ur location-stake. To-morrow Tom will come up
here, when he can make his camp and get to work at it regularly, sinking
his ten-foot prospect-hole. What are we going to name it? The 'Hermit'?
The 'Raven'? The 'Socrates'?"

"Call it the 'Big Reuben,'" I suggested.

"Good!" exclaimed Joe. "That's it! The 'Big Reuben' it shall be."

This, therefore, was the title we wrote upon our location-notice, by
which we claimed for Tom Connor a strip of ground fifteen hundred feet
in length along the course of the vein and one hundred and fifty feet
wide on either side of it; and thus did our old enemy, Big Reuben, lend
his name to a "prospect" which was destined later to take its place
among the foremost mines of our district.

CHAPTER XVI

THE WOLF WITH WET FEET

We had been so expeditious, thanks largely to Joe's good judgment in
tumbling into the right hole at the start when he slid down the shale,
that we reached home well before sunset, when, according to the
arrangement we had made as we rode down, Joe started again that same
evening for Sulphide. This time he made the trip without interruption,
and when at eight o'clock next morning he drove up to our house, Tom
Connor was with him.

"How are you, old man?" cried the latter, springing to the ground and
shaking hands very heartily with our guest. "That was a pretty narrow
squeak you had."

"It certainly was," replied Peter. "And if it hadn't been for these
boys, I'd have been up there yet. What's the news, Connor? Any clue to
your ore-thieves?"

"Not much but what you and the boys have furnished. But ask Joe, he'll
tell you."

"Well," said Joe, "in the first place, Long John has disappeared. He has
not been seen since the evening before the robbery. No one knows what's
become of him."

"Is that so?" I cried. "Then I suppose the robbery is laid to him."

"Yes, to him and another man. I'll tell you all about it. After I had
been to the mine and given Tom our news, I went down town to Yetmore's
and had a long talk with him. That was a good idea of your father's,
Phil, that we should go and tell Yetmore: he took it very kindly, and
repeated several times how much obliged he felt. He seems most anxious
to be friendly."

"It's my opinion," Tom Connor cut in, "that he got such a thorough scare
that night of the explosion, and is so desperate thankful he didn't blow
you two sky-high, that he can't do enough to make amends."

"That's it, I think," said Joe. "A