y rich," said Abel, laughing as a man laughs who is in
high spirits produced by vigorous health.

"Well, go on," said Dallas.

"Here it is, then: what's the good of our going grubbing on just to be
able to say we're richer still? `Enough's as good as a feast,' so
what's the good of being greedy? Why not let some one else have a turn,
and let's all go home?"

"What do you say, Bel?"

"Ay! And you, Dal?"

"Ay!"

"The `Ays' have it, then," cried Tregelly.

"Well done, my sons. Hooroar! We're homeward bou-wou-wound!" he roared
in his big bass voice. "Hooroar! We're homeward bound!"

Business matters are settled quickly in a goldfield, and the next day it
was known in the now crowded ravine, where every inch of ground was
taken up, that the big company of which the judge was the head had
bought the three adventurers' claim, known far and near as Redbeard's,
for a tremendous sum. But all the same, heads were shaken by the wise
ones of the settlement, who one and all agreed that the company had got
it cheap, and they wished that they had had the chance.

"You're one of the buyers, aren't you, Norton, and your lot who came up
first are the rest?"

"That's right," said Norton, smiling. "Hah!" said the man. "Kissing
goes by favour."

"Of course," said Norton. "But then, you see, we were all old friends."

"We said it was to win or to die, Bel," said Dallas one day, when all
business was satisfactorily settled and they were really, as Tregelly
had sung, homeward bound.

"Yes," said Abel quietly, "and it all seems like a dream."

"But it's a mighty, weighty, solid, golden sort o' dream, my son," said
the big Cornishman, "and there's no mistake about it, you've won. I
say, though, I'm glad we're taking the dog."

THE END.

End of Project Gutenberg's To Win or to Die, by George Manville Fenn

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