"Work us to death and then come back and give us the laugh! Where you been at ?" "Center City," confessed Harry cheerily.
"And you knew all the time ?" Mother Howard wagged a finger under his nose.
"Well," and the Cornishman chuckled, "I did n't 'ave any money.

I 'ad to get that shaft unwatered, did n't I ?" "Get a rail!" Another irate--but laughing--pumpman had come forward.
"Think you can pull that on us?
Get a rail!" Some one seized a small, dead pine which lay on the ground near by.
Others helped to strip it of the scraggly limbs which still clung to it.

Harry watched them and chuckled--for he knew that in none was there malice.

He had played his joke and won.

It was their turn now.
Shouting in mock anger, calling for all dire things, from lynchings on down to burnings at the stake, they dragged Harry to the pine tree, threw him astraddle of it, then, with willing hands volunteering on every side, hoisted the tree high above them and started down the mountain side, Sam Herbenfelder trotting in the rear and forgetting his anger in the joyful knowledge that his ring at last was safe.
Behind the throng of men with their mock threats trailed the women and children, some throwing pine cones at the booming Harry, juggling himself on the narrow pole; and in the crowd, Fairchild found some one he could watch with more than ordinary interest,--Anita Richmond, trudging along with the rest, apparently remonstrating with the sullen, mean-visaged young man at her side.