He noted the positions of the two sleepers—Meyer making weird music with his open mouth as he lay on his back thoroughly tired out.
Insinuating himself into the tent on all fours, he crept over to the center pole, and slipped Prawle’s jacket off the nail from which it hung.
With that in his possession he made his escape from the tent.
Outside he thrust his fingers into the pockets, one after another, and extricated a new pocketbook Gideon had bought to replace the old one stolen from him.
This he opened, took out a small wad of bills, which he thrust into some crevice of his loose garments, then, with the pocketbook in his hand, he started off in the direction of the trail leading to Rocky Gulch.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE LITTLE SCHEME WHICH FAILED.
The one main street of Rocky Gulch was lit up from end to end by the numerous kerosene lamps which burned in the saloons and other buildings lining the right-hand side of the thoroughfare.
Every drinking place had its crowd of patrons, attracted by various devices, such as a wheezy piano played by an indifferent performer, an asthmatic flute, from which uncertain notes floated out on the night air, or a squeaky violin in the hands of a poor musician.
The miners of Rocky Gulch, however, were not particular to a shade.