When Hanson returned that afternoon, his round face was beaming. His big blue eyes stared right into Phil’s.

“Say,––by yiminy,––you some kid! You quiet Brenchfield’s she-devil!”

“And what about that?”

“What about it! That no good for Sol Hanson. I know all about him. Somebody tell me. By yiminy! you make damn good blacksmith. Some day we put up signboard, ‘Hanson and Ralston, General Blacksmiths.’ We get all the trade in this damn Valley.”

“Who told you about she-devil, Sol?” asked Phil curiously.

“Oh, somebody! He not speak very much but he say plenty when he be good and ready. He watch round corner. Brenchfield make she-devil wild. You speak to her and she get quiet.”

“It wasn’t Jim Langford who told you, Sol?”

“Langford,––no! Langford’s mouth all stitched up. He say nothing at all. You wait!”

Sol put his fingers in his mouth and whistled.

In a second, the half-witted, ragamuffin Smiler bobbed his grinning face round the door post. Hanson waved him in and when the youngster saw that only Sol Hanson and Phil were inside he raced round and round Phil in sheer delight, like a puppy-dog round its master. He rubbed his hand up and down Phil’s clothes, and he kept 102 pointing to himself and to Phil. Phil could not make out his meaning.

“He says you and him good pals,” interpreted Hanson.

“You bet we are, Smiler!” said Phil, patting the boy’s matted hair.

“Smiler and me make a deal. We going to live together after this,” said Sol. “Smiler he got nobody. Smiler hungry most all the time; dirty, no place to sleep; just a little mongrel-pup. I got lots of grub, nice shack, good beds. Smiler get lots of bath. Smiler and me we going to be pals. What you say, Smiler?”

The boy grinned again and gurgled in happy acquiescence.

“But the kid can’t talk?”

“Oh, he talk all right; you bet! He talk with his head, and his eyes, his feet and his hands; talk every old way only you don’t savvy his kind of talk.”

As soon as work was over, Phil hurried up the hill home. He had had a trying day of it one way and another and he was longing for a refreshing bath and a clean-up.

He popped his head into Langford’s room, but Langford either had not come or had been in early and had gone out again.

Whistling softly, he went into his own. His whistle ended abruptly, for his bedroom looked as if it had been struck by a cyclone. Everywhere, in wild confusion, lay shirts, collars and clothes; books, papers and personal belongings. The drawers of his bureau were pulled out and the contents scattered. Someone evidently had been in on a thieves’ hunt and had been neither leisurely nor nice about the job.

Phil could not, for the life of him, imagine why anyone would want specially to ransack his of all the choice of rooms at Mrs. Clunie’s. He had nothing worth stealing, 103 while many of his landlady’s boarders were fairly well endowed in the matter of worldly possessions.

He leaned over the bannister and called excitedly for Mrs. Clunie.

“Guid preserve us a’; what’s wrang?” she exclaimed, pulling her dress up in front and hurrying up the stairs.

Phil showed her into his room without a word. The moment she saw the state of it, she threw up her hands in amazement.

“Goodness sakes, Mr. Ralston! It looks as if there had been thievin’ bodies here.”

“Have any strangers been in the house?”

“Not a soul, Mr. Ralston, except the man you sent wi the note to let him ha’e your spurs that were in the bureau drawer.”

“But I didn’t send any man, and I didn’t write any note!” put in Phil.

“You didna? Oh, the slyness o’ him! As sure as my name’s Jean Clunie, he was the thief.”

“Well!” said Phil ruefully, “he has made a deuce of a jumble of my clothes. But he came to the wrong room if he came for valuables.”

“I was busy and I told him to run up and get them. Oh, the cunnin’ de’il. Is there nothing missing?”

“Nothing that I know of; certainly nothing valuable, for I don’t own any such!”

“Bide a minute till I get that note,” exclaimed the perspiring and excited landlady.

She returned in a minute with the paper.

Phil read it over. It was written in a rough hand, in pencil.

Mrs. Clunie,

Please allow bearer into my room to get my spurs for me. He will know where to find them.

Phil Ralston.

Phil scratched his head.

“Well, that beats all!”

“And you never wrote it?”

“Not I!”

