knowed what had happened. He had licked that awful
sorrow. He's ben off down in civilization now fer these ten years, but
now he's back agin. The silent company is callin' him, he says, an' he
jist has to have a free breath an' a little more pasture, an' this is the
only place he can git it."

"He must have had an extraordinary companion, if he had learned to care
for him in that way," remarked Mr. Allen.

"Extraordinary, yew say," began Dad in a low, measured tone. "Bet the
last button on your britches, he was that an' more. He was a youngish
feller, an' quick as scat. Knowed more 'bout machinery 'n all the other
fellers I ever knowed. Seems to me he growed up in Kankakee, or suthin'
like that, an' he was a--"

"Where did you say he came from, Mr. Wright?" asked Willis in a voice
that betrayed his excitement. Willis had been thinking very rapidly as
Dad told his story. What was there in this strange tale that so
fascinated him, and made him want to cry aloud? He had never felt so
strange before.

"Why, I don't 'zackly recollect," replied Dad. "It was Kankakee or
Kangaroo, er some sech name. Many's the night he's stopped with me in the
big cabin an' told me about all kinds o' machinery. The night the big
cabin burned he was here a showin' me a lot o' plans of machinery he had
got up himself. They were 'bout all he saved out o' the fire, 'cept his
hide, an' that was some scorched.

"I never seed a man 'at went so plumb dumb crazy over a few gold nuggets
as him. 'T was here at the old cabin he met his pard, an' they made plans
fer a great minin' company. Of all the fellers they was settin' up
machinery in the mines a dozen years ago, this feller was the best o'
the lot. Why, oncet he rigged up a--"

"O, Mr. Wright, were there lots of different men installing mine
machinery here in the early days?" inquired Willis. A note of anxiety
had crept into his voice.

"More'n one, do ye mean, lad? Well, I should snicker. I mind oncet they
was five o' them at the cabin one night, an' every feller could prove
that his machinery was the best. Sech a jamborees o' arguatin' I never
heerd. I had to send 'em all t' their bunks t' keep 'em frum fightin'.
Laws, yes, plenty o' 'em, boy; but this one feller, I forgit his name,
now--my pard could say it quicker'n scat--was wuth all the rest o' the
bunch put together. He was a reg'lar genius with machinery."

Dad had been filling his pipe from the package Mr. Allen had given him.
He