"Have you seen anything of that strange man while we've been gone?" she asked him.

To her relief José shook his head. "No."

"Everything all right?"

This time José shook his head more emphatically. "Ah--there was much trouble at the mine today." With many excited gestures he went on to tell her that one of the loaded tram-cars had got loose and had crashed down the mountain side, tearing up the track and causing much trouble. "Very much trouble," he repeated, shaking his head.

"What caused the car to break loose?"

José shrugged his shoulders expressively. "That I do not know. Me no _sabe_. Señor Eldridge say he no understand."

All at once the thought flashed into her mind that perhaps the smuggler was at the bottom of this accident. Maybe that was his way of getting even. 

CHAPTER XVI 
DOWN THE MINE SHAFT

The next three days were busy ones for the girls. Miss Prudence had bought scores of yards of gay-colored cretonnes and other materials, and she now set all three to work making couch and pillow covers and draperies.

"I've got to have draperies to hide the iron bars at the bedroom windows," she had said. "I don't like to see those iron bars. They make me feel as if I'm in prison."

When she escorted the girls to her bedroom and showed them the heaps of materials, Jo Ann remarked with a whimsical smile, "I didn't realize what I was getting us into when I suggested brightening up this house with draperies and cushions. It looks as if we'll be running the sewing machine instead of Jitters for the next week or two."

Florence and Peggy both laughed. They knew Jo Ann did not like any task that kept her in the house, and especially one of the sitting-still kind, like sewing.

"'Outdoor action and plenty of it,' is Jo Ann's slogan," Peggy explained a moment later for Miss Prudence's benefit. "She says sitting still and sewing make all her muscles feel cramped and her head ache and her mind tired."

"Well, it does," Jo Ann defended. "I feel as if I'm getting petrified. I'd rather climb mountains any time."

"I'll let you run the machine, then," Miss Prudence spoke up briskly. "That'll keep your 

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