“Starve to death!” scoffed the scout. “We’ll not do that while there’s no more than thirty feet of shaft keeping us from the surface of the ground. There’s a way to get out of here, and we’ll find it. How are you feeling now?” “Pedder. Der pain ain’d so pad like id vas. I t’ink I vill live long enough to shtarve to deat’, anyvay.” “Come on after me,” said the scout, “and let’s see what we can make out of the level.” He entered the darkness of the drift, scratching matches as he proceeded. Twenty feet measured the length of the level, and the scout brought up short against a wall of virgin rock. “Nothing much here, baron,” said he. “The men who located this property drifted twenty feet off the shaft to find the lead. They didn’t find it, and so gave up.” “I haf found somet’ing,” said the baron. “Look here, vonce.” The scout retraced his way a few feet to where the baron was standing. On the floor of the level, directly in front of the baron, was something that looked like a pile of silver balls. Each ball was about the size of a man’s fist, and there must have been more than a hundred of them. The scout picked up one of the balls, examined it a moment, and then dropped it in amazement. “Vat’s der madder, Puffalo Pill?” queried the baron, in some excitement. “Meppy dis iss a silfer-mine, hey?” The match flickered out in the scout’s fingers, and the baron heard a low laugh. “Vat for you laugh like dot?” demanded the baron. “Meppy ve can take dot silfer avay, und sell him und make some money. Oof dere iss money enough for me to ged marrit on, all vat habbened mit me I vill call a goot t’ing. Dose Inchuns dropped us indo a silfer-mine; und der choke’s on dem, hey?” “Baron,” said the scout, “this isn’t a silver-mine.” “Ain’d dose palls silfer?” “No, they’re gold.” “Goldt? _Himmelplitzen!_ I t’ought goldt vas yellow. Dose palls are _vite_.” “They’re gold, nevertheless, baron,” said the scout; “yellow gold covered with quicksilver. That is a pile of amalgam--gold and quicksilver as it comes from the plates of a stamp-mill.” “Py chimineddy! Iss dot some oof McGowan’s lost goldt, Puffalo Pill?” “I’ll bet my pile it is. Those redskins have dropped us into the place where the bullion thieves have been caching their loot.” “Und id don’d pelong to us, but to McGowan!” “It’s McGowan’s gold, all right, baron.” Once more a laugh broke from the scout’s lips. “We’d never have found it if that white villain and those Apaches hadn’t----” A whistle echoed down the shaft and drifted in along the level to where the scout and the baron were standing, near the pile of amalgam. “Vat id iss?” whispered the baron, taking a tense grip on the scout’s arm. “Meppy der Inchuns haf gome pack to put us oudt oof der vay.” But the baron was wrong in this conclusion. While he and the scout stood there, trying to puzzle out the cause of that whistle, a voice came to their ears. “Buffler! Aire ye thar, ole pard?”