By hard labor he managed to clear away the rubble of the slide and uncover the vein for a distance of several feet before dusk began to fill the cañon. He carried down with him the richest pieces of rock that he could find, and that night he worked with mortar and pestle until his arms ached with the unaccustomed exercise. Several times that evening he was pulled away from his air castles by the peculiar sensation of some one standing very close to him. It was not the first time he had experienced the sensation, but never before had the impression brought him a comforting sense of friendly companionship. It struck him suddenly that he must be growing used to the idea, and that Johnnywater Cañon was not at all likely to “get” him as it had got Waddell. He had not heard the Voice all day, but he believed that he could now listen to it with perfect equanimity. He had just one worry that evening; rather, he had one difficult problem to solve. In order to work in that quartz, dynamite was absolutely necessary. Unless he could find some on the place, it began to look very much as if he would not be able to do much unless he could get some brought out to him from town. The result of his cogitations that evening was a belief that Steve Carson must have had dynamite, caps and fuse on hand. Men living out in a country known to produce minerals of one sort and another usually were supplied with explosives. Even if they never did any mining, they might want to blow a bowlder out of the way now and then. He had never seen any powder about the place; but on the other hand, he had not looked for any. The next morning he panned the pulped rock immediately after breakfast and was overjoyed at the amount of gold he gleaned from the pint or so of pulp. At that rate, he told himself gleefully, the wedding ring would not need to wait very long. After that he went hunting dynamite in the storehouse and shed. He was lucky enough to find a couple of dozen sticks of powder and some caps and fuse wrapped in a gunny sack and hung from the ridgepole of the shed. The dynamite did not look so very old, and he guessed that it had been brought there by Waddell. This seemed to him an amazing bit of good luck, and he shouldered the stuff and went off up the bluff with an extra canteen and his lunch, whistling in an exuberance of good humor with the world. Faith, of course, went with him and curled herself in her little hollow just under the frowning malapi ledge.