“I hat a tream mit meinselluf der oder night, brofessor,” continued Fritz, coming up from behind, “und you bed my life it vas der keveerest tream vat I know. Iss treams someding or nodding? Tell me dot, oof you blease. Ballard, he say it iss; aber you know more as anypody, so tell me, iss it?”
“Go away,” said the professor severely; “you annoy me.”
“I peen annoyed like anyding mit dot tream,” went on Fritz, not in the least disturbed by the professor’s ill humor. “Dis iss der vay I ged it: Fairst, I valk along der moonlight in, mit der dark around, und I see a shtone mit a gross on der top. Yah, so hellup me, I see him so blain as nodding; und I pull oop dot shtone, und I tig, and vat you dink?”
“I am not interested at all in your foolish delusions!” came tartly from the professor. “If you have business anywhere else, do not let me detain you a moment.”
“Make some guesses aboudt dot!” persisted Fritz. “Vat you dink is der shtone under mit der gross on, hey? Shpeak it oudt.”
The professor, goaded to desperation, merely glared.
“Py shinks!” cried Fritz, “I findt me so mooch goldt dot shtone under mit der gross on dot I cannot carry him avay!” He leaned down and whispered huskily, his eyes wide with excitement: “Puried dreasure it vas, brofessor, so hellup me! Come, blease, und hellup me look for der shtone mit der gross on. Ven I findt me der dreasure, I gif you haluf.”
With an explosion of anger, the professor leaped to his feet, flung his book at Fritz, and dove head-first into a tent. Fritz turned away wonderingly.
“Vat a foolishness,” he muttered, “for der brofessor to gif oop haluf der dreasure like dot! Vell, I go look for der goldt meinselluf, und ven I findt him, I haf him all.”
Now, Fritz might have walked his legs off looking for a stone “mit a gross on,” had not Silva grown tired of hunting a placer and returned suddenly to the Wells. He saw Fritz in close converse with the professor, crept to a point within earshot, and listened. Creeping away as silently as he had approached, he showed his teeth in a smile of savage cunning as he pulled a half-burned stick from the smoldering fire and dogged the Dutchman down the gulch.