Jim Ferrers had stated a plain truth when he remarked that Nevada men did not often waste ammunition.
With four rifles aimed at him, at that short, point-blank range, it would seem that Jim's last moment had come.
Yet at that instant the sound of an approaching motor ear was heard.
Then the car, moving at twelve miles an hour mounted the crest at a point less than seventy yards from where the four ambushed men lay.
Joe Timmins caught sight of them.
"Take the wheel!" muttered Timmins, forcing Parkinson's nearer hand to the wheel.
In an instant Joe was upon his feet, drawing his revolver. He fired at the men in ambush, but a lurch of the car on the rough ground destroyed his aim.
"Dolph Gage and his rascals at the ridge," bellowed Joe, in a fog-horn voice, pointing.
Jim Ferrers dropped to the ground, hugging it flat. Harry followed suit. Tom Reade hesitated an instant, then away he flew at a dead run.
Close to a tree Tom stopped, thrusting right hand in among the bushes. Up and down his hand moved.
"Shoot and duck!" snarled Dolph, in a passion because of their having been discovered.
Boom!
Over by the ridge where Gage and his fellow rascals lay it looked as though a volcano had started in operation on a small scale.
Fragments of rock, clouds of dirt, splinters and bits of brush shot up in the air.
Following the report came a volley of terrific yells from Dolph and his fellows.
They had been on the instant of firing when the big explosion came. Jim Ferrers, too, was taking careful aim at the moment.
It is a law of Nature that whatever goes up debris, mixed with larger pieces of rock and clots of earth, descended on the scene of the explosion. Yet little of this flying stuff reached Dolph Gage and his companions, for they were up and running despite the mark that they thus presented to Ferrers.
Nor did the rascals stop running until they had reached distant cover.
"Stop it, Jim—-don't shoot!" gasped Tom Reade, choking with laughter, as Ferrers leaped to his feet, taking aim after the fugitives.
"I want Dolph Gage, while I've got a good, legal excuse," growledFerrers, glancing along rifle barrel at the forward sight.
"Don't think of shooting," panted Tom, darting forward and laying a hand on the rifle barrel to spoil the guide's aim. "Jim, it isn't sportsmanlike to shoot a fleeing enemy in the back! Fight fair and square, Jim—-if you must fight."
There was much in this to appeal to the guide's sense of honor and fair play. Though scowled, he lowered the rifle.
"Tom, you everlasting joker, what happened?" demanded Harry Hazelton.
"You saw for yourself, didn't you?" retorted Reade.
"Yes; but——-"
"Are you so little of an engineer that you don't know aminewhen you see one, Harry?"
"But how did that mine come to be there?"
"I planted it."
"When?"
"Today, when you started on your ride."
"Oh!"
"You see, Harry, I was pondering away over mining problems this morning. As you had the only horse, that was all that there was left for me to do. Now, you must have noticed that most of the outcropping rock around here is of a very refractory kind?"
"Yes," nodded Hazelton.
"Then, of course, you realize that for at least a hundred feet down in the mine the rock that would be found would be the same."
"Undoubtedly."
"So, Harry, I was figuring on a way to blast ore rock out whenever we should find refractory stuff down a shaft or in the galleries or tunnels of a mine."
"Fine, isn't it?" retorted Hazelton. "A great scheme! You blast out the rock and the force of the explosion shoots all the fine particle of gold into the walls of the mine—-just the way you'd pepper a tree with birdshot!"
Mr. Dunlop had drawn close and now stood smiling broadly.
"That appears to be one on you, Reade," suggested the mine promoter.
"That's what I want to find out," returned Tom soberly; "whetherI'm a discoverer, or just a plain fool."
"What do you think about it?"
"Let's go and look at the ledge, and then I can tell you, sir,"Reade answered, striding forward.
"Look out!" cautioned Joe Timmins. "Those hyenas will shoot. They'll be sore over the trick you played on them, and they'll be hiding waiting for a chance for a shot."
"Oh, bother the hyenas," Tom retorted, impatiently. "I'm out for business today. Coming, Mr. Dunlop?" The mine operator showed signs of hanging back.
Harry promptly joined his chum at what was left of the little ledge. After a few moments Mr. Dunlop, seeing that no shots were fired, stepped over there also, followed by his nephew. Jim Ferrers climbed a tree, holding his rifle and keeping his eyes open for a shot, while Timmins threw himself behind a rock, watching in the direction that the four men had taken.
"This looks even better than I had expected," Tom explained, his eyes glowing as he held up fragments of rock. "You see, the dynamite charge was a low-power one. It just splintered the rock. There wasn't so very much driving force to the explosion. Another time I could make the force even lower."
"Here's gold in this bit of rock!" cried Harry, turning, his eyes sparkling.
"Yes; but not enough to look promising," replied Mr. Dunlop, after examining the specimen. "But we'll look through the rest of the stuff that's loose."
The two men who had hung back soon joined them.
"I wouldn't care about filing a claim to it," Mr. Dunlop, shaking his head after some further exploration. "This rock wouldn't yield enough to the ton to make the work profitable."
"Just a little, outcropping streak, possibly from the claim that I have below," was Mr. Dunlop's conclusion "By the way, Reade, how did you explode the mine?"
"With a magneto," Tom explained, then ran and took the battery from behind the tree from which he had fired it. "I buried the wire, of course, so that no one would trip over it," he added. "Just after I got it attended to Alf Drew happened along, looked forlorn, and wanted a job. So I had almost forgotten the mine, until I realized that the thing was planted right in front of where Dolph Gage's crew were hidden. By the way, Jim, where is Alf?"
"All the information I've got wouldn't send you two feet in the right direction," the guide reported gruffly.
"And where are our tents and the other stuff?" Harry demanded."Gage's crew couldn't get far with them in the time they've had.Shall we hustle after our property?"
"Yes," nodded Tom.
"At the momentary risk of being shot to pieces," added Mr. Dunlop, dryly.
