the younger man reached the bottom the sooner, and sitting down began to shy pebbles at a bowlder a few yards below, to see how far they would glance.

bob came lumbering down the slope of loose stones, took a seat pretty near len, and slowly drawing his knife from his pocket, opened it with great deliberation and began to whittle at a bit of spruce bark.

nothing was said for some time, and neither took any notice of the other. each was waiting for his opponent to begin. at last the eager disposition of the young virginian, who never could bear to waste time in going about whatever he had to do, and who in consequence had often exemplified the maxim “more haste less speed,” overcame his reserve and broke the silence.{142}

“well, bob,” he began in a careless manner, “i never expected to see you in as mean a scrape as this.”

if our embassador had studied over it for a week, he could not have made a remark which would better serve his purpose. bob had long deemed himself a very wily old dog indeed. he had boasted of this to his associates more than once, and had assured them that they would see how, on this occasion, he would “argify and bamboozle that young cub of a bushwick” until, figuratively speaking, he had tied him all up in a bundle and laid him away on a shelf in safe storage.

but len’s cool remark, driving straight home to the very heart and spirit of all his pretensions, let the wind out of old bob’s behavior and arguments together. it angered him in an instant, and when a diplomat gets angry he loses his power. instead of the soft words and sly reasoning by which he had hoped to fool his antagonist into opening his doors to the treachery which it was intended{143} should follow; instead of the pretty speeches which bob had carefully thought out and talked over, came furious retorts, bad language, and threats, to which len listened with the utmost composure.

the substance of it all was, that bob and his precious accomplices had jumped the mine, and yet they hadn’t jumped it, rightly speaking, because they had as much right there as anybody. the claim had been abandoned, and if anybody had gone to work at it why that was at their own risk, and they mustn’t complain when another man came along and took it away from the first party.

“now i’ve got this yere ’rora mine,” bob shouted excitedly, “and i’m goin’ to keep it, don’t you forget that! an’ wot’s more, my friend mr. stevens is agoin’ to jump that claim you’re holdin’ now, ’n’ that cabin. that cabin belonged to my friend pickens, ’n’ he told me, before he went away, that if i wanted it i could have it, and i can prove it.”{144}

“now,” bob kept on, “you young roosters ’d better give up and crawl out. we’ll give you a chance to get away and take your blankets and things if you’ll quit peaceable-like and git out. we don’t want no trouble, nor nobody hurted.”

“then why did you put a ball into our doorpost?” interrupted his listener.

“scotty did that. i told him’t wa’n’t on the squar, an’ ’twas kinder haxidental anyhow. if you’ll quit shootin’ at us we wont shoot at you,—an’ i wouldn’t nohow.”

“we haven’t fired a shot.”

“you’re jist ready to all the time,” bob persisted, “so’s we gentlemen can’t work our property for fear of you.”

“you ‘gentlemen’! your ‘property’!” repeated lennox, with infinite scorn.

“yes, ours. and, as i was sayin’, we’ll go to town and get help, if we arn’t enough alone, and we’ll bounce you out o’ that cabin which we want for ourselves, and you may thank your stars if you yet out with whole{145} skins. the hull filin’ of ye must pack up and scoot ’fore sundown.”

“that’s rather sudden,” len pleaded; “can’t you give us till to-morrow morning? it looks like it was going to rain to-night.”

“well, we don’t want to be rough on young chaps like you, though you’re too cheeky for these parts,” bob conceded, thinking he had frightened the lad; “and we wont crowd ye to-night. but, by this, that and the other! if you don’t skip out early to-morrow you’ll hear from us, you bet!”

“all right!” len rejoined. “i’ll tell the boys. i’m glad you gave us till to-morrow to get out, for it looks mighty like a storm to-night.”

it required only a very brief report from lennox to acquaint the firm with what bob had threatened, and, no doubt, would try to carry out.

