Peter laughed to think that he had expected the boy to understand him. How could he––at his age?
“I’ll give it to you, laddie––all of it.”
“Gee!”
Elia’s cold eyes lit with sudden greed.
“But you’d best say nothing to the folks,” Peter added slyly. “Don’t let ’em know we’re looking for anything.”
“Sure,” cried the boy quickly, with a cunning painful to behold. “They’d steal it. Will Henderson would.”
Peter thought for a moment, and relit his pipe, which had gone out while he was talking.
“You don’t like Will, laddie,” he said presently, and so blundered into the midst of the boy’s greedy reverie.
“I hate him!”
Any joy that the thought of the promised gold might have given him suddenly died out of the dwarf’s vindictive 142 heart, and in its place was a raging storm of hatred. Such savage passion was his dominating feature. At the best there was little that was gentle in him.