y sullen,
forbidding crowd at the corner below the city hail.

"There's a strike on among the men who are building the railroad," said
Hobbs. "Ugly looking crowd, eh?"

"A strike? 'Gad, it's positively homelike."

"I heard a bit ago that the matter has been adjusted. They go back to
work to-morrow, slight increase in pay and a big decrease in work. They
were to have had their answer to-day. Mr. Tullis, I hear, was
instrumental in having the business settled without a row."

"They'd better look out for these fellows," said King, very soberly. "I
don't like the appearance of 'em. They look like cut-throats."

"Take my word for it, sir, they are. They're the riff-raff of all
Europe. You should have seen them of a Sunday, sir, before the order
went out closing the drinking places on that day. My word, they took the
town. There was no living here for the decent people. Women couldn't go
out of their houses."

"I hope Baron Dangloss knows how to handle them?" in some anxiety. "By
the way, remind me to look up the Baron just as soon as we get back to
town this evening."

"If we ever get back!" muttered the unhappy Mr. Hobbs. Prophetic
lamentation!

In due time they rode into the sombre solitudes of Ganlook Gap and up to
the Witch's glen. Here Mr. Hobbs balked. He refused to adventure farther
than the mouth of the stony ravine. Truxton approached the hovel alone,
without the slightest trepidation. The goose-herd grandson was driving a
flock of geese across the green bowl below the cabin. The American
called out to him and a moment later the youth, considerably excited,
drove his geese up to the door. He could understand no English, nor
could Truxton make out what he was saying in the native tongue. While
they were vainly haranguing each other the old woman appeared at the
edge of the thicket above the hut. Uttering shrill exclamations, she
hurried down to confront King with blazing eyes. He fell back,
momentarily dismayed. Her horrid grin of derision brought a flush to his
cheek; he faced her quite coolly.

"I'll lay you a hundred gavvos that the kettle and smoke experiment is a
fake of the worst sort," he announced, after a somewhat lengthy appeal
to be allowed to enter the hut as a simple seeker after knowledge.

"Have it your own way! Have it your own way!" she cackled.

"Tell you what I'll do; if I can't expose that trick in ten minutes,
I'll make you a present of a hundred gavvos."

She took him up like a fl