ilarity of our friend,
Connor, was explained. He had no liking for Yetmore, as we have seen,
and it delighted him immeasurably to think of that too astute gentleman
rushing off to buy my father's share of a valuable mine, and, if he
succeeded, finding himself the owner of a worthless boulder instead.

For myself, I was much puzzled how to act. Naturally, I felt pretty
indignant at Yetmore's action, and it seemed to me that if, in trying to
cheat my father, he should only succeed in cheating himself, it would be
no more than just that he should be allowed to do so. But at the same
time I thought that my father ought to be informed of the state of the
case as soon as possible--he, not I, was the one to judge--and so,
turning to Connor, I asked him to lend me his pony so that I might set
off at once.

"What! And spoil the deal!" cried Connor; and at first he was disposed
to refuse. But on consideration, he added: "Well, perhaps you're right.
Your father's an honest man, if ever there was one, and I doubt if he'd
let even a man like Yetmore cheat himself if he could help it; and so I
suppose you must go and tell him the particulars as soon as you can. All
I hope is that he will have made his deal before you get there. Yes, you
can take the pony."

But it was not necessary to borrow Connor's steed after all, for when we
stepped outside the cabin, there were our own ponies coming up the road.
The halters were fastened up round their necks, and they showed evident
signs of having been run hard some time during the morning. Presumably
Yetmore had abandoned them somewhere on the road and they had walked
leisurely back.

"Well, boys," said Connor, "we may as well all start together now; but
as your ponies have had a good morning's work already, we can't expect
to make the whole distance this evening. We'll stop over night at
Thornburg's, twenty miles down, and go on again first thing in the
morning."

This we did, and by ten o'clock we reached home, where the first person
we encountered was my father.

"Well, Tom," he cried, as the miner slipped down from his horse. "So you
made a strike, did you?"

At this Tom opened his eyes pretty widely. "How did you know?" he asked.

"I didn't know," my father replied, smiling, "but I guessed. Does it
amount to much?"

"Well, no, I can't say it does," Tom replied, as he covered his mouth
with his hand to hide the grin which would come to the surface.
"Yetmore's been here, I suppo