"Those little chances go with being involved in a Nevada mining dispute, don't they?" queried Reade.
"Where can we begin to look?" Harry pressed. "Let's scurry about a bit. Surely men can't get away with tents without leaving some trail."
Within two minutes they had the trail. Marks were discovered that plainly had been made by dragging canvas and guy-ropes along over the ground.
"We'll find our stuff soon," predicted Tom, striding along over a rough trail. "The scoundrels didn't have a team, and they wouldn't take the stuff far without other transportation than their own backs. Hello! What's in there?"
Tom had detected some motions in a clump of brush.
"Look out!" warned Jim Ferrers, bringing his rifle to "ready."
But Tom darted straight into the brush.
"Then this is where you are?" demanded Tom dryly. He glanced down at the cowering form of Alf Drew.
"So you've got the 'makings,' have you?" Reade demanded, seizingAlf by the collar and yanking him up to his feet.
Paper and tobacco fell from young Drew's nerveless grasp to the ground.
"You made me drop the makings of a good one," whined Alf resentfully.
"You didn't have that stuff two hours ago. Where did you get it?" Reade demanded.
"Found it," half whimpered Drew.
"Do you expect me to believe any such fairy tales as that?" insistedTom Reade.
"If you have tobacco and cigarette papers," Tom continued, "then some one gave the stuff to you. It was Dolph Gage, or one of his rascals, wasn't it?"
"Don't know him," replied the boy, with a shake of his head.
"Now, don't try to fool me, Drew," warned Tom, with a mild shake administered to the youngster's shoulders. "How much tobacco have you?"
"A whole package," admitted Alf reluctantly, feeling that it would be of no use to try to deceive his employer.
"And plenty of papers to go with it?"
"Ye-es."
"You got it from four men?"
"No; I didn't."
"Well, from one of four men, then? Tell me the truth."
"Ye-es."
"What did you do to please the four men?"
Alf Drew shifted uneasily from one foot to the other, and then back again.
"Come! Speak up!" Reade insisted sternly.
"You're wasting our time. What did you do for the four men?"
"I didn't do anything," Alf evaded.
"What did you tell them, then?" Reade wanted to know.
"They asked me a few questions."
"Of course; and you answered the questions."
"Well, I——-"
"What did the men want to know about?" pressed Tom, the look in his eyes growing sterner still.
"They wanted to know how many men Jim Ferrers had," admitted theDrew boy.
"Oh, I see," pondered Tom aloud, a half smile creeping into his face. "They were guessing the size of Ferrers's army, were they?"
"I—-I guess so," Alf replied.
"And you told them——-?"
"I told 'em the camp was made up of you and Mr. Hazelton, JimFerrers and myself."
"And then they gave you the tobacco for cigarettes, did they?"
"I made 'em gimme that first," Alf retorted, a look of cunning in his eyes.
"So, my bright little hero, you sold us out for a toy bale of cigarettes, did you?" demanded Tom Reade, staring coldly down at the shame-faced youngster.
"I—-I didn't see how it could do any harm," sniveled young Drew.
"Perhaps it didn't," Tom admitted. "So far, it has resulted only in our being ambushed and all but murdered. Now, where did they take our tents and the other stuff?"
"I don't know," declared Alf. "Are the tents gone?" He answered so promptly that Reade believed him.
"Very much so," replied Reade, releasing his grip on Drew's shoulder."Come on, friends, we'll hunt further."
"Say, what was that big explosion?" asked Alf, running after the party when he found himself being left alone.
"No time to talk until we find our camp stuff," Tom called back over his shoulder.
"I'll help you," proposed Alf eagerly.
"You're full of helpfulness," Reade jibed.
But Alf evidently preferred to stick to them. He ran along at the heels of the last rapidly striding man. Joe Timmins was the only one absent, he having remained at the camp site to keep a watchful eye over the automobile.
Jim Ferrers was in the lead, his trained eyes searching the ground for the trail of the tents.
Within five minutes the party came upon the tents and the food supplies, all of which had been dumped into a thicket in confused piles.
"We'll sort this out and get it back to camp," Tom proposed. "Alf, little hero, redeem yourself by buckling down to a good load. Come here; let me load you down."
Alf meekly submitted, cherishing a half hope that he would not be discharged from his new position after all.
At the end of an hour the stuff had all been taken back and the camp looked a good deal as it had looked that morning.
"Now, Alf," directed Tom in a milder, kinder tone, "you hustle over and break your back helping Mr. Ferrers to get supper ready. We're a famished lot. Understand?"
Alf was only too glad to be able to understand that his part in the dismantling of the camp had been overlooked. While Tom and Harry led their guests into one of the tents, young Drew hastened over to where Jim Ferrers was starting a fire in the camp stove.
"Now, put that stuff back in your pockets, or I'll throw it in the fire!" sounded the angry voice of Ferrers. "You can't use any of that stuff when you're working around me."
"The poor little cigarette pest must have been trying to use his newly acquired 'makings,'" grinned Tom.
While Ferrers was thus busied with preparation of the meal, Joe Timmins had taken the guide's rifle and was keeping a watchful eye over the approaches to the neighborhood.
"So you young men think you could serve me satisfactorily as engineers," questioned Mr. Dunlop.
"I think we could," Tom answered.
"But I am afraid you young men have a rather large notion as to the pay you're worth," continued the mine promoter.
"That's right, sir," Reade nodded. "We have a good-sized idea on the pay question. Now, when you go to Dugout City next you might wire the president of the S.B. & L. railroad, at Denver, or the president of the A.G. & N.M., at Tucson, Arizona, and ask those gentlemen whether we are in the habit of making good on large pay."
"How much will you young men want?"
"For work of this character," replied Tom, after a few moments of thought, during which Harry Hazelton was silent, "we shall want six hundred dollars a month, each, with two hundred dollars apiece added for the fighting risk."
