One day when our miners were nearing the end of their cross-cut, Old Bob was sitting in his cabin down in the outskirts of the village, trying with his squinting eyes and stiff fingers to mend a pair of brown duck trousers, which were past any further wearing without repairs.

He was worrying and muttering over this miserable task, when he heard hurried footsteps approach and stop at the door. A moment later it was pushed open and a man entered whom he did not recognize.

“I ’spose likely you don’t know me,” the stranger said. “I’m Scotty.”

“Scotty, eh? Well, stranger, I don’t know ye much better by that, but take a{50} cheer. Did ye come over the range? and did ye have any business with me?”

The stranger sat down, took from his pocket a flat-bottle, unscrewed the top and offered it to his host.

Bob received it, remarked civilly, “Well, here’s how,” and poured a deep draught of its contents down his throat. Then wiping his lips with the back of his hand he passed the bottle back, with the comment:

“You air a gentleman, sir, or you wouldn’t be passin’ round whisky ’s good as that.”

“Well, I try to treat a square man right when I meet him. Do you remember a little scrimmage in the El Dorado a few days ago with a feller in your camp here, named Morris? I guess you wa’n’t there.”

“No,” Bob replied, “I had other business that night. But I heerd about it, and came darned near being hung afterward by a little mistake o’ the boys, who thought I was hiding the feller they bounced out of town so suddent.”39}

“Didn’t you hear his name?”

“No—nobody knowed him, and I never set eyes on the coon.”

“I’m the man.”

“You?” yelled Bob—surprised fairly out of his wits.

“Yes, that’s me, and I reckon it’s all right.”

“Well, Scotty,” Bob replied. “I’ve drunk with you, and when I drink with a man he’s my friend; but ef I hadn’t you’d have to get right out o’ this, ’cause I aint got use for fellers like you.”

“Now, Mr.—?” The visitor hesitated, in a questioning way, evidently wishing the name to be supplied.

“No matter about the mister, call me Bob as the rest of the boys do. I hain’t mistered you yet.”

“Now, Bob,” Scotty began again, “you may be prejudiced. That aint fair as between friends. You ought to hear both sides. I’m not so bad a man as they make{52} out in this ’ere camp. Fact is, we were all pretty high-strung that night, and a little rumpus oughtn’t to be laid up agin a gentleman who tries to deal square and make an honest livin’. I don’t lay up nothin’ agin Morris. We just pulled pistols on one another as gentlemen will sometimes, ye know, and he got the drop. That’s all. Now a man like me shouldn’t be sent out o’ town for a little thing like that. It’s an outrage, and you know it, Bob.”

“Yes,” the upright Robert assented. “It’s a big outrage. Mor’n that, I b’lieve the boys would see it now, ’n’ nobody’d say a word if you were to go into the El Dorado to-night. I’ll risk it, ’n’ I’ll introduce you as my friend, and then let any one object if he thinks best!”

“There’s one young feller you can’t catch with no chaff like that, and if I get a good chance, I’ll break his head.”

“Who’s that?”

“Don’t know his name, a tall, red-bearded{53} galoot, that looks like a Scotchman. Now I’m part Scotch myself and I admire the way he hit me under the ear, for my country’s sake, but all the same I owe him one!”

“Why, that must be that new pardner of Brehm and Bushwick’s up the creek.”

“Very likely. He’d just come up in the stage and was askin’ after a man o’ that name.”

Describing him to one another, they agreed that Sandy was the object of Scotty’s special aversion. This knock-down incident (into which it is unnecessary to go more particularly) was only one more count against the firm, and a new bond uniting this precious pair of scallawags. How and why Bob hated Max and Lennox we know; for a still better reason the gambler fostered a grudge against Sandy. They needed no oath-taking, therefore, to make them firm allies in any plan which might present itself to get revenge and possible profit; but in{54} respect to the latter point they had deceived themselves into a belief that our young friends had far more money than was really the case.