their work like a crowd of boys building a snow fort. Ha-ha-pah-no
and Na-tee-kah took full possession of the camp-fires and cooked for
dear life. Judge Parks and Yellow Pine finished their inspection of the
hole in the rock and of the ore which had been dug out of it, and then
they went to help Sile and Two Arrows care for the horses and mules.

"We won't unpack much till the house is up," said the judge.

"You're satisfied with the outcrop, are ye?" asked Pine, a little
proudly.

"It's all you said it was, and that is all I could ask for. We can run a
tunnel right in now, so we can work straight along, under cover, in bad
weather."

"That's the thing to do. I believe it will pay for itself from the very
start."

"If it does," said the judge, "it will be an uncommonly good mine for a
gold-mine. Not one in ten but what empties the pocket of its first
owner."

"This one won't, then. It's as good a property as there is, and we can
cover all the ledge with claims and get a good title to 'em. It's fresh
ground, and no kind of interference--"

"Unless the Apaches interfere."

"They don't often come east so far as this, 'specially now that most of
'em have been cornered. Mining in these parts isn't the risky kind of
business it used to be. Must say, though, that I felt kind o' streaked
sometimes, last year, when I was a prospectin'."

"There was risk in it, all alone; but nine rifles and a good breastwork
will make a tremendous difference."

"They will that, and there's no sech thing as takin' us in the rear.
They can't climb over that ridge, nor that one."

It was later than usual when anybody lay down that evening. Two Arrows
and his sister had heard of mines before, but they had never seen one,
and the whole matter was a great curiosity.

These uncommonly well-behaved pale-faces meant to dig a hole into the
side of that mountain and get gold out of it, and they were going to
build a stone "lodge" and stay there. Sile explained to them, as well as
he could, a purpose he had formed of making a great farm in that valley,
and raising all sorts of things to feed the miners, and of having a town
there, with schools and churches for the Indians, and a public library
and a saw-mill and a grist-mill and a blacksmith-shop and a hotel. The
main idea obtained by Two Arrows was that in a little while the valley
would be full of horses of the best kinds. Na-tee-kah went beyond that
and got a picture into her mind of a big