Like a miner who has found the gold for which, for years, he has been
searching, he arose, with the tiny fragments in his hand, to look at
them with greedy eyes, in a more comfortable, upright posture. His face
had very plainly paled and in his eyes was an expression of such
avaricious eagerness and satisfaction as she had never seen before upon
a human countenance.

Before he made a sound she knew that he had found that thing for which
he had been seeking. His grizzled countenance, intent as any alchemist's
of old upon his search, and, as its absorption grew, continually less a
pleasant face to contemplate, now twisted, suddenly, into an expression
of incredulous joy. He took the fragment he had been examining in both
his hands and held it close before his eyes. Then he made a minute
search of it with his little magnifying glass. Then he fell upon his
knees, and, with his clawlike fingers, scraped more earth from the rock
whence he had chipped it.

Satisfied by what he saw there, after he had done this, he rose with a
new expression on his face--so crafty, so exultant, and, withal, so
evil, that Madge involuntarily shrank back to better screening in her
leafy hiding place.

The old man, with sweeping movements of his heavily booted feet, swept
the thin earth he had scraped from the rock's surface back into its
place, thrust the fragments deep into his pocket, and started hurriedly
away, plainly greatly pleased, along the trail which led into the
valley. She watched him with a beating heart, much puzzled.

What could it be that he had found, there, on her land? Visions of gold