d to
cross the river?"

"It's my mate," said Moonlight. "I know the voice. Is that you,
Scarlett?"

"It's Scarlett, all right," called back the voice, "but how am I to
cross this infernal river?"

The three men walked to the edge of the water, and peered into the
darkness.

"Perfectly safe," said the Prospector. "She's barely up to your middle."

There was a splashing as of some one walking in the water, and presently
a dark object was seen wading toward them.

"Now, what the deuce is all this about, Scarlett?" It was Moonlight who
thus expressed his wonderment. "The man who travels here at night
deserves to get bushed. That you reached camp is just luck."

"Camp?" replied the dripping Scarlett. "I've been waiting for you at
_our_ camp since nightfall with twenty other devils worse than myself.
Don't you ever sleep in your tent?"

"Of course 'e does," the Prospector answered for Moonlight, "but mayn't
a digger be neighbourly, and go to see 'is friends?

"Come, and dry yerself by the fire, and have a bit of tucker."

"But Great Ghost!" exclaimed Moonlight, "all the gold's in my tent, in
the spare billy."

"Quite safe. Don't worry," said Scarlett. "All those twenty men of
mine are mounting guard over it, and if one of them stole so much as an
ounce, the rest would kill him for breach of contract. That's the result
of binding men to go share and share alike--they watch each other like
ferrets."

Jack took off his clothes, and wrapped in a blanket he sat before the
fire, with a pipe in his mouth and a steaming pannikin in his hand.

"Well, happy days!" he said as he drank. "And that reminds me,
Tresco--you're wanted in Timber Town, very badly indeed--a little matter
in connection with the mails. 'Seems there's been peculation of some
sort, and for reasons which are as mad as the usual police tactics, the
entire force is searching for you, most worthy Benjamin. The yarn goes
that you're a forger in disguise, a counterfeiter of our sovereign's
sacred image and all that, the pilferer of Her Majesty's mails, a
dangerous criminal masquerading as a goldsmith."

"Holee Smoke!" cried the Prospector. "Look to your gold,
gen'lemen--there's thieves abroad, and one of us may be harbourin' a
serpent unaware. Ben, my lovely pal, consider yourself arrested."

"Do I understand there's a writ out?" asked Moonlight, serious,
judicial, intensely solemn. "This must be put a stop to instantly.
Imagine our virtuous friend in