yers laid down their
cards; the partner of the guilty man being so overcome as to lay down
his hand face upward.

Then they all stared, but not one of them spoke; they wanted to, but
none knew how to do it. It was not usually difficult for any of them to
address such specimens of the gentler sex as found their way to Fat
Pocket Gulch, but they all understood at once that this was a different
sort of woman. They looked reprovingly and beseechingly at each other,
but the woman, at last, broke the silence by saying:

"I am sorry to disturb you, gentlemen, but I was told I could probably
find Mr. Buffle here."

"Here he is, ma'am, and yours truly," said Buffle, removing his hat.

He could afford to. She was not beautiful, but she seemed to be in
trouble, and a troubled woman can command, to the death, even worse men
than free-and-easy miners. She had a refined, pure face, out of which
two great brown eyes looked so tenderly and anxiously, that these men
forgot themselves at once. She seemed young, not more than twenty-three
or four; she was slightly built, and dressed in a suit of plain black.

"Mr. Buffle," said she, "I was going through by stage to San Francisco,
when I overheard the driver say to a man seated by him that you knew
more miners than any man in California--that you had been through the
whole mining country."

"Well, mum," said Buffle, with a delighted but sheepish look, which
would have become a missionary complimented on the number of converts he
had made, "I _hev_ been around a good deal, that's a fact. I reckon I've
staked a claim purty much ev'rywhar in the diggins."

"So I inferred from what the driver said," she replied, "and I came down
here to ask you a question."

Here she looked uneasily at the other players. The man who stole the ace
translated it at once, and said:

"We'll git out ef yer say so, mum; but yer needn't be afraid to say
ennything before us. We know a lady when we see her, an' mebbe some on
us ken give yer a lift; if we can't, I've only got to say thet ef yer
let out enny secrets, grizzlies couldn't tear 'em out uv enny man in
this crowd. Hey, fellers?"

"You bet," was the firm response of the remaining two, and Buffle
quickly passed a demijohn, to the ace-thief, as a sign of forgiveness
and approbation.

"Thank you, gentlemen--God bless you," said the woman, earnestly. "My
story is soon told. I am looking for my husband, and I _must_ find him.
His name is Allan Berryn."