ent--it's Barger--up there--dead!"

Barger! The name acted as swiftly on the crowd as oil upon a flame.
It seemed as if the wave of news swept like a tide across the street,
down the thoroughfare, and into every shop.

Two automobiles were halted in the road, their engines purring as they
stood. Their drivers dismounted to join the gathering throng. One of
the men was Bostwick, down from the hills. He had searched for Beth at
Mrs. Dick's, and then had followed here.

"Barger! Barger's dead in camp and the 'Laughing Water' claim was
stolen--and Culver killed!" One man bawled it to the crowd--and it
sped to Bostwick's ears.

One being only departed from the scene--Trimmer, the lumberman, swiftly
seeking McCoppet.

Van, in his heat, had told too much, accusing the prisoner in hand. He
silenced Gettysburg abruptly and started to force aside the crowd.

"Gentlemen, gentlemen, move aside," he said. "I've got--by Jupe!
there's Bostwick!"

It was Bostwick fleeing to his car that Van had discovered. Searle had
seen enough in the briefest of glances. He had heard too much. He
realized that only in flight could the temper of the mob be avoided.
He had seen this mob in action once before--and the walls of his
stomach caved.

Like a youthful Hercules in strength and action, Van went plunging
through the crowd to get his man. But he could not win. Bostwick had
speeded up his motor in a panic for haste and his car leaped away like
a dragon on wings, the muffler cut-out roaring like a gattling.

Van might perhaps have shot and killed the escaping man who held the
wheel, but he wanted Searle alive.

A roar from the crowd replied to the car. A score of men ran madly in
pursuit. None of them knew the details of the case, but they knew that
Bostwick was wanted.

They drifted rearward from the hurtling car like fragments of paper in
its wake. The few down street who danced for a moment before the
modern juggernaut, to stop it in its course, sprang nimbly away as it
rocketed past--and Searle was headed for the desert.

One wild, sweeping glance Van cast about, for a horse or something to
ride. Suvy was stabled, unsaddled, up the street. Bostwick and his
cloud of dust were dropping away in a swiftly narrowing perspective.
And there stood a powerful, dusty-red car--empty--its motor in motion!

There was no time to search for its owner. There were half a dozen
different cars with which Van Buren was familiar.