to pile up a few pieces of rock at the bottom, and no one who would have
seen it would have known that the lode was gone. That is what most chaps
would have done, and a third chap who was working with us was all for
doing it. Anyone would have given us five hundred ounces for it. Well, I
didn't say nothing, it was what pretty nigh anyone on the mines would
have done if he had the chance, but Harry turned on our partner like a
mountain lion. 'You are a mean skunk, New Jersey' says he. 'Do you think
that I would be one to rob a man only because he would be fool enough to
take a place without looking at it? We've worked to the edge of the
claim both ways, and I don't reckon there is a dollar's worth of gold
left in it, now that it has pettered out at the bottom, and if there was
I would not work another day with a man who proposed to get up a
swindle.' So as soon as he got up to the surface he told everyone that
the lode had gone out and that the claim weren't worth a red cent. He
and New Jersey had a big fight with fists that evening. The other was
bigger than Harry, and stronger, but he were no hand with his pistol,
and Harry is a dead shot; so he told New Jersey he would fight him
English fashion, and Harry gave him the biggest licking I ever saw a man
have. I felt pretty mean myself, you bet, for having thought of planting
the thing off; but as I hadn't spoken, Harry knew nothing about it. If
he had, I doubt if he would ever have given me his hand again. Yes, sir,
he is a straight man all round, and there is no man better liked than
Harry. Why, there are a score of men in this town who know him as I do,
and, if he came to them and said, 'I have struck it rich, I will go
halves with you if you will plank down twenty thousand dollars to open
her up,' they would pay down the cash without another word; and, I tell
you, there ain't ten men west of the Missouri of whom as much could be
said."

The next morning at daybreak Jerry and Tom started. They rode due north,