“Let’s hope for the best,” replied Doctor Dan. “You thought I was gone, but I was only winded from the terrible pressure of that brute. I knew when you bent over me, Dick, but I couldn’t speak, and—hello! Here’s another one of them. Hold on there! Hold on!”
It was Tony. Down the trail he came dashing furiously.
“Hold up!” he cried. “Don’t shoot. I saw Mudd go down from the heights above here. I’m out of it. There’s a big force coming from the Gold Queen!”
Two weeks later Dick Darrell stepped off of a Pullman car at the B. & O. depot in the city of Washington.
Leaning upon his shoulder was a young man looking pale and interesting, who had evidently been very sick—our old friend Charley, of course.
Behind him came a tall, handsome Indian dressed in ordinary clothes.
Here was our party home again from the Bad Lands, and as their adventures were now all over, we must bring our story to a speedy conclusion.
The arrival of the party from the Gold Queen was the work of Bill Struthers, the treacherous guide, who changed his mind upon arriving at the mine and made a clean breast of the whole affair to Colonel Eglinton, who immediately organized a force to go to his daughter’s relief.
They were too late to deal with Martin Mudd, for the man had gone to his long account and no effort was even made to find his body. As for the rest, drunken men are easily captured—there was no resistance made at the cave.