“Well, but if you go, who is to buy our gold-dust?”
“The Christian merchants,” said Isaac, with an indifferent air.
“But they are such Jews,” cried Jem, inadvertently. “I mean—I mean——” And rough as he was, he looked as if he could have bitten his tongue off.
“I know what you mean,” said Isaac, sadly. He added: “Such as they are, they are all you have now. The old Jew was hunted and hooted and insulted in this place yesterday; here then he trades no more; those who set no value on him can of course supply his place.”
“The blackguards,” cried Jem, “the ruffians, I wish I had seen them. Come, Mr. Levi, that was not the mine; that was only the riffraff; you might forgive us that.”
“I never forgive,” was the calm reply.
CHAPTER LXVIII.
A TREMENDOUS snow-storm fell upon the mine and drove Jem into his tent, where he was soon after joined by Jacky, a circumstance in itself sufficient to prove the violence of the storm, for Jacky loathed indoors, it choked him a good deal.
The more was Jem surprised when he heard a lamentable howl coming nearer and nearer, and a woman burst into his tent, a mere pillar of snow, for she was covered with a thousand flakes each as big as a lady's hand.