The sun was down when the two friends entered their tent and began to pull off their muddy boots, while a little man in a blue flannel shirt and a brown wide-awake busied himself in the preparation of supper.
“What have you got for us to-night, Paddy?” asked Westly.
“Salt pork it is,” said the little man, looking up with a most expressive grin; “the best o’ victuals when there’s nothin’ better. Bein’ in a luxurious frame o’ mind when I was up at the store, I bought a few split-pays for seasonin’; but it comes hard on a man to spind his gould on sitch things when his luck’s down. You’ve not done much to-day, I see, by the looks of ye.”
“Right, Paddy,” said Tom Brixton, with a harsh laugh; “we’ve done nothing—absolutely nothing. See, there is my day’s work.”
He pulled three small grains of gold, each about the size of a pea, from his trousers pocket, and flung them contemptuously into a washing-pan at his elbow.
“Sure, we won’t make our fortins fast at that rate,” said Paddy, or Patrick Flinders.
“This won’t help it much,” said Westly, with a mingled smile and sigh, as he added a small nugget and a little gold-dust to the pile.
“Ah! then, haven’t I forgot the shuggar for the tay; but I’ve not got far to go for to get it. Just kape stirrin’ the pot, Mister Westly, I’ll be back in a minit.”
“Tom,” said Westly, when their comrade had gone out, “don’t give way to angry feelings. Do try, like a good fellow, to look at things in a philosophical light, since you object to a religious one. Rightly or wrongly, Gashford has won your gold. Well, take heart and dig away. You know I have saved a considerable sum, the half of which is at your service to—”
“Do you suppose,” interrupted the other sharply, “that I will consent to become a beggar?”