"The fighting risk?" questioned Mr. Dunlop.
"Well, we shall have Dolph Gage and his crowd to guard against, won't we?" Reads counter-questioned.
"But such pay is absurd!" he protested.
"From your view-point, very likely, sir. From our view-point it will be very ordinary compensation, and nothing but our desire to learn more about mining will tempt us to go into it at the figure we have named."
"Your price puts your services out of the question for my company," replied Mr. Dunlop, with a shake of his head.
"Very good, sir," Tom rejoined pleasantly. "No harm done, and we need not talk it over any more. We wish you good luck in finding proper engineers for your work. You will probably motor back to Dugout tomorrow morning, won't you?"
"We'll have to," Mr. Dunlop answered. "We're not safe here until we hire a few good men to come out here to keep Gage and his fellows at a distance."
"That's true, sir," Tom nodded. "As you'll need a good many men here by the time you start work on your mine you'll do well to bring at least a score of them down at once. Twenty good, rough men, used to this life and not afraid of bullets, ought to make you feel wholly safe and secure on your own property."
There was more talk, but neither Tom nor Harry again referred to their serving the new company as engineers.
In due course of time Jim Ferrers, with such help as Alf was able to give, had supper ready to serve. It was a rough meal, of hard tack, pilot bread, potatoes, canned meats and vegetables, but outdoor life had given all a good appetite and the meal did not long remain on the camp table.
For guard duty that night it was arranged that Jim Ferrers and Joe Timmins should relieve each other. Tom also offered to stay up with Ferrers, Harry taking the watch trick with Timmins, though neither of the young engineers was armed or cared to be.
Harry and Timmins were to take the first watch. The others retired early. Tom Reade was about to begin undressing when Hazelton came in for a moment.
While the chums were chatting, Alf Drew's forlorn figure showed at the doorway of the tent.
"Say, boss," complained Alf, "I haven't any place to sleep."
"What?" Reade demanded in pretended surprise, "with nearly all the ground in Nevada at your disposal?"
"But that isn't a bed," contended Alf.
"Right you are there, lad" agreed Tom.
"Now, see here, boss, only one of you two is going to sleep at a time tonight. I'm tired—-I ache. Why can't I sleep on the other cot in this tent?"
"Come here," ordered Tom.
Alf wonderingly advanced.
Whiff! whiff! moved the young engineer's nostrils.
"Just as I thought," sighed Reade. "You've been smoking cigarettes without any let-up ever since supper."
"Well, I have ter," argued Drew.
"And now you smell as fragrant as a gas-house, Alf. Mr. Hazelton is rather particular about the little matter of cleanliness. If you were to sleep on his cot the smell of cigarettes would be so strong that I don't believe Mr. Hazelton could stay on his cot when it came his time to turn in."
"But say! If you knew how dead, dog-tired I am!" moaned Alf.
"Oh, let him sleep on my cot," interposed Harry, good-heartedly. "If I can't stand the cot when I come to use it, then it won't be the first night that I've slept on hard ground and rested well."
"All right, Alf, climb in," nodded Tom. "But see here. Cigarettes make you as nervous as a lunatic. If you have any bad dreams tonight, and begin yelling, then I'll rise and throw you outdoors. Do you understand?"
"Yes," mumbled the boy. "But I won't dream. I'm not nervous now. It's only when I can't get enough cigs that I'm nervous."
"You should have seen him this afternoon," Tom continued, turning to his chum. "The lad and I took a walk. At every other step he kept imagining that he heard rattlesnakes rattling."
"And I did, too," contended Alf stoutly. "You know I did. You heard 'em yourself, Mr. Reade."
"I didn't hear a single rattler," Tom replied soberly.
"Let the tired little fellow go to bed in peace," urged Harry.
"All right," Tom agreed.
Alf went to the head of the cot, to turn the blanket down from the head.
Click-ick-ick-ick! came the warning sound.
With a yell of terror Alf Drew bounded back.
"There's another rattler," he screamed. "It's under that blanket."
"It's all your nerves," Tom retorted. "There isn't a rattler within miles of here."
"Didn't you hear a rattle, Mr. Reade?" wailed the cigarette fiend.
"No; I didn't."
"Didn't you, Mr. Hazelton?"
Harry was on the point of answering "yes," but Tom caught his eyes, and Harry, knowing that something was up, shook his head.
"You must both be deaf, then," argued Drew.
"Why, see here, you nervous little wreck of a cigarette," said Tom, grinning good-humoredly, "I'll show you that there is no snake in that bed. Watch me."
With utmost unconcern, Tom took hold of the blanket, stripping it from the cot. Then he ran his hands over the under blanket.
"Not a thing in this bed but what belongs here," Tom explained. "Alf, do you see how cigarettes are taking the hinges off your nerves."
Shame-faced, and believing that Tom was right, Alf advanced toward the cot. As he reached the side of it——-
Click-ick-ick! sounded close to him.
"You can't make me stay in this tent. It's the most dangerous spot in Nevada," cried Drew, turning and fleeing into flee open. The two chums could hear his feet as he sped to another part of the camp.
"Some trick about that rattling?" queried Harry in a whisper.
"Of course," Tom admitted with a wink.
"It's a shame to tease the youngster so."
"It would be," Tom assented rather gravely, "but I'm using that means to make the lad afraid to smoke cigarettes. If young Drew goes on smoking the miserable little things he'll become come a physical wreck inside of a year."
"How do you do the trick, anyway?" asked Harry curiously.
"Does it really sound like the click of a rattler?" asked Tom.
"Does it? I was 'stung' almost as badly as poor Alf was. How do you do the trick?"
"I'll show you, some time," nodded Tom Reade.
With that promise Harry had to be content, and so must the reader, for the present.
