In the morning he was partially recovered from fears and tears. The women patted his face, fed him to bursting, fingered the beautiful plaits of his yellow hair, and otherwise showed that they had not surrendered all their feminine sensibilities to their tumultuous lives. They spoke to him in pleading voices, and he gurgled up his words of reply in the unknown tongue. The saloon-keeper's theory that it would be a good thing to set him up on the bar some more in order to keep trade, was voted both inhuman and impracticable by the women. Later in the day a young man managed to get on the youngster's blind side, when by blandishments he beguiled him on to his pony in front of him. Thus he rode slowly through the streets, to the delight of the people, who responded to Gold Nugget's progress by volley and yell. This again frightened him, and he clung desperately to his new friend, who by waving his arm stilled the tempest of Virginia City's welcome, whereat the young man shouted, "Say--do you think this kid is runnin' for sheriff?" The Gulch voted the newcomer the greatest thing that ever happened; took him into partnership, speculated on his previous career, and drank his health. Above all they drank his health. Unitedly they drank to his weird past,--his interesting present, and to his future life and happiness, far into the night. It was good for business, said the saloon-keepers one to another. On one of the same mountain winds which had heralded his coming was borne down the Gulch next morning the tragic words, "The kid has gone!" "Gone?" said the miners; "gone whar?" Alder promptly dropped its pick, buckled on its artillery, and assembled before the nine-notch man. "Where has the kid gone?" it demanded. His woman stood beside the bar, wild-eyed and dishevelled. "I don't know, gentlemen--I don't have an idea. He was playing by the door of my shack last evening. I went in the house for a minute, and when I came out he was gone. I yelled, and men came, but we could not find him hide or hair." "If any man has got that kid away from me,--mind you this now,--he will see me through the smoke," spoke nine-notch, as he rolled his eye malevolently for a possible reply. Long search and inquiry failed to clear matters. The tracks around the house shed no new light. The men wound their way to their cabins up and down the Gulch, only answering inquiries by, "The kid is gone." CHAPTER II WHITE WEASEL