"Is that right, Dexter?" "That's the way it looks to me, Dave," said the ranchman capitalist, who, whatever might be his limitations in the field of high finance, was not lacking the nerve to fight unquestioning in any partner's quarrel. The president of the Brewster City National turned back to Smith. "What do you want, Mr. Smith?" he asked, not too cordially. "Nothing that you'd give us, I guess; a little business loyalty, for one thing----" "And a checking balance for immediate necessities for another?" suggested the banker. With all his trained astuteness--trained in Kinzie's own school, at that--Smith could not be sure that the gray-faced old Westerner was not setting a final trap for him, after all. But he took the risk, saying, with a decent show of indifference: "Of course, it would be more convenient here than in Denver or Chicago. But there is no hurry about that part of it." The president took a slip of paper from a pigeonhole and wrote rapidly upon it. Once more his optimism was locking horns with prudent caution. It was the optimism, however, that was driving the pen. Baldwin's word was worth something, and it might be disastrous to let these two get away without anchoring them solidly to the Brewster City National. "Sign this, you two," he said. "I don't know even the name of your new outfit yet, but I'll take a chance on one piece of two-name paper, anyhow." Smith took up the slip and glanced at it. It was an accommodation note for twenty thousand dollars. With the money fairly in his hands, he paused to drive the nail of independence squarely home before he would sign. "We don't want this at all, Mr. Kinzie, unless the bank's good-will comes with it," he said with becoming gravity. "I'll stand with you," was the brusque rejoinder. "But it's only fair to you both to say that you've got the biggest kind of a combination to buck you--a national utilities corporation with the strongest sort of political backing." "I doubt if you can tell us anything that we don't already know," said Smith coolly, as he put his name on the note; and when Baldwin had signed: "Let this go to the credit of Timanyoni Ditch, if you please, Mr. Kinzie, and we'll transfer it later. It's quite possible that we shan't need it, but we are willing to help out a little on your discount profits, anyway. Further along, when things shape themselves up a bit more definitely, you shall know all there is to know, and we'll give you just as good a chance to make money as you'll give us." When they were safely out of the bank and half a square away from it, Dexter Baldwin pushed his hat back and mopped his forehead. "They say a man can't sweat at this altitude," he remarked. "I'm here to tell you, Smith, that I've lost ten pounds in the last ten minutes. Where in the name of the jumping Jehoshaphat did you get your nerve, boy? You stand to lose an even hundred-and-fifty-dollar bill on this deal; don't you know that?" "How so?" asked the plunger.