Hazelton went out to stand first watch with Joe Timmins. Alf Drew, finding that the Dunlop party had no room for him under the shelter they had rigged from the rear of the automobile, curled himself on the ground under a tree and fitfully wooed sleep. By daylight the little fellow was fretfully awake, his "nerves" refusing him further rest until he had rolled and smoked two cigarettes. By the time the smoke was over Jim Ferrers called to him to help start the breakfast.
Nothing had been seen of the four intruders through the night.
"I think we shall try to get safely through to Dugout City this morning," suggested Mr. Dunlop.
"You'll make it all right, if you have gasoline enough," remarked Ferrers, who hovered close at hand with a frying pan filled with crisp bacon.
"You don't believe Gage will try to attack us on the way?"
"He has no call to," replied Ferrers. "You're obeying him by leaving the claim, aren't you?"
"Then probably Gage and his companions will settle down on the claim after we leave," suggested Mr. Dunlop.
"If Gage tries to jump the claim in your absence," proposed Ferrers, "your course is easy. If you have the legal right to the claim you'll have to bring back force enough to drive those hyenas off."
"Will you people try to keep an eye over the claim while I'm gone?" asked Mr. Dunlop.
"That would be a little out of our line," Tom made reply. "Besides, Mr. Dunlop, I'm not at all sure that we shall be here until you return."
"But we haven't settled, Reade, whether you and your partner are to be our engineers at the Bright Hope Mine."
"Quite true, sir," nodded Tom. "On the other hand, you haven't engaged us, either"
"Won't you keep the matter open until our return?"
"That would be hardly good business, Mr. Dunlop."
"Yet suppose I had engaged you,"
"Then we'd be going back to Dugout City with you."
"Why, Reade?"
"So that we might get in touch with the world and find out whether you are financially responsible. We wouldn't take an engagement without being reasonably sure of our money."
"You're a sharp one," laughed Mr. Dunlop.
Yet he made no further reference to engaging the two young engineers, a fact that Reade was keen enough to note.
Within an hour after breakfast the Dunlop ear pulled out, leavingTom Reade with only his own party.
"What our friend wants," smiled Harry, "is a pair of mining engineers at the salary of one mere surveyor."
"He won't pay any more than he has to," rejoined Reade.
"Do you really want to work for Dunlop?"
"I really don't care a straw whether I do or not," was Tom's answer. "Harry, we're in the very heart of the gold country and we don't need to work for copper pennies."
"If you'll allow me to say so, friends," put in Jim Ferrers, "I believe you two are the original pair with long heads and I'm going to stick to you as long as you'll let me."
"Me, too," piped up Alf Drew ungrammatically.
The young cigarette fiend was at that instant engaged in rolling one of his paper abominations.
Click-ick-ick-ick!
"Rattlers again!" shivered Alf.
Paper and tobacco fell from his fingers and he fled in terror.
Two nights passed without adventure. On each of these nights the three campers—-for Alf didn't "count" divided the hours of darkness into three watches, each standing guard in his turn. On the third morning after the departure of the Bright Hope group the campers were seated at breakfast around the packing case that served as table.
"I feel as though we ought to be at work," suggested Hazelton.
"Good!" mocked Tom. "You've been riding every day lately, and I have remained in camp, testing samples of ore that I've picked up on my strolls."
"You take the horse today," proposed Harry, "and I'll stay in camp and work."
"Suppose both of us stay in and work," proposed Reade.
"That'll be all right, too," nodded Harry, pleasantly. "May I ask, Tom, what you're up to, anyway?"
"Yes," Reade smiled. "If the Bright Hope is a real mine there must be other good property in this region. I've been looking about, and making an assay every now and then. Jim, you've prospected a bit, haven't you?"
"Yes," nodded the guide. "And, gentlemen, in my day I've been sole owner of three claims, each one of which panned out a fortune."
"Great!" glowed Harry. "But how did you lose your money, Jim!"
"I never got a cent out of any of the mines," rejoined the guide grimly.
"How did that happen?"
"Did you ever hear of 'square gamblers'?" inquired Ferrers.
"Some," Tom admitted with a grimace. "We ran up against one of that brood in Arizona, eh, Harry?"
"You didn't play against him, I hope, hinted Jim soberly.
"Yes, we did," admitted Tom. "Not with his own marked cards, though, nor with any kind of cards. We met him with men's weapons, and it is necessary to add that our 'square gambler' lost."
"The 'square gamblers' that I met didn't lose," sighed Jim Ferrers. "They won, and that's why all three of my mines passed out of my hands before they began to pay."
"You must know something about ore and croppings, and the like,Jim?", Tom continued.
"In a prospector's way, yes," Ferrers admitted.
"Then we'll take a walk, now. Alf can wash up the dishes."
"It's all the little wretch is fit for," muttered Ferrers contemptuously.
Jim looked carefully into the magazine of his repeating ride, then saw to it that his ammunition belt was filled.
"Ready when you gentlemen are," he announced.
"Say, won't you take me with you?" pleaded Alf.
"You wouldn't be of any use to us," Reade answered.
"But I—-I am afraid to stay here alone."
"Do you believe yourself to be so valuable that any one will want to steal you?" Tom laughed.
Alf made a wry face and watched the others depart. Then, filled with needless alarm, he crawled out into a thicket and hid himself. He didn't mean to be trapped by prowlers!
Tom led the way for nearly a mile. At last the trio climbed a slight ascent, halting at the top of the ridge.
"You see, Jim," Tom explained, "this ridge runs southwesterly from here."
"I see it does?" nodded the guide.
"Now, to the northeastward I don't believe there are any croppings that look good enough. But just keep along to the southeast, picking up a specimen here and there. Some of the rock looks good to me."
Jim Ferrers didn't answer in words, though his eyes gleamed with the old fever that he had known before.
"Here's a pretty piece of stone," called the guide in a low tone.He stood holding a fragment about as big as his two fists.
"It's streaked" pretty well with yellow, you see, gentlemen," he remarked;
"It is," Tom agreed, taking the specimen.