“But he took your spurs, for I saw them in his hand.”

Phil glanced about him.

“Yes!––I guess he has taken my spurs.”

“My, but I’m the foolish woman. I never heard tell o’ the like o’ it before. This place is gettin’ as bad as the ceety o’ Glesca.”

“What was the man like, Mrs. Clunie?”

“Oh, just a wee, short kind o’ a rough lookin’, dirty kind o’ a mannie, wi’ a horse.”

“What kind of a horse did he have?”

“To tell ye the truth, I didna pay muckle attention to the beastie, but I think it was brown coloured, wi’ a white patch on its e’e. Oh, ay! and it was lame, for when he went aff I could see it hobblin’ on its fore legs as it galloped doon the road.”

“All right!” said Phil. “If you send Betsy up to put the room in order, everything will be O.K.”

“I’m right sorry I wasna more parteecular, Mr. Ralston, but I didna think for a minute except that you would be anxious for your spurs. A letter like that would deceive the very Lord himsel’.”

“Don’t you worry now! I paid only a dollar and a half for the spurs, and I have had that much wear out of them, so they don’t owe me anything.”

At the same time, Phil himself worried considerably over the matter, for closer inspection betrayed the fact that his little box of private papers and letters had been burst open and examined; also that his leather letter-case––in fact everything likely to contain documents of any kind––had been scrutinised.

As he bathed and dressed himself, he still worried, 105 until it occured to him that this might be some of Brenchfield’s doings. He wondered, and then he laughed to himself at the chances the would-be thief had taken to get––nothing.

Once more Phil lost patience with himself, as he thought of his foolishness in getting rid of that confession of Brenchfield’s; and yet, in destroying it he had merely acted up to the feeling and good intentions he had had at the time.

He took a turn outside. At the top of the hill, at the corner, little Smiler, with a cleaner face than usual, ran out from the end of a house and stood up in front of Phil.

“Hullo kiddie! What’s the good word?”

Smiler just grinned.

“Smiler!” inquired Phil, “you see a little man to-day on a brown horse with a white eye?”

Smiler looked as serious as was possible for his permanently crooked face, then he nodded intelligently. He pointed to his leg and went a few steps limping.

“Yes, yes!” exclaimed Phil, “horse got a lame leg!”

Smiler nodded.

“Where did you see him?”

Smiler pointed in the direction of the hill.

“Up near my place?”

The boy nodded again.

“Where did he go?”

Smiler shook his head this time.

“Too bad!” exclaimed Phil.

“If you see him again, anywhere, Smiler, run in and tell me, will you? I’ll be at the Kenora for a bit.”

Smiler nodded, delighted that he was going to have a chance to be of service to the big man he had taken such a fancy to.

“Here!” Phil handed him twenty-five cents, and the boy ran off in the direction of the Chinese restaurant.

Phil continued down the street, knowing that if the little man on the lame brown horse with the white eye was still in town, it would not be long before Smiler would have him wise to it.

He strolled into the dining-room of the Kenora and ordered his lunch. And, as he waited, in came an old acquaintance in all his high-coloured and picturesque splendour––Percival DeRue Hannington.

Hannington spotted Phil at once and strutted over. He shook hands with vigour and set himself down opposite.

“By gad! old chap,––but this is quite refreshing. I’ve often thought about you and your good advice not to be in too big a hurry to buy a blooming rawnch.”

“Why?” inquired Phil. “I’m glad you took it and it did you good.”

“But I didn’t take it;––worse bally luck. Don’t you know, I thought you might be trying to put me off the chawnce of getting into something good. Everybody warned me when I came out here that I wasn’t to take everything I heard for gospel. The beastly trouble seems to be to distinguish between the gospel and the tommyrot.”

Phil laughed, and it made him forget his own troubles.

DeRue Hannington ordered dinner also, and, as he refreshed himself he became reminiscent.

“So you did buy a ranch?” started Phil.

“I paid for one,” said Hannington, “and, if that isn’t jolly-well buying one, you’ve got to search me, as the Johnnies out here say.

“You see, when you toddled off that day, I was in the saloon asking three fellows if they knew of anyone who had a rawnch for sale.

“One Johnnie said he had a good one I could have cheap, for cash.”

