he very threshold of life. Some lines he had read only a few days
before, curiously enough came back to him:

_"'Tis life, of which our nerves are scant,
O life, not death, for which we pant,
More life and fuller that we want."_

Yes, that was it. He wanted life, wanted it eagerly, wanted it
thirstily, wanted it desperately. Never before had it seemed so sweet.
An hour earlier it had stretched before him, full of promise. The blood
ran warm and riotous through every vein. He had everything to live
for--health, strength, home and friends. And now the ending of all his
dreams and hopes and plans was--what?

A shadow fell across him. He looked up. It was the vulture, circling
lower now, as though its instinct told it of a coming feast. Dick
shuddered. The air seemed suddenly to have grown deadly chill.

CHAPTER II

THE PURSUIT

Down at the ravine, stretched out at full length beneath the shade of a
great tree, Bert and Tom were watching the progress of the work, as it
slowly neared completion. There was more to do than was at first
thought, but after making allowance for this, it seemed to drag on
endlessly.

"Not much genius in that crowd, I imagine," said Bert.

"What do you mean?" asked Tom, looking up in surprise.

"Why," returned Bert, "I forget what philosopher it was--Carlyle, I
think--who says in one of his books that 'genius is only an infinite
capacity for hard work.' You don't see much of it straying around loose
here, do you?"

"Well no," laughed Tom, "not so that you would notice it. I've just been
looking at that fellow over there with a hammer. I'll bet I could take a
nap in the time it takes him to drive a nail."

"They ought to have as foreman one of those husky, bull-necked fellows
I've seen in some of the section gangs laying out a railroad in the
Northwest," went on Bert. "Those fellows are 'steam engines in
breeches.' There isn't much loafing or lying down on the job when they're
around. When they speak, the men jump as though they were shot."

"Yes," answered Tom, "or perhaps a mate on a Mississippi steamboat would
fill the bill. Those colored roustabouts certainly get a move on when
they feel his gimlet eye boring through them."

"After all, I suppose the climate is a good deal to blame," mused Bert.
"It's hard to show much ginger when you feel as though you were working
in a Turkish bath."

"Right you are," responded Tom. "We fellows born and bred in