The bugle sounded recall, and the soldiers waited, so that Job could keep his promise. All that summer day as he lay on the cot, listening to the ripple of the spring, the neighing of the horses, the bugle-calls, and the coming and going of the men, he thought of those comrades shut in the store office without food, and waiting for relief which it must seem would never come. Just at dusk, mounted behind a sturdy little trooper, and well disguised, Job started back. They passed around Wawona by a side trail; and, striking the main turnpike near its junction with the Signal Peak road, galloped on in the dark, fearing no recognition, and well prepared to meet anyone who demanded a halt. The light was burning in Aunty Perkins' window as they passed. It was after midnight when they crept slowly down the timber on the other side of Rattlesnake Gulch, and Job dismounted and stole on ahead. A gloom rested on the Yellow Jacket. A few lights shone out of shanty windows and in saloons. The stars seemed to rest on the top of the smoke-stacks which rose like vast shadows in the distance. A low, far-off murmur of voices, now rising, now dying down, stole out on the clear night air. Down Job crept, now on hands and knees, to the foot of Sullivan's alley. He heard a step. The sentry was coming. Job gave the call Pat and he had agreed upon--the sharp bark of a coyote. In an instant he saw a flash and heard a report, as a bullet whizzed past him. Then he heard voices: "What was that, Jacob?" "A leetle hund, I tinks." "A hund? You shoot him not! You save bullets for bigger ting. See?" Oh, where was Pat Rooney! It was fully an hour before the sentry's pace changed and the step sounded like Pat's. Again Job barked, and a hoot like an owl's replied. It was Tim's father! A few minutes, and Pat had clasped him to his heart, and told him the officers were still in the store office; that the men were desperate--they had been drinking heavily, and, he was afraid, before another night would burn the whole place. Would Job go back into the mine and take his chances? Of course Job went. He slunk up the alley into a hidden passage-way he knew of back of the Last Chance Saloon, and kept in between the buildings till within a stone's throw of the office. There, wedged in between two old shanties, he had to wait two hours for Pat to get on the office beat. Oh, what a long night! Just ahead were the office and the starving men. Between them and their rescuer a Chinaman stalked, gun in hand, pig-tail bobbing in the night air, and eyes ever on the alert to see an intruder. In the bar-room Job could hear the talking. Dan Dean and O'Donnell were there. They were boasting that not a soul outside knew of the strike; that a late telephone to Gold City showed no one there knew; that the stage was still held at the stables; that there was no hope for "the boss and the tyrants." To-morrow they would sign that paper or take the consequences.