Frigidly, mechanically, Nettlewick examined the securities, found them to tally with the notes, gathered his black wallet, and rose to depart.

“I will say,” he protested, turning the indignant glare 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 canyons 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: 

   DEAR TOM: 

I hear there’s one of Uncle Sam’s grayhounds 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 afternoon to buy up that Gibson bunch of cattle.  They’ll realise $40,000 in less than thirty days on the transaction, but that won’t make my cash on hand look any prettier to that bank examiner.  Now, I can’t show him those notes, for they’re just plain notes of hand without any security in sight, but you know very well that Pink Ross and Jim Fisher are two of the finest white men God ever made, and they’ll do the square thing.  You remember Jim Fisher—­he was the one who shot that faro dealer in El Paso.  I wired Sam Bradshaw’s bank to send me $20,000, and it will get in on the narrow-gauge at 10.35.  You can’t let a bank examiner in to count $2,200 and close your doors.  Tom, you hold that examiner.  Hold him.  Hold him if you have to rope him and sit on his head.  Watch our front window after the narrow-gauge gets in, and when we’ve got the cash inside we’ll pull down the shade for a signal.  Don’t turn him loose till then.  I’m counting on you, Tom.

   Your Old Pard,
   BOB BUCKLY,
   Prest.  Stockmen’s National.

The major began to tear the note into small pieces and throw them into his waste basket.  He gave a satisfied little chuckle as he did so.