ery sweetly
smelling cloth called Harris tweed; and when Dollops described the one
he saw to me this evening, I recognized it at once."

"Then Tweed Coat is Ross Duggan, Cleek?"

Mr. Narkom's voice was a trifle shrill. Cleek's eyes met his squarely,
and his eyebrows went up.

"Who else?" he said.

CHAPTER XXIII

A STARTLING DENOUEMENT

And so it came about that Dollops and Cleek, both wearing dark suits
(procured in Cleek's case at the Three Fishers, and from his own
dressing-bag), and with caps pulled down over their faces and false
moustaches decorating their upper lips as a protection against
unforeseen discovery, made their way out in the clear moonlight toward
that "gravel pit" of which Dollops had spoken, and padded soft-footedly
down the hill toward the little "shanty" to which Dollops guided them,
and after a quick glance at it, pushed on into the darkness of the
night; down, down, down into the valley--to the thing that lay there
revealed in the moon's rays, and which in the face of the to-morrow's
sun would have vanished like the picture upon an exposed camera film.

But to-night--to-night they could see the whole panorama of it, lying
close to the earth, concealed behind a huge furze-bush upon the
hillside, stomachs flat against the face of it, eyes sharpened upon that
identical spot which told so much to them of what they sought. Perhaps a
dozen men worked there--perhaps more--coats off, shirt-sleeves rolled
up--big, bonny men of brawn and muscle, come of a stock as tough as the
granite of the hillside itself and hardened by the keen winds and the
keener air of the Highlands that had given them birth.

"Giants!" whispered Dollops awe-inspiringly, his lips close against
Cleek's ear.

"_Thieves!_" responded Cleek, with a quick intake of the breath. "Gad!
they're a lot, Dollops! And if they caught us up here, hidden away, our
chances would be exactly nil. Where's your friend Balmy, eh?"

"Dahn there--under that big flare, sir--'im wiv the blue shirt and the
red neck-cloth. Likely lookin' blighter, ain't 'e?"

"H'm. Not very. Not a sound, boy! There's a couple of 'em coming this
way. Got it in barrels, have they? Gad! I'd like to have a look at one
of those homely articles. I'll swear there's a false bottom to it, if I
know anything of this kind of trickery.... Hello!--there's Tweed Coat!"

"Tweed Coat," thus named, passed a stone's throw in front of them, his
arm linked with another man's