"No, sir; that's all I have to spare. It will take you so close to the city that you can easily walk in," said Claus, turning on his heel and starting toward the town they had just left. "You can walk twenty-five miles very easily."
It was right on the point of Casper's tongue to "open out" on Claus, and give him as good as he sent. Wouldn't he have had more dollars in his pocket if he had never met the man who was anxious at all times to play a game of billiards or pool with him, especially on pay-day, when Casper was known to have money in his pocket? But, on thinking the matter over, he decided that he would say nothing about it. Claus was a pretty big man, and there was no knowing what he would do if the boy made him angrier than he was now.
"He is going to be fooled again," said Casper, as he fell in behind Claus, who walked toward the town as if he were in an awful hurry to get there. "What good will it do him to go on to Denver? He can't get the box there, neither can he cheat Julian out of his money. Julian will find any amount of friends there—I never heard of a boy with a hundred thousand dollars in his pocket who could not find somebody to stand by him—and they will tell him what to do. Oh! why did I make so great a mistake! I ought to have started for Denver the moment I got my hands on that box. Well, I got five dollars out of Claus, anyhow."
Casper sauntered along behind Claus, who was walking rapidly, and when he reached the depot he looked all around for his companion, but failed to see him. Claus had gone off somewhere, and Casper was there alone.
CHAPTER XV.
HOW A MINE WAS HAUNTED.
"Well, boys," said Mr. Fay, when they had reached the street and were walking toward their hotel, "I have somehow taken a great interest in you, and I am anxious to see you come out all right. It is the most remarkable thing I ever heard of. You did not know what was in that box when you bought it, did you?"
"No, sir," replied Julian; "it was all sealed up. The auctioneer said something about a miner having hidden the secret of a gold-mine in it, and I bought it for thirty cents."
"The auctioneer happened to hit the matter right on the head. I will go with you in search of a cheaper boarding-house than the one at which you are now stopping, and you had better remain there until Mr. Gibson hears from those people in St. Louis. That will be two weeks, probably. If, at any time, you grow weary of walking about our city, looking at what little there is worth seeing, come down to the office, and we'll sit there and swap a few lies."
Mr. Fay continued to talk in this way while they were walking along the streets, meanwhile turning several corners, and the longer he talked the more the boys saw the traits of his Western character sticking out all over him. He talked like a gentleman, and then spoiled it all by remarking that they would "swap a few lies" when they came around to his office. He had probably been out West so long that he had become accustomed to Western ways of conversation.