"You can raise a garden all right, I reckon," Oliver's new friend told him, following him as he rose to continue his journey. "But you got to irrigate, and there ain't the water in Clinker Creek there used to be. Folks up near the headwaters use nearly all of it, and in the hot months what they turn back will all go up in evaporation before it gets down to you. There's a good spring, though, but it strikes me it don't flow anything like it did when Old Tabor Ivison lived on the land." "Is there a house on the place?" "Only an old cabin. At least there was last time I chased a buck down in there. And something of a fence, if I remember right. But fifteen years is a long time--I reckon everything left is next to worthless." They came to a pause at the edge of the sidewalk beside an aged villager, who stood leaning on his crooked manzanita cane as he gazed at Poche and his silver-mounted trappings. "That's Old Dad Sloan," whispered Damon Tamroy. "He's one o' the last of the 'Forty-niners. Just hobbles about on his cane, livin' off the county, and waitin' to die. Never saw him take much interest in anything before, but that outfit o' yours has caught his eye. Little wonder, by golly!" Oliver stepped into the street and lifted the hair-tassled reins of the famous bridle. He turned to find the watery blue eyes of the patriarch fixed on him intently. With a trembling left hand the old man brushed back his long grey hair, then the fingers shakily caressed a grizzled beard, flaring and wiry as excelsior. A long finger at length pointed to the horse. "Where'd you get that outfit, young feller?" came the quavering tones. Mr. Tamroy winked knowingly at Oliver. "It was my father's," said Oliver in eager tones. The 'Forty-niner cupped a hand back of his ear. "Hey?" he shrilled. Oliver lifted his voice and repeated. "Yer papy's hey?" He tottered into the street and fingered the heavily silvered Spanish halfbreed bit, which, Oliver had been told, was very valuable intrinsically and as a relic. Then the knotty fingers travelled up an intricately plaited cheekstrap to one of the glittering silver-bordered _conchas_. The old fellow fumbled for his glasses, placed them on his nose, and studied the last named conceit with careful, lengthy scrutiny. "Is that there glass, young feller?" he croaked at last, pointing to the setting of the _concha_, a lilac-hued crystal about two inches in diameter. "I think it is," Oliver shouted. The old man shook his head. "I can't see well any more," he quavered. "But this don't look like glass to me." "I've never had it examined," Oliver told him. "I supposed the settings of the _conchas_ to be glass or some sort of quartz." "Quartz?" "Yes, sir." The grey head slowly shook back and forth. "Young man," came the piping tones, "is they a 'B' cut in the metal that holds them stones in place?" Oliver's eyes widened. "There is," he said. "On the inside of each one."