Just my luck!" Corliss started swiftly to his feet.

Bishop jerked his head about.
Two women and a man had staggered clumsily in through the door, and were standing just inside, momentarily blinded by the light.
"By all the Prophets! Cornell!" The pocket-miner wrung the man's hand and led him forward.

"You recollect Cornell, Corliss?
Jake Cornell, Thirty-Seven and a Half Eldorado." "How could I forget ?" the engineer acknowledged warmly, shaking his hand.

"That was a miserable night you put us up last fall, about as miserable as the moose-steak was good that you gave us for breakfast." Jake Cornell, hirsute and cadaverous of aspect, nodded his head with emphasis and deposited a corpulent demijohn on the table.

Again he nodded his head, and glared wildly about him.