And so they came to the Saucy Susan Gold Mine, at least to the ridge of the surrounding kopjes, and looked down to where a cluster of huts like beehives told them humans dwelt down there in the hollow.
"It can't be a mine," said Diana. "It's just a hollow in the hills; the sort of place giants hide in when they play hide-and-seek."
"But it is," Stanley assured her. "We shall see a little more as we wind down."
And presently they came within view of a shaft, and two honest-eyed young Englishmen, both old Charterhouse boys, came forward to greet them.
Meryl shook hands with her face all aglow with interest; and to their humble apologies that they had only huts to invite them into, she said, "But it is so nice of you to invite us at all. You wouldn't believe how proud I am to come here to see you, and how tremendously interested."
And Diana, with a droll expression, remarked, "You seem to live rather in the nethermost depths. You must feel as if you were going to heaven literally and figuratively every time you ascend to the outer world."
The elder brother laughed pleasantly, but the younger, who had a white face and a delicate, refined air, looked at her a little wistfully. Meryl chatted on with the elder, but Diana, with her quick perception, scented a silent, wordless, plucky endurance of adverse conditions in the younger, and gave her attention to him.
Then they went into the dining-room hut, and found a meal spread on a roughly made table, with only two chairs for seats and all the rest packing-cases.
"Who has to sit on a chair?" asked Diana. "I needn't, need I?..."
"Why, they are quite sound!... Are you afraid of a spill?..." asked Lionel Macaulay, looking amused.