touched an
unpleasant chord. After a pause, Mr. Britton inquired,--

"You have no clue whatever as to Darrell's identity, have you?"

Mr. Underwood shook his head. "Queerest case I ever saw! There wasn't a
scrap of paper nor a pen-mark to show who he was. Parkinson, the mine
expert who was on the same train, said he didn't remember seeing him
until Harry introduced him; he said he supposed he was some friend of
Harry's. Since his sickness I've looked up the conductor on that train
and questioned him, but all he could remember was that he boarded the
train a little this side of Galena and that he had a ticket through from
St. Paul."

"You say this Parkinson was a mine expert; what was he doing out here?"

"He was one of three or four that were here at that time, looking up the
Ajax for eastern parties."

"In all probability," said Mr. Britton, musingly, "Darrell was here on
the same business."

"If that was his business, he said nothing about it to me, and I would
have thought he would, under the circumstances."

"I wonder whether we could ascertain from the owners of the Ajax what
experts were out here or expected out here at that time?"

Mr. Underwood smiled grimly. "Not from the former owners, for nobody
knows where they are, though there are some people quite anxious to
know; and not from the present owners, for they are too busy looking for
their predecessors in interest to think of anything else."

"Why, has the Ajax really changed owners? Did they find any one to buy
it?"

"Yes, a Scotch syndicate bought it. They sent over a man--one of their
own number, I believe, and authorized to act for them--that I guess knew
more about sampling liquors than ores. The Ajax people worked him
accordingly, with the result that the mine was sold at the figure
named,--one million, half down, you know. The man rushed back to New
York, to meet a partner whom he had cabled to come over. About ten days
later they arrived on the ground and began operations at the Ajax. The
mill ran for just ten days when they discovered the condition of affairs
and shut down, and they have been looking for the former owners ever
since."

Both men laughed, then relapsed into silence. A little later, as Mr.
Britton stirred the fire to a brighter glow, he said, while the tender
curves about his mouth deepened,--

"I cannot help feeling that the coming to us of this young man, whose
identity is wrapped in so much mystery, has some peculiar