14998	----	THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND SIMON'S MINE BY ROSS KAY Author of "Dodging the North Sea Mines," "With Joffre on the Battle Line," "The Search for the Spy," "The Go Ahead Boys on Smugglers' Island," "The Go Ahead Boys and the Treasure Cave," "The Go Ahead Boys and the Racing Motor Boat," etc., etc. _ILLUSTRATED BY R. EMMETT OWEN_ _I leave this rule for others when I'm dead: Be always sure you're right--THEN GO AHEAD Davy Crockett's Motto_ NEW YORK BARSE & HOPKINS PUBLISHERS =BOOKS FOR YOUNG MEN= * * * * * =THE GO AHEAD BOYS By Ross Kay= _12mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume, 75 cents, postpaid_. 1 THE GO AHEAD BOYS ON SMUGGLERS' ISLAND 2 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND THE TREASURE CAVE 3 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND THE MYSTERIOUS OLD HOUSE 4 THE GO AHEAD BOYS IN THE ISLAND CAMP 5 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND THE RACING MOTOR BOAT 6 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND SIMON'S MINE (_Other volumes in preparation_) BARSE & HOPKINS PUBLISHERS NEW YORK 1917 * * * * * _The Go Ahead Boys and Simon's Mine_ [Illustration: In spite of their recent exertions and the loads they were carrying they all began to run. page 203] PREFACE In this book the writer has endeavored to relate a story of stirring adventure and at the same time eliminate all sensationalism and improbable elements. The thread of the story was given him by a man who was familiar with the life and experiences of prospectors. Indeed, there is warrant for almost every event recorded in these pages. The author has no desire to make his young heroes either preternaturally brilliant or possessed of too precocious brains. They are normal, healthy American boys fond of travel and adventure and naturally are meeting experiences such as come to men doing what they were doing in certain parts of our country. Self-reliance, determination, the ability to decide quickly and to act promptly, the strength of will which prevents one from abandoning too easily a course of action which has been decided upon,--all these are foundations upon which any successful life must rest. If these qualities can be acquired in the early years then life is just that much stronger and better. The Go Ahead Boys, in spite of their many experiences are typical boys of America, and as such wish to express to the many friends they have made their hearty appreciation of the interest which has been expressed in their wanderings and adventures. Ross Kay. TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I A GHASTLY DISCOVERY 11 II A CLUE 21 III TWO UNBIDDEN GUESTS 30 IV TWO THIEVES IN THE NIGHT 40 V A START AND A LOSS 48 VI DIVIDED 57 VII TWO NAVAJOS 65 VIII WAITING 75 IX DOWN THE RUSHING RIVER 84 X A RATTLER 92 XI A PERILOUS FALL 101 XII A WRECK 109 XIII ALONE IN THE CANYON 118 XIV CLIMBING 126 XV THE SEARCH 134 XVI A STARTLING ARRIVAL 143 XVII A DEPARTURE BY NIGHT 151 XVIII RESTORING THE MAP 160 XIX A JOYOUS RETURN 169 XX TWO CROW TREE 178 XXI THE RETURN OF THE STRANGERS 187 XXII SPLIT ROCK 196 XXIII ON THE RIM 205 XXIV A SMALL CLOUD 214 XXV CIRCLES 224 XXVI CONCLUSION 234 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND SIMON'S MINE CHAPTER I A GHASTLY DISCOVERY "Look at that!" Instantly Fred Button and his companion halted and the two boys stared at the sight to which their attention had been directed. Even their guide, who at that time was several yards behind, hastened to join them and was almost as shocked by the sight as was his young companions. "What is it? What is it?" whispered John. "Can't you see?" retorted Fred. "It's a skeleton of a man. The skull is over there," he explained as he pointed to his right. "The other bones have been scattered. Probably some wolves or buzzards have been at work here." For a brief time no one spoke. The bones before them were unquestionably those of a man. They had been bleached by the sun and their very whiteness increased the ghastly impression. "What do you think has happened?" inquired John in a low voice. Fred shook his head and turned questioningly to the guide. Zeke, the name by which the guide was commonly called, also shook his head as if the mystery was not yet solved. Without speaking he approached the place where the skeleton had been discovered, and a moment later with his foot unearthed a sleeve of a coat which had been buried from sight by drifting sands of the desert. Stooping, Zeke pulled hard and soon drew forth the coat. The garment itself was somewhat torn, but still was in a fair state of preservation. Turning to his companions Zeke said abruptly, "Better look around, boys, and see if you can find something else. My impression is that you'll find a set of prospector's tools not far away." In response to the suggestion the two boys at once busily began their search. A shoe, worn and plainly torn by strong and savage teeth, was brought to Zeke. Later a pick ax, spade and hammer also were discovered and added to the pile. Meanwhile Zeke had been searching the garment which he had discovered and in one pocket he had found a small book which evidently interested him greatly. Thrusting his discovery into his pocket, Zeke turned to the boys and said. "What do you think? Shall we bury these bones or shall we try to take them back?" "Back where?" inquired Fred. "To our camp or back to civilization?" "I shouldn't do either," suggested John. "We can bury the bones here and mark the spot so that if we ever find out who the man was we can tell his friends where they will find what is left of him. What do you think?" he added, turning to the guide as he spoke. "I think that's the best thing to do," replied Zeke quietly. "Personally I haven't any strong feeling about what happens to my carcass after I have left it." "Have you any idea who or what this man was?" Fred asked. "I found this in his pocket," responded Zeke, displaying the little book he had taken from the coat. "What is it? What is it?" inquired Fred eagerly. "It looks to me like it was a diary. Some of it is missing and some is faded, but it looks to me on the whole as if the man was keeping an account every day of what he was doing and where he went." "Can't you find his name in there somewhere?" inquired John. "I haven't yet. I have a suspicion that these bones belong to old Simon Moultrie. He was an odd stick and I guess was more than half crazy. He was prospecting most of his life, leastwise as soon as he came out to these regions. The funny part of it all was that he wouldn't go with anybody and wouldn't let anybody go with him. Once or twice he thought he had struck it rich, but I never heard that anything panned out." "What makes you think the dead man was Simon Moultrie?" "Mostly because he hasn't been heard from of late. It must be seven or eight months since he has shown up. You see he used to come in twice a year for supplies and then he would start out prospecting and not show up again for six months, or until his supplies ran low." "How old a man was he?" inquired John. "Sixty-three or sixty-six, I should reckon," replied Zeke glibly. "He was a bit off, same as I was telling you, and had just gone dippy on the subject of finding a mine." "And you say he did find one or two?" "He thought he did find one or two, but when he came to follow them up, why the stuff didn't assay worth a cent, or else it was just a little pocket he had happened to find. What do you think ought to be done with these bones?" again inquired the guide. "The best thing to do is to bury them and mark the spot just as John said," said Fred. The suggestion was speedily acted upon and taking the spade which had been found Zeke soon digged a grave in the soft soil. Then carefully and silently the bones of the unfortunate man were collected and covered. A bleached limb of a mesquite tree which had doubtless been torn away and been carried far from its location by one of the terrific wind storms that occasionally sweep over the region, was thrust into the ground at the head of the little grave. Next a piece of paper was taken from his pocket by John. Upon it he wrote, "The grave of an unknown man, supposedly Simon Moultrie. The bones were found July 13, 1914, by Fred Button, John Clemens and Zeke Rattray." "Don't you think," inquired John, "that I had better put our addresses on this paper too?" "Good scheme," replied Fred. Accordingly the permanent address of each member of the party was added to the brief statement. "Do you suppose we'll ever hear from anybody?" inquired John in a low voice. "I don't know," answered Fred, shaking his head as he spoke. "It's one of those things you never can tell about." Fred Button was one of the four boys who among their friends and themselves, for the matter of that, were commonly known as the Go Ahead Boys. They were schoolmates and classmates and were nearly of the same age, John being the only one who was eighteen, while his three companions were each seventeen years old. In various parts of their country they had been spending their recent vacations together. The list of books given at the beginning of this story will indicate the various parts of the country in which they had met their adventures. At the present time, however, when this story opens, they were nearly two thousand miles from home. Across the continent they had journeyed together and together also they had spent ten days viewing the wonders of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado. The apparently perilous ride on the backs of donkeys down Bright Angel Trail had been greatly enjoyed, as well as certain other inspiring expeditions which the boys had made, sometimes in company with others and sometimes with a single guide for the quartet. So enthusiastic had the young travelers become over their experiences that at last they had obtained the consent of their parents to make an expedition of their own. Two guides were secured who were familiar with the entire region and two strong skiffs were purchased. In these boats the boys had planned to follow a part of the dangerous Colorado River. They had no desire to incur the perils that belonged to many of its swirling rapids and tossing waters. In other places, however, the river was comparatively safe and there the boys planned to follow the course of the stream with their strong and heavy little boats. Inasmuch as Fred's father was a prominent railway official he had obtained for the boys certain privileges which otherwise they might not have had. Fred himself was the most enthusiastic member of the party. Shorter than any of his comrades his weight was still nearly as great as any of the four. His solid, sturdy little frame was capable of great endurance and there were few experiences he enjoyed more than tiring his long, lanky comrade John, who as one of his friends brutally expressed it was as much too tall as Fred was too short. Out of consideration for Fred's physique, among his friends he was known as Pigmy and Pee Wee, the former title sometimes being shortened into Pyg. John, however, rejoiced in his name, or if he did not rejoice, at least was accustomed to respond to the appellation, String. The remaining members of the little band were George Washington Sanders, one of the most popular boys in the school in which all four were students. Frequently he was referred to as Pop, a distinction by which his friends indirectly expressed their admiration for one who was laughingly referred to as the "Papa of his Land," just as the great man for whom he was named was the "Father of his Country." Grant was the member of the Go Ahead Boys who easily led in whatever he attempted. In the hundred yards dash he had established the record of the school. His standing in scholarship was high, while his fund of general information was so extensive that he had received the appellation, Socrates. This nickname, however, recently had been shortened by the time-saving lads and Grant was more frequently called Soc than by the name which his parents had given him. His ability as an athlete was scarcely less than his success in the classroom. And yet Grant by no means was one who withdrew from out-of-door life, or enjoyed less than his friends the stirring adventures in which they all had shared. Zeke Rattray, the guide, was a tall, bronzed, powerful young fellow about twenty-five years of age. For several years he had dwelt in the region, serving as guide for various exploring parties or prospectors. The Go Ahead Boys had smiled incredulously when Zeke had informed them that when he came originally to the state because he was expected to die "back east," (in Iowa) of tuberculosis. "I weighed just one hundred and nineteen pounds when I landed out here," he explained, and then as he stood erect and threw back his powerful shoulders his young companions laughed. It did not seem possible that the strapping young giant, who now weighed at least two hundred pounds, ever had been reduced to such a condition as he described. The immense strength of Zeke had never impressed the Go Ahead Boys more than when he finished his simple task of interring the bones which had been discovered by Fred and John. "If I should meet him on the street alone," whispered Fred to John, "I should kindly give him the whole sidewalk. I believe that he could do what Grant says he can. Just look at those hands." "What does Grant say he can do?" "Why he declares that Zeke can bend the barrel of a rifle." CHAPTER II A CLUE The thoughts of the two boys speedily were withdrawn from the physical prowess of their guide. At that moment he had again taken the little book he had found in the pocket of the coat of the dead man, and, opening it, said, "I'm not sure, boys, whether this man was Simon Moultrie or not. It sounds just like him, but there's so little writing that I can't tell." "What does it say?" inquired John eagerly. "Why, it's a diary. Some days he didn't write anything and other days when he did write, the pages are torn and the writing is so blurred that no one can make out what he means." "Let me see it," said Fred, extending his hand as he spoke. Taking the little book Fred saw that it apparently was a diary as Zeke had suggested. It was for the year 1914. One entry was quite distinct wherein the unfortunate man had recorded the story of his journey to Tombstone for fresh supplies. When he commented upon this fact, Zeke said, "That's what makes me think it might have been Simon. As I said to you he only came in twice each year and then stayed just long enough to get supplies to last him for the next six months. Of course he may have come in when I didn't know anything about it." "When did be make his trips?" inquired Fred. "Usually about October and. April He didn't like to lose much time from his prospecting so he would come in just about the time the snow was gone and get fitted out for his work that summer." "If he wont in last April," suggested John, "he must have lost some of his supplies." "Nobody knows just where he made his head quarters. It's more'n likely though that the coyotes, if they could talk, might be able to tell you more about what became of old Simon's bacon than any living man could." "Here's something!" exclaimed Fred excitedly. "This is worth while," he added, after he had looked carefully through the various pages of the diary and in the back part of the book, distinct from the numbered pages, he had found the following entry: "June 1st. At last I have found it. It seems good after twenty-three years of disappointment to be able to say that I have found a good lead and that there is a sure enough vein here. I thought I was on the right trail when I was in the middle of Thorn's Gulch and I found pretty soon that I had struck it just right. I followed the lead four days and every day I was more convinced that I had found something at last worth while. The assay will be great. Soon I shall have all the money I need, and my poor old sister will no longer be broken hearted for me. I was determined to find a mine and now I have one that is worth all my long working and waiting." "Any name signed to that?" inquired Zeke quickly when Fred ceased reading. "No." "Then you can't be sure it's Simon's." "Yes, you can, if the book belonged to him, as you think it did. It's plain this Simon, if that was his name, was an educated man." "How do you know that?" inquired John. "Why, the words are all spelled as they ought to be and his penmanship is good. The only thing is that there isn't a name signed nor any sign that will show who wrote it. Hello!" he added quickly, "here's something on the next page that ought to interest us." "What is it?" inquired John, approaching and looking over the shoulder of his friend. "It looks to me like a map," said Fred thoughtfully. "Here's a place that is marked Thorn's Gulch and over here on one side is a spot marked Two Crow Tree, and a little further up on the same side is Tom's Thumb. Across the Gulch is a place marked Split Rock. Not far away from it is another mark which he calls his stake. Then right opposite it are three other marks,--1/2 m N.E., 1/4 m S.E., 1/4 m N.N.E. Here's a picture of it," Fred added. X Two Crow Tree. X Tom's Thumb. .---------------------------------------------- . Thorn's Gulch . .--------------------------------------------- . . X Split Rock. / / Stake 1/2 m N.E. | | o 1/4 m S.E. | | 1/4 m N.N.E. [Illustration: Map] "That's interesting," said Zeke thoughtfully. "I know where Thorn's Gulch is." "How far is it from here?" inquired Fred. "Oh, I should say it is a good forty miles." "Is it hard to get there?" "I haven't ever been this way," replied Zeke, "but I'm thinkin' we can make it." "In which direction does the Gulch run?" "It's a funny place," explained Zeke; "it runs mostly north and south. It takes a sharp turn at the lower end." "Probably that was to let out the water that had been caught in there." "Probably," said Zeke scornfully. The guide had slight confidence in the explanations which the boys had to give for the formation of the great chasms found near the Colorado River and its tributaries. "I'm thinkin' that the One who made that Canyon could just as well make it the way it is as the way you say." "No doubt about that," Fred laughingly had conceded. "It isn't a question of ability, it is simply how it was done." "According to what I can find out," said Zeke, "there seems to be styles in explainin' things, same as there is in clothes. My wife doesn't want to wear the dress she had two years ago even if it isn't worn out very much. When I ask her what's the matter with it she says it's out o' style. It's the same way with explaining how this great hole in the ground came here. There seems to be a sort of 'style' about it. Some people say it's erosion, others say it's the work of a big glacier. Then too I have heard some say as how it was neither and some said it was both. That doesn't make any difference though, but I know where Thorn's Gulch is and I can go there if you want to." "If Simon found a mine what was it?" "Can't say," replied Zeke sharply. "It might be gold, it might be zinc and more likely might be copper. Most likely of all though is that he didn't find no mine 't all." "There isn't anything more in the diary about it anyway," said Fred, who now had looked through all the pages without discovering any further description. "How long is Thorn's Gulch?" "Somewhere between fifteen and twenty miles," answered Zeke. "Whew!" whistled John. "If we're going to look up the lost mine we'll have some 'looking' to do I'm thinking." "Right you are," said Fred soberly. "Do you think we had better try to find this place?" "That's for you to say," said Zeke. "It's all one to me whether I help you find a copper mine or whether I keep you from, tipping over in the boat. I'm inclined to think the boat business is a good deal safer than the other." "But we can't throw away a clue like this," protested Fred. "Here it is," he added, again looking at the map. "Two Crow Tree and Tom's Thumb and then across the Gulch about half way between the two places on the other side is Split Bock and then back of that is the stake. I don't know what these figures mean." "I do," said John confidently, "it's a half-mile northeast, then you go a quarter of a mile southeast and then you turn and go a quarter of a mile north northeast. Why, it's just as simple as the multiplication table." Zeke smiled and shook his head and although he did not speak it was plain that he did not accept John's explanation of the somewhat mysterious figures as correct. "Did you ever hear of Two Crow Tree?" asked John. "I never did," said Zeke solemnly. "Well, did you ever hear of Tom's Thumb?" "Can't say that I have." "Then, it's plain," said John, winking at Fred as he spoke, "that we'll have to get somebody who is more familiar than you are, Zeke, with this part of the country." "Huh!" snorted Zeke. "Don't you believe it. There ain't nobody in these diggin's that knows the country like I do." "But you don't know where Two Crow Tree is or Tom's Thumb, to say nothing about Split Rock on the opposite side of the canyon." "That doesn't mean that I can't find them," retorted Zeke. "You mustn't forget either that those names may be the ones that Simon gave the places. They may not be on the map at all and nobody else may ever have called them by those names." "Well, shall we try to find the place? That's the question," said John somewhat impatiently. "Not until the other boys and Pete come back here." Pete was the name of the second guide and on most occasions Zeke professed to despise his judgment and belittle his information. "Oh, Pete will do just what you say is the thing to be done," said Fred, winking at John as he spoke. "That 's likely," assented Zeke. "All the same I'm not going to start off with you two boys and leave the other two here for Pete to look after. I'm afraid Pete couldn't keep off the coyotes, to say nothing of the buzzards." "Zeke," said Fred abruptly, "how long do you think it took the coyotes and the buzzards to strip those bones that we found?" "Not more than a half-hour." "What?" "That's right," said Zeke positively. "A job like that doesn't take a half-dozen coyotes any time at all. And I'm thinkin' they had to divide with the buzzards anyway." John, who apparently for a few minutes had not been taking much interest in the conversation now looked up from the place where he was standing and said sharply, "I'm for looking for that lost mine." "That's a good one," laughed Zeke. "What is a good one?" demanded John tartly. "Your lost mine. There wasn't any mine anyway. All there was to it was a prospect. Old Simon maybe thought he had found a lead, but unless 'twas a good deal surer than any other one he ever found, it wasn't worth much, but all the same I'm for tryin' to find it if the other boys and Pete agree to it." CHAPTER III TWO UNBIDDEN GUESTS By this time the boys and their guide had returned to the place where they had left their companions. Their two companions already were there and the return of their friends was greeted by a shout from both Grant and George. Other things, however, speedily were forgotten when Fred related the story of their gruesome discovery in the sheltered place or cave on the sloping side of the mountain. Both George and Grant at once united in declaring that the decision which their friends already had made to seek for the lost mine was to be highly commended. Again and again the diary was inspected and the part wherein Simon Moultrie had recorded his discovery of the great lead was read aloud again and again. Pete, the guide, a silent, bronzed man of thirty, openly scoffed at the idea that any discovery worth while would follow their attempts to find the spot indicated in the diary of the lost prospector. "Nobody knows," declared Pete, "whether you found the bones of Simon Moultrie or not." "That doesn't make any difference," declared Fred sturdily, "if we can only find the place he spoke of. Zeke says he knows where Thorn's Gulch is--" "Huh!" interrupted Pete. "I guess ev'rybody in this part o' th' country knows where Thorn's Gulch is." "But," continued Fred, winking at John as he spoke, "he doesn't know where Two Crow Tree is nor just where Tom's Thumb is located. Of course you know, so we came back to the camp." "If I don't know I can find 'em, I guess," assented Pete sturdily. "That's just what Zeke said," laughed Fred. "What we're looking for isn't somebody who can _find_ them, but somebody who knows where they are." "Don't you worry none about that," said Pete. "We'll find the spot if there's any such place." The camp was located in a most attractive spot, high above the roaring river. It was on the sloping side of the towering border. A natural pathway lead to the plateau above, while a spring of clear water was conveniently near for their needs. In spite of the July day the air was cool and the smoke of their camp-fire was carried swiftly down the canyon. The sublime sight of the Grand Canyon was before them, although from their camp they were unable to see the largest of all the great gulches. The sides of the various canyons, which the swiftly flowing Colorado had made, were carved and fretted almost beyond belief. The various strata of rock and soil that had been exposed to view by the centuries of action of the mighty river were marvelously tinted. Indeed, George declared that the blues, the grays, and reds and mauves were only less impressive than the overwhelming size of the Grand Canyon itself. Grant, however, was positive that the sculptured sides of the vast hole were equal in interest to the coloring and the glory of the canyon itself. With every changing angle of the sun the colors and shadings also changed. Again and again the boys had marked the shadows formed every morning and evening and they laughingly announced and described the various resemblances which they had traced. The Grand Canyon itself is only a part of the long canyon, in places a mile deep and in certain places a score of miles from side to side, through which the mighty river has forced its way. The Colorado River starting in Southern Utah is formed by the junction of the Green and the Grand Rivers. The former rising in Northern Utah, traverses also a part of Wyoming, while the latter river traces the western Rockies in Colorado. Of this wonderful stream Major Powell, the first to descend the river, wrote, "Ten million cascade brooks unite to form a hundred rivers. Beside that, cataracts and a hundred roaring rivers unite to form the Colorado, a mad turbid stream." One distinguished writer, describing the mighty canyon, said it is "most mysterious in its depth than the Himalayas in their height. It is true that the Grand Canyon remains not the eighth but the first wonder of the world. There is nothing like it." Our special interest, however, is in the four boys and their two guides, who now were assembled in the camp. Every boy was bronzed and toughened by his exposure and labors. Packs were to be seen which had been brought into camp on the backs of the various members of the party. Each pack contained about sixty pounds of food and materials necessary for the expedition. In addition, guns had been brought, fishing rods were visible and other implements, which were a part of the camp life were on every side. Burros had been used to carry some of the burdens until the boys had entered within the canyon itself. Then the burros with the Indian boy who had accompanied them as far as the border, turned back to the place from which they had come. It was not believed that sufficient material would be left after the expedition was completed to require again the services of the donkeys. After supper the boys stretched themselves on the ground near the fire which was still burning. "We have kept together all the way as far as this," suggested Fred, "but I'm wondering now if we wouldn't do better if we divided into two parties." "What for?" demanded Grant, sitting quickly erect. "I've just been talking to Zeke and asking him whether he didn't think we would need more supplies than we have before we came back." "Nonsense," said John. "We have all we want. It isn't going to take us more than a year to find that place Simon Moultrie told about. If we don't get some trace of it within a few days I'm not in favor of keeping up the search and for that reason I don't believe we'll want any more supplies." "Nobly spoken!" laughed George. "It sounds like the supreme wisdom of Soc. What do you say about it?" he added, turning to Grant as he spoke. "I know just enough to know that I don't know anything about it," answered Grant. "But what do you think?" protested Fred. "I think we may need more than we have. What does Zeke say about it?" replied Grant. "Zeke doesn't think we had better divide again. He says that if we need supplies we can go in for them, but the probabilities are that we shall be back long before any such lack comes. He thinks we had better all keep together. There's safety in numbers sometimes, you know." "I agree," said Grant, "if that is Zeke's opinion. Still when we get on the ground where our real search begins I'm of the opinion that we'll get along better and faster if we make two parties instead of one." "There will be time enough to talk about that when we have to," laughed Fred. "Look yonder," he abruptly added, pointing as he spoke to two men who could be seen coming down the natural approach to the camp. "Where did they come from? Who are they? What do you suppose they want? You don't suppose it is somebody coming in with a message of bad news for us, do you?" No one replied to the questions of the startled boy, but every member of the party at once turned and keenly watched the approaching men. Both were walking, although Zeke explained in a low voice that doubtless they had burros somewhere not far away. In a brief time the two strangers approached the camp and immediately made themselves known. "I've seen both those men before," whispered Fred excitedly. "Where?" inquired John. "They were on the train when we came. They sat right across the aisle from us. I'm sure they are the same men for I never shall forget the scar on the left cheek of that short one." The two approaching strangers were now so near that it was possible for John to confirm the statement of his friend. A long livid scar, extending almost entirely across his left cheek, was visible on the face of the younger man. His companion was taller, evidently at least ten years older and had a face which was not altogether prepossessing at first sight. "Yes, sir," repeated Fred. "I saw both those fellows on the car the day before we left the train." "Evenin'," called the man with the scar. "Same to you," retorted Zeke. "We're doin' a bit o' prospecting or at least we expect to do some and got caught up here in a gully which we can't very well get across where we are. We saw the smoke of your fire and thought we might come down and perhaps you would invite us to spend the night with you." "You're entirely welcome," said Zeke. The guide's manner was quiet and there was nothing to belie the apparent cordiality of the statement he had just made. The young campers, however, were by no means convinced that their unbidden visitors were parties whom they could welcome. Already the sun was below the western cliffs, although its beams in certain places still flashed between the mountains and tinged the sides of the adjacent canyon with myriad dancing and delicate colors. Hospitality, however, was a part of the life on the plains and seldom was any unexpected guest turned away from a human habitation or company. Suspicious though the boys certainly were they did not offer any protest and in response to their invitation to share in the remnants of their evening meal, the two strangers at once accepted and seated themselves not far from the camp-fire. It was not until they had eaten that they explained more in detail who and what they were. Not long before this time they had come from Tombstone to search for a mine of whose existence they declared they had received information from certain somewhat vague reports. "The trouble is, Mr. Stranger," one of them explained, "that we don't know just where this mine is. There was a report in Tombstone that an old prospector up here had struck it rich, but that he died or at least hadn't been heard from since the report started. The Indians say that he was looking for his mine in a part of the country where the Great Spirit has forbidden the children o' men to come. They declare that this prospector didn't die a natural death." "What did he die of?" inquired Zeke. "Why they say that no man ever goes into that region and comes out alive, or if he does happen to succeed in that, he can't dodge the bad luck which is sure to catch him." "And do you want to find the place?" inquired Fred quizzically. "We do and if there is any such place we're going to find it." The four boys meanwhile had glanced apprehensively at one another when they heard the reference to the discovery of a mine which soon had been lost. The statement too that the original prospector was dead increased the mystery as well as the interest of the Go Ahead Boys. What would these strangers say if they knew that already in the possession of the Go Ahead Boys was the statement of an old prospector who very likely was the very one to whom the unwelcome guests had frequently referred? CHAPTER IV TWO THIEVES IN THE NIGHT The question was speedily answered when, to the dismay of his companions, John said abruptly, "That must be something like the man whose body we found to-day." Instantly both strangers were staring at the boy who had spoken. Even in the dim light their intense interest was plainly manifest. Zeke was doing his utmost by absurd motions to impress upon the mind of John the fact that he must say nothing more. The two visitors at the camp, however, were too deeply interested to lose the opportunity. Speaking slowly and as if he was not especially interested, the man with the scar on his face said in a drawling manner, "Where was that, sonny?" "I don't know just where it was," replied John. "We found the body or rather the bones of a man to-day." "What did you do with them?" "Buried them, of course." John was aware now that his friends were angry at his uncalled-for statements. His obstinacy, however, had been aroused and he was ignoring all the signs and motions that were given him from every side. "Wasn't there anything besides the bones?" inquired the visitor. "They had been picked clean. Zeke here thought that the coyotes and buzzards had been at work." "Probably had. You didn't find any clothes?" "I believe we did get a coat and a pair of shoes." "Would you mind letting me look at them?" John turned to the guide and said, "Let them see that coat, Zeke. There's no harm in that," he said loudly as he turned to his companions. Reluctantly the guide displayed the coat which he had dug from the sand and eagerly both visitors inspected it. For a moment no one spoke and then the man with the scar said abruptly, "I'm sure that's old Sime Moultrie's coat." Again there was a brief silence before the man continued, "He was a strange duffer. I have seen him off an' on the last fifteen year. He never gave up his search for a mine and I guess he never found one. Strange how a man will keep on as if he was all possessed when he has once got started prospecting." "What do you suppose happened to him?" inquired Fred. "There's no tellin' as long as I didn't see the skeleton. Zeke here ought to know." "I don't know anything 'bout it," said Zeke gruffly. "Well, the possibilities are," said the man with the scar, "that he took sick an' died. He must have been all alone and nobody can tell how long he may have been sick. As I rec'lect, he used to come in about ev'ry Spring and Fall for fresh supplies. He wouldn't 'low any one to go with him and he didn't have much to say to any one when he came in to the town." "Did you find any papers in the coat?" inquired the second stranger, who up to this time had seldom spoken. "Not very much. We couldn't find anything with his name on it," explained Zeke, "so we couldn't be sure whose bones they were." "You didn't find any papers at all?" again inquired the man. "We didn't find anything that showed who he was," said Zeke slowly, "same as I told you." "The coat then is the only thing you have got to identify him with?" "We found a pick-axe and spade and hammer," explained Zeke. "Have you got them here?" "Yes, they're somewhere about the camp. I don't know just where we did put them." "Better let us have a look at them." "It's too dark to see them now. Wait 'till mornin'." "We aren't going to wait until morning," laughed the man with the scar. "We've got a long hike and we thought we would make part of it before sun-up. It's a good deal cooler travelin' at night, and especially when there's a good moon, than it is to crawl across those tablelands when the thermometer is about a hundred and ten in the shade; and there isn't any shade." "Better wait until mornin'," said Zeke abruptly. "No, we're goin' now. Come on, Jim," the man added, as he turned to his companion. "It's time for us to be movin'." Without further words the two strange visitors departed from the camp and soon disappeared along the winding way that lead to the summit. "That's a nice thing you did, Jack!" exclaimed Fred angrily as soon as the two men were gone. "What's the harm?" retorted John. "I didn't tell them anything about any lost mine." "You didn't have to," retorted Fred, "after what they said. They had heard about a man dying, though how they ever knew beats me. And they believed that he was the man who was reported to have found a great lead." "What of it?" "A good deal of it," joined in Grant. "You have given them an idea and they won't forget it." "What good is an idea?" demanded John. "They haven't any paper and they can't find the place without it." "All the same," said Fred, "I'm sorry you said anything about Simon Moultrie." "But I didn't say anything about him," protested John. "They were the ones that did most of the talking. I thought if I told them about the bones we found this afternoon that perhaps they would talk some more and say something that would help us." "Great! Great!" laughed George scornfully. "You 'done noble,' Jack. If those men don't find the place, you may rest easy that they will keep track of us for a while." "Why will they?" "Because they'll want to see if we found anything in the pocket of Simon Moultrie's coat that would give us any clue to the place where he had made his great discovery. They'll watch us for a while anyway and if we don't do anything, they may make up their minds that we haven't found anything; but if we begin to do anything like making a search among the mountains, you mark my words those two fellows will show up again just as sure as you're born." "We'll know about that later," said John. For an hour the boys remained seated about their camp-fire, talking over the unexpected visit of the two strangers and the marked interest they had manifested in John's story. Conversation gradually ceased and for a time the Go Ahead Boys were chiefly interested in the fantastic figures cast by the flames and in the marvelous tints of the clouds as the moonlight was shining through them. Nearby was the bottomless gulf. They were unable to see the mighty chasm, but the knowledge that they were near its brink produced a feeling all its own. At last however, Fred declared it was time for the Go Ahead Boys to turn in. His own example was speedily followed and in a brief time silence rested over the camp. The motionless figures on the blankets, with every boy sleeping with his feet turned toward the fire, which now had died down, presented a sight which would have appealed strongly to their distant friends in the east had they been able to see it. Seldom did any figure stir and the weird silence was unbroken save by an occasional sigh of the wind as it swept past the dwarfed trees on the mountain side. How much time had elapsed Fred did not know when he was suddenly aroused and quickly sat erect. For a moment he was unable to determine just where he was but the sight of his sleeping companions soon recalled the events of the preceding day, and, satisfied, he was about to resume his place on his blanket when he was startled by the sight of two crouching figures approaching the camp. They came from behind the buttress of rock about thirty feet from the fire. Both figures were crouching low and moving slowly and with extreme caution. Hastily Fred resumed his place on the blanket, having instantly decided not yet to awaken his comrades. He was eager to discover what the purpose of the men in visiting the camp was. His heart was beating rapidly as he peered intently at the men. They had now drawn close to the camp and again had stopped to make certain that their approach had not been discovered. Still moving silently they began to circle the place, moving in opposite directions. Several times each stopped to examine what he had discovered in the pockets of a coat he had found. Apparently, however, the search was not altogether satisfactory. After they had completely circled the camp, noiselessly as they had approached the two men withdrew. It was evident that they had taken nothing of value and Fred indeed was almost ready to conclude that he had been dreaming or that his eyes had deceived him. The silence was still unbroken save by the occasional sigh of some heavy sleeper. The passing clouds were still reflecting the light of the moon and in the dim light Fred again thought he perceived the approach of the two crouching men. In a moment, however, he was convinced that he was mistaken. Had he made the same mistake before? Had he thought he had seen, without actually seeing, two men creep into the camp? Almost convinced that he had been dreaming, Fred did not awaken any of his comrades, thereby escaping any ridicule that might be heaped upon him for disturbing their slumbers and in a few minutes was himself again soundly asleep. CHAPTER V A START AND A LOSS When morning came Fred was still uncertain whether his experience of the preceding night had been a dream or a reality. As he glanced at the enthusiastic countenances of his friends he was almost convinced that what he had seen had been the shadowy figures of a dream. Besides he was fearful of the bantering which the Go Ahead Boys might bestow upon him if it was discovered that there was no basis for his statement. However, as Fred deemed the matter too important to be entirely ignored, he said while the boys were seated about the improvised table, "Were any of you fellows up last night?" "Not guilty," laughed George. "I was asleep almost before I had stretched out." The other two boys also declared that their slumbers had not been disturbed and that neither had wandered about the camp. "What's the trouble, Freddie?" laughed Grant. "You act either as if you don't believe us or something happened." "Well, I'm not sure, but something did happen," said Fred slowly. "What was it? Tell us your story," demanded John. "Either I dreamed or else I surely saw two men moving about the camp. There was a moon and the place was almost as light as day." "Who were the men?" demanded Grant. "Perhaps they weren't 'men' at all," replied Fred, who was certain now that he was safe from ridicule. "Do you think they were our visitors?" "Yes," replied Fred promptly, "that's exactly what I do think." "What were they doing?" asked John. All the Go Ahead Boys were now deeply interested in Fred's statement and eager to hear what more he might say. "I saw the two figures moving about the camp and at first I thought they were some of you. Pretty soon, however, I made up my mind that they weren't. I turned over on my side and pretended to be asleep, though I was watching these men all the time." "Why didn't you wake us up?" demanded John. "Because I wasn't sure that I myself didn't need waking up." "You're a great lad," said John scornfully. "Zeke," he called, turning to the guide, "Fred thinks he saw those two men that were in our camp last night come back." The guide looked keenly at Fred, and it was plain he instantly was interested and perhaps alarmed. "What were they doin'?" he asked slowly. "Why, they were moving about the camp," replied Fred. "It didn't seem to me they were here more than five or ten minutes but just as I was about to call you or the boys they disappeared." Zeke said no more as he turned at once to the place where the garments and implements of Simon Moultrie had been placed. The four boys were aware now that the guide was somewhat alarmed and instantly all four ran to join him. "You see it is gone," said Zeke blankly as he displayed the empty pockets in the coat of the dead prospector. "Gone!" exclaimed the Go Ahead Boys together. "It isn't here anyway." "You mean his diary?" demanded Fred. "That's exactly what I mean. Your dream was a nightmare and it's likely to be a still bigger one for us." "Do you think those men took that diary?" asked Grant. "You can see for yourself," retorted Zeke gruffly. "Maybe you put it somewhere else," suggested George. "Huh!" snapped the guide. "I left it right in the pocket. Eight in that there pocket," he added as he again displayed the coat. "What did they want of it?" inquired John. "They wanted what you told them about." "I didn't tell them anything about anything," said John angrily. "The trouble with you, Jack, is that you can't read between the lines. You see, those men were not born yesterday and they could put two and two together." "But I didn't give them anything to put together," protested John. "If I recollect aright," suggested Grant, "there was something said about the coat and the tools that the prospector had with him. If I'm correct it seems to me that the men wanted to see the coat and the axe and the spade and the hammer." "What of it?" demanded John. "Everything," retorted Grant. "They probably suspected that if there was a coat there were pockets in it. And if there were pockets then there was something in them." "They guessed right, all right," laughed George. "Never you mind," said John. "I remember exactly what the diary said and I can draw another picture of that Gulch with just exactly the places marked on it that the prospector had marked." "Try it," suggested Fred. "That's just what I'll do," said John as he turned to the tent from which he speedily returned with a pad and pencil. For a moment no one spoke while John busily made his drawing. "There," he said as he held it forth to view. "That's just as good as the original." "It's a mighty pretty picture," scoffed George. "The only trouble with it is that no one knows whether it is correct or not." "Zeke, isn't that drawing all right?" demanded John as he held forth the paper to the guide. "It isn't so far wrong," acknowledged Zeke cautiously, "but I guess we'll be able to do something whether we have any paper or not. I'm more afraid of those two men than I am that we shan't be able to draw th' picture that old Sime had in his diary." All four boys looked keenly into the face of the guide but no one inquired concerning the meaning of his words. "Well, the little book is gone, anyway," continued Zeke. "We've got to decide what we'll do without it. When do you boys want to start?" "What do you mean? For the lost mine?" demanded Fred. "That's what I thought you wanted to do." "Well, we do all right," said Fred quickly. "Are we ready to start?" "We can be in a few minutes," said Zeke. "I think we can drop down the river in the two boats. That will be easier than climbing up the cliffs." "Great!" exclaimed Fred enthusiastically. "How far can we go with the boats?" "Ten or twelve miles," answered Zeke. "And when we stop we'll be more than half way to Thorn's Gulch. It's so much quicker to go by the river than over land." "That will be fine," repeated Fred. "Let's get started." "It's going to be hot in the middle of the day," suggested Zeke warningly. "All the more reason then for starting right away," said Grant. "All right," assented Zeke. "We'll put things to rights here in the camp and then we'll go down to start on our voyage." The light tent was folded and concealed under the projecting rock nearby. Most of the cooking utensils also were hidden or at least placed where they would not attract the attention of any chance visitor. It was extremely unlikely that any one would come to the place, although among the parties visiting the Grand Canyon there might be some who would be attracted by the safe landing place, just as the Go Ahead Boys and their guides already had been. "We had better plan to be gone about four days!" spoke up Pete who up to this time had taken no part in the morning conversation. "I should think we ought to have supplies for more than that," said Fred. Pete, however, insisted that the time he had named would be ample for their first attempt. "If we don't strike anything," he explained, "we shan't need to stay any longer and if we do we can mark the spot or leave someone there on guard and the rest can come back for more supplies." "What do you think, Zeke?" asked Fred. "I think Pete is all right," replied the guide. "We want to leave our supplies here pretty well protected and we don't want to take enough with us to tire us out carrying them. We'll have to measure it down pretty fine. We want just enough but not an ounce more than we ought to have." Zeke's word carried the day and in a brief time the Go Ahead Boys were busily engaged in packing the few belongings they planned to take with them on their expedition. These were conveniently arranged so that they might be carried upon the backs of the boys, making a burden that did not exceed twenty-five pounds in weight for each boy when the arrangement was at last completed. "Everything all ready now?" inquired Zeke when at last the packages, implements and knapsacks had all been prepared. "How is the river right below us?" asked John. "It's a bit rough and pretty swift for a spell," replied Zeke. "Any danger of capsizing?" asked Fred nervously. "There's always that danger," replied Zeke solemnly. "Nobody knows when the boat may turn squarely over. If you think you would rather walk across country we can try it that way," he added, winking solemnly at Fred's companions as he spoke. Cautiously the party made their way down the canyon and at last after several exciting experiences arrived on the shore of the rushing Colorado. Zeke's statement that the river here was rough was speedily confirmed. The tossing waves seemed to be rushing at break-neck speed past the little point. There was a bend in the channel a half-mile below and a projecting point there was plainly seen. "I don't like the look of that," muttered Fred as he first saw the rushing stream. "There's something I like still less," said Grant. "What do you mean?" demanded Fred. "Why there's only one boat there." "What!" exclaimed George and Fred together. "That's right," repeated Grant. "One of the boats is gone." CHAPTER VI DIVIDED For a moment the boys stood and stared blankly at the one boat and at the place on the shore where the other had been drawn from the water. There was no question now as to their loss. Every member of their party was present and yet only one boat was to be seen. Certain of their supplies also were missing and the discovery served to increase the feeling of dismay. "Do you suppose that boat got loose?" inquired Fred, who was the first to speak. "I don't 'suppose it got loose,'" retorted Grant somewhat gruffly. "Do you think somebody took it?" again Fred asked. "If it didn't get loose, please tell me why it's gone? There's only one way the boat could get into the river. One was for it to get loose and the other for somebody to work it loose." "Then the question is," said George, "who took it?" "And there isn't much question about that," said Fred confidently. "Do you think those two men stole the boat? I mean the two that were in our camp last night?" "I don't know who else could take it," said John. "And it's my fault too, isn't it?" "In a way it is your fault, all right," said Grant. "You started those men on the trail. If you had kept still no one would have known anything about it." "That's right," said John, closing his eyes and doing his utmost to assume the expression of a martyr. "If anything goes wrong, put the blame on little Johnnie. Cock Robin wasn't in the same class with little Johnnie--" "You've talked enough," broke in Zeke. "All your talkin' isn't goin' to bring back our boat. The question is what are we goin' to do, now that one of the boats is gone." "Can't we all get into one boat?" inquired George. "You can," snapped Zeke, "but you won't stay in very long. She would never carry six." "What shall we do, then?" asked Fred. "I think the first thing for us to do is to look around and see if we can find anything that will give us a clue to the takin' o' the boat." Acting upon the suggestion the boys at once began a search along the shore, Fred and John steadily moving back from the river. Not one of them, however, was able to discover any signs of the presence of the men whom they suspected. The plain fact was that the heavy boat was gone and with it had gone many of their supplies. It was true that one boat was still left, but the guide's statement that it could not carry six left only one way out of the present difficulty. "We can do one of two things," suggested Pete when the members of the party assembled again. "We can leave some o' you here and the rest o' us can strike out across the country for more supplies. It won't be so hard comin' back as it will be goin'. We'll get some burros to carry the stuff back for us and then they can go back with the drivers." "If we don't do that what else can we do?" inquired Grant. "Some of us can go down the river in the boat and then strike out for Thorn's Gulch while the others are coming overland." "It will take two days to do that," said Fred ruefully. "And the other will take four and maybe five," retorted Zeke. A marked difference of opinion appeared in the company, but at last it was decided that Pete and John should go for additional supplies while all the other members of the party were to remain where they then were. Sharp directions were given by the departing Pete that no one should leave the camp during his absence. The Go Ahead Boys promised faithfully to follow his suggestion and within an hour Pete, who was nearly as tall as John, and his companion had disappeared from sight. A renewed search for evidences of the men who had taken the boats was made, and Zeke and Fred even went down the stream a mile vainly hoping that they might find the boat stranded somewhere in the region. Their search was unavailing and when they returned to the camp it was with a fixed opinion that the sole solution of their difficulties was to be found in patiently remaining in camp until Pete and John had made their long journey across the desert. That evening while they were seated about the campfire conversation turned upon the mighty river near which they had found their resting place. "Yes, air," Zeke was saying, "the first man an' about the only man that ever went the whole length of the Colorado was Major Powell." "Did he go in a little boat?" inquired Fred. "Yes, he had four boats?" replied Zeke. "They were all small, but every one was built for the voyage." "Did he go alone?" inquired George. "No. Nine men went with him." "When was it?" asked Grant. "In 1869. It took a lot of nerve to start on that trip too, let me tell you. Even the Indians were afraid of the river and every one of them said he didn't know really what the river was." "What do you mean?" asked Fred. "Why the redskins had all sorts of stories about the Colorado from the place where the Grand and the Green join to make it. And they had a lot to make them afraid, too. You see no one ever knew, when his boat got caught in the currents or whirlpools, whether there might be ahead o' him some great underground passage where the river had cut its way and the boat might be carried in there and never get out. Then too when they started on a swift current no one could tell when the water got rougher and swifter whether they were goin' head on for some great, roarin' cataract. Yes, sir, it was a very ticklish trip that Major Powell took, and what made it still worse for him was the fact that he had only one arm." "What did he do with the other one?" inquired Fred. "Had it shot away in the Civil War. I tell you he had more nerve than any man that ever came out to these parts. Unless p'raps it was Bill Williams, whose grave is away over yonder more than fifty miles beyond the Grand Canyon." "Did the men who were with Major Powell come through all right?" asked Fred. "All those that stayed with him did. There were four that got discouraged, and cleared out and left the very day when Major Powell floated clear of the Grand Canyon. It's strange about that. The exploring party came out all right, but not one of the four men that deserted was ever afterwards heard of. Probably they tried to make their way up some o' these cliffs and tumbled and fell." "Did you say that the Indians knew all about the Grand Canyon?" asked Grant. "No, I didn't say no sech thing," said Zeke sharply. "What I said was that the Indians were afraid of the place. They had any number of stories about the region." "What were they?" asked Fred eagerly. "Oh, I don't know," answered Zeke, "There was one, I understand, about the Indians believin' or at least reportin' that the Grand Canyon was the road to heaven. They had a story that one time one of their big chiefs lost his wife. He was very fond of her and when she died it seemed to take the heart right out o' him. He spent most o' his time mournin' for her and pretty soon the life o' the tribe was beginnin' to suffer. "At last, at least so the Indians say, the god, Tavwoats, offered to prove to the big chief that his wife was happier than she had been even when she was livin' 'long with him. The chief took him at his word and Tavwoats started right away to take the chief where he could look on the happiness of his wife. It seems the trail he made to the Happy Land was what we now call the Grand Canyon. They say that there were more bright colors and pretty places to be seen there then than one can find now. "When Tavwoats and the big chief came back through the trail among the mountains, the god rolled a wild and roaring river into it to keep out those who did not deserve to go to the Happy Land. That's the way the Colorado River was formed, at least accordin' to th' Indian story. Of course they didn't know what we know now that the Grand and Green joined forces to make up the big stream." "That's a very pretty story," said Grant, rising as he spoke. "The Indians must have had a lot of poetry in them to make up so many wonderful legends." "You would have thought they had poetry in them," said Zeke, "if you ever happened to be out here when there was a Navajo or Apache uprising. I tell you the air is full of poetry then, the same as it is full of rows and yells and shouts, and you can see the redskins full of poetry,--some people out here call the stuff they drink by another name,--ridin' like mad 'round the desert shooting every man, woman and child they can find. Oh, yes," he added, "it's a whole lot o' poetry." The hour, however, had arrived when the Go Ahead Boys were ready to retire for the night. Fred was the first to set an example but in a brief time the other Go Ahead Boys had followed, the fire had been extinguished and silence rested over the region. CHAPTER VII TWO NAVAJOS Early the following morning, while the boys were preparing breakfast, they were startled by the approach of two men. "Look yonder!" exclaimed Fred, who naturally was the first to discover the approach of the strangers. "Are those the two men that were in the camp the other day?" "No," replied Zeke quickly after he had gazed long and earnestly at the men who could be seen coming down the pathway from the top of the cliff. "They're Indians." "Is that so?" demanded George who was instantly excited. "What are they?" "Navajoes," replied Zeke after another inspection. "What do you suppose they want?" asked Grant. "Everything you have got and some things besides," answered Zeke, his affection for the redmen being not very strong. "The first thing they'll ask us for will be the breakfast." "We'll give them some breakfast," said Fred promptly. "I didn't say nothin' about _some_ breakfast," spoke up Zeke. "I said the breakfast. They'll want it all and some besides." "Then the only thing for us to do," laughed Fred, "is to begin right away." Fred's example was speedily followed by his friends, who quickly took pieces of the sputtering bacon on sharpened sticks which they held in their right hands while with their left they grasped pieces of the cooked cereal which Zeke had been frying for breakfast. All were busily engaged in this pleasing occupation when the two Indians approached the camp. The redmen were the first to speak and to the surprise of the Go Ahead Boys they addressed them in excellent English, at least the one who appeared to be the leader was able to express himself clearly and in correct form. "We would like some breakfast," said the spokesman, who was a young Indian perhaps twenty-one years of age. "All right, sir," spoke up Fred before any one else could respond to the request. "We'll fix you some in a minute." Fortunately the supply was ample for the present meal at least, and both Navajos, seating themselves upon a projecting rock, almost devoured the food which was given them. The Go Ahead Boys were eager to talk with the redmen, but silence rested over the camp. Zeke was particularly gruff in his manner and apparently ignored the presence of the strangers. At last the Indian who had been chief spokesman said, "We have come to ask if two white men have come to your camp within a few days." "What do you want to know for?" asked Zeke quickly. Whatever his reasons may have been for inquiring the Navajo did not offer any explanations. "Yes, there were two men here but they have gone," said Zeke slowly. "Did one of them have a scar across his cheek that reached almost from his nose to his ear?" "Yes." "Was the other man larger and heavier?" "That's right," said Fred, aware that both his companions were as deeply interested as he in the conversation. "Where did they go?" "We do not know," spoke up Zeke. "We didn't invite them to come here and they didn't stop to say good-by when they left." "Do you know their names?" "I can't say that we do," replied Zeke. "Was there anything special that you wanted o' them?" The Navajo glanced quickly at his companion, who plainly understood the question and then said, "Yes, we want very much to see them." "Well, I'm afraid then that you'll have to go where they are." "Did they go down the river or did they go up the cliffs?" "The last we saw of them they were headed for the sky," said Zeke glumly. "Did they have ponies?" "We didn't see any. They may have left them up yonder, but they didn't bring any into the camp." The Navajo again turned to his companion and carried on a conversation in a low voice, apparently ignoring the presence of the others. "If there was any message you wanted left," suggested Zeke, "we might take it and tell them that two Navajoes are waiting for them." "No," replied the Indian abruptly. "Say nothing. Do you know whether they are coming back to your camp or not?" "I hope not," said Zeke. "Have you any reason to think they were bad men?" "I don't know nothin' about them, just as I told you," responded Zeke gruffly. "As I said, the only way you can find that out is to go where they are." "And do you know whether they started toward Thorn's Gulch?" "Where?" demanded Fred quickly. "Thorn's Gulch." "What makes you think they were headed for Thorn's Gulch?" demanded Zeke. "I didn't say we knew," said the Indian solemnly. "I asked you if you knew." "Well, we don't," said Zeke. "What is there about Thorn's Gulch that makes you think they might want to go there?" Instead of replying to the question the Navajo again turned to his companion and carried on another conversation with him in still lower tones than before. Then abruptly rising, the Indian, who had been acting as chief spokesman, said, "I don't think we need to trouble you any more." "Hold on a minute," said Fred. "What's your hurry?" Both Indians had turned as if they were about to retrace their way along the steep incline by which they had approached the camp. Halting abruptly at the question, before either could speak Fred continued, "You talk a good deal like a man who has not been trained as most of the Indians I have seen around here have been." "Yes," said the Indian, a broad smile appearing on his face as he spoke, "My name is Thomas Jefferson, in the white man's language." "Thomas Jefferson?" demanded Grant. "Where in the world did you get that name?" "When I went to the white man's school they gave me a white man's name." "Where were you in school?" "Pennsylvania." "Is that so?" exclaimed Grant, who was especially interested in such matters. "Yes," explained the Indian, "I was sent east by some missionaries to be educated. As I told you they gave me a white man's name and I was there three years in the school." "So that is where you learned to speak such good English is it?" said George. "Yes." "Do you find that your education helps you a good deal out here in your life among the Navajos?" For a moment the young Indian stared blankly at the inquirer and then without replying to the question, once more turned to his companion and after a brief conversation he again faced the boys and said, "We thank you for the breakfast you have given us. We must go now." "Shall I tell those men if they come back," spoke up Zeke, "that Thomas Jefferson and another Navajo have been here to see them?" There was a gleam in the eyes of the namesake of the great statesman when he answered, "Say nothing." "Yes," said Zeke, "but I would like to know if they are looking for you." "We are looking for them," retorted the Navajo. "Well, all I can say," said Zeke, "is that I hope you'll find them. Maybe you'll find them too before they find the claim staked by old Sime Moultrie." Plainly the Navajo was startled by the guide's suggestion for he stopped abruptly and said, "Is Simon Moultrie dead?" "Yes, and his bones have been buried," answered Zeke. "Where?" "Not far from where he died." "When did he die?" "That I can't say." "And did he stake a claim?" "Did I say he did? Did you know him?" "Everybody knew Simon Moultrie," said the Indian. "He came to Tombstone many times for supplies." "That's right, he did," acknowledged Zeke. "He was a great old prospector. He kept it up all his life but I never knew of his finding anything worth staking." "He did not stake any claim?" "I can't say." The Indian looked keenly at the guide and then turning looked with equal keenness at the boys who were greatly enjoying the conversation. He did not say any more, however, and in company with the other Navajo at once departed from the camp. Silently the Go Ahead Boys watched the departing redmen until their forms had been hidden from sight by one of the numerous projecting cliffs. Then the tension was somewhat relieved and Fred turned to Zeke and said, "What do you think those Indians wanted?" "My opinion is that they have gotten wind somehow that those two men are looking for the claim that old Sime Moultrie may have staked." "What will happen," inquired Grant, "if the Navajos begin to look for the claim and come upon those two white men there?" "It will depend on which party can draw his gun first," replied Zeke dryly. "Do you think it's as bad as that?" demanded Fred excitedly. "I don't think nothin' about it. I haven't much use for those white men, and when it comes to a Navajo--why you have heard what the only kind of a good Indian is, haven't you?" "A dead Indian," answer Grant with a laugh. "Well, I didn't say it. You said it. Did I ever tell you about the Navajo squaw that some of the women up here, stopping over at Albuquerque, fitted out for her wedding?" "No," replied the boys together. "What did they do?" "Why they gave her six dresses and a lot of other things they thought she would need as soon as she was in her own house. Some of them stopped there a year or two afterward and looked her up. The squaw was wearing one of the dresses that the white women had given her, but they found out that when one dress had become so old and torn that the squaw couldn't wear it much longer she would just put another dress right on over it and wear that until it was worn out, and then she put on number three and then number four. She was wearing six altogether when this white woman found her." "That's a fine story, Zeke," laughed Fred. "It's almost good enough to be true." "No, sir, it's too good to be true," spoke up George. "That doesn't make any difference," said Zeke sturdily. "I'm telling you what was told me. That's all I know about it." "Zeke," said Grant, who up to this time had taken little part in the conversation, "if you really think those Indians are after those two white men and that something may happen if they happen to meet, don't you think we ought to get word to them somehow?" A grin appeared on the face of the guide as he replied, "That's a good 'un! That's a good 'un! The chances are ten to one that if you interfered with them in their little game you would have all four o' 'em turn against you. But that hasn't anything to do with what's facin' us. We've got to make up our minds pretty quick what we'll do." CHAPTER VIII WAITING "What do you mean?" inquired Fred. "Why, I mean that if we're goin' to be fools enough to try to find old Sime Moultrie's stake then we'll have to take whatever comes to us." "And you think we're likely to have trouble with the Indians or the two white men if we begin to look up the place?" "We may not see either of 'em," replied Zeke evasively. "Yes, but if we do see them," said Fred persistently. "Do you think we're going to have any trouble?" "That remains to be seen." "But do you think we will?" persisted Fred. "A good deal will depend on which party strikes what he thinks is the claim first. If we get it I don't believe they will bother us and if they get it I'm mighty sure we shan't bother them. But there," he added, "I think I'm takin' a good deal more trouble than I need to. The chances are one hundred to one that there isn't any such thing as Moultrie's stake, and if there isn't, why then of course we're all safe anyway." Zeke threw back his head and laughed noisily, a recreation which he seldom permitted himself to enjoy. The joke, however, which he had just perpetrated was such a rarity that even the boys were compelled to join in his mirth. Meanwhile there was a long and weary waiting before they could expect the return of their companions. There were times when the boys worked their way along the shore, or, with Zeke in supreme command, used the one skiff that remained They did not, however, venture far in the little boat because they were compelled to tow it back one or two of the boys remaining in the boat, while their companions dragged it along the rocky or projecting shore. It was easier when they first dragged the boat up the stream and then descended at a speed which in places outdid that of the swiftest horse. There were expeditions also to be made along the sides of the cliff, but these were cautiously undertaken for Zeke was unduly fearful for his young charges. Fred most of all the members he specifically watched. He declared that Fred "usually acted and then did his thinking afterward." When night fell the boys assembled about the camp fire and occasionally prevailed upon their gruff guide to relate some of his own experiences on the desert or among the mountains. "Yes," said Zeke one night in reply to a question by Fred, "I've had some troubles with bad men. Over in Nevada there was a time when a gang of robbers tried to waylay everybody that set out from Reno. It happened that I was at Reno with my mother one time and I had to drive about forty miles to my aunt's where she was going to visit. The houses out there aren't so thick that anybody gets over-afraid of being crowded out or bein' bothered by the neighbors. On the stretch where I was goin' there were three or four shacks but I didn't find many choosin' that part of the country for a dwellin' place." "Did they have a good road?" inquired George. "Fairly good. It was the only one that led over the mountains in that part of the world. Well, I had my mother along, as I was sayin', and when we had gone about eighteen miles from Reno, right in a narrow little gorge I saw two men comin' toward us. They were in a buggy and I knew right away from the looks of their horses that they could make good time. Besides, when I saw the men I knew they were both strangers and, to tell the truth I didn't like the way either one o' 'em acted. "When they came pretty close to where we were I turned out to give them most of the road for I didn't want any trouble as long as I had my mother along. Perhaps I told you she was with me. "Well, the first thing I knew the men all of a sudden swung over toward me and before I knew what was going on they had locked their buggy wheel with mine. They pretended to be mad, but I knew right away that this was a part o' their game. It was worse than two to one for I not only had to fight for myself, but for my mother. However, she is pretty game and she saw what was up so she turned to me and said, said she, 'Zeke, you hand me the reins and I'll look after the horses and you get out and help untangle those wheels.' When I got out of the buggy both the men laughed and that rather stirred me. 'You seem to be mighty easy to please,' I said. You see I was younger then than I am now, and didn't have so much sense." "Where did you get the new sense?" inquired Grant solemnly. "Oh, once in a long time I run up against a fellow that come from the East. He usually gave me all the advice I needed and never charged me a cent for it either." The boys laughed at Grant's confusion, but ignoring the interruption Zeke continued with his tale, "I tried to appear unconcerned like and I said to one of the men, 'Take hold here and give me a lift, I'm 'most afraid to back down any further for fear I'll tip my mother out.' They didn't either of 'em offer to help me, in fact neither one of them got out of the buggy and when I took hold of my horse's head and tried to back away they just moved up their horses so that the wheels kept locked just as they had been before. I looked at the wheels and pretty quick I made up my mind that mine were a good deal stronger than theirs. I had told my mother when I took the reins that she had better get out while we were tryin' to break loose there. Of course she did what I told her. I was afraid the men might draw their guns, but still I thought maybe the fact that I had my mother along with me might make 'em hesitate a little. There are mighty few men even in the mines that will do anything to frighten a good woman, and nobody had to look very long into my mother's face to make up his mind that that was what she was, sure enough good. "Well, we backed and filled for a spell and I see that things were gettin' worse so I waited until we worked out away a few yards up a little rise on the side of the mountain. The men all the while pretended that they thought it was a joke, and then when I got just to the right place, quick as a wink I jumped up and yelled at my horse in the loudest tones I could muster, and when little Zeke really tries hard to make himself heard there isn't usually much trouble in hearing him. I struck my horses with my whip at the same time and all together we had considerable of a ruction, but it turned out just as I thought it would. Their horses were scared worse than mine and when they all four jumped ahead going in opposite directions, of course something had to give way and it wasn't my wheels either, let me tell you. I didn't wait to investigate how much damage I really had done, but I put my horses into their best licks and stopped just long enough to take in my poor, old, frightened mother, and then I didn't stop, let me tell you, until I was out o' sight of those men." "Did they try to chase you?" "No, they didn't. I'm thinkin' they were having troubles enough of their own just then. At all events I never see any more of them." "Do you really believe they meant to rob you?" asked George. "Sure, as you're born!" replied Zeke. "That was just what they were there for. The only thing that saved me was my havin' my mother along. 'Twasn't long afterward before I heard of a man being held up just as I was. Two men came along in a buggy and locked wheels with him and while he was trying to help himself out of the fix one of them dropped him with the butt of his gun and went through his pockets and all his belongings. That's one reason why I have always remembered Jump Off Joe Creek." "Remembered what?" laughed Fred. "Jump Off Joe Creek," repeated Zeke. "That was the name of the mountain brook right near where I had my fight with the robbers." "But I didn't see that you had any fight," persisted Fred. "Not exactly a fight, but it's where I would have had a tough fight if it hadn't been for me havin' my mother 'long with me. Perhaps I told you she was in the buggy with me when those wheels locked." "I believe you did remark something about that," said Fred so drolly that his companions laughed. "And you think," inquired Grant, "that we're likely to have trouble with these two men the same way?" "No, I didn't say 'the same way,'" replied Zeke. "I'm just tellin' you what's going on 'round here so that you'll be a bit prepared for it when the proper time comes." "Do you really think we'll have any trouble with those two men?" inquired George anxiously. "I've given you my opinion," replied Zeke. "You won't have no trouble if you don't find no claim, and if there ain't no claim then you won't have no trouble. So it's just as broad as it is long, you see, and I'm hopeful we'll get out again with our lives." "Yes, I hope so too," said George so solemnly that his friends laughed aloud. Zeke's stories were as numerous as they were quaint after he had once begun to relate them. To beguile the slowly moving hours the boys insisted upon his recounting many of his adventures, some of which were exceedingly thrilling, so thrilling indeed that none of the boys accepted them as true. But all things at last come to an end and the waiting of the Go Ahead Boys was drawn to a close late one afternoon when Pete and John entered the valley. They were heavily laden with packs and explained that up on the cliff other possessions which they had secured had been left with the Indian boy who had come with them and was to take back the burros after they had been relieved of their burdens. Speedily all the Go Ahead Boys were engaged in the task of bringing in the supplies. Twice the difficult climb had to be made and even the return to the camp, although the trail led down the steep incline at times, was even more difficult than the ascent had been. The same night after all the supplies had been brought to the camp and the boys had begun to make up their packs, for they planned to start on their expedition early the following morning, they were startled by the return of the two Navajos who had visited the camp soon after the departure of Pete and John. It was quickly manifest that both Indians in spite of their quiet manner were keenly excited and when they had related a discovery they had made that very day, the excitement of the Go Ahead Boys was only less than their own. CHAPTER IX DOWN THE RUSHING RIVER "We saw where the two white men camped last night," explained Thomas Jefferson. "They are working' their way into Thorn's Gulch." "And do you think they are looking for Simon Moultrie's claim the same as we are?" demanded John, who was not fully aware of the events which had occurred during his absence. The Navajo smiled slightly and replied, "Yes, they both are trying to find the place." "Do you know where it is? Have you anything to show where he found the new mine?" "Not very much," replied the Indian. His manner, however, impressed the Go Ahead Boys strongly that Thomas Jefferson possessed information concerning the object of their search which he was not willing to communicate. The mystery surrounding the place had deepened. The fact that two white men as well as two Indians, in addition to the Go Ahead Boys and their guides, were convinced at the same time that the dead Simon Moultrie had discovered a lead of great promise, increased their interest. Already Fred and John had discussed what they would do with the fortune which they were convinced soon would be theirs as soon as the claim of the dead prospector had been located. John and Pete, thoroughly wearied by their long journey for supplies, were soon ready for bed. Their example was contagious and in view of the long and difficult journey awaiting them on the morrow all the Go Ahead Boys speedily followed their example. Daylight had appeared, though the light of the rising sun had not yet shone above the towering cliffs, when the guides were busily preparing breakfast the next morning. In spite of the prospect awaiting them the appetites of the Go Ahead Boys were all keen and a hearty breakfast was disposed of before any one suggested that the hour for their departure had arrived. A few of their belongings were left behind, after they had been carefully stowed away among the various cliffs and hidden from the sight of any chance passerby. It was seven o'clock when at last Zeke declared the party was ready to depart. Every boy had his kit strapped upon his back in addition to the rifle which he carried while Zeke led the way and Pete served as a rear guard. Since the missing boat had not been recovered it had been decided to try to make the journey overland. However, just as the party left the camp Pete said decidedly, "I think this is all fool business." "What do you mean?" demanded Fred, who was next before him. "I think it's foolishness for all six of us to go overland when we have a boat that will bring us within a few miles of Thorn's Gulch. Some of our heaviest supplies can be taken that way, and, if we have to, Zeke and I can make two trips from the place where we can land to the opening to Thorn's Gulch. Hold on," he called to Zeke. The little party abruptly halted and after Pete had warmly urged his views Zeke reluctantly consented to a change in their plans. Pete, accompanied by Fred and John were to return and use the boat as far as they were able to make their way safely toward Thorn's Gulch. They would then land, draw the boat up on the shore, where it would be safe from storms, and at once start for the entrance of Thorn's Gulch where they were to await the coming of their companions. Naturally it was expected that the party led by Pete would arrive at the Gulch before the others. In that event Pete was to select a camp and make such provisions as were in his power for spending the second night. Zeke had explained that he was not planning to rush his party across the desert. Rather he explained he would move leisurely, finding some place for rest and refuge in the middle of the day. In no place would he depart far from the rim of the Grand Canyon. He was confident that even with these expected delays he would easily arrive at their destination by sunset of the second day. The two Navajos had not been included in either party; the truth of the matter being that neither Zeke nor Pete wanted the young Indians among his followers. The feeling of the boys, however, was markedly different, but they did not make any objections, relying upon the need of assistance later to warrant them in inviting Thomas Jefferson and his friend to become members of their party at that time. Indeed Fred had expressed himself in this manner to the Navajos, and Thomas Jefferson, indicating that he understood fully the conditions, promised to report later after the party had entered Thorn's Gulch. There was no further delay and George and Grant following Zeke soon disappeared from the sight of their companions. Meanwhile Fred and John assisted Pete in packing in their boat the supplies which they were to carry down the Colorado. Both George and Grant had protested against their companions attempting the passage of the river. They were aware of the perils that awaited them and were fearful that they would not be able to land all their cargo safely. "That's the way of it," said Fred in mock solemnity when he had responded to George's protest. "You don't care anything about us, but you're mightily afraid that some of the things we have on board may be lost in the river." "We don't want to lose either the crew or the cargo," retorted George. "There's no more danger going down the stream where we are than there is in trying to climb the cliffs and strike out overland," declared Pete. No further protest had been made and not long after the departure of the division which was to climb the rugged pathway that led to the table-land the sailors were ready to embark. Fred and John were both skillful in handling the boat, a form of knowledge in which even Grant was proficient. It was for this reason largely that Pete had selected Fred and John to accompany him. Before he stepped on board, John, who was to push at the stern, looked out over the broad river. The current made in toward the shore where he was standing and was clearly defined. The swift waters bore around a bend not more than fifty yards below them. It is true that the passage here had already been made and the boat hauled back, but the very fact that a previous voyage had been tried although it allayed certain fears nevertheless made both Go Ahead Boys aware of the places where peril would confront them. Pete was in the bow holding a long pole in his hands, while Fred was to take his friend's place whenever the latter desired him to. In a brief time the strong heavy skiff was caught in the sweep of the channel and was borne swiftly down the rushing Colorado. There was an excitement in the attempt that manifested itself clearly in the faces of all three. At one place where for a brief time the waters were stiller Pete turned to his fellow voyagers and shouted, "My, I must say you're the two nerviest boys I ever see." John and Fred stared blankly at each other at the compliment, neither in fact having been unduly alarmed or suspecting that they were passing through any unusual peril. Twice the boat had been swept in close to a projecting ledge but fortunately had escaped without any serious crash. At the end of ten minutes the boys were aware that they were approaching the place which they dreaded most of all in their descent. The river became somewhat narrower here and the waters consequently were much deeper. A shoal or some huge hidden ledge rose in mid-stream and the swift current, divided by the obstacle, roared and sang as it rushed forward on its way on either side. One hundred yards below the projecting rock the divided channel was reunited. There was a great peril, however, that the little boat, as it was driven forward by one part of the stream, might be caught in the eddies that were formed when the waters united. For a time the rocky shores seemed to be flying past the advancing boat. Occasional glimpses of the sky far above them added to the picture. Before them extended a long, narrow defile through which the deep water seethed and boiled as it sped forward. The grave peril here was that the boat might strike some of the projecting rocks or be grounded on one of the hidden projections. It was impossible for any one to use his pole here and Fred had passed the paddle to John while he himself insisted upon taking his place in the bow and ordering Pete to seat himself amidship. The boat was moving at least ten miles an hour. Two-thirds of the passage had been safely made. The expression on Fred's face was tense as occasionally he caught a glimpse behind him of his long friend working desperately with his paddle. Every ounce of strength each boy possessed was required for the effort. Occasionally the guide shouted his direction first to one boy and then to another and then to both alike. Neither Fred nor John, however gave much heed to their advisor nor indeed was it possible for them to hear what he said. The sound of the noisy water filled their ears, the peril of the projecting rocks continued to face them and a glance at the dark colored stream below was sufficient to warn them of dangers to be avoided there. Fred, who, as has been said, was paddling from the bow turned for a moment to glance back at John. At that moment, however, the heavy boat suddenly struck an unseen rock. The force of the current was sufficient to drive the boat safely over the place of peril, but Fred as he had nearly lost his balance glanced again behind and to his horror he saw the long legs of John disappearing over the side of the boat. CHAPTER X A RATTLER Meanwhile the other party which had started for Thorn's Gulch was also having its own experiences no less thrilling than the mishap which had befallen John. Zeke was the leader of the trio while George had taken Pete's place as rear guard. Steadily climbing the way which previously they had used as a path, stopping frequently for rest, for their breathing was somewhat more difficult in the high altitude than on the lower levels, they at last succeeded in gaining the crest of the canyon. Zeke then led the way across the table-land, at times moving far from the border and then again approaching almost within sight of the great canyon. The Canyon of Arizona extends for hundreds of miles, becoming vast and wide in what is commonly known as the Grand Canyon. It winds through the country at times visible and sometimes concealed from sight by intervening cliffs or trees. Before the noon-hour arrived the party halted, seeking the shelter of a small cleft in the rim where they were able to start a fire and cook some of the food they had brought with them. The heat was so intense that Zeke commanded the expedition to wait until late in the afternoon before the journey was resumed. Although neither George nor Grant acknowledged that he was tired, both Go Ahead Boys were entirely willing to heed the advice that was given them. Late in the afternoon the three explorers again resumed their journey. A brief halt for supper was made, but soon afterward the boys once more were following Zeke as he led the way in the moonlight. The air was cool now and although the altitude was still high the boys found less difficulty in breathing. In a sheltered spot well known to Zeke a camp was pitched for the night and soon after they had cast themselves upon their blankets all three were soundly sleeping. It was long before sunrise when Zeke's stentorian call summoned the boys to the task of the coming day. It was with some difficulty that both young prospectors responded. As soon, however, as breakfast had been prepared and eaten, although it was still an hour before sunrise, they started once more on their journey to Thorn's Gulch. Steadily, monotonously they kept on their way, walking in single file and in the same way which had been observed the preceding day. It was not long after sunrise when Zeke suddenly jumped to one side shouting to the boys as he did so to keep away. Before either of them was aware of any peril Zeke drew his revolver and fired several shots at an object in front of him, which as yet was unseen by the boys. "There!" shouted Zeke. "I guess that'll get you, you rascally varmint!" As he spoke he seized his long knife and hurled it savagely. "How do you like that?" he shouted, "I guess you won't do any more harm to anybody." The curiosity of George and Grant had been so thoroughly aroused by the strange calls and actions of their guide that in spite of his warning both crept forward to see what had aroused his anger. And both soon were aware of the cause. A few feet before them was a huge rattlesnake still twisting and turning in its last agonies. Zeke secured his knife, and again and again hurled the weapon at the snake although now they were safe from any attack by the reptile. Its skin was glossy and the dark folds had a certain beauty of their own. Both boys, however, were unaware of the colors of the great snake. At last Zeke succeeded in severing the body. In a moment he grasped the tail and flung the part to which it was attached several yards away. "Better count the rattles," he said. "I don't want to touch the thing," said George with a shudder. "The tail can't bite you," suggested Grant as he advanced boldly and grasped the part of the body to which the rattles were attached and held it up to view. It was still squirming somewhat and George turned away in disgust. "I don't like snakes," he explained. "I can't say that I'm very fond of them," said Grant, "but I think if you don't want them, Pop, I'll take these rattles home with me." "Did you count them?" demanded Zeke, who now approached the spot where the boys were standing. "Not yet," replied Grant. "I'll do it now." There were thirteen rattles found in the snake and when Grant held them up and shook them George was unable to repress the shudder that crept over him. "How was it, Zeke," he asked, turning to the guide, "did the fellow strike at you?" "No, I happened to see him moving across the rock. He's a big fellow. He must be eight feet long," answered the guide. "Aren't you afraid of them?" inquired George, shuddering again as he spoke. "Afraid? No. Why should I be afraid? They give you warning before they strike and that's what the rattles are for." "I wonder if that is what they are for," said Grant thoughtfully. "I don't see why nature should have provided a snake with a means of scaring off the animals he wants to get for his breakfast." "That's what it is," said Zeke. "It can't be for nothin' else." "I've heard it said that shaking the rattles had a strange effect on certain animals. A canary bird sings and a rattler rattles. Perhaps they both think they are improving the music of the spheres." "Fine music!" snorted Zeke. "I have heard it said that the snakes and owls and prairie dogs are great friends," suggested Grant. "They all live together in the same hole." "I don't know nothin' about their being friends," retorted Zeke. "I'm thinkin' the prairie dog does most of the work any way you fix it. He's the one that digs the hole, then along comes the snake and makes his home in it, and then the owl creeps in and there you have it." "I should think they would eat one another," laughed George. "Maybe they do for all I know," said Zeke. "Now if you've had enough to satisfy you with this rattler we'll start ahead again." "But I don't see," persisted Grant, "why he didn't bite you." "Huh!" snapped Zeke. "He didn't get a chance to coil himself. They are just like a hair-spring. They have to get a little purchase before they can do anything, then they do a good deal too, if they try real hard. I don't like them, but I never do what a good many guides out here do." "What's that?" asked Grant. "Why, they're so afraid of rattlesnake bites that they keep loaded up with whisky all the time. That's the best antidote for the snake bite and these fellows must have been bitten about three times a day, most of them." Zeke said no more and in a brief time all three were moving steadily across the table-land. Late in the afternoon Zeke stopped and pointed to a place far in the distance, "Yonder is right near Thorn's Gulch," he explained. "We ought to get there in about three hours." "Three hours!" exclaimed George. "Why how far is it from here?" "About eleven miles." It was almost impossible for either of the boys to believe that the spot to which Zeke had pointed was so far distant. The air was so clear that the place appeared to be much nearer than it really was and if they had been asked each boy would have stated his opinion that the intervening distance could be covered within an hour. "There are two ways now which we can take," explained Zeke. "You mean we can take them both, or either of them?" laughed George. Ignoring the question which the guide gruffly referred to as "smart," Zeke explained that they could go down into the canyon a short distance in advance of them and follow the course until they came to the entrance to Thorn's Gulch. "That will be about where John and Fred will come in, won't it?" inquired Grant. "I guess that's so," admitted Zeke. "Perhaps it will be better for us to go down the slope and strike Thorn's Gulch from that side." Accordingly the direction was changed and advancing toward a slope that led to the valley below, the boys prepared to follow the lower course and meet their friends at the opening where it had been agreed the meeting should take place. Each boy still carried upon his back the pack which had been placed there when they had broken camp. The descent was consequently hampered somewhat by the weight which rested upon their shoulders. Much of the way was difficult and the three members of the party no longer were able to keep closely together. George, who still was the rear guard, steadily dropped behind his companions until he was no longer able to discern them before him. The way by which Zeke was leading now led along a side of the canyon where the walking was increasingly difficult. The broken stone crumbled beneath their feet and they were in constant danger of slipping or falling. Aware that he had lost sight of his companions and was steadily falling behind, George increased his pace, hoping to overtake his companions within a few minutes. In his zeal he approached nearer the edge of a ledge than he was aware. Suddenly the broken stone gave way beneath his feet and in spite of his efforts George was thrown from the ledge and began a swift descent on the side of the cliff. Fortunately the cliff-side was not as steep as in certain other places, but the desperate boy was unable to check his flight. He had given one wild call to his friends when first he had slipped over the border. After that all his strength was required to prevent himself from falling headlong. In spite of his utmost endeavors his foothold soon became more insecure and suddenly as the ground beneath him gave way George was thrown forward on his face. The heavy pack on his shoulders prevented him from rising or recovering the ground he had lost. Rolling, slipping, sliding, the terrified boy continued on his way down the side of the cliff. CHAPTER XI A PERILOUS FALL Fortunately the side of the cliff down which George was slipping was not sheer all the way. It was steep; indeed, so steep that it was impossible for the frightened boy in spite of his desperate attempts to check his flight, to gain a foothold. In his descent some of the loose ground gave way and whenever he tried to seize a small projecting point that too fell before him. George was aware that far below him was the valley or bottom of the gulch. There were possibilities that at any moment he might slide over some cliff beneath which there was nothing to interfere with his fall to the ground far below, a descent of at least two hundred feet. George was amazed at the coolness with which his mind was working. Fully aware of the peril confronting him, nevertheless he thought calmly of his companions and the surprise they would experience when his absence was discovered. If he fell to the bottom of the gulch doubtless they would never learn the fate which had befallen him. When he had gone about sixty feet down the cliff-side his progress abruptly was halted when he came to a heavy projection of rock. Upon this a stunted tree was growing close to the side of the mountain. Almost instinctively George grasped this tree and his heart almost ceased to beat when he found that his progress was effectively stopped. His first fear was that the projection might give way under the force with which he had struck it. For a moment he simply clung to the trunk of the tree and closed his eyes waiting for the crash to come. When several moments had elapsed and he found that he was still safe he opened his eyes and looked all about him. Above him he could see the marks that indicated the trail he had followed in his descent. It was, however, almost impossible for him to retrace his way. He was now painfully aware that he had severely bruised his left leg in his fall. Otherwise he was not seriously hurt as far as he was able to ascertain. It would be difficult, if not entirely impossible for him, in the condition in which he now found himself, to make his way up the sloping side of the cliff, while to slip or fall would be fatal. Rejoicing at his narrow escape George seated himself with his back against the side of the mountain as far as it was possible for him to move along the edge of the rocky shelf. His first feeling of rejoicing at his narrow escape soon gave way to anxiety. He had been so far behind Zeke when he had fallen that he was doubtful now that his absence would be discovered until Grant and the guide had gone a considerable distance ahead. And when his disappearance should be discovered his companions would have no knowledge where to begin their search. Keenly excited, he shouted in his loudest tones, "Grant! Grant!" Not even an echo greeted his prolonged appeal. He shouted again and again, but it soon was plain to him that he had not made himself heard. Thoroughly alarmed now he was almost ready to attempt the perilous ascent, having decided that it was better for him to do so while he was still strong and before his leg should become helpless. A glance toward the border of the cliff, however, was terrifying. So high was it above the gulch below that his peril was great. Almost in an agony of fear he renewed his shouts and though he waited anxiously after every appeal there was no answer to his calls. It was impossible for him to estimate the time that was passing. The slowly moving minutes seemed to the Go Ahead Boy almost like hours. There were moments when it seemed to the terrified boy that he must let go his hold upon his insecure protection. He had passed his left arm around the trunk of the small tree and it was not difficult for him to maintain his position. Again he renewed his frantic appeals, the thought having come to him that Grant and the guide might retrace their way and at some place hear his calls for help. As a matter of fact less than an hour had elapsed when at last George was startled by the sound of a voice directly above him. Peering over the border was a face which he soon discovered was that of Thomas Jefferson, the young Navajo Indian who with his companion had previously come to their camp. Plainly the young Indian had heard the cry and was striving to discover the source from which it had come. Once more George shouted, this time almost hoarse from his efforts. An answering call, however, revealed the fact that the Navajo had discovered him. Indeed it was possible now for him to hear the words of the Indian. "Stay right where you are," called Thomas Jefferson. "Don't try to do anything for yourself." The face disappeared from the border of the cliff and anxiously George waited to discover what means would be used for his rescue. That he would be left in his predicament he was convinced was not to be thought of. Nevertheless the anxious boy became troubled when a time that seemed to him inordinately long passed and still no word was heard from above him. Almost frantic he was about to renew his shouts when he discovered the Navajo crawling over the edge and slowly and cautiously descending the sloping side of the cliff. Almost fascinated by the sight George watched every movement. The moccasin-clad feet of the Navajo did not once fail to find a secure hold. Almost like the rattler which had been killed that morning he crawled and squirmed, steadily making his way toward the place where George was awaiting his coming. Abruptly a new fear seized upon the Go Ahead Boy. If Thomas Jefferson should succeed in gaining the place where he was awaiting his coming, would the shelf be sufficiently strong to support the weight of both? The suggestion was alarming and the perspiration stood out on George's forehead as he thought of the new danger. He was aware now that under the shoulders of the Navajo there was a lariat made fast and that this was being paid out from above as he slowly descended. It was evident now that Thomas Jefferson's companion was above the gulch and that he was assisting in the descent of his companion. In the nervous condition in which George now found himself a thousand new fears possessed him. Perhaps the lariat would not be long enough. As Thomas Jefferson proceeded, his foot might slip and his entire weight be thrown upon the slender rope or strap. Even if the Indian should succeed in attaining the shelf where George was standing, would the slender strip of leather be strong enough to support the weight of both? Meanwhile, as if he were devoid of all fear, the young Navajo slowly and steadily continued his descent. He was not more than fifteen feet from the boy whom he was seeking to rescue, when, with his foot braced against a small projection and the lariat clasped tightly in his hands, he paused as he said, "Don't be scared. Just keep hold of that tree and you'll be all right." As soon as he had spoken, the descent was renewed and in a brief time the Navajo had taken his place beside George. "Look out!" warned George, his voice trembling as he spoke. "I'm afraid this tree isn't strong enough to hold both of us. I don't think the shelf is, either." The peril was so great and the fear of George so keen that for a moment he trembled violently. The Navajo, however, quickly passed his arm under that of the trembling boy and said soothingly, "There's no need to be scared. This place is plenty strong to hold us both. Just be careful and do what I say." As he spoke Thomas Jefferson removed the noose from beneath his arms and placed it under the arms of the frightened boy. "You get hold," he explained. "I'm afraid I can't help very much," said George. "I've hurt my leg." The Indian made a hasty examination and then shaking his head said, "Not much hurt. You can climb all right." "When shall we start?" demanded George. "As soon as you're ready." "I'm more ready now than I shall be later, I suspect," said George ruefully. "It's the only thing to be done, and, if it is, why, the sooner I begin it the better." Carefully George turned and lying against the ground looked up at the border of the cliff. "Is the rope strong enough to hold us both?" he asked, turning again to the Indian. "Plenty strong," replied Thomas Jefferson. "I shall not take hold. You'll have it all." "How then will you get up there?" demanded George, aghast at the suggestion. "I shall climb. It's not new work for me. I shall be close behind you so that if you fall I may help." "If I fall or the lariat breaks," declared George, "there will be no stopping me. Both of us will go straight to the bottom of the gulch." "Look up all the time," suggested the Indian. "Don't once look behind you. You need not fear for me for I have no fear for myself. Besides Kitoni is very strong. He has taken a purchase around a tree and the rope cannot slip. You are perfectly safe." "Shall I try to climb by using the rope or shall I dig in my fingers and toes and try that way?" "Don't pull on the rope too much," answered the Navajo. "There will be places where you may have to do that. It will be safe to do so for Kitoni will take in all slack, but it will be better if you try to climb." "Here goes then," said George in a low voice as he turned and began the perilous ascent. CHAPTER XII A WRECK John was an expert swimmer but his skill was not of much avail when he plunged headlong into the rushing waters of the Colorado. The boat was moving swiftly when he met with his accident and it was impossible for the Go Ahead Boy to retrace his course and swim directly toward the shore. The horror of Fred and Pete when they saw the long legs of John just disappearing beneath the surface of the river may well be imagined. It was impossible for them to check the speed of the boat and equally impossible to change its course. Almost as helpless as if it had been a chip it was carried forward by the swift current. "He's going faster than we are," said Fred in a low voice as he discovered the head of his friend several yards in advance of the skiff. "Then he must be swimming," said Pete. "Is he a good swimmer?" "I never saw a better," replied Fred, not once turning away his eyes from the sight of John. "He has the Australian crawl and all the fancy strokes." "I don't know nothin' about them crawls," answered Pete, "but he's swimmin' like a duck. He'll reach that point below us long before we get there." The guide's surmise was correct for John was exerting himself strongly to gain a low point which he had seen in the distance and around which the swift waters of the current were swept forward. Before the conversation in the boat was renewed both the guide and Fred were aware that John had succeeded in his attempt. He had gained the low lying shore, but in his efforts to rise, although the water where he was standing did not come above his waist, he several times was thrown back into the stream and once nearly lost his foothold. However, at last the sturdy lad succeeded in gaining the shore. As soon as he had shaken the water from his head he turned to look in the direction from which the skiff was coming. The boat now was not more than one hundred feet away. "Come in here! Stop here!" shouted John in his loudest tones. Whether or not his words were heard he saw that his friends were doing their utmost to follow his directions. Still borne onward by the rushing current they nevertheless succeeded in gaining the outer edge and when the sharp bend around the point was made they came sufficiently near the shore to enable Pete with the painter in his hand to leap into the shallow water. Although the guide braced himself strongly and exerted all his strength, his attempt would have failed, if John, instantly aware of the predicament of his companion, had not leaped to his aid. While Pete was struggling and striving to regain a firm standing John seized the painter and as he was braced for the sudden strain he succeeded in checking the speed of the boat and drawing it within the more sheltered waters of the little bay. Meanwhile Pete had succeeded in grasping the gunwale of the skiff and promptly shouted, "Run her up on the beach, boys! One, two, three! Now then, all together!" By their united efforts they succeeded in bringing the boat up on the shore to a place where it was not in danger of being swept away by the swiftly flowing river. "That's what I call a close call," exclaimed Fred with a sigh of relief, when at last he was certain not only that his friend was safe but that all the cargo and the skiff itself had been landed. "What happened to you?" he inquired of John. "I didn't have time to find out very much," replied John demurely. "I lost my balance and the first thing I knew I was making as graceful a dive as ever you saw. I went up like a rocket." "You looked very much like a rocket," sniffed Pete. "We saw your long legs hanging down and thought that something must have pulled you out of the boat." "Something did," replied John dryly. "What was it?" demanded Pete. "The force of gravitation. I had all I could do to make this shore, let me tell you. I had on sneakers and I put in my best work, for I wanted to get on this side of the channel. At first I thought I was not going to make it but I did at last and here I am." "Are you hurt any?" asked Fred. "Hurt? No. I'm as sound as I was when we started." "You may be as sound," laughed Fred, relieved now by the assurance that John was not injured, "but you're a woe-be-gone looking specimen. I think even you would laugh, String, if you could see yourself. You're like the definition of a line that Mr. Strong gave us in mathematics. You're the shortest distance between two points, a length without breadth or thickness." "I've heard those words before," said John sharply. "I wish somebody could get up something new if he wants to make remarks concerning my physique. I'm not the one to blame if it doesn't suit you." "Nobody blames you, Johnnie," laughed Fred. "We're just trying to face the cold facts." "That's what I'm trying to do too," said John demurely. "I had in my pocket a copy we made, or at least what we thought was a copy, of the records from old Simon Moultrie's diary and they are gone now." "Are you sure?" asked Fred, startled by the unexpected statement. "Yes, I'm sure," replied John, turning the pockets inside out as he spoke. "I put them right in here," he explained as he placed his hand upon one pocket. "I guess there won't be a great deal of harm done," spoke up Pete. "It was all done from memory anyway, at least that's what I understood you to say." "That's right, it was," said John, "but if you have a piece of paper in your pocket, Fred let me have it and I'll write it out again. I'll do it now. It will be easier and safer to fix it up before we start than it will to let it all get dim in our minds." Accordingly John took the diary which Fred handed him and tearing a leaf from the back of it at once proceeded to draw from memory an outline of the picture in Simon Moultrie's diary. To this he added the puzzling directions which they had found indicated near the stake. "I think we're all right," he said with satisfaction as he glanced at the drawing he had made. "There's one thing about it," said Pete, "it won't do no harm. Now then, if you're rested, I think we'd better start on, only I think I'll chain your long legs to the boat so that if you decide to leave us the way you did before, we can haul you in the same as we would an anchor." "You won't have to haul me in," retorted John. "I'm going to stay by you this time." "See that you do," said Pete sharply. In a brief time the boat had been pushed out once more into the stream and again the three passengers with their poles had taken their stations and were prepared to do their utmost to guide the course down the river. For a considerable distance the waters were not so turbulent as they had been farther up the stream. Occasional rocks were passed and several times the points rising almost to the surface of the river were discovered. However, the current was so strong that it carried the boat safely around the threatening danger, and almost with the speed of a race horse the little party again turned down the stream. It was not long before the spot which Pete had declared was to be their landing-place was seen before them. Here there was no great difficulty in gaining the shore and in a brief time the three passengers and the skiff were safely on the bank. "What shall we do with the skiff?" inquired John after the cargo had been unloaded. "We'll leave it here and let some one else take it up the stream or use it if he goes down. I think it will carry clear to the Gulf of California if he wants to try it." "How about that map, String?" demanded Fred as he turned again to his tall companion. "Right in my pocket," declared John promptly, "and dry too. I told you I was not going overboard this time, and I kept my promise, didn't I?" "You certainly did," laughed Fred. "Now, then, what are we to do next?" he added, turning to the guide as he spoke. Pete, however, did not reply. He had advanced several yards up the shore and was drawing from the loose soil several pieces that evidently were parts of a boat that had been wrecked. "Do you see those?" he inquired, holding up some of the parts he had found. "Yes," answered Fred. "It looks as if a boat had been wrecked down here, doesn't it?" "It was 'wrecked' all right," answered Pete, "but I'm wondering if either of you boys knows what boat it was?" "What boat was it?" inquired John, advancing to the place where the guide was standing. "It's our lost skiff," replied Pete. "What!" "It's just as I'm tellin' you," Pete repeated. "That skiff we lost the other night didn't get loose. It was taken by somebody who knew what he was doing and brought down here. Here's where the party landed," he added, as he pointed to the shore. "But the boat wasn't 'wrecked,' unless you call smashing it wrecking it." "What do you mean? How do you know?" demanded Fred in keen excitement. "I know because I can see with both eyes," replied Pete sharply. "I don't have to have it all written out for me when I see what's happened to that boat." "Why should anybody want to wreck it?" inquired Fred. "It might be safer for some people if they started down the stream from here not to have any boats around that could follow." "Do you think those two men who were in our camp took the boat?" Fred inquired abruptly. "That's exactly what I think. And I think too," the guide added as he stopped to examine other parts of the boat, "that this skiff was wrecked as well as smashed. There's a hole stove in the bottom and then there are places that have been cut by an axe so I guess both parts of the story are true." "Do you suppose they went up Thorn's Gulch from here?" asked Fred in a low voice. "That's just what I think they did," replied Pete. "Do you think we may meet them somewhere in the Gulch?" "I shouldn't be a bit surprised." "Then we may have pretty serious trouble before we're done." "Right you are," assented Pete. "But it's time for us to be moving, boys," he added. "Here, I'll help each of you with his pack and we'll start out. If those two men are ahead of us we'll know it before they know that we're following them." CHAPTER XIII ALONE IN THE CANYON For a considerable distance the way along which the guide was leading was not difficult. The footing was fairly strong and there were not many obstacles to be met. Both boys in spite of the exciting experiences of the morning were deeply interested in the marvelous sights which greeted them as they advanced into the gulch. On the sides of the canyon layers of rock and earth of different colors were plainly to be seen. Occasionally there were strange formations that extended from the rim of the cliff to the bottom of the valley that were like huge buttresses fashioned by the hands of men. "Look at that!" exclaimed Fred, calling the attention of John to one of these peculiar formations. "That looks exactly as if it had been cut out by a mason." "It certainly does," acknowledged John, stopping and gazing at the interesting sight. "Indeed, if we had this place back east," he continued, "it would not be difficult to make some people believe that it had been especially designed so that they could charge a dime a head to come in to see it. What do you suppose Coney Island would do with the Grand Canyon?" "I guess Coney Island, if it had the Grand Canyon, would hide in some little corner. You wouldn't see much of the Island in a place like that." Pete was not leading his young charges at a rapid pace. In spite of the fact that they were at the bottom of the gulch the altitude was still so high that breathing was somewhat difficult. They steadily continued on their way for two hours, making only occasional stops. Then they halted for the midday rest and the preparation of the luncheon which Pete at once began to get ready. The fire was kindled under the lea of a projecting shelf of rock and soon the odor of broiling bacon appealed strongly to the Go Ahead Boys, whose appetites already needed no stimulant. "This is the life!" exclaimed John a few minutes later when he and Fred were seated on rocks under the shade of the over-hanging cliffs. John was holding a strip of broiled bacon on the end of the stick which he grasped in one hand, while with the other he was holding a huge piece of johnny-cake, in the making of which Pete was an expert. "We couldn't find anything better than this," responded Fred, "even after we have dug out our mine. I wonder what we'll do with all the money we'll get." "I know what I shall do with mine," laughed John. "What?" "Spend it in carfare coming out to the Colorado River. I would like nothing better than to start in where the Green and Grand Rivers join and try to do what Major Powell did. Indeed, I would like to go clear through to the lower part of the Gulf of California." "You don't want very much, do you?" laughed Fred. "Not very much," retorted John. "This simple life appeals to me all right." "You certainly looked simple this morning when you disappeared in the river." "You mean I looked simple _before_ I disappeared," retorted John. "I don't know what I can do to make you more careful in your use of the English language. You certainly did not see me _after_ I disappeared." "We certainly did," retorted Fred. "I saw your head away down the stream though your feet weren't very far in front of the boat. You were going like mad." "I don't deserve any credit for that," laughed John as he extended his stick for more bacon. "Did you notice how many branches there are to this gulch?" inquired John as he resumed his repast. "I've counted four or five canyons that open into the right side of this gulch and I guess there are as many on the other side although I can't see." "Yes, it's all broken up," acknowledged Fred as he looked in the direction indicated by his companion. "It's a mighty interesting place." "That's no news," laughed John. "Where are you going?" Fred had arisen and throwing his gun over his shoulder he had started toward one of the canyons that opened on the opposite side of the great gulch. "Where are you going?" called out Pete sharply as he discovered the action of the Go Ahead Boy. "Not very far," replied Fred. "You had better not," warned Pete. "Look out for snakes." Fred stopped abruptly at the reference to the reptiles, but as John laughed loudly he decided to continue on his way. "Come along, Jack," Fred called. "Nay verily, not so. I've had all the hike I want to-day." Fred laughed and made no further response. Without waiting for his friend to join him he turned into the canyon and in a few minutes was unable to see the camping place which he had left behind him. Fred, who had a keen eye for color, was examining the marvelous shades