s riches to me."

"He is really dying," whispered some one in Frank's ear. "He will not
live ten minutes. The wonder is that he is alive at all."

"Who are you? and what is the mystery connected with this ring?"
hurriedly asked the boy.

"Never mind my name," came faintly from the lips of the dying man. "It
would do you no good to know it. I have lived a wild life--a wicked
life. This is the end! Fate brought me to Fardale--fate showed me the
ring that bore the chart to the lost mine."

The man stopped and closed his eyes, while the ghastly pallor spread
over his face.

A hand held a bottle of liquor to his lips, and he swallowed a few
drops, which gave him a few more moments of life. Again his eyes
unclosed.

"Once I committed murder for that ring," he whispered. "I killed the
Mexican who possessed it. It was a crazy hermit who cut that map on
the stone. He discovered one of the richest mines in Arizona, and a
fantasy of his deranged brain led him to cut the chart upon the stone,
for he cared nothing for the gold himself. When he died, he gave the
ring to a Mexican who attended him in his last moments, telling him its
secret. In Tombstone the Mexican got drunk and boasted of his riches,
showing the ring. That night I killed the greaser, and obtained the
ring. I had a partner, and he stole the ring from me. How he came to
part with it, and how it fell into the hands of your father, boy, is
something I do not know."

He was exhausted, and his voice sunk till Frank could not catch the
words. Then he lay still, short breaths fluttering his lips.

Frank feared the man would not rally again, but he did, and the boy
panted:

"Tell me where this mine is located. What part of Arizona does the
chart represent?"

With a last great effort, the dying man whispered:

"Northwest from Tombstone--lies the--Santa--Catarina--mountains.
There--there--is----"

His eyes grew glassy--the last faint breath fluttered over his
lips--the man of mystery was dead.

* * * * * *

The man in black was buried in the cemetery just outside Fardale
village, and the small stone which Frank Merriwell caused to be placed
at the head of his grave bears the word "Unknown."

The man had died just as his lips were about to reveal the location of
the country depicted by the chart cut on the black stone of the ring
that had caused so much trouble. He had mentioned the Santa Catarina
mountains,