Directly he opened his eyes, one of those strange intuitions that come to us all at times apprised him that all was not well. Gazing about him, the first thing the lad noticed was that the window blind was shoved aside. It had been left that way by Dayton in the invader's hasty exit. With a queer sensation of dread, Nat, broad awake now, sprang from the chair in which he had dozed off, and made for the bed under which the chest had been hidden.
There was nothing there.
With a shout of consternation, the boy staggered back, fairly dazed by the disaster. But Nat was not a boy to remain uselessly thunderstruck for more than a few seconds. Recovering his wits, he instantly realized what must have occurred. Somebody had entered the room by means of the porch roof and stolen the chest.
But who?
As we know, none of the boys had any idea of the close vicinity of Colonel Morello's band. They deemed them, in fact, far from there, in the fastnesses of the Sierras. Nat's first suspicious thought then flashed on the landlord. The man's interest in the chest, his furtive eye and servile manner, all rushed back into the lad's recollection.
He hastily aroused Joe and apprised him of the startling thing that had occurred. Joe, scarcely less taken aback than Nat, was out of bed in an instant. Together the two boys made all speed to the room occupied by Cal and Ding-dong Bell. The mountaineer sprang to his feet with a roar of rage as Nat communicated his dire tidings. He hastily threw on his clothes, and while the rest did the same examined his revolver.
"I've a notion I may have ter use you afore the night is over," he said, addressing the well-worn weapon as if it had been a sentient being.
As soon as they assembled once more—which was within a few minutes—Cal burst out with:
"I'll bet the hole in a doughnut that this here robbery has something to do with that crackling we heard in the chaparral this afternoon. I was pretty sure then that the noise was made by some coyote a-listenin' to our talk. I'm sure of it now. Whoever it was—and I suspect it was one of that Morello crowd—they heard enough to put them wise to the fact that we had the sapphires and meant to stop in Santa Inez ter-night. Ther rest was easy for them."
"But it would not have been had it not been for my neglect of my duty in going to sleep," said Nat bitterly. "It's all my fault. I ought to be——"