"Nothin'; that's why I ask." The man had also become interested in the flotsam of the beach, and had stopped to pick up a dam-shell which he shied into the surf. Then he added slowly, and as if not to make a point of the inquiry, "Is she alive?"
"Yes. Here this week. Lives up in Warehold in that big house with the brick gate-posts."
The man walked on for some time in silence and then asked:
"You're sure the child is livin' and that the mother's name is Jane?"
"Sure? Don't I tell ye Cobden's in the crew and Miss Jane was here this week! He's up the beach on patrol or you'd 'a' seen him when you fust struck the Station."
The stranger quickened his steps. The information seemed to have put new life into him again.
"Did you ever hear of a man named Bart Holt," he asked, "who used to be 'round here?" Neither man was looking at the other as they talked. The conversation was merely to pass the time of day.
"Yes; he's the captain's son. Been dead for years. Died some'er's out in Brazil, so I've heard my father say. Had fever or something."
The Swede walked on in silence for some minutes. Then he stopped, faced Tod, took hold of the lapel of his coat, and said slowly, as he peered into his eyes:
"He ain't dead, no more'n you and I be. I worked for him for two years. He run the mines on a percentage. I got here last week, and he sent me down to find out how the land lay. If the woman was dead I was to say nothing and come back. If she was alive I was to tell the captain, his father, where a letter could reach him. They had some bad blood 'twixt 'em, but he didn't tell me what it was about. He may come home here to live, or he may go back to the mines; it's just how the old man takes it. That's what I've got to say to him. How do you think he'll take it?"