Acting upon this determination, he crawled carefully forward, for he was too near to venture upon standing upright; and moreover, as the answering whistle had proved that others were in the neighbourhood, he was compelled to be on his guard against discovery from other quarters. His quick ear soon caught the sound of an approaching tread, and directly after, he heard words spoken. The spy’s curiosity was now raised tenfold, especially as one of the two men who were now, as he well knew, close to him, struck a match to light his pipe, and the momentary flash showed him both figures in a brief glimpse. They were unluckily placed with their backs towards him, so that he could not see their features. He now felt confident that the first one was Rube Steele, and that the second was not entirely unknown to him, but more than this he could not tell. This was terribly tantalising; and after the brief illumination of the match, a more impenetrable darkness seemed to have settled upon the pass and the rocks around; so, at all hazards, he resolved to get still nearer. He was perhaps a little unguarded in his eagerness, and made some slight noise, and it is certain that he had not calculated all the hazards which might environ him, for a low fierce growl showed that a dog was with the men, and the spy shuddered with horror as he heard the sound. ‘Did you hear anything?’ said a harsh voice. ‘The dog would not have growled like that, unless some one was hanging around.’ ‘Nonsense!’ returned the other; and the voice was certainly the voice of Rube Steele. ‘He heard a jack-rabbit, perhaps, or scented a polecat. I reckon there ain’t a soul within a league of this cañon to-night. The miners are all at Flume City, and the Indians have left the district for more than a week past.’ ‘You may be right,’ returned the first speaker. ‘But the dog is uneasy, and I never knew him give them signs for game or venison; no, nor for Injun neither. I should have said there was a white man near. But we air a little too much in the line of the main pass to show a light, which we must do. Come behind this rock.—Good dog!—mind ’em!’ These last words were of course addressed to the dog, which had continued to growl at intervals while his master was speaking, although the unseen watcher had lain as still as death. The animal was apparently soothed by being thus noticed, and probably followed the men, whose footsteps could be heard as they removed to the proposed cover behind the Big Loaf Rock. The spy had no inclination to follow them to learn more, but crawled carefully and noiselessly over the ground until he was at a safe distance from the pass; so far, indeed, that he judged that even the acute ears and scent of the dog could not detect him when he rose, and hurried in the direction of the city as fast as his legs could carry him.