that were to be seen along the sides of the canyon. Rock and soil were clearly distinguished and the comparison which John had made the preceding day, when he had said that the sides of the canyon looked like a great piece of layer-cake, caused Fred to smile at the recollection. He stopped abruptly when for a moment he fancied he saw a huge living creature behind a sage bush a few yards before him. Pete had related many stories of the savage mountain lion and the peril of encounters which he had with the savage beasts. Since he had started, the fiercest animal Fred had seen had been the noisy little coyote. After night fall the sly, little beasts often came within sound of the camp and their weird barks or cries made the silence of the night appear even more intense. Of bears Fred had not seen one. Pete had related the story of the fate which had befallen a friend of his who, making his way through the forest one day had jumped upon a log which appeared in his pathway and without any delay then had leaped down upon the ground before him. The "ground" however, had proved to be a she-bear with her two cubs nearby. "They found only the bones of poor Jim Hyde," Pete had remarked at the end of the story. "I don't see how you know that Jim jumped upon a log," suggested John when the guide's story had been told. "That was easy," declared Pete. "We saw the prints of his feet leading right up to the log and marks where he stood on the top and then over on the other side there was nothing but the bones of the poor fellow." Fred recalled the somewhat gruesome tale as he entered further within the shades of the canyon. The sight, however, was so fascinating that he still continued on his way. The vivid coloring of the sides seemed to be more marked most of the way just a little in advance. Led on by the continued hope of discovering some place of special beauty, Fred was astonished when at last he looked at his watch and saw that more than an hour had elapsed since he had left his friends. The Go Ahead Boy was less interested in the sights which greeted him on his return than when he at first entered the canyon. Occasionally he stopped before some sight that was unusually impressive, but he was eager to retrace his way for he was aware that the guide would soon want to resume their journey. When he came nearer the place he was seeking, Fred's thoughts were turned once more to the mine for which the search was to be made. At the thought his eagerness again increased and he began to walk more rapidly. It was strange that he did not discover the place before him where his friends were awaiting his coming. He steadily continued on his way, walking occasionally with increased speed. At last really puzzled by his failure to discover the camp he stopped and looked keenly about him in all directions. Why was it that he had not found the place where they had stopped for their noonday meal? Indeed, as he now looked about him on all sides he failed to recognize the region. There was a sinking of Fred's heart and yet the boy refused to believe that he had lost his way or that he was really in peril. There were many small canyons or gulches, as has been said, which opened into the larger gulch. Into several of these Fred entered, hoping to discover something that would convince him that he was moving in the right direction. His alarm increased, however, when he soon discovered that he was moving through a region that was entirely unknown. Not a familiar object was to be seen. The fear in his heart deepened and again the troubled boy stopped to look keenly about him. As Fred tried to obtain his bearings his confusion apparently increased. The stream in the bottom of the gulch was wider than the one he had seen in the first part of his journey. He peered in one direction in his search for landmarks only to fail and then turn and try the same experiment in another gulch. All his efforts were alike unavailing and a great fear now welled up in the heart of the troubled boy. He looked up to the rim and saw the passing clouds that seemed to be close to the ground. There was no help to be found from that direction and suddenly he laughed aloud as he thought of his rifle. He would fire the gun and as soon as he heard the response of John he would know in which direction to move. Accordingly he discharged his gun and then as there was no immediate response, he waited in suspense until he was convinced that no answering report had been given. Again he fired and once more he waited for the answering shot. No answer, however, was given and now thoroughly alarmed Fred again turned and retraced his way. CHAPTER XIV CLIMBING After he had advanced several hundred yards Fred was by no means certain that he really was retracing his way. Either he was greatly confused or the places by which he was passing were strange. By this time the Go Ahead Boy was thoroughly alarmed. The thought of being lost in Thorn's Gulch, or in some one of the myriad branches of the majestic chasm that extended for hundreds of miles in the course of the mighty Colorado, was alarming. Fred had a momentary glimpse of his home. He even pictured to himself what would occur there when the report was brought that he had been lost in one of the canyons. Doubtless his three friends would tell how they had searched for days and perhaps weeks, and with all their efforts had been unable to find any trace of his presence. Finding almost a pleasure in his picture of misery, Fred nevertheless was aware that, unless he aroused himself at once, all the horrors of which he had dreamed might become a terrible reality. Stepping within the shadow of a great cliff he did his utmost to be calm and try to think out what his problem was. He pictured to himself the sights of Thorn's Gulch through which he and John had been led several miles by the guide. Closing his eyes he endeavored to fix accurately in his mind the direction in which Thorn's Gulch extended. Having satisfied himself as to this he next tried to think of the angles in which the various branches extended. As he recalled his own actions it seemed to him that he had gone in a half-dozen different directions. It was therefore now well nigh impossible to fix accurately the direction in which he ought to move. Again he looked keenly all about him, trying to find his bearings. At last he turned back over part of the way by which he had come. At times the frightened boy ran swiftly and then frequently stopped to glance at the sky far above the rim of the canyon. More and more his mind became confused and in his terror he increased the speed at which he was running. Soon breathless from his endeavors, he was compelled to halt and once more he did his utmost to calm himself. He recalled the time which had elapsed since he had left his friends. Glancing at his watch he saw that more than two hours had passed and that now it was late in the afternoon. Darkness would soon be at hand and would come suddenly when it arrived. Already Fred fancied he could feel the chill of the night air. He had no food anywhere about him and visions of hunger increased the suffering of the troubled boy. Besides he was afraid of what might occur in the hours of darkness. When at last night came Fred had not found his way back to the spot where he had left his friends so many hours before. He was convinced now that he would be compelled to pass the night alone in the canyon. Whether or not he ever would be able to escape from the gulch was more than a question in his mind. Chilled and hungry as well as alarmed, Fred did not dare look for a place where he might sleep. In the darkness it would be impossible for him to tell whether or not rattlesnakes were near or the eyes of some prowling beast might already be fixed upon him. It was a night of agony. How the long and weary hours at last passed Fred had no conception. There were times when he felt numb as if all power of sensation had entirely left his body. Again he tried resolutely to assure himself that safety would come with the morning light and that soon either he would find his friends or they would discover him. Somehow he was convinced that neither Pete nor John would search together for him. It was likely also that one of them would remain in the spot from which Fred had started so that if the lost boy in some way should be able to make his way back he would not be tempted to depart again under the impression that his friends already were gone. When at last the morning came, almost with the suddenness with which darkness had fallen upon the canyon, Fred's spirits revived in a measure. Above the rim of the great gulch he saw a huge bird circling high in the air. He was unable to determine whether or not the bird was an eagle but it certainly reminded him of one. The sight of the circling bird recalled the emblem of his country,--the majestic eagle. With what powerful wings the great birds had been endowed. What wonderful and graceful sweeps they took in their encircling flights. For a moment he almost envied the great bird he saw above him. If he too had wings he might be able to escape from the place in which he was practically imprisoned. A moment later he was almost ashamed of his complaint. If the bird was able to make its way not only up the canyon but also far above it why should not a man be able at least to gain the rim? The very fact that there were difficulties to be solved was what made the work of a man worth while. The difference between a man and a lump of earth was that one was living and was able to use his will and brain, while the other was a clod always to remain a diminishing bit of the surface of the earth. "I'll be a man!" declared Fred resolutely. As he spoke he sprang to his feet and drew his belt more closely about him. He recalled stories of Zeke in which that worthy guide had explained that the feeling of hunger was greatly assuaged by drawing one's belt more tightly. Convinced that he had been helped already, Fred raised his rifle to his shoulder and fired. He was eager to give some token to his friends if they were nearby that he was not far away and in good condition. He fired three shots, but no answering shot was heard. For a moment he thought of the anxiety of John and the guide. The picture of the distress of his friend was not inspiring and almost in desperation Fred again raised his rifle and fired. Still no response was made and the troubled boy was convinced that he was indeed lost. He was aware too that the lack of food and loss of sleep had combined to make him weaker. He was still following the course of the stream but his halts were longer and more frequent. Whenever he came to a steep place the difficulty of climbing became more manifest. And yet the determined boy did not abandon hope. Resolutely he continued in his efforts and at times was surprised to find how rapidly he was moving. It was long since he had taken any thought of his surroundings. His sole purpose now was to keep on until he should come to some place that would enable him to gain the plateau above. Once there, he believed he would be able to discover where he was and perhaps be able to find his friends. He had no conception of distance or direction. He might be moving farther and farther all the time from his companions, but there was nothing else to be done and so he doggedly held to his purpose and continued on his way. He was convinced that he was steadily climbing all the time. The rim appeared to be nearer and although the brook was not much below him its swifter current indicated that it was passing over ground much higher than it had been when Fred first had followed it. Fred had been unable to obtain anything to eat. He had not seen any living creatures except a few hideous and huge lizards and the birds which had been flying far above the border of the canyon. He now had approached a part of the canyon where the way appeared to be much more open than before. For some strange reason which he was unable to explain he had been able to follow what appeared to be almost a pathway. Seldom had he been compelled to climb from rock to rock or make many detours. He was aware that far away was the steadily rising rim of the canyon from which he had made his ascent. He saw the sloping side of the hill before him which extended perhaps two hundred feet. On the opposite side of the canyon the colored rocks took on very vivid tints but whether or not there was a sheer fall on his side just beyond the portion he could see he was unable to determine. Suddenly Fred stopped and stared in amazement before him. For a moment he was fearful that hunger and weariness had combined to make him see visions. He pinched his arm to assure himself that he was awake. There was no mistaking the object at which he was looking. At that very moment it turned and he saw a man rise from the rocky side of the canyon and peer eagerly down at the sloping border. Fred's amazement increased when a moment later he discovered two objects in the distance apparently crawling up the hillside. He stared blankly at the sight but there was no escape from the impression he had first received. Three men were plainly before him. It was also evident to the Go Ahead Boy a moment later that the one whom he had first discovered was assisting the other two. He saw the long lariat or leather rope several times rise and fall above the ground and then he was convinced that an accident had occurred and that the two whom he saw slowly making their way up the side of the mountain had been the victims. He was unable to determine whether they were friends or foes, they were so far before him. He hesitated after he had raised his gun to his shoulder to proclaim his presence by a shot, and then lowered his rifle. A shot might startle the unsuspecting men who were struggling to gain the rim and the report of his rifle might increase their danger. At the same time, however, he began to advance more rapidly and in a brief time was able to recognize the men whose actions he had been so keenly watching. CHAPTER XV THE SEARCH A strange feeling of excitement now possessed Fred. He already had recognized George and a moment later was certain that the two Indians who had entered their camp were the ones who now were assisting his friend. Pushing forward as rapidly as he was able, Fred had not gone far before in his loudest tones he shouted, "I'm coming! I'm coming!" At the sound instantly all three of the persons he had seen turned and looked blankly in the direction from which the unexpected hail had come. For a moment Fred was startled for fear that the surprise might harm George who might lose his grip on the steep and loose side of the gulch. His one thought, however, had been that by the announcement of his coming he might encourage all three to use their utmost endeavors until he should arrive at the place where he might help the Indian. His alarm, however, was unfounded. Fred, desperately fighting his feeling of weariness and hunger, pushed forward rapidly on his way and was greatly relieved when he saw that George and both Indians also were renewing their efforts. Slowly and yet steadily George was making the ascent. Occasionally he stopped for rest, but not once had he looked behind him. The advice of Thomas Jefferson to look only above him when he was climbing had been strictly followed. It was nearly at the same time when Fred and George arrived at the place on the brink of the canyon where Kitoni, the Indian, was standing. Each boy was aware of the emotions that filled the heart of his friend. For a moment they were both unable to speak and then Fred, whose tongue was seldom silent long, said eagerly, while his eyes filled with tears, "You must have had a close call, George." "I did," replied George. "Somehow I slipped over the edge here and went sliding down that incline. I tried to stop myself but I couldn't get any brace or foothold until I came to the little shelf down there. That small tree saved my life." "Were you alone?" inquired Fred. "Yes," replied George foolishly. "I must have dropped behind Grant and Zeke. We were pretty well spread out here anyway." "How long ago did it happen?" "About fifty years, I should judge by my feelings," replied George dryly. "I fancy it really was about an hour or two." "Why didn't Grant and Zeke come back and look for you?" "Perhaps they did. They may have passed the place without knowing that I was anywhere near. But how is it that you are here alone? Where are String and Pete?" "That's what I don't know," said Fred. "What do you mean?" "Just what I say, I haven't the slightest idea where they are." "Where did you leave them?" "Way back near the entrance of Thorn's Gulch. We stopped in the middle of the day yesterday and after we had eaten our luncheon I began to make some investigations of my own. That's the last I've seen of either Pete or Jack and besides I haven't had a mouthful to eat since yesterday noon." "You haven't?" exclaimed George. "I'm afraid we can't do anything for you until we find Grant and Zeke. They have most of the supplies. Let me get into my pack and see what I've got." George's pack which Thomas Jefferson had insisted upon taking when he rescued the Go Ahead Boy was now opened but there was no food in it. "There's nothing else to be done," said George, shaking his head. "Yes, there is something to be done," said Fred tartly. "We've got to do something. You don't know where Soc and Zeke are and I don't know where String and Pete may be. We've got to find them." "We'll find them," suggested Thomas Jefferson quickly. Both young Indians had been silent during the conversation although they were intensely interested in the conversation of the two boys. "I shall go to look up the two who went ahead of you--" began Thomas Jefferson. "But they may have passed this place and gone in the other direction," interrupted George. "I shall see," said the Navajo quietly. "I shall go in that direction and Kitoni will go in the other looking for the other two." "But he may not find them," suggested George quickly. "They probably thought Fred was lost and they have been staying where they were when he left them." "We shall see," was the laconic reply of Thomas Jefferson. "But what makes you think they will be where Fred left them?" demanded George. "I do not know," replied the Indian. "One may look and one may stay. If they think he is lost one may stay in the camp so that he will know where he is if he finds his way back to it. You must both stay right here where you are," he added. "Do not move even if no one comes for a day and a night. It is your only hope." "Hi! Hi!" exclaimed George abruptly. "I've found something in my pack! It's good to eat." George, greatly alarmed for his friend, had renewed his search among his belongings hoping to discover some food that might be prepared for the hungry lad. Strips of bacon quickly were cut and the boys, in spite of George's lameness and Fred's hunger, insisted upon making a fire and cooking the food. They were eager for the Indians to begin their search for their missing friends as speedily as possible. It was not long before the two Navajos started on their expeditions, Thomas Jefferson moving in the direction in which Grant and Zeke had gone, while his companion retraced his way in the hope of discovering John and the other guide. It had been agreed that neither should remain away longer than the following evening. If the Indians were not back in camp by that time it was agreed that the meeting place which previously had been selected for the two parties should be the spot which all should seek when they returned with the lost members of the party. It was also agreed that neither of the boys should try to withdraw from the place where they then were. The overhanging ledge protected them from the heat of the sun, and if they should be compelled to spend the night there they would be safer from the attacks of any prowling beasts than would likely be the case in a more open or exposed spot on the way they had followed. "George," said Fred when the light had faded and the silence that rested over the great cliff was tense, "do you really think there's anything in what the Navajo said?" "What did he say?" "Why, don't you remember that he said that whoever tried to come in here to find the lost mine was certain to get into trouble? It seems to have worked pretty well with us so far. I lost my way and you fell and bruised your leg, to say nothing about trying to slide over the precipice and land in the valley below." "I guess what Thomas Jefferson said didn't make you lose your way," replied George. "I know," acknowledged Fred thoughtfully. "But how do you account for it that he should have said what he did and then before we get very far on our way into the Gulch something happens to both of us and something may have happened to John, to say nothing about Grant and Zeke." "I guess you're tired and nervous, Pee Wee," said George, who was aware of the feeling in the heart of his friend. "Well, all I can say," declared Fred, "is that I hope there won't be anything worse happen to us than has come already." "Why should there be anything worse?" "There shouldn't, that's just what I mean." "Of course we've got a job ahead of us. It isn't any easy thing to locate a valuable claim. If it was there wouldn't be anything in the copper, or silver, or gold, or whatever the metal is that we want to get. That's why men use gold for money. It's so scarce and so hard to find and then after you have found it it's harder still to mine it. Hark," he added abruptly, "it seems to me I heard somebody speak." Both boys listened intently and a moment later Fred declared, "You're right, Pop, there is somebody coming." The sound of voices was faintly heard coming from the direction in which Thomas Jefferson had gone in his search for Grant and Zeke. The sound became steadily clearer and in a brief time the dim outlines of the three approaching men were seen not far away. "Hello, there!" called George. "Hello, yourself!" came back the reply which both boys recognized at once as the voice of their missing comrade, Grant. A few minutes later all three arrived at the place where George and Fred were awaiting their coming. "You're a great fellow!" exclaimed Grant to George. "Why didn't you keep up with us?" "Why didn't you come back and look for me?" retorted George. "It's a great idea that a man slips down the side of the canyon and almost falls over a precipice and nobody cares enough about it even to stop and say good-by to him." "We did come back," explained Grant, "and then we decided that you must have gone on again, so we turned back, then we stopped for we didn't know what to do. That was just about the time when the Navajo caught up with us and told us that you and Fred were back here together. He told us too about Fred's wandering around the canyons trying to see if he too couldn't get lost. According to Thomas Jefferson he came mighty near succeeding too." Fred did not reply although it was plain that his feeling of relief at the return of Grant was as great as that of his companion. The conversation speedily turned upon the exciting experiences through which all three boys had passed that day. Zeke declared gruffly that there wasn't one of them fit to be in the canyon. "I'm tellin' you," he said, "this is no place for a kid or a tenderfoot. It's a man's job to work one's way up this gulch, let me tell you, and we ought not to have any infants along with us." "We're not 'infants,'" spoke up Fred. "Except in the eyes of the law," he added. "We're able to do the job and there isn't any one of us that's trying to back out." "No, I wish some of you would," growled Zeke. "What with your getting lost and trying to slide over the edge of the Gulch there isn't much time to look for any lost claim or find any prospect." "How long do you think it will be before Jack and Pete come here?" inquired Fred. "Nobody knows," replied Zeke. "Maybe an hour, maybe a day, and maybe a week and maybe never." CHAPTER XVI A STARTLING ARRIVAL Whether the gruff words of the somewhat crusty guide cast a spell over the boys or they themselves shared in the dark vision presented by him no one knew. At all events silence soon rested over the little camp and in a brief time all were asleep. Now that Fred and George had been cared for and the immediate peril into which they had fallen was gone a feeling of relief had come to the three Go Ahead Boys. They were still anxious concerning their missing companion, but their confidence in Pete and their knowledge that John was not likely to incur any unnecessary risks, to say nothing of the search which Kitoni was making, all combined to strengthen their hope that the missing Go Ahead Boys would soon be with them. When the light of the following morning appeared the camp was astir and Zeke, who was awake before his young charges had opened their eyes, was already preparing a simple breakfast. It had been difficult for him to obtain wood with which to kindle the fire but after a diligent search in the barren region where they had halted he at last obtained a sufficient number of dead and dried branches that had fallen from the few trees on the side of the canyon. When breakfast had been prepared and eaten, the courage of the boys promptly revived. Frequently each turned and looked far down the great gulch, hoping to obtain a view of John or the absent guide, but as yet nothing was seen to indicate that the young Navajo had found the missing member of the party. Already in the sunlight the air was Intensely warm. In the shade, however, it was so cool that Fred declared an overcoat would not be uncomfortable. "I'm getting in a hurry," he said. "It won't do you any good if you be," said Zeke solemnly. "You'll have to take things as they come." "The trouble is they don't come," laughed Fred. "I want Pete and John here." "I guess you'll have to put up with those of us that haven't got lost or tried to fall over the rocks," growled Zeke, his eyes twinkling as he spoke. "Here's Thomas Jefferson," he added, "he'll help you pass the time." The Navajo had not passed the night near the spot which the boys had selected. No one was aware whether he had departed to rejoin his friend or had merely sought another resting place. "They always show up about breakfast time," growled Zeke under his breath. Nevertheless the guide at once prepared some food for the Indian who now had rejoined the party. "Did you see anything of our friends?" inquired Grant eagerly. "I saw nothing," replied the Navajo. "I do not expect all people here to be safe." "Why not?" demanded George. "I have explained already," replied the Indian. "This is no place for white men. It belongs to the Indians, and the spirits of those who live here do not love to have white men come. I have never heard of one who tried to enter who did not have bad luck before long." "Yes," laughed Fred, "but I have known people to have bad luck who never heard of Thorn's Gulch." "They may have bad luck without coming here," said Thomas Jefferson, "but they are sure to have it if they do come." "Why don't you go and help find your friend?" spoke up Zeke, addressing the Navajo as he spoke. "Kitoni will come." "Do you think he will find John and Pete?" inquired Fred eagerly. "He will find them," answered the Navajo. "It may take two days, it may take more." "Why I couldn't have been as many miles away as that," declared Fred. "It's not the number of miles, it's the difficulty of finding the gulch into which they have gone while they were looking for you." "Do you think they separated?" asked Fred. The Navajo nodded affirmatively, but did not speak. "In course they separated," spoke up Zeke. "One looked for you and the other stayed in camp so that you wouldn't be making any mistake when you came back and passed the place." "Thomas Jefferson," spoke up Grant, "why do you think the spirits of the Indians live here in Thorn's Gulch?" Whatever the opinion of the Navajo may have been he did not explain. Indeed he did not even reply to the question. It was manifest that he himself thoroughly believed in what he had said. Even his three years in the Eastern school had not been sufficient to deprive him entirely of the superstitions which he had inherited from his ancestors. "Do you think we'll find that mining claim?" inquired George. "I don't know," replied the Indian. "But what do you think?" persisted George. "I don't know," again said the red man. Convinced that it was useless to attempt to obtain any opinion from the young Indian, the boy ceased to question him. Striving to possess their souls in patience they waited while the sun climbed higher into the heavens and still its light did not betray any signs of the coming of their missing friends. By turning and leaning a few feet over the way, the three boys were able to see much farther into the gulch behind them. Patiently they kept watch but the slow minutes moved on and still John did not come. It was late in the afternoon when Grant suddenly sprang to his feet and after gazing long and earnestly in the direction in which the guide was looking, he said excitedly, "Zeke, isn't that two men coming up the trail?" "Yes," replied the guide shortly. Instantly the three Go Ahead Boys were standing and peering excitedly in the direction indicated by Grant. "That can't be String and Pete," said George in a low voice. "They would come from the other direction, wouldn't they, Zeke?" "Yes," replied the guide abruptly. "Then who are these men?" "Not knowing, I can't tell you. I can say though that I hope you'll be quiet and not forget that children are to be seen and not heard. In course I mean if those two men come here, as I think they will." The unexpected discovery of two men in the gulch was of itself startling. Seldom had the foot of man trod these weary wastes. There was an air of complete desolation that rested over the entire region. The discovery therefore of two men coming along the side of the canyon and following the way over which Zeke had gone was doubly surprising. Conversation lagged while all four carefully watched the actions of the approaching men. Whoever the strangers might be it was evident that they were not entirely unfamiliar with the region. They picked their way with confidence and made surprisingly good time as they advanced. When they had come within fifty yards of the place where the boys were standing, Fred excitedly seized George by his arm and said, "Do you see who those two men are?" "Who are they?" asked George. "They are the same two white men that came into our camp over on the canyon." "Is that so, Zeke?" demanded George in surprise as he turned to the guide. "Yes," answered Zeke sharply. "Now see if you can keep from talking too much." In a brief time the two white men advanced to the camp. From their actions it was apparent that they had not been aware of the presence of the young prospectors. Their surprise consequently was as great as that of the Go Ahead Boys. When they entered the camp the long, livid scar on the cheek of the smaller man convinced the boys that their visitors were indeed the same men who previously had come to their camp and to whose actions they had attributed the loss of the diary of Simon Moultrie, as well as the strange disappearance of the second boat. The visitors were the first to speak as the taller man said, "What are you folks doing here?" "Just now we're doing nothin'," replied Zeke brusquely. "Can't you see?" "That's about the same job we've got," laughed the man with the scar. "We've been busy enough," growled Zeke. "Doing what, may I ask?" inquired the larger of the visitors. "Oh, looking for a lost boat--" "Nice place to look for a boat," replied the man with the scar as he laughingly pointed to the desert wastes all about them. "That makes no difference, we've found it just the same," declared Zeke. For a moment the two white men stared blankly at him, and then both laughed as one said, "If you don't mind I wish you'd tell us where you found a boat up here." "I didn't say it was up here," explained Zeke. "I said we'd found a boat where the men who took it had smashed." "How do you know it was smashed?" inquired the man with the scar. "Tell him," said Zeke abruptly, turning to Fred, "I wasn't myself in the party," he explained, "but this boy was and he knows all about it." "Pete was the one who found the boat," exclaimed Fred, "but we all saw it." "We likewise also are looking for a lost diary," broke in Zeke. "It's a nice place to look for that, too," said the man with the scar. For a moment the two visitors looked keenly at each other while neither spoke. "I tell you," said Fred excitedly in a whisper to George, "they are both bad men and I wish we were out of this." CHAPTER XVII A DEPARTURE BY NIGHT "If only John and Pete were here," said Fred in a low voice to his companions as they withdrew to the border of the camp. "But they aren't here," laughed George, "and there isn't any use in wasting any time crying over their absence." "That's right," joined in Grant. "We're doing everything we can do to find them, and if we don't find them it won't be our fault." "Do you really think," demanded Fred, "that they won't be found?" "No, I don't think anything of the kind," said Grant. "I'm very sure they will be found. All I'm saying is that it's foolish to waste your time lamenting over what can't be helped." "I'm not crying," retorted Fred somewhat sharply. "Yes, you are," rejoined his friend. "You're wailing over the fact that John and Pete aren't here." "Well, they aren't here, and that's one fact." "If you cry about it, that's another. My mother told me there are only two things a fellow never ought to worry about in this world." "What are they?" inquired Fred interested at once. "The things you can help and the things you can't. There isn't any use in worrying over things you can change, for if you're able to change them, stop worrying and get at them and make them different. If you can't possibly change them, then all the worrying in the world won't do you any good." "I'm wondering," inquired Fired, turning as he spoke and glancing again at their uninvited visitors, "if those men are planning to stay here." "They certainly look the part now," said George in a low voice. "What can we do to get rid of them?" asked Fred. Grant shook his head as he said, "I don't want the contract myself of getting rid of them. If you want to try it you're welcome." "But I don't see," continued Fred, "why we're bound to take them in and treat them as if they were our long lost brothers. I would a good deal rather see John and Pete come marching into the camp." "So would I," acknowledged Grant, "but they'll come when they're found and not before. These fellows are here now and Zeke says it's the law of the desert that a man who drops into your camp at nightfall is entitled to share everything you have,--supplies, tents, beds and everything." "Then I suppose we shall have to put up with it," said George somewhat glumly. "I don't like the appearance of either one of them," he added as again he glanced at the men who now were seated at one side of the camp. Zeke, apparently was not paying any undue attention to either of the visitors. He was busying himself in certain camp duties though it was plain to his young friends that throughout his task he was keenly observant of the actions of their unwelcome visitors. Darkness now was creeping over the land and already outlines of the great gulch were becoming confused with the clouds and the trees. It was almost impossible to determine where the rim of the gulch was. The silence, too, that rested over the region was almost oppressive. It was a silence more intense than anything any of the Go Ahead Boys ever before had experienced. Their difficulties were multiplied too by the arrival of the two men whose bearing and actions certainly increased the probability that Fred's statement concerning them that they were "bad men" was true. The two visitors had eagerly accepted the supper which was given them and then they did not indicate any desire to depart. They did not disturb conditions nor did they strive to enter into conversation with the campers. Occasionally Zeke or one of the boys had spoken to the men, but otherwise they had mostly been left to their own devices. When time for retiring had come and John and Pete had not come back nor had any word been heard from the young Navajo who had gone in search of them, even Zeke became somewhat serious when the boys spoke to him concerning the failure of the other members of their party to join them. "I'm thinking" Zeke remarked, "that Kitoni will be able to find 'em, that is, if they're still in the land of the livin'." "But don't you think they are?" demanded Fred, aghast. "In course I think they are," said Zeke testily. "There wouldn't be no use in tryin' to find 'em if they weren't." "But Thomas Jefferson says this valley is a place where the spirits of the dead Indians come and they don't like to be disturbed. He says that any one who tries to come into this valley is certain to have trouble." "I reckon we've had our share of trouble," growled Zeke, "and we haven't got very far into the Gulch yet either, but I don't believe no red-skin spirit has nothin' at all to do with it." The guide's meaning, in spite of his failure to express himself, was clear to his young companions and they strove to be content, although all three were aware that Zeke was becoming increasingly uneasy over the continued absence of John and Pete. True to Grant's opinion the two strangers remained for the night at the camp. They had not expected to be invited nor had Zeke or any of the Go Ahead Boys bidden them go on. It was taken as a matter of course that they would be permitted to share the camp which they had found in the desert region. "We've had a hard time," murmured Grant when at last the boys were preparing for the night. "It's been one thing after another. We've lost a boat, lost Simon Moultrie's diary, lost John and Pete, and I'm not sure that we haven't lost a good deal more by having these two tough-looking men come here and join the band as they have." "Why don't you keep watch on them to-night?" suggested George. "Because that's one of the two things I can't worry about," replied Grant demurely. "If they are going to shoot us I can't help it and if they aren't then there's no need of lying awake nights." In spite of the anxiety of the Go Ahead Boys not many minutes had elapsed before all three were sleeping soundly. Fred was utterly wearied by his efforts of the day and was the first to close his eyes. George's bruised leg was annoying though not especially painful, and it was not his suffering that caused him to lie awake long after his friends were sleeping. His accident had made the boy somewhat home-sick. Again and again visions of his faraway home now arose before him and he was almost willing to blame his father for permitting him to take this trip to the Grand Canyon without older members of the family going with him. Indeed, the longer George thought over the matter the more he was inclined to pity himself and to blame some one else for his present misfortune. He was well aware that there was nothing serious in the bruise he had received and that in all probability within two or three days he would be as well able to walk as ever he had been. But he was tired and anxious and under such conditions his feelings naturally were somewhat depressed. At last, however, George's eyes slowly closed and he too was asleep beside his companions. It was not so with Zeke, the guide, however. Without betraying his fear he had been suspicious of the two men since they had first come to the camp. Unknown to them he was mindful of their every act and frequently while he was engaged in his tasks he listened and overheard parts of their conversation which he was desirous of hearing. Zeke had stretched himself upon the dry, warm ground near the Go Ahead Boys, but it was long before sleep was to come to him. The slow moments passed and nothing was heard to break the tense silence of the wonderful region. Indeed, the silence itself was almost oppressive. It was George who had declared that "the silence was something you could hear." Strange as the expression is it is almost descriptive of the conditions under which the Go Ahead Boys now found themselves. Zeke, however, had little sentiment and in no way had been governed by the feeling which had influenced the Go Ahead Boys. Although he was lying on the ground and his breathing was deep and regular his eyes all the time were sufficiently open to enable him to see what the men of whom he was suspicious were doing. The hours passed slowly, but none of Zeke's fears were confirmed. Midnight came and the denseness of the silence became even more marked than before. Now, however, the suspicions of the guide were to be confirmed and his fear proved not to be altogether groundless. Zeke saw one of the white men suddenly and silently sit erect. While the man was looking about him, Zeke's position was unchanged, but his little eyes were peering out through half-opened eyelids and his right hand suddenly had clutched the pistol which he carried in his belt night and day. The white man whom he was watching was the one whose face was scarred. For several minutes he sat erect and motionless, until he plainly was satisfied that all the other parties in the camp were asleep. Then Zeke saw the man slowly rise. Even after he was standing erect he still remained motionless. Then apparently satisfied that no one in the camp was aware of his action the man slowly and stealthily moved toward the border of the camp where the packs carried by the boys had been deposited. Glancing behind him once, the man, still apparently convinced that he was not seen, stealthily drew one of the packs toward him and as soon as he had grasped it at once started from the camp over the way by which he had come. Zeke now was fully awake. He too glanced keenly about him to satisfy himself that the others were not aware of his actions. Apparently satisfied that he had not been seen, he took his rifle and silently followed in the direction in which the unwelcome guest had departed. For some strange reason Fred also was aroused directly after the departure of the guide, and somewhat startled, sat up. As he did so he saw the taller white man slowly rise from the ground where he had been lying and begin to move rapidly in the direction in which his comrade had disappeared. CHAPTER XVIII RESTORING THE MAP Fred was not aware of the departure of Zeke nor that he had followed the first of the white men to leave the camp. As a consequence when he saw the stranger rise and slowly walk from the place, he had not been disturbed by any fear of mishaps. Indeed, he did not even look about the camp carefully to ascertain whether or not the other man was still there. Apparently too this man when he had gone had departed empty-handed. For a brief time Fred hesitated, almost deciding to awaken his companions and inform them of his discovery, but at last, convinced that such action was unnecessary and still unaware that the guide also had gone, he once more stretched himself upon the dry ground and soon was soundly sleeping. He was aroused the following morning by Grant who was shaking him as he shouted, "Wake up, Fred!" "Is it time to get up?" yawned Fred sleepily. "It's time for every one of us to be wide awake," declared Grant. "Do you know what has become of Zeke and the two men that were here last night?" "Have they gone? Aren't they here now?" demanded Fred at once thoroughly awake. "No, sir, there's not one of them here," replied Grant. "That's strange," said Fred. "I waked up in the night and saw one of the white men leaving the camp." "Didn't you see the others?" "No." "Did the man take anything with him?" "I didn't see that he did." "Well, one of the packs is gone anyway." "Then the other man must have taken it," said Fred positively. "I'm sure the one I saw leaving didn't carry anything with him." "He may have come back," suggested Grant. "That's true," said Fred thoughtfully. "I hadn't thought of that. Thomas Jefferson," he added as the young Navajo now approached the place where the two Go Ahead Boys were standing, "what do you make of this?" "All three gone," replied the Indian. "We know that already," replied Fred sharply, "but we don't know where they have gone nor why nor who. What time was it," he demanded of Grant, "when you first found this out?" "About ten minutes ago when I first waked up." "I saw one of the men leaving," Fred explained, "but I haven't any idea what time it was. It was in the night sometime." "Did he go alone?" inquired the Indian. "Yes," Fred answered. "In which direction did he go?" asked the Navajo. Fred pointed to his right and without a word the young Navajo instantly ran to that side of the camp and began to inspect closely the footprints of the men who had gone. In a brief time he returned and said simply, "No two of the men went together. The man with the scar went first. If the man you saw did not have any pack then it was the short man that took it." "How do you know they didn't go together?" inquired Grant. "I can see their footprints. If they had gone together they would have walked side by side or one would have been directly behind the other. That is not the way it is." "But how do you know that the scarred man went first?" "Because I find a place where Zeke crossed over from one side of the way to the other. He stepped in the footprint of the other man in one place. Zeke's foot is bigger so I'm sure it was his print. He could not step on the other's footprint unless he was behind him." "But what makes you think that they both went before the man that Fred saw?" "Because that man did not have a pack. The pack is gone." "But I don't see how that proves they went before. They may have left after the other man." The Navajo shook his head, however, and said, "They go first." "What are we to do now?" demanded George as he joined his companions. "The first thing we want is some breakfast and then we'll decide what next to do," said Grant, who in spite of Fred's greater readiness to talk, now naturally assumed the place of the leader of the three Go Ahead Boys. At that moment, however, the Navajo again turned to the young campers and said, "I'll go to find out where Zeke and the two men went. If I go you three boys must stay here until I come back." "But suppose you don't come back?" suggested Fred. "I shall come," said the Navajo confidently. "But suppose you don't?" said Fred again. "If I do not come by to-morrow morning," explained Thomas Jefferson, "then you will know that something has happened to me and you will go back if you can find your way." "Not much!" declared Fred. "If you don't come we shall try to find out what has happened to you." "No. No," said Thomas Jefferson abruptly. "But I shall come back." "You're not going until after breakfast," suggested Grant quickly as the Indian apparently was about to depart. "I will get breakfast when I come back," said Thomas Jefferson laconically. Without any further conversation he at once departed, closely following the footprints of the three whom he believed had gone before him. "Well, what's to be done now?" inquired George after the three Go Ahead Boys had remained silent while they watched the departing Navajo as long as he remained within sight. "We'll get breakfast," replied Grant. For a time conversation ceased while the boys were busily engaged in the preparation of their morning meal. In spite of the mystery surrounding them and the anxiety that more or less every one felt, they were all hungry. As a consequence the simple breakfast speedily was prepared and it was not until it had been eaten that the boys once more turned to the problem which now confronted them. "I'm telling you," said Grant positively, "that Thomas Jefferson is all right. The only thing for us to do is to stay right here where we are until he comes back or John and Pete are brought here by Kitoni." "I'm afraid something has happened to String," said Fred slowly. "So you have said before," remarked Grant dryly. "Now the thing for you and for us all to do is just to hang on to ourselves and wait. We mustn't let this get on our nerves. If we do no one knows what we shall be up against." Grant's companions did their utmost to carry out his suggestion, but there was little activity in which they could indulge and the time dragged heavily on their hands. "How far do you think we've come into Thorn's Gulch?" asked Fred when several hours had elapsed. "Six or eight miles," replied Grant promptly. "Then we ought to be able to find our way out all right," said Fred. "Of course we can," said Grant quietly, "though after we find our way out we haven't gotten to the end of our troubles." For a time the suggestion made all three boys silent and serious. They were more than two thousand miles from home. One of their companions had not been seen for many hours and in spite of what he was willing to acknowledge every one of the Go Ahead Boys was now anxious concerning the safety of the missing John. Not even a guide was left them and the continued failure of Zeke to return increased their fears. Fred, the most easily discouraged of the Go Ahead Boys had been the most eager of all to enter upon the expedition. It was plain to his comrades now that his spirits were sinking and both were fearful of what the effect would be if Fred entirely lost hope. "I tell you what we'll do," suggested Grant at last. "We'll try to make a copy of the map that Simon Moultrie had of the place where he had staked his claim." "We can't make any copy," said Fred disconsolately, "we haven't anything to copy." "Then we'll make it from memory," said Grant quietly. "Let me see," he continued, as he took a note book from his pocket and at once began to draw on a blank page. "Here's Thorn's Gulch," he added as he drew lines to indicate the great canyon. "We have come about six miles so we'll put our camp about here," he explained as he marked the location. "Now as I remember, Simon Moultrie had marked Two Crow Tree on this side of the Gulch and about so far from the place where the Gulch runs into the Grand Canyon. Then about so much further on the same side of the Gulch was Tom's Thumb. About half way between Two Crow Tree and Tom's Thumb on the other side of the Gulch was Split Rock. Then a little to the right in back here was the place he marked as the stake. Now, let me see, what were the figures and the letters he had there?" "The first one," said Fred interested now in what Grant was saying, "was '1/2 m. n.e.'" "That's right," said Grant, "and right below it was '1/4 m. s.e.'" "And the last one at the bottom," joined in George, "was '1/4 m. n.n.e.'" "There," Grant said with satisfaction as he held his drawing up for inspection. "I think we have reproduced Simon Moultrie's map closely enough to tell us about where we are and where we've got to go." "Are we still going on?" inquired Fred. "Of course we are going on," declared Grant. "We'll start just as soon as the others join us. Look yonder!" he said, abruptly leaping to his feet as he spoke and pointing to a distant spot on the side of the Gulch. "There's something moving over there." CHAPTER XIX A JOYOUS RETURN Keenly excited, the three boys instantly arose and advanced nearer the rim of the Gulch. Around the bend of the next great buttress or projection they saw two forms moving slowly which they instantly recognized as men. "That's Zeke and Thomas Jefferson!" exclaimed Grant in a low voice. "What has become of the other two men?" inquired George. "You'll have to ask them,--or Zeke and T.J.; perhaps they will be able to tell you something after they get back here." Grant's surmise proved to be correct. Within a half-hour both Zeke and the Indian returned to the camp. Neither was willing to describe the details of very much of his effort to overtake the two white men who had gone from the camp. It was manifest, however, that both white men had disappeared and that along with them had gone one of the packs, now doubly valuable in the eyes of the boys. "Didn't you see the men anywhere, Zeke?" inquired Fred. "Not a sign." "Did you find out where they went?" "Not exactly." "What do you mean by that?" "Why not seein' 'em, I'm not sure where they are nor where they went." "But you think they went--" "I'm not doin' very much 'thinkin'' just now," replied Zeke as he at once began his preparations for the evening meal. Fred however, was not to be turned aside so easily. Approaching the place where Zeke was working he said, "Do you think those men have tried to go to the place where Simon Moultrie staked his claim?" "I don't know nothin' 'bout it," replied Zeke, without looking up from his task. "My only 'pinion is that if there's any such claim and we don't get there pretty soon there won't be much for us to look for." "Why do you suppose John and Pete don't come back?" "Because they have not returned." "Don't you think that Kitoni found them?" "I don't know much about it. I'm thinkin', however, that if they are to be found, the Navajo will be as likely to find 'em as anybody." "I wish I never had started on this trip!" exclaimed Fred manifestly downcast at the outlook. "It doesn't make any difference what you 'wish'," said Zeke gruffly. "You have started and you're here. I don't know of any way of gettin' out of Thorn's Gulch outside of flyin' or walkin'." "I guess you're right," replied Fred dolefully. "Hello, what's that?" he added abruptly. From far away had come a faint shout. Fred was positive that he had heard a call, but Zeke, ignoring the words of the Go Ahead boy, abruptly arose and ran to a place far to the left of the camp. His startling action when it was seen by the Go Ahead boys at once caused every one to follow his example. Again the faint call was heard and this time it was answered abruptly by Thomas Jefferson, whose voice carried far and was almost as sharp as the report of a pistol. "Who is it? Who is it?" demanded Fred. The Indian made no reply, but as the distant call was heard again he repeated his call, which this time was distinctly answered. As yet no one was able to see the place from which the cry had come. "Do you think anyone is in trouble?" inquired Grant anxiously of the guide. "No," replied Zeke. "Do you think any one is in trouble?" inquired "That's more than I can tell." "Why don't you call Pete?" "No use. Thomas Jefferson has answered the call and there isn't anything more to be done except to wait until they get here, then we'll see whether any one is missin' or not." "Come on, fellows, let's go down and see!" shouted Fred to his companions, who at once prepared to obey the suggestion. "Here, stop that!" ordered Zeke sternly. "You're not goin' to do anything of the kind. We've got one boy lost now and that's enough. My dad used to tell me that one boy was a boy and two boys was half a boy. I don't know just how much four would be," he added quizzically, as he glanced at his young companions. "We've got troubles enough now. Just hold your horses and wait, and we'll soon find out what we all of us want to know." Striving to possess their souls in patience the Go Ahead Boys waited while the minutes slowly dragged on. Again and again Fred impatiently shouted, but for some reason there was no further answering cry. It might be that the little party had passed under some projecting shelf of rock which cut off all sounds from above. Just as the sun set, however, to the great delight of the boys they discovered three men slowly climbing the side of the gulch almost directly below them. Instantly the Go Ahead Boys cheered and shouted, although no replies were made to their hails. From what they were able to see they concluded that not one of the three missing members of the party was disabled. They were all toiling slowly up the sloping side, and it was soon manifest that every one was able to make the effort for himself. Twenty minutes later John, Pete and Kitoni gained the place where their friends were awaiting their coming. "You never had any one so glad to see you in all your life," shouted Fred as he ran to John and tried to throw his arm around his neck. As Fred was the "pigmy" of the party his efforts were ridiculous, but they nevertheless served to remove a part of the tension under which all were laboring. "Are you all right, Jack?" demanded Grant. "I am now," replied the tall Go Ahead Boy somewhat ruefully. "What happened to you?" asked Fred. "I got lost too. We waited for you to come back and when you didn't come after a long time, I started out to look for you. Pete told me not to do it, but of course I knew better than he did and nothing would do but I must try it. It's lucky I'm here, let me tell you." "Did you find your way back to the place where Pete left you?" "I did not. He found me. Now then, what happened to you? We didn't know but that you might have fallen over some rim or been bitten by a rattlesnake or swallowed by a mountain lion. The first thing we knew was when Kitoni came along and told us." "Did you go back to the place where you were when I left you?" "What do you think we'd do? Of course we went back. We didn't know but by some kind of fool-luck you might have gone back there and if we weren't on hand we knew you wouldn't know the place and most likely would go on past it and then be lost on the other side. You see we were in a tight box." "I'm sorry," said Fred ruefully. "All I can say is that from this time on I'm going to stick so close to the crowd that nobody can lose me." "You'd better!" said John threateningly. "I thought I was done for, when I got lost too. I thought of Fremont and Kit Carson and the Forty-niners and all the old chaps that came out over the Santa Fe trail. I have heard my father tell what fights they had with the Indians and how their water and supplies ran low and all that, but if any of them had any harder time than I had then I'm sorry for him, that's all. There was just one thing that made me hang to it." "What was that?" inquired Grant. "Why it was what my father had told me. He said that the difference between men isn't very much,--I mean what makes one man succeed and another man fail. He says it's just that little difference though that counts. I remember he told me about one of his classmates in college who was the brightest fellow in the class. He started in all right on any line of work, but just before the job was all ready to be clinched he usually gave up. My father says that is the way it is with men. They may be all right up to the last point, but that last point is the one that counts. That's the 'final punch' that counts most." "Well, I'm glad you got out of it all right anyway," said Fred cordially. "Did you see any bears or mountain lions or snakes." "Not one, but I saw some lizards which scared me almost as much as if they had been rattlers. They were ten or twelve inches long. They had a funny way of running and every few steps would turn around and look at me." "I'm not surprised," said Grant soberly, breaking in upon the conversation. "I understand precisely the feeling of those lizards. There's only one of your kind in all the world." "You're right for once in your life," retorted John. "Now tell me," he added, "what your plans are. What is the next thing to be done?" "Now that little Johnnie has arrived," laughed Grant, "I think the best thing we can do, if Zeke and Pete agree, is to stay here to-night and start on early to-morrow morning." "Start where?" demanded John. "Why for Simon Moultrie's claim." "I had almost forgotten about that," laughed John, "but I guess that's as good a trip as we can make." By this time Zeke had supper prepared and the boys responded to his announcement with a zeal that caused the guide to say, "You boys must not forget that one of our packs is gone. We may have to go short on our rations." The statement at once led to the story of the coming of the two white men and their strange departure. Grant explained how Zeke and Thomas Jefferson had each made a search, but the two men had disappeared. It was suspected, however, that they had gone farther into Thorn's Gulch and were determined to make their own search for the lost claim of Simon Moultrie. "If they get there first," said Zeke dryly, "we may have our troubles staking any claim when we come." "Well, we shan't get there unless we start," declared Fred, whose mood now had changed completely. "I'm for starting as early as we can get John up to-morrow morning." "Never you mind your Uncle John!" declared that worthy individual. "I shall be ready before you are." Whether or not it was the rivalry of the boys that caused them to rise early the following morning is not known, but the sun had not yet appeared above the eastern horizon when after a breakfast, prepared by Zeke and Pete, the Go Ahead Boys, together with the guides and the two Navajos, who now by common consent had become members of the party, once more began their search for the claim which Simon Moultrie had staked. CHAPTER XX TWO CROW TREE The party was compelled to move somewhat slowly as Fred and George had not yet entirely recovered from their recent experiences. Their spirits, however, were high, and in the bracing air of the early morning the troubles of the preceding night were forgotten. Zeke and Thomas Jefferson led the way while Pete and the other Navajo formed a rear guard. The packs had been rearranged so that now the burdens were lighter for every one. Indeed, the loss of the pack which their white visitor had taken had made the guides somewhat anxious concerning the outlook for supplies. A journey of one hundred miles at least would be required to obtain fresh provisions and at least a week would be necessary if one of the guides should be sent to obtain them. There might be difficulty too in bringing in the supplies even if they should be obtained. In a measure the boys reflected the feeling of their leaders, but their confidence in the speedy outcome of their quest was keen and as a consequence other things were ignored or forgotten. As the morning waned the conversation lagged somewhat and the hour was near when they planned to stop for their noonday meal and rest. They were now walking along the rim of the great Gulch. Their pathway had led upward and indeed there were places immediately below them where it was more than doubtful if they would be able to proceed. At a sudden sharp call from Zeke the remaining members of the party hastened forward to the place where the guide was standing. "Look ahead of you," said Zeke. "Do you see anything?" "I see rocks and the rim of the Gulch, plenty of sand and lots of sky," replied Fred glibly. "Look along the rim," suggested Zeke, ignoring the flippant manner of the Go Ahead Boy. "What do you see about a mile ahead of us?" "I don't see anything different from what I said," laughed Fred. The other boys, however, were silent for a time while they peered intently in the direction indicated by the guide. Suddenly Grant said in a low voice, "Zeke, do you mean that tree yonder?" "That might be it," replied the guide. As he spoke two large, black birds suddenly arose from a branch of the distant tree and flying lazily disappeared beneath the rim of the Gulch. "That's it!" exclaimed John eagerly. "That's it! That's the tree Simon Moultrie marked out in his diary. Zeke," he added excitedly, "isn't that the Two Crow Tree?" "It may be," replied Zeke. "Then let's go ahead and not stop until we get there. It isn't more than a mile or two away, is it?" "About that," replied Zeke. The suggestion of the Go Ahead boy was at once adopted. The entire party increased their speed and rapidly moved forward. Twenty minutes had elapsed when they stood beneath the tree which had been discovered by Zeke. "What kind of a tree is it?" inquired Fred. "It's a Two Crow Tree," retorted George glibly. "I wish I was dead sure of that," spoke up Zeke. "Don't you think it is?" demanded Grant. "Yes, I think it is, but of course I can't be sure." "What shall we do now?" demanded Fred. "Cook our dinner here and decide what we'll do next." As soon as the simple meal had been prepared the young prospectors were summoned to the repast. Their interest was so keen, however, in the tree under whose branches they were seated that all the Go Ahead Boys were ready to declare that the first landmark indicated by Simon Moultrie had been found. "The only thing for us to do," said Zeke after he had listened to all that the boys had to say, "is for Thomas Jefferson and myself to leave you here while we go ahead to see if we can find anything that looks like Tom's Thumb. If we find it then we may be pretty sure that we're on the right track." "How will you know?" inquired John. "Have to use our common sense," said the guide sharply. "Did you ever see Tom's Thumb?" "If I did I didn't know it by that name," said Zeke. "What do you boys think we had better look for?" "I say a rock shaped like a man's thumb," said Fred. "I don't," spoke up John. "What I would look for would be a place in the mountains ahead." "I suggest a formation in the rim of the Gulch," said George. "What do you say?" demanded Zeke as he turned to Grant. For some reason the guide manifested greater confidence in the judgment of Grant than in the opinions of the other boys. "It seems to me," said Grant slowly, "that I should be on the lookout for all of them. I'm inclined to think, however, that if you find it, it's likely to be something in the shape of the ground that makes one think of a man's thumb." "Don't none of you boys stir from this tree," ordered Zeke abruptly. "Jeff and I will go ahead and--" "For a time you'll be the Go Ahead Boys," laughed Fred. "I don't care much 'bout what you call us, but if we can get there you'll hear from us before a great while." The interest of the Go Ahead Boys was still keen after the departure of the guide and the Indian. Silently they watched the two men as they steadily proceeded on their way until at last they were lost to sight by an elevation around which they were making their way. "Soc," asked John, "why do you suppose there were two crows in that tree?" "Because they had stopped for rest or observation," laughed Grant. "That isn't what I mean," retorted John. "You know when crows alight they usually station one of their number as a guard on a tree or fence or some place of elevation, that is supposed to give warning. Now, I don't think I ever saw two on observation, did you?" "I don't know that I ever did," said Grant. "Now that you speak of it, I'm not sure they were crows anyway." "They were crows all right," declared Fred confidently. "My, Pee Wee!" said John in mock admiration. "If I only knew just half as much as you think you know I would be a wise man." "That's all right, String," retorted Fred glibly. "Don't you remember what I told you about that great Englishman who said that Nature never made any man seven stories high without leaving the top loft empty?" "I believe I have heard you refer to that fact some three thousand, eight hundred and sixty-one times. In fact I have almost learned it by heart. I haven't any doubt the man who said it was a little runt not much bigger than you are." Fred's face flushed as the Go Ahead Boys laughed and conversation ceased for a time. The boys had given their word not to leave the region of the big tree. There was therefore nothing to be done except to endure the waiting until Zeke and the Navajo returned. Occasionally the conversation turned on the subject of the claim which Simon Moultrie plainly had believed he had discovered. Fred, who was the most enthusiastic of the Go Ahead Boys, was positive the lost claim would be found and that the future wealth of the four boys was therefore certain. The others may have been as eager as Fred to find the place for which they were seeking, but they were more restrained in their manner and inclined to tease their enthusiastic comrade. "Zeke told me," suggested Grant soberly, "that really this Simon Moultrie was crazy." "Is that so?" retorted Fred. "Then I suppose you're ready to say next that everything he saw was crazy too." "Not quite as bad as that," laughed Grant, "but I do say that it's possible, if Simon Moultrie really was insane, he may have imagined he saw things or found them when he didn't see them at all." Even Fred was somewhat sobered by the declaration of his companion and once more the party lapsed into silence. It was now past mid-afternoon and the Go Ahead Boys were becoming impatient over the failure of the guide and the Indian to return. "If they haven't found any thing," said Fred irritably, "then they ought to come back and tell us so. We don't want to stay here forever." "Nay, verily, we do not," said George, shaking his head soberly. "I agree with Pyg. If Zeke doesn't come back within an hour I say we start after him." "You want your turn in being lost in the canyon, do you?" said John grimly. "Well, all I can say is that if you do, you can try it, but as for little Johnnie he stays right here where he is. I've had all I want of lost Go Ahead Boys in Thorn's Gulch or any other canyon." Although they did not share in John's fear nevertheless the boys all remained in their camp. It was about four o'clock when Kitoni called their attention to two tiny figures in the distance. The glasses revealed that they were men and that they apparently were coming across the Gulch. How they would be able to make their way up the steep side no one could explain. "That must be Zeke and Thomas Jefferson," suggested Fred at once ready to form and express an opinion. The Navajo, however, shook his head as he said, "It is not Zeke and it is not Thomas Jefferson." "Then who is it?" demanded Fred. "It seems to me we're all the while having two or three men come into our camp when we've been told that there wasn't a human being in these parts. They told us in Tombstone that we wouldn't see a strange face in this part of the world." "I see one now," declared John, turning and staring at his diminutive friend. The Go Ahead Boys laughed but their interest was too keen in the men who now in the distance could be seen more distinctly. "You don't suppose those two strange white men can be coming back here, do you?" inquired Grant in a whisper. "Yes, that is just who they are," replied Kitoni. "Look yonder!" he added as he pointed in the direction in which Zeke and the Navajo had departed. Two other men also were seen coming from that direction and no effort was required to induce the Go Ahead Boys to believe that Zeke and his companion were returning to the camp. CHAPTER XXI THE RETURN OF THE STRANGERS The excitement among the Go Ahead Boys at once became intense. Convinced now that the two men, whose presence whenever they had visited the camp had created trouble, were now returning and the fact that the belligerent Zeke and the Navajo were also likely to arrive at about the same time, convinced the boys that some exciting scenes were to be witnessed. As yet it was manifest that neither party of approaching men had become aware of the coming of the others. "There they go!" exclaimed George excitedly when Zeke and his companion disappeared from sight. "Maybe they won't be back here until after the other fellows have left." "Don't you worry," spoke up Fred. "The other fellows aren't going to leave and that's the worst of it. What shall we do?" "We shan't do anything until we have to," said Grant. "It will be money in our pockets to keep silent in seven languages." "There they are now!" exclaimed Fred in a low voice as the two white men approached the camping place. "We're hungry," explained the man with the scar. "Give us something to eat." "You haven't eaten all there was in that pack already, have you?" demanded Fred. "What are you talking about? What pack do you mean? We haven't got any pack," replied the visitor. "You haven't now. What did you do with it?" "You'll have to explain what you mean. You 're talking in riddles, as the poet says," sneered the stranger. "All we want is something to eat and I'm thinking you'll cook it for us pretty quick." "I understand it's the law of the desert," spoke up Grant, "that any one who comes into your camp has to be fed." "Sure it is," said the man glibly. "But there isn't anything in that law," continued Grant, "which says what kind of stuff we've got to feed you. My advice to you is to keep right on your way and not stop here." "That's just what we're not going to do," laughed the other man loudly. "We're hungry and you're going to feed us." "Is that so?" retorted Fred. "Perhaps you'll tell us when we're going to get the meal." "You 're going to get it now and there isn't going to be any fooling about it either." "Do you want your ice cream before your dinner or after?" inquired Fred mockingly. "How about your coffee?" he added. "Will you have a demitasse or a bowl?" For a moment the man stared blankly at Fred and then apparently convinced that his demand was not to be complied with he advanced savagely upon the Go Ahead Boy as he said, "We don't want no more fooling. You get us something to eat." At that moment Grant nodded positively to Fred, an action which was not seen by their visitors. Puzzled by the direction of Grant, Fred hesitated a moment and then without a further word began hasty preparations for a meal. A fire was kindled, although all the wood in the camp was required for the purpose and in a brief time he poured into the boiling water the remaining contents of a broken box of cereal. It was plain that the visitors both were as hungry as they declared themselves to be. They were watching the actions of the boys so keenly that they were neither of them aware of the approach of Zeke or Thomas Jefferson. Grant, however, already had discovered the approach of the guide and the Navajo, who now were not more than forty yards distant from the place where the boys were standing. "I wonder if these men are hungry too," said Grant dryly. As he spoke he turned toward the approaching guide, an action which was immediately followed by all the camp. For a moment the two unwelcome visitors appeared to be about to flee from the place. They turned toward the Gulch, but soon their courage apparently returned and they came back to the place near the fire. By this time Zeke and Thomas Jefferson had arrived at the camp and in his most surly manner the guide turned to the two uninvited guests and said, "What are you two fellows doing here?" "We stopped to get something to eat," explained the man with the scar, who, as usual, was the spokesman. "Well, you aren't going to get it here," said Zeke sharply. "The thing for you to do is to vamoose. Get out of here and get out right away! None of that," added Zeke in a low voice as he saw one of the men reach toward his hip pocket. "There's going to be no shootin' done here exceptin' I am th' one to do it." Zeke, who was a powerful man, now grasped the hands of the man with the scar and in spite of his efforts twisted his wrists until he compelled him to drop the weapon which he had drawn from his pocket. "Leave it there," said Zeke quietly. "It won't do any harm. Now you two get and don't you wait for me to say it again!" There was something in Zeke's manner that convinced the two men that it might be dangerous for them to delay. Glancing hastily at each other they at once turned from the camp. When they had gone fifty feet, the smaller man stopped and turned about so that he once more faced the camp, as he shouted, "You think the game is in your hands, don't you? Well, you'll have another think. All I can say to you is that you've got a big surprise coming." As no one responded to his threat the stranger quickly turned about and soon overtook his companion. Silently the Go Ahead Boys watched the departing men until they had disappeared below the rim of the great Gulch. Then Fred said, "Zeke, what do you suppose that fellow meant?" "There's no tellin'," replied Zeke in his most non-committal manner. "But what do you think?" "I'm not thinkin' very much. I'm watchin' this stuff to see that it doesn't burn." "That's all right, Zeke," said Fred impatiently. "But what I want to know is whether or not you think those two men are going to be waiting for us when we find the claim which Simon Moultrie staked." "I'll have to tell you later about that." "Look there! They are coming back!" abruptly exclaimed Fred. The Go Ahead Boy's words were true for the two men were seen clambering upon the rim and once more approaching the camp. "Will you give me my pistol?" demanded the man with the scar. "There's no knowing what we may run up against and I don't like to go down into the Gulch without anything to protect me." "No, sir, I won't," said Zeke. "That pistol is as dangerous in your hands as it would be in the hands of an Apache. There's just one thing we'll do for you." "What's that?" "I'll take back what I said and we'll give you something to eat if you'll agree to leave and never come back." "In course we'll do it," laughed the man. "I didn't believe that you'd turn us away without giving us even a spoonful of that stuff you're cooking." Other articles of food had been prepared by Zeke, who was desirous of economizing in the fire. Wood was scarce and so difficult to obtain that the guide was unwilling to waste a fire just for the sake of their uninvited guests. As soon as he was convinced that the men were busy in their repast Zeke solemnly winked at Grant and in a manner which was seen by all who were in the camp motioned for him to follow. Grant at once obeyed the suggestion and as soon as they had withdrawn to one side Zeke in a low voice said, "Did those two fellows come across the Gulch?" "Yes," replied Grant. "Then it looks likely to me that they have been looking for that claim." "What makes you think so?" "They have been gone 'bout long enough to cover the distance." "Do you think they have found it?" "I can't say." "But do you think they have?" "It looks a bit like it, judging from the fact that they have come back here so soon. Now I want you to see which way they go when they leave." "Are you sure they're going to leave?" "Perfectly sure," remarked Zeke as a slight grin appeared for a moment upon his face, "and they're goin' to be in a hurry when they go, too. Have you got plenty of soap in the camp?" "Yes, I think so." "Well, then I want you to take some of it and go down there at the head of the path they follow when they leave us and grease those rocks. Don't cover them all, but put enough on them so that the rocks will be slippery." "But you don't want to hurt them, do you?" protested Grant. "Don't you worry none about hurtin'. All I'm goin' to do is to 'accelerate their departure,' as the poet says." "What poet says that?" inquired Grant laughingly. "I don't just remember his name," said the guide demurely. "He said it though and that's enough." "I'll do what you say," said Grant, as they both turned back to rejoin their companions. Beckoning to Fred, after he had secured a bar of soap and taking with him a small pan of water, Grant led the way to the spot which the guide had indicated. There, unseen by the others they thoroughly carried out the directions which Zeke had given them and in a brief time turned back to the camp. "I guess we'll be goin' on, as we agreed," said the man with the scar when their simple repast had been eaten. No one interposed any objections, and the two men, after Zeke had once more refused to restore the pistol which he had taken from them, arose and started toward the path which before they had followed when they had returned to the camp. CHAPTER XXII SPLIT ROCK "Well, boys," said Zeke when the men had departed, "my advice to you is to watch out for those two fellows. I told 'em they would go in a hurry when they left camp. You watch 'em! There they are now!" As he spoke the feet of each of their recent visitors suddenly flew out from under him and both men slid rapidly forward on their backs. "Haw! Haw!" roared Zeke, who was seldom heard to laugh. "That's a good 'un! Come back here," he shouted, "and I'll pick you up!" The Go Ahead Boys, however, did not wait for the men to rise. Running swiftly to the place where they had disappeared from sight they peered down the sloping side of the Gulch and saw both men still moving rapidly in their descent. Apparently neither was in any special difficulty, although both were moving swiftly in their descent. They had gone down the shelving and soft side of the Gulch a hundred feet or more before either of them regained his footing. The man with the scar, who was in advance of his companion, first attempted to rise, but his effort was intercepted by his larger companion who slid against him with full force, again sending both men rolling down the cliff side. Inasmuch as there was no special danger connected with their descent, for the ground was soft, the amusement of the Go Ahead Boys became keen. They laughed and shouted their words of approval, and Zeke's words were the loudest of all. The two men, when at last they succeeded in regaining an upright position, turned and savagely shook their fists at the laughing party on the rim of the Gulch and then resuming their descent, continued on their way until both disappeared from sight. "I'm thinkin'," said Zeke as the party returned to the camp, "that those fellows won't come back here again, at least in the daytime." "If they come at night," suggested Fred, "it won't do us any good, I'm afraid." "No more it won't," acknowledged the guide, "but if my plans work out, when they come back here we shall be gone." "Did you find Tom's Thumb?" asked Grant "We did," answered the guide quietly. "You did?" exclaimed Grant. "If you had never seen it before how did you know it was the place for which you were looking?" "You couldn't miss it," explained Zeke. "There's a stretch of rock there almost as big as a house that is shaped exac'ly like a man's fist, only the thumb stands straight up." "Did it really look like a thumb?" inquired Fred excitedly. "It did. We both saw it about the same time and there wasn't any mistaking it either." "That's all right then," said Grant. "If we've found Two Crow Tree and Tom's Thumb then it ought not to be very hard for us to find Split Rock. We know just about where it is placed, according to the map that Simon Moultrie drew." "It's on the other side of the Gulch though," suggested George. "You don't mean it?" exclaimed Fred laughingly. "What a wise chap you are." As Fred spoke Grant drew from his pocket the paper on which he had retraced the outlines of the map drawn by Simon Moultrie. "In course we're not sure," said Zeke, "but we can get an idea about where to look." "When shall we start?" asked Grant. "First thing in the morning" replied the guide. "We wouldn't take any chances starting by night, though now that I've got that chap's revolver I'm thinkin' we wouldn't have anything very much to fear from him." "But the other man may have a pistol," suggested George. "That's right," acknowledged Zeke. "All the more reason for waitin' until mornin' afore we start." "Well, there's one thing," laughed Grant, "and that is that we shan't try to go down the Gulch the same way those two men started." "They did sit down hard, didn't they?" chuckled Zeke. Again the Go Ahead Boys laughed at the recollection of the ludicrous sight presented by the two white men when they had unexpectedly started swiftly on their descent of the Gulch. When the following morning dawned, the guides and the two Navajos were the first to be stirring in the camp. Before breakfast had been prepared, however, the Go Ahead Boys were awake and preparing for their expedition. The packs were to be restrapped and all their various belongings secured. This task was completed by the time breakfast was ready and when the boys seated themselves on the ground they were thoroughly ready to receive the food which Zeke and Pete now served them. "Zeke," inquired Grant, "do you really think those two men found the claim which Simon Moultrie staked?" "I don't really think so," answered the guide slowly, "but I shouldn't be surprised if they did." "If they have got it," said Grant, "what can we do?" "Nothin'." "Do you mean to say that we can't claim it?" "That's just what I mean. You can take up some other claims right close by if you want to, but first come first served." "But that isn't their claim. It belonged to Simon Moultrie." "Well, if it did," said Zeke dryly, "then I reckon they have as much right to it as we have." "I hadn't thought of that," said Grant blankly. "However, I haven't much idea that old Sime ever filed his claim. If he didn't, why we stand as good a chance as any one. I do say," he added, "that the sooner we get started and the faster we go the less trouble we're likely to have." "Then why don't we start right away?" demanded Fred as he leaped to his feet. In a brief time the party with their packs on their backs started toward the Gulch. As has been said, the sides of the canyon at this place were not unduly steep, and, though the descent in places was difficult, none of the Go Ahead Boys had met with any mishap when at last they all safely arrived in the valley below. There they halted for a rest and before they resumed their journey Zeke said, "It's so warm here in the middle of the day that I feel as if I was suffocated. I guess we'd better stay here where we be 'till we've cooked our dinner." The descent had required so much effort on the part of every one of the Go Ahead Boys that they were all willing to accede to the guide's suggestion. "Zeke, how far do you think we'll have to go before we begin our search?" inquired Fred. "We'll have to go until we come to the claim," replied the guide dryly. "But when shall we begin to look?" "Keep lookin' all the while. I'm thinkin', though," Zeke added, "that we shan't have to go more than three or four miles from the rim." "You don't suppose he has staked his claim right on the top of the ground, do you?" inquired George. "What put that notion into your head?" laughed the guide. "Why it looks so on Simon's map." "That's all right," acknowledged Zeke. "That map doesn't show many gulches, does it? But I'm not lookin' for a claim right on the flat part of the rim." "You'll tell us when to begin to look for the stakes, won't you?" asked Fred who was deeply interested in the project which now was distinctly before him. "Don't you worry none about that," replied Zeke. "When you boys are ready to start you say the word and we'll leave." "I guess we're all ready to go now," suggested Grant. "Off we go then," said Zeke, as he promptly arose and swung his pack to his back. The party by this time was moving in single file, Zeke still leading the way and Pete following as the rear guard. The two young Navajos had not remained in the line for any continued length of time. They were moving back and forth, the expression of their shining eyes betraying their keen interest. Indeed, the possibility of discovering a mine had so aroused every member of the party that even the guide who was leading could not entirely conceal his excitement by his manner. For nearly three hours the little expedition continued on its way. Climbing proved to be more difficult than the descent had been, but at last the party was near the rim. There they halted once more while Zeke directed the Navajoes to move along the side of the gulch beneath the rim while the others continued on their way across the plateau. "Yonder is Split Rock, I'm thinkin'," abruptly said Zeke as he stopped and pointed to a huge rock unlike any others which the boys had seen in the region. The stone had been cut almost as if by some huge knife. Several inches of the space between the halves had been filled in by the dust which the winds had deposited. In the midst of the soil thus obtained a tree was growing which now had shot up at least twenty feet above the top of the great rock. "What do you suppose that is?" inquired George lightly. "Is the tree trying to keep those rocks apart or are the rocks trying to keep the tree in between them?" No one replied to the query of the Go Ahead Boy, for all were keenly aroused, now that they had found the third object which Simon Moultrie had indicated on his map. So eager were all the members of the party that in spite of their recent exertions and the loads they were carrying they all began to run. In a brief time they arrived at the destination they were seeking and as they swung their packs from their shoulders Grant hastily drew again from his pocket the map which he had made in his attempt to recall the one which Simon Moultrie had drawn in the diary that the Go Ahead Boys had found. CHAPTER XXIII ON THE RIM The little assembly crowded closely about Grant and looked with eager interest at the drawings he had made. "What does it mean?" inquired Fred, "when it says you have to go a half-mile northeast?" "I'm not sure that it says that," replied Grant. "There's simply a mark here, 1/2 m. N.E." "Well, any lubber knows that that means a half-mile northeast." "Not being a 'lubber,'" retorted Grant, "of course I'm not sure. I'm not very much impressed by a 'lubber's' knowledge anyway." The Go Ahead Boys laughed at the retort, but their interest in their immediate problem was too keen to permit other matters to enter their thoughts. "Now how do we know that those letters don't refer to the stake itself?" asked George. "A brilliant remark," said Grant scornfully. "All you have to do is to locate the claim that Simon Moultrie staked and then prove that it is a half-mile northeast, a quarter-mile southeast, and a quarter of a mile north northeast from some place that you don't care anything about." "That's not it," said Zeke, shaking his head as he spoke. "It's the claim itself. My opinion is that you go a half-mile northeast from Split Rock. Then turn and go one-quarter of a mile southeast and then a quarter of a mile north northeast." Both the Navajos were present, standing on the border of the assembly and their shining eyes betrayed their keen interest in the discussion. "If I recollect aright," said John, "in that diary of Simon Moultrie's he wrote that he was in the middle of Thorn's Gulch when he struck the vein just right." "That's so," spoke up Grant quickly, "I do remember that." "Yea!" continued John, elated by the response which had greeted his words, "and that isn't all. He says he followed it up and found the place he was looking for. Didn't he say too that he had already had an assay made and that it was great?" "Wonderful, String!" said Fred. "You have proved yourself to be a great man. That's exactly what was in the diary as I recall it. The only thing then for us to do is to follow along the middle of Thorn's Gulch until we strike the vein." "Huh!" retorted Zeke, "you had better make arrangements to have breakfast with the man in the moon than try any such plan as that." "What shall we do then?" demanded John. "We've got to decide first of all," explained Zeke, "about this claim that old Sime staked." "That's what we're trying to do," interrupted Fred glibly. "Be patient with the child, Zeke," said Grant dryly. "He rides on a half-fare ticket yet." "Quit your fooling," spoke up John. "We want to find out about this." "Well," said Zeke, "I've got a compass here, of course, but I haven't any chain. How are we going to tell when we have covered the distance!" "The only way," responded Grant, "will be for us to pace the distance until we come to what we think is about the spot which Simon found." "That will take a month of Sundays," spoke up George. "It will take some time," acknowledged Grant, "but I don't know any other way. Do you, Zeke?" he inquired, turning to the guide. "Where are you going to start with your measurements?" demanded Zeke. "Why, at Split Rock, of course," said Grant promptly. "From the middle of the Rock, or the edge? From the near side or the far side? From the top of it or--" "I say," broke in Fred, "that we start from the edge of the Rock where it touches the sand. Then we can follow the compass and we know just how many paces there will be in a half-mile." "It will depend on who does the pacing, I guess," said John drolly. "My legs are longer than Fred's and I guess my steps wouldn't be more than half as many as his." "The best thing for us to do," said Grant confidently, "is to measure off as nearly as we can do it just what a yard is. Then John, who can cover any distance from two inches to two yards, can try to take steps just the required length." "We can try that," assented Zeke dubiously, "though I'm inclined to think the better plan will be for us to get a stick that will measure a yard as nearly as we can make it. Then we had better measure it off. We can follow the compass all the way and needn't go very far aside even if we don't come to the exact spot." "It's a long job," remarked Fred dolefully. "You see we've got to turn. We've got to make the half-mile, then stop and change our directions and go a quarter-mile southeast and then stop again and go a quarter of a mile north northeast. I wonder why old Sime didn't make it a straight line anyway." "We may find out," said Grant, "that he had to go this way. What shall we do, Zeke?" he added, turning to the guide. "Whichever you say," replied Zeke. "Then, I say we try first to let John pace a half-mile. We'll all go along with him and when he comes to the end of his eight hundred and eighty yards why all there is for us to do is to stop and change the direction according to the compass and start out again." "We haven't anything to measure with," said John dolefully. "We can strike it pretty close," said Zeke. "I'll tell you what we can do, boys," said Fred. "The first joint in my thumb is just three-quarters of an inch. We can measure it with that." Securing a piece of string Grant carefully measured according to the rule suggested by the diminutive Go Ahead Boy and soon he held up his string saying, as he did so, "If Fred is right that is exactly a yard." "Let me see it," said Zeke, taking the string. Making his own measurements he soon declared that Grant was almost correct in his statement. "We can't get within a half-inch of it anyway," he said. "A half-inch on a yard would mean four hundred and forty-four inches for a half-mile," said Grant. "Now four hundred and forty inches is thirty-six and three-quarter feet. If we get as far as that out of our way it will take us from now until Christmas to find old Simon Moultrie's lost mine." "It doesn't make any difference," said John, "that's the best we can do and that's all we've got to work on." The elongated Go Ahead Boy already had measured twenty yards of the ground and after every yard had been indicated he was walking over the distance trying to see how closely he could adjust his footsteps to the measurements which had been made. "We'll try it anyway," said Grant. "There's nothing else to be done, but it won't be safe to start until to-morrow morning, will it, Zeke?" "That's what it won't," said the guide quietly. "We'll stay here at Split Rock until sunrise to-morrow morning." In accordance with the directions of the guide preparations were at once made for passing the night at the place where they had halted. Thoroughly tired by their exertions the Go Ahead Boys were ready for bed soon after their supper had been prepared and eaten. Indeed, it was not long after dark before silence rested over the entire camp and apparently every member of the party was sleeping soundly. Some time later Fred suddenly sat erect and looked keenly all about him. He was unable to decide what had awakened him so abruptly for the silence which rested over the place was unbroken. Uneasy over his sudden awakening, Fred, after delaying a few minutes, silently arose and doing his utmost not to disturb his other comrades moved cautiously toward the rim of the Gulch. The stars in the sky above him were shining so brightly and appeared to be so near that to the boy it seemed almost possible that they might be plucked from their setting. Not a cloud was visible in the sky. The silence that rested over the entire region was so tense that Fred's nerves were tingling as he stopped for a moment to look about him and listen. What a marvelous experience it was. Alone with a few of his friends on the limitless plains, thoughts of the busy scenes in the great city in which he had his home were almost impossible under such conditions. The whole world seemed to be barren, while over all were the shining stars whose lights were visible thousands of miles away. Suddenly Fred's thoughts were diverted from the sublimity of the sight which had claimed his attention. At that moment he saw the form of some one peering just above the rim of the great Gulch. Startled by the sight Fred dropped upon the ground and excitedly waited for events to develop. The man before him turned for a moment and apparently was speaking to some one who was hidden from Fred's sight. The boy was confident that he overheard several words although he was not able to distinguish anything that was said. Fred saw the man whose approach he had discovered now turn again and silently approach the camp. Greatly surprised Fred speedily was aware that the approaching man was Thomas Jefferson. It was not possible to deny that he had left the camp and in all probability had been talking to some one in the Gulch. Who or what the man was, it was impossible for Fred to conjecture. Troubled and perplexed by the strange occurrence he started swiftly toward the camp. As he drew near, abruptly the Indian arose and advanced. "Is that you, Thomas Jefferson?" whispered Fred. "What you do?" replied the Indian. The Navajo spoke in low tones, but his excitement was revealed in the trembling of his voice. "Me? I haven't done anything. What have you been doing?" "What you see?" inquired the Indian. Ignoring the question, Fred said, "Who was talking to you?" "Where? What you see? What you hear?" demanded the Navajo now plainly aroused by the question of the Go Ahead Boy. "I have told you," replied Fred. "What were you doing out there with that fellow below the rim of the canyon?" Before Thomas Jefferson could reply a thought flashed into Fred's mind which nearly staggered him. Was it possible that the Navajo had been meeting the two white men who had made so much trouble? And if he had met them what had he told them? Was he revealing what every one in the camp now was expected to keep secret? And why were the two white men still following the party if they had already discovered the location of Simon Moultrie's claim? The questions were so troublesome that Fred decided that it was necessary for him to consult Zeke at once and tell him about the exciting experience through which he had just passed. CHAPTER XXIV A SMALL CLOUD Fred was relieved when he discovered that Thomas Jefferson was eager to go back to the camp and avoid all further questioning. The actions of the Navajo, however, increased Fred's feeling of anxiety. He watched the Indian until he was convinced that he was trying to avoid any further interview. Then the Go Ahead Boy moved silently around the camp to the place where the guide was sleeping. Fred's hand placed lightly upon the face of Zeke at once aroused the guide who quickly sat erect. Fred meanwhile had dropped on the ground by his side and as he did so he said, "Don't move, Zeke. Don't get up. I've got something I want to tell you." "What is it, lad?" whispered Zeke, at once complying with the suggestion. Thus bidden Fred related his discovery of Thomas Jefferson returning from the rim of the Gulch. He also gave his reasons for believing that the Navajo had been having an interview with some one on the sloping side of the Gulch. He expressed fully his suspicions that the unseen man was one of the two unwelcome white men who had visited the camp several times. In low voices Fred and the guide conversed for several minutes. When the conversation at last was ended and all of Zeke's questions had been answered the guide said to Fred, "Now see that you keep this to yourself. I'm hopin' that we shan't have any serious trouble, but I don't like the way it looks. Don't tell any of your pals about it." Fred promised to carry out the suggestion although he had expected to tell John at least of the discovery he had made. It was long before the excited boy was able to sleep, but when at last his eyelids closed they did not open until the party was already astir. When breakfast had been eaten Zeke approached the place where Fred was working on his pack and said in a low voice, "I want you to come with me." "Where?" inquired Fred. The guide did not reply to the query, but without any delay Fred arose and followed him as he led the way to a place below the rim. There to his surprise Fred saw Thomas Jefferson, evidently awaiting their coming. As soon as the guide and the Go Ahead boy arrived, Zeke said to the Indian, "Now then, Thomas Jefferson, I want you to tell us what you were doing last night. I don't want any nonsense about it either. You answer my questions straight or there'll be trouble for both of you Navajoes." Fred was certain there was a sharp gleam in the eyes of the Indian but he did not respond to the suggestion of the guide. Quietly seating himself he faced them both and evidently was waiting for Zeke to begin his cross examination. "Thomas Jefferson," said Zeke sternly, "weren't you sent east to be educated in the schools?" "Yes," replied the Indian simply. "And weren't all your expenses paid?" "Yes." "Didn't they treat you white?" "They thought they did." "Don't you _know_ they did? They paid all your traveling expenses. They paid for your board and your clothes. There wasn't anything that cost you a cent. What do you mean then by saying 'they thought they did'?" "It was hard for me when I come back to the Navajo people. They laugh at my clothes. They think what I have learned is no good and pretty soon I am ready to give up all I have learned so that the Navajo shan't laugh at me some more." "That isn't it, Thomas Jefferson," said Zeke tartly. "You're expected to come back to your tribe and show them how to live. That's the way a good many do. I never saw an Indian who had been educated and then came back to his tribe and give up because he was afraid some silly girl was going to laugh at him for his clothes or his new education, that, if he let go, he did not swing twice as far in the other direction. There's no Indian like a bad Indian. And no bad Indian is as bad as the one I'm telling you about." The Navajo did not respond though his manner betrayed that his anger was steadily rising. "Now, then, I want to know, Thomas Jefferson, what you were doing with those men down on the side of the Gulch last night," continued Zeke. "I did not see men." "Well, _man_, then. Have it your own way. Perhaps there was only one of them. Was it that fellow with the scar on his face?" "I did not say." "Well, that's what you must do. You've got to tell us who he was." "If I do not tell what will you do?" "Drive you out of camp the same as I would drive a rat out of his hole." The Indian laughed but made no other response. "Now, then, Thomas Jefferson," said Zeke, angered by the apparent indifference of the young Indian, "did you see that white man or didn't you?" "I did not see him." "Are you talking straight?" "I am." "It is 'good talk' you're giving me, is it?" "I did not see the man." "Well, then, who was there?" "I did not see any one." "But Fred here says you were talking to somebody." "Let him say." "All right, T.J.," said Zeke abruptly. "We'll stop here for a while. I'm not done with you yet. Now, what I want you to do is to take Kitoni with you and go along the side of the Gulch keeping your eyes open for any sign of a vein. If you find it you let me know right away." "What you do?" inquired the Navajo. "We shall keep up above the rim and try to find out what is there. Now mark you, T.J., don't try any of your tricks on us. If you do, the first thing you know you'll be thrown out and there'll be no cure for it." The guide now rejoined the other members of the party and plans were soon made for the day. It finally was decided that while the two Indians were making their way along the side of the Gulch, all the others should be divided into two parties. Each of these two parties was to spread out in such a manner that at least ten feet intervened between any two men. It was decided also that the Indians should precede the others by at least an hour. Meanwhile it was agreed that the center of the rock should be made the starting place for the new expedition. Slow progress was certain, but all were more eager now to avoid mistakes than they were to make haste. John, who declared he had now acquired an accurate stride which covered exactly a yard, led the way. Directly behind him was Zeke, while the boys were scattered on either side. Pete again formed the rear guard, although no danger now was feared unless the actions of Thomas Jefferson implied that they were being watched by others. Zeke had declared positively to Fred that he thought the Indian was not telling him the truth. "There's all the more reason," he explained, "why we must keep our eyes open. I'm sure that the Navajo is being paid for his work and I shouldn't be surprised if that man with the scar was the treasurer of the fund." Even Fred now ignored any peril that might arise from the supposed interview of Thomas Jefferson with other enemies, for the excitement of the last part of their investigations was strong upon him. Slowly the little band advanced over the broken surface. There were gullies so deep that at first it seemed impossible to gain the opposite side. Most of these, however, were narrow and consequently the difficulties of John in measuring the distance were not greatly increased. Grant had explained that if they did start from the wrong place they would steadily swing more and more away from the spot they were seeking. However, there was nothing to be done except to try and the eagerness of the boys clearly showed how willing they were to make the attempt. As the distance covered by John steadily increased, the boys became more silent though they were steadily watching for some object that might indicate the end of the first part of their search. No object, however, was seen and when at last John halted, declaring that he had covered exactly the distance required, he was standing on an elevation so slight that no one believed it was a landmark. "Now, from here," said Grant, "we turn and go southeast a quarter of a mile." "From where?" demanded Zeke. "From where String is standing." "Might as well start from there as anywhere," growled Zeke. "It's a kind of fool's journey anyway." The sun was now pouring its beams directly upon the heads of the young explorers and there was no relief to be had. Across the desert stretch not a place of refuge was within sight. "There's nothing else to be done," said Grant resolutely. "Jack will have to keep on and follow the compass just as closely as he did on the way here." The declaration of the Go Ahead Boy was so evidently true that without a protest from any one the entire party resumed its march. They were now at least a half-mile from the rim of the great Gulch. In changing the direction in which they were moving they still were following the line made by the huge chasm. They had gone only half the distance of the second stage of their journey, when they all halted abruptly as Zeke said in a low voice, pointing as he spoke toward the canyon, "Is that smoke off there?" For a moment all in the party were silent, but Pete and Grant were strong in their opinion that a thin line of smoke was visible just above the border of Thorn's Gulch. "Huh," muttered Zeke, "that's more or less what I expected." "What was it you were expecting?" demanded Fred. "Just what I see." "Yes, but what do you see?" "The same as you do," said the guide sharply. "I don't see anything but a little smoke. It may not be anything but a cloud," said Fred. "Well, you see the same thing that I do and you're as free as I am to explain what it means. I'm very free to say that I don't like it." "Here I am," exclaimed John, who had closely been following the compass. "Where is that?" laughed George. "Right here where I am is the end of that quarter-mile that we were to follow to the southeast." "Stay where you are then," said Grant quickly. "We've got to measure from that spot to find anything like the stake we're looking for. We're now going a quarter-mile north northeast from here." Again at the second halt John was standing on another small elevation, although it too was so slight that it would not have called attention to itself from any chance passer-by. "We're on our last lap, now," said Fred gleefully. "In a few minutes we'll know whether we've struck oil or gold. Come on, fellows!" he shouted in his excitement. The little band at once renewed their journey and their excitement steadily increased as John's pace led them, as they believed, in the direction which had been indicated in the diary of Simon Moultrie. CHAPTER XXV CIRCLES The determination of the Go Ahead Boys now was more manifest than at any time since they had left the Grand Canyon. The different ways in, which this feeling expressed itself was marked, for Fred's face was flushed and John's was eager as they pressed steadily forward. George was sometimes hopeful and sometimes in despair, while Grant was the only one whose countenance was unmoved. Conversation did not thrive now for several reasons. The face of every one was turned toward the distance and as they pressed forward John's pace unconsciously became swifter. Indeed, the tall Go Ahead Boy was so interested now in arriving at the end of his journey that unconsciously he was giving less heed to the paces he was making. Abruptly John stopped, declaring that he had come to the end. He had carefully followed the direction of the compass and had covered the last quarter-mile. Blankly the Go Ahead Boys looked all about them. They now found themselves on the side of a low hill which itself seemed to be part of a mountain. At their left were ledges and great rocks that had been worn away by storms or the action of the air and sun. In whichever direction they looked, however, they were unable to discover anything that seemed to indicate a claim. "I tell you we've come to the wrong place," said George, easily the most discouraged of the band. "There isn't anything here and I knew there wasn't all the while." "Why did you come then?" demanded John irritably. "I didn't want to break up the party," responded George. "What shall we do now?" asked Fred, whose distress of mind was manifest in the tones of his voice. "There's nothing to do but quit," said George. "It's a wise man that knows when he has had enough and I've had all I want." "Q.E.D.," said Grant dryly. "What do you mean by that?" demanded George. "You know what it stands for," answered Grant. "All I meant was that you proved what you started out to prove." "What is that?" demanded George. "Why that you're a wise man and know when to quit." "But honestly, Soc, isn't that the way you feel about it, too?" demanded Fred disconsolately. "'Honestly,' Fred," retorted Grant mockingly, "it's _not_ the way I feel about it. I'm not going to give up. Did you ever hear the story of Bruce and the spider?" "Only a few times," laughed John. "I think you have told us about how he was hiding in a cave and how he watched a spider that kept on trying to swing himself across a corner. I believe that he failed a good many times but finally succeeded." "Good for you, String," laughed Grant. "I wasn't quite sure that you got the point." "I get the point, all right," retorted John, "when you're able to make it plain. All the same," he added, "what are we going to do next?" "I'm not so sure," said Grant slowly. "Probably we'll have to stay here a few weeks and keep on trying to find the right spot." "What are you talking about?" demanded Fred blankly. "I wouldn't stay here a few weeks for all the money there is in every mine in Arizona!" "This is the time and this is the place when the majority have got to rule," said Grant quietly. "If the majority want to stay here and look a little longer for Simon Moultrie's claim then I guess the others will have to stay too. There's going to be no journeying across the desert or back up the gulch and the canyon by any party of one or two. We've had enough Go Ahead Boys get lost." "Don't be so proud," retorted Fred. "_You_ haven't been lost, but it wasn't any fault of yours. It was simply your good luck." "I'm not denying that," said Grant. "I am quite sure I should have been lost if I had been where you were. All I'm saying is that we aren't going to lose any more." "Well, what _are_ we going to do?" asked George. "We've got to decide what we'll do first," said Grant. "What do you think?" he added, turning to the guide as he spoke. Zeke had been silent throughout the conversation. It was plain that he was perplexed and perhaps downcast at the outcome of their first attempt. However, the expression of his face was unchanged when he said, "I've decided one thing and that is that you boys are going to stay right here and watch a little while." "'Watch'?" repeated Grant. "What do you mean? What are we going to watch?" "You're going to be on the lookout," was all that Zeke was willing to explain. "There's going to be some things goin' on around here worth seein', in my opinion," he added, "but I don't know just what and I'm not sure just where. I do know though the first thing that's going to be done." "What's that?" inquired Grant. "I'm going to get under the shadow of that big rock yonder and then I'm going to cook some dinner." "But it isn't more than eleven o'clock," protested Fred. "I don't care what time it is. I'm going to cook the dinner if it's seventeen o'clock to-morrow mornin'." "And after dinner what?" asked Grant. "What I told you," said Zeke. "I'm going to leave you boys here on the lookout while I go down over the rim." "What are you going for?" asked Fred. "Two things," replied Zeke. "I'm going to look first for those two pesky Navajos and then I'm going to have an eye on that ledge that Simon Moultrie referred to in his diary." "If you have one eye in one direction and the other in another, Zeke," laughed Fred, "you'll be getting cross-eyed the first thing you know." Fred's laugh relieved the tension somewhat and when dinner had been prepared by the guides the spirits of all had risen once more. "I'm suggesting," said Grant before the boys arose from their seats, "that we form five big circles here, about twenty-five feet apart. We'll have a common center and then from there we will start out, every one covering the part that has been given him. In this way we'll be able to cover a good deal of this ground and find out whether there's anything here to show that Simon Moultrie ever struck a claim." "Better not try that until I come back," suggested Zeke. "I will be back along about supper time and I may have somethin' to report when I come. If I do, it may change all your plans." "What do you expect to report, Zeke?" asked George. "Just exactly what I find," answered the guide solemnly, whereat the Go Ahead Boys all laughed loudly. "Now, you mind what I say," said Zeke a few minutes later. "Don't none of you go more'n a hundred yards from this spot. It may be I shall need the help of every one of you and need it in a hurry too. If I do, I want you on hand. Besides, there isn't any use in any more of you wanderin' off into the gullies trying to lose yourselves." Zeke arose and after he had carefully looked to his person to assure himself that his revolver was in his hip pocket and that the pole he had taken would stand a severe test, quickly started toward the rim. Not once did he glance behind him and in a brief time he stepped lightly over the rim of the Gulch and disappeared from the sight of the Go Ahead Boys. For a few minutes after the departure of the guide the boys remained in the camp, obedient to the suggestion of Zeke, and perhaps all alike fearful of being lost if they ventured far from the locality. Their restlessness, however, returned in a brief time and Grant said to his companions, "Boys, why don't we try out my plan?" "What plan is that?" asked Fred. "Why, that we use this place where we have camped as a center and that every one of us, as I told you, a few feet from the others try to make a big circle about it." "I think that's a good scheme," said John excitedly. "It will give us something to do and it will help us in finding what we're after." "That's right," joined in George. As a consequence the boys speedily began their new task. Fred was stationed about twenty-five feet from the camp, George was fifteen feet beyond him, John was stationed an equal distance beyond George, while Grant, who was about sixty feet from the camp, made the outer circle. At a given signal the boys began their search. They did their utmost to retain the same relative positions, although such action required greater exertion on the part of Grant than of the other Go Ahead Boys. When at last the circles had been completed the Go Ahead Boys decided to repeat the experiment, following a similar plan and at equal distances beyond the circles already made. "We must look out," suggested Fred as the boys lined up the second time, "not to go too far away. You know Zeke told us not to leave this place." "I guess we shan't have any trouble," declared John. "We shan't be beyond hailing distance from one another anyway." The second attempt when it was completed had met with no better success than had crowned their former efforts. No one had found a trace or indication of any spot that had been staked out as a claim. The third time the strange wheels revolved about the camping place, although by this time the distance that had to be covered was greatly increased. When the boys at last assembled once more and the reports were made they were all plainly disheartened. Perhaps the fact that they were tired also had much to do with their feeling. Even Fred, however, did not suggest that they should abandon their main purpose, for the excitement of the search in spite of his disappointment was still strong upon him. "I'm not just sure," said George when the boys stretched themselves upon the ground, "that I'm looking for the right thing anyway." "What do you expect?" demanded Fred. "I'm looking for Simon Moultrie's claim, that's all," remarked George simply. "Yes, and probably you expected to stumble over a mine with the men all at work. You expected to find a shaft and mules and men on every side. How about it, Pop?" "I'm not quite as bad as that," replied George, joining in the laugh that greeted Fred's words, "but I'll have to own up I don't know exactly what I was looking for." "You're hopeless," laughed his friend, but for some reason silence soon rested over the little group. The afternoon was waning and the night would soon be at hand. Already shadows were creeping over the gulches and canyons and the reflections were weird and in places fantastic. In the fading light the vivid colors of the sides of the canyons became softer. The coming of the night seemed to cast its spell over all. The Go Ahead Boys had become quiet. Even the stories of Pete, who a few minutes before had joined the band, seemed to be as unreal as the empty shells. Few questions were asked and it was not plain that all the boys were listening. Suddenly John arose and exclaimed, "There comes Zeke! I wonder what he has to report." In a moment John's companions had joined him and all four were advancing to meet the guide who was returning from the rim of the Gulch. CHAPTER XXVI CONCLUSION "Where have you been, Zeke?" called John. "Down, 'n the Gulch," replied the guide gruffly. "What did you find? Did you see any one?" "Nothing to speak of," retorted Zeke, who plainly was not disposed to recount the story of his recent adventures. Without halting, the guide said, "The Navajos will be coming soon." "What do you mean?" demanded John excitedly. "Just what I say," said Zeke. "Do you mean the whole Navajo tribe or just the two that we've seen?" "You certainly be the most innocent chap I've ever seen," remarked Zeke irritably, as for a moment he halted and looked sternly at the two boys. "Of course I mean Thomas Jefferson and Kitoni." "What are they coming up for?" demanded Fred. "Children should be seen and not heard," retorted Zeke. John laughed, but the face of his diminutive friend flushed angrily though he did not reply to the statement of the leader. Plainly Zeke was not inclined to talk. In silence he led the way back to the camp without referring again to his visit or explaining what his future plans were to be. Neither would he talk after he had arrived, except to remark that it would be time enough to talk when the Navajos came. Two hours later Thomas Jefferson arrived in camp. The time had been hanging heavily upon the hands of the Go Ahead Boys and the coming of the Indian provided a sharp relief. "Where's Kitoni?" demanded George as Thomas Jefferson alone entered the camp. "I cannot say." "Are you expecting him pretty soon?" "I expect him to be here when he shall come." "That's quite a remarkable statement, isn't it?" said John lightly, as the Indian turned away and approached the place where Zeke was lying on his back. An extensive conversation between the Navajo and the guide followed but the Go Ahead Boys were unable to hear anything that was said. At last, however, Zeke arose and approaching the place where the Go Ahead Boys were standing, he said, "I hear you boys didn't do what I told you?" "What was that?" inquired Grant. "I told you not to leave this camp." "We didn't go very far away," laughed Grant. "Every one of us got busy and we made some circles around the place here where we're stopping. We tried it three times, but we didn't find any signs of the claim which Simon Moultrie had staked." "What did you expect to find?" demanded Zeke, a broad grin appearing on his face for a moment. "The claim," reported Grant sharply. "Did you think there was a big sign up there stating that this was old Simon Moultrie's property and warning everybody to keep off?" Without waiting for a reply Zeke turned away, nor were the Go Ahead Boys able to induce him to renew his conversation. No reference was made to the plans for the following day and all four boys were greatly mystified when at last they retired for the night. The failure of the guide to be interested in the attempts the boys had made to discover the claim for which they were searching was somewhat mortifying. Indeed, Fred was inclined to break out in open rebellion. It was Grant, however, who soothed his feelings and prevailed upon his friend not to speak again to Zeke concerning the efforts they had made. Early the following morning the missing Navajo and the white man whose face was scarred, who had been an occasional unwelcome visitor in the camp, together approached the place where the boys were awaiting their coming. "Do you see who that is?" demanded Fred in a low voice. "Not being aged and infirm and my memory not having failed me as yet," said Grant solemnly, "I do recollect our distinguished visitor." No more was said although with deep interest the boys watched the approach of the two men, wondering all the time what the coming of the white man implied. Their curiosity was still further increased when Zeke without waiting for the men to enter the camp met them thirty feet away and at once entered into a low and earnest conversation. "What's the meaning of all this?" demanded Fred again. "I don't see what that fellow is doing back here and I don't understand why Zeke appears to be so friendly with him. You don't suppose," he added cautiously, "that the guide has decided to go in with the other fellows, do you?" "Don't you remember what Zeke told you a good many times?" spoke up Grant sharply. "He said that children should be seen and not heard." Fred's face was expressive of his anger, but he wisely did not respond to the suggestion of his friend. It was not long before Zeke and the two newcomers entered the camp where breakfast was hastily prepared for the Indian and his companion. "Zeke," spoke up John, "we don't understand what's going on. What does all this mean?" "What does all what mean?" retorted Zeke blankly. "You know just as well as I do. What is this man doing here in our camp again?" "You'll have to ask him." "Well, I don't want to ask him. I don't want anything to do with him. He stole Simon Moultrie's diary, he smashed one of our boats, he took one of our packs and no one knows how much more damage he has done. I don't think he ought to be here." "You might tell him so," suggested Zeke, smiling slightly as he spoke. "I'm not going to tell him," retorted John. "I'm telling you and you are responsible for this party." "That's right, so I be," spoke up Zeke as if it was the first time he had heard the statement. "There isn't much use," he continued, "in my looking after you when I find that you don't pay any 'tention to what I tell you. I left word for not one o' you boys to leave the camp while I was gone and when I come back I find that all four of you have been up to all sorts of tricks." "What are those men waiting for?" demanded Fred, glancing as he spoke at the Navajo and the white man, who were frequently looking toward the rim of the Gulch. "I think you'll have to ask them," said Zeke as he at once withdrew and joined the men whose actions had caused Fred to ask his question. Fred's confusion returned when he found that Zeke and the white man apparently were on the best of terms. His anger increased as he became convinced that he was the topic of their conversation, for each frequently glanced in his direction and both laughed as if the reference to the Go Ahead Boy was highly amusing. Fred's conviction that they were awaiting the coming of some one was strengthened when he joined his friends. "I'm telling you, fellows, there's something strange about all this," he said positively. "Nobody knows what those men have in mind. I'm getting worried." "What are you afraid of, Pee Wee?" laughed George, who thus far apparently was unmoved by the anxiety of his friend. "I'm afraid something will happen that won't do us any good," said Fred. The fears of the Go Ahead Boy were not expressed, however, for at that moment above the rim of the Gulch appeared the tall form of the white man who had been the companion of the man with the scar. Blankly the Go Ahead Boys stared at this latest addition to their party, but not one of them was able to offer any explanation of his coming. It was plain, however, that the arrival of this man had been expected, for both the Indians and the man with the scar at once advanced to meet him and the long conversation that followed indicated that his approach was not a surprise. The confusion in the minds of the Go Ahead Boys increased when a few minutes later Zeke conducted the two white visitors to the place where the boys were standing. As he drew near he doffed his hat and said, "Boys, I want to make you acquainted with Mr. Moultrie. This is the man," he added, as he slapped the tall stranger on his shoulder. The boys somehow murmured their appreciation of the introduction though the blank manner in which they stared at the visitor indicated that they were more mystified than before. A moment later Zeke beckoned to the man with the scar to approach. As he came near the place, again Zeke doffed his hat and making a low bow said to the boys, "I want to make you 'quainted with Mr. Pratt. We have been waiting for Moultrie to come," he explained, "and I'm thinking we're about ready to start." "Where?" demanded Grant. "You come along and you'll see," was all the explanation Zeke gave. Dubious as the Go Ahead Boys were they nevertheless decided to follow the suggestion of their guide and in a brief time the entire party, including the two Navajos, set forth from the camp. The tall stranger was the leader now and silently and swiftly he led the way. Apparently he was fully aware of the destination he was seeking and the most direct method of approaching it. Across the little plateau over which they were moving he led his followers until at last they came to a deep gulch or gully that had been worn into the side of the mountain. Doubtless the torrents which had swept down the hill-side had worn their way into the mountain-side, leaving this deep gulch as the evidence of their power. The excitement of the boys increased when Mr. Moultrie entered the gully. It was manifest that he was no stranger here and as he swiftly advanced, his followers found difficulty in keeping up with the pace that he set. For fifteen minutes not a word was spoken although the excitement increased with every passing minute. Indeed, it was manifest that the interest of Zeke and the Navajoes was steadily increasing as they moved farther into the gulch. Fifteen minutes later the man who had been introduced to the boys as Moultrie abruptly halted and said, "It is right here." "What is here?" demanded Grant, who was now the spokesman for the Go Ahead Boys. "Simon Moultrie's claim," said the man simply. "What!" demanded Grant. "Where is it? I don't see it. What have you to do with it?" "It's right before you," said the tall man, smiling as he spoke, "and the reason why I am here is because that claim belongs to me. I am James Moultrie, Simon's younger brother. After he found this place and filed his claim he wrote me what he had done and said that he had made his will, leaving the whole thing to me." "And who is this man?" demanded Grant, turning to Moultrie's companion. "His name is Pratt. Didn't Zeke introduce him?" "Yes," answered Grant. "I know who he is but what is he?" "He's a prospector who has been working around here not far from my brother more or less for five years. My brother was almost insane and Pratt knew it. He tried to keep a little watch over him, but Sime wouldn't have him around. He was about here, however, when my brother died and he helped me locate the claim." "Were you the man who took our diary?" spoke up John. "'Your' diary is good," laughed Mr. Moultrie. "Do you think it really was yours?" "We found it," said John doggedly. "By the same rule," said Mr. Moultrie, "the man that found this boy when he was lost in the gulch ought to own him. We took the diary all right, but it belonged to us anyway. We were only appropriating what was ours." "What about that boat that was stove in?" "That was an accident. We took one of the boats fully expecting to give it back to you within a day or two. We struck a rock and that's all there is to the story." "But what about that pack?" "Our supplies were all gone so we took the pack," laughed the man. "Did Zeke know about it?" suddenly inquired Fred. "I reckon he wasn't altogether lacking in information," laughed Moultrie. "Then, why did you bring us all here?" demanded Fred, turning angrily upon the guide. "I thought you wanted to come here," responded Zeke solemnly. "We wanted to find the claim," retorted Fred. "Well, you have found it, haven't you?" inquired Zeke as most of the party laughed loudly. "We have found what you _say_ is the claim," acknowledged Fred, "but--" "We have found what _is_ the claim," said Mr. Moultrie quietly. "Now, I appreciate the zeal of the Go Ahead Boys and I don't intend to forget it. This claim may be worth a hundred million dollars and it may not be worth one red cent. I'm going to give one hundred shares, if a company is organized and we put out the stock, to every one of the Go Ahead Boys." "How much does Zeke get?" laughed Grant. "He doesn't get anything," said Mr. Moultrie, "unless we develop a mine here and that means a lot of work and a long wait. Then, if the prospect looks good, we may organize a development company, and if the development shows up well, then we'll organize a mining company. But no one knows now whether he's rich man, poor man, beggar man or thief until all that has been done." THE END THE GO AHEAD BOYS BY ROSS KAY. _I leave this rule for other's when I'm dead: Be always sure you're right--THEN GO AHEAD. --Davy Crockett's Motto_. [Illustration] The love of adventure is inborn in all normal boys. Action is almost a supreme demand in all the stories they read with most pleasure. Here is presented a series of rattling good adventure stories which every live "go ahead" boy will read with unflagging interest. There is action, dash and snap in every tale yet the tone is healthful and there is an underlying vein of resourcefulness and strength that is worth while. * * * * * 1 THE GO AHEAD BOYS ON SMUGGLERS' ISLAND. 