"Well, p'r'aps you're right, Ben. Our old doctor used to say smokin' wasn't good for boys, but I've smoked more or less since I was twelve years old."
"There's something I'd like better than smoking just now," said Ben.
"What's that?"
"Eating supper."
"Just so. I wonder where that heathen Ki Sing is?"
Ki Sing was cook and general servant to the little party, and performed his duties in a very satisfactory manner—better than either Ben or Bradley could have done—and left his white employers freer to work at the more congenial occupation of searching for gold.
"Ki Sing is unusually late," said Richard Dewey. "I wonder what can have detained him? I am beginning to feel hungry myself."
"The heathen is usually on time," said Bradley, "though he hasn't got a watch, any more than I have.—Dick, what time is it?"
"Half-past six," answered Richard Dewey, who, though a miner, had not been willing to dispense with all the appliances of civilization.
"Maybe Ki Sing has found another place," suggested Ben, jocosely.