Various stories were afloat about Austin.  Oh, yes, Scowl Austin was a hard man—­the only owner on the creek who wouldn’t even pay the little subscription every poor miner contributed to keep the Dawson Catholic Hospital going.

The women, too, had grievances against Austin, not only “the usual lot” up at the Gold Belt, who sneered at his close fist, but some of the other sort—­those few hard-working wives or “women on their own,” or those who washed and cooked for this claim or that.  They had stories about Austin that shed a lurid light.  And so by degrees the gathered experience, good and ill, of “the greatest of all placer diggin’s” flowed by the idler on the bank.

“You seem to have a lot to do,” Seymour would now and then say with a laugh.

“So I have.”

“What do you call it?”

“Takin’ stock.”

“Of us?”

“Of things in general.”

“What did you mean by that?” demanded the Colonel suspiciously when the Superintendent had passed up the line.

The shovelling in was done for the time being.  The water was to be regulated, and then the clean-up as soon as the owner came down.

“Better not let Austin hear you say you’re takin’ stock.  He’ll run you out o’ the creek.”

The Boy only smiled, and went on fillipping little stones at Nig.

“What did you mean?” the Colonel persisted, with a look as suspicious as Scowl Austin’s own.

“Oh, nothin’.  I’m only thinkin’ out things.”

“Your future, I suppose?” he said testily.

“Mine and other men’s.  The Klondyke’s a great place to get things clear in your head.”

“Don’t find it so.”  The Colonel put up his hand with that now familiar action as if to clear away a cloud.  “It’s days since I had anything clear in my head, except the lesson we learned on the trail.”

The Boy stopped throwing stones, and fixed his eyes on his friend, as the Colonel went on: 

“We had that hammered into us, didn’t we?”

“What?”

“Oh, that—­you know—­that—­I don’t know quite how to put it so it’ll sound as orthodox as it might be, bein’ true; but it looks pretty clear even to me”—­again the big hand brushing at the unmoted sunshine—­“that the only reason men got over bein’ beasts was because they began to be brothers.”

“Don’t,” said the Boy.

“Don’t what?”

“I’ve always known I should have to tell you some time.  I won’t be able to put it off if I stay ... and I hate tellin’ you now.  See here:  I b’lieve I’ll get a pack-mule and go over to Indian River.”

The Colonel looked round angrily.  Standing high against the sky, Seymour, with the gateman up at the lock, was moderating the strong head of water.  It began to flow sluggishly over the gravel-clogged riffles, and Scowl Austin was coming down the hill.

“I don’t know what you’re drivin’ at, about somethin’ to tell.  I know one thing, though, and I learned it up here in the North:  men were meant to stick to one another.”