"That don't look so bad," commented Sandy, fingering the quartz. He indicated the glassy red samples. "What's that stuff?"
"Volcanic bottle-glass, I reckon--how it come with the samples I dunno, unless Hassayamp thought it was pretty. This here quartz, like you say, ain't bad; I'd say it was pretty dinged good, if ye ask me!"
Sandy's eyes glinted at the red-glass specimens, and suspicion filled his heart.
"Uh-huh," he grunted. "What's your proposition?"
"Well, I don't want to sell outright. That there lode is goin' to pay big when she's developed. Looks to me, the way them specimens shape up, like she'd run into rotten quartz an' free gold; ye can see that for yourself. Sooner'n sell the hull thing, I'd hang on a spell longer. But here's my idee: You an' your pardners buy the mortgage an' give me a one-fourth int'rest in the mine. You'll have to foreclose the mortgage----"
"Sure--I recorded her after Hassayamp cashed in an' Piute got his title."
"Bein's you'll have to settle Piute, an' develop her an' so forth, I ain't aimin' to stick ye none. Say, you buy the mortgage for five hundred, go ahead an' foreclose her, keep the homestead if ye want it, and give me one-fourth int'rest in the mine. Ain't that fair?"
Sandy frowned thoughtfully. He knew that on this basis he was going to be stuck somewhere--and he believed that he knew exactly where. Deadoak was trying to unload upon him a worthless mortgage. Since that mortgage covered the mining rights and the improvements thereon--property of the state and not subject to mortgage--the document was illegal.
Mackintavers had made a fortune because he knew men, could probe into their minds and motives, could find their weak points and utilize them. He had lost that fortune because he had tackled the wrong man, and he had no intention of repeating the mistake. He sized up Deadoak for exactly what that gentleman was--a shiftless desert rat planning to take in the innocent stranger, without any very deep or well-laid plot. It aroused all the predatory instinct in Sandy. Forgotten were his virtuous resolves and high aspirations. Before his mind's eye unfolded a simple but beautifully perfect scheme by which he might grab this property entire.