The building itself was a barnlike structure, unpainted, but with a rude, unfinished veranda in front.  One end contained a saloon, crowded with patrons, but the office, revealed in the glare of a smoky lamp, disclosed a few occupants, a group of men about a card-table.

At the desk, wide-eyed with excitement, Miss Donovan took a service-worn pen proffered by landlord Pete Timmons, whose grey whiskers were as unkempt as his hotel, and registered her name.

“A telegram came to-day for you, ma’am,” Peter said in a cracked voice, and tossed it over.

Miss Donovan tore it open.  It was from Farriss.  It read: 

If any clues, advise immediately.  Willis digging hard.  Letter of instruction follows.

FARRISS.

The girl folded the message, thrust it in her jacket-pocket, then turning to the marshal and Westcott, gave each a firm hand.

“You’ve both been more than kind,” she said gratefully.

“Hell, ma’am,” Dan deprecated, “that warn’t nothin’!” And he hurried into the street as loud cries sounded outside.

“Good night, Miss Donovan,” Westcott said simply.  “If you are ever frightened or in need of a friend, call on me.  I’ll be in town two days yet, and after that Pete here can get word to me.”  Then, with an admiring, honest gaze, he searched her eyes a moment before he turned and strolled toward the rude cigar-case.

“All right, now, ma’am?” Pete Timmons said, picking, up her valise.  The girl nodded, and together they went up the rude stairs to her room where Timmons paused at the door.

“Well, I’m glad you’re here,” he said, moving away.  “We’ve been waitin’ for you to show.  I may be wrong, ma’am, but I’d bet my belt that you’re the lady that’s been expected by Ned Beaton.”

“You’re mistaken,” she replied shortly.

As she heard him clatter down the stairs, Miss Stella Donovan of the New York Star knew that her visit would not be in vain.

CHAPTER VIII:  A GANG OF ENEMIES

The miner waited, leaning against the desk.  His eyes had followed the slender figure moving after the rotund Timmons up the uncarpeted stairs until it had vanished amid the shadows of the second story.  He smiled quietly in imagination of her first astonished view of the interior of room eighteen, and recalled to mind a vivid picture of its adornments—­the bare wood walls, the springless bed, the crack-nosed pitcher standing disconsolate in a blue wash-basin of tin; the little round mirror in a once-gilt frame with a bullet-hole through its centre, and the strip of dingy rag-carpet on the floor—­all this suddenly displayed by the yellowish flame of a small hand-lamp left sitting on the window ledge.

Timmons came down the stairs, and bustled in back of the desk, eager to ask questions.

“Lady a friend o’ yours, Jim?” he asked.  “If I’d a knowed she wus comin’ I’d a saved a better room.”