Part 66 (1/2)

”Say, wasn't it!” cried Porter. ”I got that out of a shoutin'

evangelist. The minute I heard it I saw where it was hot stuff for my spiel. I'm that way: I got that kind of good eye. I'll be going along the street and some little thing'll happen that won't amount to nothin'

at all really. Another man wouldn't think twice about it. But like a flash it comes to me how it would fit in to a spiel. It's like an artist that way finding things to put in a picture. You'd never spot a dago apple peddler as good for nothing but to work a little graft on mebbe; but an artist comes along and slaps him in a picture and he's the fanciest-looking dope in the art collection. That's me. I got some of my best spiels from the funniest places! That one this morning is a wonder, because it don't _listen_ like a spiel. I followed that evangelist yap around for a week getting his dope down fine. You got to get the language just right on these things, or they don't carry over.”

”Which one is it, Painful?” asked Baker.

”You know; the make-your-work-a-good-to-humanity bluff.”

”And all about papa in the 'sixties?”

”That's it.”

”'And just don't you _dare_ tell the neighbours?'”

”Correct.”

”The whole mountains will know all about it by to-morrow,” Baker told Bob, ”and they'll flock up here in droves. It's easy money.”

”Half these country yaps have b.u.m teeth, anyway,” said Porter.

”And the rest of them think they're sick,” stated Wizard Waller.

”It beats a free show for results and expense,” said Painless Porter.

”All you got to have is the tents and the j.a.ps and the Willie-off-the-yacht togs.” He sighed. ”There ought to be _some_ advantages,” he concluded, ”to drag a man so far from the street lights.”

”Then this isn't much of a pleasure trip?” asked Bob with some amus.e.m.e.nt.

”Pleasure, h.e.l.l!” snorted Painless, helping himself to a drink. ”Say, honest, how do you fellows that have business up here stick it out? It gives me the w.i.l.l.i.e.s!”

One of the j.a.panese peered into the tent and made a sign.

Painless Porter dropped his voice.

”A dope already,” said he. He put on his air, and went out. As Bob and Baker crossed the enclosed s.p.a.ce, they saw him in conversation with a gawky farm lad from the plains.

”I sh.o.r.e do hate to trouble you, doctor,” the boy was saying, ”and hit Sunday, too. But I got a tooth back here--”

Painless Porter was listening with an air of the deepest and gravest attention.

VII

The charlatan had babbled; but without knowing it he had given Bob what he sought. He saw all the reasons for what had heretofore been obscure.

Why had he been dissatisfied with business opportunities and successes beyond the hopes of most young men?

How could he dare criticize the ultimate value of such successes without criticizing the life work of such men as Welton, as his own father?

What right had he to condemn as insufficient nine-tenths of those in the industrial world; and yet what else but condemnation did his att.i.tude of mind imply?