"No, I mean it. There's another thing--I wouldn't whisper it even to you if you weren't my partner as well as my wife. I have reason to believe the creek bed above the dike is a rich placer. I've planned to take Knowles and Ashton in on that discovery--Gowan, too, if Knowles asks it." "A placer?" "Yes, placer mine--gold washed down in the creek bed. But it's a small thing compared with another discovery I've made. Up there--" Blake pointed up the steep ledges that he had climbed--"I found a bonanza." "Bonanza? What is that, pray?" "A mint, a John D. bank account, a--Guess?" "A gold mine! Oh, Tom, how romantic!" "Yes; it's free-milling quartz. We can mill it ourselves, and not have to pay tribute to the Smelting Trust. That's romance--or at least sounds like it. You will pay for all the development work, in return for one-third share. I shall take a third, as the discoverer, and Chuckie gets the remaining third as grub-staker." "As what?" "She is staking us with grub--food and supplies. If she had not sent for me to come and look over the situation, I should not have been here to stumble on this mine. So she gets a share." "I'm glad, glad, Tom! Isn't it nice to be able to do fine things for others? I'm so glad for Chuckie's sake, because, if Lafayette keeps on as he is doing now, he may win his father's forgiveness." "What has that to do with Chuckie?" "You and I know what she is, Dear; yet if she had no money, his father might insist on regarding her as a mere farm girl. He is as--as snobbish as I was when we were flung ashore by the storm, there in Mozambique." "I fail to see that it matters any to Chuckie what Ashton senior thinks." "Of course you don't see. You're as blind as when I--" the lady blushed--"as when I had to fling myself at you to make you see. The dear girl is as deeply in love with Lafayette as he is with her." "No? She doesn't show it. How can you tell?" "You know that Mr. Gowan is desperately in love with her." "That stands to reason. He couldn't help but be. Can't say I like the fellow. He may be all right, though. Must have some good qualities--Chuckie seems to be very fond of him." "As fond as if he were a brother. No; Lafayette is to be the happy man--unless he backslides. We must help him." Blake nodded. "That's another thing that hangs on this project. If it proves to be feasible, I can give Ashton a chance to make good as an engineer. I used to think he must have bought his C.E. Now I see he has the makings." "He can be brilliant when he chooses. If only he were not so--so scatter-brained." "What he needed was a jolt heavy enough to shake him together. It seems as though his father gave it to him." "That shock, and being picked up by Chuckie," agreed Genevieve. "We'll help her keep him braced until the cement sets," said her husband. "It's even worse to let brains go to waste than water."