unusual implements which constitute the impedimenta of a prospector. Green returned the smiles and replied in kind to the various jocular greetings. He welcomed these effusions, for they signified that he was being taken seriously. Two miles out of town he had an encounter which pleased him still more when Noreen loped round a bend in the trail. He snanched his hat off as she pulled up and surveyed his baggage with patent amusement.
`I'm glad you didn't inflict that on Blue, it would have broken his heart,' she said, and then, her face sobering, `Why have you left the Y Z?'
`Me an' the foreman had an argument,' he replied gravely, but the little crinkles at the corners of his eyes were much in evidence, and she knew that he was anything but downcast. She determined to punish him.
`Dad told me you nearly killed Blaynes,' she said severely. `I'm afraid you're of a quarrelsome disposition-- we seem to have had nothing but trouble since you came.'
The reproof did not have the effect she expected, for the recipient grinned widely, and asked, `Yu blamin' me for the rustlin' too?'
`You know I did not mean that,' the girl replied indignantly. `Why do you always put me in the wrong?'
`Must be my quarrelsome disposition,' he returned, and then, noting the expression on her face, added, `I shore am a trouble-hunter, yu see.'
His quizzically woebegone air dispersed her resentment and she smiled as she said, `You have certainly made a lot of enemies. Why don't you go away?'
`Do yu want me to?' he countered.
The blunt question made her hesitate. For some reason which she did not attempt to account for she knew that she would be sorry if he took her advice but, of course, she could not tell him so.
`I am still in your debt, and I naturally do not wish that harm should come to you,' she fenced.
`Yu don't owe me anythin',' he replied. `As for enemies, well I reckon the man who never makes any don't amount to much. I ain't runnin' away.'
`You are risking your life just for a matter of pride?' she queried.
`That, an'--other things,' he smiled. `Yu see, I've a hunch there's a gold-mine around here, an' I aim to locate it.'
Noreen gathered up her reins. She did not in the least believe he was staying to hunt gold, but she knew he would not tell her anything he did not want to--he was not the type.
`I sincerely hope you will be fortunate,' she said.
`Thank you, ma'am, if I get what I'm hopin' for I'll be more than that,' the puncher said, and again there was the look in his eyes which had stirred her pulses once before in the street at Hatchett's. At the touch of the spur her pony jumped forward, and with a wave of the hand she was gone. Green watched until a turn in the trail took her from sight, and then resumed his way.
'She shore didn't want me to clear out, but shucks, there ain't nothin' to that,' he mused. `Reckon if our ears was longer, hoss, we'd make a fair pair o' jackasses, so don't yu go puttin' on any frills either.'
It was towards noon when he reached the blind canyon, for he had travelled by devious ways; it was possible that his movements might be watched and he wished his choice of a locality to commence operations to appear haphazard. Several times during the journey he had paused and investigated certain spots as though considering them. He now did the same as he stood on the bank of the stream, about halfway along the canyon, and then he spoke aloud: `She'll do. I reckon there oughta be colour in them sands, an' there's shore enough trout in the pools below. Anyway, she's a dandy place for a camp.'
He led his horse back to a strip of grass which stretched from the shady bank of the stream to the overhanging cliff which formed one of the walls of the canyon, stripped the animal and tethered it with his rope. Then winh his axe he attacked a nearby thicket and cut a number of light poles. With these, and the strippings from them, he soon erected a lean-to shelter, choosing a spot where the rock-face shelved and formed a shallow cave. In this he deposited his baggage, and having lighted a fire, began to prepare a meal. This despatched, he pottered about the camp making his hut more weatherproof, cutting additional fuel, and gathering spruce-tops for his bed. Presently he took the spade and the shallow pan and went down to the stream to make his first bid for fortune. He found it hard and disappointing work, for no sign of the precious metal rewarded his efforts.
`Durn it, this ain't goin' to be such a picnic as I thought,' he soliloquised. `Guess I'll have to look around for likelier spots.'
He tried several other places with the same result, and at length flung down his tools in disgust and went a- fishing. Here he met with more success and soon three speckled beauties lay on the grass beside him. He broiled them for his supper and turned in. On the following morning he again tackled the search for wealth and found it no more successful or attractive than it had been the day before. But he stuck manfully to it, for he was conscious of a conviction that he was not alone in the canyon. Therefore, he was not so surprised as he appeared to be when a rider came ambling along the bank of the stream on which he was working, and pulled up to watch with a cordial greeting of, `Howdy, stranger.' Green returned the salutation, while his quick eyes gathered the details of the newcomer's appearance. He was evidently a cowhand, about forty, with a clean-shaven, open face, good-humour in every line of it. Hecarried a revolver at his hip and had a winchester on the saddle. He was riding a pinto horse the brand on which Green could not see. Pushing back his big sombrero, the visitor said: `Findin' much?'
Green, kneeling over the pan, grinned up at him. `Plenty dirt,' he replied, `but not a smidgin' o' gold so far.'
The stranger looked around. `Seems a likely place,' he remarked. `But that's the funny thing 'bout minin'; yu never can tell.'
`I take it yo're speakin' from experience.'
`Shore I am--wasted part o' my life in California. Meanin' no offence, I take it yu are new at this game.'
`Yu take it correct; I reckon I must seem plumb clumsy.'
The other man laughed. `Everythin' has to be learned, an' yu shore are makin' yoreself in a mess. Lemme show yu the trick of it.'
Dismounting from his horse, he trailed the reins, and took the pan of dirt Green was beginning to wash. In about half the time the novice had required the pan was empty save for a tiny residue of sand which the operator scanned eagerly, and then threw out.
`Not a colour,' he said. `Well, let's try her again.'
`Yu shore have got that there pannin' business thrown an' tied,' Green remarked, as he watched the deft hands of the expert. `I'm hopin' yu'll stay an' eat with me; my camp's just handy.'
`Yu bet I will. I'm short on grub an' got a goodish way to go,' replied the other.
The puncher left him busy with his self-imposed task and went to prepare a meal. A few fortunate casts provided him with fish, and when, in response to his hail, the visitor reached the camp, an appetising odour of broiled trout and coffee greeted him. Facing his host, cross-legged on the grass, he attacked the food like a hungry man.
`Say, these fish is prime,' he remarked presently. `Yu may be a mite awkward with a gold-pan but with a frying-pan yo're ace-high.'
Over the meal the newcomer grew communicative. His name, he said, was Dick West, more commonly known as `California,' and he was now punching for an outfit whose headquarters were situated at the base of the Big Chief range.
`What brand?' asked the host.
`Crossed Dumb-bell,' replied the other, watching closely.
`New to me,' Green said carelessly. `Didn't know there was a ranch in that part, but then I ain't infested this locality long my own self.' He went on to give his own name, and the bare fact of his dismissal from the Y Z, taking care that his resentment should not be too obvious. The stranger nodded understandingly.
`If you weren't wedded to thisyer grubbin' for gold, yu could come along o' me,' he offered. `I reckon we could use another man. The pay is fifty per an' shares, an' the shares is better than the fifty per I'm tellin' yu, for the right man.'
`Sounds good,' Green commented.
`It's as good as it sounds too,' said the other. `Old Jeffs ain't a bad sort either.'
`That the boss?'
