ignorant! He recovered himself quickly, and said with a
smile:--

"But I discovered the ledge and its auriferous character myself. There
was no trace or sign of previous discovery or mining occupation."

"So I jedged, and so I said, and thet puts ye all right. But I thought
I'd tell ye; for mining laws is mining laws, and it's the one thing ye
can't get over," he added, with the peculiar superstitious reverence of
the Californian miner for that vested authority.

But Key scarcely listened. All that he had heard seemed only to link
him more fatefully and indissolubly with the young girl. He was
already impatient of even this slight delay in his quest. In his
perplexity his thoughts had reverted to Collinson's: the mill was a
good point to begin his search from; its good-natured, stupid
proprietor might be his guide, his ally, and even his confidant.

When his horse was baited, he was again in the saddle. "If yer going
Collinson's way, yer might ask him if he's lost a horse," said the
foreman. "The morning after the shake, some of the boys picked up a
mustang, with a make-up lady's saddle on." Key started! While it was
impossible that it could have been ridden by Alice, it might have been
by the woman who had preceded her.

"Did you make any search?" he inquired eagerly; "there may have been an
accident."

"I reckon it wasn't no accident," returned the foreman coolly, "for the
riata was loose and trailing, as if it had been staked out, and broken
away."

Without another word, Key put spurs to his horse and galloped away,
leaving his companion staring after him. Here was a clue: the horse
could not have strayed far; the broken tether indicated a camp; the
gang had been gathered somewhere in the vicinity where Mrs. Barker had
warned them,--perhaps in the wood beyond Collinson's. He would
penetrate it alone. He knew his danger; but as a SINGLE unarmed man he
might be admitted to the presence of the leader, and the alleged claim
was a sufficient excuse. What he would say or do afterwards depended
upon chance. It was a wild scheme--but he was reckless. Yet he would
go to Collinson's first.

At the end of two hours he reached the thick-set wood that gave upon
the shelf at the top of the grade which descended to the mill. As he
emerged from the wood into the bursting sunlight of the valley below,
he sharply reined in his horse and stopped. Another bound would have
been his last. For the shelf, the roc