"Does the vein run with the top of the ridge?" demanded Harry eagerly.
"It runs a little more to eastward, from this point, I think," Tom made answer. "But let us walk along, in three parallel lines, and see who finds the best indications."
By noon all three were fairly tired out by the steep climbing over the rocky ground. Each had as many specimens as he could carry. The result of the exploration had tended to confirm Tom's notion as to where the vein lay.
"Now, let's see about where we'd stake the claim," Tom proposed. "Of course, we want to get the best rock obtainable. We don't want to leave the best part of this slope for some one else to stake out. It seems to me that the claim ought to start up by that blasted tree. What do you say, Jim?"
"Well, I don't like to make mistakes where you young gentleman are concerned," Ferrers answered, taking off his felt hat and scratching his head. "You see, it isn't my claim."
"The dickens it isn't!" Reade retorted.
"Why, you—-you gentlemen didn't plan to take me in, did you," asked Ferrers, opening his eyes very wide in his amazement over the idea. "You see I—-I can't contribute my share of the brains, along with a pair like you," continued the guide. "Look at you two—-engineers already! Then look at me—-more'n twice as old as either of you, and yet I'm only a cook."
"You're an honest man, aren't you, Jim?" demanded Reade.
"Why, there's some folks who say I am," Ferrers slowly admitted.
"And we're among those who believe that way," Tom continued. "Now, Jim, you're with us, and you've every right to be a partner if we find anything worth taking up in the mine line."
"But there ain't no sense in it," protested the guide, his voice shaking with emotion. "You don't need me."
"We need a man of your kind, Jim," Tom rejoined, resting a very friendly hand on the guide's shoulder. "Listen to me. Hazelton and I are engineers first of all. We'd sooner be engineers than kings. Now, the lure of gold is all well enough, and we're human enough to like money. Yet a really big engineering chance would take us away from a gold mine almost any day in the year. Eh, Harry!"
"I'm afraid it would," confirmed Hazelton.
"If we left a paying mine, Jim, what would we want?" Tom continued. "We'd want an honest partner, wouldn't we—-one whom we could leave for six months or a year and still be able to depend on getting our share of the profits of the mine. You've gambled in the past, Jim, but you stopped that years ago. Now you're honest and safe. Do you begin to see, Jim Ferrers, where you come in? Another point. How old do you take us to be?"
"Well, you're more than twenty-one, each of you," replied Ferrers.
"Not quite, as yet," Tom answered. "So, you see, in order to take out a claim we'd need a guardian, and one whom we could depend upon not to rob us. Jim, if we're to take up a mine we must have a third man in with us. Do you know a man anywhere who'd use us more honestly than you would?"
"I don't," exclaimed Jim Ferrers. "At the same time, gentlemen, I know your kind well enough. Both of you talk of fighting as though you dreaded it, but I'll tell you, gentlemen, that I wouldn'tdareto try any nasty tricks on either of you."
"We understand each other, then," Tom nodded. "Now, then, let us try to make up our minds just where we would want to stake off this claim if the gold assays as well as it looks."
At the beginning Tom and Harry built a little pile of stones. Then, by mere pacing they laid off what they judged to be the fifteen hundred feet of length which the government allows to a single mining claim.
"We can attend to the proper width later," suggested Tom. "Now, what do you say if we make for camp at once. I'm not hungry; still, I think I could eat my half of a baked ox."
The instant that the trio reached camp, Jim Ferrers, with an unwonted mist in his eyes, began to juggle the cooking utensils. Tom busied himself with building the best fire that he could under the chamber of the assaying furnace, while Harry Hazelton, rolling up his sleeves, began to demonstrate his muscle by pulverizing little piles of ore in a hand-mill.
"Be careful not to mix the lots, Harry," advised Tom, glancing over from his station by the furnace.
"Thanks for the caution," smiled Hazelton. "But I have just enough intelligence left to understand the value of knowing from what section of the slope each particular lot of rock comes."
Dinner was eaten in silence. For one thing the campers were ravenously hungry. In the second place, though each kept as quiet as possible, he was deep in the thrall of the fever to dig up hidden gold.
The meal was nearly over when Alf Drew came into camp.
"Are you leaving anything to eat?" he asked.
"Maybe," said Jim Ferrers grimly, "but you were left to wash the breakfast dishes, and you haven't done it yet. Now, you'll wash the breakfast things, and then the dinner things, before you get even a cold bite to eat."
Alf didn't protest. Now that he was back safe in camp he felt much ashamed of himself for having run away and left the camp unwatched.
As soon as he had eaten his dinner Tom Reade went back to the assay furnace to improve the fire.
"Now, Harry, we'll get the powdered stuff ready to roast," Reade remarked. "We've a lot of it to rush through this afternoon."
"And we want to be sure to finish it at least two hours before dark, too," Larry nodded. "If we decide to file a claim Jim ought to be riding for Dugout City by dark, ready to file the papers the first thing in the morning."
"And Jim can bring back half a dozen men to help us sink the first shaft," proposed Tom.
"That's where I feel like a fool," muttered Ferrers. "I haven't a blessed dollar to put in as capital."
"We'll take your honesty for a good deal in the way of capital,Jim," Tom hinted cheerfully.
"Harry, you might get out the transit, the tape, markers and other things. If we stake out a claim we'll do it so accurately that there can be no fight, afterward, as to the real boundaries of our claim."
"What shall we call the claim?" inquired Hazelton, as he came back with the surveying outfit.
"Suppose we wait until the assay is done, and find out whether the claim is worth anything better than a bad name," laughed Tom.
The crucibles were in the furnace now, and a hot flame going. Jim Ferrers sat by, puffing reflectively at his pipe as he squatted on the ground nearby. Alf Drew was smoking, too, somewhere, but he had taken his offensive cigarettes to some place of concealment.
Harry anxiously watched the course of the sun, while Tom kept his gaze, most of the time, near the furnace.
