rs," he observed laconically.

Vada rushed past him to inspect their treasures, her tears already
dried into streaks on her dirty little cheeks.

"An' bugs," she cried gleefully, squatting beside the box.

They had forgotten.

* * * * *

The man hurried away down towards the creek, bearing the pitiful
bundle of woman's raiment. The girl was ahead, and, as she again came
into his view, one thought, and one thought only, occupied his mind.
Jessie was his whole world--at that moment.

He, too, had forgotten.

"They've runned away," cried Vada, peering into the box.

"Me don't like 'piders," murmured Jamie definitely.

Vada's great brown eyes filled with tears. Fresh rivulets began to run
down the muddy channels on her downy cheeks. Her disappointment found
vent in great sobbing gulps.

Jamie stared at her in silent speculation. Then one little fat hand
reached out and pushed her. She rolled over and buried her wet face in
the dusty ground and howled heart-brokenly. Then Jamie crawled close
up beside her, and, stretching himself out, wept his sympathy into the
back of her gaping frock.

CHAPTER III

THE AWAKENING OF SCIPIO

At noon the camp began to rouse. The heavy eyes, the languid stretch,
the unmeaning contemplation of the noontide sunlight, the slow
struggles of a somnolent brain. These things were suggested in the
gradual stirring of the place to a ponderous activity. The heavy
movement of weary diggers as they lounged into camp for their dinner
had no suggestion of the greedy passion which possessed them. They had
no lightness. Whatever the lust for gold that consumed them, all their
methods were characterized by a dogged endeavor which took from them
every particle of that nervous activity which belongs to the finely
tempered business man.

The camp was a single row of egregious dwellings, squat, uncouth,
stretching away on either side of the veranda-fronted store and
"gambling hell" which formed a sort of center-piece around which
revolved the whole life of the village. It was a poor, mean place,
shapeless, evil-smelling in that pure mountain air. It was a mere
shelter, a rough perch for the human carrion lusting for the orgy of
gold which the time-worn carcass of earth should yield. What had these
people to do with comfort or refinement? What had they to do with
those things calculated to raise the human mind to a higher spiritual
plane? Nothing.