gold in the ground when the flume isn't there
to work it out?" said Jessie to her sister, with a cautioning glance
towards Dick.

But Dick did not notice the look that passed between the sisters. The
richer humor of Jessie's retort had thrown him into convulsions of
laughter.

"And now SHE says, wot's the use o' the gold without the flume? 'Xcuse
me, ladies, but that's just puttin' the hull question that's agitatin'
this yer camp inter two speeches as clear as crystal. There's the
hull crowd outside--and some on 'em inside, like Fairfax, hez their
doubts--ez says with Miss Christie; and there's all of us inside, ez
holds Miss Jessie's views."

"I never heard Mr. Munroe say that the flume was wrong," said Jessie
quickly.

"Not to you, nat'rally," said Dick, with a confidential look at
Christie; "but I reckon he'd like some of the money it cost laid out for
suthin' else. But what's the odds? The gold is there, and WE'RE bound to
get it."

Dick was the foreman of a gang of paid workmen, who had replaced the
millionaires in mere manual labor, and the WE was a polite figure of
speech.

The conversation seemed to have taken an unfortunate turn, and both the
girls experienced a feeling of relief when they entered the long gulch
or defile that led to Indian Spring. The track now becoming narrow, they
were obliged to pass in single file along the precipitous hillside,
led by this escort. This effectually precluded any further speech,
and Christie at once surrendered herself to the calm, obliterating
influences of the forest. The settlement and its gossip were far behind
and forgotten. In the absorption of nature, her companions passed out of
her mind, even as they sometimes passed out of her sight in the windings
of the shadowy trail. As she rode alone, the fronds of breast-high
ferns seemed to caress her with outstretched and gently-detaining hands;
strange wildflowers sprang up through the parting underbrush; even the
granite rocks that at times pressed closely upon the trail appeared as
if cushioned to her contact with star-rayed mosses, or lightly flung
after her long lassoes of delicate vines. She recalled the absolute
freedom of their al-fresco life in the old double cabin, when she
spent the greater part of her waking hours under the mute trees in
the encompassing solitude, and, half regretting the more civilized
restraints of this newer and more ambitious abode, forgot that she had
ever rebelled against it. The