"He can't save any money to go into anything else," laughed Gilman, momentarily awakened into a surprising semblance of life. "Every time he gets fifty dollars he goes out of town to buy a fancy meal." "You were born for easy money," the black-eyed one advised Wix. "It's that sort of a lip that drives us all into the shearing business." Wix shook his head. "Not me," said he. "The law books prove that easy money costs too much." The black-eyed one shrugged his shoulders. "In certain lines it does," he admitted. "I'm going to get out of my line right away, for that very reason. Besides," he added with a sigh, "these educated town constables are putting the business on the bump-the-bumps. They've got so they want from half to two-thirds, and put a bookkeeper on the job." Mr. Gilman presently created a diversion by emitting a faint whoop, and immediately afterward went to sleep in the bread-platter. Wix sent for the porter of their sleeping-car, and between the two they put Mr. Gilman to bed. Before Wix returned to the shell expert he carefully extracted the money from his friend Clifford's pocket. "He won't need it, anyhow," he lightly explained, "and we will. I'll tell him about it in the morning." "I guess you can do that and make him like it all right," agreed the other. "He's a born sucker. He can get to the fat money, can't he?" Wix shook his head. "No," he declared; "parents poor, and I don't think he has enough ginger in him ever to make a pile of his own." The other was thoughtful and smiling for a time. "He'll get hold of it some way or other, mark what I tell you, and you might just as well have it as anybody. Somebody's going to cop it. I think you said you lived in Filmore? Suppose I drop through there with a quick-turn proposition that would need two or three thousand, and would show that much profit in a couple of months? If you help me pull it through I'll give you a slice out of it." Wix was deeply thoughtful, but he made no reply. "You don't live this way all the time, and you'd like to," urged the other. "There's no reason you shouldn't. Why, man, the bulk of this country is composed of suckers that are able to lay hands on from one to ten thousand apiece. They'll spend ten years to get it and can be separated from it in ten minutes. You're one of the born separators. You were cut out for nothing but easy money." Easy money! The phrase sank into the very soul of Jonathan Reuben Wix. Every professional, commercial and manufacturing man who knew him had predicted for him a brilliant future; but they had given him false credit for his father's patience to plod for years. Heredity had only given him, upon his father's side, selfishness and ingenuity; upon his mother's side, selfishness and a passion for luxurious comfort, and now, at twenty-six, he was still a young man without any prospect whatsoever.