Presently the Blackguard asked a question, watching narrowly what the effect would be. "I suppose, Charlie, you'll be flirting with Miss Burrows up yonder?"
The lad blushed hotly.
"I thought so, Charlie. Halt; look me square in the eyes, if you can. The Spanish end of me wanted to ride you down just now; it got jealous, but the English end of me thinks it only common decency to warn you. I may be flirting with that girl myself,—I suppose because I oughtn't to think of her on a regular month's fine of my pay and Government rations. You needn't look like a frost-bitten chipmunk,—the betting is ten to one on you, because you're a presentable candidate, and I'm not, worse luck. The betting is a hundred to one on you, because you've got the field all to yourself, you brat. Besides that, you're good-looking in a way, with those infernally frank blue eyes, while I look like the very devil. We've each got to take our chance, and when she makes her choice, the devil take the hindmost. You understand?"
"But it's not that way at all." Mr. Ramsay was blushing. "She's an awfully nice girl—but—fact is," he drew himself up, and added with slow magnificence, "I'm not a marrying man."
The Blackguard laughed. "Well, let's drop that and get down to the Tough Nut Claim before dinner-time. By the way, when you meet these prospectors, take care not to let them suspect why you came to this country, because, if they think you represent money in London, they'll make it a point of honour to sell you a wild-cat claim."
"Why did you bring me this way?"
"When that cad Burrows has talked you blind you'll need a friend or so to lead you about. Come on, we'll have dinner at the Claim."
Among the torchlike pines they came to a little log-cabin, with a door and window in front, shaded by an extension of the ridge roof, and at the back a chimney of sticks wattled over with clay. Just beyond, a cutting had been made into the hill, this being the entrance to a tunnel, the waste rock from which had been spread out into a terrace, or dump, littered with heaps of silver-bearing lead, all glittering in the sunlight. From within the tunnel came the steady clang of a sledge-hammer beating a bar of steel into live rock; but the Blackguard tethered his horses to a stump, and the two men sat down in a rough smithy.
"What's this?" Mr. Ramsay sniffed disdainfully. "It looks like some blacksmith's shop."
"It is," said La Mancha, lighting his pipe. "They use it for sharpening the points of the drills. Look here, youngster, for fear of trouble when you meet these prospectors, I'm going to give you a dose of etiquette.