“Little matter o’ business,” he said, leading the way. Two men in one corner puffed bad cigars while they bent over a glazed paper, whereon a certain property was outlined in red ink. No one else there. Hildegarde and Mr. Blumpitty took the opposite corner. “I got t’ give y’ $25,” said Blumpitty, as one who has studied every alternative. “What in the world for?” asked the young lady. “Bonus on the _Congress_ ticket.” He had pulled a roll of bills out of his pocket, and the breeze in the transit from open porthole to open door paused on its way to toy with greenbacks of a goodly denomination. “I didn’t know there was a bonus,” said Hildegarde. “Naw,” said Blumpitty vaguely, as he handed her the money. He got up murmuring “breakfast.” But when he found himself on his feet he glanced with slow caution at the absorbed faces opposite, still bent over the map of a mining district, and lowering his voice, “Did Mrs. Mar say anything to you touchin’ the Mother Lode?” “Yes.” “Well, don’t mention it, will yer?” As Hildegarde looked up to say, “Oh, no, indeed,” there was the spectacled man’s friend at the porthole. At least it looked like his cap and his high collar, for that was all of him that any one could see. Even that much vanished the moment Hildegarde raised her eyes. When she and Mr. Blumpitty reached the deck the arctic cap was nowhere to be seen. How had he disappeared so quickly in such a crowd? Mr. Blumpitty paused a moment before going below, muttering to himself, “I jest been talkin’ to a gentleman”—the yellow-gray eyes went over the heads of the throng—“a gentleman that thinks _he_ knows where it is.” “The Mother Lode?” Blumpitty’s pale visage relaxed to something remotely like a smile as he answered, “But he don’t.” “I suppose,” said Hildegarde, “all these people in one way or another hope to find it—the Mother Lode, you know.” Blumpitty’s vague eyes came back from the snowcapped range of the Cascades, and dwelt with a ruminant sympathy upon the passing faces. “Ya-as, they think they’re headin’ straight fur it. But they ain’t.” “Nobody on all this ship, or on all the other ships is really heading straight but you.” “Wa-al”—he seemed to wish to be strictly, punctiliously accurate—“I got to go to Snow Gulch first.” “But after that?” “Ya-as. After that!” And Blumpitty went to the third breakfast-table on his way to millionairedom and the Mother Lode. The girl lay back in her long chair and stared at the crowd, thinking how strange it was that Hildegarde Mar should be among them, and even while she wondered the sense of strangeness was wearing away.