"I'll be up town to see Mr. Wheaton in a day or two," he declared, as he slouched through the door. "He seems to be more interested in Wheaton than Wheaton is in him," observed Saxton to himself. Saxton spent a week at Great River. He hired a[Pg 51] man to repair fences and put the house in order. He visited several of the large ranch owners and asked them for aid in picking out the scattered remnants of the Poindexter herd. Nearly all of them volunteered to help, with the result that he collected about one hundred cattle and sold them at Great River for cash. He expected to see or hear of Snyder in the town but the fellow had disappeared. [Pg 51] The fact was that Snyder had ridden over to the next station beyond Great River for his spree, that place being to his liking because it was beyond the jurisdiction of the sheriff whose headquarters were maintained at Great River,—an official who took his office seriously, and who had warned Snyder that his latest offense—getting drunk and smashing a saloon sideboard—must not be repeated. After he had been satisfactorily drunk for a week and had gambled away such of his fortune as the saloonkeeper had not acquired in direct course of commerce, Snyder came to himself sufficiently to send a telegram. Then he sat down to wait, with something of the ease of spirit with which an honest man sends forth a sight draft for collection from a town where he is a stranger, and awaits returns in the full enjoyment of the comforts of his inn. On the third day, receiving no message from the outside world, Snyder sold his pony and took the train for Clarkson. [Pg 52] [Pg 52] CHAPTER V DEBATABLE QUESTIONS CHAPTER V DEBATABLE QUESTIONS Evelyn Porter had come home in June to take her place as mistress of her father's house. The fact that she alone of the girls belonging to families of position in the town had gone to college had set her a little apart from the others. During her four years at Smith she had evinced no unusual interest in acquiring knowledge; she was a fair student only and had been graduated without honors save those which her class had admiringly bestowed on her. She had entered into social and athletic diversions with zest and had been much more popular with her fellow students than
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