tone of gloom. Gay touched Tryon's shoulder.

"Make him come, too," she whispered.

"I'm just taking a run out to the Glendora," announced Tryon. "Want to
come?"

"I do," said Guthrie, with laconic significance, and climbed in beside
the driver. They flipped through the night at thirty miles an hour,
which was as much as Tryon dared risk on such a road. The Glendora was
about ten miles off. Gay, furled in the big coat and kindly darkness,
could hear the two men exchanging an occasional low word, but little
was said. It was doubtful whether Guthrie knew who Tryon's other
passenger was.

In time, the clanking and pounding of a battery smote their ears, and
the twinkling myriad lights of a mining camp were spread across the
darkness. One large wood-and-iron house, standing alone on rising
ground, well back from the road, was conspicuously brilliant. The
doors were closed, but lights and the sound of men's voices raised in
an extraordinary uproar streamed from its open, unblinded windows and
fanlights. Abruptly Tryon turned the car so that it faced for home,
halted it in the shadow of some trees, and jumping out, strode toward
the house, followed by Guthrie and Gay.

Almost as they reached it, the door was flung open, and a man came out
and stood in the light. He was passing his hand over his eyes and
through his hair in an odd gesture that would have told Gay who he was,
even if every instinct in her had not recognized Druro. The
pandemonium in the house had fallen suddenly to a great stillness, but
as Guthrie and Tryon reached the house, it broke forth again with
increased violence, and a number of men rushed out and laid hands on
Druro as if to detain him. He flung them off in every direction; a
couple of them fell scrambling and swearing over the low rail of the
veranda. Then, several spoken sentences, terse, and clean-cut as
cameos, fell on the night air.

"Come on home, Lundi; we have a car here."

"I tell you he has killed Capperne! Capperne is dead as a bone!"

"All right!" came Druro's voice, cool and careless. "If he's dead,
he's dead. I am prepared to accept the consequences."

The Australians stood off, grouped together, muttering. Guthrie and
Tryon moved to either side of Druro, and between them he walked calmly
away from the house. When they reached the car, he took the seat
beside Tryon, Guthrie climbed in next to Gay, and they drove away
without a word being spoken. The whole n