"I reckon," he admitted shamefacedly, "I must hev fell asleep. That damn fire broke up my rest last night." With which comment he slouched, still sleepily, out of the place, rubbing his eyes as he went, with ham-like fists. At the rafts he found Bud Sellers, and a round dozen men of Bud's selection. Looking them over, Halloway privately approved. There was not an eye in the number that was not hawk-clear; or a figure that was not nail-hard. These were fellows cut to a pattern of action, but even in their excellent average, one stood out with an individualism which immediately struck the observer. He was introduced as Jerry O'Keefe, but Halloway would not have needed the name, once he had seen the lazy challenging twinkle in the gray-blue eyes, to spot him as a man of Irish blood. O'Keefe had need to look up to meet the glance of the giant, but that was for him unusual. Into most eyes he looked down, for when he stood in his socks he was six feet two inches of hard-bitten sinew and man-flesh. "Where's Brent?" asked Halloway, and Bud Sellers, whose manner had fallen into the stillness of one chafing against delay, replied tersely, "He hain't come back yit." Soon, though, he arrived, and by now the west was reddening toward sunset. In a situation calling for absolute parsimony in the economy of time it would have meant moments salvaged for the trio of men, who must act as commanders of the rest, to have gone at once into a discussion of the results of their several investigations. Yet that was impossible, since for Halloway to tell his story to both would mean revealing his knowledge of telegraphy. So while he and Brent talked first alone, Bud Sellers stood apart, and into that fertile soil of mountain suspicion crept a vague questioning as to why full confidence was denied him--a suspicion which was later to bear fruit. When he had been told all, save of Halloway's eavesdropping, he made his own report. "Myself, I hain't found out much, save thet I've got ther men ready, an' thet I seed Lute Brown talkin' with Jase Mallows a spell back." It was arranged that half of the force should proceed at top speed to Crabapple post office and mobilize there; that Halloway himself should push through to Viper and eavesdrop on the telegraph key, and that the others should loaf about Coal City watching the suspects and gleaning what information they could. The men of the last named contingent were to play hounds on the heels of the plotters and seek to follow them without being discovered. While the three were still in council at one end of the raft, Bud came suddenly to his feet and his jaw dropped in amazement. There striding down the bank to the boom, with a face as freshly pink as a wild rose, was Alexander herself, with her pack on her back.