STRANGE'S PARTNER The day's work was over and Thirlwell and his employer sat, smoking and talking, in their shack at the Clermont mine.

Scott was young and had once been fastidious, but, like Thirlwell, he wore work-stained overalls.

For a time when they first came up, both had clung to a few of the refinements of civilization, but their grasp on these had slackened, and now they frankly admitted that it was too much of an effort to change their clothes when they were tired.
The shack was built of pine logs, notched where they crossed at the corners, and the seams were caulked with clay and moss.

A big stove, now empty, stood at one end, its pipe running obliquely across the room before it pierced the iron roof, so as to radiate as much heat as possible.

Plans, drawing instruments, and some books on mining, occupied a shelf on the wall; guns, fishing rods, and surveying tools a corner, and a plain, uncovered table the middle of the room.