Later as the crowd dispersed to eat Atkinson said to Meyers, "The boss knows how to handle men all right, all right; he put sugar on the pill. The gang went off grinning. They know they've got to be good--but only up to a limit." Meantime Felipe Martinez had not been idle. He rode up to engineering headquarters on his pony one evening and carried Weir out into the open where their words would not be overheard. He reported that he was quietly working for information of Weir's father among the older Mexicans who would be likely to remember him, but proceeding cautiously so that no one would suspect his purpose. He represented himself to them as undertaking to write a history of San Mateo County; he must depend upon them for data of early days; it would be a fine book bound in leather, in which their names and possibly their pictures would appear;--which never failed to flatter the parties with whom he talked. And the lawyer laughed with amusement as he related the success of his method. "I have already seen some thirty or forty people, a few of whom recalled your father, but no more. But this afternoon," he continued, "I discovered a woman who worked at the Weir ranch house." Martinez perceived the engineer's attention quicken. "She said the Weirs had a little boy of four years of age, perhaps five. You, Mr. Weir, of course. They suddenly paid and discharged her one day, packed a trunk and drove hurriedly off; and the next morning Sorenson took possession of the ranch and she went home. They drove off in a great haste--there was no railroad anywhere near here then--and that was the last she ever saw or heard of them." "Yes." "One thing more there was: she said there was a story that went around for awhile afterwards that Weir and another had lost their ranches and cattle gambling. For that reason Weir left the country; and for that reason, too, the other man, Dent, by name, committed suicide in Vorse's saloon where they had gambled. She said Saurez, an old man living with his son up a little creek, would know about that, for he used to clean out Vorse's bar-room in those days." Steele Weir grasped Martinez's shoulder in a quick grip. "He did! Get everything he knows out of him," he commanded. "Leave it to me, Mr. Weir. I understand how to wheedle facts out of these old fellows." But it was doubtful if the engineer heard his words. He had dropped his hand, stood opening and shutting his fingers, while on his face grew the hard implacable look that always whetted the attorney's curiosity.