“I rather think not,” said the red-whiskered man, slapping the landlord on the shoulder. “You’re a deep one, but you don’t get round me quite so easy.”
“I suppose you’ve got enough shares to make you independent, Mr. Carter?”
“I had a hundred, but I managed to pick up five hundred more, at two dollars apiece. I wouldn’t sell ’em for fifty dollars a share.”
“When are you going out to the mines again?”
“In a week or two. I’ve got to go home to St. Paul, to see my family and transact a little business, and then I shall go back. I want to see General Wall and ascertain if he has succeeded in buying up those Eastern shares first.”
“To whom do they belong?”
“They were bought by a man named Conrad. He died, leaving a son--a mere boy--in charge of a village lawyer as guardian. The lawyer is a slow, cautious man, and we haven’t succeeded in getting him round yet, or hadn’t, at last accounts from the general. I may have to go East and interview him myself.”
“Are they working the mine now?”
“Yes; but we are not doing very much till that is decided. What time is it?”
“Eight o’clock.”