"No, not quite. More like what you feel when a frock won't fit you, Lilla."
"So! I understand: well, wherefore are you sulky?"
"I can't sell my freight at my price. Just think what rough luck it was for me that Bacon Brown got in so soon after me. And after bringing the stuff so far and at such a cost too!" and again for a moment the colonel's face looked white and drawn in the lamp light.
The Frazer river trail was a bad one, but once its perils were passed there seemed to be no reason why an old packer should turn pale at the mere memory of them.
"Ach, sacrifice!" cried the girl. "You sell your bacon a dollar a pound, and you call that sacrifice. Have you no shame?"
"All very well for you, Lilla. You are a girl who owns a gold-mine; I'm only a poor packer. By the way, have you done anything more about Pete's Creek since last season?"
"No, but I think I'll do something soon."
"Better send me to find it for you, Lilla, before someone else gets hold of it, and give me a share in it for my work. I'll take you, and you keep the creek. How will that do?"
"And what do I become—ach, I mean what shall I get for my share?"
Her partner laid his hand upon his heart and made her his most impressive bow, but the girl only burst out laughing merrily. Perhaps the noise and bright lights of a dance-house are unfavourable to sentiment.