“What was the man’s name?” asked Phil.

“Barney, Barney something-or-other; oh, yes! cawn’t forget it;––Barney Douthem. He did me, the rotter.

“Do you know him, Mister––Mister Phil?”

“I have heard of him. He left here some time ago for the other side of the Line.”

“I fawncied so,” said Hannington. “I’m looking for that miserable thieving josser.

“Well, I hired a horse and went out with the Barney fellow to see the rawnch, right away. A jolly nice place it was, too––just ten miles out. The Barney chap lived there with a Chinaman who did his housework. It was a twenty-acre place on the side of a hill, with a decent sort of a house and stables. There was a beautiful view of the lake and the Valley, and a fine fishing stream running right through the property. One could fish out of his window, lying in bed. A positive duck of a place!”

“Yes!” remarked Phil, “but a rancher can’t live on scenery and by fishing in bed. What kind of fruit trees did the place have?”

“Deuced good trees, Phil! At least, they seemed all-right. Of course, I’m not a bally expert on fruit trees.

“The Douthem chap said he could recommend it and I could have it for five thousand dollars cash. I gave him a cheque right off the reel. He gave me his receipt for the money, and the deal was closed there and then.”

DeRue Hannington stopped, as if the memory of it was somewhat painful.

“Not exactly closed, Phil! because it sort of opened up again, two days ago, just three weeks after I was done by Douthem, and he had cashed my cheque and jolly-well beat it, as they say out here.

“It was like this. I was sitting on the veranda, enjoying 108 a smoke and admiring my property and the view, when a collector Johnnie came up the road and asked me where Douthem was. I told him Douthem was gone, and I was now the proprietor.

“‘Didn’t know they had changed tenants,’ said he. ‘I’ve called for the rent.’

“Do you know, Phil, I fawncied the silly owl had gone balmy, but he insisted that he had to collect thirty dollars a month rent.

“Of course, I showed the fellow my receipt for the place, proving I was the owner of it. But he just looked at it and said:––

“‘Say!––who are you making a kid of? This might be all right for a bunch of groceries, or electric light, or a ton of coal, but it isn’t all right for a rawnch.’

“‘Why!––what’s the matter with it?’ I asked. ‘Doesn’t it say, Received from Percival DeRue Hannington the sum of five thousand dollars for one ranch of twenty acres, with house and barns, situated ten miles from the city of Vernock and called Douthem’s Ranch?’

“‘Sure it does,’ said the chap. And he was devilish rude about it too.”

By this time, Phil had all he could do to keep from shouting with merriment. He did not dare to look at DeRue Hannington, so he kept religiously to his food.

“Well,––he told me the rawnch belonged to some other people; that Douthem only rented it, and that one had to have a deed and register it when one bought property. The blooming upshot was I had to pay the collecting fellow his thirty dollars and get out. So I landed back here to-day.

“I daresay, Phil, a man has to pay for his experience, but you know it looks as if a fellow had to do so much paying that when he does finish up by really owning something, 109 he will have paid such a beastly lot for it that he’ll never be able to make it up again.”

Phil showed impatience.

“Good heavens, man!––don’t you know that land is not exchanged without an Agreement for Sale, or a Deed?”

“How should I know?” answered the innocent. “I never bought land before. If I pay the price for an article, it should be mine, shouldn’t it?”

“If the man you pay is honest,” replied Phil, “but he isn’t always honest, hence Agreements and Deeds.

“Next time you buy a ranch, Mr. Hannington, take my advice and hire a lawyer to see the deal through for you.”

“No more bally rawnches for me, Phil. And it is possibly just as well I lost this one, because I have learned that one has to grub and mess among caterpillars and all those dirty little insects and worms they call bugs, which keep getting on the fruit trees, eating up the bally stuff you are trying to grow. I simply cawn’t stand the slimy, squashy little reptiles, you know!”

“I am afraid you are destined to meet them in other places besides ranches,” remarked Phil.

“I have found them on my dinner table before now!”

“How disgusting!” exclaimed the horrified Englishman.

“What are you going to tackle next? Don’t you think you had better get a job for a while, working for wages, until you get acclimatised; and so conserve your money until you have had the necessary experience?”

