He turned toward Jim a wondering look, and asked, slowly:

"Then, why did you free me?"

"Because she loved you," said Jim, and then he walked quietly away.

V.

"Why, Miss Peekin!"

"It's a fact: Eben Javash, that went out better'n a year ago, hez got back, and he wuz at the next diggins an' heerd all about it. 'T seems the officers ketched Brown, an' Jim Hockson gave 'em thirty thousand dollars to pay them an' the bank too, and then they let him go. Might's well ha kept his money, though, seein' Brown washed overboard on the way back.

"I ain't a bettin' man," said the deacon, "but I'd risk our white-faced cow that them thirty thousand dollars preached the greatest sermon ever heerd in Californy--ur in Crankett either."

Miss Peekin threw a withering glance at the deacon; it was good he was not on trial for heresy, with Miss Peekin for judge and jury. She continued:

"Eben says there was a fellow named Weasel that hid close by, an' heerd all 'twas said, and when he went to the rum-shop an' told the miners, they hooray'd for Jim ez ef they wuz mad. Just like them crazy fellers--they hain't no idee when money's wasted."

"The Lord waste all the money in the world that way!" devoutly exclaimed the deacon.

"An' that feller Weasel," continued Miss Peekin, giving the deacon's pet cat a vicious kick, "though he'd always been economical, an' never set a bad example before by persuadin' folk to be intemprit, actilly drored a pistol, and fit with a feller they called Colonel Two--fit for the chance of askin' the crowd to drink to Jim Hockson, an' then went aroun'

to all the diggins, tellin' about Jim, an' wastin' his money treatin'

folks to drink good luck to Jim. Disgraceful!"

"It's what _I'd_ call a powerful conversion," remarked the deacon.

"But ther's more," said Miss Peekin, with a sigh, and yet with an air of importance befitting the bearer of wonderful tidings.

"What?" eagerly asked Mrs. Crankett.

"Jim's back," said Miss Peekin.

"Mercy on us!" cried Mrs. Crankett.

"The Lord bless and prosper him!" earnestly exclaimed the deacon.

"Well," said Miss Peekin, with a disgusted look, "I s'pose He will, from the looks o' things; fur Eben sez that when Weasel told the fellers how it all wuz, they went to work an' put gold dust in a box fur Jim till ther wus more than he giv fur Brown, an' fellers from all round's been sendin' him dust ever since. He's mighty sight the richest man anywhere near this town."

"Good--bless the Lord!" said the deacon, with delight.

"Ye hain't heerd all of it, though," continued Miss Peekin, with a funereal countenance. "They're going to be married."

"Sakes alive '" gasps Mrs. Crankett.

"It's so," said Miss Peekin; "an' they say she sent for him, by way of the Isthmus, an' he come back that way. Bad enough to marry him, when poor Brown hain't been dead six months, but to _send_ for him--"

"Wuz a real noble, big-hearted, womanly thing to do," declared Mrs.

Crankett, snatching off her spectacles; "an' I'd hev done it myself ef I'd been her."

The deacon gave his old wife an enthusiastic hug; upon seeing which Miss Peekin hastily departed, with a severely shocked expression of countenance and a nose aspiring heavenward.

MAKING HIS MARK.

Black Hat was, in 1851, about as peaceful and well-regulated a village as could be found in the United States.

It was not on the road to any place, so it grew but little; the dirt paid steadily and well, so but few of the original settlers went away.

The march of civilization, with its churches and circuses, had not yet reached Black Hat; marriages never convulsed the settlement with the pet excitement of villages generally, and the inhabitants were never arrayed at swords' point by either religion, politics or newspapers.

To be sure, the boys gambled every evening and all day Sunday; but a famous player, who once passed that way on a prospecting-trip, declared that even a preacher would get sick of such playing; for, as everybody knew everybody else's game, and as all men who played other than squarely had long since been required to leave, there was an utter absence of pistols at the tables.

Occasional disagreements took place, to be sure--they have been taking place, even among the best people, since the days of Cain and Abel; but all difficulties at Black Hat which did not succumb to force of jaw were quietly locked in the bosoms of the disputants until the first Sunday.

Sunday, at Black Hat, orthodoxically commenced at sunset on Saturday, and was piously extended through to working-time on Monday morning, and during this period of thirty-six hours there was submitted to arbitrament, by knife or pistol, all unfinished rows of the week.

On Sunday was also performed all of the hard drinking at Black Hat; but through the week the inhabitants worked as steadily and lived as peacefully as if surrounded by church-steeples court-houses and jails.

Whether owing to the inevitable visitations of the great disturber of affairs in the Garden of Eden, or only in the due course of that developement which affects communities as well as species, we know not, but certain it is that suddenly the city fathers at Black Hat began to wear thoughtful faces and wrinkled brows, to indulge in unusual periods of silence, and to drink and smoke as if these consoling occupations were pursued more as matters of habit than of enjoyment.

The prime cause of the uneasiness of these good men was a red-faced, red-haired, red-whiskered fellow, who had been nicknamed "Captain," on account of the military cut of the whiskers mentioned above.

The captain was quite a good fellow; but he was suffering severely from "the last infirmity of noble minds"--ambition.

He had gone West to make a reputation, and so openly did he work for it that no one doubted his object; and so untiring and convincing was he, that, in two short weeks, he had persuaded the weaker of the brethren at Black Hat that things in general were considerably out of joint. And as a, little leaven leaveneth the whole lump, every man at Black Hat was soon discussing the captain's criticisms, and was neglecting the more peaceable matters of cards and drink, which had previously occupied their leisure hours.

The captain was always fully charged with opinions on every subject, and his eloquent voice was heard at length on even the smallest matter that interested the camp. One day a disloyal miner remarked:

"Captain's jaw is a reg'lar air-trigger; reckon he'll run the camp when Whitey leaves."

Straightway a devout respecter of the "powers that be" carried the remark to Whitey, the chief of the camp.

Now, it happened that Whitey, an immense but very peaceable and sensible fellow, had just been discussing with some of his adherents the probable designs of the captain, and this new report seemed to arrive just in time, for Whitey instantly said:

"Thar he goes agin, d'ye see, pokin' his shovel in all aroun'. Now, ef the boys want me to leave, they kin say so, an' I'll go. 'Tain't the easiest claim in the world to work, runnin' this camp ain't, an' I'll never hanker to be chief nowhar else; but seein' I've stuck to the boys, an' seen 'em through from the fust, 'twouldn't be exactly gent'emanly, 'pears to me."

And for a moment Whitey hid his emotions in a tin cup, from which escaped perfumes suggesting the rye-fields of Kentucky.

"Nobody wants you to go, Whitey," said Wolverine, one of the chief's most faithful supporters. "Didn't yer kick that New Hampshire feller out of camp when he kept a-sayin' the saloon wuz the gate o' hell?"

"Well," said the chief, with a flush of modest pride, "I don't deny it; but _I_ wont remind the boys of it, ef they've forgot it."

"An' didn't yer go to work," said another, "when all the fellers was a-askin' what was to be done with them Chinesers--didn't yer just order the boys to clean 'em out to wunst?"

"That ain't the best thing yer dun, neither!" exclaimed a third. "I wonder does any of them galoots forgit how the saloon got a-fire when ev'rybody was asleep--how the chief turned out the camp, and after the barkeeper got out the door, how the chief rushed in an' rolled out all three of the barrels, and then went dead-bent fur the river with his clothes all a-blazin'? Whar'd we hev been for a couple of weeks ef it hadn't bin fur them bar'ls?"