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264 "They wanted to make off with our stores," answered Dave, and pointed to the goods tied up in the rubber cloth.

"So that's the trick, eh?" bellowed Abe Blower.

"First the hosses an' now the stores!" roared Tom Dillon. "Humph! Ye deserve to be shot full o' holes!" he went on, for he had lived in the times when the stealing of a horse, or of a miner's food, was considered by everybody a capital offense.

"I—I beg of you, have mercy!" cried Job Haskers, as he got unsteadily to his feet. "I—I—this was not my plan at all—Merwell suggested it. We—we were not going to—er—to steal anything."

"No? Then wot was ye goin' ter do?" demanded Abe Blower, sarcastically.

"We were—er—only going to hide the stuff," stammered Link Merwell, and he glared at Job Haskers savagely for having tried to place the responsibility of the raid on his shoulders.

"I don't believe a word of it!" came sternly from Tom Dillon. "You wanted to leave us to starve here, or compel us to go back to town—so you could hunt for that lost mine alone. I see through the trick. We ought to shoot you down like dogs!"

"It's jest wot they deserve, consarn 'em," muttered Abe Blower.