thick skins and produced a chorus of muttered curses, but no one ventured an excuse. Baleful looks followed Lesurge and his sister as they returned to their own camp.
'The girl must tell all she knows or the old man suffers,' Paul said vindictively. 'I'll win--whatever the price.' * * * Early on the ensuing morning, Mary and Lesurge were seated on an outcrop of rock near the camp, watching the fiery crimson splendour of the sun as it emerged from behind a distant range of hills. All traces of the tempest which had torn the man's self-control to shreds had gone; only the veiled passion in his gaze as it rested on her slim young body betrayed the fire within.
'The escape of the cowboy is serious,' he began. 'Really?' she asked. 'Of course, you did not mean to--hurt him.'
'I should have kept my word,' he replied. 'My dear, you do not fully comprehend. That man is an outlaw with a price on his head; his life is already forfeit. He is a cold-blooded killer, capable of any crime to compass his end-- the stealing of our--your gold.' Jo, 'He might have robbed the coach,' she objected.
'Green was after bigger game,' Paul lied. 'He's what you Westerners call a 'hawg'.' She smiled at that but soon her face was grave again. 'I never wanted wealth--much,' she said reflectively. 'And now I have seen what dreadful deeds men will do to get it ...'
'One has to live.'
'Even though others die?'
'The inevitable law of Nature, from the tiniest insect upwards,' he told her. 'Mary, I want you to have every happiness that gold can give, but apart from that, I cannot let these bandits rob you; it would be my fault, due to my well-meant but stupid blunder.' She laid a hand impulsively on his. 'I will not have you blame yourself,' she said. 'Everything you did was for me.' She flushed and added softly, 'I hope that one day I can repay you.' Her words sent the hot blood of desire racing through his veins and he bent his head lest she should see the naked lust which leaped to life in his eyes. Triumph surged in him; he had won--so far.
'My dear, you mean all to me,' he said tenderly, 'but I shall never be content until I have checkmated those rogues and repaired the damage I have done. You must help me to find the mine, Mary.' The girl was silent, consldering. Snowy was an impostor, the secret her own and she had a right to part with it. In a low voice she told him: 'This spot was spoken of and the cabin. You must follow the stream back to a strip of pines. A great granite finger which sways, overshadows the mine; the letter called it the Rocking Stone.' Paul's eyes glistened. 'If you'd only told me sooner,' he said reproachfully.
'I promised not to,' she replied. 'I was given what seemed to be a good reason.' With all his adroitness, he had hard work to hide his feelings. To have been baulked and nearly outwitted by a tool he hadmeant to use and throw aside made him writhe with rage. He promised himself that Snowy should pay--presently.
'Well, never mind, we can win yet,' he smiled. 'Come, Berg should have breakfast ready, and I'll own to being hungry.' His good humour persisted when they returned to camp, and Lora--remembering his black mood but a few hours before--was scornfully amused. Snowy came sidling up, uncertain of his reception. Mary discerned his discomfort and took her own way to end it.
'Morning, Uncle Phil,' she said.
It was her usual greeting, but this time it made the old man blink. He hesitated for a bare instant, and then. 'Mornin', my dear,' he returned huskily. Paul's frown was hut momentary.
'Good news, girls,' he announced. 'We take the trail today.'
'To Deadwood?' Lora inquired.
'No, to El Dorado--the Land of Gold. Oh, it isn't far. We just travel up this creek till we reach a belt of trees, find an overhanging point of rock which moves, and there we are. Do you remember it--Ducane?' Snowy received the gibe apathetically. 'Can't say I do,' he mumbled. 'Feller in Californy told me of a swingin' stone. a big chunk, one man could start rockin' but twenty couldn't tip her over. I reckoned he was lyin'. Never heard o' the like in these parts.'
'You're going to see one, and work under the shadow of it, digging dust--for me,' Paul said harshly. 'And if you try to steal any I'll have you whipped.'
