* * * * *

"Let him go!" she repeated, more of fierceness in her voice than
Redburn had ever heard there, before. "He shall not escape my
vengeance. Oh, my poor, poor dead brother!"

She flung herself back upon the couch, and gave herself up to a wild,
passionate, uncontrollable outburst of tears and sobs--the wailings of
a sorrowing heart. For a long time she continued to weep and sob
violently; then came a lull, during which she fell asleep, from
exhaustion--a deep sleep. Redburn and Alice then carried her into an
adjoining room, where she was left under the latter's skillful care.
Awhile later the cabin was wrapped in silence.

When morning sunlight next peeped down into the Flower Pocket, it
found everything generally astir. Anita was up and pursuing her
household duties, but she was calm, now, even sadder than before,
making a strange contrast to blithe, gaysome Alice, who flitted about,
here and there, like some bright-winged butterfly surrounded by a halo
of perpetual sunshine.

* * * * *

Unknown to any one save themselves, two men were within the valley of
the Flower Pocket gold-mines--there on business, and that business
meant bloodshed. They were secreted in among the foothills on the
western side of the flowering paradise, at a point where they were not
observed, and at the same time were the observers of all that was
going on in front of them.

How came they here, when the hand of Deadwood Dick guarded the only
accessible entrance there was to the valley? The answer was: they came
secretly through the pass on the night preceding the arrival of the
road-agents, and had been lying in close concealment ever since.

The one was an elderly man of portly figure, and the other a young,
dandyish fellow, evidently the elder's son, for they resembled each
other in every feature. We make no difficulty to recognizing them as
the same precious pair whom Outlaw Dick captured from the stage, only
to lose them again through the treachery of two of his own band.

Both looked considerably the worse for wear, and the gaunt, hungry
expression on their features, as the morning sunlight shone down upon
them, declared in a language more adequate than words, that they were
beginning to suffer the first pangs of starvation.

"We cannot hold out at this rate much longer!" the elder Filmore
cried, as he watched the bustle in the valley below. "I'm as empty as