"There's two miles of water frontage to it; there's the house we put up, also a little cabin where the present caretaker lives. The only other place within a couple of miles by water and four miles round by land through the bush, is a cottage that stands on the property abutting Eileen's, and close to her bungalow. It has been boarded up and unoccupied for quite a while. Of course, up behind, over the hills, there are ranches here and there, while, across the bay and all up the coast, there are squatters, settlers, fishermen and ranchers for a fare-you-well." "You say there is a caretaker there already?" I put in. "Yes!--I was just getting to that. He's an old Klondike miner; came out with a fortune. Spent the most of it before he got sober. Came to, just in time. Now he hoards what's left like an old skinflint. Won't spend a nickel, unless it's on booze. Drinks like a drowning man and it never fizzes on him. A good enough man for what he's been doing, but no good for what I want now." "You don't want me to do him out of his place, Mr. Horsfal?" I asked. "I was coming to that, too,--only you're so darned speedy. "He's all right as a caretaker with little or nothing to do, and he will prove useful to you for odd jobs,--but, I have a salmon cannery some miles north of this place and I am going to have half a dozen lumber camps operating south, and further up, for the next few years. Some of them are going full steam ahead now. "They require a convenient store, where they can get supplies; grub, oil, gasoline, hardware and such like. I need a man who could look after a proposition of that kind,--good. The settlers would find a store up there a perfect god-send. "The property at Golden Crescent is easily got at and is the most central to all my places. Now, having an eye to business, and with Eileen's consent, I have decided to convert the large front living-room of her bungalow into a store. It is plain, and can't be hurt. It's just suited for the purpose. I have had some carpenters up there this past week, putting in a counter and shelves and shutting the new store off completely from the rest of the house. "A stock of groceries, hardware, etc., has already been ordered from the wholesalers and should be up there in a few days. "Steamers pass Golden Crescent twice a week. When they have anything for you, they whistle and stand by out in the bay; when you want them, you hoist a white flag on the pole, on the rock, at the end of the little wharf; then you row out and meet them. "These are the main features, George. Oh, yes! I'm paying one hundred dollars a month and all-found to the right man." He stopped and looked over at me a little anxiously. "George!--will you take the job?" "What about those other poor beggars who have applied?" I asked.