"Enough to make a man rich in a couple of months if he worked honest," he continued.
"There's some as would give a good price for this claim," Bob continued, meditatively. "It's my 'pinion it's a pocket, and a deep one; if we was wanting to quit we'd be able to raise a tidy sum on it."
"And if one of us," Bob said, speaking still in an abstract sort of way, "had found the life distasteful, and wished to leave his partner--if he hated the dirt, and the hard labour, and had friends as he'd like to go home to--the other would be willing, like as not, to pay him a good round sum for his share of the claim; but," looking anxiously at his companion, "there ain't either of us feels like that?"
Bob heaved a sigh, took up his pick again, let it fall, then, seating himself upon a heap of earth, took up the fragments of quartz which sparkled with sprays of native gold, and crushed them into atoms with a hammer.
"Some men," he said, softly, glancing at Steve, and catching his eyes fixed upon him, "have a hankering after England when they've made something of a pile, and the sweetheart they left there--we didn't leave any sweetheart?"
"And some want to see the old father and mother?"
"Just so," with attempted cheerfulness; "we're different, we're enough for each other."
No answer this time. Bob looked at the fair, pretty boyish face; it was pink all over, pink as an honest, genuine blush could make it; he turned away, and sighed again. The jay-bird on the earth-heap strutted up and down like a sentinel on guard, chattering noisily and screaming now and then; the wind blew from the pine woods, bringing the pungent smell with it; the evening was very warm. Steve let fall his pick, brushed a few earth specks from his shirt, washed his face and hands in an unconscious sort of way, then looked at his partner.
"I'm going to turn it up for to-day," he said.
"Ah!" Bob returned, slowly. "Well, I'll put in a bit more work, I think."
Steve lingered a moment as though he would have said more with a little encouragement, but Bob was so deeply engaged in his work that he felt a sort of delicacy in disturbing him, and turned away, walking slowly and thoughtfully, as though undecided about something. The jay-bird watched him go, then came nearer to Bob, pecked at his shirt sleeve, pulled at his red handkerchief, and took other liberties, keeping his sharp eyes on the handsome face and hammer alternatively. Bob glanced at him, smiled and sighed at one and the same time, then let his hands fall idly between his knees.