an hour after merry and brad had left the office of the general manager of the ophir mining company, merry was sitting alone on the veranda of the ophir house, waiting for his chums to arrive from the camp in the gulch. he was wondering, a little dubiously, whether he had done right by setting his judgment against the colonel’s in the matter of jode lenning.
in matters of sentiment, and quite apart from ordinary business, merriwell knew that colonel hawtrey was far from infallible. the colonel himself had mentioned the fact that he had been wrong and merriwell right in affairs connected with ellis darrel. the same sort of a “hunch” that had led merry to befriend darrel was now spurring him on to help lenning. if it was right in one case, he felt in his bones it must be right in the other.
and then, too, lenning was absolutely friendless. in this sorry plight, he had smothered his pride and appealed for aid to a fellow whom he considered an enemy. this touched merry, as he might have expressed it, pretty close “to where he lived.” lenning had asked for help, and merry would have felt like a cur if he had turned him down.
the lad on the veranda was unable to find any fault with himself for his generous action. he did not mix any hard-headed logic in his reasoning, but considered the affair almost entirely from the standpoint of doing the right thing by a chap who was down and had every man’s hand against him.
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“i say, merriwell!”
frank started at the sound of the voice. looking up, he saw a lad leaning over the veranda rail not more than a couple of yards away. his face was haggard, and his clothes, although of good quality, were dusty and rumpled. a pair of eyes, by nature of the shifty sort, were fixed with some steadiness upon merry’s face.
“oh, hello, lenning,” said frank, with a certain amount of constraint in his voice and manner. “i thought you were out at the mine.”
“i was there,” came the answer, “until i heard a little while ago that i was to have a job as night watchman, and that i owed the job to you. that sent me to town. can you give me a little of your time? i—i’ve got something i want to say to you.”
“sure! come up here and take a chair. we’ll palaver as long as you please.”
“i’d rather not do my talking here. if you’re agreeable, suppose we walk out along the road to the mine. i’ll feel more like loosening up if i knew there’s no one around to overhear.”
“that suits me,” and frank left the veranda and started south with lenning, through the ragged outskirts of the town.
lenning did not travel the main street, but avoided it, finally leading frank out on the trail to the mine by a roundabout course. a short mile lay between the settlement and the ophir “workings,” and lenning did not speak until the last house in the town had been left behind. if he had much to say, frank thought, he would have to talk fast if he got through before they reached the mine.
but lenning did not propose to walk while he was easing his mind. he found a place at the trailside where
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they could sit down, and after they had made themselves comfortable, he began:
“i reckon you think i had a good deal of nerve to drag you into this,” said he, “but i knew if you wouldn’t give me a good word no one else would, and the jig would be up. i’m obliged to you. i hadn’t a notion you’d help me, but i took the only chance i had. you’ve acted white, and i want you to know that i appreciate it and that i’m going to make good—if it’s possible.”
“i don’t know why it isn’t possible,” said merriwell, “so long as you keep away from shoup.”
a scowl crossed the other’s haggard face. instinctively his hand went to the back of his head, where the paddle had left its mark.
“you can bet all you’re worth i’ll keep away from that crazy dub. he had a lot to do with getting me into trouble. the responsibility isn’t all his, by a long shot, for i was born with an inclination to be crooked—and you can’t get away from what’s bred in the bone.”
“who pounded that into you, lenning? was it shoup?”
“i don’t know. he was always harping on that idea, and maybe i got a little of it from him.”
“well, it’s the wrong idea, i don’t care where you got it. cut it out. don’t hamper yourself with any such foolishness. you’ve got a hard fight on your hands, and if you go into it without any confidence in yourself, you’re going to lose out.”
lenning stared at merriwell blankly.
“don’t you believe that some traits are handed down to a fellow?” he asked.
“they may be handed down, but that’s no sign a fellow’s got to let them get a strangle hold on him,” frank answered, with spirit. “some fellows,” he added, “take
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all the credit if they make a show in the world; but, if they go wrong, they put all the blame onto some one else. you’re responsible for what you do, or don’t do. a fellow’s a pup if he can’t take all the responsibility for his own actions, or——”
frank broke off with a laugh.
“hang it!” he grunted, “i don’t know what license i’ve got to preach. what i’ve said is the truth, though, so we’ll let it pass and go on to something else.”
