He smiled all over, but said nothing.

"Go on," said he to Tom. "What else did you find?"

"And right there is where the fun comes in," said Tom. "The passage was
about twenty feet long--he was too badly hurt to go further--and with
every step of the way he had broken down a piece of the bushes, first on
one side and then on the other, to enable him to keep a straight course.
Right under the head of a rock that the passage brings up against, you
will find something buried. It may not be the nugget, but there is
something there."

"Why didn't you dig down and see what it was?" said I.

"It was pretty near night when I found it, and besides I wanted Elam to
see it. I will go with you now, if you say so."

"No," said Elam, filling up his pipe for a fresh smoke. "I'll be happy
for once in my life for twelve hours, and if at the end of that time I
find that there is nothing there----"

"But I tell you there is something there," ejaculated Tom.

"I will go back and go to herding cattle," added Elam, paying no
attention to Tom's interruption. "I will give it up as a bad job."

There wasn't much sleeping done in that camp that night, and although we
stayed awake till toward morning, we had little to say to each other. We
all wanted to see what was hidden up there. I had seen Elam become
wonderfully excited whenever anyone spoke of the nugget and hinted that
it wasn't there, but I had never seen him come so near finding it
before. When daylight came Tom declared he couldn't wait any longer, so
we got up and saddled our horses and followed along after him. We did
not stop to cook breakfast, for in case we did not find the nugget
nobody would want any. After going about a quarter of a mile, Tom
stopped and dismounted from his horse.

"There are the stones," said Elam.

"You go along a little further and you will find everything just as I
described it to you," said Tom. "Elam is about half wild," he added in a
low tone to me, "so you and I had better take a pick along. Mind, I
don't say it is the nugget, but there is something hidden in there."

Talk about Elam's being half wild! Tom and I were in that fix also. We
saw Elam examine the broken bush, the one that was held in place by two
limbs that were tied about it, and his face grew as white as a sheet. He
worked his way into the bushes, making his way all too slowly to suit us
who were following close at his heels, and finally stopped under the
hanging rock, where th