Again Landlord Larry was the speaker, and he began by asking if the unfortunate stranger, whose wound had crazed him, was in the crowd. Every eye was at once on the search for the man, but soon the reports came that Bernard Brandon was not in the crowd. Then Landlord Larry made known that the mysterious disappearance, at the time of Miss Seldon's capture by the road-agents, was a coincidence so strange that it needed explanation. Miss Seldon was coming to Last Chance to find that very young man, who had in turn come there in search of her father, and now, when she was a captive to the road-agents, to be given up only upon the payment of a large ransom, the stranger had most mysteriously disappeared. The name of the young lady's father was Andrew Seldon, and if any miner present could tell aught regarding him, or had known such a man, the landlord wished him to come and tell him all that he could about him. But it was the duty, and but justice, for one and all of them to set out on the search for the young stranger who had disappeared from their midst, and he wished to know if they would not take a day off and do so, for it might be that he had been injured, and was then lying suffering and deserving their sympathy and aid somewhere among the mountains. A perfect yell in answer to the request of Landlord Larry told him that Bernard Brandon would be found if he was in or near Last Chance, and so it was agreed that all would start at dawn the following morning, many mounted, many on foot, and report the result, if good or bad, at the hotel at night. So the miners' meeting broke up, and with the first gray in the east the following morning, four-fifths of Last Chance were off, searching for the missing man. As they wore themselves out, or completed the search over the circuit assigned them, the men came in and reported at the hotel. Each had the same story to tell, that the search had been a fruitless one. Many of the mounted men did not come in until after dark, but theirs was the same story, that no trace of the missing stranger could be found. At last every man who had been on the search had returned, and not the slightest trace of the missing Brandon had been discovered by a single one who had gone out to look for him. No one remembered to have seen him very lately, and so his fate was unsolved, and the miners put it down as unknown, with the belief that he had either been kidnaped by road-agents or had fallen into some stream, or from a cliff, and thus met his death. The belief of Landlord Larry and Harding was that Bernard Brandon had been captured, for some reason, by road-agents, and this convinced them that there were spies of the outlaws then dwelling in their midst; but what the motive for kidnaping the man was, they could only conjecture, believing it to be ransom that they thought the miners would pay, and, if they did not, that Celeste Seldon would.