“Not so long as my old dad is willing to foot the bills! The least he can do is to keep me going here. It is cheaper for him than letting me gad about between London, Paris and the Riviera. Besides, my mother would 110 die of shame if she fawncied her boy Percy was working for wages like a common labouring bounder.”

This was a species of maternal niceness Phil had never run up against, consequently he did not feel sympathetic toward it.

“They tell me oil-wells are a jolly good thing to get into. That fellow Rockefeller made a lot out of them, didn’t he? You don’t know of any likely places around here, Phil?”

“No! I don’t think this is much of an oil country, Mr. Hannington. What we hear about oil here is more or less bunk. Better leave it alone!”

“You know,––I did meet a fellow on the train coming across. He had a jolly good thing. He was a water-diviner;––could tell you where the water was for a well just by walking over the land with a twig in his hand and doing a kind of prayer. Seemed to listen for the water, the same way as a robin does on the lawn when after worms.”

Phil laughed. “Yes!––I have met a few of that water-divining species, and some of them were pretty good at it, too. They seemed to strike it right fairly often.”

“Aw, yes, Phil!” continued DeRue Hannington, wiping his mouth with his napkin and leaning back in his chair, “but this fellow did have a good scheme. He said, you know, if a man could divine water, there was nothing to prevent him from divining oil too. So he was going to the oil-well district in California to test himself out with his idea, then he was coming back to Canada to start up oil-wells all over the bally country.”

“He’s going to let me in on it too. That’s what I call one of my futures. Just a speculation, old chap! I gave him two hundred and fifty dollars on his note. He required it to pay his way to the Oil Wells. Don’t you think it might be a real good thing, Phil?”

“It might!––but I don’t think I would tell many people about it,” said Phil quietly.

“Why?––Oh, yes, I see! I oughtn’t to give the chap away before he elaborates his plans. Might spoil them. Silly I didn’t think of that!”

“Just so, Mr. Hannington!”

“Meantime, though,––I intend buying a house here and settling down. I do like this Valley. It is so deuced picturesque, you know, and rural. When I’m properly established, I can go in for mining. On a hilly country like this, there ought to be good mining properties; gold, silver, etcetera. Don’t you think so, Phil?”

“There might be, if one could only hit them. I’ve never had enough time or money myself to take the matter up as a hobby.”

DeRue Hannington rose slowly from the table.

“Well, Phil, old top!––I’ve enjoyed our talk. I hope to see you again soon. Come and have a cocktail before I go!”

Phil got up, and they went into the bar together, where a number of Vernock’s seasoned bar-loungers were following their usual bent.

DeRue Hannington kept harping on his various money-making schemes, in his high drawling voice, which could be heard all over the saloon. Suddenly his eye fell on one with whom he seemed to be casually acquainted; a foppishly dressed, smooth-tongued rascal who dealt in horses, cards, bunco real-estate, insurance and anything else that brought a commission without much work. He was called Rattlesnake Jim by those who knew him, but Mr. Dalton by those who didn’t.

“Excuse me, Phil, but I would like to have a word with Mr. Dalton.”

Phil knew at once that Hannington was one of those who didn’t know Rattlesnake Jim.

The Englishman called Dalton over.

“Say, old chap,––have a drink!”

Dalton had one.

“What about that horse, Dalton? Have you sold her yet?”

“No siree! I’ll sell her when I get my price. I ain’t in no hurry.”

“Well, you know I offered you two hundred and fifty for her.”

“And she’s yours for five hundred bucks.”

Phil interfered.

“Oh, come off the grass! What do you take my friend for?”

“Do you know the horse we’re talking about?” asked Dalton.

“Sure I do!––the white mare. She’s a good enough horse, a beauty to look at, but there aren’t any millionaires around Vernock going to give you five hundred dollars for her. A hundred and fifty is plenty for a good riding horse these days.”

“Say!––whose horse is it, anyway?”

“Yours,––I presume!” said Phil.

“Who’s buying the horse?”

“Not me!”

“All right,––keep out!”

Phil smiled.

Dalton twisted up his face and turned to Hannington.

“Well, boss,––is it a go?”

Hannington demurred, then he showed a little decision, which Phil was beginning to think he was entirely devoid of.

