"I just now opened the door," he said at last, speaking in a slow, deliberate way. "I slipped here as quietly as I could, because they told me you were asleep, and I must not make a noise. I got here just as you were telling this man that no one but him should know who you were before you came among us--that is all, I guess."

She had sat down on a seat close to Harris, and dropped her face in her hands.

Overton stood with his back against the door, looking down at her. In his eyes was a keen sorrow as she sat down in that despairing fashion, and crept close to the stranger as though for refuge from _him_.

"I might have avoided telling what I heard," he continued; "but I don't think that would be quite square among friends. Then, as I see you have found a new acquaintance here, I thought maybe you would have something to tell me if you knew what I heard you say to him."

But, kindly as his words were, she seemed to shrink from them.

"No; I can't. Oh, Mr. Dan, I can't--I can't," she muttered, with her head still bowed on the arm of the chair occupied by Harris. "If you can't trust me any more, I can't blame you. But I can't tell you--that's all."

"Then I'll just go down stairs again," he decided, "and you can finish your talk with Harris. I'll keep the rest of the folks from interrupting you as I did. But if you want me, little girl, you know I'll not be far away."

The tears came in her eyes. His persistent kindness to her made her both ashamed and glad, and she reached out her hand.

"Wait," she said, "maybe I have something to tell you," and she unfolded the paper again and showed it to Harris.

"Shall I tell him? Would you rather he would be the man to do the business?" she asked. "You know I'm willing, but I don't know enough myself. Do you want him to be the man?"

Harris nodded his head.

With a look of relief on her face, she turned to Overton, who watched them wonderingly.

"What sort of man is it you want? or what is it you want to tell me?"

"Only that I've found a plan of the ground where he made that rich find the letter told of," she answered, with a bit of a tremble in her voice.

"He's never been able to look after it himself, and was afraid to trust any one. But now--"

"And you have the plan--_you_, 'Tana?"

"Yes, I have it. I think I even know where the place is located.

But--don't ask me anything about how I got the plan. He knows, and is satisfied--that is all."

"But, 'Tana, I don't understand. You are giving me surprises too thick this evening. If he has found a rich yield of ore, and has taken you into partnership, it means that you will be a rich woman. A streak of pay ore can do more for you than a ranger like myself; so I guess you can afford to drop me."

Her face fell forward in her hands again. The man in the chair looked at her and then turned his eyes pleadingly to the other man, who remained standing close to the door.

Overton recognized the pleading quality of the glance, and was filled with amazement by it. Witchery seemed to have touched the stranger when paralysis touched him, else he would not so quickly have changed from his suspicion of the girl into that mute pleading for her.

She was trying so hard to keep back the tears, and in the effort her jaws were set and her brows drawn together stormily. She looked to him as she had looked in the lodge of Akkomi.

"You don't trust me," she said at last; "that's why you won't help us. But you ought to, for I've never lied to you. If it's because I'm in it that you won't have anything to do with the mine, I'll leave. I won't bother you about that school. I won't bother you about anything. I'll help locate the place if--if Joe here is willing; and then you two can be partners, and I'll be out of it, for I can trust you to take care of him, and see that the money does what it can for him. I can trust you if you can't me.

So you are the one to speak up. What is your answer?"

CHAPTER XII.

PARTNERS.

"Well, I've been a 'hoodoo' all my, life; and if I only lead some one into luck now--good luck--oh, wouldn't I learn a sun-dance, and dance it!"

The world was two weeks older, and it was 'Tana who spoke; not the troubled 'Tana who had crouched beside the paralytic and cowered under her fear of Overton's distrust, but a girl grown lighter-hearted by the help of work to be done--work in which she was for once to stand side by side with Overton himself, for his decision about the prospecting had been in her favor. He had "spoken up," as she had asked him to do, and a curious three-cornered partnership had been arranged the next day; a very mysterious partnership, of which no word was told to any one. Only 'Tana suddenly decided that the schooling must wait a little longer. Lyster would have to make the trip to Helena without her; she was not feeling like it just then, and so forth.

Therefore, despite the very earnest arguments of Mr. Lyster, he did have to go alone. During all the journey, he was conscious of a quite unreasonable disappointment, an impatience with even Overton, for not enforcing his authority as guardian, and insisting that she at once commence the many studies in which she was sadly deficient.

But Overton had stood back and said nothing. Lyster did not understand it, and could not succeed in making either of them communicative.

"You'll be back here in less than a month," said Overton. "We will send her then, if she feels equal to it. In the meantime, we'll take the best care we can of her here at the Ferry. I find I will have time to look after her a little until then. I have only one short trip to make up the river; so don't get uneasy about her. She'll be ready to go next run you make, sure."

