Polly nodded eagerly but said nothing to interrupt him.
“Well, we remained longer than we had planned when we left Pebbly Pit. The friends in New York were so eager to entertain us before we went back home, that the days passed swiftly before we realized we had stayed on ten days longer than we should have done at that time.
“Now to go back to the time when those two rascals tried to jump your claim, the time your father and Mike guided the party when you-all climbed the Indian Trail to Grizzly Slide.
“It seems that crafty clerk who had copied the rough map of the claim you staked on Flat Top and filed in Oak Creek, never gave up hope of some day getting his hands on enough of that gold to help him get away and live comfortably, ever after, on the proceeds.
“When he learned that everyone of the family at Pebbly Pit, would be East for a few weeks, and the mine would be left in charge of Mike and the other employees, he immediately called a few cut-throats together and laid his plans accordingly.
“After the discovery of his perfidy in copying the claim papers and then trying to jump the staked claim, he had been discharged from the office in Oak Creek and, thereafter, no one respectable would employ him. So he hung about the saloon and spent his time in gambling with the miners from Up-Crest, back of Oak Creek station. He found willing confederates in this group of Slavs who hailed the invitation to steal enough gold to enable them to go back to Europe and pose as rich men.
“The whole plot had been kept unusually secret for that species of foreigner, so no one at Oak Creek knew of the proposed raid. But Mike rode into Oak Creek the morning before the night these rascals planned to act, and with his unusual gift of intuition, he felt that something was working quietly in the minds of the evil-looking men he found whispering over a small table in one corner of the saloon.
“Mike hung around for several hours to try and learn if any plot was hatching against Rainbow Cliffs while the owners were absent; or perhaps these men planned a rush on the mine while he and but few men were on guard. But nothing could be discovered. Feeling assured because of the sly and malicious expressions of the men at the table when they glanced at Mike, as he sat in another corner and pretended to doze, that Hank had some move under way to trouble him and his assistants, made the Indian use splendid judgment and action that day.
“He borrowed the Sheriff’s thoroughbred bloodhound, and asked for a few extra men to accompany him to the cave and stay there until the owners returned, promising them better wages than they could earn at any work in Oak Creek, or on the ranches nearby. To allay suspicion he rode out of town, alone, but he had agreed to wait at Pine Tree Blaze for the extra men.
“The men rode away from town each at a different time, to avoid talk or notice by the loungers at the saloon, and all met at the rendezvous that afternoon. Mike then led the way up the steep trail, and by dark they were in camp.