"Jim Coville, the forest ranger, is the only man I know of," answered Sam Ellison.
"Where may he be reached?"
"It's a twenty-mile ride to his station."
"I must find him at once. Will you go with me and show me the way? After I get something to eat I will tell you what has occurred."
Dunkan said he would.
While Tad and Ned were eating their belated supper the others sat about—all but Chunky, who decided that he too needed food—and waited with some impatience until Tad was ready to tell them his story.
This he did very shortly afterwards, sketching it briefly up to the time of Smoky Griffin's appearance on the scene.
"You beat anything I ever heard of," growled Sam Ellison.
"What do you make of it, sir?" asked Tad.
"Make of it? Why, Tad, you've turned up one of the biggest sensations this mountain has ever known. Those fellows that you saw shooting into the ground today—or the one you saw doing it—was salting the ground with gold so that when the man they were going to swindle had the soil analyzed it would be found to contain 'pay dirt' in profitable quantities. I wonder who the victim was to be?"