2 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND THE TREASURE CAVE. 3 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND THE MYSTERIOUS OLD HOUSE. 4 THE GO AHEAD BOYS IN THE ISLAND CAMP. 5 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND THE RACING MOTOR BOAT. 6 THE GO AHEAD BOYS AND SIMON'S MINE. (Other volumes in preparation) =_Cloth, Large 12mo., Illustrated, Per vol. 75 cents_= For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price by the publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS Publishers 28 West 23rd Street New York THRILLING STORIES OF THE BIG EUROPEAN WAR * * * * * THE BIG WAR SERIES (Trade Mark Registered) BY ROSS KAY [Illustration] The big European War, one of the greatest epoch-making events in the world's history, has been chosen by one of the best-known writers of juvenile fiction as the scene of a series of thrilling stories of these stirring times. Not a description of battles, nor the study of strategical campaigns, but good whole-some fiction with a little of the historical interwoven. These are authentic, instructive and exciting narratives on the greatest war in history. THE SEARCH FOR THE SPY. THE AIR SCOUT. DODGING THE NORTH SEA MINES. WITH JOFFRE ON THE BATTLE LINES. FIGHTING IN FRANCE. BATTLING ON THE SOMME. WITH PERSHING AT THE FRONT. SMASHING THE HINDENBURG LINE. =_Cloth, Large 12mo., Illustrated, Per vol. 75 cents_= For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price by the publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS Publishers 28 West 23rd Street New York THE BOY SCOUT LIFE SERIES Published with the approval of The Boy Scouts of America * * * * * [Illustration] In the boys' world of story books, none better than those about boy scouts arrest and grip attention. In a most alluring way, the stories in the BOY SCOUT LIFE SERIES tell of the glorious good times and wonderful adventures of boy scouts. All the books were written by authors possessed of an intimate knowledge of this greatest of all movements organized for the welfare of boys, and are published with the approval of the National Headquarters of the Boy Scouts of America. The Chief Scout Librarian, Mr. F.K. Mathiews, writes concerning them: "It is a bully bunch of books. I hope you will sell 100,000 copies of each one, for these stories are the sort that help instead of hurt our movement" THE BOY SCOUT FIRE FIGHTERS--_CRUMP_ THE BOY SCOUTS OF THE LIGHTHOUSE TROOP--_McLANE_ THE BOY SCOUT TRAIL BLAZERS--_CHELEY_ THE BOY SCOUT TREASURE HUNTERS--_LERRIGO_ BOY SCOUTS AFLOAT--_WALDEN_ BOY SCOUTS COURAGEOUS--_MATHIEWS_ (Other volumes in preparation.) =_12mo., Cloth, Illustrated, Per vol. 75 cents postpaid_= For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price by the publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS Publishers 28 West 23rd Street New York THE SOMEWHERE SERIES BY MARTHA TRENT Cloth, 12mo. Illustrated With picture inlay and wrapper Per volume, 60 cents postpaid [Illustration] Around a central figure, "half girl, half boy, and the better half of each," the author has written a fascinating story laying the plot first in America and subsequently, in the other stories, in other countries. The author's intimate knowledge and deep insight into the life and surroundings of the young heroines in the various countries add distinct educational value to the pronounced charm and quaintness of the stories. A peculiarly timely series of books for young readers who have been following the progress of the war. 1 HELEN CAREY: SOMEWHERE IN AMERICA 2 MARIEKEN DE BRUIN: SOMEWHERE IN BELGIUM 3 ALICE BLYTHE: SOMEWHERE IN ENGLAND 4 VALERIE DUVAL: SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE 5 LUCIA RUDINI: SOMEWHERE IN ITALY 6 PHOEBE MARSHALL: SOMEWHERE IN CANADA For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage prepaid) on receipt of price by the publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS PUBLISHERS 28 West 23rd Street New York "As Popular as the Game Itself" THE BIG LEAGUE SERIES (_Trade Mark Registered_) BY BURT L. STANDISH. [Illustration] Endorsed by such stars of baseballdom as Christy Mathewson, Ty Cobb and Walter Johnson. An American boy with plenty of grit--baseball at its finest--and the girl in the case--these are the elements which compose the most successful of juvenile fiction. You don't have to be a "fan" to enjoy these books; all you need to be is really human and alive with plenty of red blood in your veins. The author managed a "Bush League" team a number of years ago and is thoroughly familiar with the actions of baseball players on and off the field. 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The tales of outdoor life, especially the exciting times they have when engaged in sports against rival schools, are written in a manner so true, so realistic, that the reader, too, is bound to share with these boys their thrills and pleasures. 1 BOBBY BLAKE AT ROCKLEDGE SCHOOL, Or, Winning the Medal of Honor. 2 BOBBY BLAKE AT BASS COVE, Or, The Hunt for the Motor Boat Gem. 3 BOBBY BLAKE ON A CRUISE, Or, The Castaways of Volcano Island. 4 BOBBY BLAKE AND HIS SCHOOL CHUMS, Or, The Rivals at Rockledge. 5 BOBBY BLAKE AT SNOWTOP CAMP, Or, Winter Holidays in the Big Woods. 6 BOBBY BLAKE ON THE SCHOOL NINE, Or, The Champions of the Monatook Lake League. 7 BOBBY BLAKE ON A RANCH, Or, The Secret of the Mountain Cave. (Other volumes in preparation.) =_Cloth, Large 12mo., Illustrated, Per vol. 75 cents_= For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price by the publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS Publishers 28 West 23rd Street New York STORIES FOR CHILDREN (From four to nine years old) THE KNEETIME ANIMAL STORIES BY RICHARD BARNUM [Illustration] In all nursery literature animals have played a conspicuous part; and the reason is obvious for nothing entertains a child more than the antics of an animal. These stories abound in amusing incidents such as children adore and the characters are so full of life, so appealing to a child's imagination, that none will be satisfied until they have met all of their favorites--Squinty, Slicko, Mappo, Tum Tum, etc. 1 SQUINTY, THE COMICAL PIG. 2 SLICKO, THE JUMPING SQUIRREL. 3 MAPPO, THE MERRY MONKEY. 4 TUM TUM, THE JOLLY ELEPHANT. 5 DON, A RUNAWAY DOG. 6 DIDO, THE DANCING BEAR. 7 BLACKIE, A LOST CAT. 8 FLOP EAR, THE FUNNY RABBIT. 9 TINKLE, THE TRICK PONY. 10 LIGHTFOOT, THE LEAPING GOAT. 11 CHUNKY, THE HAPPY HIPPO. 12 SHARP EYES, THE SILVER FOX. 13 NERO, THE CIRCUS LION. 14 TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER. =_Cloth, Large 12mo., Illustrated, Per vol. 60 cents_= For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price by the publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS Publishers 28 West 23rd Street New York THE POLLY PENDLETON SERIES BY DOROTHY WHITEHILL [Illustration] Polly Pendleton is a resourceful, wide-awake American girl who goes to a boarding school on the Hudson River some miles above New York. By her pluck and resourcefulness, she soon makes a place for herself and this she holds right through the course. The account of boarding school life is faithful and pleasing and will attract every girl in her teens. 1 POLLY'S FIRST YEAR AT BOARDING SCHOOL 2 POLLY'S SUMMER VACATION 3 POLLY'S SENIOR YEAR AT BOARDING SCHOOL 4 POLLY SEES THE WORLD AT WAR (Other volumes in preparation.) _Cloth, Large 12mo., Illustrated, Per vol. 75 cents_ For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price by the publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS Publishers 28 West 23rd Street New York ENTERTAINING STORIES FOR CHILDREN From 4 to 9 years old THE ANIMAL SERIES BY FRANCES TREGO MONTGOMERY [Illustration] The best way to entertain children is to tell them a story. The better the story, the more lasting the impression on the young mind. These tales, told in the simple and charming style for which this authoress is noted, will serve a two-fold purpose--entertainment for the children and an acquaintance with many well-known facts concerning animal life. The ever increasing sale of these books attests to their growing popularity. Has your boy or girl read them? If not, now is the time to get a copy. 1 COWS AND CALVES 2 HORSES AND COLTS 3 PIGS AND PIGGIES 4 CHICKENS AND CHICKS 5 DOGS AND PUPPIES 6 CATS AND KITTIES =_Cloth, Quarto, Illustrated with eight colored illustrations and six pen and ink drawings, Per vol. 50 cents_= For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price by the publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS Publishers 28 West 23rd Street New York THE MARY JANE SERIES BY CLARA INGRAM JUDSON Cloth, 12mo. Illustrated. With picture inlay and wrapper Per volume, 60 cents [Illustration] Mary Jane is the typical American little girl who bubbles over with fun and the good things in life. We meet her here on a visit to her grandfather's farm where she becomes acquainted with farm life and farm animals and thoroughly enjoys the experience. We next see her going to kindergarten and then on a visit to Florida. Exquisitely and charmingly written, these are four books which every little girl from five to nine years old will want to read. 1 MARY JANE--HER BOOK 2 MARY JANE--HER VISIT 3 MARY JANE'S KINDERGARTEN 4 MARY JANE DOWN SOUTH For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage prepaid) on receipt of price by publishers. * * * * * BARSE & HOPKINS PUBLISHERS 28 West 23rd Street New York 
61811	----	QUEST ON IO By ROBERT MOORE WILLIAMS Radium-seeking Andy Horn and his talking honey-bear believed they were alone on Jupiter's bleak satellite. Then out of nowhere dropped the space-girl trailing a fateful comet of piracy and death. [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories Fall 1940. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] "Os--car" Assistant Navigator Andy Horn cocked an attentive ear and listened for an answer, but only the soft eternal moan of Io's restless winds came to his straining ears. "Dern that perfidious imp of Satan to hell and gone and back again," he muttered, stretching his red neck out like a turkey gobbler and squawking again. "Os--car.... Dern your flea-bitten hide. You better turn up." Gravel grated on a rock ledge not five feet above him and a Ganymedian honey bear stepped daintily into view. It was about the size of a fox, had sleek, heavy brown wool interspersed with longer black hairs, and a round, intelligent face. It sat down on the ledge and eyed him as guilelessly as if it hadn't heard him calling all the time. "Hi, Bub," it said. Andy reached decisively for a rock. "Dern you, Oscar, I've told you not to call me Bub." He let go with the rock, but Oscar had slipped blithely to cover. Andy grabbed another rock and waited and pretty soon the round face peeked over the ledge at him. It eyed the stone he had in his hand and was very contrite. "Aw, Boss, put down that rock. I was only foolin'." Andy maintained his belligerent attitude. "I'm very sorry, Mr. Horn." "That's better," Andy answered. "I didn't raise you on a bottle from the time you were three weeks old to have you sass me when you're grown up. Show some respect. Come on down from up there. We're going to eat." Andy had brought food with him from Ganymede, for Io produced nothing that human beings liked, except mineral wealth, and he was prospecting for that, taking advantage of the two months' forced vacation while the _Golden Stag_ was being repaired. A stern jet had jammed when she was landing, and she had sat down heavily on her tail, shearing off her stern rocket tubes and knocking a hole in her hull. In two months, if fate was kind, he might possibly locate a claim that would provide him with enough money to purchase the dream of his life, a neat private space yacht lying at the docks on Luna where her millionaire owner had left her after a narrow escape from a meteor had convinced him that space travel was not for amateurs. The ship could be bought for a hundred thousand, which was a give-away, and Andy had come to Io prospecting, for with the ship he could earn a comfortable living prospecting around the world. He had brought his honey-bear along for company. "Ah, food!" Oscar licked his chops, and started to descend, but hesitated and looked doubtfully over his shoulder up the twisted, rock-ribbed ravine. "Boss," he said hesitatingly, "I think you ought to know and I was going to tell you when you got so free with that rock, but there's another of you blood-thirsty humans prospecting up this ravine, and he's got a gun, and when you started shouting for me, he quit prospecting and grabbed that gun, and started looking." "The devil!" Andy ejaculated. "Why didn't you tell me?" "I have. Duck, Boss...." Oscar flattened himself out of sight. * * * * * Andy needed no further urging. He squeezed his lithe six-feet down behind a boulder just as a heat beam hissed over his head. It hit the bluff behind him and he watched the dust boil out as the pulsing radio-frequency beam turned to heat. The gun worked that way. A thin radio-frequency special beam was projected and it continued on its way until it struck something, when it turned to heat. It didn't work worth a darn on Jupiter. The planet's soupy atmosphere turned the ray to heat within a dozen feet of the muzzle, but in space, or in the extremely thin atmosphere of Jupiter's moon, it was bad business. Andy cautiously stuck his head around the boulder. "Hey," he yelled, "cut out the shooting. What are you trying to do? This ain't the Fourth of July." "Get out of here," a shrill voice came floating down to him. "This is a free country and I'll stay here as long as I damn well please." In answer a heat ray singed the top of the rock he was hiding behind. "Blast 'im, Boss. He almost got you," he heard Oscar whisper. "I'll make him hard to catch," he answered, pulling his stumpy blaster from the holster at his back, and testing the spring to see if it was wound up to maximum capacity. The blaster was spring actuated, and hurled an explosive pellet about the size of a buckshot, which was really a tiny atomic bomb. Where that pellet hit, there was big trouble immediately, but the pellets in rare instances had been known to explode in the gun, in which case the person who had hold of the gun was never heard of again, so that blasters were not a favored weapon. Andy had picked this one up at a bargain from a technician whose nerves had gone bad from space strain and who no longer had enough guts to shoot it. Blasters were not used on Jupiter or Saturn. Too much atmosphere and gravity for even the most powerful spring to hurl the pellet far enough for the shooter to be safe. Andy poked one eye around the top of the boulder and squinted for a target. He was in the edge of the glow zone. Off yonder, 216,000 miles away, the mighty rim of Jupiter was visible. The sun was on the other side of Io, but reflected light from the planet supplied illumination much better than the best terrestrial moonlight. Twisted, tumbled, torn and shattered rocks met his eye. Mosses, lichens, a few tough, low-growing plants. It looked like a picture of hell, but it was a prospector's paradise, for the rocks of Io were shot through with veins of gold, silver, platinum, iridium, not to mention the more common iron and copper, which were not sought for because transportation back to earth was too expensive to pay profits. "Off to the right," Oscar whispered. The glint of Jove-glow on a polished sight up the ravine gave Andy an aiming point and he snapped the blaster in that direction. He over-estimated the weak gravity of Io and the pellet hit on top of a high ridge beyond. A most satisfactory explosion took place there. Rocks split and tumbled in every direction. Andy lowered his sights and blasted again. Another brilliant explosion illuminated the landscape, far to the left this time. "You shoot like a rocket-man," Oscar commented. "Shut up," Andy growled. The men who tended the rockets lived in atmosphere of constant hammering from the explosion of the driving charges. A few years handling rockets and a man was unable to hold his hands still, so that old rocket-men always looked like they had well-developed cases of _paralysis agitans_. To tell a navigator, who had to have sure nerves and steady hands, that he resembled a rocket-man was a supreme insult. "Duck, Boss, he's drawing a bead on you," came Oscar's hurried whisper, and Andy jerked his head down behind the boulder just in time to avoid a ray that frothed across the top of the stone. No warning shot, that one. The unknown marksman had fired that shot with honest intentions of doing damage. * * * * * The ray skipped back and forth across the boulder, went over the top and burned into the bluff beyond. Andy watched it, and wondered what in hell all the shooting was about. Io, by order of the Interplanetary Council, was free territory, with the exception of commercial developments, but any straggler was always welcome there, for the sake of his companionship. Andy did not know whether he had stumbled into a space-pirate's lair, or whether some cracked prospector was using him for a target. The ray played out, vanished, but Andy kept his head down and waited. Minutes passed. Gravel crunched at his left and he swung the blaster up, but it was the honey-bear. "Oh, it's you," Andy said. "Get back up there and keep your eye peeled for the man with the ray gun." "He has beat it. I saw him slip back up the ravine and over the ridge." "The deuce he has!" "Yeh. Let's get out of here. This shooting makes me nervous." Andy stuck his head over the boulder. Nothing happened. He waved his cap, sure that this would draw fire, but it didn't. He lifted his blaster, whereupon Oscar hurried out of sight. He loosed a couple of pellets, which tore up great holes in the rocky ravine. There was no answer. He climbed up on the boulder. Only desolation met his eye. "Is the shooting over?" Oscar chirped from some unseen but probably secure refuge. "Yeh. Come on out." The honey-bear came into sight. He looked up at Andy. "Boss, I tell you let's get out of here. First thing you know, you'll get in the way of a heat beam, and then what'll I do for sugar?" "Skirmish, dern you, skirmish. We're going to track that fella down and find out how come all this shooting." "Not me, Boss, not me." "Yes, you, or no sugar." "Aw, hell." Oscar subsisted largely on a Ganymedian sweet and found sugar an excellent substitute. The honey-bears were a great puzzle to scientists. Their hair glowed when subjected to rays from radium, the creatures were very intelligent, had vocal organs readily adaptable to human speech, but were altogether an enigma. They lived in holes in the ground, had a very loose tribal organization, but made no effort to improve their condition, and obviously despised the human race for trying to improve theirs. They were content to be honey-bears, or _thlots_, to give an approximate English rendering of what they called themselves. Affectionate and loyal, they made marvelous pets. And while Oscar protested against following the person who had shot at them, Andy knew the _thlot_ would be right with him. Their advance over the broken terrain of Io would have done credit to an Indian. Andy, figuring an ambush might be ahead, was very cautious, and Oscar was cautious by nature. They had advanced for over a mile when Andy caught a glimpse of a tiny glow in a crevice in the rocks. He crept forward and found himself on a ledge overlooking a very humble camp. Perhaps thirty feet below him, the man was sitting. He was using his heat-gun set at low concentration to boil water, an old prospector's trick. Even in the cumbersome garb necessitated by the chill of Io, the man looked lithe and slender. Some youngster, Andy decided, taking a desperate chance on a frosty moon, but he wondered what necessity would drive a kid to brave the rigors of Jupiter's flea-bitten satellite. * * * * * He craned his neck for a better look and a loose stone turned under his feet. The figure tending the boiling kettle was on the alert instantly. He had grabbed the heat-gun and was looking for a target. Andy was in a pickle. He was too close to use the blaster, and he didn't want to use it anyhow, but any second the man would locate him and then the heat-gun would make him sizzle. There was only one thing to do, and he did it. He launched himself out into space, the weak gravity of Io permitting him to make the drop without danger. Andy heard a startled cry as the man saw him coming. The gun hummed as a ray lanced by him. And then he landed on the man's neck, the heat-gun went flying, and the man crumpled, Andy landing on top. The man wiggled and Andy twined his legs around the middle, applied pressure. Hands scratched at his face. He launched a short jab, aiming at the chin, but the man jerked his head to one side and Andy's fist landed up on the head, doing no damage but knocking off the man's cap. Andy took one look at the short red curls flying in his face and hastily stopped his fight. He released his legs and scrambled to his feet. "Madam--" he began, his intention being to say that he was sorry, but she made a grab for the heat-gun and he was obliged to shove her, which was not the thing a gentleman would do--but then ladies usually didn't try to blister every strange man they met with a heat ray. Andy picked up the gun. "Madam," he said reprovingly, "What in heck ails you?" "Give me that gun, you--claim-jumper!" Since she was starting toward him, he held the gun behind him. Seeing she couldn't get the gun, she stopped, and the blast she launched from her eyes made Andy think they were heat guns of a new kind. "Singe her, Boss, singe her," a new voice spoke, and Oscar came scrambling down the gravel slide. "Oh!" the girl gasped, for Oscar looked plenty blood-thirsty as he galloped. "It's a dingo. Kill it, quickly." Dingoes were the only predatory animals found on Io. What they lacked in size they made up in fierceness, and since they usually hunted in packs, they made life very unhappy for the lone prospector. "No. It's Oscar. He's not dangerous." The honey-bear skidded to a stop beside them, saw how fright had made the girl move close to his boss, and disgust was very plain in his voice. "Phooey--a woman!" She saw the half-grin lurking on Andy's face, and jerked away, her cheeks flaming. "He liked to have you stand close to him, the idiot," said Oscar in an easy way. "Mind your manners!" said Andy sharply, but the _thlot_ only grinned and wrinkled his nose to show his disgust. Oscar was a woman-hater. "Now that you've got me, what are you going to do with me?" she snapped. "Do? Do with you--" It was a poser, Andy saw. He hadn't wanted a woman, hadn't bargained for one, and hadn't the least idea of what to do with one. He knew that men frequently married them, and while he was thirty-three and quite old enough to get married, he hadn't been planning on it, for space men on the Jupiter run usually didn't live long enough to enjoy matrimony. And anyhow, Andy had a vague idea that you were supposed to be in love before you got married, after an appropriate interval of moonlight, and romance, and nonsense. "I'm not going to do anything with you," Andy continued, shaking his head. "Why did you jump on me then?" "I! Hell, woman!--I beg your pardon--Why did you shoot at me?" "Because you and your gang tried to jump my claim. You know that as well as I do." "Me? I never jumped a claim in my life. I'm a navigator, doing a little prospecting on the side, while my ship is laid up." And since she seemed doubtful, he showed her his credentials and told her the story, even telling her about the yacht on Luna that he wanted to buy. * * * * * "Oh," she said. "Oh ... I'm sorry. I had located an outcropping of quartz, and three men tried to take it away from me, and I thought you were one of them.... I'm very sorry." "Quite all right," Andy answered awkwardly. "A perfectly natural mistake." "Phooey!" Oscar snapped. "Women!" Andy glared at the _thlot_ and turned to the girl. "Prospecting is a mighty tough occupation for a single woman, isn't it, Ma'am?" "My father was a prospector. I was born in a mining camp on Ganymede, and I followed my father from the time I was able to walk. Yes, it's a hard life, but it's better than being a sissie and having some man support you because he happens to be married to you." "Um--" said Andy thoughtfully. "Um--" "You got something there," Oscar interpolated. "I was just getting ready to eat," the girl said suddenly. "Will you join me?" "Only too happy to, provided you tell me your name." It was a magnificent effort, for Andy. "Frieda Dahlem." "Frieda--Ah, nice name." "Poppycock!" said Oscar. "Let's eat." Conversation languished during the meal. Andy glared at the _thlot_, but Oscar was busy with his cube of sugar, too happy to say anything. "Have you--have you found anything in your prospecting?" Andy asked. "No. Oh, there's the outcropping of quartz I told you about, but the vein isn't rich enough to make it profitable. To import extraction machinery would cost a small fortune. The hills here are full of caves--dark, gloomy places that looked like they would make good hiding places for dingos, and I've been afraid to venture into them. Have you had any luck?" "Naw. I guess I'll be a navigator until the end of my days," Andy answered dolefully. "More sugar, Boss. One more lump, please," Oscar queried. "Sugar costs a fortune here, you glutton, freight rates being what they are. No more for you today." "Aw, Mr. Horn, one more lump, please." "Give the horrid thing another lump, Mr. Horn." Oscar sulked at being called a "horrid thing." Fearful of an outburst of _thlot_ profanity, Andy hurriedly produced the requested sugar. Oscar grinned happily. The grin and the happiness both vanished as something hissed through the air over their heads. It struck several hundred yards beyond them and the explosion sent debris showering in the air. Andy and the girl jumped to their feet. "It's those men who tried to jump my claim," Frieda said. "They have come back." The air hissed again and another explosion followed. "Home was never like this," Oscar wailed. "Where are those caves the woman was talking about? Me for them." "That's a darned good idea," Andy answered. "We better move out of here, and move fast." Frieda needed no urging. Her face was white, but she held her heat-gun resolutely as they skipped over the rocks. Andy had his blaster out, and was searching vainly for a target. Another explosion shook the ancient, time-worn hills. Andy snapped three shots at random and three explosions followed. This business was a game that two could play at. [Illustration: _Andy's blaster roared again. "Quick!" he barked, "Get inside the cave. It's our only chance...."_] "This way," Frieda panted, the thin air of Io not providing enough oxygen for fast running. * * * * * Following her pointing finger, Andy saw a dark opening yawning in the face of the bluff. In other circumstances he would have instantly noticed that it had an artificial appearance, as if the cave had been cut into the stone by other than natural means. Frieda came to a panting halt just inside the entrance, but Oscar, his tail between his legs, skipped rapidly out of sight into the dark cavern. The _thlot_ loved peace. "Frieda--Miss Dahlem, I mean," Andy panted. "We're safe here, at any rate." Almost immediately a blast shook the cavern. Loosened stone fell from the roof, there was a shower of debris outside, the cavern rumbled, and the light coming in through the entrance faded as a landslide almost completely blocked the opening. "Hell!" Andy gasped, "another shot like that and we'll be buried alive. This is no place for us. Let's get out of here." He moved to the entrance, his earth-sired muscles thrusting aside slabs of stone that he could not have handled on earth. Frieda worked with him. Together they cleared a space of less than two feet at the top of the cavern, which would allow them to slip out. Andy stuck his head out and immediately jerked it back. "There are three of 'em. They're on top of the hill and they've got a blaster trained on us. Luckily they didn't see me, but if we try to run, they'll blow us to smithereens." "Can't you get a clear shot at them?" "Maybe. But if I miss, they'll blow enough junk over the mouth of this cave to bury us a mile deep. Too much chance. What's eating them, anyhow?" "They saw some very rich samples that I had dug out of the quartz vein I told you about. If the whole vein were as rich as those samples, it would be worth a fortune, and they think it is that rich. Having tried to take it, they know they have to kill us, for if we escape, the space police will round them up and give them a shot of gas." "Um--I see. Looks tough on the home team." She didn't answer. Andy cautiously stuck his head outside and jerked it back as another atomic pellet dislodged a huge stone that came sliding down the hill. "Did they see you?" "Don't think so. That was just a shot for good luck. They think we're bottled up in here, but you can bet, if we lie still and don't give them any indication that we're alive, they'll be around to make certain our goose is cooked. I would, if I were in their place." Frieda looked at him and he immediately added, "I mean that's the logical thing to do. If you've got to kill somebody, make sure he's dead." It was a hard statement but the men who piloted the liners on the Jupiter run were a hardy breed. They took grim chances every day the liners were in space and were accustomed to look death in the face and call him friend. They waited. Andy scooped out an opening where he could watch without being seen. Frieda, sitting below him, whispered to him several times, but his only answer was a terse command to shut up. He was watching the three men who had now begun to move stealthily down the opposite hill. They came slowly, taking advantage of every bit of cover. Andy watched and grimly waited, pushing his blaster into position. He had no illusions on this matter, but he was aware that the girl was protesting. "What are you going to do?" "I'm going to blow those crooks clear to Jupiter," he answered, finality in his tone. "No," she protested. "Can't you hold them and disarm them?" "Don't be an idiot! How?" "I don't know. But it's murder to shoot them down like that." "Yeh? They been asking for it. Ah...." * * * * * The three men were standing in a cleared space looking across at the bluff, evidently deciding on what to do. Andy squinted through the sight, lifted his head to estimate the distance and the drop, dropped the rear sight a notch, and squinted again. He was aiming for the blaster in the hands of the first man, a tough-looking, bearded brute. If the pellet from his gun hit the blaster in the man's hands--well, there wouldn't be enough left of the three men to smell bad. He steadied his gun, started to squeeze the trigger. "Stop it," said a wailing voice in his ear and a heat-gun prodded him in the back. "It's murder. I can't let you do it." "You infernal idiot!" Andy shouted, forgetting himself. The sound of his voice reached the three men. They took to cover. Andy ducked away from the opening. He half carried, half led the protesting girl back into the cave. They were just in time. A sharp explosion at the mouth sent tons of rock cascading down, blocking the entrance completely. "Now we're fixed!" said Andy grimly. "We'll never get out." The girl was sobbing softly. "I'm sorry--I couldn't help it--" Another explosion sounded outside. Andy could hear the muffled sound of falling stone. "They're doing a good job--" he began "Hello Jupiter! What was that?" The cavern swayed and rocked to the blast of a terrific explosion. It sounded like a blast from a battery of atomic cannon. A section of the roof between them and the entrance fell in and a choking dust arose. The ground seemed to buckle. The solid stone quivered like jelly. "I got it," said Andy, awe in his voice. "Their blaster. A pellet exploded when the spring hit it, and that set off the magazine." He hesitated, then continued. "There's not ... enough left for identification purposes." The girl was crying. "Anyhow ... you didn't murder them," she sobbed. "And I'm glad--you didn't." "So am I, kind of. We got maybe a week or two to be glad in. We have a few condensed food tablets in my pack. Everything else is back at camp. The tablets will last a little while...." He could hear the girl crying softly, but the closing of the entrance had shut off the last gleam of light from the cave, and he couldn't see her. Awkwardly he reached out in the darkness, found her, drew her gently to him. For a long time there was silence broken only by an occasional soft whisper of sound as one or the other changed his position. Andy realized that he was a little thirsty, and he wondered if this was the forerunner of the violent pangs to come. He was aware of her soft whisper. "Sh--Look--" A spot of weirdly glowing light was moving slowly along the cavern floor. Without body, or visible means of locomotion, it seemed to flow along. Andy felt his hair rising as he looked at it. "Give me your heat-gun," he whispered, and the weapon was passed over to him. He lined up the sights and waited. * * * * * The small spectral figure slowly approached. It hesitated, moved back, then came forward again. Andy forgot that he was thirsty, that he would soon be hungry, that he was doomed to die. He could hear the girl breathing hard. What was the glowing figure? Was it friendly. He did not know, did not dare to guess. Perhaps it was seeking them, perhaps it recognized food in them. Perhaps it was some form of electrical energy, perhaps it resembled jelly, like the blobs that existed on Callisto that were so avid for human flesh. Andy held the sights of the heat gun on it, waited. He did not know whether the gun would affect it. The girl was breathing in long, slow pants, like she was holding her breath. It came nearer, shining like a gigantic fire-fly except that the glow was pale blue instead of golden. It was within twenty feet of them. "Shoot!" Frieda whimpered. "Shoot, quickly...." He started to squeeze the trigger. "Boss," a familiar but unhappy voice spoke. "Something is wrong with me. I shine." "Oscar!" Andy shouted dropping his gun. "You imp! Where in hell have you been?" The glowing spot bounded forward, leaped into Andy's arms. "Do something for me, Boss. I shine and I don't like it." The girl's laughter sounded silly. "I'll do something for you. I'll buy you a barrel of sugar." Radium. Somewhere in this cavern was a deposit of radium, and Oscar had run into it. The hair of the _thlot_ glowed when in the presence of radio-active energy. Andy was laughing crazily. Radium ... more precious than diamonds. Fortune. The ship on Luna. His! He had forgotten they were locked in the cavern. "Come on," he yelped. "Lead us to the place where you started glowing." "It's back in there, in a ball. I don't want to go. Let's get out of here." "You take us there, or I'll break your damned neck." "Aw, Boss...." "Get going." Oscar, complaining bitterly, started off. They followed. The cave widened out into an immense chamber. In the center was a crucible of some kind, a cracked, battered crucible filled with glowing matter. Andy scratched his head, moved forward. "There it is, Boss, right there." A soft glow, like moonlight, filtered through the interstices of the crucible, dimly illuminating the cavern. Dust moved beneath their feet, dust that had not been disturbed for ages. Oscar sneezed. A heavy, cup-like crucible with cracked walls that had been several feet thick ... in the center was a softly glowing ball.... Andy bent over it.... Radium.... There was no doubt.... But.... "Hell," he said, his jaw dropping. "Hell...." His eyes caught the heavy outlines in the dust on the floor. He stirred it with his toe. "Intelligence," he muttered. "Intelligence was here, in this cavern perhaps a hundred centuries ago. The crucible is lead, incredibly old. Perhaps part of it was once radium. It was the heart of some kind of an engine, some method of releasing energy, possibly hundreds of thousands of years ago. Look! You can see in the dust where other metals, which formed a framework, have oxidized...." The girl said nothing, and Oscar, for once was silent. "Once there was intelligent life on Io. It built this, and left it for some reason that we can't even guess at." * * * * * Frieda stared at the glowing metal, moved back. "A fortune," she said. "Yours." "No," he corrected. "Ours." They were silent. The mighty cavern was silent. Dim ghosts seemed to move in it, the shadows of a mighty people that had once been here, and had gone.... "I want to get away from here," Oscar whimpered. "I don't like this place." Andy sighed. Their dust would mingle with the dust of the builders of the cavern. Another hundred thousand years would pass before the place was rediscovered. Maybe more.... "We can't," said Andy. "The entrance is blocked." "The hell we can't!" Oscar answered. "When all the shooting was going on the rocks started to fall in here, and I looked for a way out. The hill is hollow. There's an opening on the other side. Come on. Quit gaping at me, and get a move on." "_Thlot_," said Andy grimly. "If you're lying, I will break your neck." "I'm not lying. Come on. You can come back later. I itch from being near that shining stuff." The _thlot_ led them off into the darkness. At last a dim glow of light showed up ahead. Andy pushed ahead of the honey-bear, stepped through a narrow opening, got a glimpse of the rim of Jupiter, red and angry, immovable on the horizon. He was suddenly very tired. He sat down heavily, stared at the forbidding planet. Forbidding it was, but it looked mighty good to him at that moment. The soft purring of the _thlot_ made him turn his head. The girl had sunk to the ground. She was scratching him and he was purring. Andy looked at him reprovingly. "I know it's poppycock," said Oscar, "but I like it. You ought to have her scratch your back sometime." 
51768	----	PROSPECTOR'S SPECIAL By ROBERT SHECKLEY Illustrated by DILLON [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Galaxy Science Fiction December 1959. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] Lost in the vast Scorpion Desert of Venus, he needed all the courage a man could own--and every bit of credit he could raise! The sandcar moved smoothly over the rolling dunes, its six fat wheels rising and falling like the ponderous rumps of tandem elephants. The hidden sun beat down from a dead-white sky, pouring heat into the canvas top, reflecting heat back from the parched sand. "Stay awake," Morrison told himself, pulling the sandcar back to its compass course. It was his twenty-first day on Venus's Scorpion Desert, his twenty-first day of fighting sleep while the sandcar rocked across the dunes, forging over humpbacked little waves. Night travel would have been easier, but there were too many steep ravines to avoid, too many house-sized boulders to dodge. Now he knew why men went into the desert in teams; one man drove while the other kept shaking him awake. "But it's better alone," Morrison reminded himself. "Half the supplies and no accidental murders." His head was beginning to droop; he snapped himself erect. In front of him, the landscape shimmered and danced through the polaroid windshield. The sandcar lurched and rocked with treacherous gentleness. Morrison rubbed his eyes and turned on the radio. He was a big, sunburned, rangy young man with close-cropped black hair and gray eyes. He had come to Venus with a grubstake of twenty thousand dollars, to find his fortune in the Scorpion Desert as others had done before him. He had outfitted in Presto, the last town on the edge of the wilderness, and spent all but ten dollars on the sandcar and equipment. In Presto, ten dollars just covered the cost of a drink in the town's only saloon. So Morrison ordered rye and water, drank with the miners and prospectors, and laughed at the oldtimers' yarns about the sandwolf packs and the squadrons of voracious birds that inhabited the interior desert. He knew all about sunblindness, heat-stroke and telephone breakdown. He was sure none of it would happen to him. But now, after twenty-one days and eighteen hundred miles, he had learned respect for this waterless waste of sand and stone three times the area of the Sahara. You really _could_ die here! But you could also get rich, and that was what Morrison planned to do. * * * * * His radio hummed. At full volume, he could hear the faintest murmur of dance music from Venusborg. Then it faded and only the hum was left. He turned off the radio and gripped the steering wheel tightly in both hands. He unclenched one hand and looked at his watch. Nine-fifteen in the morning. At ten-thirty he would stop and take a nap. A man had to have rest in this heat. But only a half-hour nap. Treasure lay somewhere ahead of him, and he wanted to find it before his supplies got much lower. The precious outcroppings of goldenstone _had_ to be up ahead! He'd been following traces for two days now. Maybe he would hit a real bonanza, as Kirk did in '89, or Edmonson and Arsler in '93. If so, he would do just what they did. He'd order up a Prospector's Special, and to hell with the cost. The sandcar rolled along at an even thirty miles an hour, and Morrison tried to concentrate on the heat-blasted yellow-brown landscape. That sandstone patch over there was just the tawny color of Janie's hair. After he struck it rich, he and Janie would get married, and he'd go back to Earth and buy an ocean farm. No more prospecting. Just one rich strike so he could buy his spread on the deep blue Atlantic. Maybe some people thought fish-herding was tame; it was good enough for him. He could see it now, the mackerel herds drifting along and browsing at the plankton pens, himself and his trusty dolphin keeping an eye out for the silvery flash of a predatory barracuda or a steel-gray shark coming along behind the branching coral.... Morrison felt the sandcar lurch. He woke up, grabbed the steering wheel and turned it hard. During his moments of sleep, the vehicle had crept over the dune's crumbling edge. Sand and pebbles spun under the fat tires as the sandcar fought for traction. The car tilted perilously. The tires shrieked against the sand, gripped, and started to pull the vehicle back up the slope. Then the whole face of the dune collapsed. Morrison held onto the steering wheel as the sandcar flipped over on its side and rolled down the slope. Sand filled his mouth and eyes. He spat and held on while the car rolled over again and dropped into emptiness. For seconds, he was in the air. The sandcar hit bottom squarely on its wheels. Morrison heard a double boom as the two rear tires blew out. Then his head hit the windshield. * * * * * When he recovered consciousness, the first thing he did was look at his watch. It read 10:35. "Time for that nap," Morrison said to himself. "But I guess I'll survey the situation first." He found that he was at the bottom of a shallow fault strewn with knife-edged pebbles. Two tires had blown on impact, his windshield was gone, and one of the doors was sprung. His equipment was strewn around, but appeared to be intact. "Could have been worse," Morrison said. He bent down to examine the tires more carefully. "It _is_ worse," he said. The two blown tires were shredded beyond repair. There wasn't enough rubber left in them to make a child's balloon. He had used up his spares ten days back crossing Devil's Grill. Used them and discarded them. He couldn't go on without tires. Morrison unpacked his telephone. He wiped dust from its black plastic face, then dialed Al's Garage in Presto. After a moment, the small video screen lighted up. He could see a man's long, mournful, grease-stained face. "Al's Garage. Eddie speaking." "Hi, Eddie. This is Tom Morrison. I bought that GM sandcar from you about a month ago. Remember?" "Sure I remember you," Eddie said. "You're the guy doing a single into the Southwest Track. How's the bus holding out?" "Fine. Great little car. Reason I called--" "Hey," Eddie said, "what happened to your face?" Morrison put his hand to his forehead and felt blood. "Nothing much," he said. "I went over a dune and blew out two tires." He turned the telephone so that Eddie could see the tires. "Unrepairable," said Eddie. "I thought so. And I used up all my spares crossing Devil's Grill. Look, Eddie, I'd like you to 'port me a couple of tires. Retreads are fine. I can't move the sandcar without them." "Sure," Eddie said, "except I haven't any retreads. I'll have to 'port you new ones at five hundred apiece. Plus four hundred dollars 'porting charges. Fourteen hundred dollars, Mr. Morrison." "All right." "Yes, sir. Now if you'll show me the cash, or a money order which you can send back with the receipt, I'll get moving on it." "At the moment," Morrison said, "I haven't got a cent on me." "Bank account?" "Stripped clean." "Bonds? Property? Anything you can convert into cash?" "Nothing except this sandcar, which you sold me for eight thousand dollars. When I come back, I'll settle my bill with the sandcar." "_If_ you get back. Sorry, Mr. Morrison. No can do." "What do you mean?" Morrison asked. "You know I'll pay for the tires." "And you know the rules on Venus," Eddie said, his mournful face set in obstinate lines. "No credit! Cash and carry!" * * * * * "I can't run the sandcar without tires," Morrison said. "Are you going to strand me out here?" "Who in hell is stranding you?" Eddie asked. "This sort of thing happens to prospectors every day. You know what you have to do now, Mr. Morrison. Call Public Utility and declare yourself a bankrupt. Sign over what's left of the sandcar, equipment, and anything you've found on the way. They'll get you out." "I'm not turning back," Morrison said. "Look!" He held the telephone close to the ground. "You see the traces, Eddie? See those red and purple flecks? There's precious stuff near here!" "Every prospector sees traces," Eddie said. "Damned desert is full of traces." "These are rich," Morrison said. "These are leading straight to big stuff, a bonanza lode. Eddie, I know it's a lot to ask, but if you could stake me to a couple of tires--" "I can't do it," Eddie said. "I just work here. I can't 'port you any tires, not unless you show me money first. Otherwise I get fired and probably jailed. You know the law." "Cash and carry," Morrison said bleakly. "Right. Be smart and turn back now. Maybe you can try again some other time." "I spent twelve years getting this stake together," Morrison said. "I'm not going back." He turned off the telephone and tried to think. Was there anyone else on Venus he could call? Only Max Krandall, his jewel broker. But Max couldn't raise fourteen hundred dollars in that crummy two-by-four office near Venusborg's jewel market. Max could barely scrape up his own rent, much less take care of stranded prospectors. "I can't ask Max for help," Morrison decided. "Not until I've found goldenstone. The real stuff, not just traces. So that leaves it up to me." He opened the back of the sandcar and began to unload, piling his equipment on the sand. He would have to choose carefully; anything he took would have to be carried on his back. The telephone had to go with him, and his lightweight testing kit. Food concentrates, revolver, compass. And nothing else but water, all the water he could carry. The rest of the stuff would have to stay behind. By nightfall, Morrison was ready. He looked regretfully at the twenty cans of water he was leaving. In the desert, water was a man's most precious possession, second only to his telephone. But it couldn't be helped. After drinking his fill, he hoisted his pack and set a southwest course into the desert. For three days he trekked to the southwest; then on the fourth day he veered to due south, following an increasingly rich trace. The sun, eternally hidden, beat down on him, and the dead-white sky was like a roof of heated iron over his head. Morrison followed the traces, and something followed him. On the sixth day, he sensed movement just out of the range of his vision. On the seventh day, he saw what was trailing him. * * * * * Venus's own brand of wolf, small, lean, with a yellow coat and long, grinning jaws, it was one of the few mammals that made its home in the Scorpion Desert. As Morrison watched, two more sandwolves appeared beside it. He loosened the revolver in its holster. The wolves made no attempt to come closer. They had plenty of time. Morrison kept on going, wishing he had brought a rifle with him. But that would have meant eight pounds more, which meant eight pounds less water. As he was pitching camp at dusk the eighth day, he heard a crackling sound. He whirled around and located its source, about ten feet to his left and above his head. A little vortex had appeared, a tiny mouth in the air like a whirlpool in the sea. It spun, making the characteristic crackling sounds of 'porting. "Now who could be 'porting anything to me?" Morrison asked, waiting while the whirlpool slowly widened. Solidoporting from a base projector to a field target was a standard means of moving goods across the vast distances of Venus. Any inanimate object could be 'ported; animate beings couldn't because the process involved certain minor but distressing molecular changes in protoplasm. A few people had found this out the hard way when 'porting was first introduced. Morrison waited. The aerial whirlpool became a mouth three feet in diameter. From the mouth stepped a chrome-plated robot carrying a large sack. "Oh, it's you," Morrison said. "Yes, sir," the robot said, now completely clear of the field. "Williams 4 at your service with the Venus Mail." It was a robot of medium height, thin-shanked and flat-footed, humanoid in appearance, amiable in disposition. For twenty-three years it had been Venus's entire postal service--sorter, deliverer, and dead storage. It had been built to last, and for twenty-three years the mails had always come through. "Here we are, Mr. Morrison," Williams 4 said. "Only twice-a-month mail call in the desert, I'm sorry to say, but it comes promptly and that's a blessing. This is for you. And this. I think there's one more. Sandcar broke down, eh?" "It sure did," Morrison said, taking his letters. Williams 4 went on rummaging through its bag. Although it was a superbly efficient postman, the old robot was known as the worst gossip on three planets. "There's one more in here somewhere," Williams 4 said. "Too bad about the sandcar. They just don't build 'em like they did in my youth. Take my advice, young man. Turn back if you still have the chance." Morrison shook his head. "Foolish, downright foolish," the old robot said. "Pity you don't have my perspective. Too many's the time I've come across you boys lying in the sand in the dried-out sack of your skin, or with your bones gnawed to splinters by the sandwolves and the filthy black kites. Twenty-three years I've been delivering mail to fine-looking young men like you, and each one thinking he's unique and different." * * * * * The robot's eyecells became distant with memory. "But they _aren't_ different," Williams 4 said. "They're as alike as robots off the assembly line--especially after the wolves get through with them. And then I have to send their letters and personal effects back to their loved ones on Earth." "I know," Morrison said. "But some get through, don't they?" "Sure they do," the robot said. "I've seen men make one, two, three fortunes. And then die on the sands trying to make a fourth." "Not me," Morrison said. "I just want one. Then I'm going to buy me an undersea farm on Earth." The robot shuddered. "I have a dread of salt water. But to each his own. Good luck, young man." The robot looked Morrison over carefully--probably to see what he had in the way of personal effects--then climbed back into the aerial whirlpool. In a moment, it was gone. In another moment, the whirlpool had vanished. Morrison sat down to read his mail. The first letter was from his jewel broker, Max Krandall. It told about the depression that had hit Venusborg, and hinted that Krandall might have to go into bankruptcy if some of his prospectors didn't strike something good. The second letter was a statement from the Venus Telephone Company. Morrison owed two hundred and ten dollars and eight cents for two months' telephone service. Unless he remitted this sum at once, his telephone was liable to be turned off. The last letter, all the way from Earth, was from Janie. It was filled with news about his cousins, aunts and uncles. She told him about the Atlantic farm sites she had looked over, and the wonderful little place she had found near Martinique in the Caribbean. She begged him to give up prospecting if it looked dangerous; they could find another way of financing the farm. She sent all her love and wished him a happy birthday in advance. "Birthday?" Morrison asked himself. "Let's see, today is July twenty-third. No, it's the twenty-fourth, and my birthday's August first. Thanks for remembering, Janie." That night he dreamed of Earth and the blue expanse of the Atlantic Ocean. But toward dawn, when the heat of Venus became insistent, he found he was dreaming of mile upon mile of goldenstone, of grinning sandwolves, and of the Prospector's Special. * * * * * Rock gave way to sand as Morrison plowed his way across the bottom of a long-vanished lake. Then it was rock again, twisted and tortured into a thousand gaunt shapes. Reds, yellows and browns swam in front of his eyes. In all that desert, there wasn't one patch of green. He continued his trek into the tumbled stone mazes of the interior desert, and the wolves trekked with him, keeping pace far out on either flank. Morrison ignored them. He had enough on his mind just to negotiate the sheer cliffs and the fields of broken stone that blocked his way to the south. By the eleventh day after leaving the sandcar, the traces were almost rich enough for panning. The sandwolves were tracking him still, and his water was almost gone. Another day's march would finish him. Morrison thought for a moment, then unstrapped his telephone and dialed Public Utility in Venusborg. The video screen showed a stern, severely dressed woman with iron-gray hair. "Public Utility," she said. "May we be of service?" "Hi," Morrison said cheerfully. "How's the weather in Venusborg?" "Hot," the woman said. "How's it out there?" "I hadn't even noticed," Morrison said, grinning. "Too busy counting my fortune." "You've found goldenstone?" the woman asked, her expression becoming less severe. "Sure have," Morrison said. "But don't pass the word around yet. I'm still staking my claim. I think I can use a refill on these." Smiling easily, he held up his canteens. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes, if you showed enough confidence, Public Utility would fill you up without checking your account. True, it was embezzling, but this was no time for niceties. "I suppose your account is in order?" asked the woman. "Of course," Morrison said, feeling his smile grow stiff. "The name's Tom Morrison. You can just check--" "Oh, I don't do that personally," the woman said. "Hold that canteen steady. Here we go." * * * * * Gripping the canteen in both hands, Morrison watched as the water, 'ported four thousand miles from Venusborg, appeared as a slender crystal stream above the mouth of his canteen. The stream entered the canteen, making a wonderful gurgling sound. Watching it, Morrison found his dry mouth actually was beginning to salivate. Then the water stopped. "What's the matter?" Morrison asked. His video screen went blank. Then it cleared, and Morrison found himself staring into a man's narrow face. The man was seated in front of a large desk. The sign in front of him read _Milton P. Reade, Vice President, Accounts_. * * * * * "Mr. Morrison," Reade said, "your account is overdrawn. You have been obtaining water under false pretenses. That is a criminal offense." "I'm going to pay for the water," Morrison said. "When?" "As soon as I get back to Venusborg." "With what," asked Mr. Reade, "do you propose to pay?" "With goldenstone," Morrison said. "Look around here, Mr. Reade. The traces are rich! Richer than they were for the Kirk claim! I'll be hitting the outcroppings in another day--" "That's what every prospector thinks," Mr. Reade said. "Every prospector on Venus is only a day from goldenstone. And they all expect credit from Public Utility." "But in this case--" "Public Utility," Mr. Reade continued inexorably, "is not a philanthropic organization. Its charter specifically forbids the extension of credit. Venus is a frontier, Mr. Morrison, a _farflung_ frontier. Every manufactured article on Venus must be imported from Earth at outrageous cost. We do have our own water, but locating it, purifying it, then 'porting it is an expensive process. This company, like every other company on Venus, necessarily operates on a very narrow margin of profit, which is invariably plowed back into further expansion. That is why there can be no credit on Venus." "I know all that," Morrison said. "But I'm telling you, I only need a day or two more--" "Absolutely impossible. By the rules, we shouldn't even help you out now. The time to report bankruptcy was a week ago, when your sandcar broke down. Your garage man reported, as required by law. But you didn't. We would be within our rights to leave you stranded. Do you understand that?" "Yes, of course," Morrison said wearily. "However, the company has decided to stretch a point in your favor. If you turn back immediately, we will keep you supplied with water for the return trip." "I'm not turning back yet. I'm almost on the real stuff." "You must turn back! Be reasonable, Morrison! Where would we be if we let every prospector wander over the desert while we supplied his water? There'd be ten thousand men out there, and we'd be out of business inside of a year. I'm stretching the rules now. Turn back." "No," said Morrison. "You'd better think about it. If you don't turn back now, Public Utility takes no further responsibility for your water supply." Morrison nodded. If he went on, he would stand a good chance of dying in the desert. But if he turned back, what then? He would be in Venusborg, penniless and in debt, looking for work in an overcrowded city. He'd sleep in a community shed and eat at a soup kitchen with the other prospectors who had turned back. And how would he be able to raise the fare back to Earth? When would he ever see Janie again? "I guess I'll keep on going," Morrison said. "Then Public Utility takes no further responsibility for you," Reade repeated, and hung up. Morrison packed up his telephone, took a sip from his meager water supply, and went on. * * * * * The sandwolves loped along at each side, moving in closer. Overhead, a delta-winged kite found him. It balanced on the up-drafts for a day and a night, waiting for the wolves to finish him. Then a flock of small flying scorpions sighted the waiting kite. They drove the big creature upstairs into the cloud bank. For a day the flying reptiles waited. Then they in turn were driven off by a squadron of black kites. The traces were very rich now, on the fifteenth day since he had left the sandcar. By rights, he should be walking over goldenstone. He should be surrounded by goldenstone. But still he hadn't found any. Morrison sat down and shook his last canteen. It gave off no wet sound. He uncapped it and turned it up over his mouth. Two drops trickled down his parched throat. It was about four days since he had talked to Public Utility. He must have used up the last of his water yesterday. Or had it been the day before? He recapped the empty canteen and looked around at the heat-blasted landscape. Abruptly he pulled the telephone out of his pack and dialed Max Krandall in Venusborg. Krandall's round, worried face swam into focus on the screen. "Tommy," he said, "you look like hell." "I'm all right," Morrison said. "A little dried out, that's all. Max, I'm near goldenstone." "Are you sure?" Krandall asked. "See for yourself," Morrison said, swinging the telephone around. "Look at the stone formations! Do you see the red and purple markings over there?" "Traces, all right," Krandall admitted dubiously. "There's rich stuff just beyond it," Morrison said. "There has to be! Look, Max, I know you're short on money, but I'm going to ask you a favor. Send me a pint of water. Just a pint, so I can go on for another day or two. We can both get rich for the price of a pint of water." "I can't do it," Krandall said sadly. "You can't?" "That's right. Tommy, I'd send you water even if there wasn't anything around you but sandstone and granite. Do you think I'd let you die of thirst if I could help it? But I can't do a thing. Take a look." * * * * * Krandall rotated his telephone. Morrison saw that the chairs, table, desk, filing cabinet and safe were gone from the office. All that was left in the room was the telephone. "I don't know why they haven't taken out the phone," Krandall said. "I owe two months on my bill." "I do too," said Morrison. "I'm stripped," Krandall said. "I haven't got a dime. Don't get me wrong, I'm not worried about myself. I can always eat at a soup kitchen. But I can't 'port you any water. Not you or Remstaater." "Jim Remstaater?" "Yeah. He was following a trace up north past Forgotten River. His sandcar broke an axle last week and he wouldn't turn back. His water ran out yesterday." "I'd bail him out if I could," said Morrison. "And he'd bail you out if he could," Krandall said. "But he can't and you can't and I can't. Tommy, you have only one hope." "What's that?" "Find goldenstone. Not just traces, find the real thing worth real money. Then phone me. If you really have goldenstone, I'll bring in Wilkes from Tri-Planet Mining and get him to advance us some money. He'll probably want fifty per cent of the claim." "That's plain robbery!" "No, it's just the high cost of credit on Venus," Krandall answered. "Don't worry, there'll still be plenty left over. But you have to find goldenstone first." "OK," Morrison said. "It should be around here somewhere. Max, what's today's date?" "July thirty-first. Why?" "Just wondering. I'll call you when I've found something." After hanging up, Morrison sat on a little boulder and stared dully at the sand. July thirty-first. Tomorrow was his birthday. His family would be thinking about him. Aunt Bess in Pasadena, the twins in Laos, Uncle Ted in Durango. And Janie, of course, waiting for him in Tampa. Morrison realized that tomorrow might be his last birthday unless he found goldenstone. He got to his feet, strapped the telephone back in his pack beside the empty canteens, and set a course to the south. * * * * * He wasn't alone. The birds and beasts of the desert marched with him. Overhead, the silent black kites circled endlessly. The sandwolves crept closer on his flanks, their red tongues lolling out, waiting for the carcass to fall.... "I'm not dead yet!" Morrison shouted at them. He drew his revolver and fired at the nearest wolf. At twenty feet, he missed. He went down on one knee, held the revolver tightly in both hands and fired again. The wolf yelped in pain. The pack immediately went for the wounded animal, and the kites swooped down for their share. Morrison put the revolver back in its holster and went on. He could tell he was in a badly dehydrated state. The landscape jumped and danced in front of him, and his footing was unsure. He discarded the empty canteens, threw away everything but the testing kit, telephone and revolver. Either he was coming out of the desert in style or he wasn't coming out at all. The traces continued to run rich. But still he came upon no sign of tangible wealth. That evening he found a shallow cave set into the base of a cliff. He crawled inside and built a barricade of rocks across the entrance. Then he drew his revolver and leaned back against the far wall. The sandwolves were outside, sniffing and snapping their jaws. Morrison propped himself up and got ready for an all-night vigil. He didn't sleep, but he couldn't stay awake, either. Dreams and visions tormented him. He was back on Earth and Janie was saying to him, "It's the tuna. Something must be wrong with their diet. Every last one of them is sick." "It's the darnedest thing," Morrison told her. "Just as soon as you domesticate a fish, it turns into a prima donna." "Are you going to stand there philosophizing," Janie asked, "while your fish are sick?" "Call the vet." "I did. He's off at the Blake's place, taking care of their dairy whale." "All right, I'll go out and take a look." He slipped on his face mask. Grinning, he said, "I don't even have time to dry off before I have to go out again." His face and chest were wet. * * * * * Morrison opened his eyes. His face and chest _were_ wet--from perspiration. Staring at the partially blocked mouth of the cave, he could see green eyes, two, four, six, eight. He fired at them, but they didn't retreat. He fired again, and his bullet richocheted off the cave wall, stinging him with stone splinters. With his next shots, he succeeded in winging one of the wolves. The pack withdrew. That emptied the revolver. Morrison searched through his pockets and found five more cartridges. He carefully loaded the gun. Dawn couldn't be far away now. And then he was dreaming again, this time of the Prospector's Special. He had heard about it in every little saloon that bordered the Scorpion. Bristly-bearded old prospectors told a hundred different stories about it, and the cynical bartenders chimed in with their versions. Kirk had it in '89, ordered up big and special just for him. Edmonson and Arsler received it in '93. That was certain. And other men had had it too, as they sat on their precious goldenstone claims. Or so people said. But was it real? Was there such a thing as the Prospector's Special? Would he live to see that rainbow-hued wonder, tall as a church steeple, wide as a house, more precious than goldenstone itself? Sure he would! Why, he could almost see it now.... Morrison shook himself awake. It was morning. Painfully, he crawled out of the cave to face the day. He stumbled and crawled to the south, escorted closely by wolves, shaded by predatory flying things. His fingers scrabbled along rock and sand. The traces were rich, rich! But where in all this desolation was the goldenstone? Where? He was almost past caring. He drove his sunburned, dried-out body, stopping only to fire a single shot when the wolves came too close. Four bullets left. He had to fire again when the kites, growing impatient, started diving at his head. A lucky shot tore into the flock, downing two. It gave the wolves something to fight over. Morrison crawled on blindly. And fell over the edge of a little cliff. It wasn't a serious fall, but the revolver was knocked from his hand. Before he could find it, the wolves were on him. Only their greed saved Morrison. While they fought over him, he rolled away and retrieved his revolver. Two shots scattered the pack. That left one bullet. He'd have to save that one for himself, because he was too tired to go on. He sank to his knees. The traces were rich here. Fantastically rich. Somewhere nearby.... "Well, I'll be damned," Morrison said. The little ravine into which he had fallen was solid goldenstone. * * * * * He picked up a pebble. Even in its rough state he could see the deep luminous golden glow, the fiery red and purple flecks deep in the shining stone. "Make sure," Morrison told himself. "No false alarms, no visions, no wild hopes. Make sure." He broke off a chunk of rock with the butt of his revolver. It still looked like goldenstone. He took out his testing kit and spilled a few drops of white solution on the rock. The solution foamed green. "Goldenstone, sure as sure," Morrison said, looking around at the glowing cliff walls. "Hey, I'm rich!" He took out his telephone. With trembling fingers he dialed Krandall's number. "Max!" Morrison shouted. "I've hit it! I've hit the real stuff!" "My name is not Max," a voice over the telephone said. "Huh?" "My name is Boyard," the man said. The video screen cleared, and Morrison saw a thin, sallow-faced man with a hairline mustache. "I'm sorry, Mr. Boyard," Morrison said. "I must have gotten the wrong number. I was calling--" "It doesn't matter who you were calling," Mr. Boyard said. "I am District Supervisor of the Venus Telephone Company. Your bill is two months overdue." "I can pay it now," Morrison said, grinning. "Excellent," said Mr. Boyard. "As soon as you do, your service will be resumed." The screen began to fade. "Wait!" Morrison cried. "I can pay as soon as I reach your office. But I must make one telephone call. Just one call, so that I--" "Not a chance," Mr. Boyard said decisively. "_After_ you have paid your bill, your service will be turned on immediately." "I've got the money right here!" Morrison said. "Right here in my hand!" Mr. Boyard paused. "Well, it's unusual, but I suppose we could arrange for a special robot messenger if you are willing to pay the expenses." "I am!" "Hm. It's irregular, but I daresay we ... Where is the money?" "Right here," Morrison said. "You recognize it, don't you? It's goldenstone!" "I am sick and tired of the tricks you prospectors think you can put over on us. Holding up a handful of pebbles--" "But this is really goldenstone! Can't you see it?" "I am a businessman," Mr. Boyard said, "not a jeweler. I wouldn't know goldenstone from goldenrod." The video screen went blank. * * * * * Frantically, Morrison tried to reach the operator. There was nothing, not even a dial tone. His telephone was disconnected. He put the instrument down and surveyed his situation. The narrow crevice into which he had fallen ran straight for about twenty yards, then curved to the left. No cave was visible in the steep walls, no place where he could build a barricade. He heard a movement behind him. Whirling around, he saw a huge old wolf in full charge. Without a moment's hesitation, Morrison drew and fired, blasting off the top of the beast's head. "Damn it," Morrison said. "I was going to save that bullet for myself." It gave him a moment's grace. He ran down the ravine, looking for an opening in its sides. Goldenstone glowed at him and sparkled red and purple. And the sandwolves loped along behind him. Then Morrison stopped. In front of him, the curving ravine ended in a sheer wall. He put his back against it, holding the revolver by its butt. The wolves stopped five feet from him, gathering themselves for a rush. There were ten or twelve of them, and they were packed three deep in the narrow pass. Overhead, the kites circled, waiting for their turn. At that moment, Morrison heard the crackling sound of 'porting equipment. A whirlpool appeared above the wolves' heads and they backed hastily away. "Just in time!" Morrison said. "In time for what?" asked Williams 4, the postman. The robot climbed out of the vortex and looked around. "Well, young man," Williams 4 said, "this is a fine fix you've gotten yourself into. Didn't I warn you? Didn't I advise you to turn back? And now look!" "You were perfectly right," Morrison said. "What did Max Krandall send me?" "Max Krandall did not, and could not, send a thing." "Then why are you here?" "Because it's your birthday," Williams 4 said. "We of the Postal Department always give special service for birthdays. Here you are." Williams 4 gave him a handful of mail, birthday greetings from Janie, and from his aunts, uncles and cousins on Earth. "Something else here," Williams 4 said, rummaging in his bag. "I _think_ there was something else here. Let me see.... Yes, here it is." He handed Morrison a small package. * * * * * Hastily, Morrison tore off the wrappings. It was a birthday present from his Aunt Mina in New Jersey. He opened it. It was a large box of salt-water taffy, direct from Atlantic City. "Quite a delicacy, I'm told," said Williams 4, who had been peering over his shoulder. "But not very satisfactory under the circumstances. Well, young man, I hate to see anyone die on his birthday. The best I can wish you is a speedy and painless departure." The robot began walking toward the vortex. "Wait!" Morrison cried. "You can't just leave me like this! I haven't had any water in days! And those wolves--" "I know," Williams 4 said. "Do you think I feel _happy_ about it? Even a robot has some feelings!" "Then help me." "I can't. The rules of the Postal Department expressly and categorically forbid it. I remember Abner Lathe making much the same request of me in '97. It took three years for a burial party to reach him." "You have an emergency telephone, haven't you?" Morrison asked. "Yes. But I can use it only for personal emergencies." "Can you at least carry a letter for me? A special delivery letter?" "Of course I can," the robot postman said. "That's what I'm here for. I can even lend you pencil and paper." Morrison accepted the pencil and paper and tried to think. If he wrote to Max now, special delivery, Max would have the letter in a matter of hours. But how long would Max need to raise some money and send him water and ammunition? A day, two days? Morrison would have to figure out some way of holding out.... "I assume you have a stamp," the robot said. "I don't," Morrison replied. "But I'll buy one from you. Solidoport special." "Excellent," said the robot. "We have just put out a new series of Venusborg triangulars. I consider them quite an esthetic accomplishment. They cost three dollars apiece." "That's fine. Very reasonable. Let me have one." "There is the question of payment." "Here," Morrison said, handing the robot a piece of goldenstone worth about five thousand dollars in the rough. The postman examined the stone, then handed it back. "I'm sorry, I can accept only cash." "But this is worth more than a thousand postage stamps!" Morrison said. "This is goldenstone!" "It may well be," Williams 4 said. "But I have never had any assaying knowledge taped into me. Nor is the Venus Postal Service run on a barter system. I'll have to ask for three dollars in bills or coins." "I don't have it." "I am very sorry." Williams 4 turned to go. "You can't just go and let me die!" "I can and must," Williams 4 said sadly. "I am only a robot, Mr. Morrison. I was made by men, and naturally I partake of some of their sensibilities. That's as it should be. But I also have my limits, which, in their nature, are similar to the limits most humans have on this harsh planet. And, unlike humans, I cannot transcend my limits." The robot started to climb into the whirlpool. Morrison stared at him blankly, and saw beyond him the waiting wolfpack. He saw the soft glow of several million dollars' worth of goldenstone shining from the ravine's walls. Something snapped inside him. * * * * * With an inarticulate yell, Morrison dived, tackling the robot around the ankles. Williams 4, half in and half out of the 'porting vortex, struggled and kicked, and almost succeeded in shaking Morrison loose. But with a maniac's strength Morrison held on. Inch by inch he dragged the robot out of the vortex, threw him on the ground and pinned him. "You are disrupting the mail service," said Williams 4. "That's not all I'm going to disrupt," Morrison growled. "I'm not afraid of dying. That was part of the gamble. But I'm damned if I'm going to die fifteen minutes after I've struck it rich!" "You have no choice." "I do. I'm going to use that emergency telephone of yours." "You can't," Williams 4 said. "I refuse to extrude it. And you could never reach it without the resources of a machine shop." "Could be," said Morrison. "I plan to find out." He pulled out his empty revolver. "What are you going to do?" Williams 4 asked. "I'm going to see if I can smash you into scrap metal _without_ the resources of a machine shop. I think your eyecells would be a logical place to begin." "They would indeed," said the robot. "I have no personal sense of survival, of course. But let me point out that you would be leaving all Venus without a postman. Many would suffer because of your anti-social action." "I hope so," Morrison said, raising the revolver above his head. "Also," the robot said hastily, "you would be destroying government property. That is a serious offense." Morrison laughed and swung the pistol. The robot moved its head quickly, dodging the blow. It tried to wriggle free, but Morrison's two hundred pounds was seated firmly on its thorax. "I won't miss this time," Morrison promised, hefting the revolver. "Stop!" Williams 4 said. "It is my duty to protect government property, even if that property happens to be myself. You may use my telephone, Mr. Morrison. Bear in mind that this offense is punishable by a sentence of not more than ten and not less than five years in the Solar Swamp Penitentiary." "Let's have that telephone," Morrison said. * * * * * The robot's chest opened and a small telephone extruded. Morrison dialed Max Krandall and explained the situation. "I see, I see," Krandall said. "All right, I'll try to find Wilkes. But, Tom, I don't know how much I can do. It's after business hours. Most places are closed--" "Get them open again," said Morrison. "I can pay for it. And get Jim Remstaater out of trouble, too." "It can't be done just like that. You haven't established any rights to your claim. You haven't even proved that your claim is valuable." "Look at it." Morrison turned the telephone so that Krandall could see the glowing walls of the ravine. "Looks real," Krandall said. "But unfortunately, all that glitters is not goldenstone." "What can we do?" Morrison asked. "We'll have to take it step by step. I'll 'port you the Public Surveyor. He'll check your claim, establish its limits, and make sure no one else has filed on it. You give him a chunk of goldenstone to take back. A big chunk." "How can I cut goldenstone? I don't have any tools." "You'll have to figure out a way. He'll take the chunk back for assaying. If it's rich enough, you're all set." "And if it isn't?" "Perhaps we better not talk about that," Krandall said. "I'll get right to work on this, Tommy. Good luck!" Morrison signed off. He stood up and helped the robot to its feet. "In twenty-three years of service," Williams 4 said, "this is the first time anybody has threatened the life of a government postal employee. I must report this to the police authorities at Venusborg, Mr. Morrison. I have no choice." "I know," Morrison said. "But I guess five or ten years in the penitentiary is better than dying." "I doubt it. I carry mail there, you know. You will have the opportunity of seeing for yourself in about six months." "What?" said Morrison, stunned. "In about six months, after I have completed my mail calls around the planet and returned to Venusborg. A matter like this must be reported in person. But first and foremost, the mails must go through." "Thanks, Williams. I don't know how--" "I am simply performing my duty," the robot said as it climbed into the vortex. "If you are still on Venus in six months, I will be delivering your mail to the penitentiary." "I won't be here," Morrison said. "So long, Williams!" The robot disappeared into the 'porting vortex. Then the vortex disappeared. Morrison was alone in the Venusian twilight. * * * * * He found an outcropping of goldenstone larger than a man's head. He chipped at it with his pistol butt, and tiny particles danced and shimmered in the air. After an hour, he had put four dents in his revolver, but he had barely scratched the highly refractory surface of the goldenstone. The sandwolves began to edge forward. Morrison threw stones at them and shouted in his dry, cracked voice. The wolves retreated. He examined the outcropping again and found a hairline fault running along one edge. He concentrated his blows along the fault. The goldenstone refused to crack. Morrison wiped sweat from his eyes and tried to think. A chisel, he needed a chisel.... He pulled off his belt. Putting the edge of the steel buckle against the crack, he managed to hammer it in a fraction of an inch. Three more blows drove the buckle firmly into the fault. With another blow, the outcropping sheared off cleanly. He had separated a twenty-pound piece from the cliff. At fifty dollars a troy ounce, this lump should be worth about twelve thousand dollars--if it assayed out as pure as it looked. The twilight had turned a deep gray when the Public Surveyor 'ported in. It was a short, squat robot with a conservative crackle-black finish. "Good day, sir," the surveyor said. "You wish to file a claim? A standard unrestricted mining claim?" "That's right," Morrison said. "And where is the center of the aforesaid claim?" "Huh? The center? I guess I'm standing on it." "Very well," the robot said. Extruding a steel tape, it walked rapidly away from Morrison. At a distance of two hundred yards, it stopped. More steel tape fluttered as it walked, flew and climbed a square with Morrison at the center. When it had finished, the surveyor stood for a long time without moving. "What are you doing?" Morrison asked. "I'm making depth-photographs of the terrain," the robot said. "It's rather difficult in this light. Couldn't you wait till morning?" "No!" "Well, I'll just have to cope," the robot said. It moved and stood, moved and stood, each subterranean exposure taking longer than the last as the twilight deepened. If it had had pores, it would have sweated. "There," said the robot at last, "that takes care of it. Do you have a sample for me to take back?" "Here it is," Morrison said, hefting the slab of goldenstone and handing it to the surveyor. "Is that all?" "Absolutely all," the robot said. "Except, of course, that you haven't given me the Deed of Search." * * * * * Morrison blinked. "I haven't given you the what?" "The Deed of Search. That is a government document showing that the claim you are filing on is free, as per government order, of fissionable material in excess of fifty per cent of the total mass to a depth of sixty feet. It's a mere formality, but a necessary one." "I never heard of it," Morrison said. "It became a requirement last week," explained the surveyor. "You don't have the Deed? Then I'm afraid your standard unrestricted claim is invalid." "Isn't there anything I can do?" "Well," the robot said, "you _could_ change your standard unrestricted claim to a special restricted claim. That requires no Deed of Search." "What does the special restricted part mean?" "It means that in five hundred years all rights revert to the Government of Venus." "All right!" Morrison shouted. "Fine! Good! Is that all?" "Absolutely all," the surveyor said. "I shall bring this sample back and have it assayed and evaluated immediately. From it and the depth-photographs we can extrapolate the value and extent of your claim." "Send me back something to take care of the wolves," Morrison said. "And food. And listen--I want a Prospector's Special." "Yes, sir. It will all be 'ported to you--if your claim is of sufficient value to warrant the outlay." The robot climbed into the vortex and vanished. Time passed, and the wolves edged forward again. They snarled at the rocks Morrison threw, but they didn't retreat. Jaws open and tongues lolling, they crept up the remaining yards between them and the prospector. Then the leading wolf leaped back and howled. A gleaming vortex had appeared over his head and a rifle had fallen from the vortex, striking him on a forepaw. The wolves scrambled away. Another rifle fell from the vortex. Then a large box marked _Grenades, Handle With Care_. Then another box marked _Desert Ration K_. Morrison waited, staring at the gleaming mouth of the vortex. It crossed the sky to a spot a quarter of a mile away and paused there, and then a great round brass base emerged from the vortex, and the mouth widened to allow an even greater bulge of brass to which the base was attached. The bulge grew higher as the base was lowered to the sand. When the last of it appeared, it stood alone in the horizon-to-horizon expanse, a gigantic ornate brass punchbowl in the desert. The vortex rose and paused again over the bowl. Morrison waited, his throat raw and aching. Now a small trickle came out of the vortex and splashed down into the bowl. Still Morrison didn't move. * * * * * And then it came. The trickle became a roar that sent the wolves and kites fleeing in terror, and a cataract poured from the vortex to the huge punchbowl. Morrison began staggering toward it. He should have ordered a canteen, he told himself thirstily, stumbling across the quarter of a mile of sand. But at last he stood beneath the Prospector's Special, higher than a church steeple, wider than a house, filled with water more precious than goldenstone itself. He turned the spigot at the bottom. Water soaked the yellow sands and ran in rivulets down the dune. He should have ordered a cup or glass, Morrison thought, lying on his back with open mouth. 
61895	----	SPACE-WOLF By RAY CUMMINGS The lure of precious zolonite drew Morgan to barren Titan--to find a weird beast-empire ruled by a cold-eyed Earth-girl queen. [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories Summer 1941. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] Solo Morgan laid his small portable spectroscope on the rock and sat down beside it to rest. He was panting, breathless from the climb up to these precipitous heights, even though the gravity here on Titan was less than that of Earth. It was night. The pallid little Sun had swiftly set behind a distant line of jagged mountain peaks. At the other horizon Saturn was rising, a monstrous glowing ball with a foreshortened segment of the rings spreading in a great iridescent flame of pale prismatic color across half the sky. From here, Solo Morgan could just see the tiny blob of his one-man space-ship where he had left it down in the hollow. "He travels fastest who travels alone," had always been Solo Morgan's motto. But now at the age of twenty-eight, a big, rangy, handsome fellow with curly, crisp brown hair, it seemed to Morgan that he was somewhat a failure. So far he had failed to strike it rich; and a single big strike had always been what he was after. He set his jaw grimly as he thought of it. Well, now was the time. There was a lode of Zolonite here on this moon of Saturn. The spectroscopic evidence of it had been faint, yet unmistakable. Doubtless it was a single, small concentration; Zolonite perhaps in an almost pure state. Immensely more valuable than radium; more valuable, than any other radioactive substance known to earth. Morgan stood up, rested, to continue his climb. By all that he had been able to determine from the faint spectroscopic bands, and the intensity registers which he had so carefully used in that circling flight around the bleak, uninhabited satellite, the Zolonite deposit must be somewhere in this neighborhood. The radiometer had seemed to indicate gathering strength as he climbed. Perhaps it would be beyond this next rise, where now he could see a ragged plateau thick with a lush, fantastic blue-gray vegetation. He started forward; and suddenly from nearby there was a sharp crack, an explosive report with a stab of yellow-red flame that mingled with the iridescent sheen of Saturn's glow. And there was a ping, a tanging whistle past his head with a thud against one of the nearby rocks where a leaden pellet flattened itself and dropped beside him. An old-fashioned bullet! Morgan dropped to the rocks, into a shadow from which in a moment he cautiously raised his head. There was nothing to be seen, except that from a distant clump a little spiral of smoke was rising. What in the devil was this? Titan, so far as anyone knew, was uninhabited. For a second it had flashed to Morgan that it might be a band of space-pirates who had followed him here. But an old-fashioned bullet-projector! Modern space-pirates would laugh at such a thing! They had nothing but the most modern electronic flash-guns, as Morgan himself in several classes could well testify. Explosive bullet-projectors were museum pieces now. Yet here was one on Titan, handled by somebody, trying to drill him! Thoughts are instant things. Morgan was flat in the rock hollow. And as he cautiously raised his head there came another crack. The bullet thudded into the metal of his tri-cornered hat, knocking it off. Too close for comfort. His flash-cylinder was in his hand. He sent a bolt sizzling against the distant rocks. It hit nothing but the rocks; but now, abruptly to one side of where he had struck, he saw a flutter--a blue-white drape fluttering in the iridescent light. And in the silence there was a frightened, startled cry. A girl's voice! In that second she had dropped back into the rock-clump. But Morgan had seen her; a white-limbed girl clad in blue drapes, with dark hair flowing down over her shoulders. Amazement was on Morgan's rugged bronzed face. But his grim lips twitched into a vague, startled smile. Holding the metal hat-brim, he raised the hat. A bullet thudded into it. Her aim was certainly too good to trifle with! Cautiously he stared out over the glowing iridescent rocks. There was no sign of movement; no sound save the distant reverberations of the girl's last shot. Morgan quietly discarded his equipment; his cylinders of synthetic food, water, the radiometer and the big insulated leaden cylinder in which he hoped to take home the Zolonite-concentrate. Thus unburdened he hitched himself back into a deeper hollow. Then he stood half erect, with his gun clipped to his belt, tensing his leg muscles for a jump. She might be able to wing him in the air during the arc of his leap, but he doubted it. There was a rock-ledge some thirty feet away over a little chasm. The crouching Morgan eyed it, took a few running, crouching steps, straightened and leaped. His body sailed in a great flattened arc over the chasm. There was another startled exclamation from the girl; another explosive report, but the bullet went wide. Morgan, chuckling, landed in a heap on the ledge, behind a little line of intervening rocks. He could stand erect here, unseen by the girl. The line of rocks extended diagonally toward her. Morgan ducked along behind them. He ran perhaps a hundred feet, crouched down again where there was a break in his rocky shield. * * * * * He could see her plainly now. She was a huddled blob with a long-barreled bullet-gun resting in a rock crevice as she peered out at the line of rocks behind which his leap had carried him. He was much nearer to her now; not over twenty feet. And he cautiously peered, more amazed than ever. The pearly, glowing sheen of the Saturn-light glistened on her skin. Her oval face, framed by her flowing black hair, was set and grim, but he could see that it was a beautiful face. "What the devil," Morgan muttered to himself. He had clipped his gun to his broad leather belt. Still grimly smiling, he picked up a huge chunk of the porous gray-black Titan rock and heaved it. The rock sailed over the girl; fell with a clatter behind her. It made her give another startled cry as she aimed toward the sound. And simultaneously, Morgan leaped again--with a bound that carried him back over the gully, and landed him almost at the girl's side. She screamed, tried to struggle to her feet, with the gun jerking around. But Morgan gripped the barrel. "Easy," he murmured. "Don't get excited; I won't hurt you." He thought that his tone, if perhaps not his words, would quiet her. And then she gasped, "You--you let me alone!" She spoke English! Morgan was beyond being amazed at anything now. He snatched the rusty old gun from her and tossed it away. She stood docile within his grip, terrified, but defiant. She was younger than he had thought, not over sixteen or seventeen probably. Her single, blue-gray garment, he could see now, was tattered, frayed. It had the look of a fabric fragile with age. It fell from her pink-white shoulders to her thighs. A crudely fashioned animal-skin belt girdled her slender waist. Leather thongs crossed her breast, modeling the dress, and her long black hair lay there in a tangle. Her feet were bare, with toughened soles from long walking on these jagged rocks. "Let me alone," she was muttering. She stood swaying backward in his grip, her dark eyes watchful, alert. He could not miss now the wildness upon her, a weird mixture of savagery and civilization. She looked as though she were figuring only how she could kill him. "Well," he said, "I don't get this at all. What's your name?" "Nada," she gasped. "Nothing else? You speak English so you're from Earth. Now how in the devil--" She suddenly twitched away from him, but he caught her and again she stood panting. "Now listen, take it easy," he said. He drew her down to the rock, and sat beside her, still holding her. "So your name's Nada? Well, Nada, let's talk about this. But first, the main idea is, I'm not going to hurt you, an' I damn' sure won't let you kill me. Get the idea?" "Yes. I understand." "Well, in a nutshell, I'm Morgan--Solo Morgan. Here alone. You might want to call me Tom; that was my original name. I'm here looking for a precious metal. I hope I find it, because it'll make me rich back on earth. And the last thing I did expect to find, here on this God-forsaken little satellite, was a pretty girl like you." It somewhat startled Solo Morgan that his heart seemed beating faster as he stared at her and felt her resisting arms within his grip. An interest in the opposite sex had never been one of his failings. It was completely contrary to his theory that he travels fastest who travels alone. But this somehow was different, startlingly different. "That's my story," he finished. "Now it's your turn." Normally, Solo Morgan always had been alert, under all circumstances, to possible danger. But he was absorbed now. He hadn't noticed the faint sound of flapping wings behind him, nor noticed the weird-looking bird-shape which passed over his head, and vanished as it dropped down into a rock-clump a hundred feet away. But Nada saw it. Her gaze, like the gaze of a trapped animal, was darting around the iridescent darkness. Her hearing, far keener than Morgan's, heard a faint cawing call, as though a parrot were chattering. She tensed in Morgan's grip. "Stop it," he said. "You can't get away from me. What other name have you got besides Nada?" "Nada Livingston. I was from Nairobi." He stared. The name was vaguely familiar. "Dr. Carter Livingston?" he murmured. "Yes. That was my father." * * * * * Morgan remembered now. He had been a boy of ten or eleven when the name of Dr. Carter Livingston had been notorious all over the world. He was a cracked old scientist living in East Africa. As Morgan remembered it, Carter Livingston had had some theory that the wild animals of earth should be protected from the cruelty of man. He wanted laws that no animals should be hunted. Then he had gone to Africa, with new theories that animals were only different forms of humans; undeveloped, untaught, but with a latent ability for learning which no human had yet recognized. Then there were rumors that in the African jungle, Carter Livingston and his young wife had established a trained-animal zoo. Wild tales. Parrots, with their pseudo-human vocal cords, not only chattering English words, but putting a childish but human intelligence into them. Apes that could mouth human words, and think human thoughts. Then Livingston's wife had died, leaving him an infant daughter. There had been some incidents of violence--Livingston's trained apes accused of raiding a nearby Masai village, and killing some of the black children whose fathers had been hunting wild animals in the neighborhood. Livingston had denied the thing as fantastic. But the British authorities had descended upon his animal-colony and cleaned it out. In a rage, Livingston, with his infant daughter, had disappeared. Morgan had been murmuring the story. "That was your father?" he said. "Yes. We came here. He died just a little while ago." Morgan drew in his breath. "And now you're living alone here on Titan?" "Alone? Why--" He heard the flapping wings this time. Startled, his hands dropped from the girl's shoulders as he turned around. A great birdlike shape was fluttering past overhead; a blue thing like a big flamingo. A grotesque bird. Its body seemed feathered, but its huge wings were naked membrane, pointed like a bat's. Its head was round, with a little glistening skull and a great hawked nose. "Caw--caw--coming, Nada--coming, Nada." In that second Morgan sucked in his breath at the gruesome, chattering cry. Just a monstrous parrot? It seemed more than that. It darted down, swooping on as though it were about to attack. Then it suddenly darted up, dropped back of a nearby rock. "Coming--help--Nada--" Its eerie cackled words still sounded. Morgan had snatched out his flash gun. Nada was clutching at him now. "Don't!" she murmured. "That's my friend. You--you must not." Hairy shapes abruptly were materializing from the rocks behind Morgan. He heard a low whining bark; whirled to see a monstrous, shaggy, red-haired animal coming at him. It suggested an ape, yet was unlike one. A large body on two long shaggy legs, with long, dangling arms. A bushy tail, wildly swishing. A round head, with the shaggy red hair dangling over its face where eyes were shining and a mouth was growling. Morgan's gun flashed. But with a cry Nada had knocked up his arm. The bolt went sizzling into the air, with its tiny crack of thunder rolling in muffled reverberations out through the shining night. He had no chance to fire again. The shaggy, oncoming thing pounced. Morgan was aware only that behind it there were others like it. The shaggy body knocked him backward. From its padded paws, fingers like claws came out--bluish fingers like the hands of an ape, clutching at his throat, strangling him. Then he heard the whizz of a thrown chunk of rock. It cracked on his skull so that all the shining darkness burst into a roaring glare of light in his head. Then the light swiftly faded as he sank into the soundless abyss of unconsciousness. * * * * * "You're better now?" He was vaguely aware that cool water was running down his face from his hair and that Nada's voice was softly murmuring to him. "You are better now? Don't die. Tamo is sorry that he hit you." His eyelids had fluttered up. He knew now that she was sponging a wound in his scalp. And all he could see was a blurred interior, and the blurred blob of Nada bending over him. Then her outline clarified. He was lying on something soft, and she was sitting beside him. "All right," he murmured. He grinned. "That was some crack somebody or something gave me." Her face lighted with relief. "One of my goths," she said. "He's sorry.... No, you lie quiet now." He was trying to struggle up on one elbow, but she shoved him back. Beside him there was a cracked old china wash basin. The water in it with which she was sponging his head was red with his blood. "Guess I'm all right now," he muttered. His hand went to his belt. His gun was gone. "Just lie quiet. You'll be all right in a few minutes." He was weak and dizzy; his body bathed in cold sweat. For another minute he closed his eyes and she went on silently sponging his head. He remembered now, vaguely, that he had been conscious enough to realize that he had been dragged here by the weird red-haired animals. It had evidently not been far. Dimly he seemed to recall that they had plunged underground, where there were phosphorescent rocks to light up the subterranean passages with an eerie glow. He opened his eyes again. He could see that phosphorescent glow through the window-openings here. He was in a room--a little grotto with tattered, faded fabric drapes on its walls, a rug on its floor. And two or three pieces of weird-looking, old-fashioned earth-style furniture. Presently he was sitting up. "I'm all right," he declared. "Thanks, Nada." His hand went to his head. "I guess it's stopped bleeding." "Yes. I think so." She was gazing at him with interest now, and Morgan realized he was the only man she had ever seen, except her father. Her bosom rose and fell under the bodice of her tattered dress with her emotion. Morgan understood that faded, old-fashioned earth-dress now. They had been her mother's clothes. And he understood the furnishings. He saw now that a bookcase in a corner of the cave-room contained half a dozen shelves of books. And on a rickety table stood a small portable sewing machine; a hoop with embroidery; needles and thread and a garment in process of mending. Her little world. Solo Morgan gazed around him, from where he lay on a camp cot, and was astonished at the thoughts he was thinking and the emotion he was feeling. "Tell me about yourself," he said gently. "This is your home, eh?" "Yes," she agreed. She told him how her father had brought her up here, how he had taught her from the books which he had brought with them. Queer that there on this moon of Saturn, the wandering, embittered Carter Livingston had found no humans, but an animal, bird and insect life. Yet it was no coincidence, for Livingston had journeyed until he found what he wanted. Himself an educated human, he would give the animals the advantages he had had through the centuries of human advancement. Breed God's creatures upward, some day perhaps to reach the intelligence of man. Morgan stared at the girl as she so earnestly described it. Rot, of course. And yet that flying, flamingo-like thing had certainly talked, and talked much more intelligently than any parrot. It had called for help, and the red-haired ape things had come on the run. Morgan grimaced with the memory. One of those round-headed goths had throttled him with its ape-like hands, while another of them cracked him on the head with a rock. He gazed around the room uneasily now, but none of them was in sight. "Can those goths talk, too?" he demanded. "Yes. A little, but it's hard to understand. A growling mumble. But they're very intelligent. You see, their life-span is nearly ten years, so we only have a few generations that father taught. He said that with use, the vocal cords and the larynx were getting more adapted. Tamo is my best one. And he makes the others understand. They're very gentle." "With you," Morgan supplemented wryly. "Yes. Cah called them for help." "Cah? You mean that big bird?" "Yes. Father bred six generations of his family. And nature made his talking apparatus very adequate for human words." "No argument on that," Morgan agreed. He was gazing through the glowing window-opening of the cave-room. There was vegetation outside. It was like a great lush subterranean forest. Gnarled, fantastic-shaped trees with bluish vines lacing them together. Huge pods hung on them, and monstrous pallid flowers that opened and closed their petals rhythmically as though breathing. * * * * * Gruesome damn things. Morgan was about to ask if what looked like vegetation here might not be more animal than vegetable, when suddenly his attention was caught by a little round red thing that was on the ledge of the rocky window-opening. It was no bigger than the end of his finger--a round, glistening, red-shelled thing with jointed legs protruding from it. Tiny antenna were weaving in front of its single eye, which seemed glaring at him balefully. He made a startled gesture. "What the devil is that?" he demanded. Nada smiled. "One of our insects. Father used to call them rollers. He said on earth you'd consider them of the ant family. They're remarkable little things. Well, I guess you'd say that about earth ants, too, wouldn't you? Terribly strong for their size, with a nasty bite. They build their own houses. They're highly organized, with workers and leaders, and their own armies." "And you can talk to them, too?" Morgan muttered. "Well, no," she said. "Not exactly. But Cah seems to be able to make them understand." The little red-shelled, ball-like thing on the window ledge suddenly hitched out a leg and rolled itself backward; then picked itself up and scurried away like a tiny round crab. "Well," Morgan said, "your father's theories, here on Titan--" A sudden distant growl made him check himself. It was outside; muttered growls, growing louder. He stared inquiringly at Nada. "The goths," she murmured. "Something wrong?" They came in a moment; two of the weird, round-headed animals, dragging something between them. In the background a pack of the others lurked, shaggy red blobs half hidden by the fantastic tangle of vines, their peering eyes like little lanterns among the foliage and the pallid flowers. It was a dead goth which was being dragged here to Nada. With Morgan after her, she ran outside. The huge dead goth lay crumpled. Its companions were mumbling at Nada. Queer form of speech, half animal, half human, so that the mouthed, snarled words of anger now, to Morgan, seemed almost but not quite intelligible. "What happened?" he demanded. The dead goth's face was leprous. Burned into a noisome, pulpy mass as though by a flash bolt. "They found him, lying like that," Nada said. Terror was on her face. "Something--someone with a strange gun of lightning, like the one I took from you." It was dawning on Morgan. Then a flapping of wings sounded. "Coming, Nada. Cah comes." The beaked-nosed, feathered shape of Cah came fluttering; landed by Nada. Weird chattering bird. "Cah saw it, Nada. Men like this one. Out beyond the tunnels, they killed Tagaro. Cah saw them. Cah sees everything--" It fluttered away, excited, like an imbecilic child, chattering with its excitement. Space-pirates! Prowling here, looking for the Zolonite. Doubtless they had seen Morgan's little space-ship; knew he was here, and were looking for him. "They were outside?" Morgan demanded swiftly. "Out near where I found you? Is that what the parrot-thing tried to say?" "Yes," she gasped. "Oh, who could it be? Other earthmen here? You--you said you came alone." "I did. But I can make a pretty darn good guess who it is all right. Nada, listen!" The ring of goths here were all eyeing Morgan suspiciously with weird, baleful eyes set in wrinkled, bluish, ape-like faces. "Tell them I didn't do it," Morgan said hastily. "Tell them bad men did it, if they can manage to understand that much from you." Would the damned growling things jump on him now? "Listen," he added swiftly to the girl. "That's a band of earthmen--space-pirates. They're here to try and steal the Zolonite I came after. Nada, where's that gun of mine you took away from me?" "What--what are you going to do?" she stammered. His eyes hardened. "I don't want them to find you. Understand that!" Morgan knew perfectly well what he was going to try to do--get the girl out of here, into his space-ship. Zolonite or not, he had no intention of trying to fight the space-pirates with this girl as the stake for success or victory. "Get that gun of mine," he commanded. "Hurry it now." * * * * * The girl ran into the cave-room; came back with it. She was trembling; white-faced. "Will--will they really kill you?" "I hope not," Morgan said grimly. "We're not going to stick around here and let them try it. Nada, listen: you show me the way into those tunnels. Tell the goths to stay here, as they'll only complicate things." The goths were sullenly watching, listening. At Nada's vehement command they slunk back, but they still watched Morgan suspiciously. "Into the tunnels?" she stammered. "But why?" He seized her arm. "Yes. Come on." No use telling her that he was going to get her back to earth. She might put up an argument at leaving her animals. He ran with her, through the little cave-room, into a dim, glowing tunnel. "This was the way you brought me in, wasn't it?" he presently demanded as they ran. She nodded. "Yes. The outer surface, not so far ahead." Good enough. He'd slam her into the ship and tell her what it was all about afterward. The tunnel was dark, with just a faint eerie glow of phosphorescence that seemed inherent to the rocks themselves. It was a narrow passage, seeming to wind upward. At intervals, other little corridors crossed it. Occasionally it widened into grottos. They came to a large one with a jagged rocky floor, broken, rocky walls. Here they halted. "Not so far now," Nada was saying. Her face in the dimness was turned toward Morgan, and she was trying to smile--a frightened, puzzled smile. And suddenly he sucked in his breath. Her teeth were shining with blue-green iridescence; luminous with a blue-green light streaming from them! Radioactive, stroboscopic light! The treasure of Zolonite he had come here to find. It must be here close at hand! Morgan gripped the girl and stood still, peering around. "What is it?" she murmured with new terror. "Wait! I'm looking around for something." And then he saw it. Zolonite in almost its pure state. The vein of its out-cropping was a crescent curve diagonally up the wall; and beneath it, shining chunks had crumbled and were lying strewn. Swiftly Morgan stooped, gathered up handfuls, stuffed them into his pockets. Samples, and then he would bring back a mining crew to open this up. And even the samples would be worth a sizable fortune. But the space-pirates wanted this, too. Solo Morgan, at that instant, was not quite clear in his mind what he would try to do. But the feel of the girl's pliant waist within his arm as they ran, decided him. She was certainly more important than the Zolonite. "I'm taking you to my ship," he murmured suddenly. "Don't bother to put up any argument now. That's where you're going." He saw her turn and stare at him. They had come abruptly to the end of the tunnel; the sheen of Saturn-light was on her face, shining in her misted eyes as she regarded him. "Taking me to earth?" she said uncertainly. "I sure am. You can't live out your life here, just for a bunch of weird animals." "But some time you'd bring me back?" she murmured tremulously. "Sure I would. Got to come anyway to mine the Zolonite." Here was the clump of rocks where he had been when first he saw Nada. His leaden cylinder was lying here. He stuffed the Zolonite samples carefully into it. Sealed it. "Now we go down the mountain, Nada, to my ship down there." A sizzling flash with a tiny crack of thunder interrupted him. The bolt from nearby sizzled over their heads as Morgan, with a sweep of his arm, knocked the girl to the ground and flung himself beside her. "That's them," he muttered grimly. "Keep down, Nada." Another bolt cracked with a prismatic shower of sparks on the rocks in front of them. Morgan and the girl were lying in a little depression now, protected by a broken line of rocks with a cliff close behind them. He could see where the pirates were gathered, at the bottom of a small gully some fifty feet away. And then in the silence, an ironic chuckling voice floated over. "Got you, Morgan. No use putting up a fight. Toss out your gun an' we won't kill you." Morgan, watchful for the chance to drill one of them if he showed himself, lay quiet with the huddled girl trembling beside him. "Got your wife with you?" the voice drawled. "That who it is? Come on out and let's have a look at her. We won't hurt her." There was a burst of raucous laughter from the other pirates. Morgan did not reply. His brain was busy trying to find an out. * * * * * Morgan could see that there was no chance for him and the girl to move from where they were lying. He had chanced a leap from here against Nada's old-fashioned explosive-gun with its single small bullet, but he couldn't take such a chance against modern bolt-weapons. The least move would expose them in the full sheen of Saturn-light. They lay still. "So you just want to stay where you are?" the voice called. "Okay, we'll get you." They were invisible; but back down the distant little gully Morgan suddenly saw the blob of a creeping figure; one of the pirates trying to get to where he could chance a leap. Morgan tensed; raised his gun. The shadowed blob moved again; straightened a little. Morgan's flash spat its bolt. A scream mingled with the tiny thunder-crack, and the blob leaped into the air, turned over and crashed down again, inert upon the rocks. It brought a fusillade of shots; but they splattered harmlessly with a great shower of sparks on the blackened rocks. And suddenly the trembling girl gripped Morgan. "Look! Cah is flying over there." She pointed. There was a flapping of wings in the Saturn-light. And the bird's eerie, cawing, chattering voice. "Cah sees them. There they are!" The excited bird's fluttering shape was visible. "Cah sees them! Cah sees everything!" it chattered. A bolt from one of the pirates mingled with its cries. The flash shot up. The huge bird, its weirdly childish voice stilled forever, came wavering down, turning end over end until it thudded heavily on the rocks. "Oh poor Cah," Nada murmured. Then she gasped: "Oh look! There by the little gully." The rocks on the upper lip of the small gully where the crouching pirates were gathered were splashed pale-white by the Saturn-light. And in the glow there now, a thin little red line was visible. A moving line. It stretched back over the rocks, down into another hollow and up again. Morgan caught his breath as he stared. It was a line of tiny, moving red figures. Myriads of them; round things small as the end of his finger. The rolling, red ants. They came hitching themselves, scuttling; a vast little army. And then he saw other lines of them converging on the gully; marching grimly, silently to battle, summoned perhaps by Cah's excited calls. Breathlessly Morgan and the girl watched. The pirates undoubtedly didn't notice the marching red hordes of tiny insects behind them. A dozen thin red moving lines now. Silently but inexorably they crawled over the rocks, down into the gully. Then there was a startled cry. "What in hell!" And one of the pirates incautiously straightened, his arms flailing wildly, his hands plucking at his clothing, at his face. Morgan raised his gun, but Nada shoved it down. "No need," she murmured. "The bites of those red ants are quite poisonous." Silently then, they stood and watched the strange battle. It was a ghastly attack. Within a minute the space-pirates were screaming, staggering. Half a dozen of their frenzied bolts went wild into the air. And then they had flung their guns away, frenzied, demoniac as they fought the swarming, viciously biting little insects crawling upon them. There were four of the men. Morgan could have shot them all as they staggered out into the open, but there was no need. In another minute they were rolling in agony on the ground, with yet more thin red lines converging upon them. And then at last their blood-chilling screams were silent. In the Saturn-light they lay motionless, red with their blood and red with the swarming hordes that crawled over them. Morgan was standing now, with the horrified, shuddering girl trembling against him. The lead cylinder with its treasure of Zolonite was clipped to his belt. But with his arm around Nada he knew that she was the real treasure he had found upon Titan. He held her closer. Nobody would ever be able to call him Solo Morgan again. 
