“Hell, yes. I ain't going to make more of it than it was, but we was taking some good-grade ore out of that thing. Not a lot of it. But we was coming on to more and more of it, like we was coming at a good-sized vein of it. We had it assayed. It was high concentration.”

“You had it assayed? Where?”

“Well, in Safford, of course.”

“Well, that there's another side to the story, ain't it?” Billy took off his hat and scratched at his head. “Had it assayed in Safford. I would have gone to Lordsburg, myself.”

“Thinking back on it, I'd be hard-pressed for argument. But we was digging and finding more, and we didn't want to run at a third of capacity while someone rode to Lordsburg. So we took it to Safford. Had it done there.”

“Right in the middle of Thems.”

“Right in the damned middle.”

“No offense, Tom. But that wasn't sterling thinking.”

“Yeah. I guess I know that. But I had good relations up there in Safford. Hell, I campaigned for McBride when he first run. I figured that bought me something.”

“Of course it got you something, Tom. I mean you been doing your whiskey business more or less right out in the open for over a year now. Did McBride ever lay a finger on you?”

“Well, no, Billy. He didn't. It just seemed to me that that was all business, and everyone done OK on it. I didn't see a reason for McBride to have got upset over it.”

“No. I wouldn't figure he would. He would most likely just not want to be bothered with any of it as long as you weren't upsetting the general peace. You know, Tom, and I don't mean any offense by any of this, but there is a lot of questions going on about how you all came into that mine.”

“We bought it. Fair and square. You know that, Billy.”

“I know and most of the people in the valley know, but we ain't the ones that count. We ain't the ones asking, ‘How did the Powers get all that money?’ Not that it's our business.”

Tom's jaw began to flex the way it did when anger took him over. “You're right about that. It ain't your business.”

“I agree on that. But there's lots of questions. Hell, Tom. Gold is eighteen dollars an ounce, and whiskey's twenty dollars a bottle. That's a lot of money, there. And whiskey's got a bigger, easier market than gold. Everyone knows that.”

“All right,” Tom said. “It ain't a good-kept secret, but it ain't coming fully out, either. Whiskey's big business, and it's big business for nearly everybody. Hell, there ain't a soul in the state that ain't got some whiskey money in their pocket. You're making out all right on this, ain't you?”