“Old pirate,” he repeated. “Son, if I hadn’t been a pirate I’d still be working for the Anaconda for wages, and there’d be no Personville Mining Corporation. You’re a damned little woolly lamb yourself, I suppose. I was had, son, where the hair was short. There were things I didn’t like⁠—worse things that I didn’t know about until tonight⁠—but I was caught and had to bide my time. Why since that Whisper Thaler has been here I’ve been a prisoner in my own home, a damned hostage!”

“Tough. Where do you stand now?” I demanded. “Are you behind me?”

“If you win.”

I got up and said:

“I hope to Christ you get caught with them.”

He said: