ill'm with a meat-axe. He
must ha' swallowed very near all the water in that well. Me an' the Chow
emptied very near two buckets out of him. He's dead to the world jes'
now. How do you feel, boss?"

"I'll be all right in a minute," said Hugh. "What's your name?"

"I'm Tommy Prince," said the stranger. "I jist kem in from my camp
to-day for them onions."

Hugh drew a long breath. The luck had turned at last.

CHAPTER XXV. IN THE BUFFALO CAMP.

"You're just the man I was looking for," said Hugh, taking in the
stranger with his eyes. "I want to get out to Reeves's buffalo camp, and
I hear you're the only man who knows that country at all. Can you get
time to come down with me? I'll make it worth your while."

He waited for the reply with a beating heart. If this man failed him he
saw nothing for it but to go back. The stranger lit his pipe with the
leisurely movements of a man who had never been in a real hurry in his
life.

Then he spoke slowly.

"Well, it's this way, boss, you see. I'm just startin' off in no end
of a hurry to go and take a team of bullocks to the Oriental to draw
quartz."

"Can't you put it off for a while?" said Hugh. "It's getting near the
wet season."

"Well, I'd like to go with you, boss, but I couldn't chuck 'em over--not
rightly I couldn't." He stroked his beard and relapsed into thought.

"Let's go in and get a drink," said Hugh. "I suppose there is some
square-face inside."

The square-face settled it. They had one drink, and the stranger began
to think less of the needs of the Oriental. They had another, and he
said he didn't suppose it'd matter much if the Oriental had to wait a
bit for their stone, and the bullocks were all over the bush and very
poor, and by the time he got them together the wet season would be on.
They had a third, and he said that the Oriental had been hanging on
for six months, and it wouldn't hurt it to hang on for seven, and he
wouldn't see a man like Hugh stuck.

So the shareholders in that valuable concern, the Oriental Mine, were
kept in pleasing suspense for some months longer, while the mine-manager
(whose salary was going on all the time) did nothing but smoke, and
write reports to the effect that "a very valuable body of stone was at
grass, awaiting cartage to the battery, when a splendid crushing was a
certainty." Meanwhile Tommy Prince was gaily journeying with Hugh down
to the buffalo camp.

Prince, a typical moleskin-trousered, co