et and sober.

"He's tired, that's what the matter," the blacksmith explained. "We'd
better be goin', boys, and come to see him to-morrow."

"Of course he must be tired," agreed the teamster.

But Jim, sitting silently watching, and the fond Miss Doc, whom nothing
concerning the child escaped, knew better. It was not, however, till
the boys were gone and silence had settled on the house that even Jim
was made aware of the all that the tiny mite of a man was undergoing.
Miss Doc had gone to the kitchen. Jim, Tintoretto, and little
Skeezucks were alone. The little fellow and the pup were standing in
the centre of the floor, intently listening. Together they went to the
door. There little Carson stretched his tiny arms across the panels in
baby appeal.

"Bruv-ver--Jim," he begged. "Bruv-ver--Jim."

Then, at last, the gray old miner understood the whole significance of
the baby words. "Bruvver Jim" meant more than just himself; it meant
the three little girls--associates--children--all that is dear to a
childish heart--all that is indispensable to baby happiness--all that a
lonely little heart must have or starve.

Jim groaned, for the utmost he could do was done when he took the
sobbing little fellow in his arms and murmured him words of comfort as
he carried him up and down the room.

The day that followed, and the day after that, served only to deepen
the longing in the childish breast. The worried men of Borealis played
on the floor in desperation. They fashioned new wagons, sleds, and
dolls; they exhausted every device their natures prompted; but beyond a
sad little smile and the call for "Bruvver Jim" they received no answer
from the baby heart,

At the end of a week the little fellow smiled no more, not even in his
faint, sweet way of yearning. His heart was starving; his grave, baby
thought was far away, with the small red caps and the laughing voices
of children.

The fond Miss Doc and the gray old Jim alone knew what the end must be,
inevitably, unless some change should speedily come to pass.

Meantime, Keno had quietly opened up a mighty ledge of gold-bearing ore
on the hill. It lay between walls of slate and granite. Its hugeness
was assured. That the camp would boom in the spring was foreordained.
And that ledge all belonged to Jim. But he heard them excitedly tell
what the find would do for him and the camp as one in a dream. He
could not care while his tiny waif was starving in hi