"Look here, Dick Dewey," said Bradley: "what do you take me for? Do you think I'm so delicate I can't walk? I wasn't brought up in no such way. I can do my regular share of trampin', whether on the prairie or on the mountain. I ain't no tender-foot."
"I don't doubt your strength and endurance, friend Bradley," said Dewey, "but a man doesn't always like to do what he is fully able to do."
"Then we needn't say no more about it. There's a gal—I beg your pardon, a young lady—in 'Frisco that's pinin' to see you, Dick Dewey, and that hoss'll get you there sooner'n if you waited till you could walk."
"I am too selfish to resist your arguments, my good friend," said Dewey. "I think I can venture to start within a week, as I am to ride."
"No doubt of it."
"You'd better let me buy your horse, and then if we don't meet again, or anything happens to it, you won't be the loser."
"'If we don't meet again'?" repeated Bradley, puzzled. "You don't mean to say you are goin' to set out alone?"
"I don't want to take you and Ben away from your claim. It isn't half exhausted yet."
"Then let somebody else exhaust it," returned Bradley. "You don't suppose, Dick, we are goin' to let you go off alone?"
"I shall not be alone. My faithful attendant, Ki Sing, will be with me."