So Lyster wondered, dissatisfied, and went away. He was even a little more dissatisfied with his last memory of the girl--a vision of her bending over that unknown, helpless miner. His sympathies were with the man. He was most willing to a.s.sist, in a financial way, toward taking care of one so unfortunate. But the thing he was not willing to do was to see 'Tana devote herself without restraint to the welfare of a stranger--a man they knew nothing of--a fellow who, of course, could have no appreciation of the great luck he was in to have her constantly beside him. It was a clean waste of exceptionable sympathy; and a squaw, or some miner out of work, would do as well in this case.

He even offered to pay for a squaw, or for any masculine nurse; but the girl had very promptly suggested that he busy himself with his own duties, if he had any. She stated further that he had no control whatever over her actions, and she could not understand--

"I know I have none," he retorted, with some impatience, and yet a good deal of fondness in his handsome eyes. "That is why I'm complaining. I wish I had. And if I had, wouldn't I whisk you away from this uncouth life! I wonder if you will ever let me do so, Tana?"

"I think you'd better be packing your plunder," she remarked, coolly. "If you don't, you'll keep the whole outfit waiting."

And that was how they let even Lyster go away. Not a hint was he given of the all-engrossing plan that bound both 'Tana and Overton to the interests of the pa.s.sive stranger, who looked at them with intelligence, but who could not speak.

Their partnership was a curious affair, and the arrangement for interests in it was conducted on the one side by nods or shakes of the head, while the other two offered suggestions, and asked questions, until a very clear understanding was arrived at.

Only one knotty discussion had arisen. Overton offered to give one month of time to the search, on condition that one half of the find, if there was any made, should belong to 'Tana, while the original finder should have the other half. He himself would give that much time to helping them out in a friendly way; but more than that he could not give, because of other duties.

To this the man Harris shook his head with all possible vigor, while 'Tana was quite as emphatic in an audible way. Harris desired that all shares be equal, and Overton count himself in for a third. 'Tana approved the plan, insisting that she would not accept an ounce of the dust if he did not. So Dan finally agreed and ended the discussion concerning the division of the gold they might never find.

"And don't be so dead sure that the dirt will pan out well, even if we do find the place," he said, warningly, to 'Tana. "Why, my girl, if the average of dust had been as high as my average of hope over strikes I've made myself, I would have been a billionaire long ago."

"I never heard you talk of prospecting," remarked 'Tana. "All the rest do here, and not you--how is that?"

"Oh, prospecting strikes one like a fever; sometimes a man recovers from it, or seems to for a while. I had the fever bad about two years ago--out in Nevada. Well, I left there. I sunk my stock of capital in a very big hole, and lost my enthusiasm for a while. Maybe I will find it again, drifting along the Kootenai; but as yet it has not struck me hard. From what I can gather, this fellow must simply have dropped on a nugget or little pocket, and something must have made him distrust his partner to such an extent that he kept the secret find to himself. So there evidently has been no testing of the soil, no move toward development. We may never find an ounce of metal, for such disappointments have been even where very large nuggets have been found. You must not expect too much of this search. Golden hope lets you down hard when you do fall with it."

But, despite his warnings, he made arrangements for their river journey with all speed possible. The three of them were to go; and, as chaperon, Mrs. Huzzard was persuaded to join their queer "picnic" party, for that was the idea given abroad concerning their little trip to the north. It was to be a venture in the interests of Harris--supposedly the physical interests; though Captain Leek did remark, with decided emphasis, that it was the first time he ever knew of a man being sent out to live in the woods as a cure for paralysis.

But the preparations were made; even the fact that Mrs. Huzzard was seized with an unreasonable attack of rheumatism on the eve of departure did not deter them at all.

"Unless you need me to stay here and look after you, we'll go just the same," decided 'Tana. "A squaw won't be much of a subst.i.tute for you; but she'll be better than no one, and we'll go."

So the squaw was secured, through the agency of her husband, whom Overton knew, and who was to take their camp outfit up the river for them. This was one reason why Mrs. Huzzard, as she watched them depart, was a little thankful for the visitation of rheumatism.

Their camp was only a day old when 'Tana announced her willingness to dance if only good fortune would come to her.

It seemed a thing probable, for as Overton poured water slowly from a tin pan into the shallow little stream, there were left in the bottom of the pan, as the last sifting bit of soil was washed out, some tiny bits of yellow the size of a pin-head, and one as large as a grain of wheat.

'Tana gave a little ecstatic cry as she bent over it and touched the particles with her finger.

"Oh, Dan--it is the gold!--the real gold! and we are millionaires!--millionaires, and you would not believe it!"