“Never mind, sir; you get them as has, and we’ll turn out such an output of tin to grass as’ll make some of the clever ones shake their heads.”
“More copper,” said Geoffrey, picking up a piece of stone.
“Yes, sir, a bit by chance; but I don’t think there’s much. This pit was sunk for tin.”
“Copper pays better than tin,” said Geoffrey, as he went on from spot to spot. “You don’t think any of this stuff was brought here from anywhere else?”
“Oh, dear, no, sir.”
“Not thrown down to make the pit seem more valuable than it is? Such tricks have been played.”
“Oh, no, sir. Besides, I wouldn’t begin till she’d been pumped out, and some more stuff got up to try her.”
“No,” said Geoffrey, “of course not;” and he went on with his examination, finding nothing to cause him great elation, but enough to make him soberly sensible that there was a modest career of success for the mine, if properly worked.
Who was to find the money, and give him the charge?
That was the problem he had to solve, and as he returned the hammer to Pengelly, and walked slowly back, he wondered whether he should be fortunate enough to find any one with a sufficiency of the speculative element in him to venture.