In another part of the cave, separated from the main room partly by natural and partly by artificial means, was a kind of magazine, where powder, lead and arms were kept.  To this the men had access at any time, and always resorted when in need of weapons or ammunition.  With this brief explanation, the reader will be able to understand how things were managed by this band of freebooters, as, also, some of the succeeding portions of this story.

As we said, Bill left the cave and went out to see Dick, who was stationed along the passage-way in the bank of the stream, to impart to him the success of their operations thus far, and to finish the details of some of their arrangements for the future.  The two worthies remained in conversation some two or three hours awaiting the return of the sentinel; and then Bill, becoming impatient, left the cave in Dick’s care, and hastened away to get his key made.  A portion of their conversation while together will be given hereafter, when a third party will be introduced as a listener; a party who at once became most deeply interested in their plans, and caught every word with the greatest eagerness, and with such emotions as may be supposed to agitate a human bosom only in cases where life and death are pending in the balances.

Will the contest be villain for villain? and life against life?  We shall see!  What, in the meantime, will become of the so recently hopeful Eveline?  Will she be lost in the strife where murderer wages war against his brother murderer?  Let us not anticipate.

Before proceeding with the direct thread of our narrative, we will again glance at the action of the “Anti-Horse-Thief League,” organized, as already intimated, to put down the bold land-pirates, whose depredations upon property had become so unbearable the honest portion of community had no alternative left but to “become a law unto themselves,” and by direct and combined action clear the country of the host of desperadoes with which it had become infested and overrun.  Many of our aged readers will remember those exciting times; perhaps some of them can call to mind the very hour when they were forced to take their rifles in hand and go forth to defend their property.

On the very night that Bill and Dick made their ineffectual attempt on ‘Squire Williams’ horses, two others of the “Horse Thief League,” as the gang of thieves were christened by the honest portion of community, went on a similar excursion into a different neighborhood, some five or six miles away, and met with a still warmer reception from the farmer whose stock they endeavored to remove without his consent, than did Bill and Dick in their attempt; for one of them was so badly wounded as to be scarcely able, with the assistance of his companion, to get away from the field and to his own home.  Next day it was rumored that such a neighbor was badly wounded, and it was very doubtful if he recovered.  Of course