The girl did not answer him for at least a minute, and appeared concerned about something that rattled in the bicycle.  Then she stopped and looked up at the man with a great tenderness in her eyes.

“You want to tell her?  Well, it will be very difficult, but I will do it for you.”

Seaforth stooped and kissed the little ungloved hand on the bicycle reverentially.  “I don’t know how I asked you, and knowing how much has been given me I am almost afraid,” he said.

Nellie Townshead smiled at him, but she said nothing further until they parted, and Seaforth turned back towards Vancouver city.  He was brimming over with good-will to everybody when he reached it, and as it happened found storekeeper Horton, who came down there occasionally, waiting for him.  Horton was by no means a genius or well versed in legal procedure, but he had a ready wit, and Seaforth felt prompted to tell him the story of their first disastrous march, which Alton had hitherto but partially narrated, though he suppressed its final incident.  Horton listened gravely with his most magisterial air.

“Harry’s no fool, but he don’t know everything,” he said.  “Now I see where you and me can take a hand in.”

“Yes?” said Seaforth thoughtfully.

Horton nodded.  “It was Damer who recorded your claim.”

“Damer?” said Seaforth.  “That was the man Harry pitched into the river at Somasco.”

Horton chuckled.  “You’re right.  Harry’s just a trifle too handy at slinging folks into rivers and down stairways.  Well, the fellow was hanging round my store, and I thought I knew him and wasn’t sure, but when I saw his name down on the Crown mining record that fixed me.  Now you’re quite ready, you and Tom, to swear to the story you told me?”

“Of course, but still I don’t see——­”

Horton’s eyes twinkled.  “You will presently.  That’s where being a magistrate comes in.  I’m going to take hold of Damer for horse-stealing.”

A thought came swiftly into Seaforth’s mind, and he smote the table.  “But I can’t swear it was Damer.  You would never convict him.”

Horton laughed the bushman’s almost silent laugh.  “I don’t know that I want to.  Anyway, I can keep on remanding him, and when I sent him up for trial it would be a rancher’s jury.  That’s going to give us a pull on Mr. Hallam, who is standing in somewhere behind the whole thing—­and I kind of fancy there’s another man with him.”

Seaforth’s face grew grave.  “Then, as Harry wouldn’t like it and there’s nothing in it, I’d get rid of that fancy.  Now, of course, you know what you can do, but isn’t it playing a little too much into your own hand?  And you see folks might get talking about the thing.”

Horton put on his most impressive air.  “There’s justice by statute, and there’s equity, as well as a lot more you never heard about,” said he.

Seaforth could not check his smile.  “And which of them is what we’re going to do?”