"But he's the head of the party in the Territory," objected Bancroft. "He can bring out more votes than any other man we can put up. If we turn him down in the convention they'll beat us at the polls." "We'll deserve to be beaten if we nominate him, anyway. I can't stomach him any longer, Aleck, and I don't see how you can." "Oh, you're prejudiced, Curt," said the other, good-naturedly. "You know you can never see any good in a man you dislike, and you took a dislike to Baxter the first day you set foot in the Territory." "Maybe I am prejudiced; but in Dell Baxter's case there's ample reason to be, and I'd be ashamed of myself if I wasn't. I know he's a friend of yours, but that doesn't prevent him from being the worst scoundrel in the whole Territory. I tell you, Aleck, there's nothing that man wouldn't do, unless it was something square and honest." "Come, come, Curt, that's rank exaggeration. I've been associated with Dell Baxter financially ever since I located in this part of the country, and I've always found him strictly on the square." "Then it was because it was to his interest to be square. He'll do you up yet, if he gets the chance and thinks it worth while. He's had his finger in every crooked scheme that's been put through from Raton to El Paso, and his hands are as bloody as his pockets are dirty." "Don't you think it's going a little too far," asked Bancroft, smiling calmly, "to accuse a man in that wholesale way when you haven't any basis for your assertions but the merest idle gossip?" Conrad gave an indignant snort. "Oh, I'm not saying he's done the jobs himself. He thinks too much of that fat paunch of his to put that into any danger. But why does he keep those Mexican thugs hanging around him if it isn't to use them for things he wouldn't dare do himself? Why, I heard from Santa Fe only last week that he's taken into his pay that Mexican cutthroat, Liberato Herrara, whom he saved last Winter from conviction for the Paxton murder." "No, Aleck," he went on. "I buck when it comes to Dell Baxter for Congress again. If he gets the nomination and the other side puts up Johnny Martinez, as it's likely they will, I'm going to support Johnny." "But he's a Mexican." "I don't care what he is as long as he's a decent man. He won't be a disgrace to the Territory in Washington, and that's more than you can say of Baxter." Bancroft's impassive face lighted with a bantering smile. "There's no limit to your bad opinion of a man, is there, Curt, if he once gets into your disfavor? By the way, is it true that the Castletons are behind Johnny Martinez?" "I don't know, and I don't care. I'm their hired man here on the ranch, but my vote's my own, and so's what little influence I may have, and I'll do with both of 'em just what I damn please. And if it came to a show-down, I'd be perfectly willing to lose my job if that would keep Dell Baxter from going back to Congress."