“Oh, back in the hills.  I discovered it over a year ago, an’ nobody knows of it but me.”

“Why didn’t you report it?”

“H’m, what would be the good of doin’ that?  Haven’t I seen too many gold strikes already, an’ what have they amounted to?  Look at this camp, fer instance.  The men have come here an’ ruined this place.  They may git some gold, but what good will it do ’em?  They’ll gamble it, or waste it in other ways.  Oh, I know, fer I’ve seen it lots of times.”

“Why, then, are you willing to reveal the secret of your mine to me?” Reynolds asked.

“Did I say I was willin’?”

“That is what I inferred from your words.”

“I merely asked ye ‘twixt which would ye choose:  the findin’ that gal, which is an unsartin proposition, or gittin’ the gold, which is as sure as the sun.  That’s all I asked.”

“But if I choose the gold, then your secret will be known, and there will be a wild stampede into the place.  You don’t want that to happen, do you?  It would be the same story of other camps, and perhaps worse.”

“No, I don’t want it to happen, that’s a fact.  But, ye see, it’s bound to come sooner or later.  Thar are so many men pokin’ thar noses into every hole an’ corner, that they are sure to find my mine before long.  Now, I want someone to my likin’ to be first on the ground, an’ that someone is you.  Ye kin then make yer choice an’ stake two claims as discoverer.  Tharfore, which will ye choose, that gal proposition or the gold?  It’s up to you.  Is it hard to decide?”

“Not at all,” was the reply.  “I shall take the girl.  One might run across gold any time, but a girl like that one won’t find again.  And, besides, what good would the gold be to me without her?  I, therefore, take the girl proposition.”

Samson looked at his companion in surprise, as if he had not heard aright.  Here was a phase of character beyond the bounds of his experience.

“An’ ye don’t want the gold?” he asked.

“Certainly I want the gold, who wouldn’t?  But you told me I had to choose it or the girl, didn’t you?”

“I surely did, though I never imagined ye’d throw down the gold.  Now, all the fellers I ever met up here would have taken the gold first.”

“Feeling sure of getting the girl later; is that it?”

“That’s about the gist of it.  They’d tackle what’s sartin first, but you’re willin’ to try the unsartin.”

“I am, and when can we start?”

“In the morning if it’s all the same to you.  We’ll need some extry grub, which we kin git from Shorty.  We won’t want much, as we’ll find plenty of meat along the way.  We’ll hit out before the camp’s astir, so nobody’ll know what’s become of us.”

“How long will it take us to cross the Golden Crest?” Reynolds asked.

“That depends upon many things.  We might do it in three or four days by the way we’re goin’, or, again, it might take six months, an’ mebbe longer.  In fact, we might never git thar at all.”