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Between Bully Presby and the man who tunneled under a bank to loot the safe, there was no moral difference save in the romance of that mystic underground world where men bored like microbes for their spoil. "Joan! Joan! Joan!" he muttered aloud, as if she were there to hear his hurt appeal. It was for her that he felt the wound, and not for Bully Presby, her father.
"I don't, or I shouldn't have asked you," Townsend answered with less patience. "Say," drawled his companion, with a calm deliberation that would have been dreaded by those who knew him, "does it hurt you much to be civil? You were asked who this man Presby is. Do you get that?"
Again her laughter overwhelmed her; but it was not shared by Dick, who stood above her on the slope, frowning in perplexity, thinking of the strange blunder into which he had been led by the words of poor old Bells, his acceptance of her identity, his ignorance that Bully Presby had kith or kin, and of the mine owner's sarcastic references and veiled antagonism throughout all those troubled months preceding.
He was interrupted now and then by a shrewd question, an exclamation, or a word of assent, and, after he had finished the account, said: "Well, that is all there is to report. What do you think?" "Who is Thomas W. Presby?" Sloan's question was abrupt. "The owner of the Rattler, the mine next to us." "He is?" the question was explosive. "Ah, ha! The moth in the closet, eh? So that accounts for it!
Presby, who never called Cyd by any other name; "don't you want to own a boat yourself?" "I does own one, sar," replied he. "De Isabel jus as much mine as Dan's." "I was going to set you up in business for yourself, Possifus." "No, sar, tank ye; can't leabe Dan, no how; he fotched dis chile out of de swamp, and I don't run no popposition to him." "That's right, Possifus; stick to your friends."
But Mr. Presby continued to do a great many kind deeds for "Possifus," which were duly appreciated. When Dan was twenty-one, he and Cyd had saved a considerable sum of money; and the Isabel having become rather shaky from old age, they proposed to procure another boat, and establish themselves at the city. With the aid of Mr. Presby, they built a yacht of forty tons, which was called the "Lily."
Studying the lines of her face, and the firm contour of her chin as it rounded into the grace of her throat, he had a joyful sense of confidence that she would not prove wanting, and dismissed Bully Presby from his thoughts. With a great embarrassment, he fumbled in the pocket of his shirt, and brought out a little box which he opened, to display a glittering gem.
"No," Dick answered, as he folded the letter and put it into his pocket, together with the one from his late father's partner. "Well, then, I can tell you, it's bad," said Presby, fixing him with his cool, hard stare. "The Cross is spotted. Once in a while they had pay chutes. They never had a true ledge. There isn't one there, as far as anybody that ever worked it knows.
He said just before he went off just like this mind you: 'I'd 'a' got Bully Presby, too, because he didn't treat me fair, after me doin' my best and a-keepin' my mouth shut about what I knew of the big lead. Now, what in hell do you suppose he meant by that?"
'You sit down, I said, 'and write this man Presby that I knew no one in connection with the Croix d'Or but the son of the man who many times befriended me, in desperate situations when I needed it! That I was paying back to the son what I was unfortunately prevented from paying back to the father a constant gratitude!
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