"Yes. She's good people; there's no discount on that. But say, you didn't size up Pete Grim any better than you had to. A good stiff bluff is about the only thing he can appreciate." "If you had heard me talk to him you would have admitted that I was trying to bluff him the best I knew how," said Lansdale. Bartrow laughed unfeelingly. "Tried to scare him with a lawsuit, didn't you? What do you suppose a man like Grim cares for the law? Why, bless your innocent soul, he can buy all the law he needs six days in the week and get it gratis on the seventh. But you might have fetched him down with a gun." Lansdale tried to imagine himself attempting such a thing and failed. "I'm afraid I couldn't have done that--successfully. It asks for a little practice, doesn't it? and from what I have learned of Mr. Peter Grim in my small dealings with him, I fancy he wouldn't make a very tractable lay-figure for a beginner to experiment on. But we worried the thing through after a fashion, and recovered the young woman's sewing-machine finally." "Bought Grim off, didn't you?" "That was what it amounted to. Miss Elliott's father came to the rescue." "There's a man for you!" declared Bartrow. "Built from the ground up, and white all the way through. And Connie's just like him. She's first cousin to the angels when she isn't making game of you. But I suppose you don't need to have anybody sing her praises to you at this late day." "No; that is why I say the obligation is on my side. I am indebted to your 'wire order' for more things than I could well catalogue." Bartrow rocked gently on the hinder legs of his chair, assuring himself that one of the things needed not to be listed. After which he became diplomatically abstruse on his own account. Two of the decorated ones came by, promenading arm in arm, and he waited until they were out of hearing. "Found them good people to know, didn't you? _Bueno!_ You used to hibernate a heap too much." Then, with labored indifference: "What do you think of Miss Van Vetter?" Lansdale laughed. "Whatever you would like to have me think, my dear boy. Shall I say that she is the quintessence of all the virtuous graces and the graceful virtues?--a paragon of para--" "Oh, come off!" growled the abstruse one. "You've been taking lessons of Connie. You know what I mean. Do I--that is--er--do you think I stand a ghost of a show there? Honest, now." "My dear Richard, if I could look into the heart of a young woman and read what is therein written, I could pass poverty in the street with a nod contemptuous. I'd be a made man." "Oh, you be hanged, will you? You're a wild ass of the lamb-ranches, and wisdom has shook you," Bartrow rejoined, relapsing into vituperation. "Why can't you quit braying for a minute or so and be serious? It's a serious world, for the bigger part." "Do you find it so? with a Miss Van Vetter for an eye-piece to your telescope? I am astonished."