by seeming to claim a part of my wealth as though it were yours by
right. But I'm anxious to forget that now."

In the meanwhile, Granger had been examining the thing which had been
placed in his hands. It was wrapped up carefully in several rags,
which were knotted and tedious to untie. When he had stript them off,
he found that they contained a nugget, somewhat bigger than the one
which Eyelids had shown him, but of the same rounded formation, as
though it had been taken from a river-bed. "Where did you get it?" he
asked excitedly.

"Where the half-breed got his--from the Forbidden River. Does El
Dorado seem more possible to you now?"

But Granger was thinking, and he did not answer the question. Suddenly
the dream of his life had become recoverable. He had forgotten Peggy,
and Murder Point, and even Spurling himself. Once more in imagination
he was sailing up the Great Amana, following in his father's track.
Once more he saw, as in Raleigh's day, the deer come down to the
water's side, as if they were used to the keeper's call; and he
watched anxiously ahead lest, in the rounding of the latest bend, the
shining city should meet his sight and the salt expanse of Parima,
from whose shores its towers are said to rise. In his eyes was the
vision of the island near Puna, which Lopez wrote about, with its
silver herb-gardens, and its flowers of gold, and its trees of gold
and of silver; and in his ears was the tinkling music, which the
sea-wind was wont to make as it swept through the metal forest,
causing its branches to clang and its leaves to shake. He was far away
from Keewatin now, making the phantom journey to the land of his
desire.

"Does El Dorado seem more possible to you now?"

He turned to Spurling a face which had grown thin with earnestness,
"Druce, tell me quickly," he said, "how long will it take us to get
there?"

"To get to El Dorado? The answer to that you should know best. But to
get to the place on the Forbidden River where this gold was found? Oh,
about five days."

"Let us go there at once, then, before Beorn finds us out."

"Ah, Beorn! The old trapper who put that half-breed on my track!"

"Did he do that? Tell me about it."

CHAPTER XV

MANITOUS AND SHADES OF THE DEPARTED

"After I had left you, I journeyed three days to the northward, till I
came to the mouth of the Forbidden River. There I found the cache
which you spoke to me about; but I did not break into it at that tim