27984	----	RALPH GURNEY'S OIL SPECULATION By JAMES OTIS Author of "The Cruise of the Sprite," "The Clown's Protege," "Roy Barton's Adventures on the Mexican Border," Etc. [Illustration] A. L. BURT COMPANY PUBLISHERS NEW YORK Copyright 1883 BY JAMES ELVERSON RALPH GURNEY'S OIL SPECULATION Renewal Granted to JAMES OTIS KALER, 1911 RALPH GURNEY'S OIL SPECULATION. CHAPTER I. THE "CHUMS." The puffing, panting engine that dragged the long train of heavy cars into the busy little city of Bradford, in the State of Pennsylvania, one day last summer, witnessed through its one white, staring eye, sometimes called the head-light, many happy meetings between waiting and coming friends; but none was more hearty than that between two college mates--one who had graduated the year previous, and the other who hoped to carry off the honors at the close of the next term. "Here at last!" exclaimed George Harnett, as he met his old chum with a hearty clasp of the hand. "In this case, if the hope had been much longer deferred, the heart would indeed have been sick." "It was thoughtless in me, old fellow, not to have sent you word when I concluded to remain at home two days longer, but the fact of the matter is that I did not think you would be at the depot to meet me, but would let me hunt you up, for I suppose you do have some kind of an office." "Yes," laughed the young man, "I have an office; but since my work just now is several miles from here, I am seldom at home, and was obliged to come for you, or run the chance of having you spend a good portion of your vacation hunting for me." "And are you sorry yet that you chose civil engineering for a profession?" "Sorry! Not a bit of it! Up here there is more excitement to it than you are aware of, and before you have finished your vacation, you will say that the life of a civil engineer in the oil fields of Pennsylvania is not by any means monotonous. But come this way. My team is here, and while we are talking we may as well be riding, for we have quite a little journey yet before us, over roads so bad, that you can form no idea of them by even the most vivid description." "But I thought you lived here in Bradford." "I live where my work is, my boy, and since it happens just now to be out of town, my home, for the time being, is in as old and comfortable a farm-house as city-weary mortals could ask for." "Well, I can't say that I shall be sorry to live in the country--for awhile, at least." "Sorry! Well, I hardly think you will be, when you learn what I have to offer you in the way of enjoyment. I am locating some oil-producing lands, in a valley where game is abundant, where the fish prefer an artificial fly to a natural one, and where the moonlighter revels with his harmless-looking but decidedly dangerous nitro-glycerine cartridge." "What do you mean by moonlighter?" asked Ralph, as he seated himself in the mud-bespattered carriage which George pointed out as his. "A moonlighter is one who shoots an oil well regardless of patent rights or those owning them, save when, by chance, he finds himself gathered in by the strong arm of the law." "I thank you, Brother Harnett, for your decidedly clear explanation. I almost fancy that I know as much about moonlighters now as when I asked the question, which is saying a good deal, for you very often contrive, in explaining anything, to leave one even more ignorant than when he consulted you." "If you are willing to listen to as long and as dry a dissertation on oil wells in general, and illegally-opened ones in particular, as ever Professor Gardner favored us with on topics in which we were not much interested, I will begin, stopping now and then only to prevent my teeth from being shaken out of my head as we ride over this road." The two had hardly got out of the "city," and the thoroughly bad character of the road was already apparent. Riding over it was very much like sailing in a small boat on rough water--always down by the head or up by the stern, but seldom on an even keel. "Go on with the lecture," said Ralph, "and while I try to hold myself in the carriage, I will listen." "Because of my friendship for you, I will make it as brief as possible. In the first place, you must know that before oil is struck, the operator finds either a rock formed of sand or of gravel. This is the strata just above the deposit of petroleum. "Of course this must be bored through, if possible, and in the pebbly rock there is no trouble about it. The drills will go through, and the gravel will be forced to the surface without much difficulty. But when the sand-rock is met, it clogs the drills, making it almost impossible to bore through. A heavy charge of nitro-glycerine makes short work of this rock, and out comes the oil. "Now, this method of blasting in oil wells has been patented, or, at least, the cases for the glycerine and the manner of exploding it has, and the company, which has its office in Bradford, use every effort to discover infringements of their patent. Like all owners of patent rights, they charge an extra price for their wares, and the result is that there are parties who will, for a much smaller amount of money, shoot a well and infringe the patent at the same time. These people are called moonlighters, and the risk they run of losing their lives or their liberty is, to say the least, very great. The lecture-hour has now been fully, and I hope I may say profitably, employed." "If it profits one to learn of your friends, the moonlighters, then your lecture has been a success. But how do you find excitement in anything they do? Surely they do not make public their unlawful doings." "Oh, everything save the shooting of the well is done legally, and with many even that is questionable! The cases are to be tried, and many believe that the owners of the patent have really no rights in the premises. The owners or prospective owners of the land whereon the wells are to be sunk, employ me to survey their tracts, and by that means I frequently make the acquaintance of those people who, for the almighty dollar, will peril their lives driving around the country with nitro-glycerine enough to blow an entire town up." "Let me trespass once more on you for dry detail, and then I will learn anything else I may want to know from observation. What is nitro-glycerine?" "I will answer your question by quoting as nearly as I can from what I read the other day. It is composed of: Aqueous vapor 20 parts. Carbonic acid 58 " Oxygen 3.5 " Nitrogen 18.5 " "Until 1864 it found no practical application, except as a homeopathic remedy for headache, similar to those which it causes. In that year, Alfred Nobel, a Swede, of Hamburg, began its manufacture on a large scale, and, though he sacrificed a brother to the terrible agent he had created, he persevered until in its later and safer forms nitro-glycerine has come into wide use and popularity. It is a clear, oily, colorless, odorless, and slightly sweet liquid, and can, with safety, only be poured into some running stream if one wishes to be rid of it. Through the pores of the skin, or in the stomach, even in small quantities, this oil causes a terrible headache and colic, while headaches also result from inhaling the gases of its combustion. It has thirteen times the force of gunpowder, exploding so much more suddenly than that agent does, that in reality it is much more powerful, and it is this same rapid explosive power that prevents it from being used in fire-arms." "You would make a first-rate professor, George," said Ralph, laughing, "and you may refer to me in case you should desire to procure such a position. Now I think I am armed with sufficient knowledge to be able to meet your oily friends, the moonlighters, and have some idea of what they mean when they speak." "If I am not mistaken we shall meet some of them very soon, without trying hard; but if we do not, I will take you to one of their cabins as soon as we may both feel inclined to go." "Don't think that I have come here to spend my vacation simply with the idea that I am at liberty to make drafts at sight on your time," replied Ralph, as an unusually rough portion of the road necessitated his exerting all his strength to prevent being thrown out of the wagon. "I intend to be of every possible assistance to you, and when I cannot do that, if you are still obliged to labor, I will extract no small amount of enjoyment out of your farm-house and its surroundings. But at any time that you have a few hours to spare, I will be only too well pleased to meet with any adventure, from nitro-glycerine blasts to the perils of trout-fishing." By this time the conversation ceased, owing to Ralph's interest in the scenery around him, and the curious combination of oil-tanks and derricks with which the landscape was profusely dotted. From Bradford to Sawyer the road winds along at the base of the hills through a lovely valley, that seems entirely given over to machinery for the production and storage of oil. On every hand are the tall, unsightly constructions of timber that form the derricks, looking not unlike enormous spiders, as they stand on the sides of the mountains or in the ravines, while the network of iron pipes, through which the oil is forced by steam-pumps from the wells to Jersey City, are fitting webs for such spiders. Huge iron tanks, capable of holding from twenty to forty thousand barrels of oil, dot the valley quite as thickly as do the blots of ink on a school-boy's first composition, and form storage places for this strange product of earth, when the supply is greater than the demand. It is truly a singular scene, and he who visits this portion of the country for the first time cannot rid himself of the impression that he has, by some mysterious combination of circumstances, been transported to some remote and unknown portion of the globe. George, to whom this scene was perfectly familiar, did not seem inclined to allow his friend to remain in silent wonder, for he persisted in supplying him with a fund of dry detail, which effectually prevented any indulgence of day-dreams. Although Ralph would have preferred to gaze about him in silence, George told him of the Pipe-Line Company, who owned the greater portion of the huge iron receptacles for oil; who also owned the network of iron pipes, through which they forced the oil to the market at a charge of twenty-five cents per barrel. He also told him that this company connected the main line of pipes with each tank owned by the oil producers, supplying a small steam-pump at each connection, and, at stated times, drew off from private tanks the oil. He even went into the particulars of the work, explaining how each man could tell exactly the number of barrels the company had taken from his tank by measuring the depth of the oil before and after the drawing-off process. Then he described how these huge receptacles were frequently struck by lightning, setting fire to the inflammable liquid, and causing consternation everywhere in the valley; of the firing of solid shot into the base of the tanks to make a perforation that would allow the oil to run off, and of the loss of property and danger of life attending such catastrophes. So much of dry detail or interesting particulars of the oil business had the young engineer to tell, that he had hardly finished when the horses turned sharply into a narrow road, over which the trees formed a perfect archway, that led to just such a farm-house as suggests by outside appearance all the good things and comforts of life. "This is to be home to you for a while," said George, breaking off abruptly in his dissertation on the price and quality of oil, in which Ralph was not very much interested, "and I can safely guarantee it to be a place which you will be sorry to leave after once knowing it." "It certainly does not seem to be a place around which anything exciting can be found," thought Ralph; but, since it was only rest from study he was in search of, he was content with that which he saw. CHAPTER II. A NEW ACQUAINTANCE. Ralph Gurney was one who thoroughly enjoyed everything in which pleasure could be found, and even while George was caring for his horses, of which he was very fond, Ralph had already begun a survey of the farm on which he was to spend his vacation. The cattle, poultry, horses, dogs, and even the cat, had received some attention from him, and he was on his way to the sheep-pasture near by to make the acquaintance of the woolly members of the flock, when the sharp ping of a bullet was heard as it whistled by his head, while, a second later, the report of a rifle rang out sharply. There was something so entirely unexpected and so thoroughly startling in this mode of salutation in so peaceful a place, that Ralph leaped two or three feet in his fright, and at the same time saw the hole in the brim of his hat, which showed how near the deadly missile had come to him. Almost any one would be alarmed at such a visitor, even though he might have been expecting this attention, and Ralph came very near trembling with fear as he realized how narrow had been his escape from death. He looked quickly around to see who was using him as a target; but no one was in sight. The sheep had been quite as much startled by the report as he had by the proximity of the bullet; therefore, there was no reason to suspect that they had had anything to do with this decided frightening of the new boarder. Ralph was on the point of calling out to George for an explanation of this apparently reckless shooting, when a voice from amid a small clump of trees shouted: "Hold out your hat and I will put a bullet through the center of it." Even if Ralph had not been angry because of the danger he had been forced to run, he would not have accepted any such cheerful invitation, and, instead of replying, he looked carefully around in search of the speaker. "Hold out your hat, and I will show you what I can do," continued the voice, while its owner persistently remained hidden. "I don't know who you are," said Ralph, speaking sharply; "but from what I have already seen of your reckless shooting, I consider it to be some one's duty to teach you how to handle fire-arms." "And you propose to do it, eh?" was the question, as a boy eighteen or nineteen years of age, with a face that was the perfect picture of good humor, walked out of the thicket. On his shoulder he carried a rifle, and in his left hand some partridges and a fox-skin. "That was a nasty shave for you," he continued, in a half-apologetic tone; "but, you see, I hadn't any idea there was any one around. Farmer Kenniston is down on the meadow, and Harnett went to town this morning; so you see that, by rights, you ought not have been here." "And because, in your opinion, I should have been somewhere else, you concluded to send me away by the most certain and effectual method?" asked Ralph, having by no means subdued his anger, although it was vanishing quite rapidly before the pleasant tone and face of the boy who had come so near killing him. "Well, you see, I didn't know you or any one else was within a mile of the place. I had a charge left in my rifle, and I wanted to see if I could knock a knot out of that second board in the barn. Just as I pulled the trigger, you came from behind the shed, and then I couldn't call the bullet back. I am sorry that I startled you so, and I was in hopes you would hold out your hat, so that you could have seen how handy I am with a rifle, which would have made you feel easier." "I must confess that I can't understand how I could be soothed by any proof of your skill as a marksman," replied Ralph, with a smile, his anger now almost completely gone. "Of course, I know that you didn't intend to shoot so near me; but in the future I advise you to empty your rifle before you come so near to a house." "But I have wanted to put a bullet into that knot from the trees back there ever since I have been here, and now let's see if I struck it fairly." As if he considered that he had made all necessary apologies for the shot which had startled Ralph, the boy started towards the barn, and in another instant he was pointing triumphantly to the offending knot in the board, which had been completely shattered by the bullet. "There!" he cried. "Harnett said I couldn't hit it from that dead pine tree, and that even if I did succeed in hitting it, I couldn't split it. Now we'll see what he has got to say to that." Ralph had nothing to say as to the argument between his friend and the stranger, and in the absence of anything else to say, he asked: "Do you live here?" "I am living here just now, and shall for some weeks longer, I suppose. You are Ralph Gurney, whom Harnett has been expecting, I fancy?" "Yes; but if George has told you who I am in advance of my coming, he has not been so liberal to me in regard to yourself." "That probably arose from the fact that I am no one in particular, while, on the contrary, you are to become one of the particularly bright and shining lights in the medical world. I am only Bob Hubbard." Who Bob Hubbard might be Ralph had no idea; but even though the young gentleman spoke of himself in such a deprecating way, it was easy to see that he did not consider himself of slight consequence in the world. He was a bright, jovial, generous looking boy, with a certain air about him which made the shot, fired so dangerously near Ralph, seem just such a reckless act as might be expected of him. "Do you like hunting and fishing?" he asked, after he found that Ralph was not disposed to say anything about the profession of medicine he had chosen, and which George had evidently spoken of. "Indeed I do," was the decided reply. "Is there much sport around here?" "All you want. I have only been out about two hours, and I have got these," he said, as he held up his game. "And as for fishing, you can catch trout until your arms ache--providing they bite rapidly enough." "Indeed!" replied Ralph, dryly. "I fancy I have seen as good almost anywhere. Do you go fishing very often?" "Nearly every day." "Then, if George has any business to attend to this afternoon, suppose you and I see if the fish will bite fast enough to make our arms ache pulling them in." Bob hesitated in what Ralph thought a very peculiar way, and said, after a pause of some moments: "I'd like to, but I have an important engagement this afternoon, and I hardly see how I can arrange it." There was certainly nothing singular in his not being at liberty to accept the proposition made so suddenly, and Ralph would have thought his refusal the most natural thing in the world had it not been for his evident embarrassment when none seemed reasonable. However, the young pleasure-seeker attached no importance to what seemed like singular behavior on the part of this newly-made acquaintance, and was about to make another proposition for a fishing excursion, when Harnett suddenly made his appearance. "Hello, Bob!" he cried, "you've been making the acquaintance of my chum, have you?" "Yes, after a fashion. I fired at that knot in the barn you said I couldn't hit from the pine tree, and came near putting a bullet through his head. But I hit the knot, and what's more, I split it." "And here is a hole in the brim of my hat, to prove that he did fire at it," said Ralph, laughing, as he held up his perforated hat to display the mark of the bullet. Harnett looked with no small degree of alarm at the evidence of Bob's shooting, and said, sternly: "I think it is quite time that you became a trifle more careful with your fire-arms, Bob. You have already had several narrow escapes, and will end by killing some one, if you don't stop shooting at every promising mark you see." "I'm not half as careless as I might be," said Bob, earnestly. "This is the first time that I have ever really come near hurting any one." "What about the time when you came near hitting Farmer Kenniston, and killed a lamb? Have you forgotten the untimely death of Mrs. Kenniston's favorite duck, or your adventure with the red calf in the pasture?" "Oh, those don't count--at least none except the lamb scrape are worth talking about, Harnett, so don't read me one of your long-winded lectures; and, now that I have hit the knot in the barn, I promise not to shoot at anything within half a mile of the place. I'm going down to town for a while, and when I get through with what I have on hand, we'll make some arrangement to show your friend the oil region." As he spoke Bob went into the stables, and when the two friends were alone again, George asked: "Well, Ralph, how do you like what you have seen of the moonlighters? Not very ferocious, eh?" "What do you mean? I haven't seen any moonlighters yet." "Indeed! You have been talking for the last ten minutes with the most successful of them. Bob Hubbard enjoys the rather questionable distinction of being the most noted one in this section of the country." Ralph looked at his friend in speechless astonishment for several minutes; this careless, good-natured boy was very far from being the famous moonlighter his fancy had conjured up, and it is barely possible that he was disappointed at not having seen some more savage looking party, for he had speculated considerably about these people who explode nitro-glycerine in an illegal manner. "If I am not mistaken," continued Harnett, "he is going to shoot a well to-night, and I guess there will be no difficulty in getting his consent for you to be present. Wait here, and I will talk with him." George hurried away toward the stables, leaving Ralph in a curious condition of mingled wonder and surprise that in this very peaceful-looking place there could be found such an evident fund for adventure. The gaining of Bob's consent for Ralph to be present at the shooting of the well was not such a difficult matter, judging from the very short time George found it necessary to talk with him. When Harnett came from the stable, he told Ralph that the necessary permission had been given, and that they would start for the cabin of the moonlighters at once, in order that none of the details of the work might be lost. While they were speaking, Bob drove out of the stable behind a pair of small gray horses, which were so spirited that their driver could pay no attention to anything but them. "I'll see you again very soon," he shouted; and hardly had he uttered the words before he was tearing along the rough road at a rate of speed that threatened a rapid dissolution of the light carriage. If George had any business to attend to on that day, he evidently made up his mind to neglect it, for he began to make his arrangements for the journey with quite as much eagerness and zest as displayed by Ralph. Since it was by no means certain that the well would be opened that night, owing to the vigilance of the owners of the torpedo patent, George made preparations to remain away from Farmer Kenniston's all night, taking blankets, food, fishing-tackle and rifles, as if their excursion was to be one simply of a sporting nature. "It wouldn't do for us to drive out to the moonlighters' cabin as if we were going to see a well shot," he said, in reply to Ralph's questions of what he proposed doing with rifles and fishing-rods; "for, if we were seen, it would be quickly reported in town, and Bob would have the whole posse of Roberts Brothers' force upon him. Now, there would be nothing thought of our going out fishing, which fully accounts for my preparations. I have known Bob to wait for a week before he dared explode a charge, and I don't care to get mixed up in any encounter between these two sets of torpedo men." "I don't want any harm to come to him through me," replied Ralph, gleefully, "but I should not be at all sorry to see just a little excitement in the way of a chase of the moonlighters." "There is every chance that you will be fully satisfied before you leave this portion of the country," said George, grimly; and then, as his horses were ready for the road once more, he added: "Get in, and, if nothing happens, I will show you the cabin of the moonlighters in less than an hour." CHAPTER III. THE CABIN OF THE MOONLIGHTERS. Bob Hubbard had been away from the Kenniston farm-house nearly half an hour when Ralph and George left it, but the latter was so well acquainted with the country that he did not need any guide to the cabin, and could not have had one, had he so desired, for Bob was far too cautious to be seen leading any one to his base of operations. It was well known by the owners of the torpedo patents that Robert Hubbard was the most skillful of all the moonlighters, and whenever he was seen traveling toward any of the wells that were being bored, he was followed, but, thanks to the fleetness of his horses, he had never been seen at his work by any one who would inform on him. Bob believed, as did a great many, that the firm holding the patent had no legal right to prevent any one from exploding nitro-glycerine by the means of a percussion cap placed in the top of a tin shell or cartridge. Several cases were before the courts undecided, and until a decision was reached, the owners of the patent would do all in their power to prevent any one from interfering in the business which they proposed to make a monopoly. Therefore, when Bob went about his work, he did so with quite as much mystery as if he had been engaged in some decidedly unlawful act. The ride from Sawyer, among the mountains, was quite as rough a one as that from Bradford, and Ralph found that he had about as much as he could attend to in keeping the guns, fishing-rods and himself in the carriage, without attempting to carry on any extended conversation with his friend. It was, therefore, almost in silence that the two rode along until George turned the horses abruptly from the main road into the woods, saying, as he did so: "If I am not mistaken, this path will lead us directly to Bob's headquarters." He was not mistaken, for before they had ridden a mile into the woods, they emerged into a clearing, in the midst of which stood a small log-house and stable. Instead of windows, the hut had stout plank shutters, which prevented any one from looking in, even if they did prevent the occupants from gazing out, and the door had more the appearance of having been made to resist an attack than simply to keep the wind or cold out. The stable was in keeping with the hut, so far as an appearance of solidity went; and as its one door was closely shut, with no bars or locks on the outside, one could fancy that when it was occupied, a guard remained on the inside, where the fastenings of the door evidently were. "I guess we have got here too soon," said Ralph, as George stopped the horses in front of the hut, without any signs of life having been seen. "There is a smoke from the chimney," said George, as he pointed to the clumsy affair of mud and sticks from which a thin, blue curl of smoke could be dimly seen, "and if they are ready to let us in, we shall soon see some one." The two sat patiently in the carriage several moments, and at the end of that time the door of the hut was opened by a young man standing in the doorway, to whom George said: "Well, Dick, hasn't Bob got here yet?" "Yes, he's here; but we didn't open the door at first because we were not sure but that you had been followed." Then turning toward the barn, the young man shouted, "Come out here, Pete, and take care of these horses!" In response to this demand the stable door was opened as cautiously as if the man behind it feared a dozen were ready to pounce upon him, and then, much as if he were unfolding himself, a tall negro came out, leading the horses away without speaking, almost before Ralph and George had time to leap to the ground. "Get into the hut as quickly as possible," George said to Ralph; and as the three entered, the door was securely barred behind them with two heavy beams that would have resisted almost any ordinary force that might have been used against them. The hut boasted of but one room, in which were to be seen piles of blankets that had evidently been used as beds, cooking utensils, provisions, sheets of tin, tools such as are used by tinsmiths, and, in fact, as varied an assortment of goods as could well have been gathered into so small a compass. In one corner of the room the floor of earth had been excavated, until a space about six feet square and four deep had been formed, and into this excavation was packed a number of square tin cans, which Ralph felt certain contained that powerful agent, nitro-glycerine. Bob was at work soldering together a long tin shell, about six inches in diameter and fully ten feet long, and he called out, as his friends entered: "Come right in. Don't be afraid that you will be shot at, for we drop all that kind of business here for fear we might all go up together. This, Mr. Gurney, is the moonlighters' cabin, and I am free to confess that it is not the most cheerful place in the world." "I don't find as much fault with the cabin as I do with what you keep stored in those innocent-looking tin cans," replied Ralph, as he seated himself on a pile of blankets at a respectful distance from the glycerine. "Oh, that's harmless enough so long as you leave it alone!" replied Bob, carelessly, and then as he resumed his work of soldering, he asked: "Did you see anything of Jim as you came in?" "No; where is he?" "Out by the road somewhere. We heard that our particular friends in town had got wind of the fact that we were going to put in a charge to-night, so Jim is doing guard duty outside, leaving Dick Norton and I to do the tinker's work. We expected to have gotten our shells all made in town; but they are looking out so sharp for us just now that it was entirely too much of a risk to bring them out here." "How did they learn that you were going to work to-night?" asked George. "That's more than I can say, unless old Hoxie was fool enough to let it out that we were going to shoot his well for him," replied Bob, working savagely with the soldering iron, much as if he would have been pleased had he been using it on Mr. Hoxie's too ready tongue. "Do you anticipate _much_ trouble?" asked Ralph, with just a shade of anxiety, beginning to realize that it would not be the most pleasant thing in the world to commence his vacation by being arrested as a moonlighter. "That's just what I can't say. We may have it, and we may not; but there's one thing certain, and that is that I'll shoot that well if I don't get back to the Kenniston farm for three months." "I don't believe that they are even looking for us. They think we went out of the business two weeks ago," said Dick Norton, as he, in a very unworkmanlike manner, attempted to aid Bob. "You see, Jim is nervous, and the least thing frightens him." "Something has startled him, at all events!" exclaimed Bob, running to the door as a low, quick whistle was heard from the outside. Dick, despite the rather contemptuous way in which he had spoken, also appeared to think something serious had happened, for he joined Bob at the door, looking very serious as both of them quickly unfastened the bars, opening the door just as a young man ran in from the woods, breathless and excited. "What is it, Jim? What has happened?" asked Bob, replacing the heavy bars instantly the newcomer was inside the building. "Newcombe and five men have just turned into the path, coming down here as if they knew just what they should find." For a moment Bob and Dick were silent, and Ralph had an opportunity to ask George: "Who is Newcombe?" "A man in the employ of the owners of the patent, and one who has threatened several times to secure the arrest of Bob." Dick's first act, after he fully realized what Jim had said, was to cover the fire, at which they had been soldering, with ashes, in order to prevent any smoke from escaping through the chimney, and by that time Bob had recovered all his presence of mind. "Even if they have at last found the hut, they will be puzzled to get into it, or to get us out," he said, as he noted the fastenings of the window-shutters, and uncovered a small aperture which served as a loop-hole through which everything that occurred outside could be seen. "You ought to have warned Pete," said George, not feeling remarkably well pleased at the chance of being besieged as a moonlighter, but yet anxious that his friends should elude arrest where the cartridges and explosive fluid would be sufficient proof against them. "There is no need of that," replied Bob. "He wouldn't show himself under any circumstances unless we called him, and from the loft of the stable he can see all that is going on." Ralph was the most uncomfortable of the party. Not being so familiar with the doings of the moonlighters, nor acquainted with the general feeling of the public against them, the idea of being thus hunted like a criminal was very repugnant to him. It was as if his companions were engaged in some crime, instead of simply infringing a patent, the legality of which had not been fully tested, and, if he could have had his choice, he would have been miles away from that spot just then. "There they come!" exclaimed Bob from his post of observation, and, looking out for a moment, Ralph saw six men riding into the clearing directly toward the house. Almost before he had time to regain his seat, and just as Bob held up his hand as a signal for silence, a knock was heard at the door, as if some one was pounding with the butt-end of a whip. No one made any reply, and it seemed to Ralph as if he could hear the pulsations of his own heart, so oppressive was the silence. Again the summons was repeated, and a gruff voice cried: "Open the door a moment. I wish to speak with Mr. Robert Hubbard." Then there was a long silence, and, seeing the look of anxiety on Ralph's face, George said, in a low whisper: "Don't look so distressed, my boy. Those men have got no more right to enter here than you have to go into another man's dwelling. If they should succeed in getting in, however, they would find sufficient to prove that Bob was about to infringe their patent; but, as it is, they have no authority to do anything, although Bob will hardly get a chance to shoot the Hoxie well to-night." "That's just what I will do," whispered Bob, who had heard George's remark. "I will put in that charge if they camp where they are all night." The men on the outside waited some moments in silence, and then the request was repeated, while at the same time footsteps could be heard as if some of them had gone toward the stable. "They might easily batter in one of the windows," said Ralph, as the pounding at the door was continued. "They would hardly try that plan," replied George, with a meaning smile. "There are a hundred or two quarts of nitro-glycerine stored here, needing only the necessary concussion to explode them. Those men know quite as well as we do how unpleasant such liquid may become, and I assure you that they will strike no very heavy blows on the building." It was a singular position for any one to be in, and Ralph was far from being comfortable in his mind, as he awaited the result of this visit to the cabin of the moonlighters. CHAPTER IV. A REGULAR SIEGE. Ralph, simply a visitor to the cabin of the moonlighters, felt far more uncomfortable than did his hosts, to whom alone there was any danger. As the party waited silently for any move by those outside, Ralph had plenty of time to review his own position, and this review was far from pleasant or reassuring. In that section of the country the fact of being arrested as a moonlighter did not imply either disgrace or crime; but in Ralph's home, where nothing was known of such an industry, save when occasionally a newspaper item was read but not understood, the news of his arrest while trying illegally to "shoot" a well, would cause as much consternation and sorrow as if he had attempted to shoot a man. It was far from being a pleasant beginning to his vacation, and he would have been much better satisfied with himself if he had not made any attempt to penetrate the mysteries of the moonlighters' dangerous calling. While these uncomfortable thoughts were presenting themselves to Ralph, Bob Hubbard was standing on a rudely-constructed table, in order that he might keep a watch upon Newcombe and his men, and from time to time he whispered to his companions of that which he saw. "They've got tired trying to find out anything at the stable, and now they're coming this way. If we keep perfectly quiet they will begin soon to believe that no one is here, and then, very likely, they will go away." It was in the highest degree necessary that these men should be thrown off the scent if possible, and each one in the hut remained motionless as statues, but, as was shown a moment later, their silence was fruitless, owing to the defective construction of their furniture. "Now they are gathering close around the door," continued Bob, from his post of observation; and then, fearing he might betray himself even through the loop-hole, he began cautiously to descend. It was as if his very efforts to move without noise hastened the catastrophe he was trying to avert, for as he started to lower himself from the table, the entire structure gave way, and he came to the floor with such a crash as could have been heard many yards away. There was no need of question as to whether Bob's downfall had been heard by those outside, for at the moment a low, involuntary cry of triumph was heard, which did not detract from the unfortunate moonlighter's discomfiture. Had Bob cried out his name he could not have proclaimed his presence any more plainly, and as he disentangled himself from amid the wreck of the table, his face spoke eloquently the anger he felt, either at his own carelessness or the weakness of the table. "It's all up now," said Jim, despondently. "There was a chance that they might get tired in time, and go away; but now they will stay here until they see us leave." "Well, let them stay," said Bob, savagely. "I have come here to get ready to shoot the Hoxie well, and I'll do it before I go home again." "Perhaps you will, and perhaps you won't," said Jim, doubtingly; "but if my opinion's worth anything, you won't." Bob made no reply to this; but attacked the tin cartridges on which he had been working with an energy that told plainly of his determination; although how it might be possible for him to do more than to get ready for the work, no one could imagine. He no longer tried to be silent, but made so much bustle with his work that George said: "What makes you so careless, Bob? Even if they did hear you when you fell, there is no reason why you should advertise the fact that you are making cartridges." "What difference does it make what they hear now?" asked Bob, not even looking up from his work as he spoke. "Do you fancy that Newcombe, finding us here, does not know just as well as we do what there is inside here? If we remain quiet, he will say to himself that we are all ready for the shot, and only waiting for him to get out of the way before we let it off. If we work, he will know no more, and we may as well take things comfortable." "It isn't any use for us to try to do anything," said Dick, disconsolately. "Newcombe will stay right where he is until we go out, and the best thing we can do is give the thing up for a while." "Yes," interrupted Jim, "let's go home, and wait until we can give him the slip and get out again." "I'll do nothing of the kind," replied Bob, doggedly. "I agreed to shoot Hoxie's well to-night, and I'm going to do it." "You can't without Newcombe's seeing you, and you know that your arrest would follow as soon after that as he could get out a warrant," said George, thinking it was high time for him to interfere with advice. "They have never been able to get any proof against you yet, and you don't want to give them the chance now just through spite." "I'm not going to give them the chance," said Bob, calmly. "I am going to take what I need out of this place while they are guarding it, and without their seeing me. If any of you fellows are afraid, and want to go home, you know how to get there; but I am going to stay, and do just as I have said." Bob could have used no better argument, if he had been anxious to have his companions remain with him, than when he proposed they should go home if they were afraid. Much as Ralph would have liked to, he did not think of leaving, when to do so was to be considered proof that he was afraid, and he, as well as the others, settled themselves down to await the result of Bob's plan, whatever it might be. Those on the outside, however, were not as contented in their waiting, as they showed in a short time, when Newcombe's voice could be heard addressing those whom he believed he had "run to earth." "Say, boys!" he cried, "you know very well that I shall stay here until you come out, and the best thing you can do is to give the job up for a while, for I promise you that you will get no chance to do the work this time." It was quite evident that Mr. Newcombe had no more desire to remain outside of the hut on guard than Ralph and George had to remain inside, and that he was anxious to put a speedy end to what had every appearance of being a long job. It was plain to be seen that he neither understood nor relished this singular behavior on the part of those whom he had no authority to arrest until they had committed some overt act, and that he was anxious to bring the case to an issue at once. The others looked at Bob, expecting he would make some reply to the proposition, but he made no sign that he had even heard what had been said. He worked industriously at the long tin tubes, neither speaking nor looking up. "You know that I have got wind of what you are going to do to-night," continued Newcombe, from the outside, "and you know that I shall stay right here until you leave; so what's the use of acting so childishly about it? Come right out like men, and begin the thing over at some other time." Even Ralph could understand that, in his eagerness to be away, Mr. Newcombe was making a great mistake in thus pleading with those over whom he could have no control until after their work was done, and Dick's face lightened wonderfully as he began to hope the "torpedo detective," as Newcombe was called, might tire of his watching and go away. All the inmates of the hut appeared to share the same hope, and Jim at once began to replace the broken table with some empty boxes, in order that he might have access to the loop-hole. "What will be the result of all this?" Ralph asked of George, as the two seated themselves comfortably in one corner of the room, where they would at the same time be out of Bob's way, and see all that was going on. "That I can't say. It may be forty-eight hours before Bob gives up the scheme he has evidently formed, and in the meanwhile here we are prisoners, for we cannot ask to leave the hut until the others do. It promises to be a tedious thing for us; but you remember that you wished there might be some excitement other than the mere shooting of the well." "Yes," replied Ralph, with a laugh, "I remember that I was foolish enough to make some such remark, and I am in a fair way to get all I wanted." By this time Jim had built up a shaky sort of a platform, by which he was enabled to climb to the loop-hole, and he at once gave the result of his outlook to his companions. "They are unharnessing the horses," he cried, in a tone of disappointment; for he had almost persuaded himself that they would leave the place at once. "Newcombe's team is directly in front, and the other two are drawn up on either side, about fifty yards from it. They are preparing for a regular siege." "Which is the most fortunate thing for us that could have happened," said Bob, contentedly. "Why? I don't see how we can do anything when they are all ready to follow us the moment we show ourselves out of doors," said Dick. "If you can't, I can," replied Bob, working leisurely at his cartridges, and with as much precision as if the "torpedo detectives" were miles away. "Tell me what you intend to do." "I'll show you when everything is ready, Dick, and not before. You have said that we couldn't do anything while they were here; therefore, whatever my plan may be, it is better than giving the whole thing up. Now, if your fears will permit, suppose you take hold and help me while Jim watches our friends outside." It was as if Dick understood for the first time that while they were bewailing their fate that Newcombe should have found their hiding-place, Bob was working industriously at the task on hand, and he began to help him at once, which employment had the effect of dispelling his fears in a wonderful degree. "Three of the men are watching the house from the front, while Newcombe and the other two are going towards the stable," said Jim; and then he added, excitedly: "I believe that rascal Pete is talking with them, for they are standing there now, looking up towards the roof as if they saw or heard some one." Dick was disposed to leave his work at this startling announcement but Bob's industry had a quieting effect upon him, and he continued in his office of helper, although with evident mental anxiety. "Now they have called one of the other men over, and all four of them are going through the motions of a conversation. Now Newcombe has taken some money out of his pocket, and is holding it up in his hand." There was a moment of silence in the hut, during which all the boys, even including Bob, awaited in anxiety the result of this evident bribe, and then Jim said, excitedly: "Pete has shown himself, and is reaching out with the pitch-fork for the money. He is selling us to Newcombe, who will know now exactly what we were going to do." CHAPTER V. BOB'S SCHEME. From what Jim could see from the loop-hole, there was every reason for the young moonlighters to believe that the negro Pete, whom they hired, was betraying them to Newcombe, and each one felt more than uneasy when Jim reported that the detective had fastened some money on one of the prongs of the hay-fork. But they were somewhat relieved when Bob said: "If you weren't all a good deal frightened, you would remember that Pete hasn't been told where we were going. He doesn't know anything more than Newcombe himself does, and if he can make a few dollars for nothing, why let him." "But what are they giving him money for?" asked Jim, who was even more disturbed by this apparent treachery on the part of their servant than were the others. "For an answer to that question, I shall be obliged to refer you to the worthy Pete himself. At all events, the only harm he could do us would be to let Newcombe know when we leave here--in case he don't want to wait--and that is just what I fancy Pete himself won't know." As soon as the boys realized that Pete had no secrets of theirs worth the purchasing, they grew more easy in their minds, and were inclined to look upon this giving of money by Newcombe as a very good joke. Jim had nothing of interest to report for nearly ten minutes after this, during all of which time the detective and his men had been engaged in earnest conversation with the negro, and then he announced that they were returning to their wagons. They had not unharnessed their horses, but had slipped the bridles from them that they might make a dinner from the rich grass, and yet be ready for a start at a moment's notice. After their return to the front of the house, one of the men drove away with one of the teams, after having received some instructions from Newcombe, and as it was nearly dark, the boys believed that the detective had sent for food, since there was no longer any doubt about his having regularly besieged the house. All this time Bob had continued his work, assisted by Dick, and it was not until the setting sun had distorted the shadows of the trees into dark images of giants that he announced its completion. "There!" he cried, triumphantly, as he laid the last tin tube by the side of the other two, "we are all ready, and in two hours more we will start." "In two hours Newcombe and his men will be there just as they are now," said Jim, rather impatiently, for he thought Bob was assuming to be able to do very much more than was possible. "I suppose they will," was the quiet reply, "and I should not be very much surprised if we should see them there twenty-four hours later." "What is it you propose doing, Bob?" asked George, who, thoroughly tired of the inactivity as was Ralph, was only anxious to know when their irksome captivity would come to an end. "I'll tell you. In the first place, how far is Hoxie's well from here in a straight line?" "Directly through the woods, I suppose it is not more than half a mile. I surveyed the next tract to it, and I fancy that is about the distance." "And if we should start from the back of the hut, traveling in a straight line, we should come to it?" "Yes; there would be no difficulty about that." "Then I propose that we simply go out through the back window, unless Newcombe has sufficient wits about him to station one of his men there. We can, by making two trips, carry enough glycerine to shoot the well in good style, and by midnight we should be all ready for the work." The plan was so simple, and with so many elements of success about it, that Bob's audience testified to their appreciation of it by vigorous applause, which must have mystified the worthy Mr. Newcombe considerably. "In an hour from now we can begin work. Ralph, who might possibly have some compunctions about carrying a couple of cans of glycerine through the woods, where to strike one against a tree might result in his immediate departure from the world, shall carry the cartridges. Then there will be four of us, each of whom can carry eight quarts. Two trips will give us sixty-four quarts, and that will be enough to start the oil from Mr. Hoxie's well, if there is any there." Bob's plan was quite as dangerous as it was simple. To carry eight quarts of glycerine through the woods when a mis-step might explode it, was such a task as any one might well fear to undertake. But the desire to leave the detective on a weary vigil while they pursued their work unmolested was such an inducement, as caused each one, even Ralph, to be anxious to try it. The night was not as favorable for the scheme as it might have been, for the moon was nearly full, and objects could be distinguished almost as readily as at noonday, save when under the veil cast by the shadows. This moonlight, Bob thought, would not interfere with their plan, since from the back of the house to the forest was but a few yards, and unless Newcombe should station one of his men there, the building would screen them from view. In case they got safely away from the house, the light would aid them, both in their journey through the woods and in their work after they arrived at the well. For some time the boys enjoyed thoroughly the anticipation of fooling Mr. Newcombe, and they might have continued to do so until it would have been too late to accomplish the work, had not Bob reminded them that they had no time to lose. Then they made their preparations for the journey or flight, whichever it might be called. The long, tin cartridges were tied together securely, with wads of paper between to prevent them from rattling; the cans of nitro-glycerine were placed by the window, where they could be gotten at readily, and Bob produced a three-cornered piece of iron, about four feet long, which weighed twenty or thirty pounds. "It will be quite an addition to your load; but I fancy you will feel safer carrying it than you would one of the cans," he said to Ralph. "What is it?" And the tone in which the question was asked showed that the newcomer to the oil fields looked upon this carrying a useless piece of iron through the woods as very unnecessary work. "That's the go-devil," replied Bob; and then, as he saw that Ralph did not understand, he added: "It is to drop through the hole to explode the cartridges after they are placed in position." Still Ralph could not fully understand its importance; but he stationed himself by the window, resolved to carry the go-devil and the cartridges any distance, rather than take the chances of being obliged to burden himself with the dangerous oil which the others appeared to regard with so little fear. Everything was in readiness for the start, and Bob clambered up to the peep-hole that he might be sure the enemy were yet in their position, which was so favorable to the plans of the moonlighters. "They are all there except the one who drove away some time ago, and--here comes the other now. He had been for food, and they are pitching into it as if they were hungry. Now is our time to start. They will be at their supper for the next half hour, and by the end of that time we shall be ready to come back for a second load." Bob looked once more to the fastenings of the doors and windows to be certain that they could not be loosened by any one from the outside, and then he cautiously unbarred the window at the back of the house. Knowing that the detective and all his force were in front, he spent no time in looking around; but, leaping out, was soon busily engaged in taking out the cans of glycerine which Jim and Dick handed him. Less than ten minutes sufficed for this work, and then each member of the party was out of doors, Ralph with the cartridges over his shoulder and the go-devil under his arm, while the others carried a can of the dangerous liquid in each hand. It had been decided that George, being accustomed to traveling through the woods in straight lines by his work as engineer, should lead the party, as the one most likely to keep a direct course, and Ralph had decided that he would remain as far in the rear as possible; for, when he saw the boys swinging the terrible explosive around so carelessly, he felt that the further away one could get from that party the safer they were. George was not as much at his ease as he might have been, for he had not grown familiar with the explosive, as the others had, and he uttered many a word of caution when they came to those portions of the woods where the trees stood more thickly together. Their progress was necessarily slow, owing to the care they were obliged to use in walking; but before Mr. Newcombe and his friends had finished their supper, the moonlighters were at Mr. Hoxie's well, where they found their arrival had long been expected. Mr. Hoxie could understand, from the manner in which the moonlighters had come, that they had run some risk of detection in getting there, and when he learned that they were obliged to make a second trip for more glycerine, he offered either to accompany them or send some of his men with them, as they should prefer. Bob refused all these offers of assistance, however, for he believed that it was owing to Mr. Hoxie's incautious remarks that the detectives had paid them a visit, and he did not propose to run any more risks than were absolutely necessary. Since four of them could carry all the glycerine needed to make up the charge, and since Ralph had such a wholesome fear of the dangerous compound, Bob insisted that Ralph remain at the well, while the others paid a second visit to the hut in the forest, a proposition which Ralph eagerly accepted, for carrying nitro-glycerine through the woods in the night was a task he was not at all anxious to perform. The return through the woods was made in a very short time, the boys walking on at full speed until they were near the hut, when the utmost caution was used. By making quite a detour through the woods, Bob was able to get a full view of the watchful detectives, all of whom were seated on the grass in front of the hut, gazing at it so intently that there was no question that any suspicion had been aroused in their minds. Before they had left the hut Bob had placed the glycerine near the window, so that it could be reached from the outside, and, after it was learned that the enemy were still in blissful ignorance, but little time was lost in getting ready to return to Mr. Hoxie's well. Perhaps the boys were no more careless in carrying the glycerine this second time than they were the first, but they certainly walked faster, and when they arrived at their destination, they had been away such a short time that Ralph could hardly believe they had been to the hut in the woods and back. Everything was now in readiness for the important work, and the question that troubled the young moonlighters was whether the worthy Mr. Newcombe and his assistants would remain looking at the empty hut until the charge was exploded. CHAPTER VI TORPEDOING AN OIL-WELL. It is safe to say that Ralph, who was interested in the shooting of the well only as a spectator, was the most nervous one of all that party who were about to show Mr. Hoxie whether he had "struck oil" or not. Bob set about the work with the air of one perfectly familiar with what he was doing, and the others aided him whenever it was possible, George alone remaining inactive, since he considered himself entitled to a seat with the spectator. The well had, of course, been bored down as far as the bed-rock, leaving an opening from eight to ten inches in diameter and quite twelve hundred feet deep, which was nearly filled with the water that had flowed in and the oil that had been poured in to give some slight resistance at the top of the cartridge. Over this, grim and weird-looking in the moonlight, rose the framework of the derrick, formed of heavy timbers, and apparently solid enough to resist any pressure that might be brought to bear upon it. Near by were scattered pieces of machinery, tools and such debris as would naturally accumulate around a place of the kind. A large reel, wound with heavy cord, capable of sustaining a hundred pounds' weight, and with a shallow hook, which would easily become detached when the pressure was removed, was fastened at one of the uprights of the derrick, while directly over the well was a block for the cord to pass through. This was to be used to lower the cartridges into the well. After this portion of the work had been completed--and all three of the moonlighters moved as rapidly as possible, lest Mr. Newcombe should put in an appearance--the task of filling the shells was begun. The tops of the long tin tubes were removed, and into these rather frail shells the glycerine was poured, Bob handling it as if it was no more dangerous than the petroleum they hoped to find. As fast as each tube or cartridge was filled it was lowered into the well by the stout wire bail that was fastened to the top, and just under the cover was the hammer which would explode the percussion cap when struck. These cartridges were pointed at the head, and since the point of the second would rest on the top of the first, and the third on the second, the blow which exploded the first would naturally be communicated to the other two. It was in lowering these cartridges into the well that Bob showed his first signs of caution in handling the explosive liquid, for the least jar or concussion, as the tin tubes were being let down into the well, would have resulted in a premature explosion, which might have had the most deplorable results. Ralph, seeing that at this point even Bob was willing to admit that there might be some danger in the work he was doing, proposed to George that they move a short distance further away, lest there should be an accident, and the reply he received was not well calculated to soothe his nervousness. "If one of those tubes should explode on the surface here, we should stand as good a chance of being killed a quarter of a mile away, as here. So we might just as well stay where we are." And Ralph remained, although he was far from feeling as comfortable as he would have felt at a more respectful distance. "All ready, now," said Bob, as the last cartridge was lowered into position, and the reel removed from the derrick. "Now in order to honor Harnett's guest, I am going to allow him the distinction of exploding the charge." For a moment Ralph thought of what an experience it would be, to explode sixty-four quarts of nitro-glycerine, and what an adventure would be his to relate when he returned to college; therefore he marched boldly up to the well, at the bottom of which was such a dangerous agent ready to do its work. But when he saw the others seeking places of safety from the gases, and possibly fragments that would follow the explosion, and when he stood upon the platform of the derrick which afforded so insecure a foot-hold, because of the oil upon it, his courage failed him. "It may be a big thing," he said to Bob, "to drop this piece of iron through the hole, and be the remote cause of such a powerful effect. But if, when I attempt to get out of the way, my foot should slip, I should hardly be in a condition to care for glory. I am greatly obliged to you for the proposed honor; but think I had better decline it." "Just as you please, my dear boy," replied Bob, carelessly. "Just find a good place where you can see her when she shoots, and I'll drop the go-devil." Ralph lost no time in obeying the young moonlighter's instructions, seeking a refuge near the corner of a small tool-house to the windward of the well, and about a hundred yards from it. "Look out for your mouth and nose just after the explosion," cautioned George, "for the gases which will come first to the surface are very poisonous." "All ready!" shouted Bob, as he looked around to see that every one was in a safe position, and then approached the well with the go-devil in his hands. There was an instant's pause as the boy stood with the heavy iron poised over the aperture, and then dropping it, he sought shelter by the side of Ralph and George. Perfect silence reigned for what seemed a long time while the go-devil was falling through twelve hundred feet of oil and water; but the time was hardly more than a minute, and then Ralph, who had expected to hear a deafening noise, simply heard a crackling sound, much as if two small fire-crackers had been exploded. It had not occurred to him that but little could be heard from such a distance beneath the surface. "Look out for the gases!" cried George. And as Ralph covered his nose and mouth with his handkerchief, he could see a black vapor, almost like smoke, arising from the mouth of the well. "There is no oil there," he said to himself, as second after second went by and there was no appearance of anything save the gases of combustion. He was almost as disappointed as Mr. Hoxie would have been at finding a "dry well;" for after all his tedious waiting he hoped to have been rewarded by seeing the "shoot" of the oil. He was rather surprised that Bob's face showed no signs of disappointment, for he surely must have wanted to see oil after his dangerous work. But Bob simply looked expectant, with his gaze fixed on the mouth of the well, and Ralph turned again just in time to see a most wonderful sight. From out of the mouth of the well arose what appeared to be a solid column of greenish yellow, rising slowly in the air like one of the pillars of Aladdin's palace as it was formed by the genii. The top was rounded, and the sides of this marvelous column, held together only by some mighty force, shone in the moonlight like a polished surface of marble, while all the time it arose inch by inch without fret or check, until the top wavered in the night wind. Then one or two drops could be seen rolling off from the summit, and in an instant the entire appearance changed. With a mighty bound the oil leaped into the air, tearing asunder the summit of the derrick as if it had been of veriest gossamer, dashing the heavy timbers aside like feathers, and spouting in the pale light drops as of molten gold. For a radius of twenty feet around the well the air seemed filled with this liquid gold that was coming from the very bowels of the earth. The oil poured out in torrents with a sharp, hissing noise that told how great was the volume of gas imprisoned beneath the rock, which was sending this oily deluge out, and the question of the value of the well was decided. "It's good for two hundred barrels a day!" cried Bob. And Mr. Hoxie, who would reap this rich harvest, insisted that it would produce very much more than that. The damage done to the derrick was not heeded by the owner since the destructive agent was worth just so much money per barrel to him. After spouting to a height of fully two hundred feet, for nearly ten minutes, the volume of oil, or, rather, of the gas that was forcing it to the surface, appeared to be exhausted, and lower and lower sank the torrent, spreading out in a fan-shape as it lessened, until finally it ceased entirely. "What is the matter?" asked Ralph, who fancied that oil-wells flowed incessantly. "Your two-hundred-barrel well will hardly produce as much as you thought." "Indeed it will," replied Bob. "You don't think wells go on flowing like that all the time, do you? They have breathing spells, like men. They spout anywhere from five to fifteen minutes, and then remain quiet about the same time, or longer. You see the gas in the reservoir of oil forces it to the surface; the escape of the oil lessens the pressure under the rock, and it remains inactive until sufficient gas has gathered again to force more up. This well is as good a one as I have ever shot." Then Bob and his partners began to make their preparations for departure, since, for them to be found with their tools near a newly-opened well, would have been almost as dangerous as to have been caught in the very act of "shooting it." Ralph would have been only too well pleased if he could have waited long enough to see the second spout, but being a guest of the moonlighters, he could not offer any objection to their movements, and he also made ready for the journey back to the hut. Bob had settled his business with Mr. Hoxie, which was simply to get the agreed amount for the work performed, and was just getting the reel into shape to carry, when the clatter of hoofs was heard far down the road. "The detectives!" shouted Mr. Hoxie, as he started toward the tool-house, where, in a very few seconds, he would be counterfeiting the most profound slumber. "The detectives!" shouted the workmen, as they sought convenient places for hiding; and the moonlighters were left to dispose of themselves as best they could. "Come this way!" cried Bob, as he caught up the reel, which might be recognized as his, regardless of how he carried it, and dashed off into the woods at full speed, followed by his partners and guests. It was a flight which would be presumptive guilt, if they were overtaken, but, under the circumstances, it was the only course the moonlighters could pursue. CHAPTER VII. MR. NEWCOMBE'S CERTAINTY. Varied and many were Ralph's thoughts, as he followed his friends at full speed through the woods, and none of them were complimentary to the business of the moonlighters. He had hoped there would be some excitement attending the shooting of the well, other than that incident to the regular work, and he had every reason to be satisfied; but he had seen a trifle more than was necessary to his comfort or happiness, and this race through the woods was quite sufficient to take the last bit of romance from the business. The work had been done; but if those who had been heard on the road were the officers, the chances were that they might succeed in finding sufficient proof as to who had done the job. Ralph understood fully that by aiding the moonlighters, even in the slight way he had, he was, for the time being, one of them, and this thought was far from reassuring. Without any reason, other than to see the sport, he had, perhaps, infringed the rights of those who were using every effort to protect them, and what the result might be perplexed him in no slight degree. But one thing was certain, and that was, now that he had become involved with his new acquaintances to a certain extent, it was necessary for him to continue with them until he could leave without either compromising himself or injuring them. Of course, every one believed that the noise made on the road immediately after the well was shot was occasioned by Newcombe's men, who, having discovered that the hut was empty, had started at once for the probable scene of operations. Under this belief, Bob dashed on toward the hut at full speed, never thinking of making any investigations to learn whether they were correct in their surmises, until, when they were but a short distance from the clearing in the woods, George called out: "Before we show ourselves, it would be well to find out whether Newcombe has really left." "That would be only a waste of time," objected Jim, "for, of course, it was he whom we heard." "I believe it was," replied George; "but, at the same time, it is well to be sure. It will only take a few moments longer, and, since Ralph and I have got mixed up in this thing, I insist that you find out whether any one is there before you attempt to go into the hut." Bob thought, as did both Dick and Jim, that Harnett was foolishly particular; but, since the young engineer was so decided about the matter, he thought it best to do as he was requested. When, therefore, they arrived at the edge of the clearing, the party waited within the shadow of the trees, while Bob stole cautiously around as before, with no idea that he should see any one in front of the hut. While he was absent, Dick and Jim were disposed to make sport of what they termed George's caution, and this merriment caused so much noise that Harnett found it necessary to remind them very sharply that both he and Ralph, without any interest, other than curiosity in the matter, and after they had been of no slight service, might be obliged to pay dearly for the part they had taken; in consideration of which, the least that could be done would be to follow out this very reasonable request. After this, the boys quieted down considerably, and when Bob returned, they were thankful that they had done so. Bob startled them all, even George and Ralph, by the information that Newcombe and his men were still on guard in front of the hut, and that, to all appearances, they had not left the stations they were occupying when the party started out to shoot Mr. Hoxie's well. If this was the case, who, then, was the party that had disturbed them at the completion of their work? This was the question that agitated them decidedly, and they were beginning a very animated discussion on the subject, when George said: "It can make no particular difference just at this moment who they were. Some one was coming, probably other torpedo detectives, and we ran away. Newcombe and his men are still here on guard. Now the most important thing for us to do is to get into the hut as quickly and silently as possible, and if those others were detectives, perhaps our friend, Mr. Newcombe, will be able to swear that we have not been outside during the night." There could be no answer to such an argument as this, save in action, and each one started for the hut, Dick and Jim feeling decidedly ashamed of the sport they had made of George's excess of caution. To enter the building silently was as easy as to leave it, and in five minutes more the party were inside, with the shutters of the back window carefully barred. Then they gave way without restraint to their mirth at having accomplished their work, while Newcombe watched their hut for them, and they might have continued at this amusing occupation during the remainder of the night, if sounds from the outside had not told them that other visitors were arriving. "Now we shall find out who it was that disturbed us," said Bob, gleefully, as he clambered upon the improvised platform, that he might see what was going on outside from the peep-hole. The boys, believing as Bob did, that these newcomers were the same ones whose arrival at Mr. Hoxie's lately-opened well was the cause of their hasty flight, awaited expectantly the result of Bob's survey. "Three men are riding up," said Bob, "and now they are stopping their horses as Newcombe goes toward them. They all appear to be talking excitedly, and every few seconds Newcombe points this way. Now they are coming right toward the door." There was no longer any need for Bob to describe the proceedings, for the noise made by the carriage could be plainly heard by all as it came toward the house, and in a very few moments even the conversation of the men could be distinguished. "The well had just been shot as we got there," one of the newcomers could be heard to say, "and you know that Bob Hubbard was to do the work. You have allowed the boy to fool you, Newcombe, and while you have been here, he has been working at Hoxie's." "But I tell you that I heard him in here early in the afternoon, and the darkey told me his team was in the stable. Now, how could he have gotten the glycerine or cartridges out of here while six of us have been on duty all the time?" And from the tone of Newcombe's voice it was easy to understand that he was very angry with these colleagues of his for doubting his ability to watch three boys. "Are you certain it was Bob whom you heard?" asked the first speaker. "He may have left some one here, and been at Hoxie's before you arrived." "I am certain there was some one here," said Newcombe, speaking less decidedly than before, "and I would be willing to bet everything I own that it was Bob Hubbard." "Betting is a very bad way to settle disputes, Mr. Newcombe," said Bob, laughingly, shouting so that every one outside could hear his voice, "and I would advise you to give it up in the future; but in this particular case you would win the money." "There! What did I tell you?" cried the detective to his visitors; and it is very probable that just at that moment he looked upon Bob as a true friend. "Yes, Bob is there," said the man, reluctantly; "but Jim and Dick were at the well." "Here's Dick!" shouted that young gentleman; "and when you two want to hold an animated conversation about either one of us, try not to start it at night, nor so near the door of a sleeping-room as to disturb those who may need a little rest." "And here is Jim!" shouted that young moonlighter. "So now that you know we are here, where Brother Newcombe has been watching for the last dozen hours, suppose the whole posse of you drive back to Bradford, where you belong." For a moment there was a profound silence outside, as if this last astute detective was too much surprised to be able to speak, and then Mr. Newcombe burst into an uncontrollable fit of triumphant laughter. He knew that it was impossible for any number of boys to fool him, and very likely he almost pitied his brother-detective for being so simple. From the sounds, the boys judged that the men were moving away from the hut, and Bob once more had access to the peep-hole as a point of observation. "They are harnessing their horses now," he said, after he had looked out a few moments, "and I guess Newcombe has convinced his friend that we must have been innocent of the shooting of Hoxie's well." "The question among them now will be as to who the other moonlighters are," laughed Dick. And all of them found no little cause for merriment in the idea of Newcombe and his friends pursuing these imaginary moonlighters. "They have started for the stable again," continued Bob. "I suppose they want to make sure that there is no chance for us to get the horses out by any way other than the front door. What muffs they are not to think how easy it would be for us to do just as we did! They have walked entirely around the stable, and are now coming back again." It was evident that Mr. Newcombe's friend needed some further proof to assure himself that it was not the boys whom he had disturbed, for Newcombe said, as he came near the hut: "Bob, I don't suppose you have any especial love for any of us, but you know that what we are doing is all fair in the way of business, and nothing as especially against you. Now, just as a favor to me, I want you to tell us what we have done since we came here." It was apparent to Bob, as it was to all in the hut, that the question was asked simply to convince the newcomers that the boys could not have left the hut during the night, and Bob, after having descended from his perch, in order that his voice might not betray the fact that he had been on the lookout, answered, readily: "I didn't know that you had been doing much of anything. You paid Pete for some information which could hardly have been worth the money, and passed it up to him on the hay-fork, for he wouldn't open the door to you. Then you sent one of your party somewhere for food, and since you had your supper, you have amused us by sitting in front of the hut. Is that enough?" "Plenty, and thank you!" was the reply, made in such a cheery tone that there was no question but that it had been sufficiently convincing. Then Bob scrambled upon his rather shaky perch once more, in order to give full information to his companions of the movements of those outside. He reported from time to time as to what they were doing in the way getting their teams ready, looking around the premises, but without taking more than a casual glance at the rear of the house, however, and then he said: "Now they are getting into their wagons. Now they are driving out on the road, and now," he added, as he leaped down with a loud shout, "they have disappeared to find the parties who shot the Hoxie well, perfectly content that we could have had no hand in the business, since it is a certainty in Newcombe's mind that we have not left the hut since he drove up here. Hurrah for Bob Hubbard's scheme, and Newcombe's belief in his own ability as a detective!" CHAPTER VIII. NEW QUARTERS. Until nearly daylight the boys remained awake, laughing over Newcombe's credulity, or congratulating each other on the success of that night's work, and then Bob, who for half an hour had been studying some plan, said: "It isn't best for us to spend all our time laughing at Newcombe, or we may find out that he's smarter than we give him credit of being. If we expect to shoot any more wells in this vicinity, we must change our quarters, for we can safely count on this being watched." "What if it is?" cried Dick, their success having made him very bold. "Wasn't it watched to-night, and didn't we shoot the Hoxie well in spite of them all?" "Yes, we fooled Newcombe well; but we might find it difficult to do so the second time. Then again, all our work would not be as convenient to the hut as this was, and if it had been necessary for us to get our horses out, you must admit that Newcombe had us very foul." And Bob, while he felt thoroughly elated by their victory, did not want that his partners should come to believe that all difficulties could be surmounted as readily. "But what do you mean about changing our quarters?" asked Jim, who looked upon their hut as something particularly convenient and well located. "I mean that we have got to build another shanty somewhere, if we can't find one ready-made." "Nonsense! there's no more use of our leaving this place than there is of our trying to fly!" said Dick. "I ain't afraid that Newcombe will come here again very soon." "But I _know_ he will," persisted Bob. "Just as soon as he suspects that we are about to do any work, he will have so many men around here that we can't show our noses out of doors without being seen. You think I'm right, don't you, Harnett?" "Well, now, see here," replied George, with a laugh, "I think Ralph and I have had all the moonlighting that is good for us, without going still further by aiding and abetting you with advice." "But you can tell us what you think," persisted Bob. "Well, I suppose I may venture that far, after having participated in the shooting of the Hoxie well. I don't think that this place is safe for you any longer, and if I was a member of this firm, I should move everything from here as soon as possible." It was plain to be seen that Dick and Jim had great faith in Harnett's advice on any subject, for as soon as he had spoken all argument was at an end, and, after a brief pause, Dick asked: "But where could we go?" "I think I know of a place as good as this, about five miles up the valley, where by working a couple of days we could fix things up as well as we have them here." "Then let's see to it at once," said Jim, who thought, if they were obliged to move, the sooner the disagreeable job was over the better. "I'm ready to start now, if George and Gurney will help us," replied Bob, quietly. "If we will help you!" echoed George. "You believe in using your friends for your benefit, don't you?" "Well, in this case, it seems as if you might be of great assistance to us, and yet not do very much violence to your own feelings. You know as well as I do that the chances are Newcombe or his men are or will be scouring the country to-day for those who shot Hoxie's well. Now, if Dick, Jim and I start out alone, and they see us driving about the country where we presumably have no business, they will follow us, and good-by to our chances of getting settled very soon. But if you and Gurney will take your fishing-tackle, Pete and I will go with you in our double wagon, and while he and I are attending to work, I will show you as good trout fishing as you ever saw." It was a skillfully-prepared bait, as he intended it should be, for he knew that the two friends were fond of fishing, and they knew that he was an authority on the subject of trout streams. At first George attempted to excuse himself on the score of having business to attend to, but it was easy to see that he wanted to go, and equally plain that Ralph had forgotten all the unpleasant experiences of the night, in his desire for sport. "You see, you won't be doing anything in the way of moonlighting," said Bob, persuasively, "for you will honestly be going out fishing. You need know nothing whatever about what Pete and I are doing, and since we have a supply of food sufficient to last at least two days longer, you will have no better chance than this." Whether George really had any work to which he should have attended or not, he evidently put all consideration of everything save sport aside, for he asked: "Well, what do you think of it, Ralph?" "I think it is just as Bob says. We shan't be doing anything but that which we have a perfect right to do, and if you can remain away from your business so long, I say let's go." Bob waited only long enough to hear this decision, and then he went at once to the stable, where he ordered Pete to harness his horses into the double wagon, in which they carried their materials when out on professional business. The old negro did not hesitate to tell his employer all that Newcombe had said to him. The detective had offered him ten dollars if he would answer certain questions, and, understanding that he did not know anything which could compromise those who hired him, had not thought it a breach of confidence to take the money. Newcombe had asked who were in the hut, and Pete had told him, for he knew the detective was quite as well informed as he was; but when Newcombe questioned him as to what the boys were about to do, where or when they were going, he was truly unable to give the desired information. This was all the detective had received for his expenditure of ten dollars, and the old darkey chuckled greatly over the ease with which he had earned the money. When the team was ready, Dick and Jim started out for the purpose of having their horses harnessed, since they had no idea but that they were to accompany the expedition, but such was not a portion of Bob's plan. "You must stay here and get the traps ready to be moved," he said, "for if we should all go, it would be quite as bad, if we were seen, as if we hadn't George and Ralph with us. Besides, your horses must be fresh for to-night, for we will hitch them into the torpedo wagon, and it is necessary that they should be able to get away from anything on the road, in case Newcombe should take it into his head to chase us." Both the boys knew Bob was right, and, much as they disliked remaining at the hut while the others were enjoying themselves fishing, they quietly submitted to what could not be avoided. Pete put a few tools into the wagon, Bob added enough in the way of eatables to last the party twenty-four hours, and, just as the sun was rising, the real and pretended fishermen started. The road led directly back through Sawyer, and on the opposite side of the creek, a fact which showed how necessary it was for Bob to have some one with him who would give to the journey the semblance of sport, rather than business. The horses were driven at a brisk trot, despite the roughness of the roads, and in less than an hour from the time of leaving the hut Bob turned his horse into what apparently was the thick woods, but in which a road, that was hardly more than a path, could just be discerned after the thicket by the side of the highway had been passed through. Over logs, stumps and brushwood Bob drove, with a calm disregard to the difficulties of the way, or to the comfort of himself and his companions, until a small hut, or, rather, shanty, was reached, when he announced that they were at the end of their journey. "Well," said George, as he alighted from the wagon, "so far as being hidden from view goes, this is a good place; but I fancy it will be quite a different matter when you try to bring a load of glycerine here. It would be a job that I should hesitate to undertake." "We can make the road all right with a few hours' work, and then we will put up some kind of a shelter for a stable. But just now fishing, not a roadway for torpedo wagons, is your aim, and, if you and Ralph will follow right up on this path, you will come to a stream, from which you can catch as many trout as you want." Taking a generous lunch with them, and wishing Bob success in his work, George and Ralph set out for a day's fishing, believing that their connection with the moonlighters was very nearly at an end. After leaving Bob, neither of the boys had very much to say about their adventure of the previous night, for it had terminated so happily that it no longer worried them, and the thought of the enjoyment they were to have drove everything else from their minds. The stream was as promising a one as the most ardent disciple of Walton could have desired, and but little time was spent, after they arrived at its banks, before they had made their first cast. The fish were as plenty as Bob had promised, and, when the time came for their noon-day lunch, they had nearly full baskets of speckled beauties, that would weigh from a quarter to three-quarters of a pound each. During the forenoon they had fished up stream, and, when their lunch was finished, they started down with the idea that they would reach the path they had started from just about the time Bob would be ready to return to the other hut. On the way down, there was no necessity that they should fish in company; therefore, each went along as he chose, with the understanding that the one who reached the path first should wait for the other. Ralph walked on ahead of George, dropping his line at every promising-looking place in the stream, but meeting with very poor luck, as compared with the forenoon's work. He only succeeded in catching four while returning, when he had captured fully thirty on the way up, and, owing to the absence of fish, or their disinclination to bite at his hook, he arrived at the point from which he had started, fully two hours before he had expected to be there. But early as he was, he found Bob impatiently awaiting his arrival, and the moonlighter's first inquiry was for the absent engineer. "We agreed to fish leisurely down stream, expecting to be here about sunset," replied Ralph. "I fancy he is meeting with better luck than I did, and that it will be some time before he gets here." "Well, we can't wait for him," said Bob, quickly. "We have got everything so that we can move in to-night, and I want to be off. It won't do for me to show myself without at least one of you, so we will send Pete back here to wait for George, and you and I will go on." "But how shall I meet him?" asked Ralph, not by any means pleased at this idea of leaving his friend. "That's easy enough to manage. Go back with me, get Harnett's team, come back here behind us, get him and drive home to Kenniston's. You will be there by ten o'clock, and we shall see you at breakfast time." "But I don't like to leave George, for I promised him I would wait for him here." "Ah, that will be all right, for Pete will explain matters to him." And, as he spoke, Bob dragged Ralph along, regardless alike of his remonstrances or his struggles. On arriving at the shanty the old negro was given his instructions, and without further delay the two started, Ralph feeling decidedly uncomfortable, for it seemed to him that, in some way, he had no idea how, he was being forced to take part in another of Bob's schemes. CHAPTER IX. THE NIGHT DRIVE OF THE TORPEDO WAGON. Bob was in such good spirits as he drove along toward the hut he was about to abandon, that if Ralph had been in the least degree suspicious, he would have believed that it was a portion of the young moonlighter's plan to separate him from his friend. Although, if such an idea had presented itself to Ralph, he would have been at a loss to understand how such a separation could have affected Bob's interest. Had the young student been more acquainted with the work of the moonlighters, however, he would have understood that another wagon behind the one containing the tools and materials for well-shooting would aid very decidedly in allowing the first team to escape, in case it was pursued. Then again, Ralph did not know that it was against the laws of any town to convey nitro-glycerine through its streets, and that, in thus moving his quarters, Bob not only ran the chance of being pursued by the torpedo detectives, but also by the authorities of the town through which he must pass in order to get to his new camp. Had George been with Ralph, the two would simply have driven back to the hut in the woods, and from there to Farmer Kenniston's home. But, in his absence, it would be necessary for Ralph to follow Bob back in Harnett's team for the purpose of taking his friend home. However earnestly the young student had resolved not to have anything more to do with the moonlighters, either actively or as a spectator, he was, by chance and Bob's scheming, aiding them in a more active and more dangerous way than ever before. "We shall come right back," said Bob, in a reassuring tone, as he saw how ill at ease Ralph felt, "and George won't have any longer time to wait than will be pleasant, because of his weariness." "Still I had much rather waited for him," replied Ralph. And then, when it was too late, he began to blame himself for not having insisted on staying behind as George proposed. "It is much better this way, because it will be a saving of time for him," replied Bob. And then he began to tell stories and make himself generally agreeable, in order to allay any suspicions that might arise in his companion's mind. In this, Bob was so far successful that when they arrived at the hut where Jim and Dick were waiting, Ralph had nearly forgotten his vexation at having left George, and believed that no better fellow or more agreeable companion than Bob Hubbard could be found in all the oil region. Dick and Jim had not been idle while the others had been away, and everything in the hut was made ready for immediate removal. Bob told them briefly of the hiding-place he had found, and then the work of loading the wagons was begun, Ralph noting with a slight feeling of resentment, that George's team was to be loaded as well as the others. The torpedo wagon was already laden with its dangerous load, and Bob showed it to him as a new feature of the oil business which he had not seen in operation the night previous because of Newcombe's vigilance. To all outward appearance it was a long-bodied box buggy, with a much deeper seat than is usually seen, and with a double set of finely-tempered springs to prevent, as much as possible, any jolting of the load. When the seat was turned over, working on hinges placed in front, the peculiar formation of the vehicle was seen. That portion of the carriage usually covered by the seat, was divided into sixteen compartments, each padded over springs, and formed with as much care as a jewel casket. In each of these compartments was a can of nitro-glycerine, protected from any undue-concussion or jolting by the springs within as well as without. At each end, on the left side of the wagon, rose a slender iron rod, fashioned at the top like the letter U, which was used as a resting-place for the tin cartridges, and rising high enough to be out of the way of the driver. "There are one hundred and twenty-eight quarts of glycerine in that little cart," said Bob, as he gazed at it admiringly, "and if any one chooses to chase us through Sawyer, they'll take precious good care that they don't get very near. You see, the officers must keep up a show of activity in trying to prevent us from driving through the town; but they are careful not to run us down too sharply." Ralph had not the slightest idea of what Bob meant when he spoke of officers in the town chasing them, and would have asked for an explanation then had not the moonlighter hurried away to get the other teams ready. It was then dark, and the boys were anxious to make the journey as quickly as possible, for it was a task about which even they did not feel wholly at ease. In the carriage Bob and Ralph had just come in, were packed the tools, provisions, sheet-tin, and such material as made a heavy load, while in George's buggy, was the bedding and other light articles, which made up a bulky load, but one in which there was but little weight. After the three teams had been loaded, the house locked and barred as carefully as if the inmates were yet within, and the stable door secured by Jim, who barred it from the interior and then clambered out of the window in the loft, Bob called his two partners one side for a private consultation. Without knowing why, Ralph felt decidedly uncomfortable at this secrecy. It was true that he had no desire to be told all the details of this somewhat questionable business, but it seemed to him as if he was in some way the subject of their conversation--as if he had been and was again to be duped, and Bob was explaining the scheme to his partners. It was some time before the private portion of their consultation was over, and then Bob said, sufficiently loud for Ralph to hear, much as if that had been all they were talking of: "Now remember. We are to keep close together until we get through Sawyer. Then, if we are followed, you are to give me a chance to get ahead, and you will keep straight on until you tire them out, if you drive all night. Ralph," he added, "Jim knows the road and you don't, so I am going to let him drive for you." Then Bob got into the torpedo-wagon, Dick mounted the one that had come from the new camp, Jim and Ralph clambered into George's team, and in that order they started toward the highway, Bob driving leisurely, as if to keep his horses fresh, in case they were called upon for any unusual exertion. The orders Bob had given aroused in Ralph's mind, now that it was too late to make any objection, the suspicions that his pleasing manner had lulled. He began to see why it was he had been hurried away before George came. The torpedo-wagon was the one that the authorities would attempt to capture, if they saw it, and George's team, being in the rear, would be the one that would most likely stand the brunt of the pursuit, in case one was made. The other two teams being ahead, could turn from the road into the woods, at a favorable opportunity, while George's horses would lure the officers away from the tell-tale loads. Ralph knew perfectly well that had Harnett come from the stream at the same time he did, his team would not have been used as a "cover," for he had no desire to implicate himself with the moonlighters, even if they were his friends, and would possibly have refused to act, or allow his team to act, any such part. But while all these ideas passed through Ralph's mind, he was not certain he was correct in his suppositions, and it was, so he thought, not advisable for him to say anything until the time came when Bob's plans were made apparent. Besides, he hoped that the officers would not see them, that there would be no necessity for flight, and that George's horses would be restored to their owner, fresh and in good condition. During the first two miles of their journey, there was nothing to which the most careful person could have taken objection, unless, indeed, it was the fact of riding behind a carriage loaded with nitro-glycerine, which was by no means a pleasant thing to do, and then the little town of Sawyer was reached. Up to this time the horses had trotted slowly; but on entering the town, Bob set the example of driving faster, and all three teams were urged along at full speed. It surely seemed as if the moving of the moonlighters' property was to be accomplished without difficulty, for the outskirts of Sawyer had nearly been passed before any sign was made that they had been observed, and then the clattering of horses' hoofs was heard, at the same time that a voice cried: "Halt!" The time had come when Ralph was to learn whether Bob was making a cat's-paw of him or not, and the suspicions he had had fast became certainties. No reply was made by the moonlighters; but the horses were urged to still greater speed, and the race had begun. "Don't drive so fast!" said Ralph, believing the time had come for him to act in George's behalf. "Why not?" asked Jim, coolly. "They'll overhaul us if we don't put on all steam." "And what if they do? This is Harnett's team, and there is no reason why we should run away." "What about all these things that are in here?" "There is nothing here but what we have a perfect right to carry, and I know that George will be angry by running away from the officers with his team, which is probably well known. We seem to be doing something which we have no right to do," said Ralph, sternly, at the same time that he endeavored to get possession of the reins. "Look out! Don't make a fool of yourself!" cried Jim, sharply. And he urged the horses on until he had worked them up into such a state that it required all his strength to hold them. To have attempted to seize the reins then would simply have been to capsize the buggy, for the road was so rough that the least deviation from the beaten track, at the pace the horses were then going, would have been fatal, and Ralph was obliged to acquiesce in the flight by remaining perfectly quiet. On the horses dashed as if bent on the destruction of the carriage. Behind could be heard the clatter of hoofs, as the pursuers did their best to overtake the violators of the law, and in the advance was the carriage, with its deadly load, that the least concussion would liberate in all its dreadful power. CHAPTER X. THE RETURN. In the excitement of the flight, and the sorrow caused by the thought of the injury which was being done his friend, in which he was forced, unwillingly, to take part, Ralph almost entirely forgot the dangerous load in advance, until an exclamation of triumph from Jim caused him to look ahead, when he discovered that Bob was no longer in sight. Ralph was almost certain that they had just passed the road that led to the new camp, and equally positive that Bob had driven in at that point, but there was nothing to show that the torpedo-wagon had been driven in there, and Jim was too much occupied with his efforts to keep in advance of his pursuers to answer a question, or even to speak. George's horses, of whom he was so fond that he would never allow them to be forced to full speed, were urged by both whip and word until they could no longer trot, but were running madly on, while the light carriage swayed from one side of the road to the other, until it seemed certain it would be overturned. Ralph was powerless to prevent such use of his friend's property, but he entered his protest against it by saying: "This matter of using George's team to permit your own to escape is something on which I have not been consulted, nor have I been permitted to say anything about it. I think I understand why Hubbard got me away from the stream before George came down, and I say to you now, as I shall say to both of your friends, that it is a mean piece of business, and one which I would do all in my power to prevent if it was possible for me to do so without running the risk of doing more harm than good." "Oh, that's all right," replied Jim, as he tried to urge the already nearly-exhausted horses to still greater exertions. But Ralph had no idea as to what he meant by "all right." If he meant that there was no harm in driving at such a mad pace, Ralph was certain he was wrong, and if he wished to convey the impression that Harnett would not be angry, the young student was equally certain he was mistaken. The sounds made by the pursuers seemed to be dying away in the distance, as if the pace was too fast for them, and as Dick guided his team skillfully into the woods, two miles beyond where Bob had disappeared; Jim gave vent to another yell of triumph. The moonlighters' property was safe, and it only remained to be seen how much Harnett was to suffer by the flight. The now thoroughly maddened horses were dashing along the rough road at a most reckless pace, and Ralph shuddered at the thought of what the result might be if they should meet any teams either coming or going. But, fortunately, it was so late in the night that thus far they had seen no travelers, and the only hope was that they would be equally successful until the wild flight was ended. On and on Jim urged the horses, with no signs of checking their speed, until finally, when it was no longer possible to hear any sounds from the rear, Ralph said: "I don't hear any one behind, and if you do not pull the horses up soon, you will ruin them, if, indeed, you have not done so already." As near as Ralph could judge, they were fully ten miles beyond the place where Bob had left the road, when Jim began to quiet the frightened animals, and before another mile had been traveled, he had succeeded so far as to make them sober down to a walk. Guiding them to one side of the road, where it chanced to be very broad, Jim brought them to a full stop, and Ralph leaped out to examine them. The glossy coats of the beautiful animals were wet with perspiration, and covered with foam until they looked like white horses marked with small patches of black; their red, dilating nostrils and heaving flanks told of the effect the mad pace had had upon them, and they looked as if it would have been impossible for them to have run another mile. Ralph even believed that they were already exhausted, and that they were utterly ruined; but Jim treated his fears as childish, being hardly willing to follow out the suggestions made. "If they are not foundered already they will be unless we do something for them at once. Let's rub them down thoroughly, and then start them back at a walk." Jim objected to doing what he considered useless work, and would have started the exhausted animals on the return at once, if Ralph had not assumed a tone that startled him. "During the ride I held my peace, because I could do no good; but now I want you distinctly to understand that you will do as I say in regard to caring for these horses, or there will be trouble between us. I should not hesitate for a moment, after what you have done, to leave you here and drive back alone." "You might not hesitate, providing you could get me out of the carriage," replied Jim, pertly; "but I might have something to say if you should attempt any interference." "Look here, Mr. James Lansel," said Ralph, decidedly, trying not to betray by his voice the anger he felt, "you will please understand now that I have interfered, and that I shall do exactly what I say. You will come out here and help me to care for these horses you have abused, or I shall endeavor to prove to your entire satisfaction which one of us is master." While Ralph had been speaking he had unfastened the traces of the horses, and by the time he concluded, one of the animals was clear from the carriage. Had he not done so it is extremely probable that Jim might have tried to run away and leave him, instead of being left. As it was, however, he apparently did not think it either a pleasant or a safe operation to measure strength with a boy fresh from school, and after a moment's hesitation, in a very sulky sort of way he alighted, doing as Ralph had commanded. The gallant little steeds were rubbed down well with dried grass; Ralph rinsed their mouths out as cleanly as possible with water from the side of the road, but taking good care not to allow them any to drink, and for an hour the two boys--one through fear, and the other because of his care for his friend's property--did all they could for the comfort of the animals. During all this time Jim had not spoken once, and Ralph was quite content to let him sulk as much as he wished; he felt as though Jim and his partners had done him a grievous wrong in placing him in such a position as made it seem that he had aided in the abusing and temporary theft of George's horses, and if the entire party of moonlighters chose to be angry with him he did not care. At the end of the hour Ralph said to the still angry, injured Jim: "We will harness them now, and I will drive on the way back." "You can do just as you please," replied Jim, "I've got nothing to do with it, and I wash my hands of the whole affair." "You may wash your hands of this portion of the affair as much as you please; but you'll take the full share of responsibility for having driven out here." Jim made no reply, which was a matter of but little moment, so Ralph thought; but he assisted in harnessing the horses, and when that was done, he took his seat in the carriage like a martyr. Ralph followed him, and, gathering up the reins, he allowed the horses to choose their own gait going back, a tenderness towards animals that Jim looked upon with the most supreme contempt. As a matter of course, their progress was very slow, for the animals were so weary that they had no desire to go faster than a walk; and still, without speaking, the two boys rode on, occupying three hours in returning over the same distance they had come in one. To find in the night the place into which Bob had driven was an extremely difficult task, and more than once did Ralph stop the horses by the side of the road, calling vigorously to George, in the belief that they had reached the new quarters of the moonlighters. It was not until after they had made four such mistakes that they heard George's voice in reply, and then he and Pete came out to lead the horses in through the thicket of bushes that screened the entrance of the road. Ralph saw at once by the look on his friend's face, and the solicitude with which he examined his horses, that Bob had told the first portion of the story, which had been more than displeasing to him. "Did you drive all the way, Ralph?" he asked. And his tone was far from being as friendly as usual. "I had nothing whatever to do with the horses or the trip, except to help rub them down when we stopped, and to drive home," replied Ralph, almost indignant that George should think even for a moment that he would have countenanced such a thing. Harnett said no more then, but busied himself in caring for the animals by unharnessing and feeding them. Jim soon joined his partners in the hut, and after he had gone, George asked Ralph for the particulars of the chase, which were given minutely. After he had finished the story, not without several interruptions from George, he asked: "How long are you going to stay here?" "Only until morning. I would have gone home to-night if the horses had not had such a long and hard drive; but as it is, we can do no better than to stay here a while, and early in the morning we will say good-by to Mr. Bob Hubbard and his partners, trying to get out of the trouble they have placed us in as cheaply as possible." "Why, is there anything new?" asked Ralph, anxiously. "Nothing save this last scheme of Bob's, and that is quite enough. I don't consider shooting wells as anything really illegal, for I do not believe that the patent can be held. But when it comes to violating a town ordinance by carrying a large quantity of nitro-glycerine through it in the manner Bob did, I consider a great wrong has been done, for it endangers the lives of every one living there. We shall probably hear from it very soon, for my team is well known in Sawyer. Then again, Bob knew that such a thing would injure me seriously in my business. I set myself up as civil engineer, and thereby ask people to employ me. That they will have every reason to refuse to do when they see me mixed up with Bob Hubbard's mad actions." Ralph had thought the matter serious enough before; but now he understood from what George had said just how much trouble might grow out of it, and all the anger he had felt during the ride was revived. "I wish I had stopped the horses, as I had a mind to do during the drive, regardless of whether I smashed the carriage or not," he said, bitterly. "I felt that things were going wrong in some way when I first left here with Bob, but I didn't know in what way, and what he said was so practical that I couldn't give a single good reason as to why I should not do as he said." "I'm not blaming you, Ralph, for I know as well as you do that it was not your fault. It was a portion of one of Bob's schemes, and, without caring how much he has injured us, he is probably congratulating himself on its perfect success. But come, let's go and lie down for a little while, and when we do get away from here in the morning, we will be careful not to place ourselves where Bob can use us again." CHAPTER XI. THE STORM IN THE VALLEY. Judging from appearances, when they entered the new cabin of the moonlighters, Ralph concluded that George had said some hard things to Bob because of the part he had obliged him to play. When the two went in to get the few hours of sleep they needed so sadly, for they had been awake during all of the previous night, no one spoke. They were all having what Ralph afterward described as a grand sulking match; but neither one of their guests paid the slightest attention to their ill humor. It was then very late in the night, and, tired as each one was, it was but a few moments before the camp was in a state of complete repose, from which neither moonlighter, engineer nor student awakened until the sun had been looking in upon them nearly an hour. If Bob had been cross the previous evening, his sleep had restored him to his usual good humor, and he greeted Ralph and George with the cheeriest of smiles. "I say, old fellow," he began, when Harnett returned from making his toilet at the brook-side, "I realize that we played you a dirty kind of a trick in using your team as we did last night; but at the time I was so anxious to get everything over here all right that I did not stop to think about it. Of course, I can't undo what has been done, but if any money trouble comes to you because of last night's work, neither you nor Gurney shall lose a cent. Try to forget it, won't you, George? Shake hands with me, and say that you will." Very few could withstand Bob Hubbard when he spoke as he did then, and Harnett's anger began to vanish immediately his moonlighting friend spoke. "We'll say no more about it, Bob; and I'll believe you wouldn't have done such a thing to me if you had taken time to think it over," replied George, as he shook hands not only with Bob, but with the other two. "Now, Gurney, come right up, and say that you bear no grudge against Jim. He knows that you were in the right when you insisted on having the horses cared for, and he would have known it last night if he hadn't got excited, as he always does when anything is up." Jim came up with outstretched hand as Bob spoke, and in a few moments the party were friendly once more, although the determination which Ralph and George had formed, relative to not visiting the moonlighters in their haunts again, was still as strong as ever. With the provisions they had on hand, and the fish that had been caught the day before, Pete served up such a breakfast as would have tempted an epicure, and it may be imagined with what zest these hungry boys attacked it. Bob and his party intended to remain where they were during that day, at least, for it would be necessary to do many things to the shanty before it would be even a secure hiding-place for their goods, and although they urged that their visitors remain with them, George was still firm in his determination to return to the Kenniston farm as soon as he had finished breakfast. It was not until after Bob had exhausted every other argument in vain that he said: "I think it would be much better, George, if you should stay here to-day, and give the people a chance to cool off in regard to last night's proceedings. If you go through Sawyer this morning, they may make it disagreeable for you." "That is one reason why I am determined to go at once. If any trouble is to come of your drive, I want it over as soon as possible, and the sooner I show myself in Sawyer, the more satisfied I shall feel." "But the chances are that the matter will drop through if you keep out of sight for a day or two," persisted Bob, almost entreatingly. "And I don't want it to drop through. If they propose to make any trouble, I prefer to meet them rather than wait around in the hope that it will be forgotten. I am obliged to earn my living, and from these people here, for the time being. Therefore, they will be doing me a very great favor if they find out exactly how far I am responsible for last night's work." It was useless to attempt to persuade George to do other than that which he had decided upon, and Bob recognized that fact. He said nothing more against the departure of his guests, but did all in his power to aid them in getting ready for the journey. The horses did not appear to be affected in the least by their hard drive on the previous night, and this, more than anything else, caused George to feel less hard toward his friends, the moonlighters. It was nine o'clock in the morning before Ralph and George were ready to set out, and as they were starting, Bob called out: "Remember, we shall stand whatever my drive may cost you, and this evening we will meet you at home." There was a feeling of positive relief in Ralph's heart when they drove out into the road, the trees behind shutting out the moonlighters from view. It was as if he had been suffering from some disagreeable nightmare, and he would have been thankful it was ended if it was not for the awakening in the form of driving through Sawyer, liable to be arrested at any moment. "George," he asked, at length, "do you really think that what was done last night will injure your business prospects?" "I feel so certain of it that I shall begin to make preparations to leave here as soon as I finish what I have on hand. I certainly know that I would not employ a man who would deliberately assist in carrying a large quantity of glycerine through a town, and at the same time drive in the most reckless manner." "But you can prove that you were not with the party, and that you knew nothing of what was being done." "Yes, I can prove that, if they give me the opportunity, and I am now in the position of a man who longs most ardently to be arrested, but yet who does not dare to appear too eager about it." "I can't say that I want to be arrested," said Ralph, dubiously, "for father and mother would think I had been doing something terrible; but I would be perfectly willing to stand it if it would do you any good." "It is about the only thing that can do me any good," replied George, decidedly; and then he added, quickly: "But we won't talk any more about it. Let us enjoy this ride thoroughly, for we have just escaped from the moonlighters' den. I can't say, however, that our troubles are entirely over; for, by the looks of those black clouds, we shall stand a chance of getting a drenching." It was as George had said. The sky, which had been cloudless when they started, was now being obscured by black, angry-looking clouds, which threatened at any moment to break and pour their burden of water upon the parched earth. Had they been riding where no shelter could be found, both the boys would have been alarmed, for there was every indication of a heavy shower; but since there were houses along the road in which they could take shelter at almost any moment, they rode on, determined to get as near as possible to their destination before the storm burst. George urged the horses along, hoping that they might reach the town of Sawyer before the rain came; but in this he was mistaken, for, before they had ridden five minutes from the time he first spoke, the great drops that acted as _avant couriers_ to the large body of water, descended, and the boys had just time to drive under a rude shed before the storm was upon them. A vivid flash of lightning, followed immediately by a deafening peal of thunder, was the prelude to as terrific a thunder-storm as the boys had ever seen, and, as the rain descended in what seemed to be sheets of water rather than drops, the lightning flashed almost incessantly, while the thunder roared until it seemed as if the very earth was shaken. Even George had never passed a summer in this section of the country before, and he knew no more than did Ralph the destruction often caused by the electric current where so much inflammable material is stored. Without a thought of the possible catastrophe that might occur, they remained under their apology for a shelter, through which the water poured in anything but tiny streams, looking out at the majestic spectacle, fearing only that the wind might throw the frail shed down upon them. "Look there!" cried Ralph, as an unusually brilliant flash was seen. "It almost appeared as if the lightning ran entirely around that oil-tank. I wonder if those are ever struck?" "It must make sad work if they are," replied George, thinking for the first time of such a possibility. "In that tank alone there must be fully thirty-five thousand barrels of oil, and the conflagration would be something terrible." He had hardly ceased speaking, when there came a flash that almost blinded them as it descended directly on the top of a huge derrick, crackling and hissing as it came, and in what seemed to be the slightest possible fraction of time, the air was filled with fragments of the heavy timbers, while, despite the pouring rain, a sulphurous odor was perceptible. The derrick had been struck, and its thousand fragments strewed the earth in every direction. "How terrible!" cried Ralph, as he covered his face with is hands in affright, for never before had he witnessed the terrific force of the lightning's bolt. George stood at the door