me! 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; "whether
I'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.