When I galloped into Rome that day there was hardly a house left
standing save my little home, our general store, and a few sod-houses
and dugouts.
Mrs. Cody and the baby were sitting on a drygoods box when I rode up to
the store. My partner, Rose, stood near by, whistling and whittling.
"My word, Rose! What has become of our town!" I cried. Rose could make
no answer. Mrs. Cody said:
"You wrote me you were worth $250,000."
"We've got no time to talk about that now," I said. "What made this
town move away?"
"You ought to have taken Mr. Webb's offer," was her answer.
"Who the dickens is Webb?" I stormed. Rose looked up from his
whittling. "Bill," he said, "that little flapper-jack was the president
of the town-site company for the K.P. Railroad, and he's run such a
bluff on our citizens about a new town site that is going to be a
division-point that they've all moved over there."
"Yes," commented Mrs. Cody, "and where is your $250,000?"
"Well, I've got to make it yet," I said, and then to Rose: "How did the
fall hit you?"
"What fall?"
"From millionaire to pauper."
"It hasn't got through hitting me yet," he said solemnly.
Rose went back to his grading contract, and I resumed my work as a
buffalo hunter. When the Perry House, the Rome hotel, was moved to Hays
City and rebuilt there, I took my wife and daughter and installed them
there.
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