of the shed, restless, regardless alike of the deluge of water that fell upon him, and of the neighing and stamping of the frightened horses; he was like one fascinated by the awful majesty of that which he saw everywhere around him. His gaze was directed toward the largest oil tank in the valley, while it seemed as if some will stronger than his own impelled him to look at this enormous construction of iron, filled with its easily ignited contents; and as he thus stood, awed into silence, it seemed to him that the largest cloud was rent entirely asunder, while from its very center a torrent of fire was poured on to the tank, from which the flames appeared to leap to meet the shaft from heaven. In an instant the entire body of oil was a seething mass of flames, while the very rain seemed to add to their fury. One of the largest tanks in the valley had been struck, and the destruction threatened every living thing that could not flee to the mountains from the river of fire that poured out over the shattered iron sides of the tank. CHAPTER XII. THE CONFLAGRATION. The grandeur of the scene upon which George and Ralph looked was indescribable, the slightest detail of which once seen could never be forgotten. The lurid flames, surmounted by the thick, black smoke, towered upward as if to meet the lightning's flash, and then, as the wind and rain beat it down for a moment, the heavy clouds of smoke rolled down the valley like some funereal pall sent in advance of the death and destruction that was to come. "What can we do?" cried Ralph, when the awe which the scene had brought with it gave place to fear for others, and a desire to avert suffering and destruction. "We can do nothing," replied George, in a low tone. "We do not even know how to fight the burning oil, and are powerless to do anything, at least until others shall come to direct the work." "But we can surely give the alarm and arouse the people," cried Ralph, as he attempted to rush out of the shed, but was prevented by George. "Do you think there is any one within two miles of here who cannot see that blaze?" asked George, as he pointed to the mountain of flame. "We can accomplish nothing, therefore we will remain here quiet until those who are familiar with such scenes shall come." Ralph recognized the common sense of George's suggestion even when it seemed impossible that he could remain idle, and while the two stood outside the shed, regardless of the furious rain, waiting for those to come who could direct their labor, they witnessed another scene, fitting companion to the one already pictured. The lightning flashes were as vivid and rapid as ever, save that the glare may have seemed a trifle less blinding because of the flames, and there was no sign that the storm was decreasing. Suddenly, even while it appeared as if a small whirlwind enveloped a derrick that stood on the hill on the opposite side of the valley, another storm of fire descended from the sky, wrapping the heavy timbers in flames without shattering them, and flinging angry tongues of fire on nearly every timber in the towering pile. For a few moments this lofty beacon burned as if trying to outshine the larger conflagration, and then, as the heat grew more intense, the small tank at its base became a receptacle for flames, which, overflowing, poured an angry stream of fire down the side of the mountain, igniting the various deposits of oil in its course. In an incredibly short space of time, the valley, which had but a few moments before been deluged with water, was covered with flames and burning streams, which the rain appeared to feed rather than extinguish. Then, as rapidly as they had come, the storm-clouds cleared away, the rain ceased, and the sun came out, clear and hot, but unable to send its rays through the impenetrable clouds of smoke which overhung the lowland, and wrapped the hills with a sable shroud. Others besides Ralph and George had seen the first damage done by the lightning, for, living where such scenes were not infrequent, they feared, at each threatened storm, just that catastrophe which had occurred, and a small army of men were already on the scene by the time the two boys had recovered from the awe which had come upon them with this second danger that was pouring down upon the valley from the mountain-side. It seemed a useless, because impossible, task to attempt to check the progress of or extinguish the burning oil, and yet the assembled multitude attacked it with a will that seemed all the more heroic because of the well-nigh hopelessness of the labor. Fastening the now thoroughly frightened horses so that they could not release themselves from the shed, which was situated on ground sufficiently high to prevent the burning torrent from flowing around it, Ralph and George threw off their coats and vests, preparatory to doing what they could to check the course of this servant of man, now become master. Quantities of shovels and pickaxes had been brought at the first alarm, and, armed with one of these, Ralph and George joined the others in throwing up embankments to check the course of the streams of burning oil, in order to hold them confined until the liquid should be consumed. Then women and children were aiding in the work, for it was to save their homes from destruction that they labored, and foremost among them ever was George, struggling against the fire-fiend, as if everything the world held dear to him was in danger of destruction. Then came the call for volunteers to get the cannon, which were nearly two miles away, that solid shot might be fired into the tank to open a passage for the oil not yet ignited, and Ralph was the first to offer his services. He had already had some considerable experience in artillery practice, and when George explained this to some of those who were directing the work, Ralph was gladly accepted to take charge of the guns. He was a gunner without any artillery, but twice as many men as were necessary started at full speed toward the town, and in a short time the only two cannon that could be procured, without going to Bradford, were on the ground, while Ralph was hastily preparing the charges of powder. It may be thought that it would not require much skill to hit, at short range, such a large object as an oil-tank capable of holding thirty-five thousand barrels; but since, in order to send the ball through the iron plates it was necessary to hit it full at the place aimed for, otherwise the projectile would glance off, it can be seen that Ralph was obliged to exhibit considerable skill. While this was being done, the others were throwing up earthworks to divert the course of the blazing streams, or to dam the oil in such places as it could burn without damage to other property; and it can safely be imagined that but little time was spent in watching what the others were doing. After George had announced that Ralph had had experience in the use of artillery pieces, and after the cannon had been brought from the town, he was left to superintend the work, a sufficient number of men remaining near to follow his instructions. The day was a hot one, and the heat from the fire, together with that from the sun, was almost insupportable; but, stripped of all clothing that could conveniently be cast aside, each one continued at his self-imposed task of averting the threatened destruction from the town. Each moment, despite all that was being done, the flames were creeping closer and closer to the town, which seemed doomed, and, as the time passed, every one saw how useless their efforts would be unless the iron tank could be pierced, allowing a portion of the oil to run off before it could be ignited. Many were the entreaties to Ralph to hurry with his work; but, fully believing the old adage that "haste makes waste," he completed his operations with deliberation, only hurrying when he could do so without running any risk of a failure. "Be quick, Ralph," cried George, as he came up, smoke begrimed, and bearing many traces of his severe work. "Every moment is more than precious now; and, even after you begin, you may have to fire several shots." "I shall fire only one at each tank," replied Ralph, calmly. "The pieces were dirty and rusty, and it would have been a waste of both time and ammunition to have shot with them before they were cleaned. I am ready now. Both pieces are loaded, and you shall see both balls count." Ralph had been working as near the blazing tanks as the heat would permit, and as he finished speaking with George, he shouted for those near by to stand back. Already had the weapons been aimed, and, with a blazing stick in his hand, he stood ready to show either his skill or his ignorance. Quickly the crowd separated, knowing only too well the value of time, and Ralph applied the torch. The explosion was almost deadened by the roar of the flames and the sharp reports of the iron plates, as they were broken by the heat, but above all could be heard the crashing of the iron, as the ball, aimed perfectly true to the mark, made its way into the oil, allowing it to spout forth in torrents. "Hurrah! hurrah!" burst from the crowd, as they realized that the boy, whose skill a moment before they had doubted, had done that which would have required hours for them to do so successfully, and then on every side arose the demand that another outlet be opened. Ralph was perplexed for a moment, since the other cannon was aimed at the smaller tank, and he had believed that one opening would be sufficient. "You will have to put another shot in," cried George. "It will take too long for the oil to run out of that one hole." While the crowd were engaged in digging a ditch for the oil that Ralph's shot had let out, in order that it should not be set on fire by that which was already blazing, the young student aimed the second cannon. Again the word was passed for the people to stand back, and a second ball was sent crashing into the tank with as true an aim as the first. Then, while all save those who were at work on the dam or helping at the cannon worked at ditches to carry off the unlighted oil, Ralph made ready for another volley. Two perforations were made in the small tank, and two more in the large one, which admitted of such a discharge of the contents, that all hands could hasten to the relief of those who were working at the dams. Already was the day nearly spent, and yet the fire-fiend was raging with fury hardly abated. The trees had long since fallen before the fiery blast; the derricks and buildings of the adjacent wells were consumed, while inch by inch the oil-fed fire crept nearer the town. George had paid no attention to his horses all this time; in fact, he had hardly thought of them until, almost exhausted, he was obliged to rest a few moments, or be entirely overcome by the heat. Then the recollection of his team, in which he took so much pride, came to him, and he started towards the shed where he had left them. One glance back at the fiery torrent, which even the children were trying to turn from the town, and he realized how important was even one man's labor in this battle with the flames. A man on crutches was standing near him as he paused irresolutely, and to him George said, hurriedly: "I left a pair of horses in a light carriage in that shed up yonder when the fire first broke out. Not even one man can be spared from here now, and yet my team must be attended to. Crippled as you are, you can be of no service here; therefore, if you will go there and get them, and then drive them to some stable in town, I will pay you well for your trouble." "I'll see that they are well taken care of, and come back here to tell you where they are," said the cripple, as he started towards the shed. And George returned to the fight once more. Had the men been working where it was cool, by their very numbers they could have checked the advance of the flames; but hot as it was, fully half who entered the conflict were overpowered by the heat in a very short time, or obliged to cease their exertions for a while, as George had done. Therefore, although fresh recruits were arriving each hour, not one-third of all the force there could be counted upon as able workers. It was an hour after George had cared for his horses, as he supposed, that the cripple whom he had engaged to do the work, approached where he was, by the side of Ralph, strengthening the banks of the ditch that carried off the escaping oil. "I went up to the shed," shouted the man, "but there wasn't any horses there, nor carriage either." "Where are they?" asked George, in bewilderment. "How should I know?" was the reply, in an angry tone. And then, before anything more could be said, a shout, almost of despair, arose from those who were working nearer the town-- "The waste oil has caught fire!" The oil which had been drawn off from the tanks, through the perforations made by the cannon balls, had been set on fire by the heat of the blazing stream by its side, and the flames were moving rapidly toward the two other large tanks in the immediate vicinity. CHAPTER XIII. A FRUITLESS SEARCH. Many conflagrations, caused by the lightning striking an oil-tank, have been known since the discovery of petroleum; but none had ever been so disastrous as the one of which the reader has had but an imperfect account. Forty-five thousand barrels of oil had been consumed or wasted up to the time as narrated in the previous chapter, and fully as much more was now threatened by the overflow, which had taken fire, and was shooting forth flames most dangerously near the other two large tanks. At the first alarm the entire force present left whatever they were working at to combat the new danger, when George and several of those who, with him, were directing the work, saw at once the peril to which the town was exposed by this sudden abandonment of the labor which had been performed for the purpose of presenting an impassable barrier to the angry flames. It was impossible that the now nearly exhausted workers could prevent the flames from attacking the two tanks upon which they were sweeping, and if vain labor was spent upon that quarter, the enemy would, beyond a doubt, gain possession of the town. To keep the men from neglecting the safety of their homes to try uselessly to save property which could easily be replaced, was absolutely necessary, and the length of time required to persuade them to return to the work they had first been engaged in would decide the fate of the village. Leaping directly in front of what had almost become an unreasoning mob, George and Ralph tried by their strength to resist the impulsive dash forward, at the same time that they shouted at the full strength of their lungs the reason why the work nearer the town should not be neglected. For some moments it seemed as if they would be trampled under the feet of the frightened multitude, and then their coolness won the victory over unreasoning fear, as it always will whenever displayed. The people returned to the more important labor the moment they understood how fruitless would have been their work in the other direction, and George aided them by his efforts and advice, while Ralph, with a dozen assistants, began a cannonading of the other two tanks that were just beginning to add their fuel to the fearful blaze. The breeze, which, caused by the heated air, always springs up during a conflagration, now rolled the thick, black smoke first in one direction and then in another, until those who had not already succumbed to the heat were nearly suffocated, and it seemed impossible that any one could continue at his work. The sun had set, although that fact was hardly noticed, since for several hours the heavy smoke had veiled the scene as with the mantle of night, through which the flames glowed and flashed luridly. In the struggle between the men and the flames, first one and then the other gained a victory; but neither had made any progress. Ralph and his assistants had opened vent-holes for the oil in the last-attacked tanks, thereby preventing fully half the oil from combustion, although it was entirely lost. The female portion of the workers had long since desisted from any effort to check the flames, and had continued their work by preparing food for the laborers, carrying it to them that they might not be obliged to spend any more time than was absolutely necessary in getting it. During all that long night the people worked in relays, that each might have an opportunity for rest, and when morning came the flames were well-nigh subdued--not so much through the exertions of those who fought against them, as because of the fact that there was nothing more remaining for them to feed upon. By that time a small body of watchers, in order to see that the remaining flames did not overleap the boundaries set, was all that was necessary at the place where ninety thousand barrels of oil had been consumed or wasted, and for the first time since the thunderstorm had cleared away, Ralph and George felt that they were at liberty to go where they chose. Both were begrimed by the smoke until it would have puzzled their best friends to tell whether they were white men or negroes, and both were in a very dilapidated condition, so far as clothing was concerned. The garments they had cast off when the work of fighting fire was begun, had been tossed about, trampled on, or scorched until they could no longer be called serviceable, and, half-clothed, dirty and disreputable-looking generally as they were, they started wearily for the town in search of rest, and, what was quite as important, a bath. Many times during the night had George thought about his missing horses; but it was not until he was relieved from all care which the conflagration had caused, that he began to grow seriously alarmed. It did not seem possible that any one could have stolen them, and he cheered himself with the thought that they had simply broken loose and run away, or that some one living near by had cared for them. A visit to the shed where the team had been left dissipated this first supposition, for there was every indication that the horses had been taken by some one, since no broken harness was there to tell of flight, and the door was carefully closed behind them, showing an excess of precaution on the part of some one, since both doors had been left wide open when George drove in. "Some one must have recognized them as yours, and taken them away thinking they were not safe while the fire was raging so furiously," said Ralph, after the survey of the shed was completed, and George believed such was the case. "At all events, we will get a bath and borrow some clothes first; then we can soon find out where they are," said George. And in pursuance of this plan the boys started towards Sawyer, so weary that it seemed almost impossible for them to walk. It was not a difficult matter for two who had worked as hard and done as much service as George and Ralph, to get all they required at the town, once they arrived there, and the bath had revived them so much that both were in favor of finding the team at once, in order that they might get what else they required at the Kenniston farm. Under ordinary circumstances they could have hired a team with which to search for their own; but now, with every one in that state of excitement or prostration which follows such scenes as the inhabitants of Sawyer had just passed through, it was almost impossible to find any one sufficiently calm to transact the most ordinary business. Twice George made the attempt to hire a horse, and then he gave up what promised to be a useless effort, both he and Ralph thinking it better to pursue their inquiries on foot than waste their time by trying to hire a team, and being obliged to walk after all. They began the search by making inquiries in town, of any one whom they met, and by going to each stable or even barn, looking in each place large enough to shelter the team; but without seeing any signs of it whatever. Then they started up the road in the direction from which they had just come, and at the dwelling nearest the shed where the team had been left, they heard the first tidings. The lady living in this house knew George's team, and said that while the fire was at its height, when she had come to her house for the purpose of getting food to carry to her husband, she had seen two men drive toward Sawyer in it. The men were entire strangers to her, she said, and they were driving at full speed, but whether that was due to the fear the horses had of the flames, or to a liberal use of the whip, she was unable to say. She described the men as being young and well dressed, and was quite positive that she had never seen them before. George's first thought was that his friends, the moonlighters, had taken the horses away, as a favor to him, and this belief was strengthened when, on questioning the woman closely, he learned that she did not know either Jim or Dick even by sight. "They probably came down when they saw the smoke," said George, confidently, to Ralph, "and on finding the team here, knowing we were at work, have carried it to Farmer Kenniston's." "I should have thought they would have tried to find us first, so as to let us know what they were going to do," said Ralph. "In order to have found us, they would have been obliged to meet some of the people here, and they probably did not think that safe, even though everyone had so much to attend to." "But they would have left word with someone," insisted Ralph. "That would have been as bad as to show themselves. Bob probably wants to make it appear that he hasn't even been in this section of the country, and if any trouble comes of carrying the glycerine through the town, he will insist that he hasn't been here." Ralph was far from being as positive that they would find the horses at the Kenniston farm as his friend was, but he contented himself with waiting until it could be proven, rather than to provoke an argument when it seemed that, under any circumstances, they had better return there. After some considerable difficulty, the boys found a man who, for a generous consideration, would carry them to the farm in his wagon, drawn by a slow, methodical-moving horse, and they set out, George's fears for the safety of his team entirely allayed, and Ralph's increasing each moment. In order to make sure that the horses had been driven toward the farm, and not in the direction of Jim's home, George made inquiries of all he met on the road, as well as at several of the houses. Quite a number of people had seen the team, driven along at full speed by two young men, and had noticed it particularly because they believed it had been sent to Bradford to get assistance in extinguishing the fire. This continued news caused George to be positive that his horses were safe at the farm, and in the rapid driving he recognized, or thought he did, Jim's presence, for that young gentleman was always anxious to get over the road as fast as possible. But when they had arrived within a mile of Farmer Kenniston's home, they received information of the team which had the effect of arousing George from his dream of fancied security, so far as his horses were concerned. A farmer who was well acquainted with all three of the moonlighters, had seen the horses as they were driven past his home on the afternoon of the previous day, and he was positive that neither Bob, Jim nor Dick was in the carriage. The men were young, well dressed, and strangers, so far as George's informant knew, and he was certain that they had not been in Sawyer, nor in the vicinity, any length of time. This aroused all of George's fears, and it was with the greatest difficulty that he could restrain his impatience until the farm-house was reached, when the first question asked was as to whether the horses were there. Farmer Kenniston was surprised that such a question should be asked, for he had seen the team going toward Bradford the day previous, and, as it was in advance of him at the time, he had no doubt but that it was George who was driving. That the horses had been stolen there could no longer be any doubt, and how they could be recovered was just what neither of the boys could decide. CHAPTER XIV. THE PURSUIT. It was some time before the boys, even with the aid of Farmer Kenniston's not very valuable advice, could decide upon what course to pursue for the recovery of the stolen property. The plan which met with the most favor, however, was that they should take one of the farmer's teams, and follow in the direction the men had been seen to drive, which was evidently through Bradford. By making inquiries on the road, they might be able to track the thieves and overtake them, although this seemed hardly probable, because of the start of nearly twenty-four hours which the men had. If the trail led through Bradford, they could there notify the authorities, and also telegraph to the different towns near by; and if it did not, it was decided that Ralph should leave George, going by himself to try to intercept the thieves by the aid of the electric current. Farmer Kenniston's best horse, which, by-the-way, was not a very valuable animal, was soon harnessed into a stout wagon, and the boys set out, having but little faith in the success of their journey. George had taken with him all the money he had, which was a trifle over two hundred dollars, since they might not only be gone a long while, but it was quite possible that if they did recover the team, they would be obliged to incur some heavy expenses. Ralph had one hundred dollars, which his father had given him for the necessary bills while on his vacation, and this he offered to George, in case he should need on the journey any more than he had. Thus the boys were, as they believed, amply provided with money, and they intended to follow the thieves just as long as they could track them. On the road to Bradford, George met two men who had seen the team the day before, and they drove into the town, confident that the men they were in pursuit of had entered there the day previous. Before trying to learn who had seen the horses, George went directly to the chief of police, told his story, and was assured that before morning at least the direction in which the men had gone should be made known. Under the officer's direction, telegrams were sent to different points where it was thought probable the thieves might go, and, so far as the boys were concerned, nothing more could be done until the officers, who had been sent out to find some news of the team during the time it had been in Bradford, should return. George was not by any means in the mood to remain idle while waiting for the policemen's report; for the loss of his team, in which he had taken so much pride, weighed heavily upon him. Instead of waiting in the police office for some news, he insisted on going out to make inquiries on his own account, and, as a matter of course, Ralph accompanied him. It is an easy matter in the country to stop at each house and inquire if the occupants have seen a team pass; but the boys found that such a system could hardly be pursued in the city, since a gentleman might feel insulted if any one should stop him in the street to ask if he had seen a pair of horses, attached to a light wagon, pass there twenty-four hours before. This difficulty had not presented itself either to George or Ralph, until they were on the street, ready to pursue their investigations, and then they were sadly puzzled to know what to do. While they were standing irresolutely in front of the police quarters, trying to make up their minds how they should proceed, George was accosted by a rough, but pleasant-looking old gentleman, who appeared very glad to see him, and at the same time acted as if he was in deep trouble about something. "I am powerful glad to see yer, Mr. Harnett; for I conclude that you've forgotten all about the promise you made to drive out an' see us every time you had the chance." "And I'm glad to see you, Mr. Simpson," replied George, as he introduced Ralph to Mr. David Simpson. "I have by no means forgotten my promise to call upon you, for I spent too many happy hours while I was boarding with you, when I was surveying the Walters' property, to ever forget that I should like to go again. I have been at work near Farmer Kenniston's, and have not had the time to pay you a visit. But now that I shall have more leisure, I will drive out some day and bring Ralph with me." "I would be powerful glad to see you, Mr. Harnett," said the old man, sadly; "but it won't be in the old home, and the good Lord only knows where the remainder of my old life will be spent." "What do you mean, Mr. Simpson?" asked George, in surprise; for the sadness visible on the old man's face astonished him quite as much as the singular words did. "It means, Mr. Harnett, that I've lost the old place I was raised on, and all for the lack of a little money. You know that I helped poor Tom set himself up in business by mortgaging the farm. If the poor boy had lived, he would have paid it all; but jest when we thought he was gettin' along so famously, he died. I've walked the streets of this town all day, hopin' I could find some one who would help me make up the balance I owe; but the fire yesterday makes everybody feel poor, I s'pose, an' I couldn't borrow a dollar; so I'm goin' home now to tell mother that we've got to leave the home where all our babies were born, and where they all died." The old man could not prevent the tears from gathering in his eyes as he spoke, and both the boys felt an uncomfortably hard lump rise in their throats as he finished. "Can't you persuade your creditor to give you longer time?" asked George. "I've just come from his office, where I begged harder of him than I ever begged of man before to take what money I had and wait a year longer; but he wants my back pasture to piece on to his own, and says he will foreclose to-morrow," replied the old man. And then, as if conscious that he was obtruding his own sorrows on one whom he had no right to burden with them, he would have changed the conversation; but George prevented him by asking: "How much did you owe him, Mr. Simpson?" "Well, you see, I'd kept the interest paid up reg'lar, an' it come to jest the face of the mortgage, five hundred dollars. I'd managed to scrape up two hundred an' twenty-five, an' up to this mornin' I'd reckoned on sellin' the wood lot for enough to make up the balance. But when the fire come yesterday, the man who was to buy it--'Siah Rich--had lost so much that he couldn't take it." "Was you to sell him the wood-lot for two hundred and seventy-five dollars?" "Yes, an' I think it was well worth that. I didn't really need it, an' if I could only have sold it I'd been all right, but now the whole thing's got to go. I don't care so much for myself, but it'll come powerful hard on the wife, for she does set a store by the old place, if it is rough-lookin'." George beckoned to Ralph to step aside with him, but there was no need of any consultation just then, for the latter said, quickly: "I know what you mean, George, and here is all I have got." As he spoke Ralph handed his friend the roll of bills which was to enable him to spend a long vacation, and then turned away, as if not wanting to embarrass the old gentleman by his presence. "Mr. Simpson," said George, as he added his own money to that which Ralph had given him, "between the two of us we have got enough to buy your wood-lot, and here is the money. Pay the mortgage this afternoon, and then you can make out a deed to these two names." George wrote his own and Ralph's name on a slip of paper, which he handed to the old man at the same time he gave him the money. "But I can't take this, Mr. Harnett," he said, while at the same time his face showed how delighted he would be to keep it. "You and your friend don't want my wood-lot, an' you only offer me this money because I have been tellin' you of my troubles, like a beggar, an' an old fool that I am. Take it back, Mr Harnett, an' mother an' I won't feel half so bad about goin' away when we've once left." "But suppose I tell you that we want to buy the land on a speculation?" said George, with a smile. "There may be oil there, and we may want to sink a well." "You wouldn't buy that land if it was oil you were after. One time I did think we might strike it, but those as know told me there wasn't any there, after they'd looked the property over," replied the old man, as with trembling hand he held the money toward George. "Well, we'll buy the land, anyway," said the young engineer, with a smile. "You have said that it was worth that amount of money, and we may be able to sell it for more than we paid you, even if there isn't any oil. So have the deed made out, and leave it for me at Farmer Kenniston's." Then, before the old man could make any further reply, George walked swiftly on, followed by Ralph, and Mr. Simpson was left to enjoy the generosity which enabled him still to retain the home that was made dear both to him and his wife by so many pleasant, and at the same time sad, recollections. "Well?" he said, inquiringly, when he and Ralph had left Mr. Simpson some distance behind, wondering if the good fortune which had come to him was real or not. "Well?" repeated Ralph, laughing. "I suppose you mean to ask if I am sorry for what I have done? Not a bit of it, for I can get father to give me money enough to pay for my ticket home, while, simply at the expense of a little enjoyment, we have made that old man happy. But how will it affect you, George? How can you search for your horses if you have no money?" "From the united funds we have twenty-three dollars left, and if that is not enough then the horses must remain lost, for I would willingly have given them up rather than that Mr. Simpson and his wife should have been turned homeless into the world." "If you think that way, then I think we have done a good thing, and we certainly ought to feel that we are of considerably more importance in the world, since we are landed proprietors. But we must look at the property before I go home, for I want to see it; and now come with me where I can write a letter to father, for the longer I stay now, the more deeply in debt shall I be." "You're not going to shorten your vacation because of lending this money, Ralph, for you shall live with me, and the only inconvenience you will suffer will be the lack of money to spend." Ralph was not so certain that he would become a burden on George simply because he had expended some money in charity; but just at that moment there was no need of discussing it; and he proposed that they return to the police head-quarters in order to find out if the detectives had learned anything about the team. Greater good fortune awaited them here than they had thought possible, for when they returned the officers furnished them with the complete description of the men, and reported that they had, indeed, driven into Bradford the afternoon before, but, during the night, had returned by the same road they had come, stating that they were going to Babcock. CHAPTER XV. THE ARREST. It was evident, from the information brought by the police, that the men who had stolen Harnett's team had driven to Bradford simply for the purpose of deceiving any one who might search for them, and that they would push on into New York State, where they might find a better opportunity of disposing of their ill-gotten property. Under the circumstances there was nothing the boys could do save return by the road they had come, and, since it was necessary to do this, it was as well that they should sleep that night in the Kenniston farm-house as in Bradford, where they would be obliged to spend some of their small store of money for lodging and breakfast. As soon, therefore, as they had received from the chief of police all the information he could impart, they started toward home, neither nearer nor further from the object of their search. All that they had done on the way down would have necessarily to be done over again, in the hope of learning of the thieves on their return, and no time was to be lost in this second search. Of course, if the men had started from Bradford in the night, there would be no use in inquiring for them anywhere between there and some distance from Sawyer; therefore, the boys decided that they would sleep at the Kenniston farm that night, recommencing the pursuit at an early hour next morning. When they reached the farm-house they found Bob Hubbard awaiting their arrival; he had come there two hours before, and when, on asking for George, he was told that the engineer had gone in search of his horses, had told the farmer that, while he did not intend to remain there during the night, he would wait for George's arrival, which he was certain would not be long delayed. Not knowing Bob's reason for expecting George's return, when it seemed certain he would be away some time, Farmer Kenniston was considerably mystified by his guest's manner; but the reason for his thus speaking was soon explained when, at a late hour in the evening, George and Ralph did arrive. "I knew you would come back to-night," said Bob, as he rushed out to meet the friends whom he had not treated exactly as it would seem friendship demanded, "for I knew, if you learned anything at all, you would find it necessary to come back this way." "Why, what do you know?" asked George, quickly. "When I tell you that I knew your team had been stolen even before you did, you must admit that I know something about it," replied Bob, feeling fully how important he was just then. "Don't be long-winded now, Bob," said George, sharply; "for you know how anxious I am." "I'll tell you all I know, and I think I may be able to make amends for the trick we played upon you in using your team the other night, unless you think it was because of that that you had your horses where they could be stolen." "Tell me what you have heard of my team!" exclaimed George, impatiently. "Jack Roberts told me, this afternoon, that he saw two fellows in your carriage about midnight, and that they stopped all night, or at least the remainder of it, in the woods just above our camp. I went up there with him about five o'clock, and it didn't seem as if they could have been gone more than an hour before we got there." "Did you find out which way they went?" "As near as could be told by the tracks, they kept straight on toward Babcock." "That's where they said they were going," said Ralph, excitedly, delighted at this confirmation of the policeman's story. "From the looks of the place where they stayed last night, I should say that they don't know very much about camping out," continued Bob. "They just hitched the horses to a tree, and laid down on the ground, with a few boughs under them, instead of putting up a shelter, which wouldn't have taken ten minutes. I found pieces of newspaper, in which had been food, scattered around. So I fancy their arrangements for the journey were made very hurriedly and incompletely. I don't think they had hay or grain for the horses, for I couldn't find any signs of either." It was evident that Bob had examined the ground thoroughly in expectation of a chase, and as he gave what was really valuable information, gathered simply from a desire to aid his friend, George was perfectly willing to forgive him for any and everything he had ever done against him. "Then we won't stop here to-night," said the owner of the stolen horses, hurriedly. "If they left there this afternoon, we may stand a chance of overtaking them to-night. You needn't take the horse out, Mr. Kenniston, for we will start right off again." "Do you think there is any chance of overtaking your horses, even if they haven't had any grain, with this poor old nag of the farmer's, whose greatest speed has been shown in front of a plow?" And Bob laughed gleefully at the idea. "It is the best horse I can get just now," said George, fretfully; for he could not see anything very comical in the fact of being thus hampered in the pursuit. "There's where you are mistaken, my dear boy," replied Bob, in his old, lofty way. "My horses are as fast, and I'm inclined to think a little faster, than yours. When Jack told me what he had seen, I thought there was a chance to pay off old scores. So I harnessed into the light double wagon, put in some blankets, and come here. While I have been waiting for you, I have got a good-sized lunch from Mrs. Kenniston, a bag of grain from the farmer, and now we are ready to start, even if we drive to the lake." "Bob, you are a good fellow," exclaimed George, as he grasped the moonlighter by the hand, and made a mental vow that he would never speak harshly to him again. While they had been talking, Farmer Kenniston had backed Bob's horses out of the shed, where their master had left them, that the journey might be commenced as quickly as possible, and the boys got into the wagon at once, George and Ralph on the back seat, and Bob in front. That the chase would be an exciting one, in case they should get within sight of the thieves, was shown by the way Bob's horses started off, and, for the first time since he was convinced of his loss, George began to have some hopes of regaining his property. "There is one danger in our chasing those fellows in the night," said Bob, after they had started, "and as to whether you will take the risk, you must decide. They will probably spend this night as they did last night--in the woods. Of course, we could not see in the dark if an ox-cart had driven into the woods, and we run every chance of driving past them. Then again, if we wait until morning, we are just so much further behind. Now, what will you do?" "I hardly know," replied George, after considerable thought. "What is your advice?" "Well," and Bob spoke like one who has already decided the matter in his own mind, "my idea is that they won't stop this side of Babcock, and I am certain they won't stop in the town. So I think we shall be safe to drive as far as there. The chances are that the thieves will drive through the town in the night, and stop in the first likely place they come to on the other side. We can start in the morning again, about as early as they can." "Then that is what we will do," said George, satisfied that Bob had deliberated upon this plan until he was convinced it was the best that could be done. "Do you believe we shall catch them?" asked Ralph, speaking for the first time since he had met Bob. "Catch them!" echoed the moonlighter. "I wish I was as sure of striking a thousand-barrel well as I am that we shall be interviewing the young gentlemen before to-morrow night." But if Bob's hopes of striking a big well had been dependent upon catching the thieves before the next night, he would never have made a success in the oil region, save as a moonlighter. "There is our wood-lot," said George, as he pointed to a grove on the opposite side of the creek, near which a very old and a very dilapidated house could be seen. Bob was curious, of course, to know what George meant, and, after the story had been told him, he said: "It was a big thing for you to do, boys, and Simpson probably appreciates it as much as any man could; but I tell you for a fact that you will get your reward for that good deed sooner than you expect. There's oil in that same wood-lot, and I've sort of reckoned on buying it myself some day. If I had known how Simpson was fixed, it would have been mine before now, for two hundred and seventy-five dollars is cheap for ten acres, even if there is nothing there but rocks." "But Simpson says he has had oil men examine the place, and there's nothing there," said George, half believing Bob had some good reason for speaking as he did. "Yes, he had a lot of old fogies there who couldn't tell the difference between oil and a tallow candle. They walked around ten minutes, collected twenty-five dollars from the old man, and then walked away. Simpson was probably paying ten per cent to old Massie, for I've heard he was the one who held the mortgage, and if he could have got half the amount loaned, don't you suppose he would have waited any length of time if he hadn't seen a chance to make more? Massie knows the oil is there as well as I do, and the old miser thought he was going to get the whole farm for his five hundred dollars. Why, the old fellow would choke both of you boys if he could get hold of you just now." Bob laughed long and loud at the way in which the money-lender had over-reached himself, and it is hard to say just how long his merriment would have lasted, since it received a sudden check. They were then just entering the town of Sawyer, and a man had stepped into the road, as if to speak to the party, seizing one of the horses by the bridle as they approached him, to make sure of being heard. "Hello! What's the matter now?" asked Bob, who had not noticed the man, and was surprised at the sudden stopping of his team. "I wished to speak with you for a moment," said the man, as he fumbled in his pocket with his disengaged hand, and then as he produced some papers, he said: "I arrest you, Mr. Robert Hubbard, and you, Mr. George Harnett, for violating a town ordinance by carrying nitro-glycerine through the streets." George had said he hoped he would be arrested, in order that he might show he had not been guilty of such a violation, but when he expressed the wish, he could have had no idea that the arrest would be made just at the moment when, in order to recover his team, it was necessary for him to be free. CHAPTER XVI. PLEADING FOR LIBERTY. This arrest, coming just when it did, was a complete surprise to George. He had hoped a few hours before that it would come, in order that he might have an opportunity of showing that he was innocent of that which was charged against him, simply because his team had been the one the officers had chased. But to be deprived of his liberty now, when every moment was precious, seemed to be doubly disastrous. To be prevented from chasing the thieves when he was at last on the track of them, was to lose his horses beyond any probable chance of recovery, while to have forty-eight hours of liberty just then, was, as he thought, almost a guarantee that he could recover his stolen team. Bob was even more excited by the arrest than George. He had the pleasing thought that he was guilty of the offense charged, added to the disappointment at not being able to aid his friend in recovering the property which he was the remote cause of being lost. He knew, as well as did George, that at the worst they would only be fined for violating the town ordinance; but it was the loss of time just then that made the matter a serious one, and he resolved to do his best to secure their liberty for a short while longer, at all events. "I won't say anything about myself," said Bob, with a laugh, "for I don't suppose my reputation as a steady young man is first-class; but you, Mr. Constable, as well as nearly every one in Sawyer, know Harnett, and you know he will keep his word. While he was helping extinguish the fire yesterday, his pair of horses and carriage were stolen. We have just got on the track of the thieves, and if we are obliged to remain here now, there will be no chance of recovering the property. Now, if you will give us our liberty, Harnett will give you his word that we will return here at any time you shall set." "That is hardly a regular way of doing business, Mr. Hubbard," said the man, with a smile, that showed he had no hard feelings against those whom he was obliged to arrest; "and if it was your word alone that I was asked to take, I am afraid I should be obliged to refuse. I'm doubtful as to whether I ought to even consider the matter." "Of course you ought," said Bob, quickly. "Now, if we should be convicted, the penalty is only a fine, and we can leave you as much money as would be required to pay those as security that we will return." "I suppose in that case, and if Mr. Harnett promises that both you and he will come here a week from to-day, I might take the risk of any accident that would prevent you from appearing." "Now that's what I call acting squarely," said Bob, in a satisfied way; and George asked: "How much money will be necessary to satisfy you that we will appear for trial?" "Well, I don't suppose the fines will be over fifty dollars. So, if you leave that amount with me, you can keep on in search of the thieves, whom I hope you will catch." Ralph's heart, which had been very light when he saw that there was a chance they might continue their journey, sank again when the officer mentioned the amount of security he demanded, for he knew that the united funds of his and George's fell far short of the sum, and what little they had would be actually necessary for their expenses on the road. "How much money have you got, Bob?" asked George, speaking in a low, determined tone, that told plainly how anxious he was to be in pursuit once more, and of the sacrifice he would be willing to make in order to be released from the meshes of the law, even if it was only for a few days. "I can't say exactly, but I'll promise you it isn't very much," replied Bob, carelessly, as if he did not think the amount of any great importance. And, after rummaging in all his pockets, he succeeded in producing one very ragged-looking twenty-dollar bill. "That's the size of my fortune," he said, as he handed the money to George, as if the matter was already ended. George had twenty-three dollars, all of which he would undoubtedly need before he returned; but, willing to run any risk rather than be longer delayed, he said to the officer: "It happens very unfortunately, but we have not got fifty dollars between us. If you will take my solemn promise that both Bob and myself will meet you here a week from to-day, and also that I will report to you on our return, together with this forty dollars, you will be doing us a favor which shall not be forgotten." The man hesitated for a moment, and Bob said, impatiently: "Oh, take the money, and let us go. You have got really more than the fine will amount to, for I promise you that Harnett can prove by us all that he had nothing to do with violating the ordinance. I simply got possession of his team to deceive you." "I shall be here when the case is called," said George, quietly; "for I am very anxious to show that I had nothing whatever to do with the matter; so please let us get on." "Well, I guess there's no trouble about it, and I don't believe any one will blame me for accommodating you, in view of all the circumstances," said the officer, as he stepped back from the wagon in order that they might drive on. "I hope you will succeed in getting your team, Mr. Harnett. Good-night, gentlemen!" "Good-night!" cried Bob, as he started the horses with a jerk that nearly threw his passengers from their seats. And in another instant they were riding at full speed in the direction of Babcock. "I hardly know what we had better do," said George, thoughtfully. "Here we are starting out on what may be a long journey, with only three dollars in our pockets, and I am not sure but that we ought to go back to town to try to get some more." "That would never do," replied Bob, decidedly. "If we should do that we could not get to Babcock to-night, and that we must do, if we expect to catch the thieves. We have got food and grain enough to last a day and a half or two days, and we can rough it in the woods, as the men we are chasing are doing." George would have preferred decidedly to be able to go to a hotel at night, rather than to camp in the woods; but Bob and Ralph were only too well pleased at the idea of living a gipsy life, therefore it was decided to keep on, or, more properly speaking, since no one made any objection to the plan, Bob continued to urge the horses on in the direction the thieves were supposed to have gone. The night was not so dark but that they could drive a good pace, but had it been daylight there is no question but that Bob's horses would have shown considerably better speed, for their driver was anxious to reach Babcock early, in order that the animals might have as long a rest as possible, before starting on their journey next day, which would likely be a hard one. Bob sang, laughed, and acted generally as if he was in the best of spirits, while Ralph joined in with him, for he enjoyed this night-drive immensely; but George remained silent, his great desire to get on faster causing the speed at which they were traveling to seem very slow. It was some time past midnight when they arrived at Babcock, and much as they liked to camp out, both Ralph and Bob would have been better satisfied, just then, if they could have remained all night at the hotel, for they were so tired that sleeping in the open air had not as many charms for them as usual. "Here's where we would have stopped if we had not been obliged to give up all our money," said Bob, as they drove past the hotel. "But now that we are nothing more nor less than three-dollar paupers, we shall be obliged to do as the thieves are probably doing--make up our bed under the greenwood, or some other kind of a tree." "It might be worse," said George, who was beginning to recover some of his cheerfulness as his companions lost theirs, "and we will stop at the next clump of trees." "There will be no doubt about our finding accommodations," laughed Bob, "unless our friends who are the cause of this excursion have engaged all the promising-looking groves." Above half a mile from the town the road ran through a piece of dense woods, which shut out even the faint rays of the moon, and Bob stopped the horses, while George and Ralph explored, as well as possible in the darkness, for a chance to make a camp. A small, open space, surrounded by bushes, about ten yards from the road, was the best place they could find, and preparations for the night began at once. The horses were unharnessed and the carriage backed in among the trees, where it would not be seen by any one who might pass during the night. The horses were fastened to a couple of trees, where they could feed without danger of getting their halters entangled among the bushes, and each was given a generous supply of grain. Among other things which Bob had placed into the carriage while waiting at the Kenniston farm was a water-pail, and with this on his arm he started out in search of water for the horses, while George and Ralph attended to the making of what could only be an apology for a camp. The blankets, cushions and rug were taken from the carriage, and were spread on the ground over a small pile of brush, for the boys were too tired to make any elaborate arrangements for the night. The carriage cushions formed the pillow to this one bed which was to serve for all three, and with the rug and one blanket under them, and the other blanket over them, George thought they would get along very comfortably. Bob was not long in finding plenty of water for the horses, and when he returned with it, after it was decided to go supperless to bed, in order to save the provisions, all three lay down on the hastily-improvised bed, little dreaming that they were within but a few rods of those whom they were pursuing. CHAPTER XVII. NEAR NEIGHBORS. As may be imagined, the sleep which visited the three boys was not as profound as it would have been had they been in bed at Kenniston farm. In the first place, the bed of brush, which had seemed so soft when they first lay down, seemed suddenly to have developed a great number of hard places, while the ends of the boughs, which had seemed so small when they were cut, apparently increased in size after they had served as a bed for an hour. Many times during the night did Bob get up to see if the horses were all right, and, while he would not admit that the bed had anything to do with his wakefulness, he knew, as well as did his companions, that when sleeping at home, he hardly opened his eyes once during the entire night. It was at a very early hour, therefore, that the boys were up, and ready to continue the chase. As a matter of course, after having gone to bed supperless, they were ready for a hearty breakfast, and, since they would have plenty of time to eat it before sunrise, they at once made preparations for breaking their fast. Thanks to the cooked food they had with them, these preparations did not consume very much time, since they were only obliged to take the paper packages from the carriage, and eat such portions of Mrs. Kenniston's samples of cookery as they desired. Bob gave his horses food and water before he satisfied his own hunger, and, just as he finished this work, he cried, as he held his hand up, warningly: "Hark! what was that?" The boys listened intently several moments, but nothing could be heard save the rustling of the leaves, as they were moved back and forth by the morning breeze, or the twitter of birds, as they started out in search of breakfast, and George said, with a laugh: "This is the first time I ever knew you to betray any caution, my dear boy, and you should be commended for it; but just now I think it is thrown away, for I hardly believe there is any one within half a mile of us who is awake so early." "I thought I heard some one coming through the bushes," replied Bob, as he began a vigorous attack on the food; "but I guess it was nothing but the wind." Five minutes passed, during which each one was so busy with his breakfast that he had no time for conversation, and then George motioned his companions to be silent. The warning was useless, for all had heard a sound in the bushes, as if some heavy body was moving through the underbrush, and all paused to listen. There was evidently some person or animal near by, and moving directly away from them; but it seemed so reasonable to suppose that it was a cow, or some other domestic animal, who had slept out of doors all night, that it was some moments before any one of the three thought of learning the cause of the noise. Even though they had every reason to believe that those whom they were pursuing would spend the night as they had spent it, each one of that party was so certain the thieves were a long distance away, that the thought that it might be those they were in pursuit of which were making the noise never occurred to them. It was not until some time after the sounds had died away that George realized how important it was that he should know what had caused them, and then he started up at once, dashing through the underbrush toward the direction from which the noise had come. Ralph and Bob started impulsively to follow him, and then the latter said, as he pulled his companion back: "One is enough to find the cow, for that is probably what we have been hearing, and we might as well be eating our breakfast while he is hunting." Ralph thought, as did Bob, that they had no occasion to disturb themselves simply at a rustling of leaves in the woods, and he willingly followed his companion's suggestion. But, before either of them could begin their breakfast again, a loud shout was heard from George, which caused them to start to their feet in dismay, for they understood that something serious had caused it. "Harness the horses quickly!" George shouted again. And without trying to understand the reason for this peremptory command, Bob and Ralph sprang toward the animals. It was not an order that could be obeyed very quickly, owing to the lack of facilities in their stable. The horses were quietly eating their breakfast; the harness was hanging on a tree some distance away, and the carriage had been pulled into the woods so far that it would require at least ten minutes before it could be gotten on to the road. Bob began to harness one horse, while Ralph attended to the other, and while they were thus employed, George came out of the woods in a very excited condition. "We have been camping within five rods of the thieves!" he cried. "The noise we heard was probably made by the horses as they led them out into the road, and I got there just in time to see them drive away." Haste surely made waste then, for all the party were so excited by what they had seen and heard, and so anxious to start in pursuit quickly, that they retarded their own progress by the bungling manner in which they went to work. Ralph, in his eagerness, got the harness so mixed up that he was obliged to undo all he had done and begin all over again before he could accomplish anything, while Bob searched five minutes for the bridle, which, in the first excitement, he had flung some distance from him among the bushes. So far as coolness and presence of mind was concerned, George was no better off than his companions. He attempted to pull the carriage into the road, and got it so fastened among the small trees that Ralph was obliged to come to his assistance, lifting it bodily out before it could be extricated. In this confused way of doing things fully ten minutes of time was wasted, and the thieves had a start of nearly twenty minutes before their pursuers were ready for the chase. It was useless for them now to reproach themselves with carelessness in not examining the woods when they first awoke, as they should have done, since they knew the thieves would spend the night in some such place, and quite as useless to complain, because they did not attempt to discover the cause of the noise when they first heard it. Had they done either one of these things, which it seemed the most inexperienced in this kind of work would have done, they would have discovered the team and had it then in their possession. As it was, however, they could only try to atone for their carelessness by being more cautious in the future, which each mentally resolved to be as he clambered into the carriage as soon as the horses were harnessed. This time George sat on the front seat with Bob, where he could more readily leap from the wagon if necessary. Bob started his horses at full speed, and George was satisfied that there would be no necessity of urging him to drive faster, for he held his steeds well in hand, requiring of them the best possible gait. "They have got quite a start of us," Bob said, after they had been on the road a few moments, and while Ralph was regretting the absence of a comb, which would enable him to feel so much more comfortable, "but I do not think your horses have had any grain since they stole them, and if that is so, I don't think we shall have any trouble in overtaking them within an hour." Perhaps, if Bob had spoken exactly as he thought, he would have insisted that his horses were so much faster, that the twenty minutes' advantage which the thieves had could be more than compensated for in speed; but just then he refrained from saying anything which might make his troubled friend feel uncomfortable or disagreeable. "Did you see the place where they slept last night?" Ralph asked of George, for as yet he had not told them of what he had seen when he ran through the woods. "Yes; I came right upon it when I first left you. They had made a sort of hut of boughs near a clearing, in which I should judge the horses had been feeding. The instant I saw the camp, and so near ours that a stone could have been thrown from one to the other, I thought it had been made by the thieves, and I ran at full speed for the road, following a trail that looked as if a carriage had but just passed that way. I got out of the woods just as they turned the bend in the road, and simply had the satisfaction of seeing my team driven away at a gallop, when, if I had done what almost any child would have thought of doing, it would have been in my possession." "Could you see the men?" "No; the top of the carriage was up, and I could see no one. They were probably looking out through the window and saw me, for if they stayed so near us since we stopped last night, they must know who we are, and will try to escape, even if they kill the horses." "I'm not so sure that they could have known who we were," said Bob, "for I have been trying to think if we said anything about the team, or what we were there for, and I do not believe we did." If the men whom they were pursuing did not know that this party who had encamped so near them were the ones in search of the team, it would be a great point in favor of our boys, for the others would not be likely to push their horses so hard. Therefore, each one tried to recall the conversation, and the result of this thought relieved George's mind somewhat, for no one could remember that a thing had been said which might betray their errand. The road over which they were traveling was a good one, and the horses were urged along by Bob at a lively rate, save on ascending ground, when they were allowed to choose their own pace, in order that they might not become "blown." At no one place, owing to the trees on each side, could they see very far ahead on the road, which prevented them from knowing whether they were gaining on the fugitives or not, although Bob firmly believed they were, for his horses had never shown better speed, nor been more in the humor for traveling. "We shall be on our way home in less than two hours," he said, triumphantly, as the horses dashed down a long hill at a pace that would be hard to beat; and then, as they began the ascent of the next hill, all their hopes were dashed. During the last ten minutes, it had seemed to Ralph that the easy-running carriage dragged, and as the horses neared the top of the hill, he discovered the trouble. "The hind axle is heated," he shouted, "and the wheel no longer turns." It surely seemed as if everything was conspiring in favor of the thieves, for the pursuers were now seriously crippled by a "hot box." CHAPTER XVIII. IN A TRAP. It seemed so impossible to Bob that such a misfortune could overtake them just when success appeared certain, that he could not believe what Ralph had said was true until he had jumped out and examined the axle. There was no doubt then but that they would be delayed for a long time, for the axle was already so hot that it was smoking, and they had neither oil nor water with which to cool it. In the valley or ravine through which they had just ridden there was no stream, and the only thing which could be done was to look for one further ahead, since they had passed the last house fully three miles behind. "It's no use crying about it," said Bob, with an assumption of cheerfulness he was far from feeling, "for here we are, and the sooner we mend matters the sooner we shall be riding on again." "But what can we do?" asked Ralph, feeling thoroughly discouraged at this accident, which, however quickly it might be repaired, would give the thieves a chance of making good their escape. "Even if we had a whole ocean of water, you haven't got any oil after the axle is cool, nor even a wrench with which to take the wheel off." "One of us must walk on ahead until he comes to some house, where oil and a wrench can be borrowed. Bob must drive his horses on at a walk, and halt at the first water he sees. It's an unlucky accident for us, and it seems strange that it should have happened just when it did." "It isn't so very strange," said Bob, as he started his team along at a walk, "and, as usual, it's all my fault. When we moved the other day, we left our oil behind in the stable, and I knew the wagon needed oiling when I got down to Kenniston's. I was just going to do it when you drove up, and then, like an idiot, I forgot it." It would do no good to discuss the causes of the accident after it had occurred. The only question was as to how the damage could be repaired, and, after that was decided, to set about doing it at once. "I will go on ahead for the oil," said Ralph, starting out at a run as he spoke, and in few moments he was lost to view, as he disappeared behind the trees, where the road made a decided curve. Bob and George walked, while the horses dragged the carriage with its one useless wheel, and in this fashion the boys, who a few moments before had believed that in two hours they would have overtaken the thieves and recovered the property, continued on their journey, as sad and dispirited as before they had been happy and confident. "If this hadn't happened," said Bob, bitterly, "we should have caught the men before noon; but now it is an open question as to whether they won't get away." "It will be strange if they don't escape," and George's voice sounded no more cheerful than did Bob's; "for even if they were not sure who their neighbors were last night, they must have been suspicious, and will do all they can to throw us off the scent. But there," he added, with a shrug of the shoulder indicative of resolution; "what's the use of mourning over what can't be helped? All we can say or do won't change matters, and we might as well look cheerful as cry." "I know that," replied Bob, with a grimace; "but when a fellow is disabled, in the woods, and probably two or three miles from any house, the most appropriate thing is to cry, even if the tears don't do any good." At this moment, as if in answer to Bob's assertion that they were probably a long distance from any house, and very much to their surprise, Ralph was seen coming down the road waving his hands triumphantly. "What is the matter?" cried George, not daring to believe that Ralph had already seen a house. "There's a farm-house just around the bend here, with everything we need in the stable," shouted Ralph, while he was yet some distance away. "I told the owner that we had a hot axle, and were anxious to get on as quickly as possible, and he says we can borrow one of his wagons, or take anything we need to fix ours." It is needless to say how delighted George and Bob were by the information Ralph had brought. Instead of losing nearly the whole of that day, as they had feared they should, by walking several miles before finding a stable, they could repair damages in a comparatively short time, and could, perhaps, yet overtake the men before night. "Hurrah!" shouted Bob, as he urged his horses into a trot, the party running behind. And in a few moments they were in the stable-yard of a large farm, where the proprietor was awaiting their arrival, ready to lend them any assistance in his power. Both he, as well as they, knew exactly what to do for this outgrowth of carelessness, and pail after pail of water was dashed on to the hub of the wheel to cool it off, even while he was yet repeating his offer to loan them one of his wagons if they were in a hurry to be on their journey again. Leaving Bob and Ralph to continue the cold-water application, since not more than two could work at a time advantageously, George went with the farmer to see what sort of a vehicle they could borrow in exchange for their own. He returned very shortly, however, with the word that he thought it best for them to get their own carriage into working order, since those belonging to the farmer were all so heavy that they would probably gain in speed, if they waited for their own, more than they would lose in time. This decision was about what Bob had expected, and he continued his work, which had not been delayed during George's absence, until it was thought that they could remove the wheel. It was a hard, and quite a long job; but it was accomplished finally, and then, when the iron was nearly cold, a plentiful amount of oil was applied; the other wheels were lubricated, and the boys were ready to continue their journey again, having lost by this accident not more than an hour's time. "You are all right now," said the farmer, after he had positively refused to take any payment for his own time or for the use of his tools, "an' I reckon the waiting here won't make much of any difference to you." "It wouldn't have been of any account if we hadn't been chasing a pair of horses of mine that were stolen at Sawyer. We were close behind them, and should have overtaken them by this time if it hadn't been for this delay." "What is the color of your horses?" asked the man, evincing such a sudden interest that it seemed certain he knew something about the missing property. "A pair of small, dark chestnut horses, in a box buggy, driven by two young men," replied Bob, quickly, confident that they were about to hear some good news, and answering all possible questions at once, in order that they might not be delayed any longer than necessary. "Then it is fortunate for you that you had trouble which made you stop here, or else you would have gone on and missed them," replied the man, speaking slowly, as if there was no possible reason why the boys should hurry on in pursuit. "When did you see them?" asked George, hurriedly. "Tell us at once, so that we needn't lose any more time." "There's no need for you to rush," drawled the man, much as if he enjoyed keeping the boys in suspense, "for if you stay right where you are, you will see them. They've got to come back this way, sure." The boys looked around as if they expected to see the thieves pop out from some hiding-place near by, and after waiting a moment to enjoy the effect his words had produced, the farmer asked, as he pointed nearly opposite the house to where a road branched off from the highway, leading, apparently, into the woods: "Do you see that road?" And then, as if realizing how useless such a question was when the road was so well defined, he continued: "Wa-al, I reckon that the same team you are huntin' after was driv up that road about an hour or so ago. It was a small pair of dark chestnut hosses, an' good ones, with a fancy buggy, an' two young fellers drivin'." "Where does that road lead to?" asked Bob, excitedly. "That's the joke of it," said the farmer, with a laugh. "It don't lead nowhere 'cept inter my wood-lot, an' that's what made me notice ther team so perticularly, 'cause I couldn't make out what they wanted up there. I tell you what it is, boys, you've got your hoss-thieves in a trap, an' you kin pull 'em out whenever you want to." "Are you sure that there isn't any way out of that? Can't they strike the main road by driving across some field?" asked George. "Wa-al, I've driv over that road as many as forty times every year for the last thirty, haulin' down wood, an' I wouldn't undertake to git a wheel-barrer out any other way than I went in. You kin stay here an' ketch 'em when they come out, or go in after 'em--_they'll be there_!" CHAPTER XIX. CLOSE QUARTERS. It hardly seemed possible to the boys that, after the mishap which it seemed would give the thieves all the time they needed to make good their escape, they could be so near to them that their capture seemed certain. But the farmer insisted that there was no outlet to the road; that a team answering to the description of the one George had lost had been driven in there, and that it had not come out. Therefore, there could be no question but that they had the thieves in a trap, as the farmer had said, and all that was necessary was to go and get them or the team. At first they were about to start out without any plan whatever, intent only on getting the horses as quickly as possible; but George realized in time that, secure as the thieves appeared to be against escape, all might be changed by too much precipitation. If they should rush in recklessly, the men might get past them by concealing the team in the bushes until they had passed that particular point, and then the road would be clear before them, unless the farmer could succeed in stopping them. It was necessary, therefore, that, in going up this road, which they were told was about two miles long, they should not only see where the thieves had gone in, but where it would be possible for them to come out, in case they should succeed in making a detour through the woods. The farmer, after listening to the discussion which the boys were having, suggested that they block up the road near its entrance with his heavy carts, and then, if the thieves should get past them, they would be obliged to leave the team at the obstruction in order to make good their own escape. This suggestion was so good that they followed it at once. Bob using his horses to haul a hay-rack, a heavy ox-cart and two dump-carts into the road, about two hundred yards from the highway, overturning and wedging them in in such a way that a passage through could not be made in less than half an hour. The farmer, having work that forenoon, which kept him near the house, promised to keep a sharp lookout while the boys went after the team, and to give the alarm in case the men should come down towards the barricade. Then, all the preparations having been completed, there was nothing to prevent them from going into the trap the thieves had voluntarily entered. Bob thought they ought to have weapons in case the men should attempt to fight for the possession of their ill-gotten booty; but George refused to consider the idea even for a moment. He had no thought that the men would do anything of the kind, and, even though he was going after his own property, he was not willing to go in such a way as might endanger the life of any one. "If you want any weapons, take a good stout club," he said, "and I think you will find even that unnecessary, for as soon as the men see us, they will do their best to get away." Bob was by no means satisfied to start up the road unarmed; but since it was George's property they were in search of, he thought his orders should be obeyed, even though the attempt should be unsuccessful because of it. "If I was in your place, I should make sure of the men as well as the team," the farmer called out, as they started, "for there's a good many more horse-thieves in the country than are needed, an' it's doin' a good turn to honest people to put 'em where they can't run off other people's property." George made no reply, but at the same time he did not propose to make an amateur detective of himself, unless the men should attempt to prevent him from taking his own, and then he would have no hesitation about causing their arrest. There was no difficulty in following the track of the carriage, for there had been so little travel on the road that the impress of the wheels was distinctly seen, and there could be no question but that it would be an easy matter to see where it was taken into the woods in case the men should attempt to hide. "I guess we had our labor for nothing in blocking up the road," said Bob, as they walked along, "for there is no chance of our passing the team so long as we can see the tracks as plain as this." "We certainly didn't hurt ourselves piling up the carts, and the time was well spent, if only for the sake of the precaution," said George; and then, stopping suddenly, after they had walked nearly a mile, he pointed to a second track, which led directly into the woods a few yards ahead of them. "They have been to the end of the road, and come back," he whispered. "Perhaps they have just turned in here after hearing us." For a moment the three boys stood looking at the trail made by those they had been so anxious to meet, and then George said, in a low tone: "We mustn't lose any time here, and when we do start it must be quickly. We will follow this track in, and keep right on in it; for we shall either find the team now in the bushes, or else the men will have done as I feared--passed us while we were on the road." There was still a chance that the men might get away with the team if they had succeeded in reaching the road in the rear of the boys, for it might be possible for them to clear away the obstructions near the main road before the boys could run a mile, unless the farmer could prevent them. George dashed into the bushes, followed closely by Ralph and Bob, and before they had gone very far, it was evident to all that the men were trying to do just as George had suggested. The track made by the carriage could be followed very readily, and there was no longer any question, after the boys had run a hundred yards, but that they were traveling in a half circle, the end of which would be at the road. "Come on as fast as you can," shouted George, when he thus saw his suspicions verified; and, regardless of whether he was followed or not, he dashed ahead at full speed, perfectly satisfied that when he saw his team again it would be at the barricade. When he reached the road up which they had just come, the second track of wheels could be seen, and he half expected to hear the farmer's warning cry, forgetting for the time that any ordinary pair of lungs could hardly be heard a mile away. Close behind George came Ralph and Bob, both excited by the thought that there was yet a possibility the men might escape with the team, and both running as fast as they could. "They've come this way!" shouted George, "and now it only remains to be seen whether we can get there in time." There was no need to say anything to urge either of the boys on to greater speed, for they were making every effort, and George himself was really the one who would be left behind if the race was continued very long. Bent only on reaching a given point as quickly as possible, the boys paid no attention to anything else save getting over the ground rapidly, and the farmer's voice rang out long and loud before they realized that they heard it. "Hello! Hello-o-o! Hello-o-o-o!" was the cry. And when finally the boys did hear it, they understood by the tone that there was urgent reason for them to make haste, for now, beyond a doubt, the thieves were trying hard to remove the barricade. Panting, almost breathless, but not realizing how nearly exhausted they were, the boys rushed on, intent only on noting the way, that they might lose no time or vantage by a misstep, until they emerged from the woods at a point where they could see that which was causing such an outcry from the farmer, who was taking quite as much interest in the saving of their property as he would have done in his own. George could see his team halted in front of the barricade they had piled up with so much, and what at the time Bob had thought useless, labor, while the men were straining every nerve to remove it, the farmer standing at a safe distance, screaming at the top of his voice, even though he must have seen the boys coming towards him as rapidly as they could run. Already had the two men succeeded in removing the two dump-carts, and were now at work upon the hay-rack, with every prospect of pulling it sufficiently out of the way to admit of their driving past; but when they saw the three boys coming down the road, they evidently concluded that they had worked quite as long as was safe, for they began to look out for their own welfare, instead of trying longer to get away with the team. After one look at the boys, probably to make sure they were the same ones whom they had seen coming up the road, the thieves ceased their efforts to move the hay-rack, and sought safety in flight, running down the road towards Babcock, instead of trying to escape in the opposite direction. The farmer, who was anxious that all horse-thieves should be placed beyond the possibility of carrying on their business, at once started in pursuit, probably without thought as to how he could make prisoners of two men whom he had not dared to grapple with when they were trying to tear down the barrier which prevented them from getting away with their booty. George, who still continued to lead the party, stopped when he reached the side of the carriage. He had gained possession of his team once more, and he was content. CHAPTER XX. A SOUVENIR OF THE THIEVES. Even had they been so disposed, neither Bob nor Ralph could have joined the farmer in the pursuit of the men, because by the time they arrived at the carriage they were so nearly exhausted that it would have been a matter of impossibility for them to run fifty yards further, whatever the inducement. All three stood by the side of the recovered property, panting and breathless, but watching eagerly the unequal race, where the two men could run a trifle more than twice as fast as their pursuer. The farmer, seeing how sadly he was being distanced, looked behind for an instant, to see if any of the boys were going to aid him, and then, seeing that they had all halted, gave up the contest by hobbling back to his stable, looking quite as red in the face and panting quite as hard as if he had run a thousand yards instead of twenty. "If you'd only followed me we could have caught 'em all," he said, in a half-reproachful tone, as he came up to the boys. "I don't believe you could have overtaken them if all of us had been close at your heels," replied George, speaking with considerable difficulty because of the shortness of his breath. "But, as a matter of fact, I don't think we could have followed those men even if the team itself had been ours only in consideration of our catching them. You see, we have run a mile at full speed, and we're about used up." "Wall, it's a pity to let 'em go, for they'll be lookin' 'round for some other team, now they've lost your'n, an' jest as likely as not I'll be the one that'll have to furnish it for 'em," said the farmer, mournfully, as he fanned himself vigorously with his broad-brimmed straw hat. "But I've seen them chaps before, I'm pretty sure. I b'lieve they're the same ones that was nosin' 'round here four or five weeks ago, lookin' for oil signs over my pasture." "Oh, we'll hope not!" exclaimed Bob, with a laugh. "For the sake of those who are really engaged in the oil business, we'll hope they do not number horse-thieves among them." "But I'm sure they're the same ones," persisted the farmer, "an' they talked as if they knowed all about the business." As soon as the boys had recovered somewhat from the effects of their exertions they began to think of returning, and Bob started to get his team, which had been left in the stable-yard, when an exclamation from George caused him to pause. The obstructions had not been cleared away from the road, and Harnett was fastening his horses to the fence, in order to help remove that which had been of so much service in stopping the flight of the horse-thieves, when some papers in the buggy arrested his attention. Taking them up carelessly he glanced over two or three quickly when something caught his eye which caused the cry of surprise that had stopped Bob. "They were oil prospectors, after a fashion," said George, "and if they knew what they professed to, they have left us a valuable souvenir." "A souvenir!" repeated Bob. "What have they done--left an empty pocket-book?" "It may prove to be quite as valueless as one, and probably will; but it looks queer, for it is made out in proper form, and only verifies what Bob said last night." "What I said last night!" repeated Bob, now thoroughly mystified. "In mercy to me tell me what you mean, and don't stand there mooning away like that." "Well," said George, who had glanced over the contents of the particular paper which had caused him so much surprise, "listen to me. In the first place, here is what I should judge to be an accurate survey of the wood-lot Ralph and I bought of Simpson. It states the price for which the land was mortgaged, and the probable price for which it could be bonded or purchased. Here is a description of the entire property, and here is given the exact spot, by measurement, where they have found satisfactory evidences of oil. It would be singular if, in helping Mr. Simpson, we had helped ourselves, and still more singular that we should learn of it through those who stole my team, and put us to so much trouble." "The only thing singular about it would be that there wasn't any oil there," replied Bob, quickly. "I've looked over that place some, and I know it's there; but other people haven't seen fit to believe me when I said so." "We didn't say whether we doubted you or not," said Ralph, who was inclined to believe fully the information contained in the paper George had found. "When you made the statement, we said nothing, one way nor the other." "Then why were you surprised when you found the same thing written there?" asked Bob, somewhat sulkily, as he pointed to the paper George held. "We were surprised to find it in the possession of such men," replied Harnett, with a laugh, "and perhaps also a little surprised to learn that we could have put so much faith in any one of your assertions. But now, with such eminent authority on the subject, I am anxious to get back, and look at the land for myself." "What are the other papers?" asked Bob. "They refer to land near Simpson's, which the men have examined and reported upon carefully, but without finding so many favorable evidences that a well should be sunk. What puzzles me is, how these men could be oil prospectors, and at the same time steal a team." "I think that is simple enough," said Bob, carelessly. "They were probably prospecting on their own account, expecting to sell their information after they obtained it. They hadn't any capital of their own, but when they saw a fine team alone in a shed, at a time when there was a terrible fire raging, they thought they could steal it without running any risk. If they had got away with your horses, they could have raised money enough on them to buy the Simpson property, and once they struck oil, they would become honest men." "That's nigh enough to the truth of it," said the farmer, solemnly; and all the party agreed to accept that as the explanation of what otherwise would have seemed very singular. All three of the boys were now more than anxious to return to Sawyer, that they might learn whether the statement contained in the paper they had found was true or not. Considerable labor had to be done, however, in the way of clearing the farmer's carts from the road, and all the boys went to work at once, while the owner sat on a rock near by, bemoaning his misfortune in not having caught the thieves, and in not having signs of oil on his wood-lot. By the time the boys had replaced his carts as they had found them, he came out of his sorrow sufficiently to invite them to remain to dinner, and he urged the invitation so strongly that they concluded to accept it, especially since the horses, more particularly George's, needed dinner even more than they did. It was a real country dinner they sat down to in the farm-house, half an hour later, while the horses stood before mangers, in which was a plentiful supply of grain, and the boys did full justice to it, eating until their hostess could have no cause for complaining that her food had not been duly appreciated. During dinner, Mr. Folsom, the host, learned that George and Bob were indirectly concerned in the oil business, and also heard some of the moonlighter's wonderful stories as to the famous wells he had discovered when others had said there was no oil in the vicinity. This was sufficient to revive all the farmer's hopes, which had been slumbering for a while, that he might be one of the lucky ones who are made rich by the discovery of oil on their lands, and he urged the boys to remain with him several days, or, at least, long enough to locate a well on his farm. It seemed all in vain for the boys to urge that they did not know enough about prospecting to make a thorough examination of the farmer's lands, or if they did, that it would be impossible for them to remain because of business. The old gentleman insisted so strongly, basing his claims to receive them as guests on what he had done to aid them in recovering George's property, that they were obliged to promise that they would return very soon, and examine, as far as they were able, his entire farm, which he was now very certain was situated directly on the oil-belt, even though wells had been sunk near him unsuccessfully. It was quite late in the afternoon when the boys did finally succeed in getting away from the too hospitably inclined farmer, and then they started down the road leisurely, for they had a long journey before them if they expected to reach the Kenniston farm that night. Bob rode alone and in advance, while Ralph rode with George, the two teams driving along side by side whenever the width of the road would permit, in order that the occupants might talk over and over again the prospects of finding oil on the Simpson wood-lot. And this conversation was continued by Ralph and George when Bob was obliged to drive ahead, both very much excited about it, and both building air-castles on the strength of the idea, even until the weary horses trotted up the lane to the Kenniston farm-house. CHAPTER XXI. PROSPECTING. It was not until a late hour on the morning after the boys arrived at the Kenniston farm after their pursuit of the horse-thieves that any one of the three made their appearance, and even then they would not have gotten up so early as they did, had not Jim and Dick paid them a visit for the purpose of hearing the particulars of the chase. Bob's partners paid no attention to Farmer Kenniston when he proposed that they wait until the boys should awaken, since the chances were that they needed a considerable amount of sleep; but insisted on paying a visit to their partner in bed, which effectually prevented him from enjoying another morning nap. When Ralph and George made their appearance half an hour later, Bob had told his friends all the particulars of the chase, including the finding of the report on the Simpson property, and the moonlighters were quite as much excited about it as if they had been the owners of the land. They insisted that George and Ralph should verify the truth of the statement at once, and, without waiting for an invitation, proposed to accompany them. Just then, owing to the unusual vigilance of the torpedo detective, the moonlighter's business was virtually at a standstill, and they had plenty of spare time in which to prospect for oil, or to prove the truth of the statement that had so singularly come into George's possession. Both the owners of the Simpson wood-lot would have much preferred to make their investigations alone; but since they could give no good reason as to why the boys should not be allowed to accompany them, nor none as to why the work should not be begun at once, they were obliged once more to start out with the moonlighters. During the ride home the night before, George and Ralph had discussed the question of what they should do in case oil was found on the property, and they both felt that in such case they should consider that Mr. Simpson still had a claim upon the land, even though they had paid him all he had said he considered it worth. They would have willingly loaned him the money to pay off the mortgage if it could have been done as well; but that they thought at the time he would not accept, and George had purchased the wood-lot. Now, however, if it should be found that the land was very valuable, neither of the boys thought it right that they should reap the entire benefit, although they were legally entitled to do so. They had feared that, by advancing the money to pay for the land, they would be seriously hampered in the search for the horses, and when they were obliged to give up the small amount which they had left, to the constable at Sawyer, it seemed certain that they would travel under many disadvantages. But this very lack of money had aided them. If they had had sufficient to pay for their lodging at the hotel at Babcock, the chances are that Bob would have remembered that the carriage needed oiling; they would not have been able to follow the men so closely next morning, nor would they have stopped at Mr. Folsom's, the only place where they could have learned of the whereabouts of those whom they were pursuing. The purchase of this land, made as it was in pure charity, had been a great advantage to them, and if it should prove a valuable piece of property, they intended that Mr. Simpson should be equally benefited. The title deeds had been left with Farmer Kenniston, while the boys were away, and there could be no question as to their proprietorship. The only thing now was to learn whether there really was any oil on the land, and this they were about to do, although it would have pleased them much more if they were to go alone, rather than in company with the moonlighters who had caused them so much trouble. Jim and Dick had their own team, and Bob proposed to use his horses in the double wagon, so that in case he wanted to return home before George and Ralph did, he could do so, and they could get Mr. Simpson to bring them down. Since this was to be a regular prospecting trip, which might necessitate their remaining out of doors all night, blankets and provisions were packed into the wagon as before, while, in addition, George carried his surveyor's instruments, that he might be able to locate exactly the spot marked on the paper, in case they should have any difficulty in finding it. On starting out, George insisted that they should first drive through Sawyer, in order that he might report to the constable, as he had promised; and, although the moonlighters did not fancy paying this visit, they were obliged to do so if they wanted to accompany the fortunate owners of the Simpson wood-lot on their prospecting trip. There was no difficulty in finding the man who had arrested them on the night when time was of so much value to them, and by the reception which he gave George it was easy to see that he had changed his mind somewhat regarding his guilt, or had heard of the valuable assistance he had rendered during the conflagration. "I will report to you at the time appointed," said George, after he had told the story of finding his horses; "and then I shall have no difficulty in proving that I knew nothing whatever about the transportation of the glycerine." "And I believe that you will not, Mr. Harnett," replied the officer. "Since it is uncertain as to whether the case will be heard on the day set, you need not take the trouble to come here until I send you word. But I should like to see Mr. Hubbard once in a while, for he is so apt to fly off from one point to another that I shall never feel really certain of him until he appears." "Now, see what it is to have a bad name," said Bob, with a grimace. "I ought to be trusted as entirely as George is, and yet I am not. Don't worry, Mr. Constable; I will be here in time for the examination, and I will also call upon you whenever I am in town." Then Bob drove on toward the Simpson place, Jim and Dick having preceded the others, for they had no desire to meet a constable even in a friendly way. Mr. Simpson was at home when the boys arrived at his farm, and the reception which both he and his wife gave Ralph and George was something to be remembered with pleasure by them for many a day. Had he been allowed to do so, he would have placed everything he owned at the disposal of the two who had so generously aided him to keep the home he loved so well; but George stopped the show of gratitude, which was really becoming embarrassing, by saying: "You will please us more, Mr. Simpson, by saying nothing about what we did, for we are likely to be repaid in a very substantial way; and if we are, you will get more for your wood-lot than you ever dreamed of." "Is it something in regard to those two men who just left here?" asked Mr. Simpson, not in the least surprised by what George had said. "What men do you mean?" "There were two here when you first came in sight, but they left at once on account of some business, as I understood. They told me that they wanted to buy my wood-lot, and when I said that I had already sold it, they offered to show good signs of oil if they could be paid for the prospecting they had done." George, Ralph and Bob looked at each other in surprise. It seemed certain that Mr. Simpson's visitors must have been the men who had stolen the team, and yet it was hardly reasonable to suppose that they would venture back there so soon after having committed the crime. "Can you describe them, Mr. Simpson?" asked George, feeling ill at ease because of the coming of these strangers, and yet not understanding why he did so. "I can't say I can," replied the old man, slowly; "for, you see, I hain't much of a hand at that sort of thing, an' I didn't look at 'em sharp enough. It seems to me that they were youngish, not much older than you, an' they looked as if they had been havin' a pretty hard tramp." "What time did they come here?" "About an hour ago. They said they had jest come from Babcock, an' got mother to give 'em some breakfast." "It don't seem as if there could be any question but that they are the same ones," said George, speaking slowly to his companions, and looking worried. "I can't tell why, but it troubles me to have them come back here." "Don't be foolish, George," said Bob, speaking rather sharply. "What harm can they do you? Besides, if they should go to cutting up any capers, it would be the easiest thing in the world to have them arrested for stealing your team, and I fancy that would settle them." The boys had come, believing they should surprise Mr. Simpson by telling him there was a chance that oil might be found on the land he had sold so cheaply; but instead of doing so, the old man had startled them considerably. "Well," said George, after a short pause, "we are going to leave our teams here with you, Mr. Simpson, while we start out prospecting the wood-lot. We believe those men who have just left are the ones who stole my team, and if you still feel that you would like to do me a favor, you will keep a sharp lookout over the stable while we are gone, for I do not think they would hesitate to steal it again if they got the chance." Mr. Simpson promised to remain within sight of the stable-door all the time the boys were away, and as proof that he was able to defend the horses against any number of men, he brought out an old army musket, minus almost everything save the stock, which he held carefully and timidly in his hands, thereby causing his wife no little fear. "If we should find oil, Mr. Simpson," said Ralph, lingering behind after the others had started, "George and I have agreed that you shall own an equal share of the lot with us." Then he hurried away, joining the others quickly, in order that he might not hear the old gentleman's thanks or expostulations. George, as well as Bob, believed they could find the place where the men claimed to have seen signs of oil without any difficulty, and they started out on what proved to be a vain search; for, after they had walked several hours, they were no wiser than when they started. It was plainly of no use to search in this way, and George started back to the house for his instruments, that he might locate the spot from the directions on the paper, which he still held in his hand. The boys, glad of a rest, waited for his return, until, after he had been absent nearly an hour, when he could easily walk the distance in twenty minutes, Bob and Ralph started in search of him, leaving Jim and Dick there in case he should return. Mr. Simpson both astonished and alarmed them by saying that George had not been to the house since he first left it, and then they began a hurried search, which resulted in nothing. They called him by name, started Jim and Dick out even to the remote portions of the lot; but without success. Strange as it seemed, it was nevertheless true that George had mysteriously disappeared. CHAPTER XXII. A CRUEL DEED. When the boys met in the wood-lot at the spot where George had left them, after they had made the first hurried survey of the place, consternation was imprinted on every face. They knew that Harnett would not voluntarily have gone away without telling them, and an undefined but a very great fear took possession of them. Each looked at the other as if fearing to speak that which was in his mind, and yet all were conscious that whatever was done to find their missing friend should be done at once. It seemed so improbable that anything could have happened to him there without their knowing it, that no one ventured to put his suspicions into words, and each waited for the other to speak. "It can do no good for us to stand here," said Ralph, after he had waited some time for a suggestion from Bob. "George is either not here, or else some accident has happened which prevents him from answering. If he had been here, and as he was when he left us, he must have heard us when we called. Now, what shall we do?" All three of the moonlighters stood looking at him in silent dismay. They were bewildered by the sudden disappearance, and Ralph understood that whatever steps were taken toward finding George must be directed by him, for his companions seemed incapable even of connected thought. "In the first place," he said, "let's make a thorough search of the wood-lot, beginning from this point and working toward the house in the direction he disappeared. If we don't find him here, we will try to make up our minds what to do." There was no dissenting voice raised against this proposition, and Ralph began the search by directing the boys to stand in a row, about ten feet apart, and then walk straight down to the fence, carefully examining every place in which George could have hidden. In this way a lane, at least forty feet wide, was examined thoroughly, and as nothing was found by the time they reached the fence, the line was formed again ten feet further on, the march continuing until they reached a point abreast of the one they had started from. No one spoke during this search, for it seemed as though they were hunting for the lifeless body of their friend, and when again they arrived at the fence, they ranged along in a new line, silently, afraid almost to look at the ground because of that which they might see. And at least a portion of their fears were to be realized, for as they walked along on this third sad journey, they first found a place where the bushes and ferns had been trampled down as if some desperate struggle had taken place, and then, a few feet further on, almost hidden in a pile of brushwood, they saw that for which they sought. It was the body of George, looking as if all life had departed, the face beaten by cruel blows until it was nearly unrecognizable, the clothing torn, and lying still as death. Even then no one spoke; no cry of alarm or of astonishment was given, for this was what they had been expecting to find during all the search. Neither of the moonlighters had recovered from their first bewilderment, and, as if this show of helplessness on the part of his companions nerved him up, Ralph still preserved his presence of mind. Kneeling down by the apparently lifeless body, Ralph unfastened or tore apart the clothing, until he could lay his hand over his friend's heart. After an instant's silence, during which it seemed to each boy that he could hear the pulsations of his own heart, Ralph said in a hard, unnatural voice, which no one would have recognized as his: "He is not dead, for I can feel his heart beat feebly. One of you go for a physician, while the others help me carry him to the house." "You take my horses, and drive first to Sawyer and then to Bradford for three or four of the best doctors you can find, and drive faster than you ever drove before," said Bob to Jim. The latter, finding actual relief in having something definite to do, started off at full speed towards the farm-house, while Ralph began to make a rude kind of a litter. Two fence-rails with limbs of trees laid across them, the whole covered by the coats and vests of the boys, was the best that could be improvised in a short time, and on this George was laid as tenderly as possible. It seemed to all the boys as if he must be reviving somewhat, for they fancied they could see him breathe as they moved him, and Bob was certain he had lifted one of his hands as if to touch his head. It was a mournful procession they formed as they moved slowly towards the farm-house, Ralph and Bob carrying the litter, while Dick stood ready to help them whenever he might be needed. At the fence they were met by both Mr. and Mrs. Simpson, who had, of course, learned the sad news from Jim, and had hurried out with almost as much sorrow in their hearts as if he had been a son of theirs, for they had learned to love George even before he had been the means of saving their homestead to them. Thanks to the help which the old people were able to give, the wounded boy was carried much more quickly and easily along, and in a short time, which seemed very long to the anxious ones, he was lying on a bed in the farm-house. Every effort was made to revive him as soon as he was placed in a comfortable position on the bed in the room, sweet-scented with herbs, and with such success that in a short time there was a movement of the eyelids, followed by a low moan which, though piteous, was welcomed by the boys gladly, for it told of life. From the time they had found him stricken down by some murderous hand, Ralph had noticed that George still held tightly clutched in his left hand a piece of paper. He had hoped from the first that it might afford some clue to the murderous assailants, and had tried to remove it, but without success. Now, however, when it seemed as if consciousness was returning, the hands unclasped from what had probably been a clutch at those who had attacked him, and the paper fell to the floor. The first physician whom Jim had found entered at this moment, and, picking the paper up, Ralph held it until he should hear the medical man's decision. He was disappointed in getting this very speedily, however, for the physician began a long and careful examination of the injured boy, in which he was assisted by the second doctor, who arrived ten minutes later. George was in good hands now, and since they could do nothing to aid him, Ralph beckoned to Bob to leave the room, for he was anxious to learn what was contained in the paper, and wished that some one should share the secret with him. "This is what George had in his hand when we found him," he said, when they were out of the house, "and I think it will, perhaps, explain who it was who tried to murder him." Bob stood breathlessly waiting for Ralph to open the paper which was crumpled tightly up in that almost death clutch, and as he saw it, he uttered a cry of surprise and anger. It was a fragment of the description of the wood-lot which had been found in the carriage when the thieves left it. "Those men have done this," cried Bob, as he clenched his hands in impotent rage--"the ones whom George would not help catch after they had stolen his team. They knew he had this paper, and when they saw him, they either tried simply to get possession of it, George resisting, or at the first attempted to kill him." "They can't be very far from here," said Ralph, as if wondering what other crime they would attempt to commit before they left. "No, and they shan't get very far, either. I'll send Dick over to Sawyer for the officers, and if it is possible, we'll have those fellows where they can't do any more mischief." Dick was only too willing to go when he heard what Bob had to tell him, and in the team he had driven over in he started at nearly as rapid a pace as Jim had. Very shortly after he had gone, Jim returned. The first physician was from Bradford, and he had met him on the road, while the second he had found in Sawyer, having gone there to visit a patient. Both were said to be very skillful, and Jim had sensibly concluded that there was no necessity of getting any more. To him the boys told of the discovery they had made regarding the scrap of paper, and had they followed his advice, they would have started in search of the villains then and there, without waiting the tardy movements of the officers. But both Ralph and Bob thought their place just then was with their friend, rather than searching for those who had assaulted him, and they persuaded Dick to forego his idea of making a personal search for the men. It was not long that the boys were in suspense as to the report of the physicians, for hardly had they finished discussing the discovery they had made as to who had done the cruel deed, when one of the medical gentlemen came from George's room. Unless, he said, there were internal injuries, of which they were then unable to learn, George's condition was not one of imminent danger. That he had been severely injured there could be no doubt; but there was every reason to believe that he would recover, unless some more serious wound than those already found had been given. He had not recovered consciousness yet, and there was hardly any chance that he would for some time, while the physician barely intimated that it was possible, owing to the wounds on his head, that he might never fully recover his mental powers. It was just such a report as medical men often make--one which leaves the anxious ones in quite as much suspense as before, and neither Ralph nor Bob was just certain whether it was favorable to their friend or not. CHAPTER XXIII. THE TOWN ORDINANCE. The news which Dick carried to Sawyer was sufficient to create a great excitement in that naturally quiet little town. In addition to what looked like an attempted murder, was the fact that George Harnett, whom they had all respected before the conflagration, and admired after it, was the intended victim. There was no need for Dick to urge that officers be sent to try to effect the capture of the scoundrels, for almost before he had finished telling the story, a large party of citizens started in search of the men, determined that they should answer for their crime. Therefore, when Dick returned, it was with so large a following that the physicians rushed out in the greatest haste to insist on their keeping at a respectful distance from the house, lest the noise might affect their patient. Bob and his partners were anxious to join in the search, and urged Ralph to accompany them, since he could do no good to George by remaining; but he refused to leave his friend, even though he could not aid him, and the party started without him, a look of determination on their faces that boded no good to the professed oil prospectors in case they should be caught. During all of that night Ralph remained with George, listening to his delirious ravings, as he supposed he was still battling for his life with the men, and just at daybreak Bob returned alone. The search had been even more successful than any of the party had dared to hope for when they set out, for the men had been captured in the woods about four miles from the place where the assault had been made and in the pocket of one of them was the paper from which one corner had been left in George's hand. They had evidently believed that they would be securely hidden in the woods, for they had built a camp, and were in it asleep when they were found. Bob had been one of the first to rush in upon them, and, seeing him, the men had shown fight; but the sight of the crowd behind him prevented any serious demonstrations, and after that their only fear had been that some one would attempt to do them an injury, a fear for which, at one time, it seemed as if there were very good grounds. When the prisoners had been carried back to Sawyer, Bob had left the party, in order to report their success to Ralph, as well as to learn George's condition. Until Harnett's friends could be informed of his situation, Ralph and Bob were looked upon as the only ones having a right to dictate as to what should be done for him, and Ralph was anxious to have the course they should pursue decided. With this in view, he had a long discussion with Bob as to what should be done, and the result of it was that he started at once for Bradford, to telegraph to George's mother, and to hire a nurse to take care of him. Mrs. Harnett, George's mother, lived in Maine, and it would necessarily be quite a long time before she could reach her son, even if she got the telegram as soon as it was sent. Therefore, it was important that a nurse should be procured, at least until she could arrive, and decide what should be done with the patient. After this was done, Ralph started to return, not wanting to be away any longer from his friend than possible, and as he neared Sawyer, he met the officer who had arrested George and Bob for violation of the town ordinance. "Where is Mr. Hubbard?" asked the officer, after Ralph had given him all the particulars of George's condition. "He is now at Mr. Simpson's, waiting there until I shall get back." "Is he particularly needed there?" "Oh, no. As for the matter of that, neither one of us will be actually needed after this forenoon, for I have just been to Bradford to engage a nurse for George until his mother shall get here. Why did you ask?" "Well, you see before this assault was committed, it was decided to call the case one of carrying glycerine through the town, to-day. Now it has been decided, in view of the service Harnett rendered at the conflagration, to drop the case against him, and only proceed against Hubbard. But if his presence was necessary to Harnett, we could postpone it easily enough." "But George would feel very badly if the case against him was dropped," said Ralph, earnestly. "Before the arrest was made, his only hope was that it would be made, so that he might prove he had nothing to do with it. Isn't it possible to proceed against him, even if he isn't there?" "And what if it is?" asked the officer, with a smile. "If it is I would urge you to call the case against George at the same time as that against Bob, for I know, beyond a doubt, that he will be proven not guilty." "I'll see what can be done; and if you and Hubbard can leave, come over about two o'clock this afternoon." "We will be there," replied Ralph. And then he drove on, rejoiced at the thought that even while his friend was sick, he could remove one cause of trouble from him. When Bob was told of the interview Ralph had had, he was by no means so well pleased that the case was to be opened so soon. "Why didn't you tell the officer that I couldn't be spared from George's side for a moment?" he asked. "That would have settled it, for just now every one is sympathizing with him." "In the first place, it wouldn't have been true," replied Ralph, "and then again, if it has got to come, the sooner it's over the better, I should think." Bob made a wry face over the matter, for he had hoped that in the excitement caused by the attack on George, both the cases would be dropped, and since there could be no doubt about his conviction, that would have been the most pleasant way out of it, so far as he was concerned. Ralph used all the arguments he could think of to persuade Bob to look at the matter in a philosophical light, and it was not until he urged the satisfaction it would give George, when he recovered, to know that he was cleared of the charge, that Bob would even admit that he was willing to go, although he knew he must do so. As soon as the professional nurse arrived and began her duties, Bob and Ralph harnessed the former's team, and started first for the moonlighters' hut, where Jim had said he would be that day, for the purpose of getting him to testify in George's behalf. This young moonlighter was quite as averse to appearing at court as his partner had been, for he feared the charge might be altered to include him, but Ralph persuaded him that such would hardly be probable, at the same time that he urged him to accompany them, for George's sake. On arriving at Sawyer it was found that the authorities were willing to call George's case in consideration of the fact that his innocence could be easily proven, and the trial began. Of course, with Bob, Jim and Ralph to testify in George's behalf, there was no doubt as to his innocence in the matter, and quite as naturally, the testimony which cleared one convicted the other, for Bob had told the story exactly as the matter had happened. George was found "not guilty," and public opinion being in favor just then of any of the friends of the injured man, Bob was let off with a reprimand and a fine of ten dollars. Bob was in high glee over this easy settlement of the matter, as was Ralph, and when the constable handed them the forty dollars which he had taken as security for their appearance, the young moonlighter insisted on presenting him with five dollars of his twenty, as a "token of his appreciation." During the ride back to the Simpson farm, and Jim accompanied them in order to remain there over-night in case he should be needed, Bob unfolded a scheme which he declared he had been maturing for some time, although Ralph insisted that it had only occurred to him after his fortunate escape from the clutches of the law. "We shall have no business for two or three weeks at least," he said; "and while George is so sick there is really nothing we can do for him. Now I propose that you and I find the signs of oil that those fellows claim to have found, and when George gets well the work will be all done for him." "But can we do it?" asked Ralph, thinking that he would be of but little service, since his knowledge of the oil business was confined to what he had seen of the moonlighters' operations. "Of course we can. I have done a good deal of prospecting, and, except that I couldn't find the place they describe by measurements, I can do the work better than George, for he has had no experience whatever." "I am willing to do it if I can," said Ralph, "for surely we can be doing no harm in trying to prove whether the property is valuable or not." "No harm! Of course there wouldn't be any!" cried Bob, growing enthusiastic over his scheme. "And if we do find things as plain as I believe we shall, there will be no trouble in borrowing money enough to sink the well at once, so that when George gets out we could surprise him with a little oil property that would make his eyes stick out." Ralph felt almost as if he was losing his breath at the "size" Bob's scheme was assuming, and he said, faintly: "Oh, we wouldn't do that!" "Indeed, but we would, and I reckon Harnett wouldn't feel very badly about it either." "If you were sure of striking oil, I'm not sure but that father would advance the necessary money to do it," he said, falling in at once with Bob's scheme, he was so dazzled by it. "That would be all the better," cried Bob, excitedly; "and I tell you what it is, Gurney, if I don't show you a five-hundred-barrel well in that same wood-lot, you shall have my head for a football." Ralph was hardly in need of such a plaything, but Bob's