“No reason at all, sir—­no reason at all,” replied the victim, hurriedly.  “It does me good to hear your prognostications.”

“I hear there is a slight rise in Con.  Virginia,” interposed Mrs. Holt, who had cultivated tact.

“Nonsense!” almost shouted the tyrant.  The heavy silver fork of the Morenos fell to his plate with a crash.  “The mine’s as rotten as an old lung.  There isn’t a handful of decent ore left in her.  No more clodhoppers ’ll get rich out of that mine.  You haven’t been investing, have you?” His ferret eyes darted from one face to another.  “If you have, don’t you ever darken my doors again!  I don’t approve of stock-gambling, and you know it.”

The guests, one and all, assured him that not one of their hard-earned dollars had gone to the stock-market.

“Great Scott!” murmured the youth to Miss Williams; “is this the way he always goes on?  Have these people no self-respect?”

“They’re used to him.  This sort of thing has gone on ever since I came here.  You see he has made this lake the most aristocratic part of the city, so that it gives one great social importance to live here; and as he won’t sell the houses, they have to let him trample on their necks, and he loves to do that better than he loves his money.  But that is not the only reason.  They hope he will leave them those houses when he dies.  They certainly deserve that he should.  For years, before they owned carriages, they would tramp through wind and rain every Sunday in winter to play billiards with him, to say nothing of the hot days of summer.  They have eaten this mid-day dinner that they hate time out of mind.  They have listened to his interminable yarns, oft repeated, about early California.  In all these years they have never contradicted him, not once.  They thought he’d die long ago, and now they’re under his heel, and they couldn’t get up and assert themselves if they tried.  All they can do is to abuse him behind his back.”

“It all seems disgusting to me.”

His independent spirit was very attractive to the companion.

“I’d like to bluff him at his own game, the old slave-driver,” he continued.

“Oh don’t! don’t!” she quavered.

She was, in truth, anxiously awaiting the moment when Dr. Webster should see fit to give his attention to the stranger.

He laughed outright.

“Why, what makes you so afraid of him?  He doesn’t beat you, does he?”

“It isn’t that.  It’s the personality of the man, added to force of habit.”

“Well, Mr. Strowbridge,” cried Dr. Webster, suddenly addressing the youth, “what are you doing for this world?  I hear you are just out of Harvard University.  University men never amount to a row of pins.”

Strowbridge flushed and bit his lip, but controlled himself.

“Never amount to a row of pins,” roared the doctor, irritated by the haughty lifting of the young man’s head.  “Don’t even get any more book-learning now, I understand.  Nothing but football and boat-racing.  Think that would make a fortune in a new country?  Got any money of your own?”