“No!––I’m dimmed if I’ll pay that much for her. I want the horse because she’s white all over and there isn’t another like her in colour about the bally town. I like 113 things different, by gad! But I simply won’t be put upon. No, dim it, dim it all,––I just won’t!”

Dalton walked away without a word, then he whirled on his heel and came slowly back.

“Want a mine––a gold mine?”

Percival DeRue Hannington, ever ready to nibble, showed interest.

“Say, Rattlesnake, forget it! Darn it all, do you think you are talking to a crazy man?”

“See here, Ralston!––why don’t you live up to your pet name and keep your trap shut? Butt out!” exclaimed Dalton, curling his upper lip in evident disgust.

“It’s an honest-to-goodness gold mine, Mr. Hannington, and I hold all the rights to it.”

Phil addressed his friend.

“Don’t be foolish now. Everybody in Vernock knows about Dalton’s mine. He can’t give it away.”

“Say, Ralston! if I was big as you and as ugly, I’d knock your face in. Mind your own dirty business and keep out. Mr. Hannington is a man-sized man, with a man-sized bean-pot and doesn’t need a wet nurse with him. He knows whether he wants a mine or not,” said Dalton sourly.

Phil’s eyes flashed anger.

“Now, Phil, please!” put in Hannington. “Really you mustn’t quarrel. And you never know, you know;––there really have been old, good-for-nothing mines and things that have turned out wonderful.”

Phil shrugged his shoulders.

“Go to it!” he said. “It’s your funeral.”

“Oh, come now! Don’t be playing the bally Dead March over me because of a silly mine.

“Mr. Dalton, what name does this gold mine go by?”

“The Lost Durkin Gold Mine!”

Hannington’s face lit up as he caught an inward glimpse of himself as the owner.

“Lost Durkin! Deuced romantic name, you know! Isn’t it, Phil?”

Phil failed to respond.

“But why Lost Durkin, Mr. Dalton?”

“It’s like this: Durkin and another guy were the discoverers of this ere mine. It panned out,––well!––nobody knowed for sure certain how it panned out; only Durkin and his pal always had lots of nuggets and dust. Durkin’s pal went away and Durkin worked it all by hisself. They say he struck it rich in a vein and went batty over it. Anyway, he acted queer for a time. One day his hat was found in the tunnel, and no sign of Durkin from that day to this.

“Durkin’s pal, Don Flannigan, without ever comin’ back, sold out the mine to Jem Grierson. Grierson sold to me. It ain’t been worked to speak of since Durkin tried it out. The gold might be lyin’ there just for the pickin’ up.”

“Oh, say, Rattlesnake!––come off,” interposed Phil.

“Why, Hannington,––every hobo that has come to this Valley is open to have a go at it any old time he likes.”

“Not on your tin tacks! I hold the mining rights to it, and nobody else. Just let somebody try it on!” put in Dalton.

“But there must be some gold in it, Phil!” remarked Hannington.

“Sure,––about four dollars a day hard working!”

“By jove!––if there’s that, there might be more, you know.”

“Yes, and there might not!”

“If the gold was absolutely sure, Phil, you know nobody would sell. Would they? A man has got to take a chawnce.

“What do you want for the bally thing, Mr. Dalton?”

“One thousand plunks,” remarked Dalton without a tremor.

“Plunks?”

“Yes, plunks,––bucks!”

“Bucks?”

“Yes,––plunks, bucks, greenbacks, In-God-We-Trusts, D-O-double L-A-R-S.”

“Two hundred quid!” figured Hannington roughly, who, for the proper realisation of actual values still had the habit of converting his dollars into English coinage.

“Tisn’t much for a gold mine, Phil,––is it now?”?

“I could get you a dozen for that.”

“Oh, now, Phil!”

Rattlesnake Jim was getting impatient.

“Say, mister––if you’re interested, come outside and talk. No use trying to make a deal, with this old man of the sea out playin’ buttinsky.”

“Don’t be a fool now,” interposed Phil. “Stay where you are!”

But DeRue Hannington was in the toils again, and the fever was in his blood.

Dalton walked slowly to the door.

