a-bloom. He came
panting up the slope under the dripping trees, with a dash of wind in
his face and the odor of damp leafage and mold on the freshening air.

He struck the decisive blow with a will. The lilies shivered and
fell apart The echoes multiplied the stroke with a ringing metallic
iteration.

The loiterers were indeed abroad. The sound lured them from their own
devious points of search, and a half dozen of the treasure-seekers burst
from the invisibilities of the mists as Ozias Crann's pickaxe cleaving
the mold struck upon the edge of a small japanned box hidden securely
between the rocks, a scant foot below the surface. A dangerous spot
for a struggle, the verge of a precipice, but the greed for gain is a
passion that blunts the sense of peril. The wrestling figures, heedless
of the abyss, swayed hither and thither, the precious box among them;
now it was captured by a stronger grasp, now secured anew by sheer
sleight-of-hand. More than once it dropped to the ground, and at last
in falling the lock gave way, and scattered to the wind were numberless
orderly vouchers for money already paid, inventories of fixtures,
bills for repairs, reports of departments--various details of value in
settling the accounts of the mine, and therefore to be transmitted to
the main office of the mining company at Glaston. "Ef I hed tole ye ez
the money warn't thar, ye wouldn't hev believed me," Lora-linda
Byars said drearily, when certain disappointed wights, who had sought
elsewhere and far a-field, repaired to the cabin laughing at their own
plight and upbraiding her with the paucity of the _cache_. "I knowed all
the time what war in that box. The man lef' it thar in the niche arter
he war shot, it bem' heavy ter tote an' not wuth much. But he brung the
money with him, an' tuk it off, bein', he said, without orders from the
owners, the miners hevin' burnt down the offices, an' bruk open the safe
an' destroyed all the papers, ceptin' that leetle box. I sewed up the
man's money myself in them feather beds what he lay on whenst he war
wagined down 'ter Colb'ry ter take the kyars. He 'lowed the compn'y
mought want them papers whenst they went into liquidation, ez he called
it, an' tole me how he hed hid 'em."

Rufe Kinnicutt wondered that she should have been so unyielding. She did
not speculate on the significance of her promise. She did not appraise
its relative value with other interests, and seek to qualify it. Once
given sh