“they have no suspicion,” len asserted, “that morris is with us, and it will be a good thing if we can continue to keep it secret.”{146}

“they’ll find it out mighty sudden and pointed-like,” muttered morris, “if they don’t play cautious.”

there was a pause for a moment or two, until len remarked that he supposed something should be said, or the enemy would think they intended to act upon bob’s bluster and abandon the claim, “which, of course, nobody thinks of doing for an instant.”

“i understand it’s ours, fair and square,” said sandy, “and sin’ possession’s nine points of the law, we might as well haud on for the other point. i remember that my grandfeyther used to say to us bairns,—‘better to keep the deil wi’oot the door, than drive him oot o’ the hoose.’ i’m thinking, though, i’d like to take that gambler-man by the nape of his neck and gie him the name of an auld scotch dance down the bank,—i mean the highland fling, ye ken?”

max did not join in the laugh; in his despondent way, he was filled with hesitation which none of the others felt. had he been{147} quite alone, i’m not sure how much he might have wavered, postponed, and yielded; but while all were waiting for him to say something, a shout came across from the other dump:

“what’re you fellers a-goin’ to do?”

len was roused. the indignation he had repressed hitherto now came to the surface.

“i’ll show those miserable sneaks that they can’t bluff me!” he exclaimed; and springing upon a heap of stones, he yelled back:

“you know you lied about your right to this mine. we bought it and we’re going to keep it. if you want it you’ve got to take it, and you’d better look right sharp after your own stake. this is ‘what we’re a-goin’ to do!’”

“well,” said max, as the excited lad leaped down out of rifle-range, “you’ve declared war for certain, and i imagine we’ll have to fight it out on this line if it takes all—”

“don’t say ‘summer’; there’s snow and frost enough in this wind to furnish a virginia january.”{148}

“well—all winter, then. but they wont try it on—they know better.”

evidently max’s indecisions were over.

“no,” morris agreed, “i don’t think they’ll attack by themselves, but they can make about as much trouble for you by simply staying there.”

“besides,” sandy put in, “one of ’em’ll start to town as soon as it comes dark, and na doot can find plenty o’ their own kind, who wad like na better sport than to join in a scheme o’ this nature.”

“i can put a stop to that,” said morris.

“how?”

“nobody’ll try to get away till night, and by that time i’ll be down there to stop him, whoever he is, and send him back again with a flea in his ear.”

“how will you get down the ca?on without their spotting you?”

“i’ll climb up the cliff and work my way down about a quarter of a mile away. i know a spot that’ll suit me to a t. i wish{149} buckeye jim was here, we’d make a break for those jumpers and clean out the whole nest in no time. he’d ought to a’ been here before this. mebbe he’s in town now—there’s no telling.”

“likely enough mr. anderson is there by this time, too,” said len.

“why, would it not be a good plan, borrowing a hint from the adversary, for one of us to go to town and be ready to hasten these gentlemen, or perhaps get assistance otherwise?”

it was sandy who made this suggestion, to which, at first, there was only silent attention.

“i’m thinkin’ that the three of us left can stand off, as ye say, those fellows yonder, and if we can manage to hold ’em all in, our agent would come back with an overwhelming force and put ’em wholly to rout.”

“i guess you’re right, sandy—but who shall go?”

“weel, i’m vera willing to do that, or anything as ye weel ken, but i’m so much of a{150} stranger in town, that probably i could be of more use here.”

“i reckon i’m your man,” said len. “max and morris are both too heavy weights to be spared from the garrison, while i can do as well on this errand as any one else, i suppose.”

“it’s no fun for you to walk all the way down that mountain trail, with the weather so threatening, but undoubtedly you might gain a great deal for us,” max interposed.

“if he didn’t get any more men to come up,” morris suggested, “he might be able to stop the other crowd’s getting any recruits.”

“yes, that’s so. when shall i start?”

“the sooner the better,” said max and sandy in the same breath.

“meaning after dark this evening,” added morris. “you go along down with me, and mebbe i’ll show you a bit of fun to cheer you up. it’ll be early moonlight; you wont have a bad tramp.”