If this money, which is
rightfully your family's, could be applied on that, it would make a
difference, don't you think?"
"I suppose John must settle it," she said, resignedly; "perhaps you had
better see him. I can't interfere one way or the other. I have no head
for business," she added, apologetically; "I'm not sure that any of us
have except Allis. We just seem to drift, drift, drift."
Crane stated the facts very plausibly, very seductively, to John Porter.
Porter almost unreasonably scented charity in Crane's proposal. He
believed that the bet was a myth; Crane was trying to present him with
this sum as a compensation for having lost Diablo. It wasn't even a
loan; it was a gift, pure and simple. His very helplessness, his
poverty, made him decline the offer with unnecessary fierceness. If
Allis had refused it, if she were strong enough to stand without this
charity, surely he, a man, battered though he was, could pass it by. He
had received a hopeful message from Allis as to Lucretia's chances in
the Derby; they felt confident of winning. That win would relieve them
of all obligations.
"I can't take it," Porter said to Crane. "Allis is more familiar with
the circumstances of the bet--if there was one--than I.
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