Lancaster went back to the hearth, fairly weak with delight. Dallas and Marylyn joined him. "W'at d' y' think!" gurgled their father. "Say, he ain't got th' sense he ought 'a' been born with!" "Don't like him," Dallas declared. "Pig eyes," suggested Marylyn. At that the section-boss calmed. "Wal," he said, "he's as good anyhow as slop-over soldiers." Meanwhile, Braden was on his way to The Trooper's Delight, his face glum, his step quick, his arms cutting the air like propellers. When he lumbered into it, he creaked up to the plank bar and helped himself to a finger of whisky. Then he propped himself on an elbow and stood scowling into the rear of the room. From the gaming-table sounded the raillery of a dozen men. Matthews was there, heels up, hat tipped back, a cigar set between his little teeth. "What y' givin' us," cried one of his companions. "You're drunk, Nick--plumb drunk." Braden listened, turning away. An advertisement of brandy hung from a shelf on the far side of the bar. He toyed with his goblet, his eyes fixed on the gaudy, fly-specked picture. "I _ain't_ drunk," Matthews declared. "I _never_ been drunk. My stomick ain't big 'nough to hold the _reequissit_ amount." There was more laughter. The interpreter, well pleased with himself, surveyed his audience, pointing the cigar, now up, now down, so that its glowing end threatened to burn his shirt collar, or, tilting skyward, all but singed what there was of a tow eyebrow. "And that ain't the best part of the story," he went on. "As I was sayin', not a darned pound of ice was left in Boston. Well, what d' y' think my old man does? He rents the fastest coast-steamer he can find. Then, he goes 'way up north in the Atlantic and lays-to with his weather eye open. Day or two, long comes a' iceberg big as a house. And by----, he hitches to it, and Boston gits ice!" And now, like a ponderous bobcat descending upon its prey, Braden stole soft-footed across the room. "Nick!" he said. His jaws came together with the click of a steel trap. Matthews lowered his heels. "Jumpin' buffalo!" he cried in amazement. "Al Braden! Where'd _you_ come from?" He took the other's hand, at the same time pulling him slowly toward the door. Away from the crowd, they brought up. "Well, _you're_ a nice one!" was Braden's answer. "You're a _nice_ one! Lettin' that Bend slip through your fingers!" All the interpreter's cocksureness was gone. He threw the cigar into the sand-box under the stove, and looked on the verge of following it. "Say, _you_ talk of fleecin'," taunted Braden. "Why, you been skinned clean's a whistle! And by a' old fool duffer from Texas!" "I was at Dodge when he come," snarled Matthews, finding his voice. "What you go streakin' off to Dodge for, after the tip I give?" "Well, no one here was talkin' railroad. So I, well, I----" Braden addressed the ceiling, his fat hands outspread. "No one here was talkin' railroad, no one here was talkin' railroad?" he mimicked.