hat was known as "Main
Street" to the entire camp.

There were men running toward the derrick--men of the day shift who
had been aroused from their sleep. Others were clustered about the
wide concrete floor where the derrick stood. Clad only in trousers and
shoes, their bodies, tanned by the desert sun, were almost black in
the glare of the big floods. They milled wildly about the derrick;
and, through all their clamor and shouting, one word was repeated
again and again:

"Gold! Gold! Gold!"

The big drill head was suspended above the floor. Dean Rawson, with
Smithy close at hand, pushed through the crowd. He was prepared to see
traces of gold in the sludge that was bailed out through the hollow
shaft--quartz, perhaps, whose richness had set the men wild before
they realized how impossible it would be to develop such a mine. But
Rawson stopped almost aghast at the glaring splendor of the golden
drill hanging naked in the blinding light.

* * * * *

Riley, foreman of the night shift, was standing beside it, a pistol in
his hand. "L'ave it be," he was commanding. "Not a hand do ye lay on
it till the boss gets here." At sight of Rawson he stepped forward.

"I shot in the air," he explained. "I knew ye were up in the hills for
a breath of coolness. I wanted to get ye here quick."

"Right," said Rawson tersely. "But, man, what have you done with the
drill? It's smeared over with gold!"

"Fair clogged wid it, sir," Riley's voice betrayed his own excitement.
"You remimber we couldn't pull it at first--the drill was jammed-like
after it bruk through at the ten-mile livil. Then it come free--and
luk at it! Luk at the damn thing! Sent down for honest work, it was,
and it comes back all dressed up in jewelry like a squaw Indian whin
there's oil struck on the reservation! Or is it gold ye were after all
the time?" he demanded.

"Gold! Gold!" a hundred voices were shouting. Dean hardly heard the
voice of the foreman, made suddenly garrulous with excitement. He
stared at the big drill head, heaped high with the precious metal. It
was jammed into the diamond-studded face of the drill; it filled every
crack and crevice, a smooth, solid mass on top of the head and against
the stem. A workman had brought a singlejack and chisel; he was prying
at a ribbon of the yellow stuff. Riley went for him, gun in hand.

"L'ave it be!" he shouted.

"But, confound it all, Dean," Smithy's voice was saying in