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Updated: June 17, 2025
"Are you unhurt?" asked Fred anxiously. "Yes, and overjoyed to see you. How came you here?" "We followed the nigger from Oreville." What happened afterwards Rodney did not need to inquire, for the two outstretched figures, stiffening in death, revealed it to him. "They are the Dixon brothers, are they not?" asked Fred, turning to Caesar. "Yes, massa."
Luke and Ernest were not dead broke, but were near it. They had less than forty dollars between them, and they had already found out that living was high in California. They remained but a day in San Francisco, and then started for Oreville with Mr. Ashton. The two friends knew nothing of mining, but as practised in those early days it took very little time to learn.
He was getting tired of Oreville, but wanted to secure some additional money before he left it. The problem was whom to make his second victim. It would not have occurred to him to rob Jefferson Pettigrew, of whom he stood in wholesome fear, but for the admission that he was an unusually sound sleeper; even then he would have felt uncertain whether it would pay.
"Look here, young feller, you're gettin' too independent! I've a great mind to leave you tonight." "You can do so if you want to," said Rodney indifferently. "Then I will!" retorted Gordon angrily, bringing down his fist upon the table in vigorous emphasis. Oreville was fifty miles from Helena, and that was the nearest point, as he supposed, where a new cook could be obtained.
"Did it pay you well?" "I was very well paid for a boy. When I left Oreville I was worth a thousand dollars." "That is well, but it is only a drop in the bucket compared with the fortune you are entitled to." "Now held by Mr. Stephen Ray?" "Yes; he will be surprised to see you here in the East." "He has seen me," said Ernest, quickly. "What!" exclaimed the lawyer. "You have not called upon him?"
Well, you have no boy to deal with." "I know that very well," confessed Burns. "How long have you been in Oreville?" "I only came this morning." "You have improved your time," said Luke, dryly. "You have stolen a gold watch, besides making this attempt at robbery." Tom Burns could not deny it, though he was surprised at Luke's knowledge. He did not reply.
In order not to excite suspicion he retraced his steps to the apartment used by his captors as a common sitting room carefully fixing in his mind the location of the gold ore. We must now follow the messenger who had gone to Oreville with a letter from Rodney's captors.
It was about ten minutes of twelve when Tom Burns, leaving his place of concealment, walked with eager steps towards the mining settlement. The one street was not illuminated, for Oreville had not got along as far as that. The moon gave an indistinct light, relieving the night of a part of its gloom. Burns looked from one cabin to another with a wistful glance.
There was a time, and that not long before, when they would have revealed nothing to Rodney, but since his residence at Oreville he had more than once visited the mines and made himself familiar with surface indications of mineral deposit. He stopped short and scanned attentively the walls of the passage.
"Well, I forgive you. Our acquaintance was brief and you judged from superficial impressions." "Perhaps so, Mr. Wheeler. Have you ever been West before?" "No." "When you came to Oreville had you any idea that I was here?" "No; if I had probably I should not have struck the town, as I knew that you didn't have a favorable opinion of me."
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