"What are you snooping around here for?" he demanded hotly. "Who are you, anyway?"
He tried to turn the other's face upward. The stranger was strong and wiry; he kept his countenance hidden very effectively. Wolfe rose, seized the man by his collar and jerked him to his feet.
"I'll see you, all right," he growled.
The stranger wheeled with all the quickness of a cat, and struck Wolfe in the chest, staggering him. Wolfe loosed his hold on the man's collar, and struck out hard. His fist met only the air. The unknown turned and ran through the deep snow and into the denser shadows of the woodland, leaving the shotgun lying under the oak. Wolfe followed and caught the fellow by his ragged coat; there was a tearing sound, and something that jingled musically dropped to the snow.
The stranger, seeming spurred by a sudden frenzy of fear, doubled his efforts, ran into a thick copse of underbrush—and escaped.
When Little Buck Wolfe picked up the thing that had dropped with a musical jingle from inside the lining of the mysterious person's coat, he was filled with amazement. It was a canvas bag containing more than twenty-four hundred dollars in banknotes, gold and silver.
The robber who had dynamited the Unaka Lumber Company's safe on the night of the fire had just slipped through his fingers!
XXI
Wolfe groveled in the deep snow for the old-fashioned shotgun his antagonist in the struggle of a few minutes before had lost. He found the long muzzle-loader, and hastened to the cabin's front door. Tot let him in, and he told her of his little adventure. They sat down before the wood fire, and counted the money.