I'll pound you till there
won't be an inch of skin left."

Chunky did not wait to hear more. He started at full speed toward his
own home, and Skip was more alarmed than before.

"Now I'm in a worse scrape than ever, for he's jest fool enough to tell
what he knows, an' then there will be trouble. I'd better go to meet
Billings, an' perhaps he can help me out."

He could reach the rendezvous without going through the village, and
greatly to his relief the leader of the rioters was waiting to receive
him.

"Now this is somethin' like business," and Billings patted the boy on
the head.

Skip stepped back; the touch of the man's hand now, when through him he
had gotten into so much trouble, was disagreeable.

"What am I to do?" he asked fiercely.

"Help me finish what you've begun."

"I won't do it. They'll have me arrested, an' you must get me through
the scrape."

"So I will after I've served the company out. We'll go off somewhere
together."

"And I'm to leave home?"

"There's nothin' for it if Wright gets the idea that you knocked the
timber away."

"If he doesn't know it already there are them who will tell him. Chunky
thinks I did somethin' to help the thing along."

"He does, eh?" and now Billings began to look disturbed. "Is he likely
to go to any of the bosses?"

"He might tell some one else who would do it."

"That's true. What with him an' Taylor, things begin to seem kinder
scarey for me."

"I'm in worse trouble."

"You're right, an' that shows we two must keep together."

"But I don't want to leave home."

"You can't help yourself. Once in the scrape, it's bad to back out."

Skip had good evidence that the way of the transgressor is hard. He felt
a decided repugnance to becoming Billings' constant companion, but he
dared not go home, and it seemed as if there was no other course left
open.

"It won't do to stay here very long, for folks might see us, and it
wouldn't be hard to guess we were up to mischief. Will you go with me,
or take the chances of bein' arrested?"

"I'll have to do what you say," Skip replied with a groan, and Billings
started straight across the hill toward the abandoned shaft.

"Where are you going?"

"We'll hide for a while. It ain't safe to loaf 'round here much longer.
Here's a dollar. Go to Taylor's an' get somethin' to eat. Tell him I
want cooked food, 'cause I'm bound on a tramp."

"I don't dare show up there."

"Move on, or I'll break every bone i