owed for food in the settlement store; he owed
for clothing he had bought in town; and he owed
innumerable gambling debts -- big sums, sums
mounting to heights he dared not contemplate.
And all he had to his name was the three dollars
lying so peacefully before him, with the speculative
Franke hovering over them like a fat buzzard
over a dead coyote. What to do! He could not
decide. He had ways for this money, other than
paying on his debts or investing in a gambling
proposition. There was to be a _baile_ soon, and
he must buy for Margherita (providing her
father, a caustic _hombre_, bitter against all wood-
haulers, permitted him the girl's society) peanuts
in the dance-hall and candy outside the dance-hall.
The candy must be bought in the general
store, where, because of his many debts, he
must pay cash now -- always cash! So what to
do! All these things meant money. And money,
as he well understood, was a thing hard to get.
Yet here was a chance, as Franke had generously
indicated, for him to win some money. But,
against this chance for him to win some money
was the chance also, as conveyed inversely by
Franke, of his losing some money -- money he
could ill afford to lose.

"You afraid?" suddenly cut in Franke, nastily,
upon these reflections. "I don' see you do soomt'ing!"

Which decided Felipe for all time. "Afraid?"
he echoed, disdainfully. "Sure! But not for myself!
You don' have mooch money to lose! But

[[9]]

p008 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p009w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p010

v?