gated smoothness. His beard, so he said, had never been introduced to either shears or razor since he first set foot in California, and he wore his hair low down upon his shoulders. Now that he could afford it, he wore broadcloth,—and a great deal too much of it. His extravagant attire—extravagant, at least, for a mine-superintendent—was startlingly emphasized by an immense diamond which he wore in the front of his "boiled shirt," that chief derision of old mining-days. But, still, Droopy commanded respect: he was far too important a personage to be treated with anything short of respect. Tom Morris, equally potent and powerful in Red Mountain affairs, dressed with becoming taste and neatness. When the two were together, Droopy's magnificence was made all the more garish by Tom Morris's simplicity. Both men were well preserved, and Droopy's face still retained the grooves and serrations of old, and his eyelids still hung down in the same lop-sided way,—the way which had made Mark Stanley shudder when he and Droopy first met.
Dubb and Dubb's mine were Droopy's joy and pride; he talked of nothing else, and thought of nothing else,—excepting his diamond. Tom Morris also set great store by Dubb's mine, but he was much more interested in Dubb's charge, Mark Stanley's daughter,—Mary Dubb, as she was now known.
Dubb had judiciously intrusted the education of Mary to Tom Morris; and Tom's influence over her had never been anything else than good. He found her earnest, intelligent, and eager; and so her education was a matter of mutual enjoyment to both teacher and pupil. Morris was a college-bred man, but he had long since decided that ornate flourishes in the training of youth were entirely superfluous: so his aim was to give Mary a practical education, with no more of the ornamental than her tastes might demand when she was old enough to comprehend that indefinite quantity which is commonly described as a higher education.
Consequently, when she was seventeen, Mary was thoroughly prepared for such of the exigencies of life as she was likely to encounter. Partly from inherent tastes, and partly from the influence of Morris, Mary became an omnivorous reader. Dubb, always ready to get whatever Mary wanted or needed, had obtained for her such books as Tom Morris suggested, until she was possessed of a fine collection. This little library—or "lyburry," as Droopy called it—was one of the chief delights of Red Mountain while it was still a rough camp; and it furnished the admiring miners almost as much food for conversation as little Mary herself.
Mary, unconsciously, exerted a powerful influence over the Red Mountain miners. At her approach, even when she was a wee, prattling child, a damper was put upon ribald or blasphemous talk; and the mention of her name had a similar effect.
"She am a angel," Droopy had declared, soon after her arrival at Red Mountain; and, though the somewhat extravagant characterization was not generally accepted, she was quite as heartily respected, by the other miners, as a woman. Presents of every description, from toy cats to six-shooters, were unstintingly rained upon her, and before she
