The Helpers

detour of a few squares which took him down Sixteenth Street to Larimer, and so

r in the open air was the excuse for the roundabout walk; but the real reason showed its head for a moment or two when he slackened his pace at one po

ir of swing doors with glass eyes in them, and at the end of the hallway a carpeted stair leading up to the light

f hesitation, and he went on again, slowly, as one to whom dubiety has lent its leaden-soled shoes. Reaching his room he lighte

It was true that he had come to Colorado to seek his fortune, and that thus far the quest had been bootless. But it was also true that he had begun by persuading himself that he must first study h

nd place than of the man, and were unconsciously left behind in the leave-takings, a species of insanity, known only to those who have habitually worn the harness of self-restraint, had come upon him in the new

out, throwing together a small heap of loose silver and crumpled bank-notes on the table. After which he made a deliberate accounting, smoothing the cre

d, let me see"-he knitted his brows and made an approximate calculation-"say, fifty dollars a day. Consequently, the mill will run out of grist in less than two day

take my hour now, and be done with it." Whereupon he rolled the money into a compact

alwart young fellow, gloved and o

opping to shake hands. "Doing time on the street at midnight,

n't have much to do but eat and sleep,

e. Same old story with you, I suppose? Haven't

shook

with a piece of sheepskin in your grip, and the Lord knows what little pickings of civil engineering in your head, and camp down in De

Jeffard admitted; and then: "Don't abuse me t

e arm about his friend and s

h the fire and getting your fingers burned; and, as a matter of course, making ducks and drakes of y

w. I'm in a blue funk, an

, and then you'll pull up a chair and proceed to burn you

eft. "Bartrow, there is such a thing as overdrawing one's account with a fr

aced man who was doubling a thick sheaf of bank-notes into portable shape. The outgoer nodded, and tapped the roll signif

faro-table. Counting his money he dropped the odd change

d white counters across the table. Jeffard arranged them in a symmetrical row in front of him, and began

r of its flood dinned in his ears like the drumming of a tornado in a forest. His capital grew by leaps and bounds, doubling, trebling, and finally quadrupling the sum he had ha

he had staked his last dollar. Five minutes afterward he was standing on the sidewalk again, drawing in deep breaths of the keen morning air, and wondering if it were only the possession of the thing

I'll be that, myself, be

agrant, and for the first time in a fairly industrious lif

room. "It isn't breakfast-time yet; and by the same token, it isn't going to be for a