s the breaking straw, the big prospector
jumped forward, and caught the man's wrist with dexterous, sinewy
fingers. He gave the arm a jerk that almost took the man from his
feet. His eyes were hard and sharp now, and his jaw seemed to have
shut tightly.

"We'll go back up no hill, you bet on that!" he asserted belligerently.
"We go by the road. We're done foolin' with you, my bucko! You go
ahead and show the way and be quick about it! If you don't, you'll
have trouble with me. Now git!"

He released the wrist with a shove that sent the watchman ten feet
away, and cowed him to subjection. He recovered his balance, and
hesitated for a minute, muttering something about "being even for
that," and then, as the big, infuriated miner took a step toward him,
said: "All right! Come on," and started toward a roadway that, half
ruined, led off and was lost at a turn. Cursing softly and telling the
burros that it was a shame they had to go farther on account of a
fool, the prospector followed, and the little procession resumed its
straggling march.

They passed the huge bunk-house, a mess-house, an assay office, what
seemed to be the superintendent's quarters, and a dozen smaller
structures, all of logs, and began an abrupt descent. The top of the
canyon was so high that they looked down on the roof of the big, silent
stamp mill with its quarter of a mile of covered tramway stretching
like a huge, weather-beaten snake to the dumps of the grizzly and
breakers behind it.

The road was blasted from the side of the canyon on which they were,
and far below, between them and the hoisting house and the mill, ran
a clear little mountain stream, undefiled for years by the silt of
industry. The peak of the cross, lifting a needle point high above
them, as if keeping watch over the Blue Mountains, the far-distant
Idaho hills, the near-by forests of Oregon, and the puny, man-made
structures at its feet, appeared to have a lofty disdain of them and
the burrowings into its mammoth sides, as if all ravagers were mere
parasites, mad to uncover its secrets of gold, and futile, if
successful, to wreak the slightest damage on its aged heart.

CHAPTER III

AN UGLY WATCHMAN

By easy stages indicating competent engineering and a lavish
expenditure of money, the road led them downward to a barricade of
logs, in an opening of which swung a gate barely wide enough to pass
the tired burros and their packs.

"You'll find Presby over there