"The connection was plain enough," said Mr. Bruce, with a smile. "It was a big New York company that wanted to get the land for nothing. Jones was getting mysterious messages from New York and from the state capital. You were almost certain that Jones was the one back of all your troubles. Well, the deductions from all those facts were simple enough. Jones was evidently the agent for the New York company. Jones was not trying to kill any of you or to break up the machine. He was simply trying to hold up and delay the building of the road. Why did he want to hold up your work, you will ask. Well, the answer is contained in that newspaper clipping. The legislature will not meet until next month, when they will likely give the land grant to the company. The inference was plain, Jones' company wanted to have the road built, but not before they got the land from the state." "But why?" persisted Charley, still puzzled. "That's the question that puzzled me," smiled the lawyer. "It was what brought me out here the first time to look over the ground, and I found that you were carrying the answer around without knowing it. You were like Jones was about the surveyors' stakes. It was such a little thing that you never thought it of any importance." "Go on," said Charley, still mystified. "Those bits of rock you had in your game bag were phosphate at the highest grade," said the lawyer, with a smile. "The company was asking the state to give them millions of dollars' worth of phosphate for nothing, trusting to the state's ignorance of the value of the land." "I see," said Charley excitedly, "they wanted to hold the machine back from digging through that land until they got the grant from the state. They reasoned that, when the shovel began to throw out that stuff, someone would be sure to recognize it, and the news would leak out, destroying their chances of getting millions of dollars for nothing." "That's about the size of it," Mr. Bruce admitted. "But I still don't see how you made Jones buy our machine at such an enormous price," said the lad. "I am rather proud of that stroke," admitted the lawyer. "Perhaps my method was not entirely ethical, but, as a lawyer, I owed a duty to you, my clients, before any abstract duty to the state. Once I got the lay of things, I began to study out how I could turn my discoveries to your advantage. Of course, I could have made public the discovery of the phosphate and the grant would not be made, but that would not repay you fellows for your losses. So I hit upon a scheme which was simple but effective. Do you remember I had you all sign some papers the first time I came out here?" "Yes," said Charley, "and I have often wondered what they were."