at
somewhere along the route, and a frayed silk kerchief was wrapped
carelessly about his head. And for all his ten millions, he carried
his own travelling pack on his broad shoulders. "And that one, the one
with the beard, that's Swiftwater Bill, another of the Eldorado kings."

"How do you know?" Frona asked, doubtingly.

"Know!" the man exclaimed. "Know! Why his picture has been in all the
papers for the last six weeks. See!" He unfolded a newspaper. "And a
pretty good likeness, too. I've looked at it so much I'd know his mug
among a thousand."

"Then who is the third one?" she queried, tacitly accepting him as a
fount of authority.

Her informant lifted himself on his toes to see better. "I don't
know," he confessed sorrowfully, then tapped the shoulder of the man
next to him. "Who is the lean, smooth-faced one? The one with the
blue shirt and the patch on his knee?"

Just then Frona uttered a glad little cry and darted forward. "Matt!"
she cried. "Matt McCarthy!"

The man with the patch shook her hand heartily, though he did not know
her and distrust was plain in his eyes.

"Oh, you don't remember me!" she chattered. "And don't you dare say
you do! If there weren't so many looking, I'd hug you, you old bear!

"And so Big Bear went home to the Little Bears," she recited, solemnly.
"And the Little Bears were very hungry. And Big Bear said, 'Guess what
I have got, my children.' And one Little Bear guessed berries, and one
Little Bear guessed salmon, and t'other Little Bear guessed porcupine.
Then Big Bear laughed 'Whoof! Whoof!' and said, '_A Nice Big Fat
Man_!'"

As he listened, recollection avowed itself in his face, and, when she
had finished, his eyes wrinkled up and he laughed a peculiar, laughable
silent laugh.

"Sure, an' it's well I know ye," he explained; "but for the life iv me
I can't put me finger on ye."

She pointed into the store and watched him anxiously.

"Now I have ye!" He drew back and looked her up and down, and his
expression changed to disappointment. "It cuddent be. I mistook ye.
Ye cud niver a-lived in that shanty," thrusting a thumb in the
direction of the store.

Frona nodded her head vigorously.

"Thin it's yer ownself afther all? The little motherless darlin', with
the goold hair I combed the knots out iv many's the time? The little
witch that run barefoot an' barelegged over all the place?"

"Yes, yes," she corroborated, gleefully.

"The little