"Come on, Harry!" called Tom at last. "We'd rake out the crucibles.My, but I hope the buttons are going to be worth weighing."
A withering blast of hot air reached the young engineers as the oven door of the portable assay furnace was thrown open. The crucibles were raked out and set in the air to cool.
"Would fanning the crucibles with my hat do any good?" asked Hazelton eagerly.
"Some," yawned Tom, "if you're impatient."
Reade strolled off under the trees, whistling softly to himself. Jim Ferrers smoked a little faster, the only sign he gave of the anxiety that was consuming him. Harry frequently sprang to his feet, walked up and down rapidly, then sat down again. Two or three times Hazelton burned his fingers, testing to see whether the crucibles were cool enough to handle. At last Tom strolled back, his gaze on the dial of his watch.
"Cool enough for a look, now, I think," Reade announced.
Harry bounded eagerly toward the crucibles, feeling them with his hands.
"Plenty cool enough," he reported. "But how did you guess, Tom?"
"I didn't guess," Reade laughed. "I've timed the crucibles before this, and I know to a minute how long it ought to take."
"What a chump I am!" growled Harry, in contempt for self. "I never think of such things as that."
Tom now carefully emptied the crucibles. In the bottom of each was found a tiny bead of half-lustrous metal, which miners and assayers term the "button."
"The real stuff!" glowed Hazelton.
"Ye-es," said Tom slowly. "But the next question is whether the buttons will weigh enough to hint at good-paying ore. Even at that, these buttons are only from surface ore."
"But the ore underneath is always better than the surface ore," contended Hazelton.
"Usually is," Tom corrected. "If we get good enough results from this assay it will at least be worth while to stake a claim and work it for a while."
Harry waited with feverish impatience. Tom Reade, on the other hand, was almost provokingly slow and cool as he carefully adjusted the sensitive assaying balance and finally weighed the buttons. Then he did some slow, painstaking calculating. At last he looked up.
"Well, sir?" asked Jim Ferrers.
"From this surface ore," replied Tom calmly, "twenty-eight dollars in gold to the ton; silver, six dollars."
"That's good enough for me!" cried Ferrers, his eyes brightening.
"Wow! Whoop! Oh—-whee!" vented Harry, then ran and snatched up the surveying transit.
"Yes; I guess we'd better go along and do our staking," assented Tom.
"And I'll be ready at daylight to file the claim at Dugout City," promised Jim. "I won't sleep until I've seen our papers filed."
"You'll file the claim in your own name, Jim," Tom suddenly suggested.
"No; I won't," retorted Ferrers. "I'll play squarely."
"That will be doing squarely by us, Jim," Tom continued. "We don't want to use up our claim privileges on one stretch of Nevada dirt."
If we can find claims enough we'll stake out three, and then pool them all together in a gentlemen's agreement."
"That's a good deal of trust you're showing in me, gentlemen," saidJim huskily.
"Never mind, Jim," returned Reade quietly. "You can show us, you know, that we didn't waste our confidence."
While they were still talking the three came in sight of the ridge.
"Look there!" gasped Harry suddenly.
"Dolph Gage and his tin-horn crowd!" flared Jim Ferrers, in anger."Hang the fellow! This time I'll——-"
"Stop fingering your rifle, Jim," ordered Reade. "Remember, nothing like fighting! If they haven't filed notice in due form on the claim, we're safe yet. If they have——-"
"Look!" hissed Ferrers.
At that moment Dolph Gage could be seen nailing a sheet of white paper to a board driven into the soil.
"We've staked what you want, I reckon!" bellowed Gage laconically."Staked it in due form, too, if you want to know."
"I guess we've lost that claim," said Tom slowly.
"Have we?" hissed Jim Ferrers.
"Keep off this ground!" yelled Dolph Gage, snatching up his rifle.
"Stop that nonsense," Tom bellowed back in his own lusty voice.
"You've no right on this ground."
"Yes, we have, if you want to know," Tom continued. "You haven't filed your papers at Dugout yet."
"How do you know we haven't?"
"I'll take a chance on it," smiled Tom amiably, as he and his companions continued to walk nearer.
Jim Ferrers held his rifle so that it would take him but an instant to swing it into action if the need came.
"If you've filed your papers for this claim" Tom continued, lowering his voice somewhat as they drew nearer to the four rascals. "Have you any such paper to show us?"
"Perhaps not," growled Dolph Gage, his evil eyes seeming to shoot flame. "But we've got our notice of claim nailed up here. We got it here first, and now you can't file any mining entry at Dugout City for this bit o' ground."
"Not if your notice is written in the prescribed language," Tom admitted.
"Well, it is. Now, keep off this ground, or we'll shoot you so full of holes that you'll all three pass for tolerable lead mines!"
"If you don't shoot and make a good job of it," Reade insisted, "I'm going to look over your notice of claim and see whether it's worded in a way that will hold in law."
"Drop 'em, boys! Don't let 'em near!" roared Dolph Gage, swinging his rifle as though to bring it to his shoulder.
But Jim Ferrers had forestalled him. The guide was gazing at his enemy through his rifle sights.
"Drop your weapon, Dolph Gage, and do it blazing quick, or I'll shoot you where you stand!" sounded Jim's voice, low and businesslike. "If any of you other galoots tries to raise his weapon I'll turn and drop him."
As Jim Ferrers had a reputation in Nevada as a rifle shot the others hesitated, then let their rifles drop to the ground.
"Hold them to their present good intentions, Jim," said Tom, with a smile, as he continued to move forward. "Now, Mr. Gage—-I believe that's your name let me see what kind of notice you know how to draw up."
"There 'tis," muttered Dolph sullenly, pointing to the board.
Tom read the notice through under his breath, word by word.
"You've done this sort of thing before, I guess, Gage," said Reade quietly.
"You bet I have. Find it all reg'lar, too, don't you?"
"As nearly as I can tell, it is," agreed Tom.
