Believe it or not, I knew a feller once who could smell gold just like a jackass can smell water. Now once on the ground, all we got to do is open our eyes and look around. That shows the makers of the map themselves don't know for sure. It don't show properly whether it's mountain, swamp, or desert. Now here's where we're bound for - hereabouts.We gotta go where there's no trails at all - where you can be positive that no surveyor or anybody who knows anything about prospectin' has ever been there before.We ought to have six hundred bucks between us. Meat's one thing and bandit's another.I was only waiting for one or two guys to ask me. Yeah, pretty soon, not even the bones will be left to tell the story. The tiger must have dragged him off to his lair, that's what. There's one thing certain, he ain't here. Curtin! Curtin! Curtin! Where are you? Curtin! I gotta get ahold of myself! Mustn't lose my head. I did right, yeah! What I should have done, maybe, bury his clothes and leave him to the ants and the buzzards.Buzzards! If somebody saw them circling, they'd know something was dead. What if his eyes are open, looking at me? Best thing to do is to get to the railroad in a hurry. In a week's time, the buzzards and the ants will have done away with him anyway. Maybe I'd better leave him like he is.But if you don't believe you've got one, what can it do to ya? Makes me sick all this talking and fussing about nonsense. If you believe you've got a conscience, it'll pester you to death. Maybe he just staggered and fell down without being hit. He knew what he was doin' when he turned 'em over to us. Ain't it always his burros that won't march in line.What was in your head when you offered to carry his goods for him that he couldn't manage by himself.I'll let you remember this the next time you try to do a good deed!.To tell you the truth, I was already eatin' dirt. Sic 'em Tiger! Chew 'em up and don't spit 'em out - swallow 'em. I could kiss every one of 'em.Oh, go get 'em. Dobbs ain't a guy likes bein' taken advantage of - do the mug in, I say! If ya know what's good for ya, ya won't monkey around with Fred C. The day you try to put anything over on me will be a costly one for both of you.Any more lip out of you and I'll haul off and let ya have it. You can't catch me sleepin'.Don't you ever believe that.I thought all you had to do was find it, pick it up, put it in sacks, and carry 'em off to the nearest bank. I sure had some cockeyed ideas about prospectin' for gold. That bandit with the Gold Hat that rode alongside the train - I had my sights on him nice as you please, but the train gave a jolt and I missed him.If we don't, the difference between what you put up and what I put up ain't enough to keep me from being right back where I was this afternoon, polishing a bench with the seat of my pants. This is an all-or-nothing proposition, ain't it? If we make a find, we'll be lightin' our cigars with hundred dollar bills.Oh, two hundred pesos! Welcome, sweet little smackeroos. I'm rich, printed number! That's the kind of sugar Papa likes.The longer it lasts, the greater our chance of diggin' something up would be! Our money would last longer while we lived out in the open. And this is the country where the nuggets of gold are just cryin' for ya to take 'em out of the ground and make 'em shine in coins and on the fingers and necks of swell dames. Why not try gold diggin' for a change? Well, it ain't any riskier than waitin' around here for a break.You'd never get another job from an American. But try shining shoes in the street or peddling lemonade out of a bucket and your hash is settled. You can sit on a bench til you're three-quarters starved.
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