way of settling hot dispute with hotter lead. Neither was he a fool. There were men in camp whom he did not like and who did not like him. Embry, for one; Joe Banks, for two; Flash Truitt, for three. Three men who, upon the surface had little enough to do with one another but whom he distrusted in all that they did and seemed. It was camp talk that Embry and Truitt had never spoken a friendly word between them; it was further report that Embry and Jim Banks had broken off abruptly their former amicable relations. Steele shrugged and believed only what it pleased him to believe. And that was, very largely, that Embry was full of craft and malice.
Nor did Steele fancy that his new secret could remain his a half dozen hours. It did not need Bill Rice's report that his men had been wondering and talking and speculating; nor Turk's further report that in the late afternoon he had seen here and there knots of men discussing "something or other" in quiet eager voices. Given a heap of raw gold in the midst of blood-stirred gold seekers, and what was the answer? A rifle laid handy at Steele's side, a certain grim tightening of the muscles about Steele's jaws and eyes.
He accepted conditions and allowed his acceptance to be unhidden. In other words, he went and squatted over what was his, meaning to hold it. When dusk had passed and night had come, swift and black. Bill Rice relieved his employer and Steele went to eat and stroll through the camp. At the saloon he was not surprised that men's eyes followed him here and there nor that while knots of men and women stood about
