Page:Dave Porter in the Gold Fields.djvu/293

Rh wonder they have landslides here. The ground and rocks are bound to settle, with so many openings to fill up."

He had gone forward about a hundred and fifty feet when he found the opening leading upward. Then of a sudden he gave a cry of wonder and delight.

Just ahead of him were a number of heavy timbers, such as are used for shoring in mines. And among the timbers lay a pick and a crowbar and the remains of a smashed lantern.

At that instant Dave remembered one thing that Roger had told him, which was that Maurice Harrison had always branded all of his tools with his initials. Eagerly, our hero caught up the pick and held the handle in the light of his torch. There, on the broad part of the pick's handle, were the initials:

"It's the lost mine!" shouted the youth. "The lost mine as sure as fate! Oh, I must get out and tell Roger and the others of this!"

But then he hesitated. What if this should prove to be only some abandoned "prospect" and not the real mine at all?

"I'd better look around a little first and make sure," he reasoned. "If I can only find some