Hannington hesitated, looked sheepishly at Phil, then exclaimed over his shoulder:

“Eh, excuse me, old chap,––won’t you!” And he hurried alongside the owner of The Lost Durkin Gold Mine.

“Couldn’t you come down a bit in your price, old dear? Your figure seems deuced steep where mines seem to be so beastly plentiful,” Phil heard Hannington say.

At the door Dalton stopped.

“One thousand for the mine, and just to show you that I’m a real sport and playin’ fair, I’ll throw the white mare in for luck.”

Hannington gasped, then slapped Dalton on the shoulder 116 and grabbed his hand in ecstasy at the overflow of generosity on the part of the mine owner.

“Done,––done! It’s a bally go!”

And the two disappeared outside in head-to-head conversation, to the accompaniment of a round of loud laughter from some old timers in the saloon who had overheard part of the talk and who knew that once more a sheep was about to be shorn of its wool.

Phil swung round with his back and elbows on the counter. He surveyed the crowd dimly through the haze of smoke in the bar-room.

Just then Jim Langford came in by the swinging doors.

Phil went over to him directly, led him to a table in the corner, and told him in a few, quick sentences of the thieving visit that had been made to his room at Mrs. Clunie’s.

“There’s more in this than you think,” said Langford, after Phil had concluded. “Haven’t you heard the news of the other thieving in town?”

“No,––where was it?”

“A gang must have been working on the O.K. Supply Company’s premises last night. Three days ago, Morrison unloaded two carloads of feed and flour in his No. 1 Warehouse. They haven’t sold a nickel’s worth, and this morning there aren’t fifty sacks left.”

“Was the place broken into?” asked Phil.

“Must have been, but every bolt and bar is secure, so are all the padlocks. It’s a mighty queer thing.

“I had it on the inside that the Pioneer Traders were shy last week, but they gave out no report; and Mayor Brenchfield, whose Warehouse and stables lie between the Pioneer Traders and the O.K. Supply Co. lodged a complaint with Chief Palmer this morning that he had lost forty bags of bran and oats from his place. Of course, his loss isn’t a patch on the loss of the other two.

“You know, this darned thing has been going on for several years. Somebody is getting fat on it. The O.K. Supply Company have lost sixty thousand dollars’ worth in four or five years. They have put new locks and bolts on, but all to no purpose. The Pioneer Traders must be considerably shy, too.

“The Police don’t do a thing, and everybody seems scared to act for fear of being got back at in some way.

“The Indians are being blamed for it; so are some of the wilder element who have cattle ranches and lots of live stock to feed. Easy way to fatten your animals, eh, Phil!

“If we could lay the man by the heels who ransacked your place, we might be able to get a clue to the others.”

Phil shook his head. “No,––I don’t think so!” he answered.

“Well, old man Morrison of the O.K. Company is a decent head and these continual robberies are bleeding him white. He told me all about it this morning.

“I have made arrangements to quit the Court House for a while and take a job with him as warehouseman, just to see what I can fasten on to.”

“Won’t they get suspicious if they know you are on the job?”

Langford laughed. “Good Lord, no! I have been in a dozen jobs in this town in as many months. Besides, nobody ever thinks of me as a Sherlock Holmes. I’m just languishing for a little excitement anyway.”

“You won’t forget then to call me in to lend a hand if there is any scrapping going?” said Phil.

“Would you really come in on it?”

“You bet!”

“All right! This old burg will have something to wake it up one of these days.”

Their attention was distracted by the rattle of gravel 118 on the window at which they were sitting. Langford shook his fist at a disappearing figure.

“Who was that?” asked Phil.

“Don’t know! Looked like Smiler, the dummy kid. Queer little devil!”

Phil jumped up.

“Maybe he’s got some information for me. Wait here! I’ll be back directly.”

Phil went outside slowly and round the corner of the building to the back-yard. Sure enough, as soon as no one was in sight, Smiler darted up to him. He was all excitement and kept pointing to a clump of trees down a side road.

“Did you find the man with the lame horse?” Phil asked.

Smiler nodded and grinned with pleasure, catching Phil by the coat and leading the way cautiously to where stood the brown mare with the white patch over her eye. She was tethered to a tree, well hidden from view of the road.

