Mulrady, who in a friendly show of being at his ease had not yet
resumed his coat, rose in his shirt-sleeves, and, standing before
the hearth, straightened his square figure by drawing down his
waistcoat on each side with two powerful thumbs. After a moment's
contemplative survey of the floor between him and the speaker, he
raised his eyes to Slinn. They were small and colorless; the
forehead above them was low, and crowned with a shock of tawny
reddish hair; even the rude strength of his lower features was
enfeebled by a long, straggling, goat-like beard; but for the first
time in his life the whole face was impressed and transformed with
a strong and simple dignity.

"Ez far ez I kin see, Slinn," he said, gravely, "the pint between
you and me ain't to be settled by our children, or wot we allow is
doo and right from them to us. Afore we preach at them for playing
in the slumgullion, and gettin' themselves splashed, perhaps we
mout ez well remember that that thar slumgullion comes from our own
sluice-boxes, where we wash our gold. So we'll just put THEM
behind us, so," he continued, with a backward sweep of his powerful
hand towards the chimney, "and goes on. The next thing that crops
up ahead of us is your three years in the hospital, and wot you
went through at that time. I ain't sayin' it wasn't rough on you,
and that you didn't have it about as big as it's made; but ez
you'll allow that you'd hev had that for three years, whether I'd
found your mine or whether I hadn't, I think we can put THAT behind
us, too. There's nothin' now left to prospect but your story of
your strike. Well, take your own proofs. Masters is not here; and
if he was, accordin' to your own story, he knows nothin' of your
strike that day, and could only prove you were a disappointed