ce
of rocks in their direction, they concluded it might be as well to
quiet me first. Lord! How I did carry on! I gave Ag the wink and
pulled for the creek, and it was not long before, with Aggy's help, in
we all three went, kersock.

They pulled me out and laid me on the bank, insensible.

"He's dead, I reckon," says Daggett.

"No," says Aggy, "I can feel his pulse beat, but it does seem to me
there's a different look in his face somehow."

Then I opened my eyes.

"Why, Agamemnon," says I, "what am I doing here?"

"Hush!" says he, "you ain't been well."

"Dear me! You don't say!" And I rubbed my forehead with my hand.

"But I feel all right now--have I been this way long?"

"Nigh on to six months, Hy, old horse; ever since we hit it so rich on
our claim--don't you remember about that?"

"Certainly," says I. "It seems like yesterday; it's as clear--but who
are these people?"

Ag let on to be very much embarrassed. "Well," says he,
"why--hunh--why--to tell you the truth, I thought I ought to get you
out of the country, to where you could see an expensive doctor, and
these are some folks I brought down to buy the claim--you being sick,
you know!"

"Buy the claim!" I hollers, jumping up. "Buy the claim? What's this
you're giving me? After all my toils and hardships and one thing and
another, to sell the Golden Queen? Well, I want you to understand that
nobody buys this claim, except across my dead body," says I.

Aggy, he looks completely dumfounded. "My! This puts me in an awkward
fix," he says. "Gentlemen, you see how I'm up against it? I can't
sell without my partner's consent, now he's in his right mind; and, as
far as that goes, the only reason I wanted to sell is removed. The
dicker's off, that's the long and short of it."

Oh, how pleased that tinhorn looked! He swallowed three times and got
red in the face before he answered a word.

"This may be all right, but it looks mighty queer to me," he growls.

"The ways of Providence is past understanding," says Aggy, taking off
his hat. "To our poor human minds it does seem queer, no doubt. Now,
Mr. Daggett," he continued, waving his arm in that broad-minded style
he had, "I'm sorry things has come out this way for your sake, although
a man that has such a sympathising nature as you will soon forget his
own disappointment in the general joy that envelopes this camp. And to
show you there's nothing small about me, you can have any on