“Now, now. Settle down, Em. I only had the one or the two, and I struck a deal that’s goin to make us rich by the end of the year.”

“What on earth could that be? Did you find a better job?”

“Nosir. I bought shares in what is goin to be the biggest lead mine in Nevada.”

“You did what?”

He reached into his pocket and hauled out the shares with elaborate ceremony. “This here, sweetheart, is your ticket to a mansion on the hill.”

Emaline took it, glanced over the share certificate. “Look at this, you fool! It says ‘led mine.’”

“That’s exactly what it is. We got ten shares in a lead mine.”

“No, silly. Look how it’s written: L-E-D. That’s not how you spell lead. You spell lead with an a. These aren’t even good forgeries.”

“Just cause they don’t know how to spell don’t mean they aint got a mine. There’s plenty of rich folk can hardly spell their own names.”

“How much did you pay for these, Jake?”

“A thousand dollars. And they’re goin to put my name on the board of directors or some such, me bein a prizefighter and all.”

Emaline felt her legs go weak. She sat down on the running board of the Dodge, trying to catch her breath.

“No. Please don’t tell me you gave them all our money. Not the whole thousand.”

“Well, hell. They wasn’t goin to give me them shares for nothin. Not in a gold-plated deal like this.”

“Oh, my God. What were you thinking? This isn’t gold-plated, it’s lead! It’s pure lead. Those shares aren’t worth ten cents apiece.”

“Well, of course they are. They’re worth a hundred dollars each. Says right there.”

“How stupid can you be? They can print anything they want on a share certificate, especially when they don’t even know how to spell. I knew you could be a fool, Jake McCloskey, but not this big a fool. You march right down there now and get our money back.”

“What if they don’t want to give it back?”

“Beat it out of them, then! You’re good at that, aren’t you?”

Jake wanted more than anything to crawl into his sleeping roll and go to sleep, but he was beginning to feel a little anxious himself. Big Hugh seemed like a fine fellow, the girl too. Not the type to steal from a man, although Maisie did remind him an awful lot of Thelma Pearl. In his mind, he was still trying to figure out how to spend his million dollars.

“Did you get a name, at least?” Emaline asked. “What did this fellow say his name was?”

“Big Hugh.”