CHAPTER XXIII.
A GENERAL SETTLEMENT OF ACCOUNTS.
Quick as were the boys in hurrying to the point where they heard the indignant Tim, they did not reach it until the affray was over. Wholly subdued, Ike Hardman begged for mercy at the hands of his conqueror, and promised to do anything desired if he received consideration.
It is a well-known fact that the wrath of a good-natured person is more to be feared than his who is of less equable temperament. The boys had never seen Tim McCabe in so dangerous a mood. He and Jeff Graham had returned to the cavern shortly after the departure of the cousins in pursuit of the thieves, and it did not take them long to understand what had occurred. They set out over the same trail, along which they readily discovered the footprints of all the parties. Tim, in his angry impatience, outsped his more stolid companion, and by good fortune came upon Hardman while in headlong flight down the mountain path.
The latter tried for a time to make it appear that he knew nothing of the abstraction of the gold from the cavern, but Tim would have none of it, and gave him the choice of conducting them to the place where it was concealed or of undergoing "capital punishment." Like the poltroon that he was, Hardman insisted that his companion, Victor Herzog, was the real wrongdoer, but he offered to do what was demanded, only imploring that he should not be harmed for his evil acts.
Tim extended his hand and took the Winchester from Frank Mansley. He knew it was loaded, and he said to his prisoner:
"Lead on, and if ye think it will pay ye to try to git away or play any of yer tricks, why try it, that's all!"
The threat was sufficient to banish all hope from Hardman, who led them along the trail a short way, then turned on to the pile of rocks beside which Frank had seen him standing a short time before.
"There it is!" he said, with an apprehensive glance at his captor.
"Where?" thundered Tim; "I don't see it!"