Frank looked, and saw that it bore the words:
"Of course, all the plainsmen must stop here," continued Leon. "We'll hang around for a day or two until we make the acquaintance of some of them, and perhaps they will tell us all we want to know. Let's go in."
Frank followed his cousin through the door, and found himself in the principal room of the hotel, which did duty as a parlor, office, and bar.
Every chair and bench was occupied, and there was a crowd of men about the counter who were talking loudly.
They were all rough-looking fellows, and Frank trembled when he saw that some of them wore revolvers and knives strapped about their waists.
These were mainly gold-hunters, who had just returned from the mountains. They had become so accustomed to wearing their weapons while they were in the mines that they did not think to take them off, even though they were among civilized people.
The room was dingy and smoky, and reminded Frank of the sailors' boarding-houses into which he had often glanced as he passed along the wharves of Boston.
The boys' first impulse, after they had run their eyes about the apartment and taken a good look at its occupants, was to open the door and go out again; but, before they could act upon it, the proprietor of the hotel, who had seen them enter, came briskly out from behind the bar and approached them.
He was as roughly dressed as any of his guests, and looked so fierce that, when he reached out his hand for Leon's valise, the boy surrendered it at once.