"Have you, as Joe said, been trailing me all the way from the coast?"
"Yes," he confessed. "But meaning no harm at all—purely legitimate, Doctor, purely legitimate!" His voice trailed away.
"Well I'm damned!" said Ralph. There was a silence while he smoked. "What was your purpose?" he finally demanded to know.
"It's such an improbable story I didn't dare tell you," said Stack. "And I haven't any proof of it."
"You tell me and I'll decide as to the proof," said Ralph.
Stack took a breath and began with renewed glibness: "I'm a newspaper reporter—Pacific Herald. The city editor was told you had made a big new strike up here, and he sent me to follow you in, and get the first story of it for the Herald. I had to do what I was told," he whined, "or lose my job. You can't blame me——!"
"Who told him about me?" asked Ralph astonished.
"Don't ask me," said Stack. "I've heard they have the assay office watched. I don't know."
It was obvious to Ralph from the man's silky, fawning voice that he was lying still. His gorge rose. Evidently the truth had to be terrified out of such a creature. They were sitting beside the last faint embers of the fire. Ralph shot out his hand and gripped Stack by the collar. A faint, gasping cry escaped the little man, and he went limp in Ralph's grasp.
"I have my revolver in the other hand," Ralph said in a rasping voice. "The truth now, or I'll crack your skull with it! It was you who watched the assay office."