Me do!"

"No," father reiterated. He opened the door, and we slipped out,
followed for some distance along the trail by the deserted youngster's
ear-splitting shrieks. Father halted once, looking irresolutely at me
as a peculiarly heart-rending outburst came to our ears. "I could
easily carry him up there," he said, with a somewhat sheepish look,
"but I suppose you couldn't fetch him home?"

"Come along, father," I retorted, slipping my hand under his arm.
"Jessie will have Ralph consoled before you could get back to the
house, and, when we started, you were in some doubt as to whether I
could carry a spade home from the mine."

"That's true," father confessed. "But hasn't the boy got a pair of
lungs, though? I doubt if I was ever able to yell like that. I dare
say it's partly owing to the climate; it's very healthy."

CHAPTER II

THE WILL OF THE WATERS

Crusoe was the generic name of the collection of rough shanties that
clustered about and among the various shaft-houses. Not all of the
mines had attained to the dignity of shaft-houses and regular hours,
many of them, indeed, being mere prospect-holes, but all were named,
and a student of human nature might have accurately gauged the past
experience or present hopefulness of their respective owners by some
of the curious freaks of nomenclature.

The shaft-house of the Gray Eagle was the last but one at the upper
extremity of the ravine along which Crusoe straggled. Father and I,
hurrying past the cabins, had nearly reached it, when a loud call from
the open doorway of one of the larger cabins brought us to a halt.

"There's old Joe!" father said, glancing at the individual who had
shouted; "I was in hopes that I could slip past without his seeing
me."

"No such good luck as that," I said, with what I felt to be
uncharitable impatience; "I almost believe that Joe sits up nights to
watch for you. It's a shame, too, for him to try to work in the mines.
Just look at him!"

"I've looked at him a good many times, Leslie, dear, but he would be
in a ten times worse position if I were to tell him that I am old
enough to take care of myself. Since the day I was born he has spent
his life in watching over me."

From all accounts that was strictly true. The white-wooled old negro
who, in his shirt sleeves, now came limping down the pathway toward
us, had once been a slave on grandfather Gordon's estate. When freedom
came to all the slaves, old Joe--who was y