"No. This is my first experience."

"I never, either. But, if I was you I'd kind of have an eye on my neighbors."

"You mean--the Wattses?" asked the girl in surprise.

The brown eyes were twinkling again: "No, Watts, he's all right! Only trouble with Watts is he sets an' herds the sun all day. But, they's others besides Watts in the hills."

"Yes," answered the girl, quickly, "I know. And that is the reason I came to see you about a horse."

"What's the matter with the one you got?"

"Nothing at all. He seems to be a good horse. He's fast too, when I want to crowd him. But, I need another just as good and as fast as he is. Have you one you will sell?"

"I'll sell anything I got, if the price is right," smiled the man.

Patty regarded him thoughtfully: "I haven't very much money," she said. "How much is he worth?"

Thompson considered: "A horse ain't like a cow-brute. There ain't no regular market price. Horses is worth just as much as you can get folks to pay fer 'em. But it looks like one horse ort to be enough to prospect 'round the hills on."

"It isn't that," explained the girl. "If I buy him I shall try to arrange with you to leave him right here where I can get him at a moment's notice. I shall probably never need him but once, but when I do, I shall need him badly." She paused, but without comment the man waited for her to proceed: "I believe I am being followed, and if I am, when I locate the claim, I am going to have to race for the register's office."

Thompson leaned forward upon the table and chewed his toothpick rapidly: "By Gosh, an' you want to have a fresh horse here for a change!" he exclaimed, his eyes beaming approval.

"Exactly. Have you got the horse?"

The man nodded: "You bet I've got the horse! I've got a horse out there in the corral that'll run rings around anythin' in this country unless it's that there buckskin of Vil Holland's--an' I guess you ain't goin' to have no call to race him."

Patty was on the point of exclaiming that the buckskin was the very horse she would have to race, but instead she smiled: "But, if your horse started fresh from here, and even Vil Holland's horse had run clear from the mountains, this one could beat him to town, couldn't he?"

"Could do it on three legs," laughed the man.

"How much do you ask for him?" The girl waited breathless, thinking of her diminishing bank account.

Thompson's brow wrinkled: "I hold Lightnin' pretty high," he said, after a pause. "You see, some of us ranchers is holdin' a fast horse handy, a-waitin' fer word from the hills--an' when it comes, they's goin' to be the biggest horse-thief round-up the hill country ever seen. An' unless I miss my guess they'll be some that's carried their nose pretty high that's goin' to snap down on the end of a tight one."

"Now, Thompson, what's the use of talkin' like that? Them things is bad enough to have to do, let alone set around an' talk about 'em.

Anyone'd think you took pleasure in hangin' folks."

"I would--some folks."

The little woman turned to Patty: "He's just a-talkin'. Chances is, if it come to hangin', Thompson would be the one to try an' talk 'em out of it. Why, he won't even brand his own colts an' calves--makes the hands do it."

"That's different," defended the man. "They're little an' young an'

they ain't never done nothin' ornery."

"But you haven't told me how much you want for your horse," persisted the girl.

"Now just you listen to me a minute. I don't want to sell that horse, an' there ain't no mortal use of you buyin' him. He's always here--right in the corral when he ain't in the stable, an' either place, all you got to do is throw yer kak on him an' fog it."

The girl stared at him in surprise: "You mean----"

"I mean that you're plumb welcome to use Lightnin' whenever you need him. An' if they's anything else I can do to help you beat out any ornery cuss that'd try an' hornswaggle you out of yer claim, you can count on me doin' it! An' whether you know it 'er not, I ain't the only one you can count on in a pinch neither." The man waved her thanks aside with a sweep of a big hand, and rose from the table. "Miz T. an' me'd like fer you to stop in whenever you feel like----"

"Yes, indeed, we would," seconded the little woman. "Couldn't you come over an' bring yer sewin' some day?"

Patty laughed: "I'm afraid I haven't much sewing to bring, but I'll come and spend the day with you some time. I'd love to."

The girl rode homeward with a lighter heart than she had known in some time. "Now let him follow me all he wants to," she muttered. "But I wonder why Mr. Thompson said I wouldn't have to race the buckskin. And who did he mean I could count on in a pinch--Watts, I guess, or maybe he meant Mr. Bethune."

