"Gold?"
The old dry cackle answered the question; the bleary eyes were bright with cunning.
"If I don't know nothin'," jibed Honeycutt, "what're you askin' me for?"
King had learned little that he did not already know. He came back to the table and began gathering up the money.
"Wait a minute, Mark," pleaded the old man, restless as he understood that the glittering coins were to be taken away. "Let's talk a while. You an' me ain't had a good chat like this for a year."
"I'm going," retorted King. "But I'll make you one last proposition." He thrust into his pocket everything excepting five twenty-dollar gold pieces. These he left standing in a little pile. "I'll give you just exactly one hundred dollars for a look at what is in that box of yours."
In sudden alarm the old man shambled back to his bunk, his hands on the bedding over the box.
"You'd grab it an' run," he clacked. "You'd rob me. You're worse than
Brodie——"
"You know better than that," King told him sternly. "If I wanted to rob you I'd do it without all this monkey business."
In his suspicious old heart Honeycutt knew that. He battled with himself, his toothless old mouth tight clamped.