“Where’s Jim?” demanded Kells.

“He’s comin’ along,” replied Pearce.  “He’s sure been runnin’ a gantlet.  His strike stopped work in the diggin’s.  What do you think of that, Kells?  The news spread like smoke before wind.  Every last miner in camp has jest got to see thet lump of gold.”

“Maybe I don’t want to see it!” exclaimed Kells.  “A thirty-pounder!  I heard of one once, sixty pounds, but I never saw it.  You can’t believe till you see.”

“Jim’s comin’ up the road now,” said one of the men near the door.  “Thet crowd hangs on. ...  But I reckon he’s shakin’ them.”

“What’ll Cleve do with this nugget?”

Gulden’s big voice, so powerful, yet feelingless, caused a momentary silence.  The expression of many faces changed.  Kells looked startled, then annoyed.

“Why, Gulden, that’s not my affair—­nor yours,” replied Kells.  “Cleve dug it and it belongs to him.”

“Dug or stole—­it’s all the same,” responded Gulden.

Kell’s threw up his hands as if it were useless and impossible to reason with this man.

Then the crowd surged round the door with shuffling boots and hoarse, mingled greetings to Cleve, who presently came plunging in out of the melee.

His face wore a flush of radiance; his eyes were like diamonds.  Joan thrilled and thrilled at sight of him.  He was beautiful.  Yet there was about him a more striking wildness.  He carried a gun in one hand and in the other an object wrapped in his scarf.  He flung this upon the table in front of Kells.  It made a heavy, solid thump.  The ends of the scarf flew aside, and there lay a magnificent nugget of gold, black and rusty in parts, but with a dull, yellow glitter in others.

“Boss, what’ll you bet against that?” cried Cleve, with exulting laugh.  He was like a boy.

Kells reached for the nugget as if it were not an actual object, and when his hands closed on it he fondled it and weighed it and dug his nails into it and tasted it.

“My God!” he ejaculated, in wondering ecstasy.  Then this, and the excitement, and the obsession all changed into sincere gladness.  “Jim, you’re born lucky.  You, the youngster born unlucky in love!  Why, you could buy any woman with this!”

“Could I?  Find me one,” responded Cleve, with swift boldness.

Kells laughed.  “I don’t know any worth so much.”

“What’ll I do with it?” queried Cleve.

“Why, you fool youngster!  Has it turned your head, too?  What’d you do with the rest of your dust?  You’ve certainly been striking it rich.”

“I spent it—­lost it—­lent it—­gave some away and—­saved a little.”

“Probably you’ll do the same with this.  You’re a good fellow, Jim.”

“But this nugget means a lot of money.  Between six and seven thousand dollars.”

“You won’t need advice how to spend it, even if it was a million. ...  Tell me, Jim, how’d you strike it?”