card. I was pickin' up a quid from the floor--he
fudged a card. Le'go o' me, an' I'll fight you fair."

"Stand quiet, I tell you, or you'll be handed over to the police."

The digger turned his hairy visage round, and glanced angrily into
Jack's eyes.

"You'll call in the traps?--you long-legged swine!" With a mighty
back-kick, the Prospector lodged the heel of his heavy boot fairly on
Scarlett's shin. In a moment he had struggled free, and faced round.

"Put up your fists!" he cried. "I fight fair, I fight fair."

There was a whirlwind of blows, and then a figure fell to the floor with
a thud like that of a felled tree. It was the lucky digger, and he lay
still and quiet amid the wreckage of the fight.

"Here," said Cathro, handing Mr. Crewe ten pounds. "Take your money--our
friend the digger lost the game."

"This is most unfortunate, Cathro." But as he spoke, the Father of
Timber Town pocketed the gold. "Did I not see Scarlett knock that man
down? This is extremely unfortunate. I have just refused the offer of
a man who avers--who avers, mind you--that he can put us on this new
gold-field in a week, but I trusted to Scarlett's diplomacy with the
digger: I come back, and what do I see? I see my friend Scarlett knock
the man down! There he lies as insensible as a log."

"It looks," said Cathro, "as if our little plan had fallen through."

"Fallen through? We have made the unhappy error of interfering in a game
of cards. We should have stood off, sir, and when a quarrel arose--I
know these diggers; I have been one of them myself, and I understand
them, Cathro--when a quarrel arose we should have interposed on behalf
of the digger, and he would have been our friend for ever. Now all the
gold in the country wouldn't bribe him to have dealings with us."

The noise of the fight had brought upon the scene all the occupants of
the bar. They stood in a group, silent and expectant, just inside the
room. The landlord, who was with them, came forward, and bent over the
inanimate form of the Prospector. "I think this is likely to be a case
for the police," said he, as he rose, and stood erect. "The man may be
alive, or he may be dead--I'm not a doctor: I can't tell--but there's
likely to be trouble in store for the gentlemen in the room at the time
of the fight."

Suddenly an energetic figure pushed its way through the group of
spectators, and Benjamin Tresco, wearing an air of supreme wisdom, and
with a manner which w