"Be careful, and keep on your guard, Hugh, or else he'll be hypnotizing you just like he seems to have done with poor Matilda and her husband. That slick tongue of his can do all sorts of stunts. Why if you don't look out we'll have you going around taking up a subscription to fit Brother Lu out with a brand new suit of togs; and perhaps buying the poor chap a bully meerschaum pipe; for it must be dreadful that he is now compelled to use one of Mr. Hosmer's old corncob affairs." His sarcasm was lost upon his chum, for Hugh laughed merrily at the gruesome picture Thad drew of his complete subjugation to the wiles of the schemer. "Of course," he continued, calmly, "I didn't forget what I was there for principally, and all the while he was talking so fluently and holding my interest, I kept watching him and trying to study his real character. Thad, I own up to failure. Once I thought I was a pretty clever hand at that sort of thing, but now I'm mixer-up, and have lost considerable confidence. "I kept changing my mind again and again. When he'd tell some of the most astonishing stories of the strange lands he'd roved through, I'd begin to say to myself that he must surely be just lying. Then the fellow'd mention some little happening that he'd describe so vividly, would you believe it, I felt the tears in my eyes, for it would be sort of pathetic. So during that whole hour I sat there and changed my mind every ten minutes, now blowing hot, and again cold. I came away in as muddled a state as I went there. His actions seem to stamp him a rogue if ever there was one; and yet, Thad, I seemed to see something different in the depths of his twinkling blue eyes." "Oh! thunder! however are we going to get rid of such a sticker?" groaned Thad, as though at a loss to know what next to do. "Listen," resumed Hugh. "Among other things he mentioned was an account of his adventures down in Texas in the big oil field there, where he said men make fortunes one day and lose them the next in speculation. He went into some details to tell me of a strange thing he had witnessed there, and among other names mentioned, he chanced to speak of a Marshal Hastings, who, it seems, is much feared by the bad men of that community. Somehow, I thought I could detect a little quaver in Brother Lu's voice whenever he spoke of this party; and, Thad, do you know, the idea flashed through my brain that perhaps he'd had an unpleasant half hour with that same Marshal Hastings himself." "I take it that you mean the officer may have warned Lu to shake the dust of that region off his brogans, and make himself scarce, if he didn't want to pull hemp; is that your idea, Hugh?" "Something along that order," came the steady reply. "At least he could not think of Marshal Hastings without some memory that was unpleasant, making him shiver." Thad's eagerness increased by jumps, and showed itself on his face, which was now lighted up with anticipation.