He rose as he spoke to indicate that the interview was at an end, holding out his hand, one which Geoffrey gripped heartily, as he sprang, full of energy, to his feet. "Thank you, Mr Penwynn. I'll come and dine with you this evening. Most happy. As to the bed--thanks, no. I am going to hunt out lodgings somewhere, for I cannot take your advice. You don't know me, sir," he said, looking the banker full in the eyes. "I've come down here to work, and, somehow or other, work I will. I have enough of the sturdy Englishman in me not to know when I am beaten. No, sir, I am not going to turn back from the first hill I meet with in my journey." "As you will," said Mr Penwynn, smiling. "Till seven o'clock then. We don't dress." "Thanks; I will be there," said Geoffrey, and the door closed as he left the room. "He has stuff in him, certainly," said the banker, gazing at the door through which his visitor had passed. "Such a man at the head of a mine might make a good deal of money--or lose a good deal," he added, after a pause. "He'll find out his mistake before he is much older." With a careless motion of his hand the banker threw his visitor's card into the waste-paper basket, and, at the same time, seemed to cast the young man out of his thoughts. CHAPTER FIVE. A LOOK ROUND CARNAC. "Tell'ee what, Tom Jennen, you fishermen are more nice than wise." "And I tell'ee, Amos Pengelly, as you miner lads are more nasty than nice. Think of a man as calls hisself a Christian, and preaches to his fellows, buying a gashly chunk of twissening snake of a conger eel, and taking it home to eat." "And a good thing too, lad. Why, it's fish, ar'n't it?" "Fish? Pah! I don't call them fish." "Why, it's as good as your hake, man?" "What, good as hake? Why, ye'll say next it's good as mack'rel or pilchar'. I never see the like o' you miner lads. Why, I see Joe Helston buy a skate one day." "Ay, and a good thing too. But look yonder on Pen Point! There's some one got hold of the bushes. I say, Tom Jennen, who's yonder big, good-looking chap?" "I d'no'. Got on his Sunday clothes, whoever he be. Don't call him good-looking, though. Big awk'ard chap in a boot. He'd always be in the way. He's a 'venturer, that's what he is. Whose money's he going to chuck down a mine?" "What a chap you are, Tom Jennen! What should we mining folk do if it wasn't for the 'venturers? We must have metal got up, and somebody's obliged to speck'late in mines." "Speck'late in mines, indeed," said the other, contemptuously. "Why don't they put their money in boots or nets, so as to make money out of mack'rel or pilchar'?" "Ah, for the boots to go down and drown the poor lads in the first storm, and the nets to be cut and swept away." "Well, that's better than chucking the money down a hole in the ground."