"Dynamite! What was the last thing you did?"
"Stoked up and sent Calixto to call Caliban while I came for you. Luckily for him that I did."
The charcoal piles were also leveled and spread over half an acre, and, walking to and fro, Seyd began to pick up and break the larger pieces. And it was only a few minutes before he called out: "Look here! Stick dynamite, broken in two and gummed over with charcoal dust--a bushel of it right here."
"Do you suppose--" Billy glanced toward the peons, who stood close by.
Seyd shook his head. "No, they had nothing to gain by it, and everything to lose. It was the easiest thing in the world for anybody to steal into the woods at night and slip a ton of this into the charcoal piles."
"Man, why didn't we think of it?" Billy groaned.
In moments of stress no two natures will express themselves in quite the same way. As they stood looking gloomily over the wreck big tears slowly forced themselves out of Billy's inflamed eyes and washed white runnels down the soot. Heartbroken, he looked up in sudden fright as Seyd burst out laughing.
"Bob! Bob!" he pleaded. "Have you gone crazy? Get a grip on yourself, there's a good fellow!"
But his pathetic anxiety merely caused Seyd to laugh the more. It was not that he was hysterical. Somehow the thought of the pain and travail, trouble, anxiety, and discomforts they had endured during the past three months touched his sense of humor.
"We have to allow that they made a pretty clean job," he said, wiping his eyes. "Let's be thankful that you were out of the way."
"Where are you going?" Billy called out, as he began to walk away.
"To finish my sleep and catch up a few hours on all that I have lost in the last three months. Take a nap yourself."
He undoubtedly thought so, yet when Seyd came out again, having slept the clock round, it was to find Billy curled up and snoring hard under the shade of the palm mat that Caliban had stretched between him and the sun. "Quit your fooling," he broke in severely on Seyd's chaffing. "Don't you know that we are down to our last dollar?"
"Thirty-three dollars and sixty cents Mex," Seyd gravely corrected. Kicking a chunk of cooled matte, he added: "But we now have this. It ought to stake us for a new start."