‘Did you think I was never coming, Jimmy?’ she asked softly.

Jim practised the virtue of equivocation.  It had never occurred to him that she would come, but he would rather have bitten a piece off his tongue than have said so just then.

‘So you made up your mind to follow the moment I told you I was going?’ he said.

’What else?  Could I have bid you good-bye so glibly?  Could you have walked off with a smile and a kiss, and never a word of coming again?’

‘Darling, I can never want to lose you.’

‘Whist’ no words fer the future!’ she said, reverting to her whimsical brogue.  ‘We’re weak mortals, an’ every one iv us is born again wid the new sun.  I’d not have ye bind the strange man ye may be to-morrow wid oaths, an’ I won’t bind the unknown colleen I may be for the likes iv ye.’

‘But to-day?’

‘To-day?  To-day I love you with a big, big heart!’ she said, with deep feeling.  ‘Kiss me!’

‘Knock off!’ cried Burton, whose head appeared suddenly at the mouth of the shaft.  ‘I reckoned you’d had time to get through with that.’

‘Och! we’ve been a long time gittin’ through wid it, an’ we’re not through yet,’ said Aurora, shaking Mike warmly by the hand.  ’You may have one for yourself—­there.’  She placed her finger on a dimple, and Mike kissed her gallantly enough.  ‘Ah!’ she sighed, ’you love another.  The kiss betrays you.’

Something that might have been a blush, had the deep tan of his skin permitted such a thing, warmed Burton’s cheek.

‘And where’s Mrs. Ben?’ he asked.

‘Somewhere about the field.’

‘They are with you?’ said Jim.

’To be sure; and the whole business—­bakery, laundry, and light refreshments—­has followed at my skirt with proper humility.’

‘They pitch tents here?’

‘Ben and Mary are now seeking a good business site.’

‘Adjacent to a hollow tree?’

‘The same bein’ a convanyint haunt fer Mary Kyley’s familiar evil shpirits.’

Done laughed, giving Aurora a one-armed, parenthetical hug.  ’They wouldn’t part with you, then?’

’They would not, nor I with them.  Dan’s been as good as a mother to me.  But how is the luck, boys?’

‘Great,’ answered Mike.  ‘We dropped on a patch here.’

’Come and see us cradle the last tubful, and I’ll give you the prettiest bit in the hopper,’ said Jim.

’Not a colour!  The heart nugget you gave me long ago has worn tender places all over me.’  She tugged at the thin ribbon about her neck.  ’I’ll carry no more.’

Done did not press the point, although he knew that she took gifts of quaintly-shaped nuggets from the other men with the indifference of a queen accepting tribute.