things were going to turn out well. But there was one little
point that all of us had overlooked, and that was destined in one way
and another to upset our plans to a remarkable extent.

Profiting by Bryce's experience, I decided to leave the car at home, as
I realised that we would have to abandon it sooner or later, and nothing
is so apt to set foolish people talking as an apparently ownerless car.
I resolved on making our headquarters at the spot where by all accounts
the unlamented Mr. Bradby had met his death. For one thing all the later
developments of the chase had centred round that one spot, and Bryce
himself had gone there unhesitatingly by the shortest and most direct
route he knew of. I couldn't see at the time where I could find a better
jumping-off place. To say the least it was a fixed point from which to
start exploring, and we had the comforting knowledge, though it might
not be of any practical use to us, that the valley itself was within two
or three days' march. With it as the centre we would have to cast a
circle with a radius of anything up to fifty miles, and then somewhere
within the enclosed area we might, or might not, find the elusive vale
that held the treasure.

We approached the rendezvous by widely divergent routes. It was a rather
extravagant precaution, no doubt, but then I wasn't taking any risks
that I could possibly avoid. The murderous gentlemen who were quite
certainly on our track were a power to be reckoned with, and at the same
time we had to keep our eyes open for the law itself. It was all right
for Bryce to say that he was playing within the law--quite possibly he
was--but I had no idea of paying any percentage to the Crown. I was
rather hazy on the matter myself, though I seemed to have heard
somewhere or other that the Government always gobbled a big share of the
loot in the case of treasure trove. At any rate the quieter we kept the
expedition the less likelihood there was of us having to pay anything at
all.

Moira was to travel with me from Murtoa, and Cumshaw decided to train as
far as Landsborough--the recently opened Crowlands to Navarre railway
would take him that far--and then do the rest across the hills on foot.
His was the longer and more difficult route, and I had intended at first
to take it myself, for reasons that have nothing at all to do with this
tale; but he was so insistent, and at one stage threatened so much
unpleasantness, that I gave into him, if on