Mayfield said, "You asked what I was thinking. Well, I will tell you. I was thinking that a man like myself, after suffering such a blow as you men have struck on this day, has two distinct paths he might travel in his life. He might walk out into the world with a wounded heart, intent on sharing his mad hatred with every person he passes; or, he might start out anew with an empty heart, and he should take care to fill it up with only proud things from then on, so as to nourish his desolate mind-set and cultivate something positive or new.

It is hard to find a friend,' I said. 'It is the hardest thing in this world,' he agreed.

Why were you feeling low? Why does anyone? It creeps up on you from time to time.

The creak of bed springs suffering under the weight of a restless man is as lonely a sound as I know.

He is not bad, I don't think. Perhaps he is simply too lazy to be good.

This perhaps was what lay at the root of the hysteria surrounding what came to be known as the Gold Rush: Men desiring a feeling of fortune; the unlucky masses hoping to skin or borrow the luck of others, or the luck of a destination. A seductive notion, and one I thought to be wary of. To me, luck was something you either earned or invented through strength of character. You had to come by it honestly; you could not trick or bluff your way into it.

Luck was something you either earned or invented through strength of character. You had to come by it honestly; you could not trick or bluff your way into it.