uld open up his mine and block
out a great ore body then her claims and Bunker's, that touched it on
both sides, would take on a speculative value. They could be sold for
cash and she could go East in style, to take lessons from the ten-dollar
teacher who had influence with directors and impresarios. Denver put in
a round of holes and blasted his way into the mountain; but as he came
out in the evening, dirty and grimed and pale from powder sickness,
Drusilla paled too and almost shrank away. She had strolled up before,
only to hear the clank of his steel and the muffled thud of his blows;
and now as she stood waiting, attired as daintily as a bride, the
dream-hero of her memories was banished. He was a miner again, a sweaty,
toiling animal, dead to all the finer things of life; but if Denver read
her thoughts he did not notice, for he remembered what Mother Trigedgo
had told him.

Two weeks passed by and Labor Day came near, when all the hardy miners
foregathered in Globe and Miami and engaged in the sports of their kind.
A circular came to Denver, announcing the drilling contests and giving
his name as one of the contestants; then a personal letter from the
Committee on Arrangements, requesting him to send in his entry; and at
last there came a messenger, a good hard-rock man named Owen, to suggest
that they go in together. But Denver was driving himself to the limit,
blasting out ore that grew richer each day; and at thought of Bible-Back
Murray, waiting to pounce upon his mine, he sent back a reluctant
refusal. Yet they published his name, with the partner's place left
vacant, and advertised that he would participate; for on the Fourth of
July, with Slogger Meacham for a partner, he had won the title of
champion.

The decision to go was forced upon him suddenly on the day before the
event, though he had almost lost track of time. Every morning at
day-break he had been up and cooking, after breakfast he had gone to the
mine; and, between mucking out the tunnel and putting in new shots, the
weeks had passed like days. But when he went to Bunker on the eighth of
September and asked for a little more powder Bunker took him to the
powder-house and showed him a space where the boxes of dynamite had
been. Then he took him behind the counter and showed him the money-till
and Denver awoke from his dream.

In spite of the stampede and the activity all about them the whole Pinal
district was not producing a cent, and would