The Spoilers

by Rex Beach

Copyright, 1905, by Rex E. Beach.
——
All rights reserved.
Published April, 1906.

THIS BOOK
IS LOVINGLY DEDICATED TO
MY MOTHER

CONTENTS

CHAP.		PAGE
[I.]	The Encounter	[1]
[II.]	The Stowaway	[13]
[III.]	In Which Glenister Errs	[22]
[IV.]	The Killing	[33]
[V.]	Wherein a Man Appears	[48]
[VI.]	And a Mine is Jumped	[59]
[VII.]	The “Bronco Kid’s” Eavesdropping	[68]
[VIII.]	Dextry Makes a Call	[80]
[IX.]	Sluice Robbers	[94]
[X.]	The Wit of an Adventuress	[107]
[XI.]	Wherein a Writ and a Riot Fail	[120]
[XII.]	Counterplots	[132]
[XIII.]	In Which a Man is Possessed of a Devil	[149]
[XIV.]	A Midnight Messenger	[168]
[XV.]	Vigilantes	[183]
[XVI.]	In Which the Truth Begins to Bare Itself	[201]
[XVII.]	The Drip of Water in the Dark	[218]
[XVIII.]	Wherein a Trap is Baited	[236]
[XIX.]	Dynamite	[249]
[XX.]	In Which Three Go to the Sign of the Sled and but Two Return	[268]
[XXI.]	The Hammer-Lock	[285]
[XXII.]	The Promise of Dreams	[300]

THE SPOILERS

CHAPTER I
THE ENCOUNTER

GLENISTER gazed out over the harbor, agleam with the lights of anchored ships, then up at the crenelated mountains, black against the sky. He drank the cool air burdened with its taints of the sea, while the blood of his boyhood leaped within him.

“Oh, it’s fine—fine,” he murmured, “and this is my country—my country, after all, Dex. It’s in my veins, this hunger for the North. I grow. I expand.”

“Careful you don’t bust,” warned Dextry. “I’ve seen men get plumb drunk on mountain air. Don’t expand too strong in one spot.” He went back abruptly to his pipe, its villanous fumes promptly averting any danger of the air’s too tonic quality.