As she saddled her horse next morning, Bethune presented himself at the cabin. "Where away?" he smiled as he rode close, and swung lightly to the ground.

"Into the hills," she answered, "in search of my father's lost mine."

The man's expression became suddenly grave: "Do you know, Miss Sinclair, I hate to think of your riding these hills alone."

Patty glanced at him in surprise: "Why?"

"There are several reasons. For instance, one never knows what will happen--a misstep on a dangerous trail--a broken cinch--any one of a hundred things may happen in the wilds that mean death or serious injury, even to the initiated. And the danger is tenfold in the case of a tender-foot."

The girl laughed: "Thank you. But, if anything is going to happen, it's going to happen. At least, I am in no danger from being run down by a street car or an automobile. And I can't be blown up by a gas explosion, or fall into a coal hole."

"But there are other dangers," persisted the man. "A woman, alone in the hills--especially you."

"Why 'especially me'? Plenty of women have lived alone before in places more dangerous than this, and have gotten along very well, too. You men are conceited. You think there can be no possible safety unless members of your own s.e.x are at the helm of every undertaking or enterprise. But you are wrong."

Bethune shook his head: "But I have reason to believe that there is at least one person in these hills who believes you possess the secret of your father's strike--and who would stop at nothing to obtain that secret."

"I suppose you mean Vil Holland. I agree that he does seem to take more than a pa.s.sing interest in my comings and goings. But he doesn't seem very fierce. Anyhow, I am not in the least afraid of him."

"What do you mean that he seems to take an interest in your comings and goings?" The question seemed a bit eager. "Surely he has not been following you!"

"Hasn't he? Then possibly you can tell me who has?"

"The scoundrel! And when you discover the lode he'll wait 'til you have set your stakes and posted your notice, and have gotten out of sight, and then he'll drive in his own stakes, stick up his own notice beside them and beat you to the register."

Patty laughed: "Race me, you mean. He won't beat me. Remember, I shall have at least a half-hour's start."

"A half-hour!" exclaimed Bethune. "And what is a half-hour in a fifty-mile race against that buckskin. Why, my dear girl, with all due respect for that horse of yours, Vil Holland's horse could give you two hours' start and beat you to the railroad."

"Maybe," smiled the girl. "But he's going to have to do it--that is, if I ever locate the lode."

"Ah, that is the point, exactly. It is that that brings me here. Not that alone," he hastened to add. "For I would ride far any day to spend a few moments with so charming a lady--and indeed, I should not have delayed my visit this long but for some urgent business to the northward. At all events, I'm here, and here I shall stay until, together, we have solved our mystery of the hills."

The girl glanced into the face alight with boyish enthusiasm, and felt irresistibly impelled to take this man into her confidence--to enlist his help in the working out of her unintelligible map, and to admit him to full partnership in her undertaking. There would be enough for both if they succeeded in uncovering the lode. Her father had intended that he should share in his mine. She recalled his eulogy of her father, and his frank admission that there had been no agreement of partnership. If anyone ever had the appearance of perfect sincerity and candor this man had. She remembered her seriously depleted bank account. Bethune had money, and in case the search should prove long--Suddenly the words of Vil Holland flashed into her brain with startling abruptness: "Remember yer dad knew enough to play a lone hand." And again. "Did yer dad tell you about this partnership?" And the significant emphasis he placed upon the "Oh," when she had answered in the negative.

Bethune evidently had taken her silence for a.s.sent. He was speaking again: "The first thing to do is to find the starting point on the map and work it out step by step, then when we locate the lode, you and Clen and I will file the first three claims, and we'll file all the Wattses on the adjoining claims. That will give us absolute control of a big block of what is probably a most valuable property."

Again Bethune had referred directly to the map which she had never admitted she possessed. He had not said, "If you have a map." The man's a.s.sumption angered her: "You still persist in a.s.suming that I have a map," she answered. "As a matter of fact, I'm depending entirely upon a photograph. I am riding blindly through the hills trying to find the spot that tallies with the picture."