"I know the man who took it. I'd swear to him in a thousand. If it means hanging them, I'll——"
One of the men, clear enough to miss the point of the joke at which his companions were laughing so heartily, interrupted to ask—
"Took what?"
"Took what? Why, the gold," Leary answered fiercely.
The words killed the laughter as water kills fire, and where a moment before the faces of the men were wrinkled with their amusement, the lines disappeared as the mouths went stern, and the flush of gaiety gave way to the pallor of fear.
"The gold?" they gasped.
"Yes, the gold," Leary shouted. "We brought it here for safety while the last game was on, and it was here they came for it, tying me up the same as you found me, and——"
"Who were they?" a man called out.
"The three who took the bets and another I've never seen."
With a shout of rage and a storm of words the men rushed from the cottage, back to the Rest, spreading the story as they went, that there had been thieves in the camp—thieves who had tried to fleece them, and, having failed in that, had robbed them instead.