“Scarcely were the words out of my mouth when I heard a stealthy footstep approaching. I promptly put the big nugget down and sat on it, and uncommonly hard it was. As I did so I saw a lean dark face poked over the edge of the claim and a pair of beady eyes searching us out. I knew the face, it belonged to a man of very bad character known as Handspike Tom, who had, I understood, been so named at the Diamond Fields because he had murdered his mate with a handspike. He was now no doubt prowling about like a human hyæna to see what he could steal.
“‘Is that you, ‘unter Quatermain?’ he said.
“‘Yes, it’s I, Mr. Tom,’ I answered, politely.
“‘And what might all that there yelling be?’ he asked. ‘I was walking along, a-taking of the evening air and a-thinking on the stars, when I ‘ears ‘owl after ‘owl.’
“‘Well, Mr. Tom,’ I answered, ‘that is not to be wondered at, seeing that like yourself they are nocturnal birds.’
“‘’Owl after ‘owl!’ he repeated sternly, taking no notice of my interpretation, ‘and I stops and says, “That’s murder,” and I listens again and thinks, “No, it ain’t; that ‘owl is the ‘owl of hexultation; some one’s been and got his fingers into a gummy yeller pot, I’ll swear, and gone off ‘is ‘ead in the sucking of them.” Now, ‘unter Quatermain, is I right? is it nuggets? Oh, lor!’ and he smacked his lips audibly—‘great big yellow boys—is it them that you have just been and tumbled across?’
“‘No,’ I said boldly, ‘it isn’t’—the cruel gleam in his black eyes altogether overcoming my aversion to untruth, for I knew that if once he found out what it was that I was sitting on—and by the way I have heard of rolling in gold being spoken of as a pleasant process, but I certainly do not recommend anybody who values comfort to try sitting on it—I should run a very good chance of being ‘handspiked’ before the night was over.
“‘If you want to know what it was, Mr. Tom,’ I went on, with my politest air, although in agony from the nugget underneath—for I hold it is always best to be polite to a man who is so ready with a handspike—‘my boy and I have had a slight difference of opinion, and I was enforcing my view of the matter upon him; that’s all.’
“‘Yes, Mr. Tom,’ put in Harry, beginning to weep, for Harry was a smart boy, and saw the difficulty we were in, ‘that was it—I halloed because father beat me.’
“‘Well, now, did yer, my dear boy—did yer? Well, all I can say is that a played-out old claim is a wonderful queer sort of place to come to for to argify at ten o’clock of night, and what’s more, my sweet youth, if ever I should ‘ave the argifying of yer’—and he leered unpleasantly at Harry—‘yer won’t ‘oller in quite such a jolly sort ‘o way. And now I’ll be saying good-night, for I don’t like disturbing of a family party. No, I ain’t that sort of man, I ain’t. Good-night to yer, ‘unter Quatermain—good-night to yer, my argified young one;’ and Mr. Tom turned away disappointed, and prowled off elsewhere, like a human jackal, to see what he could thieve or kill.