per and they softly opened the
door. Benito slept; beside him drowsed a red-shirted miner slumped upon
a chair. Adrian shook him, whispering, "Where's Doctor Jones?"

"Don't know," muttered the watcher, sleepily. "This yere is his busy
night I reckon. Asked me to look after this galoot. Feed him four
fingers of that pizen if he woke."

His head drooped forward and a buzzing sound came from his open mouth.
Once more Adrian shook him.

"Didn't he say anything about his destination?"

"His which, pard?"

"Where he was bound," the young man said half angrily.

This time the other sat up straighter. For the first time he really
awoke and took intelligent cognizance of the situation.

"Now I come to think on it, he's bound for the hill over yonder. Woman
named Briones come for him at a double quick. Good lookin' Spanish
wench. She took him by the arm commandin' like. 'You come along,' she
says and picks up his medicine chest. 'Don't stop for yer hat.' And he
didn't." He winked heavily, chuckling at the reminiscence.

"Then it isn't Juana Briones that's ill. Perhaps it's her husband."

"Has she got a husband?" asked the miner, disappointedly. "No, I reckon
'twant him. 'Twas a woman name o' Stanley. I remember now--Goin' to
have a bebby."

CHAPTER XXIII

THE NEW ARRIVAL

"Take my horse," said Brannan, hurriedly. "I'll stay here with Benito."
He bundled the excited Stanley and Nathan Spear out of the room, where
Benito still slept under the spell of the doctor's opiate. "You, too,"
he told the miner, "you've had too much red liquor to play the nurse."
He closed the door after them.

The young contractor spoke first. "By the eternal, I never thought of
that! I'm glad she had a woman with her."

He spurred his horse toward Telegraph, Hill, as it had begun to be
known, since signals were flashed from its crest, announcing the arrival
of vessels. Down its farther slope was the little rancho of Dona
Briones, where Inez in her extremity had sought the good friend of her
childhood.

Adrian's thought leaped forward into coming years. Inez and he together,
always together as the years passed. And between them a son--intuitively
he felt that it would be a son--a successor, taking up their burdens as
they laid them down; bearing their name, their ideals, purposes along,
down the pageant of time.

He paid little heed as they passed through a huddle of huts, tents and
lean-tos on the southern ascent. Though the hour