"I've seen that before," she said with a sniff, "so you can stop driving those burros so hard. It came from Wunpost's mine." "Wunpost!" yelled Dusty Rhodes, his eyes getting big; and then he spat out an oath. "Who told ye?" he demanded, sticking his face into hers, and she stepped away disdainfully. "Hungry Bill," she said, and watched him writhe as the bitter truth went home. "You think you're so smart," she taunted at last, "why don't you go out and find one for yourself? I suppose you want to rush in and claim a half interest in his strike and then sell out to old Eells. I hope he kills you, if you try to do it--_I_ would, if I were him. What'd you do with that five thousand dollars?" "Eh--eh--that's none of your business," bleated Dusty Rhodes, whose trip to Los Angeles had proved disastrous. "And if Wunpost gave Hungry that sack of ore he stole it from some other feller's mine. I knowed all along he'd locate that Black P'int if I ever let him stop--I've had my eye on it for years--and that's why I hurried by. I discovered it myself, only I never told nobody--he must have heard me talking in my sleep!" "Yes, or when you were drunk!" suggested Wilhelmina maliciously. "I hear you got robbed in Los Angeles. And anyhow I'm glad, because you stole that five thousand dollars, and no good ever came from stolen property." "Oh, it didn't, hey?" sneered Dusty, who was recovering his poise, "well, I'll bet ye _this_ rock was stolen! And if that's the case, where does your young man git off, that you think the world and all of? But you've got to show me that he ever _saw_ this rock--I believe old Hungry was lying to you!" "Well, don't let me keep you!" cried Billy, bowing mockingly. "Go on over and ask him yourself--but I'll bet you don't _dare_ to meet Wunpost!" "How come Hungry to tell you?" burst out Dusty Rhodes at last, and Wilhelmina smiled mysteriously. "That's none of your business, my busy little man," she mimicked in patronizing tones, "but I've got a piece of that rock right up at the house. You go back there and mother will show it to you." "I'm going on!" answered Dusty with instant decision; "can't stop to make no visit today. They's a big rush coming--every burro-man in Blackwater--and some of them are legging it afoot. But that thieving son of a goat, _he_ never found no mine! I know it--it can't be possible!" CHAPTER IX A NEW DEAL