It was the nature of the Widow to resort to violence in every crisis of her life and at each fresh memory of the effrontery of Wiley Holman she searched the empyrean for words. From the very start he had come to Keno with the intention of stealing her mine. First it was his father, who pitied her so much he was willing to buy her shares; then it was the tax sale, and he had sneaked in at night and tried to jump the Paymaster; then he had deceived her and stood in with Blount to make her sell all her stock for a song; and then, oh hateful thought, he had actually sold out to Blount for a hundred dollars, cash; only to put Blount in the hole and buy the mine back again for the price of the ore on the dump! The Widow poured forth her charges without pausing for breath or noticing that her audience had fled, and as Wiley went on about his business she raised her voice to a scream. The rest of the Kenoites, and some of the workmen, were out staking the nearby hills; but whenever she stopped she thought of some fresh duplicity which made reason totter on its throne. He had refused half the mine from Blount as a gift and then turned around and bought it all. He had refused to buy her shares, time and again, when he knew they were worth a million; and then, to cap the climax, he had let her sell to Blount and bought them for nothing from him. And even Death Valley Charley--poor, crazy, brain-sick Charley--he had robbed him of all ten of his claims! It was a damning arraignment, and Wiley's men listened grimly, but he only twisted his lip and nodded his head ironically. With one eye on his accuser, who was becoming hysterical, he hustled the ore into the empty trucks and started them off down the road; and then, as Virginia led her mother away, he re-engaged his cook. They had supper that night in the old, abandoned cook-house; and, so wonderfully do great minds work, that a complete bill of grub was discovered among the freight. Not only flour and beans and canned goods and potatoes, but baking powder and matches and salt; and the cook observed privately that you'd think Mr. Holman had intended to make camp all the time. It is thus that foresight leaps ahead into the future and robs life of half its ills; and the Widow Huff, still unpacking plates and saucers, was untroubled by clamorous guests. She had had her say and, as far as Wiley was concerned, there were no more favors to be expected.