"I was raised in Vermont. Worked on a farm for dad till I was twenty-two. Then with fifty dollars, which I had in the savings bank, I started for California. Well, I got there at last, but my funds were almost gone. I got a chance to do some rough work till I had enough to go to the mines. There I made something of a pile, enough to pay off the mortgage on the old farm, and have ten thousand dollars left. I've just come from there." "Do you ever expect to go back to the mines?" "Yes. I should not be satisfied now to remain at the East. Where are you going?" "To the city." "To get a place?" "Yes, if I can." "Have you parents living?" "I have a mother," said Robert slowly. "And you want to get work to help support her?" "No, she has plenty of money." "Then why do you leave home?" Robert looked at his companion. His plain, honest face impressed him favorably. He felt that he was a man in whom he could confide. "I have a step-father," he said briefly. "I understand. You and he don't hitch horses. Is that so?" "You are right." "Tell me all about it." "I will. I should like to ask somebody's advice. I want to know whether I have done right." "Go ahead, my lad." Robert told the story, and the miner listened attentively. "Do you know what I think of that step-father of yours?" "Tell me." "I think he is about as mean a skunk as I ever heard mentioned. What made your mother marry him?" "I don't know. She must have been infatuated." "I suppose you had an easy time at home." "Yes, I did." "And now you will have to work for a living?" "Yes, but I don't mind that." "I see you're the right sort," said the miner approvingly. They had reached the next station. In the next car there was a tumult and a noise as of men scuffling. The miner rose and opened the door of the car. He and Robert saw the two men who had tried to swindle our hero in the hands of two angry men, who hustled them out of the car with such violence that they fell prostrate beside the track. "What's the matter?" asked the miner. "These men tried to relieve me of my watch. They won't try it again in a hurry." Bruised by the fall, the two men picked themselves up and slunk away. "They're a precious pair of rascals," said the miner. "If we had them at the mines, they would soon dangle from the branch of a tree." CHAPTER VIII. PERIL. Jones and Barlow, the two men who had been so ignominiously expelled from the train, picked themselves up, and with faces flaming with anger shook their fists at the train in impotent wrath. "This is an outrage, Jones," said Barlow, the taller of the two. "So it is," said Jones, rubbing his knee, which had received an abrasion from falling on a flinty stone. "They don't know how to treat a gentleman." "No, they don't. You're right, Barlow." "I suppose the boy and that long-legged miner are laughing in their sleeves."