At this moment Dan came around the corner of the cabin, with a string of squirrels thrown over his shoulder. There were eight of them altogether and he held them up so that his father could see that every one of them was shot through the head. Godfrey complimented him on his skill, and when the boy passed into the cabin became suddenly silent and thoughtful. A question had just occurred to him. What if Dan had spent some of the money at the landing before he came home? He could not breathe freely until he found out. “Dannie,” said he, as the boy, having put away his rifle, came out again and seated himself on a log near the cabin preparatory to skinning the squirrels he had shot, “ye told me ye’d got----how much fur that quarter of beef?” “Three an’ a half, pop,” was the reply, and Dan began to look wild, and arose rather hastily from the log. There was something in the tone in which this question was propounded that made him fear that the storm he had quelled a short time before, was gathering again; but his father’s next words reassured him. “Yer a good son, Dannie,” said Godfrey. “An’ that’s the way to get rich, that ar way is. Take money when ye can get it, an’ _keep_ it, too; mind that, Dannie. Don’t go to throwin’ it about loose an’ reckless, but hold fast to it with sich a grip that nothin’ can’t make ye let up. Ye didn’t spend none of it at the landin’, I hope?” “No, I didn’t. Didn’t I tell ye that I brung every cent of it hum?” “That’s a good boy,” said Godfrey; and having set his fears at rest, he became silent again and puffed at his pipe until he was called to supper. When the meal was over, he went back to his pipe again; Dan made a pretence of chopping wood; while David assisted his mother in her household duties. It began to grow dark at last, and then Dan threw down his axe and seated himself beside his father who was nodding on the bench. “Say, pop, be we goin’ to look fur that bar’l to-night?” he asked. “No, Dannie, we hain’t,” was the sleepy reply. “I can’t. Here I’ve been an’ hoofed it down to the landin’ an’ back since dinner, an’ I’m jest teetotally tuckered out. Wait till to-morrow an’ then we’ll go!” Dan was surprised at this answer. He was tired himself, but the prospect of digging up eighty thousand dollars in gold and silver, would have put life and energy into him if he had been completely exhausted. He attributed his father’s refusal to his inherent laziness; but something he discovered the next morning showed him that he was wrong there.