Long John hesitated. He would have preferred to lie about it, probably, but knowing that we could go and see for ourselves in a couple of minutes, he made a virtue of necessity and replied:
“Yes, there’s some of it there; but it don’t amount to much. I guess the vein ain’t worth looking for. Come and see.”
We walked forward and looked into the hole Long John had chopped, when we saw that his prospector’s instinct had hit upon the right place again. Here also was a black streak an inch thick below the yellow sand.
It was evident that the vein of galena was somewhere up-stream, though we ourselves were unable to judge from the amount of the deposit whether it was likely to be big or little. Long John might be telling the truth when he “guessed” that it was not worth looking for, though, from what we knew of him, we, in turn, “guessed” that what he said was most likely to be the opposite of what he thought.
We could not tell, either, whether our new acquaintance was speaking the truth when he declared that he was satisfied with his day’s work and had already decided to go home again; I think it rather likely that, being unable to devise any scheme for shaking us off, and not caring to act as prospector for us as well as for Yetmore, he preferred to go back at once and report progress. He was right, at any rate, in saying that the drifts ahead were too deep to admit of further prospecting; for the mountains began to close in just here, and the snow was becoming pretty heavy.
Nevertheless, Joe and I thought we would try a little further, if only for the reason that Long John would not, and we were about to part company, when we were startled to hear a voice above our heads say, “Good-morning,” and, looking quickly up, we saw, seated on a dead branch, a raven, to all appearance asleep, with his feathers fluffed out and his head sunk between his shoulders.
That it was our friend, Socrates, we could not doubt, and we looked all around for the hermit, but as there was no one to be seen, Joe, addressing the raven, said:
“Hallo, Sox! Where’s your master?”
“Chew o’ tobacco,” replied the raven.