ut the Little Clean-Up vein below your hundred-and-fifty-foot
level. Now you know why they have been fighting us so desperately, and
why, as a final resort, they are willing to pay us five million dollars
for a quit-claim to the Little Clean-Up. We've got them by the neck,
Jimmie. We can make them pay for every dollar's worth of ore they have
stolen from us."

It was too big to be surrounded at the first attempt. I completely lost
sight of my own involvement in the upflash of joy at the thought that at
the long last the two old scoundrels who had robbed others right and left
were going to get what was coming to them. Benedict went on with his
story quietly and circumstantially.

"I guessed at once what Whitredge was up to when I found that he was
circulating that pardon petition. He was aiming to make you a
self-confessed criminal before we could have time to turn a wheel. At
that, I wired a Cincinnati detective agency, and a young man who knew his
business was put on the job. The detective's reports showed the whole
thing up. Geddis, Withers and Whitredge were hustling like mad to make
capital out of your recapture by the prison authorities. Whitredge was
to advise you to urge the sale of the Little Clean-Up upon Barrett and
Gifford, and your reward was to be a pardon, by the asking for which you
would be virtually confessing your guilt. Thus the past would be buried
beyond any possibility of a resurrection. Nice little scheme, wasn't it?"

"You have those two papers--the letter and the petition," I said, with an
uncontrollable shudder. "You'll never know how near Whitredge came to
winning out. I was just about to sign when you came."

"Whitredge is a dangerous man," was Benedict's comment. "He took the
train from Glendale last night, and the detective went with him, wiring
me from a station up the line. I caught the next train and got here two
hours ago. I might have headed him off of you, I suppose, but I had a
bit of legal business to attend to first. If you are ready, we'll go.
Your wife is waiting for you in the warden's office, and she'll be
wondering why we are so long about getting the doors unlocked."

"Go?" I stammered. "You--you mean that I'm free?"

"Sure you are! My legal business was to press the _habeas corpus_
proceedings which were begun as soon as I had obtained evidence of the
miscarriage of justice in your trial before Judge Haskins. You are a
free man. I left the order of