So this business was settled. Robert Palmer, governed by kindly feeling rather than hard sense, overlooked his friend's weakness for speculation, rather counting it as honesty.
CHAPTER VIII
"Bed-Bug Brown," Detective
When Mat Bailey drove the stage out of Graniteville the next morning, John Keeler and "Bed-bug Brown" were the only passengers. Brown had spent the previous evening learning all that he could about Mamie Slocum and her young admirers. He had actually learned that a young man from Nevada City who signed himself J. C. P. Collins had paid her attentions. He had also discovered that the young school-teacher had more than once expressed much admiration for Mat Bailey. In view of what Henry Francis had told him of Mat's reflections on the school-teacher, Brown resolved, quietly and of his own accord, to keep an eye upon Mat as well as upon Mamie.
The little man was unusually quiet, revolving various theories in his head, and contemplating the magnificence of the ten thousand dollar reward. But the presence of John Keeler, Cummins' old partner, suggested the wisdom of gleaning information from this source. So, in order to impress Keeler with his seniority and larger experience, he began:
"You don't remember, I suppose, Mr. Keeler, when camels were introduced here in the gold fields?"
"No, that was before my time."
"It was back in fifty-six, before the water-ditch companies had fairly got started. It was as dry as Sahara on these mountains then, and it is no wonder somebody thought of camels."
"Well, when you think of our ostrich farms, camels don't seem out of place in California. Did you ever think, Mr. Brown, what extremes of climate we have right here in Nevada County? Along about the tenth of December they are cutting ice up in the Sierras while they are picking oranges in the western end of the county."