"No, she'll rest yer a bit just now. I'll set her
to watchin' suthin' else, like as not, when I want her." Flip fell into
one of her suggestive silences. Lance watched her earnestly, mollified
by a single furtive glance from her significant eyes; the rain dashed
against the windows, and occasionally spattered and hissed in the
hearth of the broad chimney, and Mr. David Fairley, somewhat assuaged
by the internal administration of whiskey, grew more loquacious. The
genius of incongruity and inconsistency which generally ruled his
conduct came out with freshened vigor under the gentle stimulation of
spirit. "On an evening like this," he began, comfortably settling
himself on the floor beside the chimney, "ye might rig yerself out in
them new duds and fancy fixin's that that Sacramento shrimp sent ye,
and let your own flesh and blood see ye. If that's too much to do for
your old dad, ye might do it to please that digger squaw as a Christian
act." Whether in the hidden depths of the old man's consciousness there
was a feeling of paternal vanity in showing this wretched aborigine the
value and importance of the treasure she was about to guard, I cannot
say.
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