"And the claim is ours."
"It's yours if you file the formal papers soon enough."
"They'll be filed first thing tomorrow morning," grunted DolphGage. "Now, try a two-step off the dirt that goes with this claim."
"Not until I've seen the borders that you claim," Tom rejoined.
"Why!" demanded Gage cunningly. "Going to start your claim right at the corners of ours."
"If you'll pardon me," Reade smiled, "I don't believe I'll tell you anything about my intentions."
"Maybe you think this claim is a pretty valuable one," Gage insinuated.
"I didn't say so."
"But you would have staked if we hadn't done it first."
"That's what you've got to guess," smiled Reade.
"Say, now you've lost this claim, tell us some thing straight, won't youth begged Dolph.
"Tell you something straight?" repeated Tom. "Certainly. I'll tell you something just as straight as I know how,"
"Well," he said, at last, "you said you'd tell us something straight."
"And so I will," laughed Tom. "It's just this: Go to blazes!"
"Come, now, don't get fresh, kid!" warned Dolph angrily. "If we're going to be on neighboring claims you may find it a heap to your advantage to use us about half-way decent and polite."
Tom didn't answer at once. He was rapidly covering the statement of location from the paper nailed to the board.
"You fellows picked up a lot of ore stuff around here," continuedDolph Gage.
"Yes?" Tom inquired. "Did you see us?"
"Yes, and we also saw you making an assay."
"You did."
"Of course we did. Say, friend, how did that assay come out?"
"It came out of the furnace," Tom answered still writing.
"'Course it did. But say, how did that assay read?"
"Read?" repeated Tom. "Why, bless me, I never knew that an assay could read."
"You know what I meant, younker. How did it figger?"
"To the best of my belief," said Tom, "an assay is as much unable to figure as it is to read."
"Don't waste any more time on the kid, Dolph," growled another of the group. "He won't tell you anything that you want to know."
"If he doesn't" rejoined Gage, "maybe he'll miss something. See here—-Reade's your name, isn't it?"
"You've got that much of your information straight," assentedTom, looking up with a smile.
"Well, Reade, maybe you'd better be a bit more polite and sociable. You've missed staking this claim, but I think we can fix it to give you a job here as engineer."
"That would be very kind of you, I'm sure," nodded Tom. "But I can't undertake any work for you."
"Then you'll lose some money."
"I'm used to losing money," smiled Tom. "As for my partner, he's a real wonder in the way of losing money. He lost ten cents yesterday."
"We've got a fine claim," asserted Dolph Gage. It's right under our feet, and there isn't another such claim in Nevada. Now, if you two want to make any real money you'd better begin to be decent with us right now. Otherwise, you won't get the job. Now, what do you say?"
"I vote for 'otherwise,'" laughed Reade, turning on his heel.
"Oh, you run along and be independent, then," called Dolph Gage after him. "If you're going to stick the winter through on this Range you'll be hungry once or twice between now and spring, if you don't take the trouble to get in right with us."
"Why?" questioned Reade, halting and looking squarely back. "Do you steal food, too?"
Once More Tom turned on his heel. Harry walked along with him. Jim Ferrers all but walked backward, holding his rifle ready and keeping a keen eye over the claim stealers.
"Come along, Jim," called Tom at last. "Those fellows won't do any shooting. Their minds are now set on their new claim. They expect to dig out gold enough to enable them to buy two or three banks. They won't shoot unless they're driven to it."
Jim Ferrers turned and walked with the boys.
Fifteen seconds later a rifle cracked out behind them, the bullet striking the dirt well to the left of Tom's party.
"It's a bluff, Jim, and——-" began Reade.
Crack! spoke Ferrers's ride.
"I knocked Gage's hat off," said the guide dryly. "Now, if he fires again, it'll show that he's looking for trouble."
"The fellow who goes looking for trouble is always a fool," Tom remarked.
"Because trouble is the most worthless thing in the world, yet a fellow who goes looking for it is always sure to find twice as much as he thought he wanted."
By the time the young engineers had reached their own camp, Harry, whose face had been growing gradually "longer" on the walk, sank to the ground in an attitude of dejection.
"Just our luck!" he growled. "Gage is right when he says that claim is the best in this part of Nevada. And, just because we were too slow, we lost it. Fortune, you know, Tom, knocks but once at any man's door."
"I don't believe that," said Tom stoutly. "Harry, now that we've made a start and lost, my mind is made up as to our course now. I hope you'll agree with me."
"What is it?" Hazelton asked.
"Harry, old fellow, we'll turn mining engineers in earnest for the present. We'll engineer our own mines, with Jim for a partner. Harry, we'll get up our muscle with pickaxes. We'll stake our fortunes on the turn of a pick!"
"You mean it, do you?" asked Hazelton, after a pause of a few moments.
"I never meant anything more in my life!"
"Then, of course, I'll agree to it, Tom. If I go astray, it'll be the first time that I ever went wrong through following your advice."
"And you're with us, Ferrers?" inquired Tom, looking around.
"Gentlemen," spoke the guide feelingly, "after the way you've used me, and the way you've talked to me, I'm with you in anything, and I can wait a month, any time, to find out what that 'anything' means. Just give me your orders."
"Orders are not given to partners," Tom told him.
"Orders go withthispartner," Jim asserted gravely. "And, gentlemen, if we make any money, just hand me what you call my share and I'll never ask any questions."
"Jim, we're going in for mining," Tom continued. "I can speak for Mr. Hazelton now, for he has authorized me to do so. Mining it is, Jim, but we three are young and tender, and not expert with pickaxes. We'd better have some experts. Can you pick up at least six real miners at Dugout City?"
"A feller usually can," Ferrers replied.
