"Course I'd like to see it."
"Well, come along tomorrow afternoon. Meet me here 'bout two. Don't say nothin' to nobody," he added still lower. "We don't want to get overrun before we've recorded."
The Boy could have hugged that mackinaw man.
Outside it was broad day, but still the Gold Nugget lights were flaring and the pianola played.
They had learned from the bartender where to find Blandford Keith—"In the worst-looking shack in the camp." But "It looks good to me," said the Boy, as they went in and startled Keith out of his first sleep. The man that brings you letters before the ice goes out is your friend. Keith helped them to bring in their stuff, and was distinctly troubled because the travellers wouldn't take his bunk. They borrowed some dry blankets and went to sleep on the floor.
It was after two when they woke in a panic, lest the mackinaw man should have gone without them. While the Colonel got breakfast the Boy dashed round to the Gold Nugget, found Si McGinty playing craps, and would have brought him back in triumph to breakfast—but no, he would "wait down yonder below the Gold Nugget, and don't you say nothin' yit about where we're goin', or we'll have the hull town at our heels."
About twelve miles "back in the mountains" is a little gulch that makes into a big one at right angles.
"That's the pup where my claim is."
"The what?"
"Little creek; call 'em pups here."