“Yes, sir, I’ll be very careful,” said Esau, “and I am looking out well.”
“For the gold,” said Mr Raydon, in an undertone, which words I caught, as he went on picking and throwing out smaller stones, then washing the basket round again and again, and the more he worked, the more his countenance seemed to change, till it looked older and more careworn than I had ever seen it before.
I knew that there were a few scales and beads of gold, for I had seen them glisten in the sunshine as he rapidly moved the basket but directly after I felt horribly disappointed, for he set it right down in the water, the weight of stones within it keeping it at the bottom, and splashed toward me.
“Here,” he said roughly, “give me the shovel.”
I gave it into his hand, and he waded half across to where there was an eddy behind a huge mass of rock, and bending down here, he scraped away the stones and sand, as if trying to make a hole, discolouring the water right along the stream. Then, forcing the shovel down as far as he could drive it, he brought up a dripping quantity of sand and small gravel, placed it in the basket, returned for another shovelful, and placed it with the other before handing the shovel to me.
“If there is much gold,” he said, “it would lie at the bottom of that eddy, where it would be swept when the stream is in flood. Now, then, we shall see.”
For another ten minutes he went on washing again, while I could see Esau, as he crept nearer and nearer, perspiring with impatience, and glancing up and down what in the setting sun now seemed to be a golden valley, for water, rocks, and the ferns seemed to be tinted of a ruddy yellow, and the tall fir-trees stood up like spires of gold.
At last I caught a glimpse of something bright again, but I could not be sure that there was more gold in the basket; it might only be the stones glistening in the wonderful ruddy light that filled the ravine.
“Hah!” ejaculated Mr Raydon, and he once more set down the basket beneath the water. “Hard work. What trouble men take to get gold!”
“There is some in the basket, isn’t there, sir?” I said anxiously, and in no wise prepared for the result.