"What if some one comes now?"
"No one is coming."
"But if some one should?"
"All the more reason for getting our work done with speed. Once we've connected the magneto and fired the blast our whole job will be done."
Josh, only half-convinced, drew a revolver and cocked the weapon.
"Now, be mighty careful!" snarled Dolph. "Don't get rattled and shoot at any shadows! A shot might spoil our plans tonight, for it would bring men tumbling out this way as soon as they could get out of their bunks and into some clothes. Give me that pistol!"
Josh, hesitating, obeyed, whereupon Dolph Gage let down the hammer noiselessly, next dropping the weapon into a pocket of his own badly-frayed overcoat.
"Now, get the magneto back, as I told you. I'll take care of the wires and see that they don't snap or get tangled."
This latter part of the work was quickly executed. Dolph deftly attached the wires to the magneto, then seized the handle, prepared to pump.
"All ready, now!" he whispered gleefully. "Two or three pumps, and damage will be done that it would cost at least fifteen thousand dollars' worth of material and labor to remedy. The kid engineers haven't the money and can't raise it. They'll have to give up—-be driven out. Then we'll send our own man, who has his mineral rights, in here to take possession, and the mine will be ours once more—-as it always has been by rights."