ty we left on the
mountain."

"I should say so, Bill."

"Do you know them, strangers?"

"Know them?" ejaculated Bill Mosely, who instantly formed a plan which
would gratify his love of vengeance and secure him the coveted horses at
one and the same time--"I reckon I know them only too well. They stole
those mustangs from me and my friend a week ago. I thought them animals
looked natural."

"Hoss-thieves!" said the landlord. "Well, I surmised there was something
wrong about them when they let that yaller heathen set down to the table
with them."

CHAPTER XVI.

A TRAVESTY OF JUSTICE.

It was speedily noised about in the mining-camp that a party of
horse-thieves had had the audacity to visit the settlement, and were
even now guests of the Golden Gulch Hotel.

Now, in the eyes of a miner a horse-thief was as bad as a murderer. He
was considered rather worse than an ordinary thief, since the character
of his theft gave him better facilities for getting away with his
plunder. He was looked upon by all as a common and dangerous enemy, on
whom any community was justified in visiting the most condign
punishment.

Bill Mosely knew very well the feeling he would rouse against the men
whom he hated, and, having started the movement, waited complacently for
the expected results to follow.

Jim Brown was by no means slow in spreading the alarm. True, these men
were his guests, and it might be considered that it was against his
interests to denounce them, but he knew his claim for entertainment
would be allowed him out of the funds found in possession of the party,
with probably a liberal addition as a compensation for revealing their
real character.

Horse-thieves! No sooner did the news spread than the miners, most of
whom were through work for the day, began to make their way to the
neighborhood of the hotel.

There hadn't been any excitement at Golden Gulch for some time, and this
promised a first-class sensation.

"Hang 'em up! That's what I say," suggested Brown the landlord.

"Where's the men that call 'em thieves?" asked one of the miners, a
middle-aged man, who was sober and slow-spoken, and did not look like a
man to be easily carried away by a storm of prejudice or a wave of
excitement.

"Here they be," said Brown, pointing to Bill Mosely and Tom Hadley, who
were speedily surrounded by an excited crowd.

"What have you say?" asked the first speaker of Mosely.

Bill Mosely repeated his story