“Wait a minute,” he added, “and I’ll be with you.”

Pulling on his mittens, he slipped through the door and confronted the visitors outside in the snow.  Their quick eyes noted his shirt, across the shoulders, discolored and powdery, and the knees of his overalls that showed signs of dirt brushed hastily but not quite thoroughly away.

“Rather early for a call,” he observed.  “What brings you across the river?  Going hunting?”

“We’re on, Smoke,” Wild Water said confidentially.  “An’ you’d just as well come through.  You’ve got something here.”

“If you’re looking for eggs—­” Smoke began.

“Aw, forget it.  We mean business.”

“You mean you want to buy lots, eh?” Smoke rattled on swiftly.  “There’s some dandy building sites here.  But, you see, we can’t sell yet.  We haven’t had the town surveyed.  Come around next week, Wild Water, and for peace and quietness, I’ll show you something swell, if you’re anxious to live over here.  Next week, sure, it will be surveyed.  Good-by.  Sorry I can’t ask you inside, but Shorty—­well, you know him.  He’s peculiar.  He says he came over for peace and quietness, and he’s asleep now.  I wouldn’t wake him for the world.”

As Smoke talked he shook their hands warmly in farewell.  Still talking and shaking their hands, he stepped inside and closed the door.

They looked at each other and nodded significantly.

“See the knees of his pants?” Saltman whispered hoarsely.

“Sure.  An’ his shoulders.  He’s been bumpin’ an’ crawlin’ around in a shaft.”  As Wild Water talked, his eyes wandered up the snow-covered ravine until they were halted by something that brought a whistle to his lips.  “Just cast your eyes up there, Bill.  See where I’m pointing?  If that ain’t a prospect-hole!  An’ follow it out to both sides—­you can see where they tramped in the snow.  If it ain’t rim-rock on both sides I don’t know what rim-rock is.  It’s a fissure vein, all right.”

“An’ look at the size of it!” Saltman cried.  “They’ve got something here, you bet.”

“An’ run your eyes down the slide there—­see them bluffs standin’ out an’ slopin’ in.  The whole slide’s in the mouth of the vein as well.”

“And just keep a-lookin’ on, out on the ice there, on the trail,” Saltman directed.  “Looks like most of Dawson, don’t it?”

Wild Water took one glance and saw the trail black with men clear to the far Dawson bank, down which the same unbroken string of men was pouring.

“Well, I’m goin’ to get a look-in at that prospect-hole before they get here,” he said, turning and starting swiftly up the ravine.

But the cabin door opened, and the two occupants stepped out.

“Hey!” Smoke called.  “Where are you going?”

“To pick out a lot,” Wild Water called back.  “Look at the river.  All Dawson’s stampeding to buy lots, an’ we’re going to beat ’em to it for the choice.  That’s right, ain’t it, Bill?”