Phil examined her legs and saw at a glance that she favoured her left fore foot. A look showed him that some gravel had worked up into an old sore.

Phil pulled the strings of a bag that hung from the saddle. The first things he came across were his own spurs. He took possession of them.

Meanwhile, Smiler was watching with deep interest.

“Where’s the man, Smiler?” asked Phil.

The boy grinned and nodded his head, as if to say:––“Come along,––I’ll show you.”

He led Phil through the back lanes to Chinatown, stopping in front of a cheap, Chinese restaurant. He pointed inside. Phil made to enter.

He encountered, of all people, Brenchfield coming out.

The suddenness of the Mayor’s appearance caused him 119 to catch his breath. In Phil’s mind it solved the problem at once.

Brenchfield stopped and stared at Phil, then he glared at Smiler who turned tail and ran off as if for his very life.

The Mayor appeared to be in one of his most sullen moods. He turned again and looked angrily at Phil, his eyes travelling from the young smith’s face to his boots, then back to his left hand in which he still held his recovered spurs.

Phil jingled them suggestively, and kept on into the restaurant. Brenchfield remained on the sidewalk in front of the door.

Phil knew quite well that he was taking chances, but he risked that.

There was nothing of any moment taking place in the main dining-room. Several diners were on stools at the counter. Others were at tables. A Chinese waiter was serving, while the cook was tossing hot cakes beside the cooking range. The door of the adjoining room was open. Some Chinamen were at a table, deeply interested in a game of chuckaluck. In a room still farther back, some white men were playing poker.

Phil strolled in there. No one paid any heed to him.

His eyes travelled over the players. He did not know any of them. But it did not take him a second to settle in his mind which was the man he was after.

A little, stout, narrow-eyed fellow, who did not seem to have been shaved or washed for months, was seated at the far corner, chewing tobacco viciously. Evidently he had just resumed his game, for Phil heard one of the players exclaim:––

“Aw!––get a move on, Ginger! What’n the deuce do you want to keep us here all day for, waitin’ for you and that blasted Mayor to quit chewin’ the fat?”

None worried about the new arrival: they were all too engrossed in their game.

In the middle of it, Phil went up close.

“Men,––I hate to butt in, but I want that dirty little fellow over there.” He pointed suggestively at his man.

“Yes,––you Ginger!” he shouted, as the little man gaped.

“Aw,––get back on your base!” was all he got for answer, for the man had no idea who had challenged him, and drunks had a habit of interfering at cards, ultimately to find themselves thrown out into the street. He took Phil for one of those and left it to the man nearest to the intruder to settle the account.

With a quick movement Phil threw his body over the table, catching the little fellow smartly by the neck-cloth and shirt in a grip that there was no gainsaying. By the sheer power of his right hand and arm, he pulled the astonished Ginger––before his more astonished partners––right across the table, planting him on his feet in front of him.

The little man gasped for breath and struggled, but finding his struggling merely meant more strangling, he commenced to feel at his hip as if for a gun.

Phil struck him on the side of the head, sending him staggering against the wall. As Ginger recovered, Phil held his spurs under the man’s nose and jingled them.

“I guess you know these?”

The fellow’s narrow eyes opened wide. He let out a guttural sound and sprang for the door. Phil shot after him. But the little one’s speed was accelerated by his fear. Phil’s boot was all that reached him and it did its work uncommonly well. A nicely planted kick, just when he reached the door-step, sent Ginger in the air and seated him on the plank sidewalk. He jumped 121 up almost before he touched the boards and tore down the road as if the devil himself were behind him.

Brenchfield, who had been a silent spectator of what had taken place, came into the main room of the restaurant, where a crowd of low whites and curious Chinese had gathered.

“Look here, young man!––you don’t want to be doing much of that in this town or you’ll find yourself locked up.”

Phil shook his spurs in the Mayor’s face.

“And you don’t want to be doing much of this, or you’ll find yourself my next cell neighbour.”

The Mayor had no idea how far his opponent was prepared to go, and evidently afraid to risk a scene, he turned his back on Phil with an oath.

“First time I catch that damned, sneaking little rat I saw you with I’ll thrash him within an inch of his miserable little life.”

“You just try it on,––and, God help you,––that’s all,” retorted Phil.