e dinner where we were, and Elam
shouldered his rifle, lighted his pipe, and started back after his map.
He told us that we had better stay where we were, and this gave me an
idea that Elam was afraid he might be shot. He was gone half an hour,
and when he came back his face wore his old-time expression again.

"Have you got it?" asked Tom, who always wanted to make sure that he was
in the right.

"Course I have," said Elam. "Catch up, and we'll go on. There is one
thing about this map business that I don't exactly like. You see this
nugget is hid in a pocket."

Of course, I was thunderstruck, but then Elam had been all over that
country, and of course knew where every pocket went to. He knew which
canyons ran back into the mountains and which did not.

"You see this man had a fight before he got the nugget, and he was too
badly hurt to get off his course to find a pocket to bury his find,"
Elam hastened to explain. "Now, this canyon that we are in goes back
into the mountains I don't know how far, and it was in this gully that
the fight took place; consequently the find is buried right here
alongside of this little stream."

"Who do you suppose that man was, anyway?" Tom remarked. "You have never
heard of him since, have you?"

"Now, wait until I tell you. I don't know. But let us go ahead, and I
will tell you what I mean in a day or two."

"What do you look for anyway, when you go off by yourself?" asked Tom.
"If you would give us a pointer on that subject we might be able to help
you."

"I don't mind telling you that I am looking for a trail," said Elam.
"And it is so old that no one but myself would notice it. When I find
that trail I'm a-going to follow it up. It isn't over ten feet long, for
a man as badly hurt as that one was, aint a-going to go a great ways to
hide a nugget."

"Do you mean to tell me that we are on his trail now?" exclaimed Tom in
amazement.

"Certainly I do. I have found two or three places where he slept."

"Why didn't you speak about it?"

"Do you suppose I have come in here this far without following some
trail? Of course not. Some of the marks he made are so badly obliterated
by the wind and the rain, that you can't make head nor tail of them,
unless you know what had been there in the first place. Why, I have
found blood on the rocks where he slept."

"You're beaten, aint you, Tom?" I asked, when he gazed at me, lost in
wonder.

"I should say I was. I wish you had showed