Too occupied with his subject to notice this ominous reception, the Old Man continued:  “I reckon I struck a fresh lead in the new grocery man at the Crossing.  He says he’ll let the Judge have a pair of boots on credit, but he can’t send them over here; and considering that the Judge has got to try them anyway, it don’t seem to be asking too much for the Judge to go over there.  He says he’ll give us a barrel of pork and a bag of flour if we’ll give him the right of using our tail-race and clean out the lower end of it.”

“It’s the work of a Chinaman, and a four days’ job,” broke in the Left Bower.

“It took one white man only two hours to clean out a third of it,” retorted the Old Man triumphantly, “for I pitched in at once with a pick he let me have on credit, and did that amount of work this morning, and told him the rest of you boys would finish it this afternoon.”

A slight gesture from the Right Bower checked an angry exclamation from the Left.  The Old Man did not notice either, but, knitting his smooth young brow in a paternally reflective fashion, went on:  “You’ll have to get a new pair of trousers, Mills, but as he doesn’t keep clothing, we’ll have to get some canvas and cut you out a pair.  I traded off the beans he let me have for some tobacco for the Right Bower at the other shop, and got them to throw in a new pack of cards.  These are about played out.  We’ll be wanting some brushwood for the fire; there’s a heap in the hollow.  Who’s going to bring it in?  It’s the Judge’s turn, isn’t it?  Why, what’s the matter with you all?”

The restraint and evident uneasiness of his companions had at last touched him.  He turned his frank young eyes upon them; they glanced helplessly at each other.  Yet his first concern was for them, his first instinct paternal and protecting.  He ran his eyes quickly over them; they were all there and apparently in their usual condition.  “Anything wrong with the claim?” he suggested.

Without looking at him the Right Bower rose, leaned against the open door with his hands behind him and his face towards the landscape, and said, apparently to the distant prospect:  “The claim’s played out, the partnership’s played out, and the sooner we skedaddle out of this the better.  If,” he added, turning to the Old Man, “if you want to stay, if you want to do Chinaman’s work at Chinaman’s wages, if you want to hang on to the charity of the traders at the Crossing, you can do it, and enjoy the prospects and the Noah’s doves alone.  But we’re calculatin’ to step out of it.”

“But I haven’t said I wanted to do it alone” protested the Old Man with a gesture of bewilderment.

“If these are your general ideas of the partnership,” continued the Right Bower, clinging to the established hypothesis of the other partners for support, “it ain’t ours, and the only way we can prove it is to stop the foolishness right here.  We calculated to dissolve the partnership and strike out for ourselves elsewhere.  You’re no longer responsible for us, nor we for you.  And we reckon it’s the square thing to leave you the claim and the cabin and all it contains.  To prevent any trouble with the traders, we’ve drawn up a paper here”—­