Twenty times they went over the tragedy of the old cabin; twenty times they weighed the half-pound of precious little lumps in the palms of their hands, and bit by bit they built up that life romance of the days of long ago, when all this wilderness was still an unopened book to the white man.

And that story seemed very clear to them now.

These men had been prospectors.

They had discovered gold.

Afterward they had quarreled, probably over some division of it--perhaps over the ownership of the very nuggets they had found; and then, in the heat of their anger, had followed the knife battle.
But where had they discovered the gold?
That was the question of supreme interest to the hunters, and they debated it until midnight.