Thus on the 13th of September, 186-, the treasure found at Blazing Star passed out of the hands of its finder.

* * * * *

Autumn brought an abrupt explanation of the mystery.  Kanaka Joe had been arrested for horse-stealing, but had with noble candor confessed to the finer offense of manslaughter.  That swift and sure justice which overtook the horse-stealer in these altitudes was stayed a moment and hesitated, for the victim was clearly the mysterious unknown.  Curiosity got the better of an extempore judge and jury.

“It was a fair fight,” said the accused, not without some human vanity, feeling that the camp hung upon his words, “and was settled by the man az was peartest and liveliest with his weapon.  We had a sort of unpleasantness over at Lagrange the night afore, along of our both hevin’ a monotony of four aces.  We had a clinch and a stamp around, and when we was separated it was only a question of shootin’ on sight.  He left Lagrange at sun up the next morning, and I struck across a bit o’ buckeye and underbrush and came upon him, accidental like, on the Red Chief Road.  I drawed when I sighted him, and called out.  He slipped from his mare and covered himself with her flanks, reaching for his holster, but she rared and backed down on him across the road and into the grass, where I got in another shot and fetched him.”

“And you stole his mare?” suggested the Judge.

“I got away,” said the gambler, simply.

Further questioning only elicited the fact that Joe did not know the name or condition of his victim.  He was a stranger in Lagrange.

It was a breezy afternoon, with some turbulency in the camp, and much windy discussion over this unwonted delay of justice.  The suggestion that Joe should be first hanged for horse stealing and then tried for murder was angrily discussed, but milder counsels were offered—­that the fact of the killing should be admitted only as proof of the theft.  A large party from Red Chief had come over to assist in judgment, among them the coroner.

Cass Beard had avoided these proceedings, which only recalled an unpleasant experience, and was wandering with pick, pan, and wallet far from the camp.  These accoutrements, as I have before intimated, justified any form of aimless idleness under the equally aimless title of “prospecting.”  He had at the end of three hours’ relaxation reached the highway to Red Chief, half hidden by blinding clouds of dust torn from the crumbling red road at every gust which swept down the mountain side.  The spot had a familiar aspect to Cass, although some freshly-dug holes near the wayside, with scattered earth beside them, showed the presence of a recent prospector.  He was struggling with his memory, when the dust was suddenly dispersed and he found himself again at the scene of the murder.  He started:  he had not put foot on the road since the inquest.  There lacked only the helpless dead man and the contrasting figure of the alert young woman to restore the picture.  The body was gone, it was true, but as he turned he beheld Miss Porter, at a few paces distant, sitting her horse as energetic and observant as on the first morning they had met.  A superstitious thrill passed over him and awoke his old antagonism.