Having, so to speak, soaped the ways, Mr. Swiggart launched his “proposition.”  He wished to pack bacon.  Hogs, he pointed out, were selling at two cents a pound; bacon and hams at twelve and fifteen cents.  We had some two hundred and fifty hogs ready for market.  These Laban wanted to buy on credit.  He proposed to turn them into lard, hams, and bacon, to sell the same to local merchants (thereby saving cost of transportation), and to divide the profits with us after the original price of the hogs was paid.  This seemed a one-sided bargain.  He was to do all the work; we should, in any case, get the market price for the hogs, while the profits were to be divided.  However, our host explained that we took all the risk.  If the bacon spoiled he would not agree to pay us a cent.  With the taste of that famous ham in our mouths, this contingency seemed sufficiently remote; and we said as much.

“Well, I could rob ye right and left.  Ye’ve got to trust me, and there’s a saying:  ‘To trust is to bust.’”

He was so candid in explaining the many ways by which an unscrupulous man might take advantage of two ignorant Britons, that Ajax, not relishing the personal flavour of the talk, rose and strolled across to the branding-corral.  When he returned he was unusually silent, and, riding home, he said thoughtfully:  “I saw Laban’s brand this afternoon.  It is 81, and the 8 is the same size as our S. His ear-mark is a crop, which obliterates our swallow-fork.  Queer—­eh?”

“Not at all,” I replied indignantly.  “It’s a social crime to eat, as you did to-day, three large helpings of turkey, and then——­”

“Bosh!” he interrupted.  “If Laban is an honest man, no harm has been done.  If he stole our steers—­and, mind you, I don’t say he did—­three slices off the breast of a turkey will hardly offset my interest in five tons of beef.  As for this packing scheme, it sounds promising; but we lack figures.  To-morrow we will drive into San Lorenzo, and talk to the Children of Israel.  If Ikey Rosenbaum says that bacon is likely to rise or stay where it is, we will accept Laban’s proposition.”

The following morning we started early.  The short cut to San Lorenzo lay through the Swiggart claim, and the road passed within a few yards of the house.  We saw Mrs. Swiggart on the verandah, and offered to execute any commissions that she cared to entrust to two bachelors.  In reply she said that she hated to ask favours, but—­if we were going to town in a two-seater, would we be so very kind as to bring back her mother, Mrs. Skenk, who was ailing, and in need of a change.  “Gran’ma’s hard on the springs,” observed Euphemia, Mrs. Swiggart’s youngest girl, “but she’ll tell you more stories than you can shake a stick at; not ’bout fairies, Mr. Ajax, but reel folks.”  We assured Mrs. Swiggart that we should esteem it a pleasure to give her mother a lift.  Ajax had met the old lady at a church social some six months before, and, finding her a bonanza of gossip, had extracted some rich and curious ore.