k that looks a whole lot
like a human head," Aleck went on to say, earnestly.

"Why, hello! I remember noticing that very same rock, the time I went
up to take a look, and see if I could get a glimpse of our hunter
squad. While about it, I turned the glasses around, to see if there
were any sheep on the sides of the mountains to the south. And it was
right then I saw that outline of a face, cut in the rock, just like
somebody had used a giant chisel and made it--nose, mouth, chin,
forehead, all complete. It startled me a little at first, Aleck."

"I should guess it would, Thad; but think what it meant to _me_, when
I had seen it on dad's little chart; and knew that the entrance to his
hidden mine lay almost in the shadow of that face! I think he looked
on it as the rock guardian to his silver lode."

"Is that a fact?" ejaculated Thad, partaking in a measure of the
excitement that shook the frame of his companion; "Well, that's more
than you've seen fit to tell me before, Aleck; and it's some
interesting, I own up."

"I meant to tell you everything, Thad, believe me," declared the
other, quickly, and with some emotion. "After the fine way you and
your chums rescued me from that shelf up on the face of the cliff, and
said you'd stand by me, no matter what happened, why, I made up my
mind that I would keep nothing back from you. By to-morrow I expected
to take the map out from the lining of my coat, where it was sewed in
by my mother's own dear hands, so that nobody would ever think things
had been disturbed at all. And now, I'm surely hoping that we'll both
set eyes on dad's mine before another dawn breaks."

"For your sake, Aleck, I hope that will come true. You deserve all
the luck in the world, and that's what every one of our fellows say.
But only for this moonlight I'm afraid we'd have had a hard job of it,
coming all this distance; because the way is mighty rough, and both of
us have stumbled lots of times as it is. We might have used the
lantern, of course, but that would have put it out of business later,
when we wanted it bad; and besides, it's flickering might have told
our enemies where we were."

Aleck felt a thrill of pleasure at the way the other used that word
"our;" why, it was just as though the Silver Fox Patrol had adopted
him into the troop; and meant to make his cause their own. For a boy
who had seldom had a friend to give him even words of encouragement,
this was a glorious happening indeed.