abbe?"

"Well, I'll do the sweepin' there. I nailed that barrel to the flure
apurpis. L'ave it alone, will ye?"

This incident decided her. That night, when Bidwell came, she broke out:

"Sherm, I cannot stand this anny longer. I'm that nairvous I can't hear
a fly buzz widout hot streaks chasin' up and down me spine like little
red snakes. And man, luk at yersilf. Why, ye're hairy as a go-at and yer
eyes are loike two white onions. I say stop, Sherm dear!"

"What'll we do?" asked Bidwell in alarm.

"Do? I'll tell ye phwat we'll do. We'll put our feets down and say,
'Yis, 'tis true, we've shtruck ut, and it's ours.' Then I'll get a team
from Las Animas and load the stuff in before the face and eyes of the
world, and go wid it to sell it, whilst you load y'r gun an' stand guard
over the hole in the ground. I'm fair crazy wid this burglar's business.
We're both as thin as quakin' asps and full as shaky. You go down the
trail this minute and bring a team and a strong wagon--no wan will know
till ye drive in. Now go!"

Bidwell was ruled by her clear and sensible words, and rode away into
the clear dark of the summer's night with a feeling that it was all a
dream--a vision such as he had often had while prospecting in the
mountains; but, as day came on and he looked back upon the red hole he
had made in the green hillside, the reality of it all came to pinch his
heart and make him gasp. His storehouse, his well of golden waters, was
unguarded, and open to the view of any one who should chance to look
that way. He beat his old mule to a gallop in the frenzy of the moment.

The widow meanwhile got breakfast for the men, and as soon as they were
off up the trail she set the awed and wondering Chinaman to hauling the
sacks of ore out from beneath the shanty and piling them conveniently
near the roadway. She watched every movement and checked off each sack
like a shipping-clerk. "Merciful powers! the work that man did!" she
exclaimed, alluding to Bidwell, who had dug all that mass of ore and
packed it in the night from the mine to its safe concealment.

Of course, Mrs. Clark, the storekeeper's wife, saw them at work and came
over to see what was going on.

"Good morning, Mrs. Delaney. You're not going to move?"

"I am."

"I'm sorry. What's the reason of it? Why, that looks like ore!" she said
as she peered at a sack.

"It _is_ ore! and I'm goin' to ship it to the mill. Have ye anny
objection?" asked Mrs. Delaney, def