"Well, I'm not going to have him arrested," Rexhill announced doggedly, "at least, not on any trumped up charge. He's broken my bread, Helen likes him. We call him a friend, in fact. I always play square with my friends--as far as possible. Strategy is strategy, nobody can quarrel with that; but this thing you propose is something more." Moran, while listening, had restrained his impatience with difficulty. He not only had reason on his side, but personal hate as well. His sense of triumph in bringing the news to Rexhill had not been for their mutual cause alone; it had seemed to Moran to point toward the end of his rivalry with Wade for the love of Helen. To have the fruits of victory snatched from him, because of a sentiment of friendship, was almost more than the agent could stand for. "Good God, Senator," he burst out, "don't throw this chance away! Think what it means to us! We are running close to the wind, and until this moment, it's been a toss up whether we'd get out of here with our lives; whether I would, at any rate. I've run a mighty big bluff on these cattle people, but I did it because it was the only way. I've held my own so far, but when they find out that it's not farm land we're after, but ore--why, Senator, there'll be no holding them at all! With Wade at their head and forty miles between us and the cars, where would we get off? We'd be lucky if we didn't swing from the limb of a tree. Do you suppose Wade would remember then that he'd broken your bread? I'll bet dollars to doughnuts he wouldn't. "But"--his voice sank to a significant whisper--"if we land him in jail...." "His friends here would get him out," interposed the Senator, nervously wiping his glasses. "Then Uncle Sam would put him in again, with a troop of cavalry to keep order here, and _that_ would be another advantage gained for our side. No, sir, once we get him in jail, we've got the law with us and against him, don't forget that. Then the cattle party would lay mighty low. Wade has been their leader right along. I tell you, it's the only way, and you know what it means to us--to you." "You don't have to tell me that," rasped Rexhill. "If we fail to put this through, I'm a ruined man." Moran's eyes gleamed. "Well, then, it's the only way, unless--unless...." "Unless what?" "Unless your daughter marries him, and it all comes into the family." Upon that point, Moran wished to know just where he stood. "I've never made a dollar through my daughter yet, and I never will," said the Senator grimly. "I'm not selling my own flesh and blood. I'll rot in the poor-house first." Moran gently breathed his relief. He would have fought to the fullest extent of his power to have aborted such a marriage, but if the Senator had favored it, he knew that it would have been difficult to prevent. "Wade has a foreman he's mighty fond of, an old man named Santry," the agent remarked, trying another tack.