Page:Roads of Destiny (1909).djvu/216

 of his glasses upon Major Kingman, “that your statements—your misleading statements, which you have not condescended to explain—do not appear to be quite the thing, regarded either as business or humour. I do not understand such motives or actions.”

Major Tom looked down at him serenely and not unkindly.

“Son,” he said, “there are plenty of things in the chaparral, and on the prairies, and up the cañons that you don’t understand. But I want to thank you for listening to a garrulous old man’s prosy story. We old Texans love to talk about our adventures and our old comrades, and the home folks have long ago learned to run when we begin with ‘Once upon a time,’ so we have to spin our yarns to the stranger within our gates.”

The major smiled, but the examiner only bowed coldly, and abruptly quitted the bank. They saw him travel diagonally across the street in a straight line and enter the Stockmen’s National Bank.

Major Tom sat down at his desk, and drew from his vest pocket the note Roy had given him. He had read it once, but hurriedly, and now, with something like a twinkle in his eyes, he read it again. These were the words he read:

I hear there’s one of Uncle Sam’s grayhound’s going through you, and that means that we’ll catch him inside of a couple of hours, maybe. Now, I want you to do something for me. We’ve got just $2,200 in the bank, and the law requires that we have $20,000. I let Ross and Fisher have $18,000 late yesterday