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110 line of her property, squatted in ugly, misshapen, stubborn fashion, a veritable toad leering into her flower garden, was the Summit City Saloon, as secure from the flare of her wrath as though it had conducted its riotous and disorderly existence a score of miles away.

"Is that place open already?" Beatrice asked of the man who had come out of her store.

"Yes," he answered. "Opened last week. And I hear some pretty big games have been played, too."

She looked at him sharply. Long ago an order had gone forth that any man working for her who was seen so much as entering the Summit City Saloon was to be summarily discharged. The storekeeper returned her look innocently.

With no further reference to this thorn in her flesh, Beatrice repeated the instructions given in Camp Corliss, making emphatic that Steele was to be considered with hostility equal to that which she showed the unsightly gambling house. Then, having his instructions, Parker whizzed them back to the hotel. Here, again, a man came out, the clerk who was also the manager, a young, capable looking chap with a bright nod for his employer. He, in turn, was told that Bill Steele must find neither food nor bed under his roof. And, like most men taking their monthly wage from Beatrice Corliss, he knew how to obey orders.

"I might have telephoned this," said the girl to Embry, as the clerk went back to his office. "But I wanted to come over anyway. I am going to have more cottages put up; the hotel must have another wing. … Home, Parker."