He shook the canvas bag and opened it when men went crowding about him.
“There he is,” announced Mr. Flye at my side.
“Looks the part,” said I.
“After I had rubbed his jaws where the gag had hurt,” confided my friend, “he told me that he ain’t more’n four jumps ahead of the boss engineer expert who is bringing out the samples for the report. All you’ve got to do now, sir, is to sit tight and look wise!”
My unlucky friend could not do much looking for his part; his eyes were swelled so badly that he could hardly open them.
“Look here, Mr. Flye,” I said, with a lot of repentance, “I must seem to you like pretty much of a crab. I don’t know how—”
“It was only a gold-mine guess, according to your notion, sir. And I know how an Easterner must feel on that point. But when I have a friend and make up my mind to let him in on a good thing I propose to do it, even if I have to apologize to him afterward for being almighty fresh. So I—”
“Don’t make me feel worse than I am feeling!”
There was a crowd in the street of Breed City by that time and Mr. Maddox, in the center of it, had worked himself into a frenzy of excitement and was offering “Bright Eyes” stock at a million dollars a share.
“Don’t mind that kind of talk,” advised Mr. Flye. “He’s half tight, and his coco ain’t just right when he gets to talking in a crowd, but you needn’t worry but what his news is all right. And you can see for yourself!”