“I’ve got a bit in a bag; but, you see, it costs all you can scrape together to live wherever I’ve been; so I thought I’d look you two up, as my mates had gone, so as to be company for a poor little lonely chap. Will you have me?”
“Of course.”
“Any chance of picking up a decent claim here?”
“Plenty, such as we have,” replied Dallas. “You’ll be able to do as well as we’ve done, and the others about here.”
“That means the lumps of gold are not too big to lift?”
“That’s it,” said Dallas. “I’ve been thinking that if we were here next summer, we ought to get a lot of ants and train them to carry the grains for us.”
“Ah, I see, my sons. I say, one might almost have made as much by stopping at home, eh?”
“Here, don’t you come here to begin croaking,” cried Dallas. “Abel here can do that enough for a dozen.”
“Can he?” cried Tregelly. “Oh, you mustn’t do that, my son. There’s plenty of gold if we can only find it. I saw a chap with a gashly lump as big as a baby’s fist. We’ll do it yet. So you haven’t done much good, then?”
“If we had we should have sent word for you to come.”