After a mood of reflection Durgan said, "You live well. These ladies must pay you well if you can afford dinners like this."
"Yes, Marse Neil, suh; they pays better than any in these parts. Miss Hermie, she's got right smart of sense, too, 'bout money. Miss Birdie, she's more for animals and flowers an' sich; but they pays well, they does."
"Look me out two good men to work with me in the mine, Adam."
Adam showed his white teeth in respectful joy. "That's all right, suh."
"Of course, as you are working for these ladies, you will look for my men in your spare time."
"That's all right, suh."
Durgan put down sufficient payment for his food, took up his travelling satchel, and walked on. From the turn of the rough cart-road on which the cabin stood the rocky summit was visible, and close below it the gables of a solitary dwelling.
"A rough perch for northern birds!" said he to himself, and then was plunged again in his own affairs. The branches, arching above, shut out all prospect. He plodded on.
The upper side of the mountain was a bald wall of rock. Where, part way up, the zigzag road abutted on this precipice it met a foot-trail to the summit, and at the same point an outer ledge of flat rock gave access to an excavation near at hand in the precipice. A wooden hut with a rude bench at its door stood on the ledge, the only legacy of a former miner. Durgan perceived that his new sphere was reached. He rested upon the bench and looked about him wistfully.
He was a large, well-built man, with patrician cast of feature, brown skin, and hair that was almost gray. His clothes were beginning to fray at the edges. They were the clothes of a man of fashion whose pockets had long been empty. His manner was haughty, but subdued by that subtle gentleness which failure gives to higher natures. A broken heart, a head carried high—these evoke compassion which can seldom be expressed.