“All.”
“What is it?”
“Gold.”
“Wal, you’re right—no use denyin’ that—but, how do you know it, Hammond? That’s what I’d like to know.”
“Why, my dear fellow, I know that you and two comrades have taken up your head-quarters down the cañon; I know also that there is gold here. All that remains for me to do, is to put this and that together.”
“Wal, you ain’t nobody’s fool,” returned the trapper, after a moment’s pause, “but I don’t know, arter all, but what a fool could have told that. Ain’t you huntin’ arter gold?—now, honest—no foolin’.”
“No, sir,” was the response.
“Why ain’t yer?”
Hammond laughed quite heartily before he answered: