He cautiously unclosed his hand, and proffered the wonderful stone to Never Never Dave, who examined it keenly, then passed it on to his next neighbour without a word, eyeing Emu Bill reproachfully the while. Strangely enough, no one seemed to appreciate Emu's find but himself; but he smiled and chuckled enough for them all. The last man to examine the specimen was Mackay; he was the latest arrival, having been down below, timbering the tunnel in the shaft which had given way so inopportunely, when the great news reached him.
"An' what's this ye've got, Bill?" he said, receiving the fateful fragment from old Dead Broke Dan, who sighed deeply as he handed it over. "What is it you're playin' at?" he demanded, after a first cursory glance.
"It's all straight, Mac," broke in Bill, eagerly. "It's a fair sample, an' there' lots more o' it, too."
Mackay eyed the speaker with fast-rising disgust. "Dae you ken, Emu," said he, slowly, "if it werena for the fact that I got a' the wind squelched oot o' me the day, I would lay violent hands on ye for puttin' up such a meeserable joke on your friends."
Poor Emu Bill looked dazed. "Why, what's wrong wi' the gold?" he asked feebly. "Surely you ain't goin' to tell me I doesn't know gold from iron pyrites——"
"Poor old Emu must ha' got a touch o' the sun to-day," grunted Never Never, sympathetically.
With a snort of indignation, Bill clutched back his specimen from Mackay, gave one glance at it, then subsided in the sand.
"You're right, boys," he announced from his lowly position in weary dejected tones; "I'm as mad as a hatter."
Not a trace of the yellow metal showed in the stone he now held in his hand.
"I would ha' sworn I saw gold in that stuff," he continued pathetically. "No, no, Emu Bill's finished. Crack me on the head, boys, for Heaven's sake, an' bury me quick."