“I am sorry I did not think of a looking-glass,” said Hume, “but I must confess I was not in a state to pick and choose carefully.”
“You did well,” said Webster heartily; “though it was a pity you forgot my razor, both for me and yourself. By-the-way, why did you burden yourself with that small crowbar?”
Hume looked a little confused. “Well,” he said, after a pause, “I thought that if we did find this—this infernal rock—the crowbar would be of use.”
“Of course,” replied Webster gravely; “of course. Let me see, what would be the value of fifty pounds of raw gold?”
“Close on 3,000 pounds.”
“Is that all. Lord love you! and has it not struck you that we could never get away with fifty pounds weight of dead metal about each of us? So that if there is a ton of gold it would not be worth to us more than the little we could carry away.”
They looked at each other blankly.
“We could hide a great quantity away, to be recovered on another journey.”
“Gentlemen, may I remind you of Mrs Glass’s advice to catch your hare before you cook him?”
“Now we’ve lost our bearings again,” said Webster, “and just, too, when we’d almost put into port and got the precious cargo on board, though by the same token the breadth of our backs is the only space at the disposal of our supercargo.”