nity may not occur again, let me now state how it all
happened."

"Nay, you must not talk. We know it all, or at least enough of it for
the present."

"What do you know?" asked Richard, with his eyes half shut, but with
eager ears.

"That in your benevolent attempt to seek after Mr. Coe you met with the
same accident--though I trust it will not have the same ending--as that
unfortunate gentleman himself. He pitched upon his head and broke his
neck, while you fell upon your side."

"That is so," murmured Richard. "He and I were partners, you see--"

"There, there; not a word more," insisted the doctor; "your deposition
can wait."

And having done what he could for his patient, he left him, in order to
examine the unfortunate Solomon. His investigation corroborated all that
he had already heard of the circumstances of his death, with which also
Richard's evidence accorded. An observation made by one of the miners
who had found the body, to the effect that it was yet warm when they had
come upon it, excited the surgeon's ridicule.

"It is now Tuesday morning, my friend," said he, "and this poor fellow
met with his death on Saturday night for certain. He could not,
therefore, have been much warmer when you found him than he is now."

"Well, me and my mate here we both fancied--"

"I dare say you did, my man," interrupted the doctor; "and fancy is a
very proper word to apply to such an impression. If you take my advice,
however, you will not repeat such a piece of evidence when put upon your
oath, for the thing is simply impossible."

"Then I suppose we be in the wrong," said Dick to Jack; and on that
supposition they acted.

In this way too self-reliant Science, whose mission it is to explode
fallacies, occasionally assists in the explosion or suffocation of a
fact, for Solomon Coe had not been dead half an hour when his body was
found.

When Richard, alone on his errand of mercy, was approaching the brink of
the third level, he could hear Solomon calling lustily for help. Nay, it
was not only "Help!" but "Murder!" that he cried out; and
notwithstanding the menace that that word implied toward himself,
Richard hurried on, well pleased to hear it; the vigor of the cry
assured him that his enemy was not only living, but unhurt. As the light
he carried grew more distinct to him, indeed, these shouts redoubled;
but when it came quite near, and disclosed the features of its bearer,
there was a dead silence. The t