"Hey! You can't do that!" wailed the invalid. He wheeled his chair toward his nephew. "You wouldn't do that if my friend Lopez was here, you big bum!" he ended, as peevish as an infant. Pell turned upon his wife. "Well, my dear--" he began, and once more his lips curled at the irony of the last phrase. "What!" Lucia said; and there was terror in her voice. Pell did not mince words. "Having both the Option and a clearer understanding of each other, there's nothing to detain us." He measured everything he uttered, and watched the effect upon her. "It's no use," Hardy broke in. "You're too late." "Not if I got there by eight o'clock," Pell said. "But you won't!" Jasper Hardy quickly said, glancing at the clock which ticked on, inexorably. Pell pulled out his watch. Then he looked at the option, deliberately, carefully, and seemed to read a final sentence. Having done so, he tore the piece of paper to bits slowly, and scattered them on the floor at his feet. At that very instant the clock struck eight. "It's eight o'clock!" "Red" exclaimed on the last peal of the bell. "Eight o'clock!" Hardy cried. "And the place belongs to me!" He turned to Pell. "Anything more from you?" he inquired, and smiled. The other stared at him; but he said nothing. Instead, he went over again to the table, and wet his handkerchief in the bowl, again refusing Lucia's proffered assistance with a wave of his other hand. He bathed his own wound. And meanwhile Hardy was saying to Gilbert: "Well, young feller, it's your move." "His move!" "Red" repeated the phrase. "Say, you wouldn't go and skin him out of the place all over again, would you?" Hardy sneered. "I'm going to foreclose, certainly, if that's what you mean, you impudent young scoundrel!" "You mean you would trim him again?" "Red" didn't believe it. "Say, boy, you better use your head. You're going to marry my darter, ain't you?" "Yes--I hope so," the foreman said. "Well, don't you realize that all I got will eventually go to you and her? Don't you?" "It will?" asked the incredulous "Red." "Certainly; when I die," answered Hardy. "I hope it'll be soon!" cried out Uncle Henry. Then, to "Red," "Don't you see he's leading you up to the top o' that gol darn mountain?" "Red" did not understand. "Gol darn _what_?" he said. Uncle Henry was exasperated at his stupidity. "Why, he's temptin' you, the old devil! Don't let him. It's a gol darn shame," he added, turning his chair so that he faced Hardy, "an old scoundrel like you tryin' to corrupt a nice young feller like him! Don't you know money you get like that won't do you no good?" "It's his--Gilbert Jones's," cried "Red," "and I ain't goin' to be party to robbin' him of it!" "Hooray!" yelled Uncle Henry. "That's the boy! I knew you was like that. You're all right!" And he backed into the alcove, happier than he had been in a long time. "You hear that?" Hardy said to his daughter. "I do," she answered, "and he's right."