"I sat there looking out toward the mountains and down on the camp. The blasts were booming from all hills--the men were going home with their dinner-pails flashing red in the setting sun's light. It was terrible to think of them going home to supper. It seemed impossible that I should be sitting there starving, and the grass so green, the sunset so beautiful. I can see it all now as it looked then, the old Sangre de Christo range! It was like a wall of glistening marble that night. "Well, I sat there till my hunger gnawed me into action. Then I staggered down the trail. I saw how foolish I had been to go on day after day hoping, hoping until the last cent was gone. I hadn't money enough to pay the extra postage on a letter which was at the office. The clerk gave me the letter and paid the shortage himself. The letter was from my sister, telling me how peaceful and plentiful life was at home, and it made me crazy. She asked me how many nuggets I had found. You can judge how that hurt me. I reeled down the street, for I must eat or die, I knew that." "Oh, how horrible!" the girl said softly. "There was one eating-house at which I always took my supper. It was kept by an Irish woman, a big, hearty woman whose husband was a prospector--or had been. 'Biddy Kelly's' was famous for its 'home cooking.' I went by the door twice, for I couldn't bring myself to go in and ask for a meal. You don't know how hard that is--it's very queer, if a man has money he can ask for credit or a meal, but if he is broke he'll starve first. I could see Biddy waiting on the tables--the smell that came out was the most delicious, yet tantalizing, odor of beef-stew--it made me faint with hunger." His voice grew weak and his throat dry as he spoke. "When I did enter, Dan looked up and said respectfully, 'Good-evenin', Mr. Clement,' and I felt so ashamed of my errand I turned to run. Everything whirled then--and when I got my bearings again Dan had me on one arm and Biddy was holding a bowl of soup to my lips." The girl sighed. "Oh, she was good, wasn't she?" "They fed me, for they could see I was starving, and I told them about the mine--and, well, some way I got them to 'grub-stake' me that night." "What is that?" "That is, they agreed to furnish me food and money for tools and share in profits. Dan went to work with me, and do you know, it ended in ruining them both. We organized a company called the 'Biddy Mining Company.' I was president, and Dan was vice-president, and Biddy was treasurer. Biddy kept us going by her eating-house, but eventually we wanted machinery, and we mortgaged the eating-house, and the money went into that hole in the ground. But I knew we would succeed. I could hear voices call me, 'Come, come!'--whenever I was alone I could hear them plainly." His eyes, turned upon her, were full of mystery.