"It makes me glad to know you believed what I told you, Thad, about that business of my uncle. If you could only meet up with him once, I'm sure you'd know the tricky kind of man he is, just from his looks, and the smooth way he talks. But no matter what they all do and say, I'm just bound to carry my plans out. My mother approves of what I am doing; and she is thinking of me, and praying all the time I'm up here, trying to take dad's place." "Don't mention it," said Thad, quickly. "Of course we all believe every word you told us, no matter whether we've met this rascally uncle of yours or not. Our chum Step Hen did, and I reckon he wasn't much impressed with him, from the way he talked. And as you belong to the scouts, our first duty is to stand by you through thick and thin." "Only as long as you believe in my word, Thad," added the other. "That's true," returned the other, quickly; "even a scout has no business sticking up for a comrade when he knows the other is in the wrong; but we believe in you, Aleck. And if only you could find that mine, I feel sure all of this funny business would stop. Once you had put in a claim, with the proper witnesses, and hurried to file it before the court, nobody could steal it away. And that's going to be just where the Boy Scouts can help you." "Well, we'll know more than we do now, before a great many hours," asserted the miner's son; "unless this little map is all wrong, and poor dad only believed he had found a rich lode. But remember, he brought home specimens that were nearly pure silver; and every one who saw them said they beat the world for richness. I can remember my dad saying that there were tons and tons without end of that same sort, in _his_ mine. And then he was suddenly taken down sick, and died with the secret untold. All these long years, when we've been poor and wanting many things, there that secret lay in my hand, oh! hundreds of times, and I never dreamed of it still accident showed me the paper, back of the glass in the little pocket mirror that dad had carried with him a long time." They relapsed into silence again for a long time, each busy with his thoughts. Aleck knew what few simple directions his rude chart carried; he had gazed at it so many times that it was photographed on his mind, and there had been no need for him to rip the seam of his coat, and take the slip of faded paper out. Kracker had not dreamed how near the coveted clue had been to his hands, at the time he actually held the boy, and closely examined all his pockets. "It's lucky," remarked Thad, after fully an hour more had passed, with both boys pushing forward steadily all the time, over rugged ways that severely tried their abilities--"it's lucky, I say, that we are heading exactly away from the direction where that Sheriff, and your uncle, must be coming from." "Yes, but I knew we'd do that before we ever started out," replied Aleck.