f disgust and lowered his
rifle. "You git down out'n that tree! Git down quicker'n lightnin',
too!"

"I'm comin', sir!" came Jamie's frightened voice from the tree-top.

Jamie lost no time in descending from his perch and in a moment stood
trembling before his captors. It was quite dark now and snowing hard,
and to the frightened little lad the two big lumbermen loomed up like
giants.

"What you doin' here?" demanded Bill with an oath as he seized Jamie's
arm with a grip that made the lad wince.

"I were--I were huntin' for the cache," confessed Jamie.

"Goin' to steal our cache, was ye? Well, we'll teach you to leave
other folkses things be!" The man gave Jamie a savage shake. "Tryin'
to steal our cache, eh? Who set you on to it? That's what I want to
know! Who set you on to stealin' it, now?"

"I weren't goin' to steal un, sir," chattered Jamie, horrified at the
implication that he was a thief.

"What were you huntin' the cache for, then? Don't lie, you little rat,
or I'll twist your neck off!"

The fellow seemed quite capable of executing the threat literally, as
he again shook Jamie savagely.

"I--aint'--lyin'--about--un, sir!" pleaded Jamie between the shakes.
"I were--just--goin'--to--look--at un, and--if--'tweren't--Lem Horn's
silver fox--I weren't--goin' to touch un!"

"Well, 'tain't Lem Horn's silver fox. It's things of our'n! Do you
hear that? _'Tain't_ Lem Horn's silver, it's our'n what's in that
there bag! You leave our things be! Do you hear what I'm sayin'? You
and your gang keep away from our cache, and don't go foolin' with
anything you don't know anything about! Do you hear?" The man gave
Jamie another shake.

"I--I didn't know! We--we just suspicioned 'twere Lem's silver, and I
were wantin' to take un back to he," explained Jamie.

"You heard what I said? 'Tain't Lem Horn's silver! You hear that,
don't you?"

"Aye, sir, I saw what you was takin' out of the bag, and 'tweren't Lem
Horn's silver. 'Twere something to drink out of a bottle. I sees you
drinkin' it."

"Let the kid go, Bill," laughed Hank, who until now had kept silent.

"We were all thinkin' 'twere Lem's silver. I'll tell un 'twere not the
silver but somethin' else that you takes from the Captain that you
were hidin' in the cache," said Jamie hopefully.

"You goin' to tell that! You heard what we said, and you goin' to blab
it?" the man roared in a rage.

"Aye, sir, I'll just tell the others so's they'll not be thinkin'