scheme had so excited him that when he did finally succeed in getting to sleep that night, it was only to dream of wonderful wells spouting wonderfully pure oil. CHAPTER XXIV. BOB'S INDUSTRY. Bob Hubbard was not one to give up anything he had once decided upon without a trial, and when he told Ralph that between them they would find the oil and sink the well before George recovered, he intended to do it if it was within the range of possibilities. Very many operators in the oil region looked upon Bob as one of the best prospectors there, and while they fully understood his reckless manner, and agreed that it could not be said that he was strictly truthful, they had the most perfect confidence in his reports on land. Therefore, it was no vain boast when Bob said that if there were good signs of oil on the Simpson wood-lot, he could easily borrow money enough to sink a well, for almost any one of the capitalists of Bradford would have been willing to make the loan upon his representations. This wood-lot of Simpson's had attracted Bob's attention some time before, as the reader already knows, and, despite the assertions of some oil prospectors to the contrary, he had always maintained that a good paying well would be found there. It had been his intention to buy the land; but he had neglected to do so, as he was in the habit of neglecting his own business until it was too late. But he would be satisfied to prove that he had been correct in his views by striking oil there, even if he was opening the property for some one else, and just then he saw the opportunity of doing a favor for his friend at the same time that he proved the truth of his own statements. On the morning after he had spoken of his "scheme" to Ralph, he was up some time before the sun was, even though he had watched by George's side until midnight, and was only waiting for the professional nurse to relieve Ralph from his duty of watcher, before beginning the work he had proposed to do. During the night it had seemed as if George had recovered consciousness for a few moments, although he had not spoken, and the physician, who had remained at the farm-house, was called to the patient's side. This brief revival of consciousness, to be followed immediately by a fever, was what the medical man had predicted, and he then said that George would appear to be very much worse in the morning; but that it was the turning of the fever which would show whether he was ever to regain the full possession of all his faculties. Therefore, when the morning came, and George, in a high fever, seemed to be very near death his friends were much less alarmed for his safety than they would have been, had the change not been expected. It was unfortunate that he could not have been removed to the Kenniston farm, where he would have been nearer medical aid in case he should need it suddenly; but he could not have been taken where he would have received more tender or devoted care then he did from Mr. Simpson and his wife. The only possible aid which either Ralph or Bob could have given, after they had relieved the nurse of the care of watching during the night, would have been in case they were needed to go to town for anything which the patient might require. Except for that, they might as well be out prospecting as remaining at the farm-house. Therefore, in order that they might both be away, and feel perfectly at ease, Bob had arranged with Dick to come over and remain during the day with Jim, to act as messenger in case there was any necessity for it. Bob's horses were there, and after breakfast, when Jim had arrived, and the nurse had resumed her duties, there was really nothing to prevent them from going where they pleased. Much as he wanted to go with Bob, Ralph was uncertain as to whether he should leave his friend until after he had spoken with the physician regarding it, and then, learning that he could be of no possible assistance by remaining, he announced that he was ready to begin the work of prospecting again, which had been brought to such a sad end the day previous. Bob started out excited by the thought of what they would accomplish, and so intent upon his scheme that he rattled on with explanations of how this or that might be accomplished, until Ralph began to look upon sinking an oil well as mere child's play, and quite convinced that it could easily be done, even without capital. Both the boys were satisfied that there were no signs of oil in such localities as they had examined the day previous, therefore there was no occasion for them to do that work over again, and Bob began his labors by starting through the wood-lot in an entirely different direction, which brought them to a small stream, or marsh, which ran directly across the land. The water-course, if such it could be called, was nearly dried up, but Bob showed every signs of delight at finding it so easily, and said to Ralph, as he began to wade along its course, regardless alike of wet feet or mud-plashed clothing: "Here is where we shall find the first signs, if there is any oil around here. Follow me, and sing out when you see any greasy-looking water in these little pools." It is quite probable that Ralph would have waded in streams which were almost entirely covered with oil, and yet never have "sung out" once, for he was at a loss to know how oil-covered water should look; but before they had traveled twenty yards, Bob said, excitedly: "Why don't you say something? I thought you would like to be the first one to discover signs on your own land, so I have held my tongue for the last five minutes, expecting to hear you shout." "But what shall I say?" asked Ralph, in surprise. "I haven't seen any oil yet." "Well, you're a fine prospector, you are!" and Bob looked at his companion as if in the most perfect amazement that he did not understand fully the business which he had had no experience in. "What do you call _that_?" and Bob pointed to the water-pools that were covered with something which showed different colors, not unlike a soap-bubble. "I've seen that queer-looking water for some time," replied Ralph, innocently; "but that isn't oil." "You may think so," said Bob, with a laugh, "but you let some of these oil operators from Bradford see that, and then it would do your heart good to hear them offer you big prices for the land. That's oil, my boy, and it shows up as plain as the nose on your face. We'll follow this swale up until we find where the oil ceases, and then I'll show you a place where you can sink a well without a possibility of losing any money by the operation." Ralph was now quite as eager and excited as his companion was, and the two splashed on through the mud and water, feeling much as gold-seekers do when they believe they are following up the leads to that precious metal. Up the marshy land they walked until they were very nearly in the center of the lot, and then Bob stopped, with a gesture of satisfaction. At this point the difference in the water was very marked, the line of oil, as it oozed out from a little bank, showing clearly, while above the water was pure. "There's one thing certain," said Bob, triumphantly, as he stood upon the sponge-like bank which afforded him so much satisfaction to see. "Those who have laughed at me because I insisted that the oil belt extended in this direction would feel kind of foolish if they could see this, wouldn't they?" "But is it what you might call a good showing?" asked Ralph, still incredulous that this land, which they had purchased only through charity for Mr. Simpson, should prove so valuable. It seemed to him that Bob must be mistaken, or those living in the vicinity would have discovered it some time before. "Well, I should say it was a good showing," cried Bob, excitedly. "Why, Gurney, there isn't one well out of twenty that are sunk which looms up like this. It will yield a thousand barrels if it yields a pint." The only question, then, as to whether it was really valuable property, it would seem, was whether it would yield the pint; and, if one could judge from Bob's face, there was no doubt about that. He was radiantly triumphant--not that he had discovered the oil, for others had done that before him, but that his views on the location of the oil belt had proved correct, and he was determined that by his efforts the supply should be made to yield, even though he could have no pecuniary interest in the matter. "We'll sink the well here, and I'll begin the work this very afternoon," he said. "But first we must go back to the house, and we'll mark our way, so that there'll be no difficulty about finding the spot again." Then Bob started toward the farm-house, walking rapidly, as if his feet could hardly be made to keep pace with his thoughts, and breaking off the tops of the bushes to mark the way. "But how are you going to work without money?" asked Ralph, almost doubting if his companion was quite right in his mind. "Do you think that a sight of that place isn't as good as a big bank account? Why, we only need about three thousand dollars to do it all." "Three--thousand--dollars!" echoed Ralph. "That's all. You write to your father, tell him what we have found, and ask him to send the money right on," said Bob, in a matter-of-fact tone. "And do you suppose he would send such an amount of money simply for the asking?" And Ralph's doubts in regard to the moonlighter's sanity increased each moment. "It don't make much difference whether he does or not," was the careless reply. "I can get everything we need to go to work with on the strength of that showing, and I tell you that we'll have that well flowing just as soon as possible. But you write to your father, ask him to come on and see what we have got, and, after he has talked with those who are in the business here, he won't hesitate about the money." "Yes, I can do that," said Ralph, slowly, but doubting very much whether he could accomplish anything by it. "But it will take three or four days at least before we can hear from him." "That don't make any difference, for it won't delay us. I'm going to start right out to buy the engine, and by the time we hear from him, we shall be at work." By this time they were at the stable, and Bob began harnessing his horses, in proof of what he said. "I wouldn't do that," expostulated Ralph. "It may not be as good as you think it is, and you may get into an awful lot of trouble about it." "Look here, Gurney," said Bob, impressively. "There's oil there--plenty of it--and I know what I'm about. You just let me alone, and by the time Harnett is able to understand anything, I'll be ready to prove to him that both he and you are rich, all through your charitable idea of buying Simpson's wood-lot." CHAPTER XXV. THE WORK BEGUN. After deciding in his own mind that he would sink a well in the place he had found, taking the work and debts upon himself when it was all to be for the pecuniary advantage of his friend, Bob was not one to lose any time. As soon as he got back to the house and could harness his horses, he had started for Bradford to make arrangements for the purchase, on credit, of such machinery as was needed, and all this had been done so quickly that Jim and Dick were not aware he had returned from prospecting until they saw him driving away. As a matter of course they questioned Ralph as to why their partner had left so hurriedly, and his reply excited them wonderfully. He told them of what Bob had found, and then he realized how good the evidences of oil were, for the boys were in a perfect fever of delight as he explained what they had seen. Then he told them of what he thought was a mad scheme on Bob's part, his intention to begin sinking a well even before he had any money to carry on the work, and instead of being surprised at their partner's rashness, as he had expected they would be, they seemed to think it a very natural course for him to pursue. They had quite as "wild" an attack as Bob had had, and although Ralph was surprised at it then, he soon grew accustomed to such phases of the "oil fever," after he had seen more of the business. Jim and Dick insisted on going out to see what their partner had discovered, not satisfied with Ralph's description, and while they were gone he tried to convince himself that this possibility of his becoming rich, even before he had been obliged to struggle with the world, was true, and not a dream. He was sitting on the wood-pile, arguing to himself as to whether Bob might not be mistaken, when Mr. Simpson came out of the house with the report that George was sleeping, and he decided to tell him the news, to see if he would be as confident as the others. But before he could speak, Jim and Dick came up, panting, but triumphant. "That's the biggest thing I ever saw!" said Jim, as he wiped the perspiration from his face, and then turning to Mr. Simpson, he added, "That wood-lot is worth about a thousand times as much as you got for it." "Eh? What's that?" asked the old man, with his hand to his ear, as if distrustful that it had performed its duty correctly. "Why, Bob has found the oil." "Yes," added Dick, "and it shows up better than anything I ever saw around here." "It is true, Mr. Simpson," said Ralph, as the old man still looked incredulous. "Bob found signs of oil this morning, which he says are wonderfully good. I don't wonder that you can't believe it, for I haven't succeeded yet, and I was with Bob when he found it." "Oil on the wood-lot!" repeated Mr. Simpson, in a dazed sort of way. "Yes, sir, and tanks of it!" replied Jim. "I am more glad than I can say," replied the old man, fervently, "for now you and Mr. Harnett will be rewarded for your generosity to an old man whom you hardly knew or cared for. It was not to be that I should have it, and it wouldn't have done me much good if I had, for mother an' I are most ready to leave this world, an' we haven't a child or a chick to be gladdened by the money. Why, Mr. Gurney, I'm as pleased for you as if it was all mine." And Mr. Simpson shook the boy by the hand in a hearty way that left no doubt of the truth of what he said. "But if there is oil there, Mr. Simpson, you own as much as George and I do, for we settled on that yesterday." "No, no!" and the old man shook his head decidedly. "When I sold the land, I believed I was getting the full value for it, and you didn't care whether it was worth what you paid or not. What you bought is yours, and there's no gainsaying that. I suspected there was somethin' more'n wood on that land when I went to pay Massie the money, for when he found that I had the full amount, he offered to pay me my price for the wood-lot, and when I told him I'd sold it, he offered to give me the whole mortgage just for that piece of land." "There!" exclaimed Ralph, as if Mr. Simpson had just told him something which it was to his advantage to hear. "Now you can see why we should give you one-third of the land. If you had come to us then, and told us that you had a better offer for it, we should have been only too well pleased to give it up. Now, if what Bob says is true, you shall still own a third of the lot." Mr. Simpson shook his head, to show he would not permit of such generosity, and Ralph did not care to discuss the matter any further, for he and George had already decided what to do. "If what Bob says is true!" cried Jim. "Why, there's no question about it, for there the oil is where you can see it for yourself." "Still, it may not turn out as he expects," objected Ralph, as if determined not to believe in his good fortune; and the moonlighters, really angry at such obstinacy, refused to argue with him any longer. They insisted that Mr. Simpson should go with them to see the fortune that had been his, without his being aware of the fact, and while they were away Bob returned. He had two men with him, who appeared as intent on business as Bob did, for all three walked past Ralph without speaking, going directly into the wood-lot. During fully an hour, Ralph sat on the wood-pile, wondering if it could be possible that he was wrong in refusing to believe what all the others seemed so certain of, and then Bob and the men came back, accompanied by Mr. Simpson and the two moonlighters, all looking as if they could hardly contain themselves because of joy. "We will start the engine and lumber right up here, Mr. Hubbard," said one of the men, as he passed Ralph, "and you can send for what you want, with the understanding that the owners of the land will ratify all your bargains." "Well, as for that, you can judge for yourselves, so far as one of the owners is concerned; the other is not able to transact any business," said Bob, turning suddenly toward Ralph, and, greatly to that young gentleman's surprise, saying, "Gentlemen, this is Mr. Ralph Gurney, who owns one-half the property, as Mr. Simpson has told you." "You are a very fortunate young man," said the gentleman who had been speaking with Bob. "You authorize Mr. Hubbard to act for you, I suppose?" "Yes, sir," replied Ralph, too much dazed to know exactly what he was saying. "There! what did I tell you?" cried Bob, as Jim drove away with the men, in order to bring the team back. "They will supply everything we need to open the well, and simply because they have seen what you did not think was of very much account. I have hired the men to build the derrick, and before you go to bed to-night you will have seen the work begun on your oil well." "But, Bob," asked Ralph, in a tone that was almost piteous, and which sounded so comical, under the circumstances, that even Mr. Simpson laughed heartily at it, "do they think the same about it that you do?" "Well, you heard what was said about supplying anything we needed, and people don't say such things, even up this way, unless they mean them. Now we shall need some considerable money, and I advise you to write to your father, telling him of what you own, and asking him to come on here prepared to help you. If he won't do it I can get all the money we need; but we shall have to pay considerable for the use of it." Ralph made no objection, nor advanced any further argument; he was in that condition of mind when he was not capable of any resistance, and he obeyed Bob's orders as meekly as if there was no way by which he could refuse. Ralph's letter was by no means one of such glowing description as Bob would have written. It was a plain statement of facts, begun by an account of how he and George came to buy the property, of the chase for the thieves, when they had their first intimation of the value of the property, of the accident to George, of Bob's discovery, and lastly of the opinion of the Bradford merchants, who were ready to supply, on credit, everything which was necessary for the opening of the well. When the letter was read to Bob in its entirety, he did not disapprove of it, nor was he very much pleased. All he ventured to say was: "It is lucky for you, Gurney, that the oil showed up so plainly that those who know a gold dollar when they see it were not so frightened about giving credit as you are about stating facts." Then Dick was sent to Sawyer to post the letter, and while he was away the workmen whom Bob had engaged had arrived. Ralph went with him when he directed them to clear away for the erection of the derrick and engine-house, and by the time the first load of lumber had arrived, he had begun to feel the effects of the oil fever. The preparations going on everywhere around, the comments of the workmen as they saw the show of oil, the ringing blows of axes, and shouts of the teamsters, all lent an air of realism to Bob's words which Ralph had failed to see or feel before. It was for him, even though it had been against his wishes, that all these men were working, and for him would accrue the profits, if indeed there were any. Bob had been as good as his word; before Ralph went to bed that night he had seen the work begun, and already was he beginning to feel that perhaps all Bob's predictions might be verified. CHAPTER XXVI. DRILLING AN OIL WELL. There was no material change in George's condition on the morning after work had been begun on the oil well. The physicians declared that he was getting along as well as could be hoped for, and the nurse gave it as her opinion that he would recover much sooner than any one had believed. Therefore, the boys were not troubled about their friend more than might be expected. On this day, work was begun on the derrick, and, as may be imagined, all the boys were on the spot to see it, Ralph's belief in the success of the venture growing stronger and stronger as the framework arose in the air. On the third day George's mother arrived, and the boys were thus relieved of all responsibility, so far as the care of their friend was concerned. It was on the evening of the same day that Mrs. Harnett came that Ralph's father arrived. After receiving his son's letter, he had thought the matter of sufficient importance, somewhat to Ralph's surprise, to warrant his paying a visit to the oil fields, and had written to Ralph to meet him at Bradford. Despite the fact that Bob could borrow on the strength of the property as much money as he needed to carry on the work, he was very anxious to convince Mr. Gurney of the value of his scheme, and on the day when that gentleman was to arrive, insisted that Ralph should go to Bradford with him early in the afternoon, in order that he might be able to arrange with the gentlemen of whom they were purchasing their supplies to meet Mr. Gurney, and tell him exactly what they thought of the proposed well. Thanks to Bob's activity, Mr. Gurney was able to see all those who had inspected the property on that same evening, and was considerably surprised by these interviews. After receiving Ralph's letter, he had thought that possibly the boys might have a site for a well which would pay to open, and he had come on believing that it was not a matter of very great importance. When he had been introduced to Bob, and had heard that young gentleman's flowery description of the vast amount of wealth which was only waiting to be brought to the surface of the earth, he was disposed to look upon it as a visionary scheme, the value of which only existed in the moonlighter's mind. Bob had been accustomed to have his statements received in that same way, and for that reason had arranged for Mr. Gurney to meet those whose judgment he could fully rely upon. These gentlemen assured him that the well promised to be a rich one; that the signs of oil were remarkably good, and that they had no hesitation in agreeing with Bob, as they had done, to supply anything which might be needed to open the well. Thus, even before he had seen the property, Mr. Gurney believed that his son was in a fair way to enrich himself through his deed of charity. In the present crowded condition of the Simpson farm-house Mr. Gurney could find no accommodations for living there, and, since he was to remain in Bradford, the boys had made their arrangements to remain there also over night, in order that they might take him out to the oil-well early in the morning. On the following day, Mr. Gurney drove out to look at the property. He saw that the work was well under way, and heard sufficient from the workmen to convince him of the fact that every one who had seen the place believed a well would yield plentifully. Mr. Gurney's business would not permit of his remaining in the oil region but one day, and when Ralph drove him to the depot that night, he gave him formal permission to draw on him at sight for all necessary expenses. After this, had it been possible, Bob would have hurried the work still faster along, but he had already urged matters on as fast as possible, and all he could do was to insist on Ralph, Jim and Dick doing as much work as one of the laborers, he setting the example. The days went on all too short for the work that each one wanted to see done, and wearily for the invalid, who was beginning slowly to recover. The fever had abated, and with the doctor's permission, the boys had an interview with their friend, who had descended within the shadows of the Valley of Death. On the night when the derrick was completed, the engine placed and housed, and the drills in position, ready for work, Bob and Ralph had a long and heated discussion as to whether George should be told of what was being done. Bob insisted that he should know nothing about it until the day on which they struck oil, while Ralph argued that if it was such a certainty that oil would be found, George should be allowed to share in the pleasure of digging for it. Already had the young engineer begun to worry about the loss his business would sustain because of his illness, and although he had not spoken of it, Ralph fancied he could see that he was also troubled about the expense which he must necessarily be under. All this, Ralph argued, would be taken from George's mind if he was told of what was being done, and after a long discussion, Bob agreed that the important news should be told on the following day, provided the physician agreed that the patient would not suffer from the excitement. On the following morning, all the boys were at the proposed well before any of the workmen arrived, in order that they might see the drills enter the ground, and by the time that important ceremony was over, it was time for the physician to make his morning call. When he did come, Ralph told him just what he thought George had on his mind, in the way of trouble, and then stated what it was he proposed doing, in case there was no objection to it. "Not the slightest objection, my boy," said the medical gentleman, heartily. "Good news seldom kills, and from what I learn, it is only that which you have to tell. I think, as you do, that it will benefit the patient, and you have my permission to unfold your budget of news after I have dressed his wounds." Half an hour later, the doctor had left the house, and Ralph and Bob entered the invalid's room, as they had every morning since he had been able to recognize them. In reply to their usual inquiry as to how he felt, George said, gloomily: "I should feel all right if I only had a little more strength. It is hard to know that I shall have to lie here a long time, simply waiting to get strong, and all the business I had succeeded in getting, done by some one else. But perhaps I couldn't have kept what I had after that scrape about the glycerine." "All that is settled, George," said Ralph. "I persuaded them to call your case the next day after you were hurt, when Bob's case came on. He and Jim and I told the story exactly as it was, and you were acquitted, while he was fined ten dollars. I should have told you before, but that we were afraid of exciting you." "Such excitement would do me good rather than harm," said George, with a smile, "for I have worried about that every day I have been here." "Then I will give you more of the same sort, only better," replied Ralph, with a meaning look at Bob. "The day after you were hurt, we hunted for the oil, and Bob found it just----" "I should say we did find it," interrupted Bob, excitedly, and despite Ralph's warning looks. "It is the richest spot you ever saw, and there's a thousand-barrel well there, if there's a drop." George opened his eyes wide with astonishment, and then closing them wearily, he said: "I'm willing to take your word for it that you found signs of oil; but I would rather hear what some one else thought as to the size of the well." "You shall hear," cried Bob, growing more excited, and forgetting all caution. "I brought Dodd and Mapleson out here, and after they had looked at it, they said they were willing to advance everything for the opening. Then we commenced work----" "You commenced work?" cried George, attempting to raise himself in the bed, and falling back from sheer exhaustion. "Yes, George," said Ralph, as he motioned Bob to remain quiet. "Every one said we'd be sure to strike oil, and Bob has started it for you. He had nothing to do for a while, and he wanted to surprise you. I sent for father, and after he had talked with some of the men, he told us we might draw on him for what money we needed." George lay perfectly still and looked at Ralph as if he could not believe that which he heard, and Bob, forgetting himself again, cried out: "The derrick's already built, the engine's up, and we commenced drilling this morning. I tell you what it is, Harnett, before you're able to get around again, we'll have a thousand-barrel well flowing that you can call your own; and, as for engineering, why, you needn't worry your head about that any more, for you'll have all the money you want." CHAPTER XXVII. "THE HARNETT." It surely seemed as if the good news which Ralph and Bob had imparted to him was all that was needed to cause George's rapid improvement. From the day when they had told him of what they had done and were doing, his recovery was so rapid that at the end of a week he was sufficiently strong to sit up a short time each day, and the physician predicted that in another week he would be able to take a walk out of doors. Meantime, the work at the well had progressed most favorably. There had been no serious breakages, no vexatious delays, no trouble of any important character. In fact, the workmen expressed it as their conviction that it would be a "lucky well," because of the singular freedom from accidents with which the entire work had been attended. Bob was in the highest possible state of excitement all the time. Each morning he anticipated that they would have some trouble which would delay them, when he was anxious to have the work completed as soon as possible, and each night, after matters had gone on smoothly, he held forth to George and Ralph of the wonderful "luck" they had had, which must be taken as an augury of that which was to come. Ralph divided his time equally between George and the scene of operations. In the early morning, he would walk out to the well, stay there an hour, and then return to report progress, continuing his alternate visits to the well and the invalid, until George knew as much of what was going on as if he had superintended it. Now, every oil well is christened with some name, which is supposed to be suggestive of the manner in which it has been discovered, or to do honor to some person who may or may not be interested in it; therefore, it is not to be supposed that a name for this pet of Bob's had not been discussed even before work had been begun on it. Each one of the boys had proposed some appellation, Bob's favorite being "The Invalid," in honor of George, and because, as he said, it had really had a chance of an existence through Harnett's illness, for he stoutly contended that had the senior owner been well, he would have been so cautious about opening it on credit, that all of them would have grown gray-headed before they saw it flowing. Jim and Dick thought that, since Bob had really been the one to open it, in case oil was struck, it should be called "The Moonlighter," in honor of the one who had done all the work, when there was no chance that he could be benefited by its success. George wanted to call it "The Gurney," and his suggestion gave to Bob and Ralph just the name the well should bear in case it answered their expectations in regard to its yield. "We will call it 'The Harnett,'" said Ralph, more decidedly than he had yet said anything in regard to the "scheme," and since Bob was in favor of this, it came to be considered a settled fact that that should be the name. After that conversation, old Mr. Simpson never spoke of it save as "The Harnett," and the boys soon learned to follow his example, until even George gave it that title. Work went on rapidly, until the drills were boring eight hundred feet below the surface, and it was hourly expected that bed-rock would be struck, when George broached to Ralph a matter he had had on his mind from the hour he first learned that "The Harnett" was being opened. "Do you remember, Ralph, what we said about giving Mr. Simpson a share in the land if oil was found there?" he asked, when Ralph came in to tell him that the rock had not been struck, but that Bob believed it would be before night. "Yes, and I still think we ought to do so," replied the junior partner, quickly. "After he had taken our money, Massie offered to give up the whole of the mortgage for a deed of the wood-lot, and he refused, for he considered himself bound to us, even though he knew we only bought it to help him along." "And what about Bob?" asked George, meaningly. "What he says about our hesitating to begin work before we had money of our own to carry it through, is nearly true, and if oil is struck there we shall have him to thank for it." "I know that, and I have been meaning to talk with you about it. Why can't we give Mr. Simpson and him an equal share with us? I think they really ought to have it." "So do I, and my proposition is that we give to each of them an undivided fourth of the entire property, they to share equally with us in everything." "And I agree to that fully," replied Ralph, quickly. "I have wanted to propose something of the kind, but was afraid you wouldn't agree to it, because of Bob's being a moonlighter, and having given you so much trouble." "But if 'The Harnett' is a success, we must attribute it all to the trouble Bob made for us. If the team hadn't been stolen we should not have been in Bradford to meet Mr. Simpson, and if it hadn't been for the theft we never should have imagined that there was any oil on the property. Besides, if Bob owns an interest here, you'll find that he won't do any more moonlighting." "Well," said Ralph, anxious that their good intentions should be carried into effect as soon as possible, "when shall we give them their share? Now, or after we find whether there is oil in 'The Harnett?'" "Now. You drive right into town, have the deeds made out, and bring them here so that I can sign them with you." It was early in the day, and Ralph would have plenty of time to make all the arrangements and yet be back before the drilling ceased, unless, of course, the rock was struck almost immediately. Therefore he started at once, refusing to answer any of the questions which Mr. Simpson and Bob put to him as to what had called him in town so suddenly. Of course neither of those whom he had left in an aggravated suspense could have any idea of his errand, and his sudden reticence after he had been in the habit of telling them all he was going to do, mystified them considerably, Bob in particular being greatly exercised over it. "I hope Gurney hasn't got on his ear about anything," he said, to George, after he had watched Ralph drive away. "He's gone into town as glum as a judge, and won't say a word." "What makes you think there is anything the matter?" asked George, with a smile. "Have you and he been having any trouble?" "Not that I know of, except that he might have got cross when he was at the well, and thought I ought to have treated one of the proprietors with a little more deference. I was helping set the drills when he came out last, and I'm not sure but that I spoke sharply when I answered his questions; but I didn't intend to." "I guess there's nothing the matter with him," said George, rather enjoying the moonlighter's perplexity, knowing how soon it would be ended. "You probably were a trifle cross, when he was there, and, being guilty, fancied that he spoke or acted differently from usual." "I didn't fancy it, for he was queer. I asked him where he was going, and so did Mr. Simpson; but he wouldn't answer either of us." "I'll find out what the trouble is when he comes back, and let you know," replied George. And with this answer, Bob went back to his work, thinking it very singular that Ralph, who had always been so good-natured, should have suddenly become so crusty. Twice during the remainder of the forenoon, Bob came to the house with some trifling excuse for so doing, but really to learn if Ralph had returned; and while he was there the last time, talking with George about the probabilities of striking sand or gravel rock, the junior partner returned. He had with him some official-looking documents, and, as he entered the house, he said to Bob, speaking quite sharply without any intention of so doing, and yet resolving all the moonlighter's suspicions into certainties: "I want some witnesses to George's signature. Will you bring Mr. Simpson, Jim and Dick here?" Bob arose silently to comply with the request, looked at Ralph wonderingly and reproachfully an instant, and then left the room. While he was absent, George told his friend of the moonlighter's trouble, and the two were making merry over it, when he returned with the witnesses Ralph had asked for. The papers were handed to George, who signed both of them, and then asked Jim and Dick to sign their names as witnesses to his signature. Ralph had already signed them while in town. Then, purposely taking considerable time about it, Ralph examined the documents as if to make sure that all was correct, and said: "Mr. Simpson, after George and I learned there was a chance that oil would be found on your wood-lot, we agreed that you should share equally with us in whatever might come of it. For that purpose I went into town, and have had a deed drawn up, giving you an equal share with us." "But I don't want none of it," said the old man, in a trembling voice, while there was a suspicious moisture in his eyes. "I sold the land to you as I'd a' sold it to anybody else, and whatever's there you own." "But the deed is made out now, and there is no use for you to protest against it," said George; and, without giving the old man time to reply, he added, as he turned to Ralph: "Now I understand that there has been some trouble between you and Bob, or he fancies there has." Bob motioned to George to be silent; but it was too late, and Ralph said: "The only trouble is that I chose to go away this morning without telling him where I was going. Then I owned one-half of the wood-lot, with all there is or may be on it, and since it was the last time I should have the right to do anything regarding it without his knowledge, I refused to tell him where I was going. But now that he owns an equal share with you, Mr. Simpson and me, he will have a perfect right to question me." Bob looked up in blank amazement, but made no attempt to speak, and after waiting several moments, during which no one save the two original partners seemed to understand the situation, Ralph said, as he handed Bob one of the documents: "Believing that but for you 'The Harnett' would not have been opened, at least for some time, we have thought it best to divide the property into fourths, one of which belongs to you." Perhaps for the first time in his life, Bob was unable to make any reply, and he walked quickly out of the room to the wood-pile, where he sat for some time as if trying to make himself believe that what Ralph had said was true. CHAPTER XXVIII. RED ROCK. The idea that Ralph and George would voluntarily give him a portion of what he considered to be very valuable property, was the farthest thought from Bob's mind. He had gone to work to open the well simply because he was anxious to prove to those who had declared he knew nothing about it, that there was a large deposit of oil where he had always insisted there must be. If any one had said to him that he was entitled to any considerable reward because he had given up his own business to improve the value of his friend's property, he would have said truly that he had not neglected his own business, since just at that time there was no work for moonlighters to do. He had started in on the work with no idea of being paid for his services, although if oil was found, and he had needed any small amount of money, he would not have hesitated to ask for it. The work had been begun by him upon the impulse of the moment, and this making him an equal owner in the well, simply because of what he had done, surprised him even more than it did any one else. It was after he had been sitting on the wood-pile long enough to understand why this property had been given him, reading first the deed, and then looking toward the wood-lot, where he could hear the sounds of activity, that he entered the house, where both his old and his new partners were discussing, as they had ever since the work had begun, the probabilities of finding oil. "I tell you what it is, boys," he said to George and Ralph, "this thing ain't just straight. You've got no right, in the first place, to give away a quarter of that property before you know what it's worth, and then, again, if you paid me ten times over for what I've done, it wouldn't amount to this. Now, if you think you'd feel better to pay me for my work, take back this deed, and so long as I have charge of 'The Harnett,' give me one barrel in every twenty you take out. That will be mighty big pay, and a good deal more than I am worth." "But I suppose you'd be glad to own a portion of a well, Bob, and especially as big a one as you insist this is going to be," said George. "So I would like to own one, and I'd rather have this one quarter, so far as money goes, than half of any well I know of. But you see this don't belong to me, for I haven't earned it, and you haven't the right to give away so much." "But we have given it away, and you can't insist upon the size of the gift, because none of us know whether, instead of being a benefit, it will not saddle a debt on you of one quarter of the expense of sinking the well," said Ralph. "I know that it won't!" cried Bob, earnestly, "and so do we all, for we're sure of striking a big flow." "Well, Bob, you've got the deed," interrupted George, "and since we want to make you one of the owners of 'The Harnett,' we'll say to you as we did to Mr. Simpson--you've got the deed, and you can't help yourself." Bob made no further reply; but five minutes later the boys saw him and Mr. Simpson perched high up on the wood-pile, talking very earnestly about something, which they quite naturally concluded was the gift they had just received, and on commenting upon it, Mrs. Harnett, although she knew there was very little necessity for it, advised the boys to insist upon the acceptance of the gift, for she believed both the recipients deserved what they considered such good fortune. Both Ralph and George were perfectly satisfied with what they had done, and in an hour after the presentation, all the partners were discussing the chances of striking oil, much as they had every day before when two of them had no idea they were to become part owners. The doctor's visits had grown less frequent since George had begun to recover so rapidly, and it had been three days since he had seen the patient. George had insisted that he was perfectly able to walk as far as "The Harnett," and would have done so had not his mother and his friends urged so strongly for him to wait until he should see the doctor again. It was on this day, just after George had eaten what any one would consider a hearty dinner for an invalid, that the physician called, and almost as soon as he appeared, George asked his opinion about his taking a little out-door exercise. "I see no reason why you should not do so," replied the doctor, "providing you may be trusted to act as your own physician, and come in before you get tired." This George was positive he would be able to do, and almost before the doctor had left the house, he was planning a visit to "The Harnett," but that his mother objected to at once, since it would be impossible for him to ride, and it would be much too long a walk. He was anxious to see the work, but, under the pressure of advice from all his friends, he consented to defer seeing "The Harnett" until later, and take a ride with Ralph instead. The horses were harnessed into his own carriage, which was made even more comfortable than ever by a profusion of Mrs. Simpson's pillows, and, assisted by all, the invalid started for his first out-door exercise since the murderous assault upon him. George wanted to drive through Sawyer, for since he had been cleared of the charge against him, he was anxious to meet his friends there, and Ralph willingly drove in that direction. Upon arriving at the town, there was every reason to fear that he would not get as his own physician, as the doctor advised, for he was warmly welcomed by every one, whether stranger or friend, until his reception was a perfect ovation. Over and over again was he thanked for the assistance he had rendered during the conflagration, and the congratulations on his recovery poured in on every side. Among the cordial welcomes he received, none was more hearty than that from the officer who had arrested him the night he was starting in pursuit of the horse-thieves, and from him Ralph and George heard some news which interested them. The men who had committed the assault were in the jail at Bradford, awaiting their examination, which was to take place as soon as their victim's recovery was certain, and the officer asked when George would be able to appear as a witness. The senior owner of "The Harnett" had no desire, even then, that these men should be punished, but since the matter was one in which he could have no choice, and since he would be obliged to attend the examination, he declared that he could go at as early a date as might be set. Evidently anxious to have the matter off his hands as soon as possible, the officer said: "Then if you feel able to drive into town to-morrow, we will hold the examination. It will not take very much of your time, and if in the morning you do not feel able to attempt it, don't hesitate to send me word, and it shall be postponed." "I don't think there is any doubt but that I shall be here," said George. And then, after bidding the kindly-disposed officer good-by, he confessed to Ralph that he should be obliged to return home. The meeting with so many in town had tired him more than the ride of two hours could have done, and Ralph began to blame himself for having permitted him to stay so long, even though he could hardly have prevented it if he had tried. But during the ride back, the weary look on the invalid's face disappeared under the refreshing influence of the quiet drive, and by the time they turned into the lane which led to the Simpson farm-house, he looked quite as bright as when he started. The lane was nearly a quarter of a mile long, and when they first entered it, Ralph was aware that something unusual had occurred, and he trembled lest some accident had happened, but as soon as he could distinguish them more plainly, he understood that the gathering was caused by joy more than sorrow. Bob, Jim and Dick were standing in front of the house, surrounded by some of the workmen from the well, and Mr. and Mrs. Simpson were hurrying from one to the other, much as if they were serving out refreshments. "What can be the matter?" asked Ralph, anxiously, as he hurried the horses along. "Do you suppose they have struck oil already?" "No, that couldn't be possible," replied George. "I rather fancy that Bob and Mr. Simpson are celebrating the happy event of being admitted to the ownership of the well." Ralph was satisfied that such was the case, and he pulled the horses in, unwilling to arrive at a scene where he feared he might be obliged to listen to thanks for what they had done. Before many minutes, however, the boys could see that those at the house were shouting to them, and when they arrived within hearing distance, they recognized Bob's voice, as he shouted: "Bed-rock! bed-rock!" And then went up a shout from all that was nearly deafening. "They have got through to the rock," cried George, his pale face flushing with excitement. And in a moment the carriage was surrounded by partners and workmen, as each one tried to tell the good news that the drills had struck the rock at a depth of eight hundred and forty feet. "What have you found?" asked George, as soon as he could make himself heard. "Sandstone," replied Bob, "and we shall be obliged to try glycerine." "The moonlighters will open the moonlighter's well!" cried Dick, as if an immense amount of sport was to be had from such an operation. "Indeed the moonlighters shall have nothing to do with it," replied Bob, with no small show of dignity, and to the great surprise of all. "There'll be no sneaking around to shoot this well, I can promise you that, for we'll have her opened in the daylight, squarely, or not at all." Jim and Dick could hardly believe that which they heard. That their old partner, one of the most successful moonlighters in the oil regions, should object to having a well, in which he had a quarter interest, opened as he had opened wells for others, was something too incredible to be true. There must have been some mistake about it, they thought, and they would shoot the well by moonlight as soon as Bob should consider the matter more fully. But all this time George was still in the carriage, and as soon as the boys realized this, they began to make arrangements for helping him out, content to wait to tell the good news more fully after he should be in his room once more. CHAPTER XXIX. THE EXAMINATION. Beyond the fact that the drills had struck the rock, and that it was of such a nature that they could not work in it, but would necessitate the use of glycerine, but little more remained to be told after that first announcement. But yet all the boys crowded into George's room and insisted on trying to tell him something new regarding the important fact. The drills had struck the rock very shortly after Ralph and George had started out, and in their rejoicing that the work was so nearly over, Mr. and Mrs. Simpson had insisted that all hands should come to the house, where a generous luncheon of preserves and bread and butter was passed around in honor of the happy event. That was all any of them could tell, and then came the question of shooting the well, Jim and Dick looking anxiously at their former partner to hear him retract those words so traitorous to moonlighting generally. Both Ralph and George were as glad as they were surprised to hear Bob exclaim against having moonlighters open "The Harnett." They would have opposed any such proposition had he made it; but since he himself objected to it, the matter was simple enough. "I will drive down to town to-night and arrange with Roberts Brothers to send a man up here to-morrow," said Bob, "and before to-morrow night we will know just what 'The Harnett' is worth." "But, Bob," cried Dick, "you don't mean to say that after we have shot the well that you're goin' to pay them more than it's worth for doin' it no better than any of them can." "That's just what I do mean to tell them, my son," replied Bob, with a mingled air of authority and patronage. "Why?" "Well, in the first place, it will avoid any trouble. In the second place, it don't look well to be sneakin' 'round as moonlighters have to do, and in the third place, we want 'The Harnett' opened square." "But you always said moonlighting was square, and that you wouldn't even let the regular men come near a well of yours," urged Jim. And from his tone it was easy to understand that this opening of "The Harnett" was a matter upon which he and Dick had quite set their hearts. "That was before I owned an interest in a well myself, boys," replied Bob. "Mind you, I don't say now that moonlightin' isn't square, for I believe it is; but when it's such a stunner of a well as this that's to be shot, I say that it hain't best to give anybody a chance to raise a question about it." It was evident to all from that moment that Bob Hubbard, the oil producer, was to be a very different sort of a party from Bob Hubbard, the moonlighter, and all save his old partners were delighted at the change. "Then have you given up moonlightin' entirely, Bob?" asked Dick, with a world of reproach in his voice. "Indeed I have," was the emphatic reply. "I'm still ready to say that it's all right and legitimate; but I'm through with it." "Then, just for the sake of old times, Bob, an' seein's how we haven't come into possession of quarter of an oil-well, let us open your well for you," pleaded Jim. And all present understood that he and Dick, having been interested in the well from the time it was first discovered, were anxious to do something toward opening it. "I'll tell you how it can be done," said George, desirous of granting Jim and Dick the very slight favor which they asked, and yet quite as unwilling as was Bob that the work should be done in any way which could be called illegal. "Bob can go to the torpedo people, pay them for the charge, get the cartridges and glycerine, with the express understanding that he is to do the work himself. That would make matters right all around, and you can fancy that you are moonlighting again." It was a happy thought, this one of George's, and every one present, even including Mr. Simpson, hailed it with joy. It was an arrangement which would please all of them very much better than to have any strangers doing the work, and Bob would have started at once to attend to it, if Ralph had not stopped him by telling him of the examination which he would be obliged to attend next day. "Since you will be obliged to go with us, you had better wait until to-morrow. You can have the tubing started on the road at the same time, and on the next day we can shoot the well," suggested George. Bob was not at all inclined to wait forty-eight hours when half that time would suffice to decide whether "The Harnett" was a wonderful success or a dismal failure; but since he would be obliged to be present at the examination, which would occupy a portion of the day, he tried to content himself as best he could. The remainder of that day was spent in discussing plans for the future, Bob entering into a profound calculation of the amount of material they would need to build a tank, for he was so certain they would strike oil, that he would have had no hesitation in beginning work on the tank even before the well was opened. On the following morning, George was feeling so well and looking so bright that there could no longer be any fear he had over-exerted himself the day before, and preparations were begun at once for the ride into town. Ralph and George were to drive in with the latter's team, while the old firm of moonlighters, with Mr. Simpson, were to go in Bob's double-seated wagon. Everything was taken which it was thought the invalid might need, and the party started, all of them wishing the journey had some other motive than that of assuring punishment to others, even though they were guilty. On arriving in town, they were met by the officer whom they had spoken with the day before, and he told them, after they had found a comfortable seat in the court-room, of all that had been learned of the prisoners. Their names were William Dean and Henry Ramsdell, and they had worked for some time in Oil City for a civil engineer there. By this means they had learned the oil business, and had shown an especial aptitude for prospecting. There they committed what may or may not have been their first crime, for no one knew where they had lived before they appeared in Oil City. They robbed their employer of nearly two hundred dollars, and it is probable that it was after that money was spent that they had stolen George's team. The examination did not last very long. George told of the theft of his team, of his pursuing the thieves, in company with Ralph and Bob, and of all that occurred up to the time he left his companions to go to Mr. Simpson's for his instruments. "Then," he said, "when I had got nearly half way from where I had left my friends at the house, these men stepped from among the bushes directly in front of me, and one demanded the paper which I held in my hand. I refused to give it to him, and as I did so, before I had time to act on the defensive, the elder of the men struck me full in the face. I at once began to defend myself, but it was two to one, and in a very short time a blow on the head from some hard substance felled me to the ground, unconscious." That was all George could tell, and Ralph and Bob were both called to the stand to testify to what they knew, both of the theft of the team and of the finding of George. Mr. Simpson, Jim and Dick were also ready to testify as to the condition of George when they found him and when they carried him into the house, but their evidence was not needed then, nor was the doctor's, who had examined and attended the wounded youth. Beyond asking one or two unimportant questions of each witness, the accused had nothing to say for themselves, or in contradiction of what had been testified to, and the judge committed them without bail for trial at the next term of court. As soon as the examination was over, Bob went to the office of the torpedo works, and there contracted for the necessary amount of material to "shoot" the well, and also stipulated that he be given permission to do the work. At first this was refused peremptorily, on the ground that it was a dangerous operation, and that he would probably succeed only in killing himself. Bob understood at once that he was not recognized, and he asked if Mr. Newcombe was in the building. That gentleman was in, and appeared very shortly after he was sent for, greeting Bob as heartily as if they had always been the best of friends rather than enemies. "Mr. Newcombe, I have come for an eighty-quart charge, with the stipulation that I can work it myself in the well on the Simpson farm, of which I own one quarter. This gentleman refuses, because he is afraid I may kill myself. Won't you vouch for my skill in the matter?" "Indeed I will," was the hearty reply; "and if you will buy all your charges in the same manner, I shall have very much less work to do." "I've stopped all that work now," said Bob, solemnly, "and so far as I am concerned, you won't have another night's drive for moonlighters." Of course, after Mr. Newcombe's introduction, Bob had no difficulty in gaining the desired permission, and he joined those who were waiting for him outside, happy in the thought that, as he expressed it, "'The Harnett' would have a chance next day to show what she could do." CHAPTER XXX. LEGAL MOONLIGHTERS. When the boys arrived at the Simpson farm-house, after the close of the examination, there was very little they could do save talk over that which was to be done on the morrow, when the value of "The Harnett" was to be decided. A portion of the tubing to be used in case there was any flow of oil, was already on the ground, and the remainder would be hauled by noon of the next day at the latest. There were no cartridges to prepare, for the Torpedo Company's workmen would attend to all that, delivering both the tin cases and the glycerine ready for use. Everything was done that could be, and in a few hours more the casing of rock, which might or might not cover a large deposit of oil, would be blown out. As sanguine as Bob had been from the first that a large yield of oil would be found, he was exceedingly nervous now that the time for the question to be settled was near at hand. Not but that he was still as positive as ever that they should strike oil, but he began to fear that it might not be found in such quantity as he had imagined. He would talk for a few moments with the boys, then find some pretext for going to the well, over which a guard had been set to prevent any evil-disposed parties from tampering with it, and once there he was quite as eager to get back to his partners as he had been to leave them. In fact, he was in the highest degree nervous, and had not the others been afflicted in a similar way, they would have noticed his condition. Mr. Simpson was in such a disturbed mental condition that he went about his work in a dazed sort of way, until his wife insisted on his sitting on the wood-pile, where if he did no good he could at least do no harm, while she did the chores for him. On hearing Bob say, for at least the tenth time since he returned from town, that everything was all right at the well, the old man did "pull himself together" sufficiently to do the milking, and then no sooner had he performed that task than he forgot what he had done, and tried to do the whole work over again, remembering his previous accomplishment only when one of the cows kicked the empty pail over, and very nearly served him in the same way. Jim and Dick were not as anxious regarding the yield of the well; therefore, they were in a state of excitement only because they were to be at what would be very nearly their old moonlighting tricks again, and were simply impatient for the time to come when they could be at work. They spent their time sitting on a rather sharp rail of the fence, bemoaning Bob's obstinacy in not having the well shot in regular moonlighter's fashion, without being so weak-kneed as to buy the right to do simply what no one ought to be allowed to prevent him from doing. Ralph and George were inwardly as excited as any one else, but outwardly very much more calm. They sat in the latter's room, talking over the prospects of striking a goodly quantity of oil, while, despite all they could do, the conversation would come around to what the result would be in case "The Harnett" proved to be a dry well. They knew that all the bills had been contracted in their names, since they were the sole owners at the time the work was commenced, and in case of a failure, they would find themselves burdened with such a load of debt that it would take them a very long time to clear it off. Even at that late hour they regretted that Bob had commenced to sink the well, and it is extremely probable that if it had been possible to undo all that had been done, leaving the land exactly as it was before the signs of oil were discovered, they would gladly have agreed to forego all their dream of wealth. Whether Mrs. Harnett and Mrs. Simpson also suffered from suspense that evening it is hard to say; but certain it is that they were more silent than usual, and the former sewed remarkably fast, while the latter's knitting-needles clicked with unusual force. It was a trying time for all in that house. Had it been daylight, when they could have been at work, the hours would not have seemed nearly as long; but, in the evening, the time passed so slowly that it almost seemed as if there was a conspiracy of the clocks, and that their hands were only moving about half as fast as they should have done. Then came the night, when every one went to bed and tried to sleep; but three in that household succeeded very badly, and who those three were may be very easily imagined. Next morning, every one was up so early that the hens were frightened from their roosts half an hour before their regular time, and the breakfast had been eaten fully an hour before it was customary to begin to prepare it. George showed the effects of his anxiety very plainly, and had his mother not feared the suspense would be worse for him than the fatigue, she would have tried to induce him to remain in the house instead of going to the well as had been agreed upon. Bob, who had visited the scene of operations before breakfast, again announced that "everything was all right," and that one more load of tubing would give them sufficient. Under the pretext that there were a great many things which it was necessary for him to attend to, while everyone knew he was simply inventing work for the purpose of hiding his anxiety, he insisted that Ralph, Jim and Dick should help George out to the well when he was ready to come, and then he hurried away. The charge would not be exploded until nearly noon, and on the night before it had been agreed that George should not venture out until a short time before the decisive moment; but now that the time was so near at hand, he could not remain in the house, and the result was that his mother and Ralph agreed he should go at once. An easy chair was carried out in the grove, and placed at a safe distance from the well, but where he could have a good view of what was going on. Then, with Ralph at one side, Dick at the other, Mrs. Simpson ahead, carrying a foot-stool and a fan, and his mother in the rear, with a bottle of salts and an umbrella, the cortege started, its general dignity sadly marred when the party were obliged to climb the fence. Bob was nowhere to be seen when the invalid and his attendants arrived at the reserved seat, but before he was comfortably seated the superintendent came up with another announcement that "everything was all right," and aided them in disposing of George. He was comfortably seated under a large tree, with Mrs. Harnett and Mrs. Simpson on either side of him, and, so far as could be judged, was quite as well off there as he would have been in the house. Once he was where he could see what was going on, and viewing the works for the first time, the haggard look left his face, thus showing the wisdom of his friends in not preventing him from coming when he wanted to. The first arrival, after the spectators had assembled, was the last load of tubing, and Bob's only trouble was, or he professed that it was, that they would lose so much oil before they could make arrangements for storing it. As the time went on, Bob was the only one who had anything to do, and those who watched him insisted that he simply did the same work over and over again. Finally, when every one began to fear that the Torpedo Company had entirely forgotten their contract, a wagon, similar to the one owned by Bob, drove up with the long tin tubes on the uprights, and the box evidently stored with the dangerous liquid. In an instant the moonlighters were changed boys. All their nervousness or listlessness was gone, and in its place a bustling, consequential air that was almost ludicrous. All three of the boys helped unload the wagon, and when the driver attempted to do his share, they plainly told him that all he would be allowed to do was to fasten his horses, if he wanted to see the operation, or to drive away if he was not interested in it. He chose the latter course, and, save for the workmen, the party most interested in "The Harnett" were left alone. Bob critically examined the cartridges, making many unfavorable comparisons between them and the ones he had been in the habit of making, and then began the work of fastening the reel to the derrick, as well as setting the upright in position, which served as a guide to the rope that was to lower the cartridges in position. When that was done--and the moonlighters did not hurry in their work, anxious as they had been before, for they were determined that this last shot of theirs should be a perfect success--the more delicate task of filling the cartridges was begun. There were four of these, each capable of holding twenty quarts, and the spectators were not wholly at their ease, as can after can of the explosive fluid was poured into these frail-looking vessels, even though the moonlighters handled it much more carefully than Ralph had seen them handle that which had been used at the Hoxie well, on the famous night when Mr. Newcombe guarded their hut for them. As each tube was filled, the boys lowered it into position in the well, and the nervous anxiety which had assailed them the night before again took possession of Ralph and George. At last everything was ready for the launching of the iron bolt, which was to call into activity the explosive mass, that was to shatter the rock under which it was hoped the oil was concealed. The moment had come when the value or worthlessness of "The Harnett" was to be decided. CHAPTER XXXI. THE SHOT. It is barely possible that when Bob stood over the aperture with the iron poised in his hands which was to be the means of opening to them the mystery of the well, there was just a shade of fear at his heart that he had been mistaken in the signs, and that an upward rush of water, would be all that would follow the explosion. His partners noted a look of almost painful hesitation on his face for an instant, and, then, as it vanished, he dropped the go-devil, retreating to where the group of anxious watchers were gathered around George's chair. The seconds that followed the dropping of the iron were wonderfully long ones, and it seemed as if each one present ceased to breathe, as the time had come when the value or worthlessness of the well was to be decided. Then was heard three distinct reports, somewhat louder than had been heard at the Hoxie well, because of the charge being nearer the surface of the earth, and this was followed by the black, noisome vapor that wreathed slowly around the aperture as if sent by the demons of the earth to keep back those venturesome mortals who would seek to penetrate their secrets. No one spoke, and each eye was riveted upon the mouth of the well, to read there the story which was soon told. First came a shower of water, breaking into drops as it reached the surface, sparkling in the sun like diamonds, and then uprose, not slowly and waveringly as Ralph had seen it once before, but shooting quickly in the air, a transparent, greenish column of oil, that broke amid the timbers of the derrick, shattering into splinters the smaller joists and scattering them in every direction. It was clearly and unmistakably oil, not in any small quantity, or sent with any slight force; but a discharge which, from its volume and intensity, showed how vast was the reservoir from which it had come, how great the strength of confined gas that sent it heavenward. For nearly five minutes the spectators sat watching the flow of oil which told of the value of "The Harnett," until Bob broke the spell that bound them, by shouting: "Hurrah for 'The Harnett!' Hurrah for petroleum!" In an instant all present, even including George, burst into loud shouts of welcome to the long-confined and valuable product of the earth which was theirs. During the thirty minutes that the new well spouted, congratulations were poured in on Bob from all sides, for through his efforts had this work been done, and without him it might have been many years before such a scene would have been witnessed on the Simpson wood-lot. The partners hardly knew how to express their joy. George was quietly happy; but the unusual brilliancy of his eyes and the flush on his cheeks told of the deep but suppressed excitement under which he was laboring. In that steady upward flow of oil he saw a competency for himself and his mother, which he had not dreamed he should secure during many long years of toil, and as he clasped her fervently by the hand, she knew that it was of the many things this well would produce which would add to her comfort that he was thinking. Old Mr. Simpson and his wife stood with clasped hands, looking at the representation of wealth which was pouring out before them, and in their eyes, even as they gazed, was a far-away look, as if they were thinking of their loved ones who, when on this earth, had been deprived of many of the necessaries of life, while wealth beyond their wildest imaginings lay beneath their very feet. Ralph was laboring under the most intense excitement, which he strove vainly to suppress. He had not, like George, been obliged to battle with the world for those things which money can buy; but he saw before him a course already marked out, which he had believed he would be obliged to struggle very hard to reach. Now he was rich, and all those things he had desired could be his. Jim and Dick were loud in their demonstrations of joy that their last shot had produced such magnificent results; but their old partner, Bob, outstripped them all in loud rejoicings. He had demonstrated beyond the possibility of an argument that his location of the oil belt in the vicinity was correct, and he had done so even as against the theories of those older and more experienced in the business than himself. In addition, one-quarter of all this was his, and he was what he had long dreamed of being--an oil producer. The length of time which the well flowed demonstrated the fact that, if it would not produce a thousand barrels of oil per day, the yield would not fall far short of that, and when it finally ceased flowing, Bob was transformed into the steady, hard-working superintendent he had been since the work was first commenced. It was necessary that something be done at once to save all this oil which was now going to waste, and he directed the workmen at once how they should begin. Unknown to his partners, Bob had already made arrangements for the building of a tank, and, as soon as the workmen were engaged with the tubing, he started Jim off to town with a message to the contractors that no time might be lost in getting at the work. Before Jim left, Ralph gave him a message which he wanted him to send to his father. It was short, containing only these words: "Well just opened. Good for eight hundred barrels per day." On reading it, Bob insisted that the eight hundred should be changed to one thousand, since that would probably be nearer the actual yield; but Ralph let it remain as it was, preferring to be two hundred barrels short of the actual yield rather than two hundred barrels over. Mrs. Harnett persuaded George to return to the house as soon as the first flow had ceased; and, aided by Ralph and Mr. Simpson--for the others were too busy to be able to help him--he went back, fancying, as soon as he was away from the well, that he had dreamed of the wonderful things he had seen, and that it could not be a reality. His friends were not certain whether he had been injured or benefited by the excitement; but he was so thoroughly tired out when he reached his room that he was obliged to go to bed at once, and there he fell into a long, sweet sleep, from which he did not awaken until evening. As may be imagined, everything was in the greatest state of activity around "The Harnett" during the remainder of that day and all the night, making ready to save the oil which then was being lost, and before the morning came, those who were working at the well decided that even Bob's estimate of a thousand barrels was too small. "The Harnett" was flowing at the rate of twelve hundred barrels of oil per day, and that represented at least as many dollars, although the price of oil might fall much lower than it then was, when the supply exceeded the demand. "If there is anybody that thinks now that the oil-belt don't extend up this way, I should like to have them come up and take a squint at 'The Harnett.' She's spouting like a daisy, and I knew she would, from the first," said Bob, as he came in to breakfast next morning, after having worked all night, his joy so great that he did not even feel the fatigue. George seemed almost well on this morning, and he took his seat with the others at the breakfast-table, much as if he was as strong as any of them, while his looks did not belie his actions. "I knew you'd be well this morning," said Bob, gleefully, "for no matter how weak you were, such a sight as you saw yesterday would put the strength into you." And then the ex-moonlighter's tongue rattled on as if it had, as motive power, a greater force than that which sent the oil up through "The Harnett." Bob was as full of business as ever on this morning. By common consent, and without the necessity of any conversation on the matter, he had been tacitly accepted as superintendent, and it was not possible for him, just then, to spend many idle moments. Already had the work on the tank been begun, and until it was finished, "The Harnett" would be connected with an empty one, about two miles away, the tubing being already nearly in position. Bob had sent, the night before, for more workmen, and he confidently expected that by night all the product of "The Harnett" could be saved. Old Pete, who had acted as a sort of watchman and guard for Bob when he was a moonlighter, had been sent for to fill a similar position at the well, and very many schemes were in progress. A house was to be built for the accommodation of the workmen, and this Bob insisted Ralph should attend to at once, as it was needed sadly. Mr. Simpson was charged with making a road to lead from the highway to the well, and since George was not strong enough to do any other work, he was made book-keeper and cashier, as well as general financier. Jim and Dick were both hired by the owners of "The Harnett," one to act as general messenger and clerk to George, and the other for such important duties as the partners might not be able to attend to. In fact, before sunset of the day after the well had been opened, each one of the owners was hard at work, and when they had ceased their labors for the day, gathering in George's room, now turned office, for a chat, Bob rather startled them by the information that it was his purpose to sink another well close by the house, as soon as he should get matters straightened out at "The Harnett." CHAPTER XXXII. MASSIE'S SCHEME. During the following week, matters went on very smoothly at the well newly opened on Mr. Simpson's wood-lot. George had continued steadily to improve, and looked quite like his old self, so much good had prosperity done for him. His mother, recognizing the fact that she could no longer be of service to him, and feeling not exactly at home in the rather limited accommodations which the Simpson house afforded, had gone home, while the three boys had settled down as regular boarders, or, rather, guests at the Simpson farm. The road had been built, the house for the workmen was well under way, and the tank completed. By having this storage place near at hand, the value of "The Harnett" could be definitely settled, and it was found that the well was producing a trifle over twelve hundred barrels of oil every twenty-four hours. The money which Mr. Gurney had advanced had already been repaid, and it was George's intention to settle for the machinery and tools in a few days more, for they were all anxious to be free from debt. Ralph's father had replied to the telegram by a letter of congratulation, and had promised to come up there to see the property before Ralph's vacation had expired, for it was by no means the young oil producer's intention to neglect his studies. While the other partners attended to the work at the well, it was his purpose to return to college to finish the regular course he had started on. It did not seem possible that, now the well was open and flowing so freely, anything could happen to prevent them from becoming wealthy, and that in a comparatively short time; but from this dream of fancied security they were destined to be rather rudely awakened. One morning, when they were all at the well, while Bob was trying, as he had every day since he first saw oil from "The Harnett," to convince them of the wisdom of boring another well just outside the limits of their own property, but on that of Mr. Simpson's, which was entirely at their service, two men drove up directly in front of them. Visitors had been so plenty at the well, that neither of the partners paid much attention to these new arrivals. Every one near there had heard Bob Hubbard's predictions that the oil belt embraced Mr. Simpson's property, but without believing him, and when the news went out that he had struck a twelve-hundred-barrel well just where every one believed there was no oil, it seemed as if the people must see it before they could be convinced it was really there. Almost a constant stream of visitors had been at the well from the day it was opened, and Bob, believing these two men had come simply to assure themselves that what others had said was true, paid no attention to them, but continued his argument with George, as showing how they could open another well further down the gully that should pay as well as this one. "Can we see Mr. George Harnett and Mr. Ralph Gurney?" asked one of the men, as both advanced toward the lucky owners of "The Harnett." "Those are the gentlemen," said Bob, carelessly, as he pointed to George and Ralph, and then turned away to attend to some work, believing the visitors had only idle questions to ask. "And are you Robert Hubbard?" asked the second man, stepping in front of Bob in such a manner as to prevent his leaving the place. "I am." "And this, I presume, is Mr. Daniel Simpson?" continued the man, as he pointed to the fourth partner, who had not yet gotten over his surprise at seeing oil flow on his land. "It is," said Bob, sharply. "Is there any one else around here you wish to see? If there is, call the roll now, for we have nothing else to do but stand up for inspection." "You four are all we have any business with just now, although in a few moments we shall want to see all who are at work here," said the man who had first spoken; and then, as he produced an official-looking document from his pocket, he added, "Here is an injunction from the court, restraining you from trespassing any further on this property, and from removing anything from it. Here, also, are summonses for you to appear in a suit for ten thousand dollars damages, brought against you by Marcus Massie." "Massie!" exclaimed Bob, while the others looked at the documents in speechless astonishment. "What have we got to do with him? We don't owe him any money." "He claims that you have damaged him to the amount named by opening this well without his knowledge or consent," replied the man. "Well, I like that!" cried Bob, angrily. "Of course we opened it without his knowledge or consent, and perhaps you can tell us why it would have been necessary to consult him about it. What has he got to do with us?" "Since the well is on his land, and since you have been converting the oil to your own use, he thinks he has a great deal to do with it," replied the second man, who looked very much like a lawyer, while the other was evidently an officer of some kind. "His land!" cried George; and then all four of the partners looked at each other in a dazed way, as if they had suddenly been deprived of the power of speech. "Yes, his land," replied the lawyer. "He had a mortgage on all this property, which he foreclosed, and he proposes to take possession of the house at once." "But--but I paid that mortgage!" cried Mr. Simpson, in a trembling voice. "I paid that mortgage, and have got it now." "Yes," was the quiet reply. "I understand that by some means you have got the instrument itself in your possession, but if you had got it because you had paid the amount due, you would have received and had recorded a release from Mr. Massie. Have you got that?" "A release!" repeated the old man, in bewilderment. "I don't rightly understand you. I paid my money and got the mortgage. Wasn't that enough?" "_If_ you had paid the money," replied the lawyer, with a decided emphasis on the first word, "you would have received a release, and that would have been recorded with the mortgage, otherwise that instrument is in full force." "But I paid it! I paid it!" wailed the old man. "I know you did, Mr. Simpson," said George, sternly, "and so does Massie. This is a sharp trick on his part to force us into buying his imaginary claim off, for he tried very hard to get hold of this property in the first place, and would have succeeded if he had not tried to get too much. We will consult a lawyer at once." "In the meantime, gentlemen," said the lawyer, "I warn you against removing any more oil, or interfering in any way with my client's property." "I don't suppose you have got an order of the court to prevent the well from flowing, have you?" asked Bob, angrily, making what seemed such unnecessary movements with his hands, that the lawyer stepped several paces backward very quickly. "This officer will remain in charge of such property as you may own here, since it is attached by Mr. Massie," said the lawyer, evidently thinking it best for him to depart, and getting into the carriage with a celerity that hardly seemed possible in one of his age. "Oh, he will, will he?" cried Bob, savagely. "Well, I shall stay here in charge of him, and I promise you he won't do anything more here than the law permits him to." "What _can_ we do?" asked Ralph, as the lawyer drove away, and the officer sauntered around the premises like one who already owned them. "I don't know what we can do now, except to go into town and consult a lawyer. There is no question but that Massie is trying a little sharp practice, and if it is a possible thing, he will get the best of us," said George. "Ralph, you and I will go into town, while Bob stays here. I suppose we had better take Mr. Simpson with us, so that he can tell all the particulars of paying the money." "We will telegraph for father," cried Ralph, as if the thought has just occurred to him. "He is a lawyer, and he will help us through with it." "That's a good idea," replied George; "but we will also see a lawyer in town, so as to know exactly what we ought to do now." Mr. Simpson followed Ralph and George as they went to the stable, and from time to time he repeated half to himself, as he passed his hand over his forehead, as if to collect his scattered senses: "I paid the mortgage--I paid the mortgage." "We know you did, Mr. Simpson, and it will be hard if we can't prove it. At all events, he has not got possession of the property yet, and I do not believe he ever will." CHAPTER XXXIII. HOLDING POSSESSION. It was a mournful-looking superintendent Bob made when his partners had left him alone with the officer who was acting as keeper of the property Massie had attached in pursuance of his swindling scheme. Bob had a wholesome dread of openly defying the law. In a case like moonlighting, where the question of legality had never been definitely settled, he had been prompt enough to take his chances as to whether he was proceeding in strict accordance with, or directly against, the law; but in the present case, where the man whom he would have been most pleased to forcibly eject from the premises was armed with all the powers of the court, Bob was obliged to content himself with thinking what he would like to do. As the officer sat there near the engine-house, doing no more than was absolutely his duty, Bob looked upon him as simply Mr. Massie's representative, and the temptation to vent his anger by some act of violence was very great. He restrained himself, however, from saying or doing anything that would entangle him in the meshes of the law; but in order to preserve this outward tranquility, he was obliged to ease his mind in some way, which he did by actually glowering at the innocent officer as though he would "wither him with a glance." Of course there was a certain amount of work which it was absolutely necessary to do, such as caring for the oil, attending to the engine which forced the oil into the tank, and such things as even the law might not be able to restrain. But the work on the buildings, the sinking of pipes in order to get a supply of gas for illuminating purposes, extending the road from the well to the house, and all that labor which was for the purpose of improvement of the property, was necessarily at an end. Had George remained, his prudence would have dictated the discharge of all their force of workmen who were not employed exclusively on the well, until the question at law had been settled. But to Bob such a course seemed too much like submitting to what was a deliberate wrong, perpetrated under the guise of justice, and he preferred the expense, rather than even the semblance of "backing down." The officer may or may not have had a disagreeable time in the pursuance of his duty while Ralph and George were in town; but to Bob it was certainly anything but pleasant, since he had great difficulty in not coming to an open conflict with this personification of law, brought in to aid fraud. It seemed to the ex-moonlighter as if his companions would never return, and once at least during every ten minutes he walked toward the house, in the hope of seeing them as they came up the lane. It was not until quite two hours past noon that his vigil was rewarded, and then he saw them coming toward the house with a fourth party in the wagon, whom he rightly conjectured was the lawyer whom they had been to consult. "Well," he cried, even before they had had time to alight from the wagon; "how have you made out?" "I haven't got time to tell you now," said George, hurriedly; "but you will hear it all when we are through with what we have to do. Mr. Hillman, the lawyer whom we consulted, and who has come out with us, says that the first and main thing to do is to hold possession, not only of the wood-lot, but of the farm. Massie will attempt this very afternoon to get his men in here, as his lawyer threatened, and if he succeeds we shall be the ones who will have to sue him, instead of his being the outside party, as he is now." "Can we prevent any one from coming here?" asked Bob, quickly. "Certainly you can, and must," replied the lawyer. "No one can come here without your permission until after the matter has been decided in court, and you must be careful that no one does." "That settles it, then," said Bob, gleefully, as he started towards the well. "The first thing I'll do will be to fire out that fellow Massie has got here, and he won't be handled very tenderly either." "Stop!" cried the lawyer, obliged to speak very loudly, for Bob was some distance away before he had ceased speaking. "That man has a perfect right to be here, for he represents the court in the matter of holding certain movable property until the suit can be decided. What you are to do is simply to prevent unauthorized persons from gaining admittance." "But how is that going to help matters?" And Bob was again disconsolate because this revenge had been denied him. "I prefer to wait until Mr. Gurney can get here before I decide fully on just what shall be done," replied Mr. Hillman. "He stands very high as a lawyer, and his advice in the matter will be worth much more than mine." "Well," asked the moonlighter, impatiently, "how are we going to prevent any one from coming on the land?" "That is a very easy matter. With your workmen and yourselves, you ought to form a regular patrol at those few points at which a person could enter, and the law will sustain you in keeping any one away, who does not come armed with an order from the court, even though you use force." That was sufficient for Bob. Legally entitled to act on the offensive, under certain circumstances, and to defend his and Mr. Simpson's property against all save those coming in the name of the law, there was an opportunity for him to work off some of the anger which he had found so difficult to restrain during the forenoon. George and Ralph were perfectly willing to let him attend to the defenses, they acting under his orders, and Bob set to work with a feverish energy that boded ill for the perfecting of Mr. Massie's scheme. Pete was ordered to take up his position at the entrance of the lane which led to the Simpson house, and Mr. Simpson was detailed to see that the negro did his duty. A stout club was all he was allowed as a weapon; but this would be sufficient, it was thought. Four of the workmen, under the immediate supervision of Jim, were stationed at the road leading to the well, and their orders were peremptory against allowing any one to enter unless with the express permission of Mr. Hillman, who, if any papers purporting to be orders from the court were presented, would first examine them to learn if they were correct. Four more men, under Dick, were stationed along the front of the property, with orders to patrol the entire line, and three others were stationed around the house, under Ralph's charge. Bob intended to have a personal supervision of all the points of defense, and in order that he might move about more readily, he had one of his horses saddled, by which means of locomotion he could visit each of his sentries at least once every half hour. The officer who had been stationed at the works as keeper of the property Massie had attached, was informed that he would be considered a trespasser, and treated as such, if he attempted to go anywhere except just where those articles were which he was expected to guard. George and the lawyer were thus left free from any duty of guarding the place, and this Bob very wisely concluded was necessary, since they might be obliged to go to town at any moment. Mrs. Simpson was set at work cooking up a quantity of food for the defenders of the castle, and this Bob proposed to carry to them himself, for he did not intend that one of his men should leave his post, even for a moment. After all this was done, Bob had time to talk with George and Mr. Hillman relative to the interview that had been held in town. Mr. Simpson had remained in the same dazed condition he had fallen into when Massie's attorney first appeared, and had been unable to repeat a single word of the interview he had had with the money-lender when he paid off the mortgage, or to remember what had been done at the time. The records had been searched, however, and no release had been found; therefore, it was plain that Mr. Simpson's ignorance of such matters had caused him to neglect to ask for one. The probabilities were that Mr. Massie, after learning of the valuable well which had been found on this property which might have been his had he not tried to gain possession of the whole farm, had taken advantage of this oversight on the part of his debtor, and, although he had been repaid the borrowed money, intended to deny that he had ever received it. That Mr. Hillman had fears of the ultimate result was shown by his desire to consult with Mr. Gurney before taking any steps in the matter, other than to hold possession of the property, and all the partners save Mr. Simpson, who did not seem to be able to understand anything just then, felt that there was a possibility that they might lose "The Harnett" after all their labor and rejoicing. Bob was by no means easy in his mind when he left Mr. Hillman and George to begin his rounds of the outposts; but he was determined that, since all they could do was to hold possession, no one not legally entitled to it should gain admittance to the place. For two hours, during which Bob had made his rounds four times, nothing had been seen to indicate that any one had even a desire to enter the Simpson farm, and then, while Bob was talking with the old man, trying to force him to remember all he had done while at Mr. Massie's office, three wagons filled with men were seen down the road coming directly toward the place. There could be no question but that this was the money-lender's party coming to take possession, and they were in larger force than any one had anticipated. Riding quickly to the house, Bob ordered Ralph and his men to join Pete and Mr. Simpson, and then he called in Dick and his men, giving these last orders to proceed at once to support Jim, in case any of the newcomers attempted to go that way. He thought, however, that the greatest trouble would be had at the lane, and he believed he was fully prepared for it. CHAPTER XXXIV. THE MISSING WITNESS. Bob had hardly called the main portion of his men to the point which was threatened by the money-lender's party, when the wagons reached the entrance to the lane, and the occupants began to get out. "You cannot enter here!" cried Bob, as the first man started toward the lane, as if he would force his way past those who were guarding the entrance. "I am sent here by the owner of the property, and it is my intention not only to go in, but to drive away those who are intruding here," replied the man, in an offensive tone. "Well," cried Bob, the anger which he had kept under control with greatest difficulty during the day now gaining the ascendancy, "it may first be necessary for you to get in before you drive any one out, and I warn you that you attempt to enter at your peril. I am here by the orders of the true owner of the property, and it will be a mighty hard show for you to get in, since my instructions are to keep every one out." By this time Mr. Hillman had arrived at the scene of the threatened trouble, and he said, loudly, so that all might hear him: "Gentlemen, the owner of this property is Mr. Daniel Simpson, my client. Acting under my advice, he refuses to allow any one to enter on his farm, and for that purpose has a body of men here to defend his rights. I warn you that you will be rendering yourselves liable to prosecution if you attempt to enter here against his express orders to the contrary." For a moment those who had been sent by Massie retreated to the wagons, as if unwilling to do anything which might bring them in conflict with the majesty of the law, and it seemed very much as if they were going to leave the place, when the lawyer who had first visited the well, and who had accompanied them, called out: "You know very well that this is Mr. Massie's property, since he has foreclosed the mortgage he held upon it, and if, in obeying his orders, you do anything which renders you liable to the law, it will be him, not you, who will be obliged to answer for your actions. I insist upon your going into the lane." "It will be their heads which will get cracked, at all events, if they attempt to come in here!" cried Bob, almost beside himself with rage; "and if you think we haven't the right or the inclination to knock down the first man who tries to come in, why don't you lead the way, to shew that you are not frightened?" Although Mr. Hillman would have prevented Bob from speaking, if he had been able to do so, the speech had had its effect, for the men cried out to the lawyer: "Yes, you lead the way, and we will follow you!" Leaping from his horse and seizing Pete's club, Bob cried out: "Show your men that you have a right to come in here, and I will show them what they may expect if they try to follow, by an example on your own head." The legal gentleman was not as eager to lead the way as he was to urge the men on, and instead of going boldly up to Bob, he tried to induce his men to go in. But none of them would make the attempt, because of the formidable array before them, and seeing how useless his efforts would be in this direction, the lawyer called one of the men to him, talking to him in a low tone. Bob, divining just what was being said, and fearful lest he should be outwitted finally, went to each one of his men, and ordered them to start for the road that led to the well the instant they should see the intruders get into their wagons. This order was given none too quickly, for almost before Bob had given his directions to the last man, Massie's party clambered into their wagons, and started down the road at a sharp gallop. "Come on, every one of you!" shouted Bob, as he forced his horse to leap the fence. By, riding at full speed, he succeeded in getting ahead of those who would take possession of that to which their employer had no rights. Of course, it was not possible for Bob's force to get over the ground as quickly as he did; but they ran as fast as possible, leaving only Mr. Hillman, Mr. Simpson, George and Pete to guard the entrance to the lane. Bob arrived at the place where Jim and his men were stationed a few seconds before the would-be invaders did, and in as few words as possible, told them what had occurred at the lane. "Strike the first man who attempts to enter," he shouted, "and strike him hard!" By that time the lawyer and his party had alighted and were marching in a solid body up to the road, evidently believing they could force their way through before the others could arrive. Instead of dismounting from his horse this time, Bob grasped a club that was being raised by one of the men, and urged his horse at full speed among those who were attempting to force an entrance. They had come out there in Mr. Massie's employ, believing that there might be some little difficulty about entering, which their very numbers would dispel at once, but by no means anticipating such a vigorous resistance. It did not suit them to measure strength with these who at last _appeared_ to have right on their side, and they fled before Bob's charge with the greatest precipitation. Bob was careful not to follow them into the highway; for, though he had no very extensive acquaintance with the law, he rightly conjectured that if he did this, he might be exceeding the powers Mr. Hillman had said were his; but he stood on the very line of his property, swinging his club in a fashion that would make it uncomfortable for anyone who might get within its reach. "You should be ashamed of yourselves," he cried, anxious to hold them in check by any means until the remainder of his army could arrive upon the scene, "to attempt even to aid Massie in depriving an old man of his hard-earned rights. Mr. Simpson paid the money-lender all the money he had borrowed; but not knowing anything of the beautiful intricacies of the law, which gives a semblance of legality to such a theft as this, neglected to ask for a release of the property. After oil was discovered here, Massie saw a chance to steal the property, and he has hired you to do what he doesn't dare to do himself. If I so much as thought I was as contemptible as you show yourselves to be by trying to do this dirty work, I would go and drown myself in the most stagnant pool I could find." Bob's speech had quite as much effect upon the men as the sight of the clubs had had, and they retreated toward their teams, protesting that they did not know the facts of the case when they started out. It was in vain that the lawyer who had accompanied them insisted that they were only doing what his client had a legal right to ask them to do; in vain that he urged them to enter on the property regardless of those who tried to prevent them. Bob had made them feel ashamed of the part they were playing, and before Ralph, who had outstripped the others in the race, arrived, they were in their wagons, insisting that they would have nothing more to do with the matter. The lawyer scolded and shouted himself hoarse, trying to oblige them to do as he coaxed and commanded, but all to no purpose. They were determined to return, and they plainly told him that unless he came with them, they should drive away without him. Under this pressure, which he could not control, the lawyer was obliged to obey those whom he had vainly attempted to command, and the party drove away, leaving Bob the well-earned title of conqueror in this first battle of Mr. Massie's. But after all danger, so far as this party was concerned, had disappeared, Bob was by no means inclined to relax his vigilance. He stationed his men in the positions he had originally intended they should occupy, supplied each of them with a generous lunch, with the addition of hot coffee, and even gave a portion to the solitary officer at the well, when he had originally intended that he should go hungry. After that was done, and after he had cautioned them to be watchful, impressing on the minds of Ralph, Jim and Dick the necessity of mistrusting every one whom they might see approaching the farm, Bob went back to the house to consult with Mr. Hillman and George. There some especially good news awaited him. It seemed as if this direct attack on Massie's part had restored Mr. Simpson to something near his presence of mind, and, aided by his wife, who had always found scolding efficacious when he relapsed into absent-mindedness, had succeeded in recalling the events on the afternoon when he paid the money-lender the five hundred dollars which he had had so much difficulty to raise. He now distinctly remembered that when he entered Massie's office a man by the name of Jared Thompson, formerly an old neighbor of his, was there, and that his first words were to the effect that he had brought the money to pay off the mortgage. The old man was equally positive that he had laid the amount on the money-lender's desk in the presence of this same man, and that Massie had then offered to buy the wood-lot. How much more might have been said while Thompson was there he was not certain, but of that much he was positive. Mr. Hillman was overjoyed at the news that there had been a witness to the repayment of the money, but when he asked where the man could be found, he was disappointed in the reply. Mr. Thompson had lived on the next farm to Mr. Simpson's, but when he left it, he went to Bradford, and from there it had been said that he had gone to Babcock. Where he was living at that time Mr. Simpson neither knew nor did he know of any one else who might be acquainted with Mr. Thompson's whereabouts. "If we can find this man, and if he heard what Mr. Simpson thinks he did, then the case will be clear enough, for we shall have a witness to the payment of the money, which, I think, will be sufficient to explode Massie's claim." "We _must_ find him," was Bob's reply. And just then he felt able to find any man, however hard he might try to hide. "Yes, but how?" asked Ralph, who had come in at the close of the conversation. "I don't know exactly," said Bob; "but there must be a way. George can be spared better than any one else. Let him harness his horses and start out. He can stay away until he finds him." "I think the best way would be to make inquiries at Bradford, and from there you might be able to track him," suggested Mr. Hillman. "Just remember that with this man everything will be plain sailing, and that without him Massie may get the best of us, and I am confident you will bring him back with you." "And above all things, George, don't give up the chase because you think we may need you here. Just remember that we can get along as well without you and spare neither time nor expense in the search," said Bob. George was perfectly willing to start in pursuit of the missing witness, and at once made his preparations for the journey. Fortunately he had with him as much money as he would be likely to want, and to harness his horses and to gather up such things as he might need was but the work of a few moments. "Don't come back without your man!" shouted Bob, as George drove away. And the defenders of "The Harnett" and the Simpson farm were left alone to await the coming of Mr. Gurney, and of George with the missing witness. All of them feared that Massie's next attempt to gain admittance would be made under the cover of darkness, and to prevent this from being successful Bob went to work. First he sent one of the men on his horse to Sawyer to purchase a number of lanterns, and while the messenger was gone he got from Mrs. Simpson all the blankets and comfortables she had. It was his purpose that half his men should sleep at their posts during the night, while the others watched, in order that they might be able to continue sentry duty for any length of time, and he also proposed that each one on guard should carry a lantern, that both he and any one who might meditate an attack, would know those in possession of the property were still on the alert. This done, the inmates and guardians of the farm were ready for the coming of the night. CHAPTER XXXV. MASSIE'S FAILURE. Although Bob had taken so many precautions against the coming of the enemy during the night, they were all useless, since neither Mr. Massie nor any one in his employ appeared at the Simpson farm. "Well," said Bob, next morning, while he was waiting for Mrs. Simpson to prepare the breakfast for the sentinels, "since they didn't come during the night they'll most likely be here to-day, so it won't do for us to grow careless." As the day wore on, and nothing was seen of the force which it was believed would appear, Ralph said to Bob: "If father started as soon as he got my telegram, he ought to be here on the train to-night, and some of us must drive into town for him." "That's true, and you must be the one to go," replied Bob, decidedly. "You can take my team, and if any one comes while you are gone, we shall get rid of them, I guess." Since Mr. Hillman wished to go to his office for some law-books and papers before Mr. Gurney arrived, Ralph started off with him about noon, leaving the farm with the often-expressed wish that nothing would happen during the absence of three of the defenders. "If you mean by that that you're afraid some of Massie's men may get in here, you're mistaken," said Bob, stoutly. "Unless we have a mind to let them, which isn't at all likely, there won't one of them get a chance to so much as show his nose inside." Now that Mr. Simpson had succeeded in gathering his scattered faculties once more, and understood that everything might yet be well with them, he seemed suddenly to have grown young again, for he was as eager in watching for approaching danger as Bob was. "Don't fear for us!" he shouted, as Mr. Hillman and Ralph drove down the lane. "We can keep a regiment of them at their distance," and he acted much as if he believed all he said. It was about two hours after Ralph and the lawyer drove away, when Bob was honored with another visit from Mr. Massie's messengers, but this time they did not come in sufficient force to cause any alarm. The lawyer and two men drove up to the lane, where Bob, having seen them while they were yet some distance away, had a force of five men, and the following conversation took place: "I am instructed by Mr. Marcus Massie, the rightful owner of this place, to take possession of it at once, and to order you off the grounds as trespassers," said the lawyer. "Do you intend to prevent us from an exercise of our legal rights?" "I intend to prevent you from coming in here," replied Bob, "and I warn you now that I will seriously injure the first one who attempts to come on to this land, which belongs to Mr. Simpson." "I have made the demand upon you," continued the lawyer, in an unruffled tone, "and I tell you now that my client will proceed against you if you thus attempt by force to prevent him from the exercise of his just and lawful rights." "Your client may proceed to do whatever he can, and just as soon as he can, and if my answer has not been sufficiently plain, I tell you again that none of you can come in here." And Bob made a demonstration with his club which appeared to convince the lawyer that he would have no hesitation about using it on his precious body. "I have warned you," said the legal gentleman, viciously, "and now you can take the consequences." "And I have warned you!" cried Bob, "and I'm certain that you will take the consequences if you attempt to come here, where neither you nor your client have any rights." With this pleasant conversation, the lawyer and his companions drove away, and once more was Bob master of the situation. The next arrivals to the disputed property were Mr. Gurney, Mr. Hillman and Ralph. The former had started as soon as he had received his son's telegram, and from the look on Ralph's face, it was easy to see that the two lawyers, after a consultation together, did not consider the situation a desperate one. "Father says that even if George doesn't succeed in finding Thompson, he believes it will be possible to show to the satisfaction of a jury that Mr. Simpson paid off the mortgage," said Ralph, as the two lawyers entered the house, leaving the boys alone in the stable-yard. "Of course if this witness could be found, everything could be settled at once." Ralph's father was also able to do something for the immediate relief of the owners of "The Harnett." On the morning after his arrival, and the guardians of the property had been undisturbed during the night, Mr. Gurney and Mr. Hillman went into town, where they succeeded in getting bondsmen for the boys, thus releasing the property from attachment. They also began a suit against Mr. Massie, to restrain him from taking any further steps in the matter until the question of ownership could be decided at law. While they were absent, George returned, and with him was the missing witness, Mr. Jared Thompson. He had been found at Babcock, and since he had no business on hand he was perfectly willing to accompany George, and all the more so because he had been promised he should be well paid for his time, which, just then, was of no value to him. He remembered distinctly seeing Mr. Simpson at Massie's office, and of seeing him pay over a large roll of money, which he stated was the amount of the mortgage. He also heard Massie say, after he had counted the money, that it was "all right," and saw him hand Mr. Simpson the mortgage, which he took from his safe. After that Mr. Thompson heard some conversation between the two men relative to the purchase of the wood-lot; but, since he was not interested in the matter, he left the office shortly after it had begun. On the arrival of Mr. Gurney from town--for he returned alone, since there was no necessity for Mr. Hillman to accompany him after the bonds had been given for the release of the property--he questioned the witness George had brought, and then stated that there was no further cause for anxiety about the matter, since this testimony would answer also the purpose of a written release of the mortgage. He also gave Bob an order to the keeper of the property at the well, recalling him from his disagreeable duties, and the ex-moonlighter had the pleasure of escorting the officer to the main road, happy that they were once more in possession of their own. Then, of course, Mr. Gurney was shown the wonderful well, and listened, long and attentively to Bob's arguments as to why another well should be sunk near the house. To the surprise of all the partners except, perhaps, Bob, Mr. Gurney advised that that scheme be carried out, saying that Bob's argument seemed to be supported by such facts in the case as were apparent even to those unfamiliar with the business. Bob was highly delighted at having convinced Ralph's father of the feasibility of this scheme, and Mr. Simpson was so impressed by the celebrated lawyer's advice that he insisted on deeding, that very night, the strip of land, on which it was proposed to sink the well, to the firm of Harnett, Gurney, Hubbard & Simpson. Mr. Gurney insisted that the other three partners should pay to Mr. Simpson their proportion of the valuation of the land, which would have been several thousand dollars; but the old man would listen to no such proposition. He had been presented with a quarter of the wood-lot when he had no claim upon it, and he urged his right to make the firm a present of as much land as he owned. There was no necessity of watching the farm that night, although Bob thought it was careless to leave it unguarded; but no harm came to it, nor did they even hear from the worthy Mr. Massie. Bob lost no time in setting about the work of opening the new well, and his first duty next morning was to set a portion of the men at work making ready for the erection of the derrick. Fortunately for the boys, the court was already in session, and Massie's claim came up for an early hearing. It seemed as if the old money-lender must have entirely forgotten that there had been a witness to the payment of the money, for he came into court apparently confident that he should be able to call "The Harnett" his own; but as soon as he saw Thompson, all his confidence vanished, and he sneaked out of court even before the case was fairly opened. Of course, there could be but one decision, under the circumstances, and in less than an hour from the time the case was called, a verdict had been given in favor of Mr. Simpson, who was advised by the judge to demand of Massie a written release, and there was no longer any question as to the ownership of "The Harnett." So far as Ralph was concerned, the case had been decided none too soon. It was time for him to return to college, and on the next day, in company with his father, he bade his partners adieu for a year, as he returned to his studies. Ralph Gurney's vacation was at an end, as this story should be, since it promised simply to tell of that time. * * * * * With the story brought to a close, the work of the author should be ended, unless, as in this case, he makes brief mention of what has happened, concerning the principal characters, from that time until the present. Ramsdell and Dean were convicted of the assault on George, and sentence of two years in the State prison pronounced against them, the charge of stealing the team still hanging over their heads, in case George wants to press it when their term of imprisonment has ended, which is not probable. While Ralph was finishing his collegiate course, Bob worked at the new well, and when it was opened, he telegraphed to Ralph: "New well just shot. Another victory for the moonlighter, for it is not more than two hundred barrels less than the other." And Ralph replied: "I claim the right to name it. It shall be called 'The Moonlighter.'" When Ralph graduated, he owned a quarter of three good, paying wells, and Bob has now an idea that it will pay to open another some distance away, where he has been prospecting for the past month. Mr. and Mrs. Simpson still live on the old farm, and George, Ralph and Bob live with them; but a new house has been built by the side of the old one, for the old couple would not consent that their first home should be torn down, and at any time that the readers visit that section of the country, they should not fail to look at "The Harnett," which still flows as it did during Ralph Gurney's vacation. THE END. A. L. Burt's Catalogue of Books for Young People by Popular Writers, 52-58 Duane Street, New York * * * * * BOOKS FOR BOYS. =Joe's Luck:= A Boy's Adventures in California. By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. The story is chock full of stirring incidents, while the amusing situations are furnished by Joshua Bickford, from Pumpkin Hollow, and the fellow who modestly styles himself the "Rip-tail Roarer, from Pike Co., Missouri." Mr. Alger never writes a poor book, and "Joe's Luck" is certainly one of his best. =Tom the Bootblack;= or, The Road to Success. By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. A bright, enterprising lad was Tom the Bootblack. He was not at all ashamed of his humble calling, though always on the lookout to better himself. The lad started for Cincinnati to look up his heritage. Mr. Grey, the uncle, did not hesitate to employ a ruffian to kill the lad. The plan failed, and Gilbert Grey, once Tom the bootblack, came into a comfortable fortune. This is one of Mr. Alger's best stories. =Dan the Newsboy.= By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Dan Mordaunt and his mother live in a poor tenement, and the lad is pluckily trying to make ends meet by selling papers in the streets of New York. A little heiress of six years is confided to the care of the Mordaunts. The child is kidnapped and Dan tracks the child to the house where she is hidden, and rescues her. The wealthy aunt of the little heiress is so delighted with Dan's courage and many good qualities that she adopts him as her heir. =Tony the Hero:= A Brave Boy's Adventure with a Tramp. By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Tony, a sturdy bright-eyed boy of fourteen, is under the control of Rudolph Rugg, a thorough rascal. After much abuse Tony runs away and gets a job as stable boy in a country hotel. Tony is heir to a large estate. Rudolph for a consideration hunts up Tony and throws him down a deep well. Of course Tony escapes from the fate provided for him, and by a brave act, a rich friend secures his rights and Tony is prosperous. A very entertaining book. =The Errand Boy;= or, How Phil Brent Won Success. By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth illustrated, price $1.00. The career of "The Errand Boy" embraces the city adventures of a smart country lad. Philip was brought up by a kind-hearted innkeeper named Brent. The death of Mrs. Brent paved the way for the hero's subsequent troubles. A retired merchant in New York secures him the situation of errand boy, and thereafter stands as his friend. =Tom Temple's Career.= By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Tom Temple is a bright, self-reliant lad. He leaves Plympton village to seek work in New York, whence he undertakes an important mission to California. Some of his adventures in the far west are so startling that the reader will scarcely close the book until the last page shall have been reached. The tale is written in Mr. Alger's most fascinating style. =Frank Fowler, the Cash Boy.= By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Frank Fowler, a poor boy, bravely determines to make a living for himself and his foster-sister Grace. Going to New York he obtains a situation as cash boy in a dry goods store. He renders a service to a wealthy old gentleman who takes a fancy to the lad, and thereafter helps the lad to gain success and fortune. =Tom Thatcher's Fortune.= By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Tom Thatcher is a brave, ambitious, unselfish boy. He supports his mother and sister on meagre wages earned as a shoe-pegger in John Simpson's factory. Tom is discharged from the factory and starts overland for California. He meets with many adventures. The story is told in a way which has made Mr. Alger's name a household word in so many homes. =The Train Boy.= By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Paul Palmer was a wide-awake boy of sixteen who supported his mother and sister by selling books and papers on the Chicago and Milwaukee Railroad. He detects a young man in the act of picking the pocket of a young lady. In a railway accident many passengers are killed, but Paul is fortunate enough to assist a Chicago merchant, who out of gratitude takes him into his employ. Paul succeeds with tact and judgment and is well started on the road to business prominence. =Mark Mason's Victory.= The Trials and Triumphs of a Telegraph Boy. By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Mark Mason, the telegraph boy, was a sturdy, honest lad, who pluckily won his way to success by his honest manly efforts under many difficulties. This story will please the very large class of boys who regard Mr. Alger as a favorite author. =A Debt of Honor.= The Story of Gerald Lane's Success in the Far West. By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. The story of Gerald Lane and the account of the many trials and disappointments which he passed through before he attained success, will interest all boys who have read the previous stories of this delightful author. =Ben Bruce.