He would never live to see it. His arms were numb. He must soon let go
and fall to his doom.

He heard voices but was too spent to call out. As a crowd of men came
running over the hill, his arms were slipping - slipping. It was almost
broad day.

He made one last, herculean effort to hold fast, turning his head over
his shoulder to glance into the deathtrap below and - just as his
repentant rescuers reached him, he gave a disgusted snort and fell -
three feet to the bottom of the hole!

In the darkness he had safely passed the Rosenhammer shaft and had
fallen into the six-feet-deep prospect hole of his own claim.

Two days later, Charlie married the Widow Schmitt



"Rattlesnake Dick"

IV

"Again swings the lash on the high mountain trail,
And the pipe of the packer is scenting the gale;
For the trails are all open, the roads are all free,
And the highwayman's whistle is heard on the lea."

- Bret Harte.