THE CURTAIN falls, shutting out our view of Tom, as, day by day, he wends his slow way from the great barren plains west of the Mississippi valley toward the modern Golconda.

He had been fortunate in joining a company of emigrants, who treated him kindly, accepting his company as welcome, for he was the only boy in the party, and to more than one he brought to mind boys of their own left behind in homes far east.

He feared that Wanuka, angry at his desertion, would pursue him, and perchance attack the party to which he had joined himself. But Miantonimo prevented that. Indian boy as he was, he was a true and unselfish friend, and repressed the sadness and loneliness which he felt for the sake of the white boy whom he had learned to love as David loved Jonathan.

The curtain rises disclosing a different scene.

We see a valley hemmed in on nearly every side by high mountains. Tall pines, straight as a flag-staff, rise here and there. Bowlders, projected above the earth’s surface by some former upheaval, dating back thousands of centuries it may be, dot the slope of the hills and the shelving valley, and this is probably the202 reason why the place received years since, and still bears, the name of Rocky Gulch.

It is not uninhabited now, for there is a small village. Most of the houses are occupied by miners, for the treasures of the place are not exhausted.

In one of these cabins, rude enough in its construction, live two men whom we have met before.

That tall figure, in a rather close-fitting suit, with an old sombrero crowning a head and covering a face which evidently belonged to a man of thought and culture, must surely be Dr. Lycurgus B. Spooner, physician and wanderer by profession. And that other figure, shorter, stouter, broader-shouldered, surmounted by a bronzed, honest face, can belong to none other than Peter Brush.

Together they sit in the twilight, which comes earlier in the shadow of the hills, at the door of their humble residence, smoking clay pipes at the close of their day’s labor.

For a time they are silent. Then Mr. Brush lays aside his pipe, and turning to his companion, says, slowly:

“Doctor, I don’t know why it is, but to-day I’ve been thinkin’ more than usual of poor Tom.”

“So have I, friend Brush. I don’t know why it is, but when I was at my work, his image kept rising before me.”

“How long have we been here, doctor?”

“Three months to-day, friend Brush.”

“And we haven’t heard anything of Tom in all that time.”

203

“It was hardly to be expected. There isn’t any post-office where he is, and if there was, he would not know where to direct to us.”

“I hope the poor boy has come to no harm.”

“That wasn’t likely unless he made an attempt to escape. The Indian boy—what was his name?”

“Miantonimo.”

“Yes. Well, he had such a fancy for Tom that he would be sure to have him treated well. It was very strange,” continued the doctor, meditatively, “almost like a romance.”

“It beats any romance I ever read,” said Peter Brush. “Doctor, I mistrust that Tom would try to escape sooner or later, and would most likely be caught and——”

Peter Brush gasped a little, and did not try to finish the sentence.

“He wouldn’t try to escape if he didn’t have a fair show, friend Brush. Tom is a smart boy; I didn’t know him long, but I found that out.”

“Yes, he’s a mighty smart boy. Now, supposin’ he did escape, what then?”

“What then? He would come here. When you told me his story, I made up my mind to that, directly. Tom set out on a mission, to clear up the mystery of his father’s disappearance. It was here that his father was robbed, and perhaps murdered. You may rely upon it, friend Brush, that he would come here just as fast as his legs could bring him.”

“I know you said that. That was why we came here.”

204 “To be on the ground when he came—precisely. Well, friend Brush, we haven’t made any mistake in that. We’ve made it pay.”

“That is true. We stumbled upon a rich vein, which wasn’t to be expected after the place had been ransacked for years. I reckon that between us we have taken out six thousand dollars.”

“About that.”

“If Tom comes here, I will divide with him. He sha’n’t suffer any loss for............