= Scenes in the Life of a Bowery Newsboy. By HORATIO ALGER, JR. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Ben Bruce was a brave, manly, generous boy. The story of his efforts, and many seeming failures and disappointments, and his final success, are most interesting to all readers. The tale is written in Mr. Alger's most fascinating style. =The Castaways;= or, On the Florida Reefs. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. This tale smacks of the salt sea. From the moment that the Sea Queen leaves lower New York bay till the breeze leaves her becalmed off the coast of Florida, one can almost hear the whistle of the wind through her rigging, the creak of her straining cordage as she heels to the leeward. The adventures of Ben Clark, the hero of the story and Jake the cook, cannot fail to charm the reader. As a writer for young people Mr. Otis is a prime favorite. =Wrecked on Spider Island;= or, How Ned Rogers Found the Treasure. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Ned Rogers, a "down-east" plucky lad ships as cabin boy to earn a livelihood. Ned is marooned on Spider Island, and while there discovers a wreck submerged in the sand, and finds a considerable amount of treasure. The capture of the treasure and the incidents of the voyage serve to make as entertaining a story of sea-life as the most captious boy could desire. =The Search for the Silver City:= A Tale of Adventure in Yucatan. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Two lads, Teddy Wright and Neal Emery, embark on the steam yacht Day Dream for a cruise to the tropics. The yacht is destroyed by fire, and then the boat is cast upon the coast of Yucatan. They hear of the wonderful Silver City, of the Chan Santa Cruz Indians, and with the help of a faithful Indian ally carry off a number of the golden images from the temples. Pursued with relentless vigor at last their escape is effected in an astonishing manner. The story is so full of exciting incidents that the reader is quite carried away with the novelty and realism of the narrative. =A Runaway Brig;= or, An Accidental Cruise. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. This is a sea tale, and the reader can look out upon the wide shimmering sea as it flashes back the sunlight, and imagine himself afloat with Harry Vandyne, Walter Morse, Jim Libby and that old shell-back, Bob Brace, on the brig Bonita. The boys discover a mysterious document which enables them to find a buried treasure. They are stranded on an island and at last are rescued with the treasure. The boys are sure to be fascinated with this entertaining story. =The Treasure Finders:= A Boy's Adventures in Nicaragua. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Roy and Dean Coloney, with their guide Tongla, leave their father's indigo plantation to visit the wonderful ruins of an ancient city. The boys eagerly explore the temples of an extinct race and discover three golden images cunningly hidden away. They escape with the greatest difficulty. Eventually they reach safety with their golden prizes. We doubt if there ever was written a more entertaining story than "The Treasure Finders." =Jack, the Hunchback.= A Story of the Coast of Maine. By JAMES OTIS. Price $1.00. This is the story of a little hunchback who lived on Cape Elizabeth, on the coast of Maine. His trials and successes are most interesting. From first to last nothing stays the interest of the narrative. It bears us along as on a stream whose current varies in direction, but never loses its force. =With Washington at Monmouth:= A Story of Three Philadelphia Boys. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, ornamental cloth, olivine edges, illustrated, price $1.50. Three Philadelphia lads assist the American spies and make regular and frequent visits to Valley Forge in the Winter while the British occupied the city. The story abounds with pictures of Colonial life skillfully drawn, and the glimpses of Washington's soldiers which are given shown that the work has not been hastily done, or without considerable study. The story is wholesome and patriotic in tone, as are all of Mr. Otis' works. =With Lafayette at Yorktown:= A Story of How Two Boys Joined the Continental Army. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, ornamental cloth, olivine edges, illustrated, price $1.50. Two lads from Portsmouth, N. H., attempt to enlist in the Colonial Army, and are given employment as spies. There is no lack of exciting incidents which the youthful reader craves, but it is healthful excitement brimming with facts which every boy should be familiar with, and while the reader is following the adventures of Ben Jaffrays and Ned Allen he is acquiring a fund of historical lore which will remain in his memory long after that which he has memorized from textbooks has been forgotten. =At the Siege of Havana.= Being the Experiences of Three Boys Serving under Israel Putnam in 1762. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, ornamental cloth, olivine edges, illustrated, price $1.50. "At the Siege of Havana" deals with that portion of the Island's history when the English king captured the capital, thanks to the assistance given by the troops from New England, led in part by Col. Israel Putnam. The principal characters are Darius Lunt, the lad who, represented as telling the story, and his comrades, Robert Clement and Nicholas Vallet. Colonel Putnam also figures to considerable extent, necessarily, in the tale, and the whole forms one of the most readable stories founded on historical facts. =The Defense of Fort Henry.= A Story of Wheeling Creek in 1777. By JAMES OTIS, 12mo, ornamental cloth, olivine edges, illustrated, price $1.50. Nowhere in the history of our country can be found more heroic or thrilling incidents than in the story of those brave men and women who founded the settlement of Wheeling in the Colony of Virginia. The recital of what Elizabeth Zane did is in itself as heroic a story as can be imagined. The wondrous bravery displayed by Major McCulloch and his gallant comrades, the sufferings of the colonists and their sacrifice of blood and life, stir the blood of old as well as young readers. =The Capture of the Laughing Mary.= A Story of Three New York Boys in 1776. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, ornamental cloth, olivine edges, price $1.50. "During the British occupancy of New York, at the outbreak of the Revolution, a Yankee lad hears of the plot to take General Washington's person, and calls in two companions to assist the patriot cause. They do some astonishing things, and, incidentally, lay the way for an American navy later, by the exploit which gives its name to the work. Mr. Otis' books are too well known to require any particular commendation to the young."--Evening Post. =With Warren at Bunker Hill.= A Story of the Siege of Boston. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, ornamental cloth, olivine edges, illustrated, price $1.50. "This is a tale of the siege of Boston, which opens on the day after the doings at Lexington and Concord, with a description of home life in Boston, introduces the reader to the British camp at Charlestown, shows Gen. Warren at home, describes what a boy thought of the battle of Bunker Hill, and closes with the raising of the siege. The three heroes, George Wentworth, Ben Scarlett and an old ropemaker, incur the enmity of a young Tory, who causes them many adventures the boys will like to read."--Detroit Free Press. =With the Swamp Fox.= The Story of General Marion's Spies. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. This story deals with General Francis Marion's heroic struggle in the Carolinas. General Marion's arrival to take command of these brave men and rough riders is pictured as a boy might have seen it, and although the story is devoted to what the lads did, the Swamp Fox is ever present in the mind of the reader. =On the Kentucky Frontier.= A Story of the Fighting Pioneers of the West. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1. In the history of our country there is no more thrilling story than that of the work done on the Mississippi river by a handful of frontiersmen. Mr. Otis takes the reader on that famous expedition from the arrival of Major Clarke's force at Corn Island, until Kaskaskia was captured. He relates that part of Simon Kenton's life history which is not usually touched upon either by the historian or the story teller. This is one of the most entertaining books for young people which has been published. =Sarah Dillard's Ride.= A Story of South Carolina in 1780. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. "This book deals with the Carolinas in 1780, giving a wealth of detail of the Mountain Men who struggled so valiantly against the king's troops. Major Ferguson is the prominent British officer of the story, which is told as though coming from a youth who experienced these adventures. In this way the famous ride of Sarah Dillard is brought out as an incident of the plot."--=Boston Journal.= =A Tory Plot.= A Story of the Attempt to Kill General Washington. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. "'A Tory Plot' is the story of two lads who overhear something of the plot originated during the Revolution by Gov. Tryon to capture or murder Washington. They communicate their knowledge to Gen. Putnam and are commissioned by him to play the role of detectives in the matter. They do so, and meet with many adventures and hair-breadth escapes. The boys are, of course, mythical, but they serve to enable the author to put into very attractive shape much valuable knowledge concerning one phase of the Revolution."--=Pittsburgh Times.= =A Traitor's Escape.= A Story of the Attempt to Seize Benedict Arnold. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. "This is a tale with stirring scenes depicted in each chapter, bringing clearly before the mind the glorious deeds of the early settlers in this country. In an historical work dealing with this country's past, no plot can hold the attention closer than this one, which describes the attempt and partial success of Benedict Arnold's escape to New York, where he remained as the guest of Sir Henry Clinton. All those who actually figured in the arrest of the traitor, as well as Gen. Washington, are included as characters."--=Albany Union.= =A Cruise with Paul Jones.= A Story of Naval Warfare in 1776. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. "This story takes up that portion of Paul Jones' adventurous life when he was hovering off the British coast, watching for an opportunity to strike the enemy a blow. It deals more particularly with his descent upon Whitehaven, the seizure of Lady Selkirk's plate, and the famous battle with the Drake. The boy who figures in the tale is one who was taken from a derelict by Paul Jones shortly after this particular cruise was begun."--=Chicago Inter-Ocean.= =Corporal Lige's Recruit.= A Story of Crown Point and Ticonderoga. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. "In 'Corporal Lige's Recruit,' Mr. Otis tells the amusing story of an old soldier, proud of his record, who had served the king in '58, and who takes the lad, Isaac Rice, as his 'personal recruit.' The lad acquits himself superbly. Col. Ethan Allen 'in the name of God and the continental congress,' infuses much martial spirit into the narrative, which will arouse the keenest interest as it proceeds. Crown Point, Ticonderoga, Benedict Arnold and numerous other famous historical names appear in this dramatic tale."--=Boston Globe.= =Morgan, the Jersey Spy.= A Story of the Siege of Yorktown in 1781. By JAMES OTIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. "The two lads who are utilized by the author to emphasize the details of the work done during that memorable time were real boys who lived on the banks of the York river, and who aided the Jersey spy in his dangerous occupation. In the guise of fishermen the lads visit Yorktown, are suspected of being spies, and put under arrest. Morgan risks his life to save them. The final escape, the thrilling encounter with a squad of red coats, when they are exposed equally to the bullets of friends and foes, told in a masterly fashion, makes of this volume one of the most entertaining books of the year."--=Inter-Ocean.= =The Young Scout:= The Story of a West Point Lieutenant. By EDWARD S. ELLIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. The crafty Apache chief Geronimo but a few years ago was the most terrible scourge of the southwest border. The author has woven, in a tale of thrilling interest, all the incidents of Geronimo's last raid. The hero is Lieutenant James Decker, a recent graduate of West Point. Ambitious to distinguish himself the young man takes many a desperate chance against the enemy and on more than one occasion narrowly escapes with his life. In our opinion Mr. Ellis is the best writer of Indian stories now before the public. =Adrift in the Wilds:= The Adventures of Two Shipwrecked Boys. By EDWARD S. ELLIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Elwood Brandon and Howard Lawrence are en route for San Francisco. Off the coast of California the steamer takes fire. The two boys reach the shore with several of the passengers. Young Brandon becomes separated from his party and is captured by hostile Indians, but is afterwards rescued. This is a very entertaining narrative of Southern California. =A Young Hero;= or, Fighting to Win. By EDWARD S. ELLIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. This story tells how a valuable solid silver service was stolen from the Misses Perkinpine, two very old and simple minded ladies. Fred Sheldon, the hero of this story, undertakes to discover the thieves and have them arrested. After much time spent in detective work, he succeeds in discovering the silver plate and winning the reward. The story is told in Mr. Ellis' most fascinating style. Every boy will be glad to read this delightful book. =Lost in the Rockies.= A Story of Adventure in the Rocky Mountains. By EDWARD S. ELLIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1. Incident succeeds incident, and adventure is piled upon adventure, and at the end the reader, be he boy or man, will have experienced breathless enjoyment in this romantic story describing many adventures in the Rockies and among the Indians. =A Jaunt Through Java:= The Story of a Journey to the Sacred Mountain. By EDWARD S. ELLIS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. The interest of this story is found in the thrilling adventures of two cousins, Hermon and Eustace Hadley, on their trip across the island of Java, from Samarang to the Sacred Mountain. In a land where the Royal Bengal tiger, the rhinoceros, and other fierce beasts are to be met with, it is but natural that the heroes of this book should have a lively experience. There is not a dull page in the book. =The Boy Patriot.= A Story of Jack, the Young Friend of Washington. By EDWARD S. ELLIS. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, illustrated, price $1.50. "There are adventures of all kinds for the hero and his friends, whose pluck and ingenuity in extricating themselves from awkward fixes are always equal to the occasion. It is an excellent story full of honest, manly, patriotic efforts on the part of the hero. A very vivid description of the battle of Trenton is also found in this story."--=Journal of Education.= =A Yankee Lad's Pluck.= How Bert Larkin Saved his Father's Ranch in Porto Rico. By WM. P. CHIPMAN. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. "Bert Larkin, the hero of the story, early excites our admiration, and is altogether a fine character such as boys will delight in, whilst the story of his numerous adventures is very graphically told. This will, we think, prove one of the most popular boys' books this season."--=Gazette.= =A Brave Defense.= A Story of the Massacre at Fort Griswold in 1781. By WILLIAM P. CHIPMAN. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Perhaps no more gallant fight against fearful odds took place during the Revolutionary War than that at Fort Griswold, Groton Heights, Conn., in 1781. The boys are real boys who were actually on the muster rolls, either at Fort Trumbull on the New London side, or of Fort Griswold on the Groton side of the Thames. The youthful reader who follows Halsey Sanford and Levi Dart and Tom Malleson, and their equally brave comrades, through their thrilling adventures will be learning something more than historical facts; they will be imbibing lessons of fidelity, of bravery, of heroism, and of manliness, which must prove serviceable in the arena of life. =The Young Minuteman.= A Story of the Capture of General Prescott in 1777. By WILLIAM P. CHIPMAN. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. This story is based upon actual events which occurred during the British occupation of the waters of Narragansett Bay. Darius Wale and William Northrop belong to "the coast patrol." The story is a strong one, dealing only with actual events. There is, however, no lack of thrilling adventure, and every lad who is fortunate enough to obtain the book will find not only that his historical knowledge is increased, but that his own patriotism and love of country are deepened. =For the Temple:= A Tale of the Fall of Jerusalem. By G. A. HENTY. With illustrations by S. J. SOLOMON. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, price $1.00. "Mr. Henty's graphic prose picture of the hopeless Jewish resistance to Roman sway adds another leaf to his record of the famous wars of the world. The book is one of Mr. Henty's cleverest efforts."--=Graphic.= =Roy Gilbert's Search:= A Tale of the Great Lakes. By WM. P. CHIPMAN. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. A deep mystery hangs over the parentage of Roy Gilbert. He arranges with two schoolmates to make a tour of the Great Lakes on a steam launch. The three boys visit many points of interest on the lakes. Afterwards the lads rescue an elderly gentleman and a lady from a sinking yacht. Later on the boys narrowly escape with their lives. The hero is a manly, self-reliant boy, whose adventures will be followed with interest. =The Slate Picker:= The Story of a Boy's Life in the Coal Mines. By HARRY PRENTICE. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. This is a story of a boy's life in the coal mines of Pennsylvania. Ben Burton, the hero, had a hard road to travel, but by grit and energy he advanced step by step until he found himself called upon to fill the position of chief engineer of the Kohinoor Coal Company. This is a book of extreme interest to every boy reader. =The Boy Cruisers;= or, Paddling in Florida. By ST. GEORGE RATHBORNE. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Andrew George and Rowland Carter start on a canoe trip along the Gulf coast, from Key West to Tampa, Florida. Their first adventure is with a pair of rascals who steal their boats. Next they run into a gale in the Gulf. After that they have a lively time with alligators and Andrew gets into trouble with a band of Seminole Indians. Mr. Rathborne knows just how to interest the boys, and lads who are in search of a rare treat will do well to read this entertaining story. =Captured by Zulus:= A Story of Trapping in Africa. By HARRY PRENTICE. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. This story details the adventures of two lads, Dick Elsworth and Bob Harvey, in the wilds of South Africa. By stratagem the Zulus capture Dick and Bob and take them to their principal kraal or village. The lads escape death by digging their way out of the prison hut by night. They are pursued, but the Zulus finally give up pursuit. Mr. Prentice tells exactly how wild-beast collectors secure specimens on their native stamping grounds, and these descriptions make very entertaining reading. =Tom the Ready;= or, Up from the Lowest. By RANDOLPH HILL. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. This is a dramatic narrative of the unaided rise of a fearless, ambitious boy from the lowest round of fortune's ladder to wealth and the governorship of his native State. Tom Seacomb begins life with a purpose, and eventually overcomes those who oppose him. How he manages to win the battle is told by Mr. Hill in a masterful way that thrills the reader and holds his attention and sympathy to the end. =Captain Kidd's Gold:= The True Story of an Adventurous Sailor Boy. By JAMES FRANKLIN FITTS. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. There is something fascinating to the average youth in the very idea of buried treasure. A vision arises before his eyes of swarthy Portuguese and Spanish rascals, with black beards and gleaming eyes. There were many famous sea rovers, but none more celebrated than Capt. Kidd. Paul Jones Garry inherits a document which locates a considerable treasure buried by two of Kidd's crew. The hero of this book is an ambitious, persevering lad, of salt-water New England ancestry, and his efforts to reach the island and secure the money form one of the most absorbing tales for our youth that has come from the press. =The Boy Explorers:= The Adventures of Two Boys in Alaska. By HARRY PRENTICE. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Two boys, Raymond and Spencer Manning, travel to Alaska to join their father in search of their uncle. On their arrival at Sitka the boys with an Indian guide set off across the mountains. The trip is fraught with perils that test the lads' courage to the utmost. All through their exciting adventures the lads demonstrate what can be accomplished by pluck and resolution, and their experience makes one of the most interesting tales ever written. =The Island Treasure;= or, Harry Darrel's Fortune. By FRANK H. CONVERSE. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Harry Darrel, having received a nautical training on a school-ship, is bent on going to sea. A runaway horse changes his prospects. Harry saves Dr. Gregg from drowning and afterward becomes sailing-master of a sloop yacht. Mr. Converse's stories possess a charm of their own which is appreciated by lads who delight in good healthy tales that smack of salt water. =Guy Harris:= The Runaway. By HARRY CASTLEMON. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Guy Harris lived in a small city on the shore of one of the Great Lakes. He is persuaded to go to sea, and gets a glimpse of the rough side of life in a sailor's boarding house. He ships on a vessel and for five months leads a hard life. The book will interest boys generally on account of its graphic style. This is one of Castlemon's most attractive stories. =Julian Mortimer:= A Brave Boy's Struggle for Home and Fortune. By HARRY CASTLEMON. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1. The scene of the story lies west of the Mississippi River, in the days when emigrants made their perilous way across the great plains to the land of gold. There is an attack upon the wagon train by a large party of Indians. Our hero is a lad of uncommon nerve and pluck. Befriended by a stalwart trapper, a real rough diamond, our hero achieves the most happy results. =By Pike and Dyke:= A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic. By G. A. HENTY. With illustrations by MAYNARD BROWN. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, price $1.00. "Boys with a turn for historical research will be enchanted with the book, while the rest who only care for adventure will be students in spite of themselves."--=St. James's Gazette.= =St. George for England:= A Tale of Cressy and Poitiers. By G. A. HENTY. With illustrations by GORDON BROWNE. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, price $1.00. "A story of very great interest for boys. In his own forcible style the author has endeavored to show that determination and enthusiasm can accomplish marvellous results; and that courage is generally accompanied by magnanimity and gentleness."--=Pall Mall Gazette.= =Captain Bayley's Heir:= A Tale of the Gold Fields of California. By G. A. HENTY. With illustrations by H. M. PAGET. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, price $1.00. "Mr. Henty is careful to mingle instruction with entertainment; and the humorous touches, especially in the sketch of John Holl, the Westminster dustman, Dickens himself could hardly have excelled."--=Christian Leader.= =Budd Boyd's Triumph;= or, The Boy Firm of Fox Island. By WILLIAM P. CHIPMAN. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. The scene of this story is laid on the upper part of Narragansett Bay, and the leading incidents have a strong salt-water flavor. The two boys, Budd Boyd and Judd Floyd, being ambitious and clear sighted, form a partnership to catch and sell fish. Budd's pluck and good sense carry him through many troubles. In following the career of the boy firm of Boyd & Floyd, the youthful reader will find a useful lesson--that industry and perseverance are bound to lead to ultimate success. =Lost in the Canyon:= Sam Willett's Adventures on the Great Colorado. By ALFRED R. CALHOUN. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1. This story hinges on a fortune left to Sam Willett, the hero, and the fact that it will pass to a disreputable relative if the lad dies before he shall have reached his majority. The story of his father's peril and of Sam's desperate trip down the great canyon on a raft, and how the party finally escape from their perils is described in a graphic style that stamps Mr. Calhoun as a master of his art. =Captured by Apes:= The Wonderful Adventures of a Young Animal Trainer. By HARRY PRENTICE. 12mo, cloth, illustrated, price $1.00. Philip Garland, a young animal collector and trainer, sets sail for Eastern seas in quest of a new stock of living curiosities. The vessel is wrecked off the coast of Borneo, and young Garland is cast ashore on a small island, and captured by the apes that overran the place. Very novel indeed is the way by which the young man escapes death. Mr. Prentice is a writer of undoubted skill. =Under Drake's Flag:= A Tale of the Spanish Main. By G. A. HENTY. With illustrations by GORDON BROWNE. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, price $1.00. "There is not a dull chapter, nor, indeed, a dull page in the book; but the author has so carefully worked up his subject that the exciting deeds of his heroes are never incongruous nor absurd."--=Observer.= =By Sheer Pluck:= A Tale of the Ashanti War. By G. A. HENTY. With illustrations by GORDON BROWNE. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, price $1.00. The author has woven, in a tale of thrilling interest, all the details of the Ashanti campaign, of which he was himself a witness. "Mr. Henty keeps up his reputation as a writer of boys' stories. 'By Sheer Pluck' will be eagerly read."--=Athenæum.= =With Lee in Virginia:= A Story of the American Civil War. By G. A. HENTY. With illustrations by GORDON BROWNE. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, price $1.00. "One of the best stories for lads which Mr. Henty has yet written. The picture is full of life and color, and the stirring and romantic incidents are skillfully blended with the personal interest and charm of the story."--=Standard.= =By England's Aid;= or, The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604). By G. A. HENTY. With illustrations by ALFRED PEARSE. 12mo, cloth, olivine edges, price $1.00. "It is an admirable book for youngsters. It overflows with stirring incident and exciting adventure, and the color of the era and of the scene are finely reproduced. The illustrations add to its attractiveness."--=Boston Gazette.= * * * * * For sale by all booksellers, or sent postpaid on receipt of price by the publisher, A. L. BURT, 52-58 Duane Street, New York. Transcriber's Note: Variations in the use of hyphens and alternative spelling have been retained as they appear in the original except as in the following changes: Page 5 friendship for you. changed to friendship for you, 12 and he was he was on his way changed to and he was on his way 14 I should have have been somewhere changed to I should have been somewhere 55 might he obliged to changed to might be obliged to 88 thay may make it disagreeable changed to they may make it disagreeable 146 in a box-buggy changed to in a box buggy 151 his own propperty changed to his own property 153 Hello! Helo-o-o! changed to Hello! Hello-o-o! 156 A SOUVENIR OF THE THIEVES changed to A SOUVENIR OF THE THIEVES. 180 call the case on of changed to call the case one of 225 said Bob, and before changed to said Bob, "and before 234 an hour bfore it changed to an hour before it 238 this was followd by changed to this was followed by 242 it was, prefering to changed to it was, preferring to 258 they might lose. "The Harnett" changed to they might lose "The Harnett" And in the advertisements: Page 5 South Carolina in in 1780 changed to South Carolina in 1780 6 price $1,00 in Corporal Lige's Recruit changed to price $1.00 8 illustrated, price $1.00 in The Boy Cruisers changed to illustrated, price $1.00. 10 price $1, in Lost in the Canyon changed to price $1. 10 cloth, illustrated. in Captured by Apes changed to cloth, illustrated, 
45287	----	Transcriber's Note: Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note. Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as printed. Subscripted text is indicated with curly braces: {2}. Words printed in italics are marked with underlines: _italics_. THE A B C OF MINING _A Handbook for Prospectors_ TREATING FULLY OF EXPLORATORY AND PREPARATORY WORK OF THE PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF ORES, FIELD GEOLOGY, THE OCCURRENCE AND ASSOCIATIONS OF MINERALS, METHODS OF CHEMICAL ANALYSIS AND ASSAY, BLOW-PIPE TESTS, PROMISING INDICATIONS, AND SIMPLE METHODS OF WORKING VALUABLE DEPOSITS, TOGETHER WITH CHAPTERS ON QUARTZ AND HYDRAULIC MINING AND ESPECIAL DETAILED INFORMATION ON PLACER MINING, WITH AN ADDENDA ON CAMP LIFE AND MEDICAL HINTS. BY CHARLES A. BRAMBLE, D.L.S., Late of the Editorial Staff of "The Engineering and Mining Journal," and formerly a Crown Lands and Mineral Surveyor for the Dominion of Canada. _ILLUSTRATED._ CHICAGO AND NEW YORK: RAND, McNALLY & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS. Copyright, 1898, by Rand, McNally & Co. PREFACE. Owing to recent rich discoveries in more than one mining field, hundreds of shrewd, intelligent men without experience in prospecting are turning their attention to that arduous pursuit--to such this book is offered as a safe guide. A complex subject has been treated as simply as its nature permitted, and when a scientific term could not be avoided, the explanation in the glossary has been offered. CHARLES A. BRAMBLE, D.L.S. PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION. A steady demand for this work has shown that it fills a want, and serves the purpose for which it was written. In issuing this second edition, a few compositors' errors that had crept in, owing to the author being in a very remote region while the book was going through the press, have been corrected, but no material changes in the text were found desirable. CONTENTS. THE A B C OF MINING. PAGE Chapter I--Prospecting, 7 II--How to Test for Minerals, 38 III--Blow-Pipe Tests, 65 IV--Economic Ores and Minerals, 75 V--Mining, 100 VI--Camp Life, 143 VII--Surveying, 155 VIII--Floating a Company, 161 IX--Medical Hints, 165 X--Dynamite, 168 XI--Atomic Weights, 170 XII--Odds and Ends, 172 Glossary, 181 A B C OF MINING. CHAPTER I. PROSPECTING. Many men seem to think that should their destinies lead them into parts of the world where there is mineral wealth they will have little chance of discovering the deposits without the technical education of a mining engineer. This is wrong. The fact is that the sphere of the prospector does not cover that of the engineer. The work of the one ends where that of the other begins, and many of the most successful discoverers of metallic wealth have been entirely ignorant of the methods by which a great mine should be opened, developed, and worked. A few simple tools and a not very deep knowledge of assaying, with an observant eye and a brain quick to deduce inferences from what that eye has seen, are the most valuable assets of a prospector. In time he will gain experience, and experience will teach him much that he could not learn in any college nor from any book. Each mining district differs from every other, and it has been found that certain rules which hold good in one region, and guide the seeker after wealth to the hidden treasure that has been stored up for eons of time, do not apply in another region. To show what may be done with imperfect, improvised apparatus, an Australian assayer, who has since become famous, started up country in his youth with the following meager outfit: A cheap pair of scales, a piece of cheese cloth, a tin ring 1-1/2 inches by 1/2 inch, a small brass door-knob, some powdered borax, some carbonate of soda and argol, a few pounds of lead lining taken from a tea chest, an empty jam pot, a short steel drill, a red flower pot. With this modest collection of implements he made forty assays of gold ores that turned out to be correct when repeated in a laboratory. About the best advice that can be given to a man who has determined to go to some out of the way region where there is a possibility of his discovering minerals is to recommend him to visit the nearest museum and gain an acquaintance with the common rocks. Should he be unable to do this he had better provide himself with small, inexpensive specimens from the shop of some dealer. It is almost impossible to teach a beginner to distinguish the various rocks by any amount of printed instruction; the only way to learn to recognize them is to handle them and note carefully their color, weight, and the minerals that go to make them up. The explorer should be able to recognize at a glance, or at any rate after a very short inspection, the sedimentary rocks, such as sandstone and limestone; the metamorphic rocks, that is, rocks that have been altered by the agency of great subterranean heat in ages long past, and which were probably stratified rocks at one period, such as granite and gneiss, and the truly igneous rocks--trap, diabase, diorite, etc. He must know also that mysterious rock which the western miner calls porphyry, and to which is ascribed most wonderful virtues in the way of ore attraction; while dolerite and dolomite must be to him familiar terms and substances. This sounds easy enough but the student will find that a good deal of hard work is necessary before he can readily recognize each of these rocks. It is even more necessary that he should learn the metals thoroughly. Each one differs from all the rest in some particular. Often this difference will be an obscure one, but to the careful investigator the recognition of the substance will be in the end certain. They may differ in weight, in color, in hardness, in a dozen different ways, so that to the man who has made a study of this subject a determination is always possible. On account of the wonderful discoveries in the Canadian Northwest and in Alaska, the eyes of thousands are turned towards those fields. Wonderfully rich placer ground has already been found and there can be no reason to doubt that very much larger areas remain unproved. Where this gold comes from is an open question; geologists, mineralogists and chemists, not to mention mining engineers and practical prospectors, have disputed over the source of the gold already found, but it must be confessed that there are almost as many theories as there are disputants. Could it be known with certainty how and under what conditions the gold got where it is found, the problem of seeking for it might be made easier. Unfortunately this is not the case, and all prospecting for the home of the precious metal is more or less a groping in the dark. We do know that the heaviest particles of gold do not travel far from where they were first deposited, because gold is so enormously heavy--its specific gravity being about nineteen times that of water--it seeks the bottom of the stream and stays there. It is not an invariable rule that the gold increases in coarseness as the stream is ascended, but it is a very general one. On some rivers rich and poor stretches of gold-bearing gravel succeed one another as the explorer makes his way up or down stream. This is difficult to account for, but in many cases is believed to be caused by the modern river robbing the bed of some one or more ancient water-courses whose beds crossed the valley of the present stream. This may or may not be the case. We only know that the miners who found coarse gold on the lower regions of such rivers as the Frazer were miserably disappointed when they reached stretches near the source and found nothing but flour gold. This same feature has been noticed in some of the Alaskan rivers. It is quite within the bounds of probability that no very rich quartz veins exist in Alaska. It does not follow from the richness of the placers that the gold is derived from very rich quartz lodes, because this amount of gold may really represent the product of a vast amount of rock that has been ground to powder and washed away in the course of ages. The gold would not travel far, and the deposits being unearthed to-day have been accumulating in these northern streams since the world was young; water-courses are nature's ground sluices. It is possible that one stream has cut through the drainage of another. Sometimes this has impoverished the first and enriched the second, while in other cases the reverse has obtained. Upheavals have formed faults[1] and fractured the strata, and the gold may have been deposited by solution in these fractures. Often the soil will have been washed away from near the top of the mountain, so that layers of stratified rock are seen to be duplicated on each side while they are covered at the summit. The prospector keeps his eye open as he goes along and notes carefully the character of the fragments of rock he finds in the streams. Quartz, diorite, diabase, and porphyry pebbles are grounds for expecting a profitable result, but of course there is no certainty of such a happy issue. As soon as the district begins to be fairly well known certain discoveries are made that invariably render prospecting easier. Local peculiarities are noted; certain characters are found to be common to the ore-bearing bodies or deposits; the lines of deposits become known, and a good deal of light is then shed upon a very difficult problem. As a rule, when the fragments of quartz, pyrite, chalcopyrite, or galena are rough, they have not traveled far, and the lode from which they have been derived should be close at hand. Water and attrition soon round these minerals on their sharp edges, and thus show that they have come from some little distance. [1] Dislocation of the strata. In some countries, especially where vegetation is scanty, the outcrop of a body of mineral may be traced by a difference in the vegetation. In South Africa a chain of pools usually follows the course of a line fault, which in its turn marks where an intrusive lode carrying mineral separates two different formations. As a rule, any heavy mineral is worth investigating. Even in remote regions silver, mercury, tin, nickel, platinum, copper, and several other metals are worth paying attention to. If they are too far away from the railroad or the steamboat to-day they may not be so next year, for civilization advances with giant stride in these days and never faster than when transportation companies are reaching forth to some newly discovered mineral field. One of the greatest drawbacks to prospecting in the North is the dense growths of moss and forest that cover the ground. In most of the Western states, in South Africa, and in Australia this drawback does not exist and prospecting was by that much the easier. However, as a compensation, there is abundant water in Alaska and the Northwest, while it was and is almost entirely absent in several other regions that possess immense bodies of ore which are not available for this very reason. Quartz has been called the mother of gold, and certainly quartz and gold are inseparably connected to-day. As to where gold may be found the best reply that can be given is in the words of the old miner, who, when asked that question, said: "Where it be's; there it be's," and then added, "and there ben't I." Although most prospectors travel alone from sheer necessity, there can be no doubt that three or four men forming a party and working together have the advantage. They can do their work cheaper, more thoroughly, and more surely. By co-operating they may carry a more complete outfit. Should any accident happen help is at hand, whereas the solitary wanderer often dies as the result of some accident that would have been trivial had he had a companion. Three or four claims may be worked in conjunction with one another at far less proportionate expense than a single one could. Nature's preparation for the reception of great ore deposits is somewhat as follows: The crust of the earth is prepared for the reception of the metals by great outbursts of igneous or melted rocks; the metals themselves being carried in suspension in the heated water that everywhere traverses the strata. These metals are deposited in the veins as soon as the waters begin to cool, and the pressure to which they were subjected from deep down in the earth's crust is removed. A great mineral country is usually marked by the outcrops of the veins being persistent in their courses and traceable for many miles, though very probably many breaks may occur in these outcrops. The rocks associated with great ore bodies are lime, porphyry, granite, shales, slates, quartzites, and diabase. Fragments of mineral and gangue, known to the miners as float, may be littered over the hills and encumber the courses of the stream. A central line of eruption may often be traced by masses of altered rock, and beds of lava or other volcanic products. We find the granite has been melted and the limestone has acquired magnesia, and thus become dolomatized. Whenever a heavy deposit of pyrites, or mundic, is found mineral probably exists below. The cubes of pyrite are not always valueless, they may contain gold in addition to the iron and sulphur. When the pyrites decay under the influence of the weather, and leave the quartz honeycombed, these cavities often contain concentrated gold; for which reason you often get a higher assay from the surface than from any point lower down in the vein. In sinking the shaft soon gets below this altered quartz and the ores are then combined with sulphur. They have become sulphides, and are harder to treat. The prospector should therefore act very cautiously when trying to develop a mine with a small capital behind him; because, although the first ore may be adapted for stamping, he may find, before he has gone down fifty feet, that it can only be treated in a smelter, and that all the money he has put into crushing apparatus is wasted. Without the prospector there would be no mining and the world would yet be in the stone age. He is not appreciated at anything like his real worth. He requires ability and experience, push and perseverance. Prospecting is a search for valuable minerals. He may not be very deeply learned in either geology or mineralogy, but he must have a keen eye and good natural powers of observation. There are some sixty or seventy elements in the world, and the most common is oxygen. Nearly all the coloring matter of rocks comes from iron. Wind, frost, rain, snow, and heat, cause a crumbling of the different rocks, and running water wears them away, and carries off and distributes the particles. By this agency, and by floating ice, they are often removed to long distances. The action of internal heat renews the deposits of mineral by eruption, or by hot springs, but this means of renewal was much more powerful in the past than it is now. Organic matter found in the crust of the earth was derived from animals or vegetables. Coal is a legacy from forests that flourished ages ago, while petroleum is all that remains of vast schools of fishes that swarmed in Devonian seas. Stratified rocks are either sand, clay, or calcareous, which means lime-bearing. In their natural position they were horizontal, but owing to subsequent volcanic action they are, in some localities, tilted at all conceivable angles. The eruptive rocks have burst through them in places, changed their character, divided them by intrusive masses, and generally enriched them with mineral deposits. Everything now known points to the theory that the contents of veins were deposited in the lodes by infiltration. In a few instances famous mines have no veins, but are literally hills of mineral; they are then of low grade, but much more remunerative than average high grade mines, owing the vast quantity of ore, and the ease with which it can be mined. The famous Treadwell mine, on Douglas Island, Alaska, has ore that is worth less than four dollars a ton, but it is quarried, and 640 stamps work day and night. There is about a dollar a ton profit, and hundreds of thousands of tons are treated annually. The tin mine known as Mount Bischoff, in Tasmania, and the Burra copper mine in Australia are other instances. Each of these deposits was found as an outcropping on the bare top of a low hill, and none of them has walls. A fault may throw the vein up or down, and a good deal of exploration may have to be done before it is recovered. A lenticular vein consists of a series of double pointed ore bodies like lenses which may be strung out, overlapping, or not. The outcrop of a vein is never the same as its strike, except on a level surface. A stringer of ore branching off from the main vein is known as a chute, shoot, or chimney. In developing a ledge or lode, first find out what the ore is. Gold is shown in the mortar, especially after roasting. Silver may be recognized at sight, or by assay tests, or blow pipe; copper, by its vivid colors,--green or blue for carbonate and red for oxide or metallic copper. The ore often differs in various parts of the vein. Explore your lode along the surface, across, and down its dip. When you find it continuous it will be time enough to think of a vertical shaft. The top of a shaft must be timbered with logs, so as to give sufficient fall to get rid of the mineral when it is hoisted. The first thing the prospector has to consider is his outfit. The more complete this is the better, but ninety-nine times out of a hundred the difficulties of transportation in a wild region are so enormous that he will have to do without a great many things that he would like to have. He must endeavor to make up for the lack of tools by ingenuity; then he may get along fairly well. A pan, he must have. In this he will wash carefully all his samples. Then, a flask of quicksilver is more precious to him even than gold; for, having it, he can resort to pan-amalgamation, which will save the precious metal even when it is in minute particles. This process may be described as follows: A pound or two of the ore in powder is placed in the pan and water is added until the mass becomes a thin pulp. One ounce of quicksilver and a small piece of that deadly poison, known to the chemist as cyanide of potash, and as prussic acid to the ordinary man, should be added, and the mass should be stirred thoroughly, for two hours if you can stand it. Then turn in water and wash off the dirt and the amalgam will be found in the bottom of the pan. This you must collect very carefully. You should have a square piece of chamois skin or a piece of strong white cotton cloth. In either case the amalgam is put in the center of this square and the cloth twisted until all the superfluous quicksilver is pressed out and your amalgam remains nearly free from mercury. This amalgam placed on a shovel and held over a brisk fire will soon show the yellow color of gold. If you have no mould you may make one of clay, put your gold therein with a little borax, and very soon, the fire being hot enough, you will have a tiny ingot of the precious metal. But most prospectors are satisfied when they have obtained their sponge gold, and do not carry their operations further in these rough and ready tests. The prospector of to-day is often a very different man from his predecessor of a generation ago. The old gold hunter used to sally forth armed with a pick, shovel and pan, and usually a very little grub. In his stead men are now taking the field who have had the benefits of a thorough education, both practical and theoretical, and provided with all the equipment necessary for their work. Some of these men carry an outfit somewhat as follows: An iron mortar holding half a gallon, together with a pestle a rough scale for pulp, a more delicate one showing troy grains and pennyweights, a 40-mesh sieve, a burro furnace and muffle, one cupel mould, a couple of dozen scorifiers, tongs to handle the cupel and scorifiers, two annealing cups, a spirit lamp, a dozen test tubes, a pouring mould, five or six pounds of borax and about as much carbonate of soda, five pounds of bone ash, ditto of granulated lead, a pint of nitric acid, ditto of hydrochloric acid, ditto sulphuric acid, ditto of ammonia, twice as much alcohol and two pounds or so of granulated zinc. As a blow pipe outfit he will take a blow pipe, spirit lamp, nitrate of cobalt in solution, cyanide of potash, yellow prussiate of potash, red prussiate of potash, a sheet or two of filtering paper and a couple of three-inch glass filters. With this outfit he can determine any mineral he may come across. By patience and observation the man who starts out to take up prospecting as a road to fortune may easily master the rudiments of his business. It will not take him long to become familiar with the commoner rocks, and the more valuable ores. His own rough tests in the field must be confirmed by competent assayers upon his return to civilization, and in this matter he should be very guarded. The most reliable assays are made either at the different government assay offices or by some of the large metallurgical works whose reputation is world wide. Prospecting is hard work, but the life is healthy and full of excitement, only the explorer should have courage, hope, and good temper, for each and every one will be as necessary in his chosen vocation as his pan and pick. When alluvial or placer gold has been found it is reasonable to suppose that the vein from which it was derived may also reward diligent search, for it is undoubtedly true that most placer gold has come from quartz veins. This, however, is believed not to be invariably the case, a recent school of mineralogists contending that pure masses of alluvial gold have been formed from the accretion or growth of the gold deposited from certain gold salts. This is in any case probably exceptional, and the prospector who finds gold in gravel should seek in the adjacent country for the quartz lodes from which it came. Important deposits may be expected at or about the line of unconformability where slates, shales, quartzites, sandstones, limestones, schists and other sedimentary deposits are pierced by intrusive masses of igneous rocks. Veins filling the cracks that once existed between two differing rocks are known as contact veins. Such veins are often very rich. Curiously enough large masses of true igneous rock rarely contain valuable deposits of mineral, but where such intrusive masses cut dikes or walls of porphyry, or diorite, the region is worthy of careful investigation. [Illustration: POCKET LENS.] In an open country the prospector should keep to the hill tops if on the lookout for veins, as the outcrops show more distinctly on the bare ridges, but alluvial deposits are only found in valleys and along the borders of streams. In any case, much of the northern part of this continent can only be prospected by following the streams, on account of the dense growth of forest with which the soil is covered. The true line of strike of a vein can be determined only on a level stretch. The line of strike and the line of dip are always at right angles to one another; the outcrop may follow the strike or it may not. A pick, shovel, and pan, are absolutely necessary to a prospector's proper equipment. A good pocket lens, cheesecloth screen, and small iron pestle and mortar are often useful. The pan is the most essential part of the outfit, and is always bright from use. The regular gold miner's pan is 13-3/4 inches in diameter across the top, 10 inches across the bottom and 2-1/8 inches deep. The best are made of sheet iron and have a joint around the bottom rim which is of some assistance in retaining the spangles of gold. A more primitive instrument than the pan is the batea. This requires more skill than the pan, and is much in favor with South American miners. It is made of hard wood, 20 inches in diameter, 2-1/2 inches deep in the center, inside measurement, and sloping gradually to nothing at the sides. The horn spoon has been handed on from antiquity. It is made from a black ox horn, at least a black one is the best as it shows the gold better; it is eight to ten inches long by three inches wide, cut off obliquely. When gold is suspected in quartz, but there is visible to the naked eye more or less iron, copper, and other base metals, it is well to crush the quartz into coarse fragments. Roast on a shovel or other convenient tool over a hot fire, and finally pulverize in the mortar. If panned it will now reveal much of its gold, while, had these measures not been taken, the sample might have given negative results and been declared valueless. After pulverizing, the ore should be passed through the cheese cloth screen before panning. If the approximate value of the ore is sought, the sample must be dried and weighed before crushing; and the resulting gold weighed. Thus: Sample is to 2,000 lbs. as gold found is to Ans. About 13 cubic feet of quartz weigh a ton before being disturbed; when broken to medium sized lumps 20 cubic feet may be taken as representing a ton. Although experience teaches the miner to estimate very closely the value of his sample, it is better for the tyro to have a small pair of scales with grain weights. A grain of gold, if tolerably pure, is equal to four cents. Above all things avoid the too common error of panning the pick of the rock, as a false estimate is bound to follow and only too probably eventual loss. A yard of gravel before being dug makes one and a half yards afterwards. A pan of dirt is usually about 20 pounds, although it is not well to fill quite full in actual work. Many a valuable mine has been found by following up "float" ore. Float is detached fragments of the vein or gangue, and it becomes more and more abundant as the lode is approached until it finally ceases abruptly. This indicates that the vein has been reached or passed, and a trench dug throughout the alluvial soil at right angles to the assumed line of the vein will probably reveal it. The float and mineral of course drift down hill; if the side of the mountain be saddle-shaped the float will spread out like a fan as it washes down, but if concave the force of gravity will concentrate it within a narrow space in the ravine. Float found at the foot of a hill has come, as a rule, from that hill. The nearer the vein the less worn will be the edges of the float and mineral. The gangue or vein-rock in which the metal is found may be calcite or calc spar, fluor spar, heavy spar or baryta, or quartz. Gold is almost always found in this last matrix. The upper parts of most quartz lodes are usually oxidized, that is to say, the atmosphere has acted upon the iron pyrites, freeing the sulphur and staining the quartz yellow, red, or brown, by oxide of iron. This is known as "gossan" or the "iron hat." Such quartz is frequently honeycombed and rotten. Below the water level these veins run to sulphides in which decomposition has not set in, and the gold contained in the quartz is no longer "free milling," i.e. will not give up its gold to mercury without a preliminary treatment. Whenever the explorer comes across a mass of gossan he should sink a trial shaft to the vein, as it is almost certain that below the oxidized sulphides a body of mineral exists likely to encourage mining operations. Native gold is malleable, will flatten out under the hammer, and a steel knife will cut it with ease. It almost invariably contains silver, sometimes to the extent of one-fifth. A little practice will enable the prospector to recognize it, for there is but one king metal. Much gold is derived from copper and iron pyrites, and silver and lead ores are a very large source of supply. Gold is found in gravel of every variety, from finest pipe-clay to boulders weighing tons. Sometimes volcanic eruptions have covered these deposits since the ancient rivers laid them down, and in many cases their courses do not in the least agree with the valleys of the shrunken streams that have replaced them. Gold may be distributed through the whole thickness of a bed, but ninety-nine times out of a hundred the richest layer of gravel is just above the bed rock upon which all the gravel rests. Gold may even be found among the grass roots, especially in dry localities where there has been little water to carry it downward. When the bed rock consists of upturned slates the gold frequently penetrates it for some little distance. Sand is nearly always poorer than gravel. The experience of miners in the Victoria gold fields is that gold is always found on the bars or points, and not in the deep pools and bends. The great difficulty with which any but the very finest particles of gold can be moved by water accounts for the value of the deposits depending largely upon the local rocks. It is very fortunate that gold's specific gravity is so great, for were it less its recovery would be much more difficult. The sluices and other apparatus of the miner are really nothing but the operations of nature imitated on a much smaller scale. There is one thing, however, time, that nature can afford to expend in prodigious periods, while man must not waste a single minute. It not being possible to point out where the ancient river beds lie, smothered as they are by hundreds of feet of overlying drift, lava, and other later deposits, the only feasible plan is a series of boring with the diamond drill. When gold has been discovered the finder must act with the greatest prudence, for even gold may be bought too dear. The surest test is a mill run, that is passing 10 to 50 tons through all the operations of crushing, milling, roasting, amalgamating, etc., and so ascertaining what returns are likely to be obtainable when the deposit is worked on a commercial scale. True sampling is necessary. All parts of the vein should be included, and the lode cross-cut by galleries in more than one spot. It is the very great necessity of these expensive preparatory explorations that has given rise to the saying, "Quartz mining is for rich men." Many gold mines have been abandoned as unprofitable that could have been mined at a profit had their owners been wealthy and enterprising enough to do a great deal of expensive prospecting by diamond drill, cross cuts, drifts and rises. In one instance that came to the writer's knowledge a clever mining engineer cleared nearly $200,000 profit by leasing for a term of years a gold mine that was supposed to be exhausted. A drill hole sunk less than 50 feet below the old workings revealed a pocket of ore in the vein, and paying quartz was found for many hundred feet below. With the improvements in electricity made recently a cheap power has been provided that will permit many mines to be reopened. The saving in working expenses effected by introducing electricity is often very large; after the plant is once installed the cost is almost nil where turbines can be employed to furnish the power to the generators. Machinery capable of delivering power at a distance of several miles from the plant, may be operated at very reasonable cost as compared to that of other prime movers. Discoveries of many deposits that have in time been successfully mined were the result of chance. No skill guided the finder; he merely stumbled upon his luck just as the wayfarer once in a while hits his toe against a well-filled pocketbook. For instance, a South Australian squatter picked up a piece of copper ore that a wombat had thrown out of his burrow, and the result was the discovery of the great Wallaroo lode. The first diamond from South Africa was picked up by an ignorant bush boy and kept with a lot of worthless pebbles in the private collection of the boy's master; no suspicion existed of its value until a passing trader had carried it away and obtained $2,500 for it in Capetown. Gold was first discovered in California in 1848 by the superintendent of a sawmill who saw it glistening in the flume. Similarly gold was discovered in both Australia and Brazil by the purest chance. Had not a tree been uprooted by the wind the vast deposits of soft hematite iron ore in the Biwabic iron mines of the Mesabi range, Minnesota, might have remained unknown for many a long year to come. In the desolate region to the northward of Lake Huron great stores of nickel ore exist. These mines, which may some day regulate the price of the metal all the world over, were exposed in a railway cutting; no one dreamed of their existence. The Redington quicksilver mine in California was discovered by some roadmakers. Tradition relates that the enormously rich silver mines of Potosi, in Bolivia, were discovered by the accidental uprooting of a bush having spangles of silver ore attached to its roots. This was in 1538, and two hundred years later a similar streak of luck revealed the wealth of the Catorce district of Mexico, from which in thirty years, ore to the value of $35,000,000 was taken. Moreover, the search for one mineral often leads to the discovery of another. The Comstock lode was first worked for gold, and the miners threw away the black sulphide of silver worth $3,000 to the ton. The Broken Hill mine in Australia was claimed as a tin deposit by its finder; it is now the greatest silver producer in Australasia. Such instances could be multiplied almost indefinitely, chance entering into a majority of mineral discoveries. On the other hand, it has happened, not infrequently, that purely scientific deductions and calculations have brought to light stores of mineral wealth. Certain minerals are likely to be found associated. Cassiterite goes with boron and tourmaline, topaz, fluor spar and lithia-mica; all containing fluorine. It is also found with wolfram, chlorite and arsenical pyrites. Magnetite is often accompanied by rocks containing garnet, epidote and hornblende. Zinc blend and galena may occupy the same vein, which is likely to be of baryta or heavy spar. Much galena carries silver. Gold is associated with many metallic sulphides such as iron, magnetic, and copper pyrites, mispickel, galena, blend, stibnite and tetrahedrite. Gypsum accompanies salt. Surface indications may be described as: Form of ground, color, outcrop, decomposed and detached mineral, mineral deposits from springs, altered or peculiar vegetation and other similar guides. A hard quartz outcrop often stands up like a wall and is traceable for miles. The Rainbow silver bearing lode of Butte, Montana, stood 20 feet above the surface. Soft minerals, such as clay, are cut into and sunk below the surrounding level. Deposits of Kaolin or China clay are usually so found. Any special bright coloration of the rocks of a district merits investigation. Copper gives green, blue, and red stains; iron, red or brown; manganese, black; lead, green, yellow or white; cobalt, pink; cinnabar or quicksilver, vermilion. The nickel deposits of New Caledonia were made known to the world by the explorer Garnier in 1863, his curiosity having been aroused by the delicate green coating given the rocks by an ore containing water, quartz, nickel and magnesium. Hard beds of shale decompose on the surface into soft clay, and a still more noticeable change is the conversion of ores containing sulphur into oxides. This chemical change causes the gossan or "iron hat," for which token of underlying wealth the prospector should be eternally watchful. This alteration may extend downward four or five hundred feet from the surface, but in such cases the true weathering has ceased long before the limit of discoloration is reached, and the change of substance is due to the filtering of surface waters through the vein. Gossan varies greatly in its nature. Galena becomes anglesite, cerussite, pyromorphite and mimetite. Copper pyrite changes into native copper, melaconite, cuprite, malachite, chessylite, or perhaps into a phosphate, arsenate, or silicate of the metal. Carbonate of manganese gives the black oxides and silver sulphide ores are, after weathering, known as native silver, kerargyrite and embolite. The ore in the gossan is very generally more valuable than it will be below, and this is especially true of gold and silver ores. The gold having been set free from the close embrace in which the iron pyrite held it previous to the latter's oxidation, it is now readily caught by quicksilver. Silver under similar conditions becomes chloride, and likewise amalgamates without difficulty. Seams containing native sulphur often show no trace of that element on the surface, having weathered into a soft, white, gray or yellowish-white granular, or pulverulent, variety of gypsum. Veins of asbestos often decompose into a white powder found in the crevices of the rocks; fibrous asbestos existing in the interior. Petroleum shows in an iridescent film upon still pools, and the odor is a sure guide to its nature. A "dipping-needle" is valuable to the prospector on the lookout for iron ore; by its use he may discover masses of magnetic ore and trace their extent. As he carries the compass over the ground the needle dips toward any iron mass he approaches; directly over the ore it becomes vertical. [Illustration: MINER'S DIPPING NEEDLE.] In a wilderness country strength of body and endurance are important qualifications. The prospector must, moreover, have such general knowledge of geology and mineralogy as to be able to recognize all valuable minerals and confirm his conjecture by simple tests. Pick, shovel and pan must be handled skillfully, while the rifle, shotgun and paddle must also be understood. For in the unsettled parts of the country the traveler must even yet rely to some extent upon the fish and game he may be able to secure, and every old prospector becomes a trained hunter and camper. Knowing how to bake bread is sometimes more valuable than much mathematics; ability to build a rough boat is often the one hope of salvation. In sinking a short shaft in a sunny country a large mirror, inclined at a suitable angle over the shaft, will give sufficient light. Lodes or veins following the general trend of the auriferous quartz are much more likely to be rich than are those that cross it. Gold is never distributed evenly in veins, though it may be in great beds of low grade material; but more often rich areas alternate with barren portions. Where quartz veins are small and the rich pockets separated by wide intervals of poor gangue the gravel of the district will usually be similar in character. As this condition obtains in the upper Yukon district as far as the gravels are concerned, it will probably be found to hold good for the quartz leads, when they shall have been discovered. The more nearly the gold formation approaches to the crystalline schists, the poorer will the quality of the gold be through the larger percentage of silver found in it. In slates the proportion may be 22 gold to 1 silver; in schists it has been known to be a ratio of 1 to 1. With the discovery of valuable gold-bearing gravel on the bare hillsides of the Northwest, a vast region has been added to the area the prospector may explore to advantage. No experience acquired in ordinary American placer grounds is likely to be of much use in detecting these higher gold-bearing gravels of the Yukon, but they appear to be somewhat similar in character to the New Zealand terraces. Terrace-prospecting requires perseverance and the use of some brains, as it is infinitely harder than creek-prospecting. These terraces or benches are the remains of old river beds. The whole bench must be carefully scanned over because the gold is quite as likely to be in one part as in the other. Sometimes it is in half a dozen different layers one above the other. Sometimes the old river terraces are entirely covered by landslides, and the majority of such deposits are not likely ever to be found, as it is almost impossible to guess at locations. In New Zealand gold has been found on table-lands nearly 6,000 feet above sea level, and according to recent information valuable claims have been discovered in Alaska on the very summits of the rounded hills on each side of El Dorado creek. To understand how such deposits as those of the Northwest may have been made, suppose that such a vein as that of the Idaho, which has been worked for a depth 1,700 feet by a width of 1,000 feet, and from which $17,000,000 have been taken, to have been worn down by glacial or other forces. Is it not conceivable that the gold would gradually have accumulated in the nearest canyon? [Illustration: DOLLY.] To obtain suitable samples of the vein a dolly is an efficient apparatus. This is practically a very simple, crude, stamp mill. On the end of a solid log, firmly fixed in the ground and standing four feet or so above the surface, a square 6-inch hole is cut in which are fitted wrought iron bars 3 inches deep by 1/2 inch wide, and separated by equal intervals. These bars taper below so as to permit free passage of the pounded mineral. A wooden box surrounding the grating keeps the ore in place. A block of wood, shod with iron, forms the stamper. The miner hauls on the handles at every blow. The gold is saved on the lower table. No one of experience in mining would look for brown hematite in a granite range, nor for black band, though such might be a likely region for red hematite or magnatite. The explorer should be familiar in theory at least with the locality where he may expect to find valuable minerals. For instance, should he be searching for some heavy, detached substance that is usually found in placer deposits he will keep to the low ground and examine carefully the beds of the streams. On the other hand, should his quest be for some ore that is more properly a component of a lode or vein he will examine the side hills and summits where denudation will certainly have exposed such deposits. Then he must know the appearance of each ore, and with the methods of making rough and ready tests he must be perfectly familiar. Gold is always more or less intimately associated with quartz. Oxide of tin is said never to have been found more than two miles from some granite rock, one of the components of which was muscovite or white mica. The junction of slates and schists with igneous or metamorphic rocks often proves a valuable find of mineral. Rocks for the purposes of the explorer may be grouped under three heads: Igneous; metamorphic; stratified. The first includes lavas; trachytes, grayish with rough fracture and mainly glassy; dark basalts: and traps, such as greenstone. Obsidian is a volcanic glass. Metamorphic rocks are thought to have once been stratified, but to have been altered by heat. They comprise granite, of quartz feldspar and mica; syenite, containing hornblende instead of mica; gneiss, like granite, but showing lines of stratification; mica schist, made up of mica and quartz and separating easily into layers; slates. Stratified rocks are those deposits from water, such as sandstone, limestone, clay, etc. A prospecting shaft need not be of large dimensions. One 4 feet square is amply large for any depth down to 30 feet, but it must be kept plumb. Sometimes shafts are sunk through the pay streak in alluvial gravel, without it being detected. Frequent panning will guard against this mistake. In the Klondike region it is said early prospectors missed very rich deposits, that have since been discovered, by stopping short of true bed rock, being misled by a bed of harder gravel that they thought was bottom. Silver almost invariably carries some gold. The dark ironstone hat already referred to is a good indication of silver ore beneath; it is generally composed of conglomerates cemented by oxides of iron and manganese. Galena, which is sometimes so rich in silver as to be worth working for that metal, may often be followed by surface indications; namely, a white limy track with detached fragments of float ore in the surface soil. The blowpipe or fire assay quickly determines silver ore. Tin in lode, stream, or alluvial deposits occurs only as an oxide, but its appearance is varied. It may be almost any color and shape. It is always near granite, containing white mica known as muscovite. The minerals for which it is most easily mistaken are: Sp. gravity. Streak. Wolfram 7 to 7-1/2 Red, brown or black. Rutile 4.2 Light brown. Tourmaline 3.2 Whitish. Black Jack 4.3 Yellow, white. The magnetic or dipping needle is used in New Jersey, as follows, according to the State Geologist, W. H. Scranton, M.E.: "An attraction which is confined to a very small spot and is lost in passing a few feet from it, is most likely to be caused by a boulder of ore or particles of magnetite with rock. An attraction which continues on steadily in the direction of the strike of the rock for a distance of many feet or rods, indicates a vein of ore; and if it is positive and strongest towards the southwest, it is reasonable to conclude that the vein begins with the attraction there. If the attraction diminishes in going northwest, and finally dies out without becoming negative, it indicates that the vein has continued on without break or ending until too far off to move the compass needle. If, in passing towards the northwest, along the line of attraction, the south pole is drawn down, it indicates the end of the vein or an offset. If, on continuing further, still in the same direction, positive attraction is found, it shows that the vein is not ended, but if no attraction is shown, there is no indication as to the continuance of the ore. "In crossing veins of ore from southwest to northwest, when the dip of the rock and ore is as usual to the southeast, positive attraction is first observed to come on gradually, and the northwest edge of the vein is indicated by the needle suddenly showing negative attraction just at the point of passing off it. This change of attraction will be less marked as the depth of the vein is greater, or as the strike is nearer north and south. The steadiness and continuance of the attraction is a much better indication of ore than the strength or amount of the attraction. The ore may vary in its susceptibility to the magnetic influence from impurities in its substance; it does vary according to the position in which it lies, that is according to its dip and strike; and it also varies very much according to its distance beneath the surface." Further instructions are given in the paper from which the foregoing extract was taken, some of which follow: "It is sufficient to say that the first examinations are made by passing over the ground with the compass in a northwest and southwest direction, at intervals of a few rods, until indications of ore are found. Then the ground should be examined more carefully by crossing the line of attraction at intervals of a few feet, and marking the points upon which observations have been made, and recording the amount of attraction. Observations with the ordinary compass should be made, and the variation of the horizontal needle be noted. In this way materials may soon be accumulated for staking out the line of attraction, or for constructing a map for study or reference. "After sufficient exploration with the magnetic needle, it still remains to prove the value of the vein by uncovering the ore, examining its quality, measuring the size of the vein, and estimating the cost of mining and marketing it. Uncovering should first be done in trenches dug across the line of attraction, and carried quite down to the rock. When the ore is in this way proved to be of value regular mining may begin. In places where there are offsets in the ore, or where it has been subject to bends, folds, or other irregularities, so that the miner is at fault in what direction to proceed, explorations may be made with the diamond drill." CHAPTER II. HOW TO TEST FOR MINERALS. When the mineralogist wishes to know the names of the specimen he holds in his hand, he, in the case of a mineral difficult to determine, considers all the following properties: Crystalline form and structure, Cleavage, Fracture, Tenacity, Hardness, Specific Gravity as compared with that of water, Luster, Color and Streak, Transparency or otherwise, Taste, Odor, Chemical Composition tested by analysis, Pyrognostic characters as determined by the use of the blowpipe, Mode of occurrence and associated minerals. Crystalline Form and Structure. Unfortunately the science of crystallography is extremely complicated and long study is necessary to master it; once acquired, however, it is of paramount usefulness to the student. According to Dana there are six systems, to one of which every crystal may be referred. They are: (1) Isometric; (2) Tetragonal; (3) Hexagonal or Rhombohedral; (4) Orthorhombic; (5) Monoclinic; (6) Triclinic. In the isometric system there are three equal axes at right angles to each other. In the tetragonal system there are three axes at right angles to each other. Two of these are equal, while the third, or vertical angle, is longer or shorter. There are two divisions of the hexagonal system; the hexagonal system properly so-called, and its rhombohedral division. All forms are referred to four axes, three equal axes inclined to each other at angles 60 degrees in a common horizontal plane, and a fourth vertical axis at right angles, and longer or shorter. The rhombohedral division comprises crystals having but three planes of symmetry, intersecting at angles of 120 degrees in the vertical axis. They are regarded as half forms of the corresponding hexagonal crystals. In the orthorhombic system there are three unequal axes at right angles to each other. In the monoclinic system there are three unequal axes, of which one, the lateral axis, is inclined to the vertical, while the angles between the others are right angles. In the triclinic system there are three unequal axes and these intersections are all oblique. The student who wishes to pursue this subject further should consult Dana's System of Mineralogy. Physical Mineralogy. Cleavage is the line of easiest separation in a mineral. It may be perfect, imperfect, interrupted, etc. Fracture, referring to any surface except that of a cleavage fall, may be uneven, conchoidal (shell-like), hackly (rough), etc. Tenacity refers to such qualities as brittle, sectile, malleable, flexible, or elastic. Hardness is represented by the difficulty with which a smooth surface is scratched. The scale in general ore was devised by Mohs. It is: 1. Talc. Scratched by the finger nail. 2. Gypsum. Ditto, but with more difficulty. Will not scratch a copper coin. 3. Calcite. Scratched by a copper coin. 4. Fluorite. Is not scratched by a copper coin and does not scratch glass. 5. Apatite. Scratches glass, but with difficulty. Is readily scratched by a knife. 6. Feldspar. Scratches glass with ease. Is difficult to scratch by knife. 7. Quartz. Cannot be scratched by a knife and readily scratches glass. 8. Topaz. Harder. 9. Corundum. Harder. 10. Diamond. Scratches any other substance. Hardness may be intermediate. For instance, any mineral that scratched quartz and is soft enough to be scratched by topaz, in turn would be rated at 7.5. Specific Gravity. This is the density of mineral and other substances compared with that of water. It is particularly valuable in determining heavy metals. To find the specific gravity of any solid body divide its weight in air by the loss of weight in water, at a temperature as near 60 degrees F. as possible, and the quotient will equal the specific gravity. In the case of gases, such as nitrogen, oxygen, etc., hydrogen is taken as the unit. Luster. There are seven kinds of luster, viz: Metallic, the luster of metals; adamantine, that of the diamond; vitreous, of broken glass; resinous, of the yellow resins; greasy; pearly; silky. There are five degrees of intensity of luster recognized, viz: Splendent; shining; glistening; glimmering; dull. Color and Streak. The streak is the color of the powder of the mineral when rubbed on unglazed porcelain, or scratched with a knife. Transparency. Minerals may be transparent, sub-transparent, translucent, sub-translucent, opaque. Taste. Minerals may be salt, bitter, sweet, etc. Odor. This test is not of much use with most minerals until heat is applied. All the petroleum oils, however, are often detected by their odor. Chemical Composition. This may always be determined by suitable tests with reagents. Pyrognostic Characters. As a means of readily determining the nature of a specimen the blowpipe is unrivalled--if in the hands of one who understands it. Mode of occurrence and associated minerals. A knowledge of these matters often assists in a determination. A regular fire assay is not within reach of many prospectors, for the necessary apparatus cannot, as a rule, be carried in the wilderness. Whenever possible, however, a fire assay gives the truest results, especially in the case of gold and silver. [Illustration: SCALE FOR WEIGHING ORE.] The operation includes testing the ore, sampling and pulverizing, weighing the ore and reagents, calcination and roasting, reduction and fusion, distillation and sublimation, scorification and cupellation, inquartation and parting the gold and silver, weighing and tabulating. "Notes on Assaying" by Dr. Ricketts is a very useful manual to have at hand. A TOLERABLY COMPLETE OUTFIT INCLUDES: A pair of scales for weighing ore and buttons of base metal. It should take 10 ounces in each pan, and show 1/20 of a grain. A bullion scale to be kept strictly for the precious metals. Loaded with one gramme, it should show 1/20 of a milligramme. [Illustration: ASSAY BALANCE FOR BULLION.] Weights. Avoirdupois; troy, metric and "assay." Assay weights save much calculation. The unit of the system is a weight of 29.166 grammes. Its derivation is as follows: 2000 lbs. : 1 A.T. :: 1 oz. Troy : 1 milligramme. To use this system, weigh out one A.T. of the ore and whatever number of milligrammes of gold and silver the assay gives indicates an equal number of Troy ounces to the ton of 2000 lbs. Avoirdupois. A muffle and a melting furnace, portable and of medium size, are handy, though furnaces may be built of ordinary brick, lined with fire brick, that would be better for permanent use. The fuels may be coke, anthracite or bituminous coal, charcoal, oil or gas. [Illustration: ASSAY FURNACE.] [Illustration: PORTABLE ASSAY FURNACE.] Crucibles of black lead, French clay, Hessian sand, and quicklime are necessary to hold the assay. [Illustration: French Clay. Hessian. CRUCIBLES.] [Illustration: SCORIFIER] [Illustration: STEEL CUPEL MOULD.] Roasting dishes, scorifiers and cupels are required. The cupel is made of the ashes of burnt bone, and it is better to make them on the spot, as the bone ash may be carried anywhere without damage, whereas the cupels are very fragile. The bone ash is moistened with water, stamped in a cupel mould, and allowed to dry slowly. A good one will absorb its own weight of lead, but it is better to calculate on its absorbing but three-quarters of that amount. [Illustration: SCORIFICATION FURNACE.] [Illustration: SCORIFICATION MOULD.] The crucible, scorification and cupel tongs, a couple of hammers, iron pestle and mortar, sieves from 20 to 100 mesh, and scorification mould complete the requisite tools. [Illustration: HAMMER.] [Illustration: HORN SPOON.] [Illustration: STEEL MORTAR.] [Illustration: ALCOHOL LAMP.] In addition, however, the assayer will require quite a bulky lot of apparatus, reagents and chemicals. All dealers keep lists of assayers' supplies on hand, and a full and complete assortment will cost about $200 in New York or Chicago. Quart bottles, with glass stoppers; ordinary corked bottles, ring stands, alcohol lamps, wash bottles, test tubes, horn spoons, iron pans, parting flasks, annealing cups, glazed black paper--these will suffice, provided the assayer has, as well, the outfit recommended for blow-pipe work. [Illustration: TEST TUBE.] Dry reagents, such as litharge, borax (crystallized), silica, cyanide of potassium, yellow prussiate of potash, argol, charcoal, starch, metallic iron, pure lead, nitre, powdered lime, sulphur, carbonate of ammonia and common salt are necessary. As solvents and precipitants, distilled water, sulphuric, nitric and hydrochloric acids, chloride of sodium, nitrate of silver and sulphuretted hydrogen are also indispensable. This will seem rather a formidable list, and so, under certain conditions, it may be; indeed, where means of transport is limited, all regular assay work must be postponed until the return to civilization. Assaying is not, however, difficult, being mostly a matter of rule of thumb, and correct results may be arrived at without a deep knowledge of chemistry, although such knowledge will never come amiss. A preliminary examination will show what the ore probably is. The blow-pipe is especially useful, though to the skilled assayer often unnecessary. The ore is first powdered, and any metallic flakes picked out and tested separately. A fair sample must be selected, otherwise all the work will be thrown away and the result be valueless. The next step is weighing the ore and the reagents. Moisture is drawn off by heating in a crucible, a low heat being sufficient. Roasting will eliminate sulphur, antimony, arsenic, etc., and must take place in a flat dish, so that the air may have free access. The powder should be stirred frequently. Reduction is the operation of removing oxygen, and it takes place usually in a crucible or scorifier. Scorification consists in placing the ore in an open dish with proper reagents, and collecting all the volatile ingredients in the slag. Cupellation, on the other hand, collects them in the bone ash, of which the cupel is composed. When silver must be separated from gold, it is sometimes convenient to increase its proportion by the addition of some known weight of the inferior metal. After fusing, the globule is placed in nitric acid, and the silver parted from the gold, which may then be weighed. This result subtracted from the weight of the original globule gives the amount of silver. To test an ore for gold, take a pound of it, crush in mortar and pass through a fine sieve. Take one-fourth ounce Troy of the powder. Place in scorifier with an equal amount of litharge. Cover with borax that has been melted and powdered, and put the scorifier in the muffle of the furnace. A blacksmith's forge might do at a pinch. Heat until the mass has become a fluid, possibly twenty or thirty minutes. Next pour into the scorification mould, and, after the slag has set, remove it with a hammer. Hammer the button into a cube and place it in the cupel, which must first have been thoroughly heated. Heat until all the base metal has been absorbed by the cupel and the button has "brightened," or flashed; when this occurs, remove the cupel to the front of the muffle, cool, and remove the button with pincers. Weigh it, and you have the amount of gold and silver in 1/4-ounce Troy. A simple sum in proportion gives the amount in a ton. All ores containing sulphur, arsenic, antimony, or zinc, should be roasted. There are three stages in the scorification process; roasting, fusion, and scorification. During the first, the heat should be moderate until fumes cease to be given off; during the second, the heat is raised and a play of colors is seen on the surface of the lead; in the closing stage, the heat is lowered for a time until the slag covers the lead, when it is again raised for a short time and the scorifier removed. Brittle buttons may be due to arsenic, antimony, zinc or litharge, and must be re-scorified before cupellation, with more lead. Take the cupel slowly from the fire to avoid "spitting," by which portions of the buttons are lost. Watch closely for the brightening. Silver is volatile at a high heat, but when the muffle is almost white, the metal well fused and clean, the fumes rising slowly, and the cupel a cherry red, all is going smoothly. If the fumes rise rapidly, the muffle is too hot. On the other hand, dense, falling fumes show the temperature is too low. Lead that is poor in silver stands the highest heat without vitiating the assay. When the material in the cupel "freezes," i.e., the absorption by the cupel stops, reject the assay and try again, giving more heat or more lead. Gold. Practically, the metal most prospectors seek is gold. It is so enormously valuable and constitutes so very small a percentage of any ore, that care must be taken or it may escape detection and be lost. Panning is the miner's method. He crushes his ore thoroughly, and places it in the pan with water; then, with a motion easy to learn but difficult to describe, he swirls the water around, allowing a little of it to escape at each revolution, carrying with it the rubbish, until finally he has a little black sand and perhaps a few grains of yellow substance, which is gold. Mica, or fool's gold, puzzles nobody but the ignoramus. True, it looks like gold in certain positions and lights, but gold will beat out thin under the hammer, just as lead would, while mica will break up into a floury powder. Mica is very light, while gold is very heavy; so there is no excuse for confounding the two. If an ore contains sulphurets and gold, the latter may be coated with some sulphur or arsenic, which would prevent the gold from amalgamating. The only remedy for this is roasting. No single acid will dissolve gold, but a solution known as aqua regia, made up of three parts of hydrochloric acid and one part of nitric acid, dissolves it. If to the solution so obtained you add some sulphate of iron, you will get a precipitate which is metallic gold, although it does not look like it, as it is brown in color; but if you place this precipitate in a crucible and heat, you will get a yellow bead of pure gold. Another test for gold is to take the solution as above obtained and add thereto a solution of chloride of tin, when you obtain a purple coloration that has been called the purple of Cassius. Gold may be distinguished from all other metals by the three following tests: It is yellow; it may be flattened by the hammer; it is not acted upon by nitric acid. Pure gold is soft, and the point of a knife will scratch it deeply. Pounded in a mortar, the pulverized mineral should be passed through a cheese-cloth screen stretched over a loop of wood. If the course contains much pyrite, it must be roasted before washing in the pan and amalgamating. Sample well, weigh out two pounds, put it in a black iron pan, with four ounces of mercury, four ounces of salt, four ounces of soda and a half gallon of boiling water. Stir with a green stick, and agitate until the mercury has been able to reach all the gold. Pan off into another dish so as to lose no mercury, squeeze the amalgam through chamois leather or new calico previously wetted. The pill of hard amalgam may be placed on a shovel over the fire or in a clay tobacco pipe and retorted. Gold is readily acted upon by the mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acids known as aqua regia, or by any solution producing chlorine. Some of the mixtures which attack it are bisulphate of soda, nitrate of soda and common salt, hydrochloric acid and potassium chlorate, and bleaching powder. The action is more rapid in hot than in cold solutions, and impure gold is more easily dissolved than pure. Mercury dissolves gold rapidly at ordinary temperatures, the amalgam being solid, pasty or liquid. Gold rubbed with mercury is immediately penetrated by it. An amalgam containing 90 per cent. of mercury is liquid; 87.5 per cent., pasty; 85 per cent., crystalline. These amalgams heated gradually to a bright red heat lose all their mercury, and hardly any gold. About one-tenth of 1 per cent. of mercury remains in the gold until it is refined by melting. The veins from which the gold of the world is won do not, on an average, hold the precious metal in greater proportion than one part of gold in 70,000 parts of veinstone. Under favorable conditions a proportion not one-fifth as rich as this, may yield a rich return. In hydraulic mining on a large scale, one part of gold in 15,000,000 parts of gravel has paid a dividend. A test known as Darton's is believed to be a valuable means of detecting minute quantities of gold in rocks, ore tailings, etc. "Small parts are chipped from all the sides of a mass of rock, amounting in all to about 1/4 ounce. This is powdered in a steel mortar and well mixed. About half is placed in a capacious test tube, and then the tube is partly filled with a solution made by dissolving 20 gr. of iodine and 30 gr. of iodide of potassium, in about 1-1/2 ounces water. The mixture thus formed is shaken and warmed. After all particles have subsided, dip a piece of fine white filter paper in it; allow it to remain for a moment; then let it drain, and dry it over the spirit lamp. It is next placed upon a piece of platinum foil held in a pincers, and heated to redness over the flame. The paper is speedily consumed; and after again heating to burn off all carbon, it is allowed to cool and is then examined. If at all purple, gold is present in the ore, and the relative amount may be approximately deduced. This method takes little time, and is trustworthy." Black sand, which is iron, often with some platinum and iridium, sometimes interferes with the result of a gold assay. Attwood recommends the following method as applicable to such a case: "Take 100 to 1000 grains and attack with aqua regia in a flask; cool for about thirty minutes or more; dilute with water and filter. If gold is present, it will now be held in solution in the filtrate. Remove the filter and evaporate the filtrates to dryness; then add a little hydrochloric acid, evaporate and re-dissolve the dry salt in warm water; add to the solution so formed proto-sulphate of iron; which will throw down the gold in the form of a fine, dark precipitate. The precipitate is seldom fine, being mixed with oxides of iron, and must now be dried in the filter paper, and both burned over the lamp in a porcelain dish. Then mix the dried precipitate with three times its weight of lead; fuse, scorify and cupel. In case platinum, iridium, etc., are found associated with the gold, an extra amount of fine silver should be added before cupellation, and the gold button will be found pure." In one of his reports the State Mineralogist of California gives a most lucid description of a mechanical assay of gold-bearing sands, stamped ore, etc., etc. He states: "It must be understood that this is only a working test. It does not give all the gold in the rock, as shown by a careful fire assay, but what is of equal importance to the mine-owner, mill-man, and practical miner, it gives what he can reasonably expect to save in a good quartz mill. It is really milling on a small scale. It is generally very correct and reliable, if a quantity of material be sampled. The only operation which requires much skill is the washing, generally well understood by those who are most likely to avail themselves of the instructions. These rules apply equally to placer gravels. Take a quantity of the ore--the larger the better--and break it into egg-sized pieces. Spread on a good floor, and with a shovel mix very thoroughly; then shovel into three piles, placing one shovelful upon each in succession until all is disposed of. Two of the piles may then be put into bags. The remaining pile is spread on the floor, mixed as before, and shovelled in the same manner into three piles. This is repeated according to the quantity sampled, until the last pile does not contain more than 30 pounds of ore. As the quantity on the floor becomes smaller, the lumps must be broken finer until at last they should not exceed one inch in diameter. The remainder is reduced by a hammer and iron ring to the size of peas. The whole 30 pounds is then spread out, and after careful mixing portions are lifted with a flat knife, taking up the fine dust with the larger fragments, until about 10 pounds have been gathered. This quantity is then ground down fine with the muller, and passed through a 40-mesh sieve. If the rock is rich, the last portion will be found to contain some free gold in flattened discs, which will not pass this sieve. These must be placed with the pulverized ore, and the whole thoroughly mixed, if the quantity is small, but if large must be treated separately, and the amount of gold allotted to the whole 10 pounds and noted when the final calculation is made. "From the thoroughly-mixed sample, two kilogrammes (2000 grammes) must be carefully laid out. This is placed in a pan or, better, in a batea, and carefully washed down until the gold begins to appear. Clean water is then used, and, when the pan and the small residue are cleaned, most of the water is poured off and a globule of pure mercury (which must be free from gold) is dropped in, a piece of cyanide of potassium being added with it. As the cyanide dissolves, a rotary motion is given the dish, best done by holding the arms stiff and moving the body. As the mercury rolls over and ploughs through the sand, under the influence of the cyanide it will collect together all the particles of free gold. When it is certain that all is collected, the mercury may be carefully transferred to a small porcelain cup or test tube, and boiled with strong nitric acid, which must be pure. When the mercury is all dissolved the acid is poured off, more nitric acid applied cold, and rejected, and the gold is then washed with distilled water and dried. "The object of washing with acid the second time is to remove any nitrate of mercury which might remain with the gold, and which is immediately precipitated if water is first used. "The resulting gold is not pure, but has the composition of the natural alloy. Before accurate calculations of value are possible, the gold must be obtained pure and weighed carefully. To purify the gold it should be melted with silver, rolled out or hammered thin, boiled twice with nitric acid, washed, dried, and heated to redness. "The method of calculating this assay is simple. It will be observed that 2000 grammes represent a ton of 2000 pounds; then each gramme will be the equivalent of one pound avoirdupois, or one 2000th part of the whole, and the decimals of a gramme to the decimals of a pound. Suppose the ore yielded by the assay just described, fine gold weighing .072 gramme, it must be quite evident that a ton of the ore would yield the same decimal of one pound. Now one pound of gold is worth $301.46, and it is only necessary to multiply this value by the weight of gold obtained in grammes and decimals to find the value of the gold in a ton of ore--$301.46 � .072--$21.70. The cyanide solution should be kept rather weak, as gold is slightly soluble in strong solutions of cyanide of potassium. Cyanide is a deadly poison." Touchstones are useful in deciding the probable value of gold alloys. Several pieces of the metal under examination are cut with a cold chisel, and the fresh edges drawn over the touchstone. These streaks are touched with nitric acid on a glass rod. Should no reaction follow, the gold is at least 640 fine. Wipe the stone with soft linen and try with test acid, made by mixing 98 parts of chemically pure nitric acid with two parts of hydrochloric acid, adding 25 parts distilled water by measure. If this has no effect, take a touch needle marked 700, and make a similar streak on the stone samples. Compare, and, if necessary, continue with the other needles, using a higher number each time. An approximate estimate of the sample will soon be obtained. Should the gold seem poorer than 640 fine, try with the copper or silver needle. Practice and a good eye soon make this method very certain in its results. Retorted amalgam is likely to contain mercury. To test for it, put a small fragment into a closed glass tube, taking care that it falls quite to the bottom. Heat the gold over a spirit lamp, and a deposit of mercury will soon be seen upon the colder sides of the tube above the bottom. The tube may be broken and the mercury collected into a globule under water. In mining regions gold dust passes current as coin, according to what is supposed to be its value. Occasionally counterfeit dust is offered. The readiest means by which it may be detected are as follows: The dust from any one district is always much alike, and any unusual appearance should create suspicion. Try any doubtful pieces on a small anvil, remembering that gold is extremely malleable. Test some of the gold with nitric acid; effervescence or evolution of red fumes, or coloration of the acid prove impurities to be present. Place two watch-glasses (most useful in chemical tests) on paper; the one on a white sheet, the other on a black, and with a glass rod convey a few drops of nitric acid from the dish to each. To the glass on white paper add a drop or two of ammonia; a blue color would indicate copper. To the other add hydrochloric acid; should a white precipitate form, it proves silver. If no action is noticed, even after heating the dish, the dust is genuine. As "dust" is sometimes merely copper coated with gold, the better plan is to cut all the larger grains in two, so that the acid may attack the copper should it be present. Copper. Copper is a very easy mineral to test for. First crush the ore and dissolve it in nitric acid by heating. Then dilute with some water, and add ammonia. The solution should turn dark blue. The carbonate ores of copper do not extend deep in the mine. Their places are taken by copper pyrites. Sulphide ores are usually difficult to treat, and when they are to be tested it is better to roast them before trying the tests for color. Test for copper may also be made as follows: The sample must be pulverized. Take an ounce of the powder, and place in a porcelain cup. Add forty drops of nitric acid, twenty drops of sulphuric acid and twelve drops of hydrochloric acid. Boil over the spirit lamp until white fumes arise. When cool, mix with a little water. Filter and add a nail or two to the liquid. The copper will be precipitated, and may be gathered up and weighed. The amount of copper in the sample multiplied by 32,000 will be the copper in a ton of the ore. Should copper be suspected, roast the powdered ore and mix with an equal quantity of salt and candle grease or other fat; then cast into the fire, and the characteristic flame of copper--first blue and then green--will appear. This test is better made at night. Coal. Coal is often more valuable than gold, and the prospector should be prepared to estimate the value of any seams he may come across during his travels. The following is a very rough but wonderfully effective test for coal. Take a clay pipe, pulverize your sample, weigh off twenty pennyweights, and place it in the bowl of the pipe. Make a cover with some damp clay. Dry thoroughly, and put the bowl upside down over a flame. The gas in the coal will come out through the stem, and may be lit with a match. Let the pipe cool after the gas has all escaped, break off the covering of clay, and if the coal was adapted for coke the result will be a lump of that substance in the bowl. Weigh this. The difference in weight between the coke and the twenty pennyweights of coal that were placed in the bowl will represent the combustible matter forced out by the heat. Now take this coke and burn it on a porcelain dish over the lamp. You will have more or less ash left, and the difference in weight of the ash and the coke will be the amount of fixed carbon in the coal. Your test is complete, and it need not have cost you even the pipe. Sulphur is a detriment to coal, and if you notice much of it in the escaping fumes, you may be sure your sample is not worth much. Mercury. Cinnabar, the common ore of mercury, is a sulphide. Scratch it with a knife, and the streak will be bright crimson. Dissolve the ore in nitric acid, add a solution of caustic potash, and you have a yellow precipitate. A very pretty test is to place the ore pulverized in a glass tube with some chloride of lime; close the top of the tube, and place a smaller one therein, so bent that it will pass into a basin of water; heat the bottom of the tube containing the ore and lime, keeping the upper part and the small tube cold with wet rags, and you will have a deposit of quicksilver in the basin. Silver. Silver ore may be detected by dissolving a small quantity in a test tube with a few drops of nitric acid. Boil until all the red fumes disappear. Let the solution cool, and add a little water. Filter the whole, and add a few drops of muriatic acid, which will precipitate the white chloride of silver. Dissolve this precipitate with ammonia; then add nitric acid once more. Exposed to the light, the precipitate soon shows a violet tint. Pure silver is the brightest of metals, of a brilliant white hue, with rich luster. To detect chloride of silver in a pulp, rub harshly with a clean, bright and wet copper cartridge or coin, and if there be silver in the pulp the copper will be coated with it. Graphite will also whiten copper, but the film is easily rubbed off. Nickel. Nickel may be determined as follows: A little of the powdered ore taken up on the point of a penknife, and dissolved in a mixture of ten drops of nitric and five drops of muriatic acid, should be boiled over a lamp for a few minutes, and ten or twelve drops of water added. A small quantity of ferrocyanide of potash will throw down a whitish-green precipitate, indicating nickel. Platinum. Platinum is a most refractory metal to treat, as it must be boiled for at least two hours in the mixture of muriatic and nitric acid, known as aqua regia. A small amount of alcohol is to be added to the solution, and the latter filtered. The platinum is precipitated with ammonia chloride. Manganese. Manganese may be proved as follows: A few grains of powdered ore are placed in a test-tube, with three or four drops of sulphuric acid. Two or three grains of granulated lead or litharge being dropped in, the color will become pink should manganese be in the ore. A preliminary examination of a mineral may be made with a pocket lens and a penknife. With the first, any conspicuous constituents may be recognized, while a scratch with the point of the latter will give an idea as to the softness or hardness of the mineral. Should much quartz (silica) be present, a sharp blow with the steel will cause sparks. The next test should be with some ore powdered and held over a spirit flame. A drop or two of water and a drop of sulpho-cyanide of potash will reveal iron, should such be present, by a deep red coloration. To another portion add one drop of hydrochloric acid, and a dense, curdy precipitate will indicate silver, if there be any. Added to the same original nitric acid solution, several drops of ammonia water would detect copper by a blue color. Antimony, tin, aluminum, zinc, cobalt and nickel, uranium and titanium are best shown by the blowpipe. Carbonates, that is those minerals that contain carbon and oxygen in addition to the metal, effervesce when brought into contact with hydrochloric acid. Some sandstones have a small amount of lime carbonate, and must be tried under the lens, as the bubbles are microscopic. These tests are extremely useful, but by no means infallible, owing to so few ores being pure. When the explorer wishes to know all the constituents of the ore he has found, he must analyze it. An analysis gives every substance in the ore. Such examinations may be either by the "dry" or "wet" methods, though usually the term "analysis" is restricted to the latter, and "fire assay" is used to describe the former. The wet assay for silver, lead or mercury is effected as follows: Drop a little powdered ore in a test tube; add nitric acid; dilute with 1/8 water; warm gently over the spirit lamp. It may dissolve or it may not. In the latter case, add four times as much hydrochloric acid. Should all these attempts fail, a fresh sample must be taken, and equal parts of sodium carbonate and potassium carbonate added, and the whole strongly heated in a platinum crucible. The contents, after cooling, is dissolved in dilute nitric acid. In any case the assay will now be dissolved, and will be in the solution. Filter. Pour ten drops into a test tube; add three or four drops of hydrochloric acid. A precipitate appears. It may be silver, lead or mercury. If silver, it grows dark violet after exposure to sunlight, or 30 or 40 drops of ammonia dissolves it in a few moments. Should it not dissolve, it is lead or mercury. Test for lead by filtering, and heating some of the precipitate on charcoal before the blow-pipe. A bead and yellow incrustation indicate lead. Should none of these things happen, then the metal is mercury. Filter; place in glass tubes; heat gently, and a mirror of quicksilver will appear on the sides of the glass. This is as far as the prospector, without the various reagents and chemicals that the analyst has always at hand, will be able to go. More complex treatment must be reserved until a return to civilization. CHAPTER III. BLOW-PIPE TESTS. [Illustration: BLOW-PIPE.] As a means of readily detecting the presence of minerals in their ores the blow-pipe, in the hands of a skillful operator, is unrivaled. Nor is this skill at all hard to come by; two or three weeks' patient study under a good master should teach a great deal, and subsequently proficiency would come by practice in the field. Unfortunately, some very clever men have become so enthusiastic as to blow-pipe work that they have devised methods by which the amount of metal in an ore as well as its nature may be determined, but in so doing have so enlarged the amount of apparatus, and complicated the tests so seriously that the simplicity of the blow-pipe outfit is in danger of being lost, and its chief advantage of being forgotten; for there are many better ways of determining the value of an ore. A good assay or, better still, a mill run, is worth incomparably more than any quantitative blow-pipe test, even when conducted by a Plattner. The chemical blow-pipe is made of brass or German silver, with platinum tip. The best fuel, taking everything into consideration, is a paraffin candle in cold climates, and a stearine candle in hot ones. Tallow may do in an emergency, but it requires too much snuffing. [Illustration: REDUCING FLAME.] The blow-pipe can produce two flames. The one known as the reducing flame, and generally printed as R.F.; and the oxidizing flame, represented by the initials O.F. In the first the substance under examination is heated out of contact with the air and parts with its oxygen. In the second, it is heated in the air and absorbs oxygen. [Illustration: OXIDIZING FLAME.] Well-burnt pine or willow charcoal in slabs 3 inches by 1-3/4 inches is the material upon which the mineral to be tested is placed. A small shallow depression is scraped out of one side of it and the assay placed therein. Platinum wire, some 3 inches long, conveniently fused into a piece of glass tube as a handle, is used to test the coloration of minerals in the flame. This should be cleaned occasionally in dilute sulphuric acid and then washed in water. A small pair of forceps with platinum points serve a great variety of purposes, but the beginner must be careful not to heat metallic substances in them to a red heat, as he may thereby cause an alloy of the metal with the platinum and spoil them for future use. [Illustration: AGATE MORTAR.] Glass tubing one-twelfth to one-quarter inch in diameter and from four to six inches in length is used for a variety of purposes. From this material what are known as closed tubes may be made by heating a piece of the tubing at or about its center over a spirit lamp, and, when the glass has fused, pulling it apart. These closed tubes are used in heating substances out of contact with the air. A small agate mortar is indispensable. It must be used for grinding substances softer than itself to a powder, but it will break if rapped sharply. A small jeweler's hammer is used to flatten metallic globules upon any hard surface A regular blow-pipe outfit would include a small anvil for this purpose, but it is hardly necessary, as any iron or steel surface will do. [Illustration: MAGNET.] [Illustration: LENS.] [Illustration: NEST OF TEST TUBES.] A magnet will detect the presence of any magnetic mineral, especially if it is reduced to powder and the test made under water. Two small files, one three-cornered and the other rat-tailed, must be included in the list of requisites. By means of the former, glass tubing may be notched and pulled or pushed apart, and the latter is necessary in fitting glass tubing to the cork of wash-bottles and other apparatus. A good lens is indispensable. That known as the Coddington is as good as any. A dozen test tubes of hard glass, with stand, in small and medium sizes, should not be forgotten. A glass funnel 2-1/2 inches in diameter is requisite in filtering. The circular filter papers are folded in four and placed in the funnel, point down, three thicknesses of the paper being on one side of the funnel and one thickness on the other. A wash-bottle is made from a flask into which a sound cork has been placed with holes in it for two pieces of glass tubing. The one serves as a mouth-piece into which the operator blows, while the other, reaching almost to the bottom of the bottle and ending in a spout outside the cork, permits a stream of water to be forced out of the bottle when it is blown into. A few glass rods in short lengths do for stirrers. A little ingenuity is better than much apparatus. Of reagents, all those to be found in a well-appointed laboratory may occasionally be of service, but the rough and ready prospector can get along fairly well with the following: Carbonate of soda, borax, microcosmic salt, cobalt solution, cyanide of potassium, lead granulated, bone ash, test papers of blue litmus and turmeric, the former for proving the presence of acid in a solution and the latter that of an alkali. The foregoing are all dry reagents. Among the wet reagents are: Water--clean rainwater--or, better still, distilled water; hydrochloric acid, sulphuric acid, nitric acid, ammonia, nitrate of cobalt. Heating a mineral with carbonate of soda on charcoal is accomplished as follows: The pulverized mineral, intimately mixed with three times its bulk of carbonate of soda, is placed in the cavity on the coal. Tin ore, which is very difficult to reduce, should have a fragment of cyanide of potassium placed upon it after it has been heated for a few seconds, and the flame is then reapplied. A globule of metal should result, and perhaps an incrustation on the coal. The reaction is as follows: Metal. Globule. Incrustation. Gold. Yellow, malleable. None. Silver. White, malleable. None. Copper. Red, malleable. None. Lead. White, malleable. Red when hot, yellow when cold. Bismuth. White, brittle. Red when hot, yellow when cold. Zinc. None. Yellow when hot, white when cold. Antimony. White, brittle, fumes. White. A small loop is made at the end of the platinum wire, and it is heated and dipped in borax; heated again, then touched while hot to the powdered mineral and heated once more. The following colors are obtained: COLOR OF BEAD. O.F. R.F. Metal. Red or yellow, hot. Bottle-green. Iron. Yellow or colorless, cold. Blue, hot or cold. Blue. Cobalt. Green, hot; blue, cold. Red. Copper. Amethyst. Colorless. Manganese. Green. Green. Chromium. Violet, hot; red-brown, cold. Gray. Nickel. The substance to be tested is generally powdered and moistened, placed in the cavity and covered or not as circumstances may demand, with a pinch of carbonate of soda or other suitable reagent. The following results may be obtained: Antimony. Place the mineral in the cavity with a little of carbonate of soda, and blow upon it with the inner or oxidizing flame. This is formed by inserting the blow-pipe an eighth of an inch into the flame and blowing steadily. A white incrustation on the coal, and a brittle button of antimony should be the result. Lead. Treat the suspected lead ore the same way, and you will get a yellow incrustation on the coal and a button of malleable lead. Zinc. Proceed as above, and after blowing for a few seconds moisten the incrustation with a drop of nitrate of cobalt. Heat once more, but this time use the outer or reducing flame, which is produced by keeping the point of the blow-pipe a little outside the flame and blowing more gently than before, so that the whole flame playing upon the coal may be yellow in color. A green incrustation will be an evidence of zinc. Copper. As usual, mix the ore and the soda into a paste and fuse it with the oxidizing flame. Dig the mass out of the charcoal with the point of a knife and rub it in the mortar with water. Now decant into a test tube, and, allowing the sediment to settle, pour off the water. If there was copper in the ore, red scales will be found in the test tube. Arsenic. Heat in the inner flame for a second or two, and if the ore contains arsenic you will notice an odor of garlic. Tin. This is a very difficult ore to reduce, but the addition of a little cyanide of potash to the powdered ore will make it easier. Fuse, after moistening on the charcoal, in the oxidizing flame, and you will probably obtain small globules of tin. Silver. Make a paste of the ore with carbonate of soda; add a small piece of lead and fuse into a button. Make a second paste of bone ash and water, and after you have dried it with a gentle flame place the button of silver and lead on the bone ash, and turn on the oxidizing flame. The lead will disappear, leaving a silver globule. Should it not be pure white, but more or less tinged with yellow, it probably contains gold; and if the button be dissolved in nitric acid, whatever remains behind is gold. Sometimes it is desirable to determine whether tellurium is present in an ore. This is very easy to find out. All that is required is a blow-pipe, alcohol lamp and a porcelain dish. Break off a small piece of the ore, place it in the dish previously warmed, blow upon the ore with the blow-pipe until it is oxidized, then drop a little sulphuric acid on the ore and dish. If tellurium be present, carmine and purple colors on the assay will proclaim the fact. Bismuth ores are very heavy; usually they have more or less antimony associated with them, which is a drawback, as the separation is an expensive matter and the returns are less than they would be from a low grade pure ore. In testing for this metal, dissolve a crushed sample in nitric acid and then add potash in excess. If the ore is one containing bismuth, you should have a white precipitate; if it contains cobalt, you will get a bluish-green coloration. Bismuth is worth about fifty cents a pound if pure and free from antimony. Galena is often mistaken for other ores, specular iron ore for instance. If the ore be crushed and heated in nitric acid until dissolved, some water added, and an addition made to the solution of a few drops of ferrocyanide of potassium, a dark blood-red precipitate is thrown down. If the ore were galena, there would be no coloration. The so-called steel galena which carries a little zinc is generally richer in silver than the ordinary cube galena, though the reverse is sometimes the case. If lead ore be dissolved in nitric acid, the solution diluted, and some hydrochloric acid added, a white precipitate is thrown down. Add ammonia and the precipitate remains unaltered. The blow-pipe operator has to learn to breathe and blow at the same time; the breathing he does through the nostrils, the blowing is produced by the natural tendency of the cheeks to collapse when distended with air. A skillful operator can blow for many minutes at a time without the slightest fatigue. To identify cinnabar, the ore from which quicksilver is obtained, make a paste of the substance in powder and carbonate of soda. Heat in the open tube, and a globule of mercury will result. Sulphur turns silver black. Make a paste with carbonate of soda, heat on the charcoal, and removing the mass with the point of a knife lay it on a silver coin and moisten. A black sulphide of silver should show quickly on the coin if sulphur is present. Magnesia gives a faint pink color when heated and treated with nitrate of cobalt on coal. Alumina under the same circumstances give a blue color. Roasting is an oxidizing process, the substance being heated in air, so that it may absorb oxygen. The test by reduction with soda on coal in the R.F. is particularly valuable in the case of copper ore, as little as 1 per cent. being detected. CHAPTER IV. ECONOMIC ORES AND MINERALS. Aluminum is derived from two ores, cryolite and bauxite. This metal has made rapid strides into favor during the past half-dozen years. Although known since 1827, it remained a rare substance in the metallic form, though it is the most abundant of any of the metals in its ore. In ordinary clay there is an inexhaustible source of aluminum. But the ores that yield the metal cheaply are few. Until recently, cryolite, found abundantly in Greenland, was the chief source of the metal, but now bauxite is used in its place. Bauxite is a limonite iron ore in which a part of the iron has been replaced by aluminum. It is found in Alabama, Georgia and Arkansas, as well as in Europe. Aluminum is white, and very light in weight. It does not tarnish easily. The chemical composition of these ores is: Aluminum. Cryolite, Al{2}F{6}.6NaF 12.8 per cent. Bauxite, Al{2}O{3}.3H{2}O 73.9 per cent. In 1895 the production of this metal in the United States was 900,000 pounds. In 1899 it rose to 6,500,000 pounds. The only firm producing aluminum is the Pittsburg Manufacturing Company of Buffalo, N.Y., who reduce the metal from bauxite, which they obtain in the southern states. One of the latest uses for this metal is for gold miners' pans. The French seem to keep ahead of the rest of the world in finding new uses for aluminum. Most of the supply of cryolite comes from Greenland, where it occurs in veins running through gneiss rocks. Glass-makers use it and pay good prices for it. Lately makers of aluminum also buy it, as it contains 13 per cent. of that metal. A new aluminum-bearing mineral, discovered in New Mexico and in Ohio, is called native alum. It gives 50.16 per cent. alumina, and may be treated by solution in warm water, filtration, evaporation and roasting. No estimate has yet been made of the amount available. As bauxite promises to be in greater demand in the future than in the present, owing to the ever-increasing demand for aluminum, the prospector will do well to make himself thoroughly familiar with its appearance. It is creamy white when free from iron, and the grains are like little peas, or pisolitic. It contains water, aluminum, silica, and generally iron. The French beds near the town of Baux are 30 miles long and 40 feet thick. In the United States, beds have been found in Alabama, Georgia and Arkansas. The Georgia beds are turning out three-fifths of the bauxite produced in America. The ore is in beds and pockets, and enough has been prospected to assure a supply for some years to come, unless the demand should grow very decidedly, in which case a scarcity might soon be felt. The American ore is easier to work than the French, and manufacturers prefer it to any they can import, even though the cost is higher and the percentage of aluminum smaller. The Arkansas deposits are as thick as the French, and only 300 feet above the level of the tide. Imported bauxite cost $5 to $7 a ton in New York City. American ore costs $5 to $12 a long ton. Best selected Georgia brings $10. Should the deposits of bauxite give out, the manufacturers of aluminum would probably fall back on cryolite. At Tvigtuk, on the west coast of Greenland, it exists, as a very heavy vein, in gneiss. It is semitransparent, and snow-white. Impurities may stain it yellow or red or even black. Its specific gravity is 2.95, and its hardness 2.5 to 3. It is fusible in the flame of a candle, and yields hydrofluoric acid if treated with sulphuric acid. It is still used for making soda and aluminum salts, and an imitation porcelain. It is also in general use as a flux. Amber. This is a fossil resin, or gum, and may often be found in lignite beds. Recent discoveries have been made on the coast of British Columbia that are expected to supply the world. All pipe-smokers know it. Antimony. The commercial ore of this metal is the sulphide known as stibnite, or gray antimony. Its composition when pure is 72 per cent. antimony and 28 per cent. sulphur. Hardness is 2; gravity, 4.5; luster, metallic; opaque; gray; cleavage, perfect. Fracture, conchoidal. Texture, granular to massive. The ore tarnishes quickly, is easily melted, or dissolved in hydrochloric acid. The associated minerals are generally the ores of lead, zinc, and carbonate of iron. Baryta may be the gangue or veinstone. Antimony is worth from 10 to 15 cents a pound. Although antimony occurs in many minerals, the only commercial source is the sulphide, stibnite. Antimony is used as an alloy in type metal, pewter, and babbitt metals. It is injurious to copper, even one-tenth of one per cent. reducing the value of that metal very considerably. The price varies greatly, being now about 10 cents a pound. The composition of stibnite is: Antimony. Stibnite, Sb{2}S{3} 71.8 per cent. The production of antimony in this country is not very large. The output of 1899 was but 1,250 tons, valued at $241,250. The ore is worth from $40 to $50 a ton delivered at Staten Island, N.Y. Apatite suffered in demand when the cheap phosphates of South Carolina were discovered, and these in turn are being ousted from the markets of the world by Thomas slag, an artificial phosphate, and by the easily-mined natural phosphates of Algeria. The price varies with the quality of the rock, from $1.75 to $11 per ton, averaging in 1899, $3.86. Apatite is a phosphate of lime, containing 43 per cent. of phosphoric acid. It occurs in the old crystalline and primary rocks of Canada, but although still of some value it has yielded the position it once occupied to the Carolina phosphate deposits, which, although not so rich in acid, are softer, and less expensive to utilize. Apatite is doubtless derived from the remains of animals or fishes that lived in the distant past. The colors are often beautiful--green, pink, gray, etc.