He was a dapper little man dressed in a dark gray bob-tailed cutaway,
and a brown derby hat, which was pushed far back on his head. His face,
however, was keen and alert and brown, all of which characteristics
indicated an active Western life at no very remote day. The words which
had so powerfully arrested Bennington de Laney's attention were
delivered by Old Mizzou to this stranger.
"Thar!" the old man had said, "ain't that Crazy Hoss Lode 'bout as
good-lookin' a lead as they make 'em?"
"So, so; so, so;" replied the man in the derby in a high voice. "Your
vein is a fissure vein all right enough, and you've got a good wide
lead. If it holds up in quality, I don't know but what you're right."
"I shows you them assays of McPherson's, don't I?" argued Mizzou, "an'
any quartz in this kentry that assays twenty-four dollars ain't no ways
cheap."
This speech was so significantly in line with Bennington's surmise that
he caught his breath and drew back cautiously out of sight, but still
in such a position that he could hear plainly every word uttered by the
group below. The girl was watching him with bright, interested eyes.
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