"Then if you'll put in a good part of tonight riding, tomorrow you can do your best to pick up the men. Get the kind, Jim, who don't balk at bullets when they have to face 'em, for we've a hornets' nest over yonder. Get sober, level-headed fellows who know how to fight—-men of good judgment and nerve. Pay 'em what's right. You know the state of wages around here. While you're at Dugout, Jim, pick out a two-mule team and a good, dependable wagon for carting supplies. Put all the chuck aboard that you think we'll need for the next two or three weeks. I'll give you, also, a list of digging tools and some of the explosives that we'll need in shaft sinking. While you're in Dugout, Jim, pick up two good ponies, with saddles and bridles. I guess I'd better write down some of these instructions, hadn't I?"
"And write down the street corner where I'm to pick up the money, Mr. Reade," begged Ferrers dryly. "You can't do much in the credit line in Nevada."
"The street corner where you're to find the money, eh, Jim?" smiledTom. "Yes; I believe I can do that, too. You know the map ofDugout, don't you?"
"'Course."
"You know where to find the corner of Palace Avenue and MissionStreet?"
"Sure."
"On one of those four corners," Tom continued, "you'll find theDugout City Bank."
"I've seen the place," nodded Ferrers, "but I never had any money in it."
"You will have, one of these days," smiled Tom, taking out a fountain pen and shaking it. Next he drew a small, oblong book from an inside pocket, and commenced writing on one of the pages. This page he tore out and handed Ferrers.
"What's this?" queried the guide.
"That's an order on the Dugout City Bank to hand you one thousand dollars."
Ferrers stared at the piece of paper incredulously.
"What'll the feller pay me in?" he demanded. "Lead at twelve cents a pound? And say, will he hand me the lead out of an automatic gun?"
"If the paying teller serves you that way," rejoined Reade, "you'll have a right to feel peevish about it. But he won't. Hazelton and I have the money in bank to stand behind that check."
"You have?" inquired Ferrers, opening his eyes wide. "Fellers at your age have that much money in banks"
"And more, too," Tom nodded. "Did you think, Jim, that we had never earned any money?"
"Well, I didn't know that you probably made more'n eighteen or twenty dollars a week," Ferrers declared.
"We've made slightly more than that, with two good railroad jobs behind us," Tom laughed. "And here's our firm pass-book at the bank, Jim. You'll see by it that we have a good deal more than a thousand dollars there. Now, you draw the thousand that the check calls for. When you're through you may have some money left. If you do, turn the money in at the bank, have it entered on the pass-book and then bring the book to me."
"I'll have to think this over," muttered Ferrers, "and you'd better set down most of it in writing so that I won't forget."
The smoke from the cook fire brought Alf Drew in from hiding, his finger-tips stained brown as usual.
"Now, see here, young man," said Tom gravely, "there is no objection to your taking some of your time off with your 'makings,' but Ferrers is going away, and you must stay around more for the next two or three days. Otherwise, there won't be any meals or any payday coming to you."
"Is Mr. Ferrers going to Dugout City?" asked Alf, with sudden interest.
"Yes."
"Say, I'll work mighty hard if you'll advance me fifty cents and let me get an errand done by Mr. Ferrers."
"Here's the money," smiled Tom, passing over the half dollar.
Alf was in such haste that he forgot to express his thanks. Racing over to Jim the little fellow said something in a very low voice.
"No; I won't!" roared Ferrers. "Nothing of the sort!"
"Does he want you to get the 'makings,' Jim!" called Tom.
"Yes; but I won't do it," the guide retorted.
"Please do," asked Tom.
"What?Youask me to do it, sir? Then all right. I will."
"What do you want to do that for?" murmured Harry.
"Let the poor little runt have his 'makings,' if he wants," Tom proposed. "But I don't believe that Alf will smoke the little white pests very much longer."
"You're going to stop him?"
"I'm going to make him want to stop it himself," Tom rejoined, with a slight grin.
Alf came back, looking much pleased.
"Let me feel your pulse," requested Reade. "Now, let me see your tongue."
This much accomplished, Tom next turned down the under lid of one of young Drew's eyes and gazed at the lack of red there displayed.
"I see," remarked Reade gravely, "that your nerves are going all to pieces."
"I feel fine," asserted Alf stolidly.
"You must, with your nerves in the state I now find them," retorted the young engineer. "Next thing I know you'll be hearing things."
Click-ick-ick!
"Wow-ow-wow!" shrieked Alf Drew, bounding some ten feet away from the low bush near which he had been standing.
Click-ick-ick-ick!
"Get away from that bush, Mr. Reade!" howled the young cigarette fiend. "That rattler will bite you, if you don't."
"I didn't hear any rattler," said Tom gravely. "Did you, Harry?"
"Not a rattle," said Hazelton soberly.
Jim Ferrers looked on and grinned behind Alf's back. The youngster was trembling. As Tom came near him the "rattle" sounded again. Within five minutes two more warning "rattles" had been heard near the boy.
"The camp must be full of 'em," wailed the terrified boy. "AndI'm afraid of rattlers."
"So am I, Alf," Tom assured him, "but I haven't heard one of the reptiles. The trouble is with your nerves, Drew. And your nerves are in league with your brain. If you go on smoking cigarettes you won't have any brain. Or, if you do, it will be one that will have you howling with fear all the time. Why don't you drop the miserable things when you find they're driving you out of your heads"
"Perh-h-h-haps I will," muttered the boy.
After an early supper, Jim Ferrers rode away. He offered to leave his rifle in camp, but Tom protested.
"I'd feel responsible for the thing if you left it here, you know, Jim. And I don't want to have to keep toting it around all the time you're away."
"But suppose Dolph Gage and his crew come over here, and you're not armed?"
"Then I'll own up that we haven't anything to shoot with, and ask him to call again," Tom laughed. "But don't be afraid, Jim. Gage and his crew will be anxious, for the next few days, to see whether they can coax us into serving them. They need an engineer over at their stolen claim, and they know it."
So Ferrers rode away, carrying his rifle across his saddle.
Alf spent an evening of terror, for the ground around the camp appeared to be full of "rattlers".