r he saw two great motor trucks go past. They were loaded with
men and headed up the canyon and Denver began to look wild. A third
machine appeared and he went out to flag it but the driver went by
without stopping; and so did another, and another. He rushed after the
next one and caught it on the hill but the men pushed him roughly from
the running board. They were armed and he knew by their hard-bitten
faces that it was another party of jumpers.

"Where are you going?" he yelled but they left him by the road without
even a curse for an answer. Well, he knew then; they were going to
Final, and Murray had fooled him again. Denver had suspected from the
first that Murray's shutdown was a ruse, to shake down the public for
their stock; and now he knew it, and that if his mine was jumped again
it would be held against all comers. Another automobile whirled by; and
then came men that he knew, the miners who owned claims in the district.

"What's the matter?" he called but they would not stop to talk, simply
shouted and beckoned him on. Denver started, right then, without
stopping for breakfast or to pick up his hobo's pack; and soon he caught
a ride with a party of prospectors whose claims he had once freed from
jumpers.

"It's a big strike!" they clamored, hauling him in and rushing on. "Old
Murray struck copper in his tunnel! _Rich?_ Hell, yes!" And they
gave him all the details as the machine lurched along up the road.

Murray had struck another ore-body, entirely different from the first
one--the copper had come out the drill-holes like pure metal--and then
he had shut down and rushed the machine-men away before they could tell
of the strike. But they had got loose down in Moroni and showed the
drill-dust and every man that saw it had piled into his machine and
joined the rush for Murray's.

"Jumped again!" muttered Denver and when he arrived in Pinal he found
his mine swarming with men. They had built a barricade and run a pipe
line down the hill to pump up water from the creek, and when he appeared
they ordered him off without showing so much as a head. And he went, for
the swiftness of the change had confused him; he was whipped before he
began. There was no use to fight or to put up a bluff, the men behind
the wall were determined; and while, according to law, they held no
title the law was far away. It was a weapon for rich men who could
afford to pay the price; but how could he, a poor man, hope to win back
h