"As to the insecurity of life," said the editor, indignantly, "it is as safe here as in New York or Boston. We admit that in the early days the country was cursed by too many adventurers of the type of this very gambler Hamlin, but I will venture to say that you will require no better refutation of these calumnies than this very miner whom you admired. He, sir, is a type of our mining population; strong, manly, honest, unassuming, and perfectly gentle and retiring. We are proud, sir, we admit, of such men--eh? Oh, that's nothing--only the arrival of the up-stage!" It certainly was something more. A momentarily increasing crowd of breathless men were gathered on the verandah before the window and were peering anxiously over each other's head toward a central group, among which towered the tall figure of the very miner of whom they had been speaking. More than that, there was a certain undefined, restless terror in the air, as when the intense conscious passion or suffering of one or two men communicates itself vaguely without speech, sometimes even without visible sign to others. And then Yuba Bill, the driver of the Wingdam coach, strode out from the crowd into the bar-room, drawing from his hands with an evident effort his immense buckskin gloves. "What's the row, Bill?" said half-a-dozen voices. "Nothin'," said Bill, gruffly; "only the Sheriff of Calaveras ez kem down with us hez nabbed his man jest in his very tracks." "When, Bill?" "Right yer--on this very verandy--furst man he seed!" "What for?" "Who?" "What hed he bin doin'?" "Who is it?" "What's up?" persisted the chorus. "Killed a man up at One Horse Gulch, last night," said Bill, grasping the decanter which the attentive bar-keeper had, without previous request, placed before him. "Who did he kill, Bill?" "A little Mexican from 'Frisco by the name o' Ramirez." "What's the man's name that killed him--the man that you took?" The voice was Jack Hamlin's. Yuba Bill instantly turned, put down his glass, wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and then deliberately held out his great hand with an exhaustive grin. "Dern my skin, ole man, if it ain't you! And how's things, eh? Yer lookin' a little white in the gills, but peart and sassy, ez usual. Heerd you was kinder off colour, down in Sacramento lass week. And it's you, ole fell, and jest in time! Bar-keep--hist that pizen over to Jack. Here to ye agin, ole man! But I'm glad to see ye!" The crowd hung breathless over the two men--awestruck and respectful. It was a meeting of the gods--Jack Hamlin and Yuba Bill. None dare speak. Hamlin broke the silence at last, and put down his glass. "What," he asked, lazily, yet with a slight colour on his cheek, "did you say was the name of the chap that fetched that little Mexican?" "Gabriel Conroy," said Bill. CHAPTER II. MR. HAMLIN TAKES A HAND.