" "Now, he proposes to develop his acreage as rapidly as possible. Nothing strange about that, is there?" "Is he sore at you?" "We didn't get along very well in France."