d then sighed again, and added,
'I fear it's no use; I fear we shall have to drop the work soon?' That
was one of the things. The other was the light in his eyes when he
examined the face of the drift. If I were a gambler, Jack, I would
'copper' what he said and wager all I had on the twinkle of his eyes."

"It looks good in the drift, surely; and, Jim, if we break into an ore
body any time, it will not surprise me."

"Nor me, either, Jack; and if we strike ore here, it ought to be good,
because, as I reckon it, since we left the Gould and Curry shaft, we have
drifted out of the G. & C. ground, clear through the Best and Belcher,
and some distance into the Consolidated Virginia, and by the trend of the
lode, if we could find an ore body here, it would be in regular course
from the Spanish and Ophir croppings."

"How long have you worked here, and how much have you saved, Jack?"

"It is three years and a month since I went to work in the Belcher,"
was the reply; "I made $400 in Crown Point stocks, and I have saved
altogether $2,800 and odd."

"I beat you by a year's work, Jack, and I have, I believe, $3,300 or
$3,400 in the bank. Suppose we try a little gamble in stocks. If we could
get an ore body here, this stock would double in a week, and it will not
fall very much lower if we do not find anything."

"All right, Jim, if you say so. Meet me to-morrow at eleven o'clock at
the California Bank, and we will put in and buy a few shares."

"Agreed," was the answer; "but our twenty minutes are up and we must go.
But, Jack, _mum_ must be the word."

"Mum goes," said Jack.

It was a queer spot where this talk was held. It was by the air-pipe in
the drift which was run from the 1,200-foot level of the Gould and Curry
shaft on the Comstock ledge in Nevada, north toward where the great
bonanza was found in the Consolidated Virginia Mine. In the face of the
drift the temperature was 120 degrees, and miners could work for only
forty minutes and then had to retire to the air-pipe to cool off. It was
while resting at the air-pipe that these men, James Sedgwick and John
Browning, talked.

They were stripped from the waist up; all their clothing consisted of
canvas pantaloons held up by a belt, and miners' shoes; they each had a
little band around the head in which was fastened a miner's candlestick.
Thus exposed, in the candlelight, they were handsome men. The excessive
perspiration caused by the heat of the mine made their