p'ints, ef ye cared to, for all ye're soft spoken. There are only four
passengers booked through; we hev to be a little partikler, suspectin'
spies! Two of the four ye kin depend upon to get the top o' their d----d
heads blowed off the first fire," he added grimly.

At ten o'clock the Summit coach flashed, rattled, glittered, and
snapped, like a disorganized firework, up to the door of the company's
office. A familiar figure, but more than usually truculent and
aggressive, slowly descended with violent oaths from the box. Without
seeing Jeff, it strode into the office.

"Now then," said Yuba Bill, addressing the agent, "whar's that
God-forsaken fool that Wells, Fargo & Co. hev sent up yar to take charge
o' their treasure? Because I'd like to introduce him to the champion
idgit of Calaveras County, that's been selected to go to h-ll with him;
and that's me, Yuba Bill! P'int him out. Don't keep me waitin'!"

The agent grinned and pointed to Jeff.

Both men recoiled in astonishment. Yuba Bill was the first to recover
his speech.

"It's a lie!" he roared; "or somebody has been putting up a job on
ye, Jeff! Because I've been twenty years in the service, and am such a
nat'ral born mule that when the company strokes my back and sez, 'You're
the on'y mule we kin trust, Bill,' I starts up and goes out as a blasted
wooden figgerhead for road agents to lay fur and practice on, it don't
follow that YOU'VE any call to go."

"It was my own seeking, Bill," said Jeff, with one of his old, sweet,
boyish smiles. "I didn't know YOU were to drive. But you're not going
back on me now, Bill, are you? you're not going to send me off with
another volunteer?"

"That be d----d!" growled Bill. Nevertheless, for ten minutes he reviled
the Pioneer Coach Company with picturesque imprecation, tendered his
resignation repeatedly to the agent, and at the end of that time, as
everybody expected, mounted the box, and with a final malediction,
involving the whole settlement, was off.

On the road, Jeff, in a few hurried sentences, told his story. Bill
scarcely seemed to listen. "Look yar, Jeff," he said suddenly.

"Yes, Bill."

"If the worst happens, and ye go under, you'll tell your father, IF I
DON'T HAPPEN TO SEE HIM FIRST, it wasn't no job of mine, and I did my
best to get ye out of it."

"Yes," said Jeff, in a faint voice.

"It mayn't be so bad," said Bill, softening; "they KNOW, d--n 'em, we've
got a pile aboard, ez well as if they s