ters became a mere
jumble of meaningless sounds. "S must stand for South," she insisted, "and
C could stand for creek, or cave, only there are no caves around here that
I've seen, or camp--South Camp--that don't do me any good, I don't know
where any of his camps were. And he'd hardly say Creek, that would be too
indefinite. Let's see, C--cottonwood--south cottonwood--short cottonwood,
scarred cottonwood, well if I have to hunt these hills over for a short
cottonwood or a scarred cottonwood, when there are millions of both, I
might better keep on hunting for the crack in the rock wall."

For a long time she sat staring at the paper. "If I could only get the
starting point figured out, the rest would be easy. It says one mile
south, one and one half miles east, one mile south, then the arrowhead
pointing up, must mean up a creek or a mountain to something that
looks like an inverted horseshoe, then, two miles west to a. to b.
whatever a. and b. are. There are no letters on the map, then it says
to stake L. C.--L. C., is lode claim, at least, I know that much, and
it can be 1500 feet long along the vein, and 300 feet each way from
the center. But what does he mean by the wiggly looking mark before
the word center? I guess it isn't going to be quite as easy as it
looks," she concluded, "even when I know that the letters stand for
the points of the compass. If I could only figure out where to start
from I could find my way at least to the a. b. part--and that would be
something.

"Anyway, I know how to make a map, now, and that is just exactly what
I needed to know in order to set my trap for the prowler who is
continually searching this cabin. It's all ready but the map, and I
may as well finish up the job to-day as any time." From the pocket of
her shirt she drew a photograph and examined it critically. "It looks
a good deal like the close-up of one of daddy's," she said
approvingly, "and it certainly looks as if it might have been carried
for a year." Returning the picture to her pocket, she folded the
preacher's map with her father's and replaced them in the envelope,
then making her way to the coulee, extracted from the tin can two or
three of her father's ore samples. These, together with a light
miner's pick, she placed in an empty flour sack which she secured to
her saddle and struck out northwestward into the hills.

At the top of the first divide she stopped, carefully studied the back
trail, and producing pape