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Hunting for gold, or, Adventures in Klondyke
Hunting for gold or Adventures in Klondyke Author:Hume Nisbet Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III WE RETURN SADLY Billy Cane either did not do his Aunt Deborah Primrose justice in his pessimistic description of her, or else she was in an ext... more »ra genial mood that evening. She was grim, certainly, and could, I daresay, be awful if contradicted or roused in any way, for she was a dogmatic woman, who had been in many parts of the world, and experienced a good deal of life. ' It may be that my free-and-easy manner of accosting her won her heart, or the idea that Billy had broken loose from the harsh parental control pleased her more than she cared to show. The main thing for us was that she made us welcome to her kitchen, and gave us a good feed of pea soup, which she was engaged in making at the time. It was glorious pea soup; at least I thought so, as I tucked into five or six plates of it. At home, I never took kindly to soups of any sort, and, I think, disliked pea soup most. Perhaps it was that that night Mrs Primrose made it differently, or our long fast and rough lines made me less fastidious, but I did enjoy that feed, I can tell you. While we were eating, the old lady watched us both attentively as she sat at the fireside, with a cup in one hand to ladle out the soup, and the other hand rubbing her rheumaticy keee. She did not ask us any questions at all, and it was only when Billy started to give his reasons for coming that she opened her mouth. ' Now, young man '—she said ' young man' with a firm depth of accent that made one wish she wouldn't—' young man, ye needn't trouble yourself making up any lies, or think you can bamboozle me. I have had too much experience of boys, an' men, too, for to be bamboozled by the smartest fool among them. I know all about it. That canting humbug of a father of yours has been extra hard on you, so you have ...« less