“i don’t want to go on to anything else,” said lenning, “at least, not just yet. this is a mighty important matter, to me. i’ve got a yellow streak—in some things, i’m a plain coward—and i’ve sort of thought i came by it naturally. my father——” he paused. “i suppose,” he went on presently, a shamed look crossing his face, “that you’ve heard how my father was killed in alaska, years ago, in a row?”
“i’ve heard something about it; but you don’t have to go into that, lenning.”
“i want you to know,” said lenning, almost savagely, “i want you to understand how that idea of shoup’s has been taking a hold on me. my father was killed while—while he was trying to take another man’s bag of gold dust.”
“what has that got to do with you?” demanded frank sharply.
“don’t you think i come in for any of my father’s failings? most people think that way.”
“forget it. that kind of talk makes me sick. a fellow ought to be man enough to stand on his own feet.”
“you know i’m a coward. i rolled that rock off apache point, and i hoped it would ‘get’ you—providing i could skip out and you’d never know who it was loosened the bowlder.”
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in spite of himself, merry felt his whole nature shrink from the fellow who was admitting such an act of treachery. by an effort, however, he succeeded in getting the whip hand of his feelings.
“then,” proceeded lenning, “when shoup knocked me on the head with that paddle and you pulled me out on dry land and kept me from drowning, i felt like a hound. that’s why i tried to square things by giving up that money.”
“i thought you did that because shoup had stolen it.”
“i reckon i talked that way, but it wasn’t the truth. i took the money from shoup and thought i’d get away with it. when you and clancy saved me, and when i knew that i was done with shoup, i began thinking about a job at the ophir mine. i wondered if i could be different—if i could get the respect of people, same as you have done—and i thought maybe i’d try it. the super wouldn’t have me, so i went to the general manager. he wouldn’t have me, either, until you had asked him to give me a chance.”
lenning swallowed hard and his voice shook as he went on:
“what you’ve done to-day, merriwell, has done more to make me see what an infernal cur i’ve been, and to want to be different, than anything else that ever happened to me. if i can keep that yellow streak from getting the upper hand, i’ll make good at the mine.”
“you’ve got to make good,” said frank, “because i’ve become responsible for you. what became of shoup?”
“he has left the country, i reckon. i haven’t seen him since yesterday afternoon.” lenning muttered a fierce exclamation. “i wish he’d hang around for a spell so i’d have a chance to get even with him.”
“that’s a sentiment you’d better side-step. you’ll have
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your hands too full straightening yourself out to get even with anybody.”
“i reckon you’re right; i’ve got a job on my hands if ever a fellow had. but shoup’s crazy, plain crazy. i’m glad i’m rid of him. i—i guess that’s about all.” he got up from the bowlder where he had been sitting. “you’ve done more for me than my own uncle would do. i’ll not forget it, merriwell. you have less reason to help me than the colonel had. i say you’ve acted white, and you can bet i’m going to see to it that you never have any reason to be sorry for it.”
“let it go at that, lenning. i guess the best of us make mistakes. you’re to be night watchman at the cyanide plant?”
“yes. it’s a responsible place. i have to watch the valves, regulate the flow of solution, and do a lot of other things connected with the plant. they’re just finishing a clean-up this afternoon, and will be running the bullion into bars this evening. the gold will have to be kept in the laboratory safe until morning—and i’ll be a guard as well as night watchman. i’m beginning at sixty a month.”
it was odd to hear jode lenning talk of work, and of getting “sixty a month.” when he was in favor with colonel hawtrey, he had had no work to do worth mentioning, and a liberal allowance had been given him for spending money. now he had to buckle down, and earn less than his allowance had been, with his own hands.
there was something vaguely disturbing to merriwell in that mention of the clean-up, and of the gold which was to be put in the laboratory safe for the night, with lenning for guard. that bullion might prove a temptation, right at the beginning of lenning’s attempt to be honest and to turn over a new leaf. frank mentally
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resolved that he would visit the cyanide plant that night, and stick around for a while to see how matters were going.
“sixty a month is a whole lot of money,” frank remarked.
“it’s a whole lot when you make it yourself,” said lenning. “i reckon i’ll have to mosey back. the super is going to show me the ropes before it’s time for me to go on duty, and i was to report to him at four-thirty.”
“you’ve got plenty of time,” said frank.
as he got up, he looked southward along the trail. a cloud of dust was moving northward, and, while he watched, three riders broke out of it—one of them trailing a led horse with an empty saddle.
“blunt!” gasped lenning, wild fear surging in the word.
he was right. one of the riders was barzy blunt, and the others were clancy and ballard. blunt was leading merry’s horse, borak.
