“Did you hear or see anything of him during the night?”
“No—I slept too sound.”
“Is anything else taken?” asked Joe. “The bag of dust——”
“Is safe. It’s only the nugget that’s gone.”
The loss was quickly noised about the camp. Such an incident was of common interest. Miners lived so much in common—their property was necessarily left so unguarded—that theft was something more than misdemeanor or light offense. Stern was the justice which overtook the thief in those days. It was necessary, perhaps, for it was a primitive state of society, and the code which in established communities was a safeguard did not extend its protection here.
Suspicion fell upon Hogan at once. No one of the miners remembered to have seen him since rising.
“Did any one see him last night?” asked Joe.
Kellogg answered.
“I saw him near your tent,” he said. “I did not think anything of it. Perhaps if I had been less sleepy I should have been more likely to suspect that his design was not a good one.”
“About what hour was this?”