'Mister Lesurge does not mean that, Uncle Phil,' Mary said quietly. 'If we have good fortune, you will share.' Paul was quick to retrieve his error. 'Of course I was only joking,' he protested, but his laugh did not ring true.
While the preparations for departure were being made, Mary contrived to get the prospector alone.
'What is your real name, Uncle Phil?' she asked.
He shook his head. 'I disremember--I've been 'Snowy' so long. Yo're mighty good to me, Mary, seein' how I've deceived you. There didn't seem much harm the way Paul put it, an' I was meanin' to play straight with you.' Her eyes were gentle. 'I don't doubt that, and my real uncle could not have been more kind. But how did you know so much about my father?'
'Fagan wised up Paul, an' he told me,' Snowy confessed, and then, 'Where did Fagan git his facts?'
'I cannot say. He travelled nearly all the way with me when I came to Wayside, but I told him nothing.'
'So he might 'a' oeen around when yore father ...' Snowy did not finish.
'It is possible,' she admitted, and stared at him. 'You don't think--'
'I do--times; you'd be s'prised,' he said. 'An' Mary that fella Lesurge ain't fit to lick the mud off'n the boots o' them two cowboys.' It was as though another man had spoken, and by the time amazement had given place to indignation, he was some yards distant.
'Uncle Phil,' she called sharply.
'I'm tellin' you,' he answered, and scurried away.
Later, as they followed the curves of the little creek, she put a question to Paul:
'You expect to find Green at this place we're going to?'
'Yes, and probably his friend Mason, who declined to join my party.'
'But why should Green have come, since he knew where o find the mine?' * 'That's his damned cleverness. If he could persuade us that the ravine was the genuine article, we go back to Deadwood in disgust, leaving him a clear field, an artful scheme which, thanks to you, we shall defeat.' The praise did not please her--she was dubious about the part she' had played, and almost regretting the search for her uncle and his elusive fortune. It had been a shock to discover that the quaint, gentle old man was a fraud and she could not yet believe that he had meant ill to her. It gave her a feeling of lonely helplessness which the presence of Paul failed to eradicate. She found herself hoping first that Gerry would be there, and then that he would not.
* * * The fugitives found the company at the Rocking Stone busy as beavers, but they gathered round eagerly to hear the news, for the puncher's early appearance, with a companion, told them something had happened. The story did not take long.
'So here we are,' Sudden concluded. 'Husky figures to throw in with us.' The big miner shed his coat and rolled up his sleeves. 'Gimme a shovel,' he said. 'One week here an' I'll go back an' stand Deadwood on its head.'
'We won't have a week,' Sudden warned. 'I reckon that right now they're on the way.'
'Yu think they'll find us?' Gerry asked.
'Shorely, the girl will weaken--Lesurge has a medicine tongue with women'--he saw the boy wince--'an' she's fond o' Snowy, even though he ain't what she thought.'
'Never could understan' her bein' kin' to that of scatterbrain,' Gerry said.
'Snowy is straight,' Sudden told him. 'Don't yu gamble too much on his bein' loco neither.' He spoke to Husky. 'Yu gotta remember that this claim belongs to Miss Ducane; we're on'y workin' it for her.'
'What's yore plan?' Rogers asked the puncher.
'Hide the hosses outside an' put a man at the entrance,' Sudden said. He studied the long, steep slope at the top of which the giant stone frowned down upon them, direful, menacing. 'Cuss it, if they get up there they can pepper us like rats in a pit.' However, short of abandoning the mine, which none of them even thought of, there was nothing else to be done. The horses were removed to a grassy hollow hedged in by thick, thorny scrub, and Bowman, armed with a rifle, was stationed at the entrance. The others went on with the work of gathering the wealth which for centuries had lain there undisturbed. Sudden and Gerry were together.
'How much o' this mine will Snowy an' Miss Ducane get if Lesurge can put his dirty paws on it?' the latter asked presently.
'Six foot each to lie in, same as the rest of us,' was the grim reply. 'An' he'll wash the dust out first.'
'But he wouldn't kill the girl.'