--but the sheen is always white. Hardness of 4.8. Specific gravity, 3.1. Asbestos. This fibrous silicate of magnesia and lime is to be looked for among primary rocks near serpentine dike. The fibers of this material may be woven into cloth that will be fire-proof. It is of considerable, though fluctuating, value. The demand for this material is likely to increase, though at present the supply is fully equal to demand. It is being used in Germany to make fire-proof paper, and in Quebec to make asbestos plaster for covering wood-work. It is generally quarried in open pits, the rock being crushed in a rock-breaker, and the fiber freed from adhering particles of rock and dust. It is then sorted, the longest fibers going into the first quality heap. The production in 1899 in the United States was 912 tons, value $13,860; in Canada, 23,266 tons, value $598,736. Borax. This mineral is borate of soda. Its composition is: 37 per cent. boric acid, 16 per cent. soda, and 47 per cent. water. Its gravity is 1.7. Hardness, 2.3. It is white, and has a sweetish taste. Borax is valuable, but occurring as it does as an incrustation upon the ground over large areas, a detailed description would be superfluous, as the explorer will surely recognize it should he find it. Clay. A good bed of clay may be of value in an accessible region. Brick-clay contains silica, alumina, iron, etc. Potters' clay is made by suspending ordinary brick-clay in water, and running off the water and fine particles suspended therein. These are allowed to settle, and, when dry, are fine potters' clay. The better the clay, the larger the percentage of potters' clay. Fire-clay should contain 60 per cent. of silica, and 30 per cent. of alumina. Mixed with sand and burnt into bricks, it will resist great heat. Light-colored clays are preferable for this purpose, as iron is prejudicial to a good fire-brick. Kaolin is the finest porcelain clay, and the best comes from China, Japan or France. It is a product of decay in feldspar rocks. The potash is washed out, and the silica and alumina left as parts of a white clay of fine grain. Coal. Anthracite is bituminous coal that has been subjected to great heat and pressure; in plain language, baked. It contains over 90 per cent. of carbon. Specific gravity 1.5 to 1.8. Hardness, 2.3 to 2.6. The ash left after burning is white or red. There is little or no sulphur in anthracite. It does not coke. There are three main divisions of coal, arranged according to their carbon, water and ash. They are: Carbon. Water. Ash. Anthracite 80-95 p.c. 2-3 p.c. 4-10 p.c. Bituminous 45-80 p.c. 1-5 p.c. 8-20 p.c. Lignite 7-45 p.c. 15-36 p.c. 6-40 p.c. Good bituminous coal contains about 85 per cent. of carbon, but the composition varies greatly. Cannel coal is a variety of bituminous that gives off much gas. It burns with a bright flame in an open grate, igniting as easily as a candle. Lignite is intermediate between coal and peat. All the Rocky Mountain coals are lignites. It is a very inferior coal at its worst, while at its best it is nearly the equal of a poor bituminous coal. Some coals will coke and others will not; nothing but a trial can settle this matter in each individual case. Good coking coal is very valuable. Cobalt. Cobalt ores are always found in veins with other metals. Pure cobalt is extremely rare. Cobalt colors are used for porcelain painting, glass-staining, etc. Chromium. All chrome is obtained from chromite, which contains 68 per cent. of chrome sesqui-oxide, the remainder being iron protoxide. Hardness, 5.5; gravity, 4.4; luster, sub-metallic; opaque. Steel-gray to almost black. Harsh. Brittle. Cleavage, imperfect. Fracture, uneven. Texture, massive to granular. Chromite in gravel looks like shot. Serpentine often contains it, when it is apt to resemble a fine-grained magnetite. It is used chiefly in iron and steel alloys, and in making armor plate. It is also used in dyeing fabrics and in paint manufacture. But little chrome ore is produced in the United States. The importation in 1899 was 15,793 tons, value $18.03 per ton. Chromite, FeOCr{2}O{3} 47-68 This ore is merchantable at $22 to $25 per ton. Domestic ore ranges from $10 to $12 a ton, while the pure imported ores are worth $21 a ton. The yearly consumption in the United States is about 16,000 tons, and the American production 100 tons. This ore is useful as a lining for furnaces, and the demand promises to become important. Newfoundland is said to contain large deposits. Copper. Native copper occurs in the Lake Superior region, but the demands of commerce are supplied from chalcopyrite or copper pyrites, and tetrahedrite or gray copper ore. Many different ores of copper may exist in the same vein. On the surface an iron cap of gossan reveals the deposit; immediately below may be black oxide of copper with some malachite, lower down red oxide, and below the water-line copper sulphides. The following are the principal copper ores: Sp. Gravity. Hardness. P. C. Cu. Native copper 8.8 2.8 100 Chalcopyrite 4.2 3.7 35 Enargite 4.4 3.0 48 Tetrahedite 5.0 3.5 to 4.5 35 Chalcocite 5.6 2.7 80 Bornite 5.0 3.0 55 Melaconite 6.2 2.0 to 3.0 80 Cuprite 6.0 3.6 89 Chrysocolla 2.2 3.0 45 The common ore is native copper, often associated with native silver, the two remaining, chemically, quite distinct. Some masses of copper occur that are too large to handle and must be cut by cold chisels, a method that costs more for labor than the value of the metal. The Lake Superior mines produce 140,000,000 pounds of copper a year, while those of Montana made the gigantic output of 228,000,000 pounds in 1896. The great Anaconda mine, of Butte, is the heaviest producer, yielding more than half the state's total. During 1899 the New York copper market rate varied between 14.75 cents and 18.46 cents per pound. Copper is probably abundant in the shape of pyrites in many parts of Canada, especially in the Northwest, and prospectors in that region should search diligently for it. The Lake Superior mines are unique in being deposits of native copper. Owing to the great demand for copper following upon the extraordinary spread of electricity, copper properties have become so enormously valuable that, possibly, the explorer will be quite as fortunate in finding copper as in finding gold. Moreover, with the exception of Spain and Chili, the United States has no serious rivals in copper production,--Montana and Michigan, producing the greater part of the output. The famous Calumet and Hecla mine, in Michigan, is now down 4,000 feet and still yields ore. The most copper ores are not difficult to distinguish. Every one is familiar with the ruddy hue of pure copper, the color of the native metal. It may be flattened under the hammer or cut with the knife. A little of the ore mixed with grease colors a flame green. Copper ores are heavy, and generally of a bright color, either red, blue, green, yellow or brown. Corundum. Nine hundred and seventy tons of this abrasive were produced in the United States in 1899; value, $78,570. Corundum is found in feldspar veins, and associated with chlorites in serpentine rock. North Carolina furnishes half the corundum marketed. The presence of this substance is always indicated in the South by serpentine, chrysolite, or olivine rocks; experience being the only guide the miners have in finding new deposits. The contacts of the olivine rocks with gneiss usually produce rich deposits. Corundum is the hardest substance known, next to the diamond. It is used as a polishing powder. Emery is an impure corundum containing iron. Corundum is composed of 53 per cent. aluminum and 47 per cent. oxygen. Specific gravity is 4. Hardness, 9. Feldspar. The Maine, Pennsylvania, New York, and Connecticut ores are worth $3 to $6 per long ton (2,240 pounds) at point of production. Fluorspar. The American market is supplied by ore from Rosiclare, Ill., Marion, Ky., Hardin Co., Ill., and Liumpton Co., Ky., and imported spar. It is worth $6 a ton of 2,000 pounds. This spar is softer than quartz and of most brilliant colors, varying through the yellows, greens, blues and reds, to pure white. The streak is always white. Specific gravity, 3. Hardness, 4. It is worth mining when abundant and accessible. Gems. Gems are to be looked for in a country of crystalline rock, such as granite, gneiss, dolomite, etc. Topaz and ruby are generally discovered in crystalline limestones, while turquoise is usually found in clay slate. It is not likely that the American prospector will come upon the true oriental ruby; he will more probably find the garnet. The ruby is next to the diamond in hardness and in value, and consists practically of pure alumina. The garnet is but as hard as quartz, and is a silicate of alumina with lime and a little iron. They crystallize in different systems, the more valuable gem belonging to the rhombohedral, and the less valuable to the isometric system. The turquoise which has lately been found in Arizona is not a crystal. The blue color which distinguishes it is derived from copper. It is a phosphate of alumina with water in composition. In form it is kidney shaped or stalactitic. Lazulite, a far less valuable substance, is also blue, but as it crystallizes in the monoclinic system it should not be mistaken for turquoise. Moreover, lazulite is softer and contains magnesia and lime, which the turquoise does not. Lapis lazuli, which is also occasionally mistaken for turquoise, belongs to the regular or isometric system; it is commonly massive or compact, and is a silicate of alumina with some lime and iron. It is found in syenite, crystalline, limestone, and often associated with pyrites and mica. Topaz belongs to the orthorhombic system. It is a silicate of alumina with fluorine. Powdered, mixed, and heated with microcosmic salt in the open tube, fluorine is disengaged with its characteristic odor, and etching action upon glass. With the blow pipe on charcoal, heated with the cobalt solution, it gives the fine blue color of alumina. The explorer who comes upon any hard, brightly colored stone, that may possibly turn out a gem, should preserve it carefully until he returns to some city, when it should be submitted to an expert. The value of a gem depends upon so many qualities that it were hopeless for the tyro to endeavor to arrive at any just estimate of it. He might ruin a superb specimen, without becoming one bit the wiser. A few of the more prominent characters of valuable gems follow: Name. Sp. Gravity. Hardness. Color. Aquamarine 2.7 7.7 Blue. Emerald 2.7 7.5 Green. Diamond 3.5 10.0 Colorless. Garnet 4.1 7.0 Claret. Opal 2.2 6.0 Opaline. Ruby 3.5 8.0 Dark red. Tourmaline 3.1 7.3 Various. Turquoise 2.7 6.0 Blue, green. Ultramarine 2.5 5.8 Blue to green. Graphite. This mineral is commonly known as black lead, or plumbago. It is the same in composition as the diamond, viz.: 100 per cent. carbon. Specific gravity, 2 to 2.2. Hardness, 1.2 to 1.9. Color, black. Greasy. Of value when free from impurities. Used in making pencils, stove polish, crucibles, etc. Found in the earlier rocks. Gypsum. A sulphate of lime occurring in great beds. Burnt, it becomes plaster of paris. Iron. This, the most important of all metals, is found in various forms. The ores of iron are: Sp. Gravity. Hardness. P. C. Fe. Native ore 7.7 4.5 100 Magnetite 5.1 6.0 72 Hematite 4.8 6.0 70 Limonite 3.8 5.2 60 Siderite 3.8 4.0 62 Pyrite 5.0 6.3 47 Native iron is only found in meteorites that have come from space. Magnetite is loadstone ore; the powder is reddish black, and the ore, dark brown to black. It is found in the older rocks and is an important ore. Hematite varies from metallic to dull in luster. There are many varieties of it, known as ironstone, ocher, needle ore, etc. Hematite may be slightly magnetic. Immense beds exist in the triassic sandstones, and in the secondary rocks below the coal measures. The powder and streak of limonite are always yellow; it is an important ore. Siderite assumes many forms. It is called spathic ore, clay-ironstone, carbonate of iron, black band, etc. Most of these carbonate iron ores only range between 30 and 40 per cent. of metallic iron, but are in demand as fluxes for other iron ores. The pyritic ores of iron, including marcasite, pyrrhotite and mispickel, are often taken for gold by the inexperienced. In an accessible region pyrites may be valuable, as they are bought by makers of sulphuric acid. Iron is so low in price that vast deposits exist which cannot be made use of because they would be too expensive to mine. A deep bed, or a narrow one, or the slightest difficulty in transportation, would preclude any profitable development. It is known that enormous areas in northern Labrador, for instance, are full of iron deposits, yet there seems no chance of their having the slightest economic value for a long time, if ever. Conditions of commerce very different to those now obtaining will have to exist before they can be utilized. Iron ore is most favorably situated for profitable extraction when it is near coking coal and beds of limestone; the former for fuel, the latter for flux. Occasionally such regions as that of Lake Superior may be able to compete successfully with others, although they do not possess the necessary smelting facilities, because these deficiencies are counterbalanced by inexhaustive stores of easily mined ores, and transportation facilities unrivaled in cheapness. Lead. The two important sources of supply are galena and cerussite. The former contains 87 per cent. of lead, and frequently some silver and gold. It is so distinctive as to be easily recognized. Luster, metallic; opaque; lead-gray; harsh. Brittle to sectile (may be cut). Cleavage, perfect. Fracture, even to sub-conchoidal. Structure, granular or foliated, tabular, or fibrous. Specific gravity is 7.5, and hardness, 2.6. The carbonate cerussite contains about 79 per cent. lead. Luster, vitreous to resinous. Translucent. Color, gray. Smooth. Brittle. Cleavage, perfect to imperfect. Fracture, conchoidal. Massive to granular. Rich carbonate ores look like clay, and are undoubtedly often passed by. The economic ores of lead are: Lead. Galena PbS 86.6 p.c. Cerussite PbCO{3} 77.5 p.c. Anglesite PbSO{4} 67.7 p.c. Pyromorphite Pb{3}P{2}O{8} plus 1/3 PbCl{2} 75.36 p.c. Lead ores are frequently rich in silver. They occur in limestone, sandstone, granite and clay. The commercial ores are galena, which is easily recognized by its steel-like cubes, and the carbonates. These latter are like lightly colored clays when in powder and are very apt to be overlooked. Fluor spar is as favorable a gangue for lead as quartz is for gold. The Rocky Mountains are the principal American sources of this metal, but a very large amount comes from the Mississippi valley. In the mountains the ore is a by-product, in silver smelting, being obtained from argentiferous galena, while in Missouri, Kansas, Wisconsin and Illinois lead and zinc are found free from any mixture with the precious metal. The age of these deposits varies from lower silurian or cambrian to the carboniferous. The ore is found in limestone rocks,--sometimes in flat openings parallel to the almost horizontal beds, or else in gash veins almost at right angles to these. As lead is often found in dolomite limestone, that is, limestone carrying almost as much magnesia as lime, and this rock was undoubtedly deposited in a shallow sea, geologists incline to the belief that therefore the lead is due to a growth of seaweeds in whose ash this metal and zinc are known to occur. At any rate, these deposits now have great economic value, and the lead and zinc ore is easily got at. Galena and zinc blende frequently resemble one another, but they may be distinguished by this infallible sign: the powder of galena is black, and that of blende brown, or yellow. Lithographic Stone. This is a very fine grained compact limestone from Bavaria. So far nothing equal to the imported stone has been found in America. The distinguishing qualities are: Gray, drab or yellow; porous, yet not too soft; of fine texture, and free from veins and inequalities. Manganese. Manganese ores in 1899 amounted in the United States to 143,256 tons, value $306,476. This mineral is used for bleaching and making oxygen, and in steel manufacture. Pyrolusite contains 63 per cent. manganese. Hardness, 2.3. Specific gravity, 4.8. Luster, metallic. Opaque. Gray to bluish black. Harsh. Brittle. Cleavage, imperfect. Fracture, uneven. Granular, massive. Manganite is harder, 4.0; its specific gravity is 4.3. Luster, sub-metallic. Cleavage, perfect. Texture, fibrous. Wad is an impure ore of manganese found in bogs, of little or no value. Pyrolusite MnO{2} 63.2 Braunite Mn{2}O{3} 69.68 Psilomelane (Variable) ? Franklinite, a zinc-manganese ore, is also a common source of supply. An ore to be commercially valuable should contain from 40 to 60 per cent. metallic manganese, and not over 0.2 to 0.25 per cent. phosphorus. To determine the value of manganese ores a somewhat intricate calculation is necessary. Delivered at Bessemer, Pa., the Carnegie Steel Company pays according to the following sliding scale: Per cent. Mn. Per Unit over 49 p.c. Fe. Mn. 46 49 p.c. 6c 28c 43 46 p.c. 6c 27c 40 43 p.c. 6c 26c 37 40 p.c. 6c 25c 34 37 p.c. 6c 24c 31 34 p.c. 6c 23c 6c 22c Moreover, for each one per cent. of silica in excess of eight per cent. a deduction of fifteen cents a ton is made, and a deduction of one cent per unit of manganese is made for each 2/100 of one per cent. of phosphorous present in excess of 1/10 per cent. From which it is evident that there can be little profit in impure deposits of manganese. Mercury. Quicksilver usually occurs in the form of cinnabar, though occasional deposits of pure metal are found in drops and small pockets, in limestone and the softer secondary rocks, including shales and slates. As the appearance of quicksilver must be familiar to all, cinnabar alone needs description. Its specific gravity is 9.0; its hardness, 2.2. It is a red brown earthy ore, the powder of which is a dull red. It is generally found in sandstone, though it occasionally occurs in slates, shales and serpentine. Heated gently with lime cinnabar yields quicksilver. If copper be held over the fumes of mercury it will be coated with a light film of the metal. An alloy with silver has been found. Mercury is heavy, extremely brilliant, and mobile. The composition of cinnabar is: Per cent. Hg. Cinnabar HgS 86.2 Although but three American states have supplied this metal, this country has held rank as second producer. Of these California is by far the most important. Oregon and Utah having never had any but a small and spasmodic output. Judging by Californian experience, the prospector is most likely to find cinnabar, the ore from which the quicksilver of commerce is derived, in metamorphic rocks. Mercury is always sold in flasks of 76-1/2 pounds. The production of mercury by the United States (California) was 28,879 flasks in 1899, which were valued at $1,155,160. The following table shows the rock in which the most famous Californian quicksilver mines are: Mine. County. Rock. Sulphur Creek Colusa Serpentine. Abbott Lake Shale-serpentine. Great Western Lake Serpentine. (?) �tna Napa Sandstone. Corona Napa Sandstone-serpentine. Aat Hill Napa Sandstone. New Almaden Santa Clara Shale-serpentine. Barton Siskiyou Shale-sandstone. Cinnabar King Sonoma Sandstone-serpentine. Altoona Trinity Porphyry-serpentine. A study of the foregoing shows that serpentine is almost as intimately connected with quicksilver as is quartz with gold, or granite with tin. These are the things that prospectors should make a note of. With the great increase of gold mining and the limited store of cinnabar that is available that ore seems certain to rise in value before long. Mica. The value of Indian mica varies from 90¢ a pound for sheets 4 in. � 1 in. to $13 a pound for sheets 10 in. � 8 in. The white mica in large sheets is valuable. The amber-colored, and spotted, are used for insulating purposes in electric plants, while the coarser sorts are ground and used as lubricants, or in fire-proof paint manufacture. Nickel. This ore is never found in metallic form, but always in combination. Pyrrhotite, or magnetic pyrites, is the source of about all the nickel of commerce. This ore has been already noticed under iron. Rare but valuable ores of nickel are millerite, nickelite, glance, and nickel bloom. Per cent. nickel. Millerite NiS 64.4 Niccolite NiAs 44.0 Some of the nickel of commerce is derived from nickelliferous pyrrhotite. Petroleum. Crude petroleum is never found in metamorphic or igneous rocks. The stratified rocks of the Devonian, Carboniferous and Cretaceous ages are most likely to hold it. The crude oil is almost black, and consists of about 85 per cent. of carbon, and 15 per cent. of hydrogen. A long iron-shod stick is all the prospector requires to take with him in his search for surface indications of oil. The warmer the day the easier the search, as the oil rises to the surface of the streams, and is found in greater quantities than on cold days. Oil existing in the lower rocks ascends through them until it accumulates under some layer that will not let it pass through. In this condition deep boring finds it, the rod usually tapping gas first. Petroleum may be noticed oozing out of gravel banks, or floating as a scum on the surface, whenever abundant. It has been found in rocks of widely different age, from extremely ancient formations to some that did not precede man by so very long, geologically speaking. Platinum. This metal is only found native. Its gravity is very high, from 16 to 22. Hardness, 4 to 4.5. Luster, metallic. Opaque. Whitish-gray. Smooth. Ductile. Cleavage, none. Fracture, hackly. Texture, granular, fine. Platinum is unaffected by acids, but if alloyed with 10 per cent. of silver it dissolves in nitric acid. Almost infusible. Platinum occurs with placer gold in the beds of streams. Usually it is in small grains, but one or two large nuggets are on record from Brazil and Siberia. Serpentine rocks are believed to have originally held the platinum found in the beds of rivers, but none has been found in veins. The entire product of the United States was 300 ounces in 1898; valued at $3,837. In 1899 there was none produced. Silver. Silver is generally found in serpentine, trap, sandstone, limestone, shale, or porphyry rocks, the gangue being quartz, calc, fluor, or heavy spar. All silver ores are heavy, and many of them are sectile, i.e., may be cut with the knife. Western men test for silver by heating the ore and dipping it into water. Some metal comes to the surface in a greasy scum, should silver be present. Native silver is found occasionally. Owing to the fall in value of this metal its future is not assured. It has fallen, during the past year, once to forty-nine cents an ounce, and this has had a most disastrous effect upon many silver mines, forcing them to suspend operations. Should the fall continue, as seems likely, and the price of silver go down to forty cents an ounce, little will be produced except as a by-product in the treatment of argentiferous lead ores. As silver enters into chemical combination with sulphur easily, as is seen by the black film that forms on silver articles in a room where gas is burnt, most silver ores are sulphides. The very abundance of silver has caused its great fall in value, and it does not appear that it is ever likely to remain for long at a price exceeding fifty cents an ounce, owing to the ease with which it may be produced, and the large quantities that must find their way to market through it being a by-product in lead smelting. From 1859 to 1891 the Comstock lode in Nevada produced $325,000,000. This lode is a belt of quartz, 10,000 feet long and several hundred wide, and is a contact vein between diorite and diabase. In America galena is the principal source of silver; the chlorides and oxides rank next; while, lastly, some silver is parted from gold when it reaches the mint, as gold always contains more or less of that metal. No precise statement as to the manner of its occurrence may be made since it is found in many different positions, and is associated with all sorts of minerals. It is never found in placer deposits, as it breaks up under the influence of water, air, etc. Its original source is doubtless the igneous rocks, where it occurs in association with augite, hornblende and mica. Silver may be expected in mountainous regions of recent origin. Between 1875 and 1891 the world's product rose from $82,000,000 to $185,599,600. Three quarters of this came from the western hemisphere. The commercial ores of silver are: Silver. Argentite Ag{2}S 87.1 per cent. Proustite 3Ag{2}SAs{2}S{3} 65.5 per cent. Prysagyrite 3Ag{2}SSb{2}S{3} 59.9 per cent. Stephanite 5Ag{2}SSb{2}S{3} 68.5 per cent. Cesargerite AgCl 75.3 per cent. The Anaconda mine in Butte is the largest producer of silver in the country. In 1896 its output was 5,000,000 ounces. The Anaconda is also the heaviest copper producer in the United States, its yield of copper being 125,350,693 pounds. Sulphur. Brimstone is found native in the neighborhood of volcanoes, extinct or active. It is also derived from iron pyrites. Color, yellow. Hardness, 2. Specific gravity, 2. Luster, resinous. Smooth. Sectile. Texture, crystalline. Talc. The scientific name of this mineral is steatite. It contains silica and magnesia. Its green color, pearly luster, and greasy feel, are very characteristic. It is not attacked by boiling sulphuric acid. Useful in the arts, but of no great value. Tin. The composition of cassiterite, the commercial ore of tin, is SnO{2}; equal to 78.67 per cent. of metallic tin. Cassiterite or tin stone is a heavy ore which occurs in alluvial deposits or in the beds of streams. It will be one of the latest ores the young prospector will find himself able to name with certainty. Granite, with white mica as one of its constituents, has so far always been associated with tin. The American continent yields little tin, and it is not likely the prospector in either the western states or in Canada will stumble upon it, though a good deposit of stream tin would enrich him in a short time, for the metal is in great demand. The streak, when the metal is scratched with a knife point, is whitey-gray and very distinctive. Tin may some day be found in the northern Rockies, as there is plenty of granite, which is favorable to this metal. It is worth about thirteen cents a pound, and a vein must yield more than five per cent. of metal to pay the cost of mining and dressing. Cassiterite, the principal tin ore, would have to be roasted. Most of the European tin mines were first worked for the copper they contained. The copper was found in the capping, but as they gained in depth they became more and more valuable for their tin. Some of the Cornish mines are three-quarters of a mile in depth. Very lately tin has been discovered and mined in vast quantities in the Straits Settlements, India. As it is found in the streams the expense of mining is very light, and it is killing the European mines. The Cornish miners put their tin ore on a shovel when they wish to test it. The sample is first crushed fine and a few skillful shakes get rid of all the gangue, leaving behind the tin and wolfram. This wolfram is always associated, in Cornwall, with the tin and it is got rid of by roasting. Australasia and Cornwall produce most of the tin used in commerce. Tin is not found native. Specific gravity of cassiterite is 6.5 to 7. Hardness, 6.5 to 7. Luster, vitreous to adamantine. Translucent to opaque. Brown, black, gray, red or yellow. Harsh. Brittle. Massive. The appearance of this metal is so variable that nothing but a test with reagents determines it with certainty. Granite is frequently the country rock in which tin is found. Zinc. This is another ore that never occurs native. Calamine or silicate of zinc is the great producing ore. Composition: Zinc oxide, 67 per cent; silicate, 25 per cent; water, 8 per cent. Specific gravity, 3 to 3.7. Hardness, 4.6 to 5. Luster, vitreous. Translucent. White. Harsh. Brittle. Cleavage, perfect. Fracture, uneven. Texture, granular crystalline. Calamine is a difficult mineral to detect without experience, as when impure it does not look in the least like a metallic ore. It would be taken for clay or shale. This ore results from the decomposition of zinc blende. Blende contains 67 per cent. zinc and 33 per cent. sulphur. It is often dark brown or black from iron, otherwise it may be red, green or bluish. It is a troublesome impurity in silver ores. Smithsonite is a carbonate much resembling, and often found with, calamine. Other zinc ores are merely curiosities and do not affect the commercial value of the metal. In the New Jersey mines the zinc ores are the oxides zincite and willemite, and the zinc-iron oxide franklinite. In the Missouri region, on the other hand, sphalerite and blende are the typical ores. Blende generally associates with the lead sulphide, galena. The Joplin district in southwestern Missouri and the adjoining region in Kansas are now mainly supplying the markets of the country, though the New Jersey deposits are very valuable. Joplin ore assaying 58 to 62 per cent. has varied greatly in price during the past four years. The lowest quotation was $20 a ton, the highest $51.50. Zinc is derived mainly from the following half dozen ores: Zinc. Sphalerite ZnS 67.0 per cent. Zincite ZnO 80.3 per cent. Smithsonite ZnOCO{2} 51.9 per cent. Franklinite (Variable) (?) 5.54 per cent. Willemite 2ZnO.SO{2} 58.5 per cent. Calamine 2ZnO.SiO{2}.HO{2} 54.2 per cent. CHAPTER V. MINING. Although the scope of this work does not include the very complex problem involved in the working of a great mine, prospecting and the simpler mining operations are so intimately connected that it would not be desirable to make mention of the one and ignore the other, because the prospector must perforce become a miner as soon as he discovers mineral, even though his operations should not go beyond a shallow trial shaft. The simplest method of hoisting dirt or rock out of a shaft, after it has become too deep for the sinker to throw the stuff out with a spade, is by a bucket and windlass, which may be either single or double, according to the power required. In northwestern Canada, where the present gold excitement has attracted so many thousand pioneers, the miners have hitherto been content with a windlass. For their purpose it answers well, as they sink through gravel and not more than thirty feet at the most before reaching the bed rock. The alluvial flats in which the coarse gold of the upper Yukon has been discovered, are composed of gravel that is invariably frozen, summer as well as winter, and which requires to be thawed out before it can be worked with a pick. Strangely enough, dynamite cannot be used, as the ground is so elastic under the frost that the tamping simply blows out and the required effect is not produced. This peculiar condition has led the men, who are mining in that part of the continent, to adopt methods very similar to those used in Siberia, where, also, the ground is permanently frozen to a great depth. After scratching the surface of the soil, and removing the deep moss that invariably covers it, they light large fires over night and in the morning remove the few inches of thawed soil underneath the ashes. By this painfully slow method they eventually sink to the richer gravel, fifteen or twenty, or even thirty, feet below the surface, though there are few shafts of this depth on the Klondike and the other gold-bearing creeks about which we have heard so much. When the bed rock is reached and the few inches of decayed surface removed, the miner builds his fire against the side of the shaft, placing some inclined logs over it as a roof, and goes to bed. When he awakes next day several feet of the soil have fallen down over the logs, and this he has to hoist. It is at this stage that the windlass worked by his companion, or partner, demonstrates its value. In a very short time all the gravel that the fire has thawed out is hoisted to the surface, and added to the dump, where it must remain until the warmth of summer shall have thawed the streams and permitted sluicing. [Illustration: MINER'S GOLD PAN.] A sluice is really nothing more nor less than a trough, open at the top, in which the gold is sorted from the lighter gravel and dirt by running water. The grade varies according to the coarseness of the gold. Very fine gold would be carried away by too swift a current, while coarse gold will resist almost a torrent. The sluice is built in joints, usually a dozen feet in length; the sides may be six inches or a foot deep, and the width varies from one to two feet. There is no rule in this matter, but owing to the extravagant price of lumber--as much as a hundred and fifty dollars a thousand feet, board measure--the tendency is to make the sluices very small and very short, thereby saving nothing but the very coarsest gold. A properly constructed sluice should be several hundred feet in length, and the inclination should not be more than one foot in twelve, while it may, in a case of fine gold, be advisable to diminish this inclination by at least a fourth. Riffles, or cross-pieces, are placed across the sluice at intervals of a few feet, and slats are placed lengthwise, filling up the intervals between the riffles. Into the crevices and interstices of these obstructions the heavy gold sinks by its own weight, and every few days, or weeks, as the case may warrant, the miner shuts off the water by closing the gate at the head of the sluice, removes the slats and riffles, beginning at the joint nearest the head and working towards the tail of the sluiceway, and collects all the gold that has accumulated. This is a very simple form of mining, but it is not the simplest. Much gold has been recovered from the gravel in which nature has placed it by the aid of the pan, a sheet iron dish modeled on the housewife's bread pan. Next to the pan the cradle is as little complicated as anything used in the winning of gold. After this comes the long tom, a considerable improvement upon the cradle, but it necessitates more water and more men. [Illustration: HORSE WHIM.] The horse whim is used in developing many a western prospect. The windlass does not work well below forty feet, and where fuel and water are to be had any sensible man will use steam power for deep mining, but there is a gap between the windlass and the steam hoist which the horse whim fills acceptably. To a depth of 300 feet a horse whim can usually handle the rock and water. It is inexpensive, in the first outlay, and costs but little to run. You can bring your bucket from a shaft a hundred and fifty feet deep in two and a half minutes, and with a seven hundred pound capacity in the bucket, in forty-five trips you could raise fifteen tons a day. A shaft three hundred feet deep would require four hours' steady work to bring to surface the same amount. A fair speed with a one-horse whim from a three hundred foot shaft is one hundred buckets per shift of ten hours, but the prospector rarely has to figure on shafts of that depth. If the mine turns out well it is likely to be in the hands of a powerful company (of which he should be the principal shareholder) before the three hundred foot level is reached. The weight of the horse whim is about eight hundred pounds. It can be taken to pieces and packed anywhere that a mule can travel; the heaviest piece will not weigh more than a hundred pounds. [Illustration: PROSPECTING MILL WITH HORSE POWER.] A small stamp mill, run by horse power, is a very favorite machine with western men, where the ore is free milling. The mortar in which the stamps work has copper plates amalgamated with mercury inside, and copper tables with amalgamated plates over which the pulp passes after oozing through a fine screen in front of the mortar. These little mills are so constructed that they can be taken apart or put together in an hour or two. They require but one horse power and will do good clean work up to their capacity. The following are the specifications of a good one: Total weight 1,500 pounds. Weight of heaviest piece 350 pounds. Weight of stamp 100 pounds. Drops per minute 60 to 80. Capacity per hour 300 to 400 pounds. Diameter of pulley 30 inches. Price, with horse power, about $350. A diamond drill is a most useful adjunct to exploration of a mine or deposit. It is, essentially, a hollow drill which may be lengthened at will, rotating rapidly and carrying a crown of "bort" or black diamonds at its extremity, that eats into the strata very quickly. Holes 3,000 feet deep have been driven by the diamond drill, but such extensive investigations of the earth's crust are tremendously costly, and may only be undertaken by governments or rich companies. For a depth of 700 feet, however, the expense need not exceed $2,100. The cost of the plant for drilling would be $3,500 more. Water is pumped down the hollow center of the drill, to keep it cool. The great advantage of the diamond over the percussion drill is that it permits the saving of a core, so that the character of the rocks and minerals passed through may be known. The diamond drill does better work in hard strata than it does in soft. The rate, in limestone, may be about two feet an hour, down to a depth of 200 feet. A complete outfit for boring with the diamond drill includes a steam engine and boiler, diamond crown, lining tubes, rods, and various minor accessories. Hydraulic mining is the cheapest known method of recovering gold. In four years the North Bloomfield Mining Company of California worked 325,000,000 cubic yards, which yielded only 2.9 cents of gold per cubic yard, and realized some profit. Very poor gravel will pay when the conditions are good. Cheap water, grades of four inches in a hundred, ample dumping room, big banks of light gravel, large areas of deposits, labor at a dollar a day, and a clever superintendent, make a combination that will yield a profit out of three-cent gravel. Miners speak of "surface" and "deep" placers; of "hill claims;" of "bench claims" on the old river terraces; of "gulch diggings;" of "bar claims" on the sand bars of existing rivers; of "beach sands" or those that in a few favored localities border the ocean. A "sluice" is a long boxway to catch the gold; a "drift" is a tunnel into the gold-bearing gravel; and hydraulic diggings are those in which water under pressure is used to disintegrate the gravel. A ground-sluice is a trench cut through the bed rock. The roughness of the natural floor serves for riffles. Booming is a process requiring a large accumulation of water in a reservoir, which may be discharged at once, and carry all the material that has collected below the pass, with one full tide, into the sluices. This practice is extremely ancient; Pliny mentions it in his Natural History. Deep mining may be divided into drifting and hydraulic mining. In the former the metal is won by means of tunnels and drifts or horizontal passageways along the length of the deposit. It is usually resorted to in districts where a flow of lava has covered the gold-bearing gravel, and made hydraulic mining impossible. It is followed in Alaska for another reason, viz., because the constantly frozen ground will not permit of the more remunerative method. The gravel is carried to the mouth of the tunnel and there dumped to be washed in the sluices. When "cemented" it must be broken up by stamps. Rich deep placers may be worked by drifting, but whenever practicable hydraulicing is to be preferred as giving better results. It yields from four to six times the amount of gold that drifting does. Thorough exploration should precede the expenditure of large sums in a hydraulic plant. Even should the explorations result in finding barren gravels the money will have been well spent in saving the cost of an unproductive plant. Black sand (magnetic iron) almost always accompanies gold, but this alone is no sign that gold is present, as black sand may usually be obtained by grinding and washing crystalline rocks. Ditches and flumes of wood or metal are used to bring the water for hydraulic mining from the region where it was impounded in a catch basin, often a distance of many miles. It is said $100,000,000 have been invested in ditches and flumes, mining and agricultural, in the western states, and new flumes are being planned every month. Some of them consist of wrought iron pipe carried over ravines by trestles 250 feet high. In planning a ditch the miner must see to it that his water supply is at a sufficient elevation to command the ground. The more pressure the water works under the better. The supply should be continuous, or at least be available during the whole working season. Ditches in regions of deep snow should have a southern exposure. All streams crossed by the ditch should be diverted into it, to counteract leakage and other loss. Waste gates must be provided every half mile. Ditches are better than flumes. Narrow, deep, and steep ditches are to be preferred in mountainous regions, and the reverse in valleys with soft soil. Some Californian ditches with a capacity of 80 cubic feet per second and grades of 16 to 20 feet per mile have been built. [Illustration: SECTION OF DITCH.] [Illustration: SECTION OF FLUME.] Sometimes the face of the country requires flumes; they may even be hung along the face of a cliff. In shattered ground and where water is scarce flumes are better than ditches. The grade for a flume is usually 25 to 35 feet per mile and its capacity is smaller than that of a ditch. Pine planking 2-1/2 inches by 12 to 24 inches, and 12 feet long, is the dimension stuff generally preferred. A flume 2 feet 6 inches square requires posts, caps, and sills of 3�4 inch; stringers 4�6 inch. Great care is needed at curves to avoid slack water and splashing. The boxes must be shortened and the outer side wedged up until the water flows as evenly as in the straight stretches. Should anchor ice form the water must be shut off at once. The life of a flume seldom exceeds a dozen years, whereas at the end of a similar period a ditch would be carrying 10 per cent more water than at first, owing to the sides and bottom having become consolidated. Wrought iron pipes are employed largely in California to replace ditches and flumes. When the pipe crosses a ravine it is known as an inverted siphon. Piping is also used to convey water from the "pressure box" to the "gates" and "nozzle." Wrought iron pipes have to stand pressure varying from 34 pounds to 800 pounds to the square inch. Air valves or blow-offs must be provided at intervals to allow the escape of air from the pipe while filling, and to prevent a collapse of the pipe after a break. A covering of coal-tar should be given the pipe both inside and out. Cost varies from one dollar to two dollars a running foot. The pressure box ends the ditch and from it the water passes into the supply pipe. The head of water is measured from this point. A box to catch sand and gravel, with a side opening and sunk below the level of the ditch, is called the "sand box." One and a half inch plank is generally the material out of which the pressure box is made. The depth of water in it is such that the mouth of the pipe is always under water. A grating in front of the pipe catches all rubbish. As no air must be allowed to get into the pipe the water must be kept quiet and deep at the pipe-head; this is insured by dividing the box into compartments, the first receiving the water and discharging it through suitable openings into the second. The water supply and the discharge should be equal. The water passes down the feed pipe, iron gates distributing it to the discharge pipes. Water must be turned on gradually, and the air valves must be open. The piping terminates in a nozzle with knuckle-joint and lateral movement. Nothing but the most secure bolting to heavy timber and the heavy weighting of the last length of pipe should be relied upon to keep the hydraulic giant in its place. Should it once begin bucking every man within reach of the powerful column of water is in imminent danger. The nozzle is directed by means of a larger deflecting nozzle, which receives the impact of the water and causes the main nozzle to swing right or left, up or down, as the case may demand. A derrick capable of moving heavy boulders, and driven by water power, is a necessity in all hydraulic mining. Masts 100 feet high and booms 90 feet long are sometimes used, the motive power coming from a "hurdy gurdy" direct impact wheel. Experiments have shown that the bucket has much to do with the power of the wheel. For instance, when the water impinged against a flat bucket the efficiency of the wheel was less than 45 per cent. of what it should have been in theory, whereas, with the Pelton bucket, it rose to 82.6 per cent. There is a great amount of so-called cement, or in other words consolidated gravel, in all the northern placers, and in many California deposits, as well. In the old Cariboo diggings on the upper Frazer, strong companies are now pulverizing the ancient cements that resisted all the efforts of the 59 miners with powder and stamp mill, and are deriving large profits therefrom. Black powder gives even better results than dynamite in gravel. The usual allowance of powder is 20 pounds in weight for every 1,000 cubic feet of ground to be moved. Make drifts T-shaped, and tamp the main drift almost to the junction with the arms, which should be parallel to the face it is required to dislodge. [Illustration: PELTON WATER WHEEL.] Sluices have their maximum discharge when set straight. Increased grade may be given below any unavoidable curves with advantage, and the outer side of the sluice must always be raised. Steps or "drops" in the sluices help in the recovery of the gold. In general, a grade of 6-6-1/2 inches to the 12-foot box is found best; this is equal to a 4-4-1/2 per cent. grade. Exceptional instances are on record, however, where grades ran from 1-1/2 per cent. to 8 per cent. In a 4 to 7 per cent. grade the water in the sluice should be 10 inches deep at least. The following table gives useful details: Sluice. Grade. Water. 6 ft. � 36 in. 4 to 5 p.c. 2,000 to 3,500 m. in. 4 ft. � 30 in. 4 p.c. 1,800 to 2,000 m. in. 3 ft. � 30 in. 1-1/2 p.c. 600 to 1,000 m. in. "The longer the better," is the sluice-builder's motto. The best "riffles" are made of blocks of pine 8 to 13 inches deep, wedged into the bottom of the sluices. They are laid in rows separated by a space of an inch or an inch and a half. Riffle strips keep them in position, these latter being laid crosswise on the bottom. When worn down to five inches, the blocks should be replaced. This amount of wear will probably require six months. Stone and longitudinal riffles running lengthwise of the box are often preferred. An undercurrent is a broad sluice set at a heavy grade below the level of the main sluice. The fine stuff drops through a grating, while the coarse gravel continues on down the sluice. Refuse material from quartz, hydraulic or other mines is known as tailings. Tailings are deposited on a dump, which in the case of a hydraulic claim must be sufficiently spacious to receive the thousands of yards of debris deposited on it each day. When available a narrow, deep canyon, or a tunnel, may take the places of dumps. Quicksilver is used in the sluices, 14 to 18 flasks being used every fortnight in a long sluice. It is not placed in the last 300 or 400 feet. In working, keep the face of the bank "square." Washing should be carried on continuously. Watches must be set over the sluices, or gold is likely to be missed. As an extra precaution, the sluices should be run full of gravel before shutting off the water. There is no fixed custom regulating "clean ups." Some managers do so every 20 days, others run two or three months, others again clean up but once in a season. In large operations, the first 2,000 feet of sluice are cleaned up every fortnight; the remaining boxes once a year. Sluices are cleaned from the head downward, the blocks being taken up for that purpose. The amalgam of gold and quicksilver is collected in sheet iron buckets. The final step is reached when the amalgam is retorted and melted in a graphite crucible. The principle of which the hydraulic miner takes advantage is the great specific gravity of gold as compared with water and rock. To illustrate this quality it may be noted that on a smooth surface inclined at an angle of 1 in 48, subjected to a heavy stream of water, 95 per cent. of the fine gold in gravel does not travel three feet. The loss of quicksilver fed into sluices will vary, even under good management, from 11 per cent. to 25 per cent. of the amount fed to the boxes. Hydraulic mines under favorable conditions are very paying investments. Gravel yielding 10 cents a cubic yard has been worked for 6 cents a cubic yard, at the rate of a million cubic yards a year. On another large claim 600,000 cubic yards were worked for 6 cents a cubic yard, yielding 13 cents a cubic yard. River dredging is another form of gold winning that has been brought to a great state of perfection in New Zealand. Although the dredge has not yet acquired the importance in America that was expected, it is successful on one or two western rivers, and as the subject becomes better understood it is conceivable that American mining engineers will be as successful in devising improved dredges as they have been in all other branches of their profession. In New Zealand the bucket dredge has proved more satisfactory than the suction dredge, although a hasty conclusion would probably give the latter the palm. At Bannack, Mont., the Bucyrus Company has several dredges in successful operation. One is 102 feet long, 36 feet wide, and draws 36 inches of water. It is very substantially made, and weighs nearly 700,000 pounds. Before such a dredge is launched, a dam is built across the gulch to impound sufficient water. As the gravel is dredged and washed, it is dumped astern of the dredge, which, in the case of a shallow creek, moves up to the excavation made by the buckets. The boilers of this dredge are double, and together have 250 H.P. There are 36 buckets, and each one has a horizontal drag of eight feet, a capacity of five cubic feet, and travels at the rate of fourteen feet a minute. After treatment by trommels, or revolving screens, coppers, and sluices, and finally by a centrifugal pump, the now almost valueless gravel goes overboard again, leaving behind 98 per cent. of the gold it once held. The traction dredge is really a land-mining machine, as it is adapted for work on land nearly flat, where but little water is obtainable. The machine travels on bogie tracks. A 50-H.P. boiler supplies the water. A boom, 40 feet long, carries a shovel of 1.5 cubic yards' capacity, and moves 70 cubic yards each hour. Mr. John W. Gray, one of the best authorities, has recently written to the Mining and Scientific Press of San Francisco a most interesting description of the progress made in saving the gold from the streams in New Zealand. He says, in part: "After great effort, numerous trials, many failures and some large losses, this system of gaining gold has been evolved from crude beginnings into a systematic and satisfactory method of mining. Dredging for gold is now attracting attention and bids fair to become an established form of mining for that metal. In New Zealand, where more work of this nature has been done than elsewhere, the evolution of the industry has been the work of years. The rivers upon which dredging operations are carried on are swift-flowing streams, subject to frequent floods, having a considerable depth of gravel, with boulders and runs of pay dirt interstratified. The conditions are, therefore, not the best for economical and successful work, and it is not surprising that many failures have occurred. The runs of gold are, however, often extensive and rich, and operations carried on upon such reaches have in a number of cases given satisfactory results. "The improved form of dredge is a double pontoon, with ladder and chain-bucket arrangement between. Screens separate the coarse from the fine material. Wide sluicing tables catch the gold, centrifugal pumps supply the water, and waste material is handled by elevators. The power is usually steam, although electricity is used in a few instances, where conditions are favorable. The dredges vary in size and capacity, but are now built of large size and great strength. Twenty thousand dollars is the cost of a large dredge with all the latest contrivances. Under favorable conditions, material has been handled without loss that only yielded a grain of gold to the cubic yard. The real cost in actual continued working is believed to be very much in excess of that figure where average conditions exist. "One dredge on the Clyde side of the Shotover, working to a depth of twenty feet below water level, lifted 40 tons per hour when operating. The profit on eleven dredges for the four weeks ending July 24, 1897, was an average of $2,686 for each dredge. "So far in this country (United States), with a few exceptions, dredging operations for gold have not been financially successful. From crude beginnings, however, the machines have been rapidly improved and perfected, until now, in some localities, dredges believed to be the most complete yet constructed are being put in operation, and results are promised, not yet attained, in the way of economical working and high percentage of saving. During the last few years, a number of dredges have been operated in California, British Columbia, Idaho, Montana and Colorado, but with poor success. Very few prove themselves capable of paying their way. Some of the machines were faulty within themselves, others were entirely unable to cope with the swift currents and large boulders of the streams upon which they were operated. This latter is said to have notably proved the case with the dredges tried upon the Frazer and Ouesenelle rivers. "Dredging operations on Grasshopper Creek, near Bannack, Mont., are now carried on successfully upon a large scale. The upper Sacramento river, in this state, has a dredge doing profitable work, and, in a small way, dredging is successful upon the Kzamath. A dredge upon that river, composed of two flat boats with a large steel scoop between, is able to cut and hoist the gravel and soft bed rock, and to handle boulders of from four to six tons' weight. The dredge is run day and night, has a 25-H.P. engine, and requires three men for each shift. In gravel 10 to 25 feet deep, 400 cubic yards can be handled every twenty-four hours. Cost of dredge, $8,000. "A large dredge of the chain-bucket variety is operating in Northern Mexico, in a dry country, where there is little water. The actual capacities of these machines are 60, 100 and 150 yards per hour. "Perhaps the most interesting dredge yet brought to the notice of the public is one lately built by the Risdon Iron Works, San Francisco, and now operating upon the Yuba river, near Smartsville, Cal. It is of the elevator, or chain-bucket, type, 96 feet long, composed of two pontoons, separated by a space five feet in width, in which is operated the ladder carrying the buckets. One man controls the dredge by means of a power winch with six drums. Four drums carry lines from the corners of the dredge to anchorages on shore--one a head-line and one the ladder line. The machine is to dredge to a depth of 45 feet, and is said to have a gross capacity of 93 cubic yards per hour. The material discharges from the buckets into a revolving and perforated screen. This segregates the large material, which is then conveyed away by the tailings elevator. Water (3,000 gallons per minute) is supplied to the revolving screen for washing and sluicing purposes by a centrifugal pump, and the fine stuff falls through the holes in the screen into a distributing box, from which it passes to a set of gold-saving tables and thence to a flume. The tables are covered with cocoa matting and expanded metal. The top tumbler of bucket-chain is operated by a vertical compound condensing engine indicating 35 H.P., which also operates the pump. It is claimed for this dredge that in any ground not deeper than 60 feet below water level or more than 20 feet above, and which contains boulders of not more than one ton weight, the material can be handled at from 3 to 5 cents per cubic yard. If the capacity of the machine is given without deduction for water raised, imperfect filling and general delays, and the increase in volume of the gravel when broken up in filling the buckets, the actual working capacity would be less, and from these causes and the losses from wear and tear, breakages and repairs, the cost of operating would be increased. The cost of the dredge complete upon the river is said to have been $25,000. "In the evolution of the dredge into the elevator or chain-bucket machine, now the popular form, the various kinds of dredges were given trials. The dipper dredge is not adapted to dredging for gold, and some of the gold is lost. With agitation of the gravel the gold soon settles and is not recovered. It is also very difficult, if not impossible, to construct a dipper dredge that is water-tight. Another objection is that the material is supplied intermittently, thus making necessary certain undesirable arrangements for supplying the material in a continuous flow to the gold-saving tables. The same objections apply with greater force to the clam-shell form of dredge. It is by no means water-tight, and loses most of the gold in the act of dredging and bringing up the gravel. The objections would seem not to have the same force if applied to hard cemented gravel or to gravel with sufficient clay or other binding material to make it consistent. It is well to remember that these forms of dredges are, in many positions, economical of operation. "The hydraulic dredge has had fair trials and proved a failure. Large storms greatly lessen the efficiency of this form of dredge, and numerous boulders hamper the pumping work. The suction force, being intense near the pipe and decreasing rapidly a short distance away, causes the sand and gravel to be carried off, leaving the gold behind. A centrifugal pump is therefore of little use to catch coarse gold, or to clear a hard, uneven bottom. Cutters do not remove the trouble, since the gravel is dispersed by the cutting, and the gold is separated therefrom. "These objections would not obtain under certain conditions, and it would seem quite possible that conditions might be found existing where the suction dredges might be arranged to do good work. A dredging company is now constructing, at Seattle, two dredges of the suction type to operate upon the Yukon river. This would indicate that there are those who believe that deposits occur in and along that river which can be successfully worked in this way. "The chain-bucket machine, the popular form for operating under average conditions, is a combination of the following elements: An excavating apparatus which clears the bottom and handles the material with little agitation and slowly and continuously delivers a regular quantity of gravel to the gold-saving appliances; revolving screen to receive and wash the material and separate the coarse from the fine; an elevator or contrivance for carrying off the coarse gravel and stones; gold-saving arrangements, or tables, over which the fine material passes and upon which the gold is caught; a pumping apparatus to supply water for washing and sluicing. "The proper capacity of a machine seems to be regulated by the capacity of the gold-saving appliances. The tables should be as wide as possible, with frequent drops, and the fine material should be distributed over the tables in a thin film. The tables are covered with plush or cocoa matting, and sufficient water supplied to keep the material clear. The material should be supplied evenly, continuously, and regularly to the tables. Care and attention are required to catch the fine gold. A disregard of the foregoing directions results in great loss, more particularly in the fine gold. Mechanical skill is required to properly design and construct a dredge, and the care of a competent mechanic is necessary to see that the machine is kept in order and economically operated. The saving of the gold, however, is what makes dredging operations a commercial success. A man skilled in these matters should be in charge of running operations. Dredges should be built of determined capacities, and should be designed to suit the conditions under which they are to operate. Careful examination and investigation of the ground to be worked should be made beforehand, and the surrounding conditions studied, and it goes without saying that these matters require engineering skill and experience. "The field for dredging for gold seems large. Where the proper conditions exist, it is a system which commends itself, and which gives promise, in competent hands, of being an economical method of mining. There is probably a very large extent of country where dredging for gold will be carried on profitably. The ground need not be in a river, if there is seepage water sufficient to float the dredge and supply clear water for the saving of the gold. Dredging requires little water as compared with that required for sluicing and elevating, and this water can, in many dry localities, be supplied at small expense, where a supply for hydraulic work or elevating would cost a very large sum, or be impossible at any cost. Any power suitable for driving the prime motors can be utilized to run the dredge. Indeed, it would seem as if a system of mining was about to be perfected which may make possible the profitable working of many deposits not easy to be worked by other methods, and which may, in many instances, solve problems regarding the successful working of deposits which hitherto have seemed most perplexing and even impossible of solution. Some doubt exists as to possible economical dredging operations under the water of torrential streams. The strong currents, the frequent floods, and many large boulders found in the channels of such streams make the working of the machines difficult and costly. This would not be so much the case in the long stretches of less current, nor would it be so at all in the valley-like reaches in the lower portions of rich streams, nor in the wide, flat portions of country where the streams enter the plains." Very few gold-bearing lodes contain nothing but free gold; on the contrary, they carry the bulk of their values in the form of sulphurets, having more or less gold incorporated, and even when the gold is native and free-milling at the surface, it is generally changed into sulphurets as depth is gained. So the miner has to consider methods of recovery more complicated and expensive than simple amalgamation with mercury, for upon gold included in pyrites mercury has no effect. Titanic iron, hematite, and tungstate of iron often hold gold, or soft clay ores carry it in their midst, and such combinations tax all the skill of the mining engineer merely to save a respectable percentage of the assay value. Sometimes chlorination and sometimes cyanization are the measures tried, but supposing the preliminary treatment to have been by stamps in the battery, concentrating is one of the main reliances of the mill man. The blanket table is undoubtedly the oldest type of concentrating machine, but it is very inferior to modern inventions. Percussion tables often do good work. In this system a sharp and frequently repeated blow is given the table, in such fashion as to make the heavy material separate from the light. "Shaking" and "rocking" tables are favored in some mills, and they give better results on fine gold than any of the previously mentioned devices. But the best machine so far invented is the Frue Vanner--an endless rubber band drawn over an inclined table, having both revolving and side motions. The lighter particles are carried off by water, and the heavier collected in a trough. [Illustration: FRUE VANNER.] Veins, lodes, or ledges, may be found in stratified or unstratified rocks, and in the former they generally cut the beds at an angle. Veins are bounded by walls. The rock in which a vein is found is a country rock. Smooth walls are called "slickensides." The upper wall of an inclined vein is the hanging wall; the other the foot wall. A layer of clay between the veins and wall is a selvage. A mass of rock enclosed in the vein is a horse. The vein stone, or gangue, is all that part of a vein that is not mineral. [Illustration: A FAULT.] The throw of a fault in a vein is measured by the amount of vertical displacement. When the miner comes to a fault, he should follow the greater angle in his attempt to recover the lode. For instance, on mining along A B to the line of fault X Y, the exploration will be continued downward, because the angle A B Y is greater than the angle A B X. Mercury that has been "sickened," that is to say, has lost its brightness and power of amalgamating, may often be cured by washing with an extremely weak solution of sulphuric acid and adding a little zinc. As regards the comparative merits of chlorination and cyanization, it may be said the one is the equal of the other. Under certain conditions, chlorine gives a higher percentage of gold; under others the same may be said of cyanide. A description of either process would be out of place, however, in a simple elementary work. Handed down through the centuries, the primitive arrastra is still useful in certain contingencies. It is like a cider mill in its principle, and was probably suggested by recollections of that machine, or else of the Spanish wine-press. A circular, shallow pit, a dozen feet or more in diameter, is first paved with hard, uncut stones of granite, basalt, or other hard rock. This pavement is a foot thick, and beneath it is a bed of puddled clay 6 inches deep. A vertical shaft with an arm, or arms, revolves in the center of the arrastra. Grinding blocks weighing 400, or perhaps even 1,000 pounds, are fastened to the arms by chains or rawhide strips. The forward part of each stone is raised a couple of inches off the floor. Mule, horse, water or steam power may be used, the speed ranging from 4 to 18 turns a minute. Nothing can be simpler, less expensive, or save a greater proportion of the value in the ore than the arrastra. Its limited capacity is its worst fault. An arrastra 10 feet in diameter will treat 500 or 600 pounds of ore at a charge, and handle one ton a day of 24 hours. Ores that were so poor they yielded nothing to the stamp mill have paid well with the arrastra. This humble device may be used to advantage, probably in some of the poorer gold-bearing cemented gravels of the Northwest. The ore should be crushed to pigeon-egg size. Small quantities of mercury, about a tablespoonful to every five tons of gravel, has been found a satisfactory proportion in California. In a permanent arrastra a layer of neatly-dressed and pointed stones is laid in hydraulic cement. A fair-sized arrastra will require 50 pounds of quartz to charge it, and the material must be broken into pigeon-egg size. After the machine has been started, and a little water added from time to time, little else need to be done for four or five hours, and this is perhaps one of the reasons for which it has always been so favored in indolent Mexico. At this stage, the quartz and ore will be very finely pulverized, and water should be added until the pulp is as thin as cream. Quicksilver must now be added in the proportion of 1-1/4 ounce for every supposed ounce of gold in the ore being treated. Two hours' further grinding is given, and water then admitted until the paste is quite thin, the speed of the arrastra being reduced at the same time so as to allow the amalgam and quicksilver to sink to the bottom. A half an hour of this treatment suffices and the thin mud is run off, leaving the gold and amalgam on the floor of the arrastra. A second charge of broken quartz is put in and the operation repeated, the clean-up not taking place oftener than every ten days, and sometimes only at intervals of a month or so. The rougher the bottom the longer the interval between clean-ups, as all the stone work must be taken up each time and all the sand and mud between them must be washed carefully. The arrastra is extremely valuable to the poor man who, having discovered a gold-bearing vein, wishes to transfer some of the metal into his own pocket, at the least possible outlay. Its cheapness places it within reach of all, while a stamp will cost a good deal. Then again the amalgamation being more perfect in the arrastra than in any other mill, it is particularly suited for the poor, lean ores. It is, however, only adapted to those that are free-milling, others not being suited to this form of apparatus, nor, indeed, to any save very costly plants. Some arrastras have been built to treat old tailings, and have paid well when water power could be used. Free-milling gold and high-grade silver and gold ores are those usually treated. The flagging should be of tough, coarse rock; granite, basalt or compact quartz are all good. This flagging should be at the very least a foot thick. When the arms of a 10-foot arrastra are revolving 14 times a minute, the outer stone is traveling 400 feet a minute. Round holes closed by wooden plugs, or a side gate, lets the liquid mud out. Some mill men use chemicals in the arrastra; potassium cyanide, and wood ashes or lye are probably the most useful, as the latter cuts grease and the former gives life to the quicksilver. Rich silver ores are treated with blue stone and salt. When the pulp has been ground sufficiently, quicksilver is added, sometimes 250 pounds being put in a single charge. A 12-foot arrastra will never treat more than two tons a day, and often no more than one-half that. One man a shift can look after a couple of arrastras, and the owner, in case of one arrastra that is working on tailings, often does everything himself. Overshot wheels, or turbines, or hurdy-gurdies, furnish the power in many cases. A simple mule-power arrastra may be built for $150. A side hill should be chosen for the site of a battery. Ample water power is necessary, though provision may be made for saving it in catch basins should such a course be desired. Moreover, there must be plenty of room below the mill for the tailings, as it may be desirable at some future time to put them through a second course of treatment. [Illustration: STAMP BATTERY.] Automatic ore-feeders are always put in by good mill men. In cold climates the water that goes through the mill should be heated, and this may be done by the exhaust steam, but care is necessary that no grease get into it, as it would prevent the gold from amalgamating. The stamps for a light mill may be 3 or 5 in number, and weigh from 700 to 850 pounds. Tables must be water-tight, with half an inch to one inch drop to the foot, according to the fineness of the gold. Below them tables, having the same inclination and covered with blanketing, are used to retain specks of gold that have passed over the plates without amalgamating. [Illustration: THREE STAMP BATTERY.] After the concentrated materials, always spoken of as the concentrates, have passed over the tables, they are often roasted to get rid of the sulphur, arsenic, etc., and afterwards treated with quicksilver in the pan, or tin, with chlorine or cyanide. These processes belong, however, to the domain of the professional chemist and metallurgist, and require the knowledge and experience of an expert to stand a chance of success. The coarseness of the mortar screens is subject to infinite variety, according to individual preference. The number of holes to the square inch ranges between 60 and 800 in Australia, and between 900 and 10,000 in the United States. The holes, when round, agree in numbers with those of sewing-machine needles, from 0 to 10. When slots are preferred to holes, they are generally 3/8-inch in length and No. 6 diameter. Russia sheet iron, or sheet steel 1/32-inch thick is the material of which they are made. It should weigh one pound to the square foot, be very soft and tough, have a clean, smooth surface, and show no rust or flaws. In Australia 1/16 sheet copper is preferred. The holes in any case must be punched in the sheet so that the rough edges are turned, and thus any pulp that finds its way into one of the holes is certain to get out again and not clog. A battery may require 13 sets of screens a year; each screen having a surface of about 1-1/2 square feet. Russia iron screens endure 15 to 40 days. As the work a stamp can do depends entirely upon how much pulp can escape through the screen in any given time, the latter is evidently a very important detail of a battery. Prospecting stamp batteries differ from ordinary batteries, chiefly in being of light build and weight. Amalgam coming from battery stamps is often mixed with all sorts of rubbish. After being gathered, it is dried with a sponge, foreign matter picked off the surface and clean quicksilver added. Soft unglazed paper thrust into the mercury removes the last vestiges of water, and then a card is drawn vertically or a piece of blanket horizontally across the mercury to clean it of iron. After squeezing, the amalgam is retorted. [Illustration: GOLD RETORT.] All the amalgam is placed in one large kettle and, if possible, the latter is put on a strong table having an inclined surface with a groove and hole at the lower end to catch any stray globules of quicksilver. Sodium amalgam, one ounce to each 75 pounds of mercury, is put in the amalgam kettle and the whole stirred. This sodium amalgam is not absolutely necessary, but is desirable. After some minutes, water is poured on the mercury and the whole stirred. All dirt rises to the surface and is removed with a sponge. The cleaning is continued until the mercury seems absolutely free from any impurity, when it is dried with a sponge. It is next turned into pointed bags of stout canvas and force applied until most of the quicksilver has squeezed through. The amalgam remains behind. The quicksilver still contains some gold, but it had better remain if the mercury is to be used again, as gold attracts gold; it can always be recovered by retorting. Sodium amalgam is best made by the miner himself, enough for one clean-up at a time. Metallic sodium and quicksilver are the necessary ingredients; the former being kept in a wide-mouthed bottle covered with coal oil. A frying-pan makes a useful mixer. It must be dry and clean. Five pounds of clean mercury is poured into the pan, and dried with a sponge, and heated beyond the boiling-point of water, but not much above, or there will be a sensible loss of mercury. A piece of sodium is wiped dry, cut into 1/2-inch squares and placed with a long pair of tongs in the center of the warm quicksilver, which, by the way, is now off the fire and in the open air, the operator meanwhile keeping religiously to windward of it, unless he courts salivation and all its attendant ills. As soon as the sodium touches the mercury a flash and mild explosion will follow, but after a few cubes have been introduced into the frying-pan, always in the center, this will cease. As soon as a solid mass of amalgam forms in the middle of the pan, the contents must be stirred slowly, and a little more sodium added. The whole mass now crystallizes out, and if put into closely-stopped bottles it will keep without further protection for a little time. Once opened, each bottle must be used. Observe all these directions faithfully, then there will be no danger of inhaling mercurial fumes nor of being blown to atoms. After the amalgam is once made, it is safe as sugar. In retorting amalgam never fill the flask too full, and apply the heat gradually, and always from the top of the flask downward. The rocker is a box 40 inches long, 16 inches wide on the bottom, sloped like a cradle, and with rockers at each end. [Illustration: CROSS SECTION OF ROCKER.] A hopper 20 inches square and 4 inches deep, having an iron bottom perforated with 1/2-inch holes, occupies the top. A light canvas-covered frame is stretched under this, forming a riffle. Riffles, and occasionally amalgamated copper plates, are placed in the bottom. The gravel is fed into the hopper, the cradle being then rocked by one hand while water is fed by a dipper with the other. The cradle must be placed on an inclination while being worked, and under the influence of the continued side-to-side rocking the dirt is quickly disintegrated, passes through the riddle and falls on the apron. From the apron it is conveyed to the inner end of the cradle floor, from which it flows over the riffles, or bars, and out at the mouth. The difference in level of the floor is generally about 2-1/2 inches, but this may be varied according to the nature of the dirt treated. Large stones in the riddle or hopper must be thrown out, but smaller ones assist in breaking up the lumps of dirt. Every little while the pebbles are turned out and looked over for nuggets. Clean-ups are necessary two or three times a day. The hopper is taken off first, then the apron is slid out, and washed in a bucket or tub containing clean water, and finally the gold and amalgam are collected in an iron spoon from behind the riffle bars, and panned out. Gravel requires at least three times its own weight of water to wash it. The most convenient way is to lead the water from a stream through a pipe discharging directly over the hopper, but this is, of course, impracticable in some places. More often the water is led to a little pit on the right hand side of the operator, from which he ladles it up as required. One man can wash from one to three cubic yards daily according to the character of the dirt, but every time he stops the machine to feed it with gravel or to empty the riddle, the sand will pack, and must be removed before washing can go on. Two men can wash nearly three times as much dirt in a day as one man. But in any case, the rocker is only a primitive machine, having a capacity but one-fifth as great as that of the Long Tom, and but one-tenth that of a very poor sluice, but as it is cheap, requires but little water, and saves a high percentage of coarse gold, the rocker will continue to be used in many districts. The Long Tom was invented many years ago by Georgia miners. [Illustration: LONG TOM.] It is a trough 12 feet by 15 to 20 inches at the upper end, and 30 inches at the lower, and 8 inches deep. The grade is usually 1 in 12. A sheet iron plate forms the lower end of the trough. These figures refer to the upper trough. The lower or riffle-box is 12 feet long by 3 feet wide, with a fall equal to that of the trough and a sufficient depth to keep the material and water from spilling over the sides. It should have four riffles. For this means of saving the gold, to work satisfactorily, the metal must be coarse and the water plentiful. [Illustration: SLUICE BOXES.] Every sluice is an inclined channel through which flows a stream of water, carrying away all the lighter matter thrown into it, and separating it from the heavy. When the operations would not be permanent enough, or sometimes for other reasons, a ground sluice is preferred to the ordinary box sluice made of boards. Ground sluicing requires, however, six times as much water as does a box sluice to do the same amount of work. It is simply a gutter in the bed rock, and if the bottom is hard and uneven its inequalities will arrest the gold; if not, a number of boulders too heavy to be moved by the stream are put into the sluice to act as riffles. No mercury is used. The water is turned off and the collected coarse gold washed in the pan. Sluice boxes may be any length, from 30 to 5,000 feet. They vary in width from 1 to 5 feet, though generally 16 or 18 inches. The grade is proportioned to the fineness of the gold, varying from 8 inches to 2 feet to the 12-foot box or length. The bottom should be of 1-1/2 inch plank, and the sides of 1-inch boards. The boxes are made 4 inches wider at the upper end than at the lower, so as to telescope. The best method found yet for arresting fine gold is the copper plate amalgamated with mercury on its face. These plates are never used at the head of a sluice or other situation where there is much coarse gold, as they would be superfluous in such a situation, but are placed some distance down the sluice and are most efficacious in arresting the "flour," or excessively fine gold. Plates are always of copper above 1/16 inch thick, and may be 6 feet or more long, and of a width suited to the capacity of the sluice. When treated with quicksilver, they become as brittle as glass, and must be handled with care. The copper plate is first washed with a weak solution of nitric acid, and then mercury that has been treated with a weak nitric acid solution is rubbed on the plate. As this surface of quicksilver wears off, it may be replaced by a little fresh mercury. Any green slime on a plate is an evidence of copper salts in the water. It must be scraped off and the spot rubbed with fresh quicksilver. Gold attracts gold, therefore the plates should not be cleaned up too often. Copper plates may be freed from gold by heating them over a fire and causing the quicksilver to evaporate slowly. The plates, after being cooled, are rubbed with dilute muriatic acid and covered with damp cloths for one night. They are then rubbed with a solution containing salt peter and sal ammoniac, and once more heated over some hot coals, but not allowed to get red hot. Soon the gold scale rises in blisters; the plates are then removed from the fire and scraped. Those parts of the plates that have not yielded up their gold must be re-treated and fired until they do so. All these scales of gold are then collected in a porcelain dish, the base metals are dissolved out with nitric acid, and the gold is then smelted. Corrosive sublimate should be placed in the crucible as long as any blue flame is seen to come from it. Some mill men prefer to amalgamate their copper plates with silver amalgam, claiming that silver-coated plates save a higher percentage of gold. To amalgamate in this way take some silver bullion, or silver coin, and dissolve in weak nitric acid, only just strong enough to act upon the silver. (If you use too much nitric acid you will waste mercury and make the amalgam harder than it should be for the best results.) After crystals have formed, quicksilver must be added, heating gently meanwhile, until a thick, pasty amalgam has formed. Let this new compound stand for some hours, and squeeze through chamois as usual. The proportion of silver may be about 1 ounce to the square foot of copper to be plated. In facing new copper plates with this amalgam, they should be washed first with dilute nitric acid; then in clear water; the ball of amalgam being rubbed over their surfaces, some little force being applied. Plates should not be used for 24 hours after coating. Porous copper plates of the best quality, and not too heavily rolled, should be used. Follow the amalgam with a swab, and rub the alloy well into the plate. Zinc amalgam (preferable when mine water containing sulphuric acid is used in the battery) is applied to the plate after it has been cleaned with a moderately dilute mixture of sulphuric acid and water. The zinc-quicksilver ball is rubbed in and applied while the plate is still wet. Zinc amalgam is prepared as follows: Cut zinc-sheet into small pieces; wash in weak sulphuric acid; and dissolve in mercury. When the quicksilver will take no more zinc, squeeze through chamois and rub in. Zinc-coated plates should stand a week before being used. Very weak sulphuric acid will always clean these plates of any scum that may form before they have received a gold coat. Sometimes the miner will be troubled with impure gold after retorting. If the metal is very dark this shade may come from the presence of large amounts of iron. A heavy proportion of mineral salts, such as chloride of calcium (CaCl), sodium (NaCl), and magnesium (NgCl{2}), in the battery water sometimes accounts for this. In such cases amalgamate, retort, pulverize and roast. Then smelt with borax, the iron passing into the slag. If necessary smelt a second time, when the gold should be pure enough to dispose of. In extreme cases, the gold may weigh but one-fifth of the amalgam treated. In districts where sufficient water for sluicing is not procurable, dry washing is resorted to. Nothing but rich, coarse gold can be worked by this method, and the dry washer rarely delves far below the surface for his gold. In the Mexican deserts the dirt is laid on raw hide, all the large pebbles picked out and the sand rubbed as fine as possible between the hands. The sand is placed in a batea and winnowed by tossing in the air, the lighter material being blown to leaward and the heavy gold falling into the batea. A form of winnowing machine has been patented, which may be driven by horse or hand-power, which is said to give satisfaction. It works by forcing a strong blast of air from a fan through a canvas screen. The inventor claims that it will do the work of three men, and work dirt for 2-1/2 cents a cubic yard. When there is a tendency in the material to cake, dry washing is impossible. CHAPTER VI. CAMP LIFE. The Indian truthfully observes: "White man make heap big fire; keep far off. Indian make little fire; get close. All same." The small fire does best in the circular tepee tent, made of canvas or leather, in use on the plains. The tepee is quite an institution, but it is generally as full of smoke as a kitchen chimney, and for that reason cannot truthfully be recommended. In theory, the smoke should all pass out of the opening in the top. By using no second skin and carefully excluding all air from around the lower rim of the tepee, it will become an admirable place to cure hams, fish, etc., by the original smoke-dried process. The Scripture declares that he that tarrieth over the wine cup has red eyes next morning, and so has he that sleeps in a smoky tepee. Properly made, however, the tepee is the thing where wood is scarce. Some original spirits are said to have started for Dawson City, N.W.T., a few years ago with bicycles and push carts. If these means of transport had sufficed, the world would have learnt something, as heretofore a canoe and a sturdy pair of legs were supposed to help the wayfarer in that region better than anything else. That is in summer; in winter, the dog-train is the quickest mode of travel. In the western states and in British Columbia pack horses or mules do the most of the prospector's freighting, and in the far north he either carries his outfit on his back or else transports it by canoe in summer, or by dog-train after the rivers have frozen. [Illustration: HUDSON'S BAY DOG SLED.] No amount of written instructions will teach a man to throw a diamond hitch, or handle a canoe in swift water. A lesson or two from an expert will, however, set his thoughts in the right direction, and in time he may become proficient. Canoeing, freighting and chopping are three things that are best begun in boyhood; no one ever yet became marvelously proficient in any one of them that began after reaching adult age. [Illustration: YUKON SLED AND HARNESS.] Dog teams are made up of from three to six dogs; a full-sized team dragging a load of 200 pounds forty miles a day for a week at a time. In the Hudson Bay region the dogs are harnessed one behind the other, but on the Yukon each pulls by a separate trace, and the team spreads out like a fan when at work. After Christmas the snow-shoe is generally a necessity in the north. Without "paddles" on the feet the explorer could hardly make his way through the woods, while with them on he sails along gayly, making a bee-line over frozen lake and water courses, and taking windfalls and down timber in his stride. The shoe in vogue in the forest is short and almost round, and flat, while that of the plains is very long, upturned at the toe, and narrow. There is a reason for these modifications, as the tyro will soon find out should he substitute the one for the other in the native habitat of either. But the loop by which the shoe is fastened on the foot is always the same. The string is made of moose hide; stretched, and greased before use. Caribou, or reindeer hide, makes the best filling, but horse or bull hide will do at a pinch. The frame is usually of ground ash, or some other tough, hard wood. A camp kit of cooking utensils often begins and ends with a frying-pan and tin kettle. Certainly when traveling light, these things should be the last to go, as with them all things are possible, even to amalgamating and retorting the precious metals. The frying-pan must have a socket instead of a long handle, as the latter may be cut from a bush at any time. A low, broad kettle boils in less time than a deep, narrow one of the same cubic capacity. All provisions should be kept in canvas bags. Matches in a leather case or safe, or in a corked bottle. Blankets are never kicked off if sewn up at foot and side into a sleeping bag. The existence of the prospector being passed in regions where the so-called benefits of civilization have not penetrated, he is generally a healthy, happy, hopeful man. Especially, hopeful. I do not remember ever meeting one that was not brimful of expectation and trust in the future. Possibly prospectors that have become pessimistic drop out of the ranks. Now the man who elects to dwell with nature has only himself to thank if he does not like his lodgings. He can be comfortable or wretched, according to his knowledge of woodcraft and wilderness residence. Whereas the tyro starts out with the avowed intention of "roughing it," the veteran is particularly careful to take matters as smoothly as he may, being well assured that in any case there will be enough inevitable discomfort in his lot to satisfy any reasonable craving. It is just the same in other walks of life; the sailor, the trapper and the soldier each learns to look after his own comfort and to seize every opportunity of making life as pleasant as possible. The three prime wants are food, clothing and shelter, and their importance is in the order named. Now, food is something that is painfully scarce in many parts of the world, and one of the great problems of wilderness travel is to provide transport for the supplies that must be carried from civilization. A rigorous northern climate necessitates a large consumption of strong, heat-producing food, while in the tropics the explorer gets along very comfortably with rice or an occasional skinny fowl, with plantains for dessert, and plenty of boiled and filtered water. Compare such a diet with that of Nansen, the arctic explorer! He and his companion lived and waxed fat on a diet of lean bear's meat three times a day, washed down by draughts of melted snow water. Moreover, although government expeditions, provided with every canned and potted luxury the stores contain, have suffered the ravages of scurvy, these two adventurous Norwegians, living on the food their rifles had provided, did not know what sickness meant. Other travelers have found that they fared better by copying to some extent the manner and customs of the natives. Fat seal blubber gives wonderful resisting power against cold, it is said; while a mild, unstimulating diet of rice suits the liver better under the Equator than the Bass ale and roast beef galore. On this continent the working man found out long ago that pork and beans suits him nicely. The lumberman says: "It sticks to the ribs," by which robust, if not classical, phrase he means that he can chop longer without feeling hungry on pork and beans than on almost any other food. The laborer having found by experience that the side of a pig and a sack of beans was a good combination to have in the larder, the man of science after a couple of hundred years or so of deliberation confirms the discovery by announcing that the flesh of a swine mixed with the fruit of the bean contains all the carbo-hydrates, etc., necessary to sustain life. The moral of all this is that pork and beans must not be forgotten when outfitting. A few other things being desirable, the following list may be consulted to advantage by the prospective prospector. This list should suffice for feeding one man for 12 months: Sugar 75 pounds. Apples (evaporated) 50 pounds. Salt 25 pounds. Salt pork 212 pounds. Pepper 1 pound. Condensed milk 1 case. Flour 2 barrels. Candles 1 box. Matches 12 boxes. Soap 1 doz. bars. Tea 1/2 case. Beans 200 pounds. The dictates of fashion being unheard on the mountain side, and beneath the pines, dress resolves itself into a mere question of warmth and comfort. Cut is of importance truly, but only insomuch as it allows free play to the limbs; to the arms in digging, and to the legs in climbing the stiff side of a canyon. Home-spun, heavy tanned duck, corduroy or moleskin, and flannel underclothing should be the mainstays of a miner's wardrobe. Rubber boots and slickers are also necessary to his comfort, while for winter use a heavy Mackinaw overcoat, or even fur, for the extreme north, is advisable. When actually at work the miner is more often in his shirt sleeves than not, and cold indeed must the day be if an old woodsman is caught traveling through the forest with his burly form encased in furs. For arctic conditions akin to those found on the upper Yukon an outfit such as the following should be chosen: 2 heavy knitted undershirts. 2 flannel shirts. 6 pairs worsted socks. 2 pairs overstockings. 1 pair miner's boots. 1 pair gum boots. 2 pairs moccasins. 1 suit homespun. 1 horsehide jacket. 1 pair moleskin trousers. 1 broad-brimmed felt hat. 1 fur cap. 1 Mackinaw overcoat. 2 pairs flannel mitts. 1 pair fur mitts. 1 muffler. 1 suit oil slickers. 2 pairs blankets. In cold weather the feet, fingers and face require the most care. The first should be stowed into two pairs of wool socks, and a long pair of knee-high oversocks be drawn over these. Boots must be replaced by moccasins. A pair of thick worsted mitts, and a pair of leather mitts outside, keep the hands warm enough even at 20 degrees below zero. At 50 degrees below put on an extra pair--or go home until the weather moderates. The favorite style of architecture in the wilderness is neither Doric nor the Gothic nor yet the Renaissance. It is called the dugout. The beauty of the dugout is its extreme simplicity. A hole in the side of a dry bank, a few sods or logs for roof, and there you have it. A veteran miner goes to earth as easily as a rabbit, and, like bunny, is never at a loss for an habitation. Next to the dugout the log cabin deserves mention, while the wattle and daub or 'dobe certainly secures third honors. The only drawback to the pre-eminence of the log cabin is that to make it you must have logs--just as the cook always insists on pigeons before she makes pigeon pie--and logs are in some districts only known as museum specimens. Now, the dugout or the 'dobe only require a gravel bank, or one of those deposits of argilite that the vulgar persist in calling clay; were it not for this fatal ease of getting, every miner and prospector would doubtless prefer living in a snug log hut, there to await in peace, comfort, and dignity the arrival of the representative of the "English syndicate" to whom he is destined to sell his claim. Napoleon found, after fighting his way across Europe and back again, that his troops were more healthy bivouacking in the open than sheltered in tents. In truth, the tent is a very uncomfortable and unhealthy make-shift; cold, hot, and damp, by turns, and often badly ventilated. A simple lean-to shelter, and a roaring fire are infinitely preferable where wood is abundant. But it takes a lot of wood to keep a bivouac warm on a winter's night; as much perhaps as would feed a fair-sized family furnace for a month. The trappers' fire is a most regal blaze. Two back logs; a pair of "hand junks" and a "forestick" are the foundation upon which the structure is reared, but the edifice itself often consumes a tall, full-limbed rock maple, or a stately birch between the setting of the sun and the rising of the same. There are three ways of making a fire; the first is suited for a "wooden" country; the second is used by "Lo," and other prairie travelers, where fuel is scarce. If overtaken by storm in any wild northern region, do as the animals and Indians do under like circumstances: seek the nearest shelter and lie close until the weather has moderated. The secret is to conserve your energy, not to fritter it away fighting a power against which you may make no real headway. A shallow, brush-lined gully; the lea of a bank, or small clump of trees; these and other seemingly slight protections sometimes mean life instead of death. The experienced woodsman never leaves camp without matches in his pocket; and in winter he carries a few pieces of dry birch bark in the bosom of his hunting shirt, as he knows how vitally necessary it is on occasions to be able to kindle a blaze at very short notice. A tent should never be pitched loosely, as no matter how fine the evening the weather ere morning may be tempestuous in the extreme, and the unpleasantness of having a tent come down about one's ears in the dark must be experienced to be realized. Also, never pitch a tent with the doorway toward the northwest in winter, because that is the quarter from which comes the cold. In summer, from June until mid-August, the mosquito, the black fly and the midge or sand fly, make life a burden in the north. The best remedy for the mosquito and black fly is a mixture of tar and olive oil, of the consistency of cream, rubbed on all exposed parts of the person. A dark green veil will also keep the insect pests out of the eyes, mouth and ears, and in winter is better than snow goggles to avert blindness. But, unfortunately, it interferes with the enjoyment of the pipe, and hence is not in much favor with woodsmen. To make good bread it is not necessary to take either yeast cakes or mixing pan into the wilderness. An old hand thinks himself rich with a few pounds of flour in his sack, and soon has a batch of bread baking that would turn many a housewife green with envy. He proceeds in this fashion: A visit to the nearest hardwood ridge shows him a green parasitic lichen growing on the bark of the maples (lungwort). Some of this he gathers, and steeps it over night in warm water near the embers. In the morning he mixes his flour into a paste with this decoction, using the bag as a pan. The dough is next covered with a cloth and set in a warm corner to rise; a few hours later it is re-kneaded and baked. The result should be delicious bread. Some of the leaven, or raised dough, may be kept, and will suffice for the next batch of bread, and so on ad infinitum. Making bed takes longer in camp than in the city, but the result is just as satisfactory. Nothing more comforting than a couch of fir boughs has been devised by man. Choosing a level spot the woodsman cuts several armfuls of the feathery tips of the fir balsam. These he places in layers like shingles on a roof, beginning at the foot and laying the butt of each bough toward the head. If sufficiently deep, say a couple of feet or so, such a bed will be soft and elastic for a night or two, when it will require re-laying. Fragrant it always is, with the delicious aroma of the fir balsam. The white man stretches himself instinctively feet to the fire; the Indian just as instinctively reclines with his side to it--and his way is the most philosophical. Strange as it may seem, the greatest danger the wanderer runs is on his return to civilization. Land surveyors, engineers, and others whose work calls them into camp for months at a stretch, dread their first night in a feather bed. They find by experience that they are lucky if they escape with nothing more serious than a heavy cold. Hot, stuffy air, and poor ventilation cause the trouble. Leaving the window wide open will almost always prevent these evil consequences, and allow the constitution to become once more tolerant of a lack of oxygen. In the wilderness, notwithstanding, wet, cold, and exposure, such ills as consumption, pneumonia, bronchitis, etc., are unheard of. Boat building and net making are two arts that the prospector will do well to master. A few weeks passed in a building yard, and a half dozen lessons from an old fisherman will teach him all that he requires of these simple but extremely useful accomplishments. The best food for sustaining life in the north is pemmican. It was once made out of buffalo meat, but now the flesh of the moose, or caribou, or of the deer, is substituted. The meat is cut in thin flakes and air-dried; then a mixture is made of one-third dried meat, one-third pure haunch fat, and one-third service berries (A. canadensis). These are rammed by main force into a bag of green hide, and pounded until as solid as a rock. Such a solid mass of food will keep for years in a cool climate. Perhaps the reader may be inclined to exclaim: "Why so much about the North; why not more about the East, South or West?" My reply to such would be: Because the great finds of the future will surely be made in the North. Dr. G. W. Dawson, the best authority on the subject, has said there are 1,000,000 square miles of virgin territory in Canada to-day, and no doubt a very large proportion of it contains mineral deposits. This 1,000,000 square miles he divides into sixteen separate areas, some half as large as Ireland, others half that of Europe, and in none of them has the footfall of a white man yet been echoed. CHAPTER VII. SURVEYING. A man, to make a success of prospecting, must have what is known as "a good eye for a country." Given that faculty he will readily pick up the little knowledge of surveying that is sometimes almost indispensable. A tape measure, and a prismatic or surveying compass, are all that he is likely to require in laying off to his own satisfaction the extent of his claim, or any similar simple operation. The surveying compass has two fixed sights, and a Jacob staff mounting, into which a wooden support is inserted. The north end of the compass is always pointed ahead, while the needle, which of course indicates the magnetic north, gives the bearing of the line run toward that north. Now, magnetic north is not by any means the same thing as true north, in fact in very few localities on the earth's surface are they the same, and then never for long. In the extreme east of the United States the needle points some twenty degrees to the west of true north, and in Alaska it points thirty-five degrees to the eastward of it. There is therefore one meridian somewhere in the central valley where the true north corresponds with the magnetic north, but as the magnetic pole is always shifting this never remains true of the same meridian for long. [Illustration: SURVEYING COMPASS.] When there is no local magnetism from iron ores, or rocks containing magnetite, the needle is fairly reliable, though never perfectly accurate, but when such attraction exists the compass is unsatisfactory. Such areas of attraction, however, are usually limited, and by squinting back, taking what is known as a "back sight," a local attraction may be detected, and in that case ranging by rods must be resorted to until the compass needle once more seeks its true position. To range by rods the course of the line having been determined by retracing the route followed to the last reliable mark, a stake is driven in at that point, and the surveyor standing some little distance behind it on the correct line directs an assistant to place another rod in such a position that the first hides it from view. It will then be on a prolongation of the line, and this operation being continued the surveyor will, in due time, find himself beyond the reach of the local attraction that deflected his needle and can resume compass work. A chain is 66 feet long. Oftentimes in mountainous or brush-covered countries a half chain of 33 feet, made of light wire links, is preferred. Two men do the chaining, which could of course be done by means of an ordinary tape measure in an emergency, the leader carrying ten pins of iron or wood, and the rear man taking one up as each chain is measured off. When all are used, ten chains (1/8 mile) have been covered. The men exchange pins and the tally man, usually the hind chainman, calls out "Tally one," and cuts a notch in a stick. Careful chaining is the essence of good surveying. The chain must always be kept horizontal, or else an allowance made for the inclination at which it was held when the measurement was taken, otherwise the results will be misleading, for all surveyors' measurements of areas are theoretically on a flat surface. To ascertain the height of a tree, tower, etc., fold a square of paper across, and glancing along the hypothenuse (longest side) of the right angle so found, ascertain at what point your line of sight just catches the top of the object. Then its height is the same distance as the distance from where you stand to its foot, or the length of a plumb line falling from its summit, together with the height of your eye above the ground, added. [Illustration] Another method is to measure the shadow of the object on a level surface, next measure your own. Then As your shadow is to your height so is the shadow of the object to its height. The area of a square is equal to the square of one of its sides. The area of a triangle is equal to the base multiplied by half the height. The areas of figures containing more than three sides may always be found by resolving such figures into a series of right angled triangles. Very frequently the surveyor is called upon to measure an inaccessible line. There are many ways of solving such a problem, but one of the simplest is as follows: [Illustration] Supposing the required distance is that from bank to bank of a river (Y-X). Then lay off the base line Y-M, driving stakes at each end; make M-P at right angles to Y-M. Sight from P to X, and drive in a stake at Z. Then: Z M : M P :: Z Y : Y X. While these simple surveying problems are easily solved, the prospector should never forget that mine surveying requires skill, experience and accuracy. He will do well always to call in the service of a mining engineer should his "prospect" ever become a full-fledged mine, as little errors of direction are particularly costly mistakes when they occur underground. Should you wish to lay off a certain acreage as a square, proceed as follows: As there are ten square chains to one acre, multiply the content in acres by 10 to reduce to square chains. Then find the square root of this number of square chains, and that will be the length of a side of the square required. For instance: To lay off 25 acres as a square: 25 times 10 equals 250 square chains. Whose square root is 15.81. Ans. The plot must be 15 chains 81 links square. Seventy average paces is almost exactly equal to the side of a square acre. If you know the content and length of one of the sides of a rectangular figure it is easy to lay it off. Thus: Given a claim 10 chains long, how wide must it be to cover 5 acres? 5 times 10 equals 50 square chains. 10 divided by 50 equals 5. Ans. 5 chains wide. CHAPTER VIII. FLOATING A COMPANY. Should the prospector discover mineral that increases in amount as the mine is opened, and shows that it is likely to prove a profitable deposit, he will have little difficulty in selling out to some wealthy syndicate. But if his mine is likely to become a big producer he should try rather to organize a company, of which he should be a shareholder--the controlling one if possible--as then the output of the mine will probably make him a rich man. It is rare that a prospector selling outright obtains anything but a fraction of the value of a good mine. Nor is it reasonable to suppose he should. When he sells, the profits of the buyers are all in the future, and may never materialize. They take all risk, and consequently insist upon a bargain. The more money a prospector can invest in the development of a good mine the better price he is likely to get when he sells. Business men dearly like to see great masses of ore in the shafts and cuts, and are always more willing to pay a handsome price when they know something distinctly promising about the purchase. Let the prospector, therefore, lay open his prospect as thoroughly as he can with the means at his disposal, and if he has faith--as he should have--in the mine he is selling, let him take a good big block of stock in part payment. He must see to it, too, that sufficient working capital is provided, as there are very few mines that pay expenses from the start. Sometimes, when the shareholders are very timid, and but little money has been paid into the treasury in the first instance, they become restive after a call or two and refuse to honor further demands. This has been the ruin of many a promising venture. Supposing, however, that this mistake has been avoided, and that sufficient funds are in the treasury to meet all likely, legitimate drains upon it, the question of officers remains a weighty one. The board of directors should be level-headed, shrewd men, with common-sense, business ideas; the secretary should understand his work; and the mining engineer placed in charge of the mine should be one whose professional knowledge is equal to the demands of the position. The secretary must have such a knowledge of the proper price of labor, and material, as to detect any extravagance on the part of the manager. At least one member of the board of directors should understand mining. Good salaries paid to the mining engineer or manager, and to the secretary, will be money well spent, provided they are competent. Cheap men have no business in such responsible positions, where the handling and wise expenditure of large sums of money necessitate brains and special training. As to the mine manager, he should be a miner, surveyor, metallurgist, assayer, bookkeeper and half-dozen other things rolled into one, and that one an honest man. Very low grade ore would probably pay in the hands of such a paragon of perfection--but he must be sought for long and diligently, and even then he may not be found. New processes are to be shunned until they have proved their worth and ceased to be new. No sooner is a mine floated than all sorts of knaves and fools appear on the scene, with new and wonderful appliances for saving 99.9 per cent. of all the value in the ore. Be rude to them. Drive them away with sticks and stones if necessary, but as you value your salvation do not hearken to them. Let some one else do the experimenting; when you know a process is good, the time will have come to spend money on it. There are at the present moment thousands of tons of costly machinery rusting in lonely Rocky Mountain canyons that were in their day "novelties," warranted to save all the values in the ore, while the unfortunate shareholders, whose misspent money freighted these things to their final resting place, are now, perchance, "touching" the belated Chicago or New York pedestrians for a nickel. The only real guide to the economic value of an ore is the treatment of a large bulk of it in the mill. Plenty of ore should be kept blocked out ahead of the workings. The more ore in sight the better for the future of the mine. Lastly, remember that thieving sometimes takes place on rather a large scale, and be on the watch to detect it. But there is a bright side to mining as well as a dark, and those fortunate men who paid 3, 5 or 8 cents for the stock of a mine that now sells for $7 can see it quite plainly; and there are many such. Mining is not a gamble as some would have the world believe, but a legitimate occupation, demanding great nerve and skill, and sometimes great patience, but not infrequently rewarding the possessors of these admirable attributes by wealth almost inexhaustible. CHAPTER IX. MEDICAL HINTS. Miners as a rule are a healthy, hardy lot of men, but nevertheless they are occasionally taken ill, and there is very seldom a doctor near at hand. Moreover, by the very nature of their work they are particularly liable to accidents. The so-called miner's consumption is caused by want of fresh air. The miner passes most of his life in places where there is a great deficiency of oxygen. Deep down in the mine the air is usually very bad, being full of smoke and damp, and the hut in which he sleeps is too often overcrowded, while the places in which he seeks his amusement, should he live in a mining camp, are usually little better. The remedy for this state of affairs is to get all the fresh air possible, then consumption is not to be feared. Should poison have been swallowed, an emetic ought to be given as quickly as possible. Mustard, or salt and warm water, are tolerably efficacious, but a dose of 60 grains of ipecac is more effectual. While the emetic is acting, the patient should drink freely of warm water or warm milk. In case of apparent drowning the body should be stripped down to the waist, rapidly dried, placed on a flat surface with the head and shoulders raised a little, and hot bricks applied to the feet. Breathing should be imitated by raising the arms above the head and turning the body on its side; turn the body back on the face and press the arms down to the side. Do this about sixteen times a minute, and keep it up half an hour if necessary. In case of a wound which bleeds freely, a distinction must be made between blood issuing from a vein and blood issuing from an artery. In the first instance, it will be nearly black, or at least very dark; in the second, it will be bright red and spurt forth. When from a vein, bleeding must be controlled by pressure below the wound, that is, farther away from the heart, while in the case of an artery, which is always more dangerous, immediate pressure must be made above the wound on the line of the artery between the wound and the heart. A pebble rolled up in a handkerchief and tied around the limb, with the stone directly above the artery, and tightened by twisting a stick in it, is a good rough-and-ready means to stop bleeding. Sometimes a pad should be placed between the handkerchief and the artery. Anything that excludes the air, such as wheat flour, or olive oil, or boiled linseed, or grated raw potato, is good to spread over a burn. If any considerable surface is burned the patient is in great danger, but small burns are rarely fatal, although they may be very painful. The best application of all is linseed oil and lime water. Scurvy is a disease that is very much to be dreaded whenever fresh meat and vegetables are scarce. It is now thought to be a condition of acid-poisoning, and the remedy is alkaline salts, such as carbonate of soda or carbonate of potash. Lime juice is also an anti-scorbutic. In cold weather a diet of almost exclusively fresh fat meat will keep off scurvy. Pneumonia is usually most fatal in crowded camps, where the men do not get a sufficient amount of pure, fresh air. CHAPTER X. DYNAMITE. Dynamite should be stored in a magazine which must be dry, cool, and well ventilated. Bricks are best, but when built of wood, the frame should be covered inside and out with boards allowing the air to have free circulation between the walls, so that the inner wall may not be heated by the sun. Do not store your caps with your dynamite. If powder was well made, it is as good a dozen years afterwards as it was on the day it came from the mill. Most accidents occur in thawing dynamite. Dynamite freezes between 40 and 45 degrees Far., that is, 10 degrees above the freezing point of water, and although it does not explode, if heated slowly, until 320 degrees Far. is reached, yet the quick application of dry heat may explode it at 120 degrees Far. This makes it so dangerous, for a stick of powder hot enough to explode under certain conditions may be held in the hand with little inconvenience. Powder should be thawed by placing it in a water-tight vessel and the vessel set in hot water. It should never be placed on or under a stove, or in an oven, or on a boiler wall to thaw out, as is so often done by the unthinking. Frozen dynamite is especially liable to explode from heat quickly applied. Nevertheless, reckless men will continue to blow themselves to pieces by foolhardy carelessness. Frozen powder is unfit for use. It will burn or smoulder, and some of it may be left in the drill hole to explode when it is not wanted to. CHAPTER XI. ATOMIC WEIGHTS. The atomic weight of a mineral is the proportion in which its elements are united, i.e., they represent the weights of the different atoms in the minerals. Hydrogen, being lightest, is made the unit. Supposing it becomes desirable to find the proportional weights of the elements of any substance with a known chemical formula. Multiply the atomic weight of each element by the number of atoms of such element, and add these products together; this will give the weight of all. The proportion of each is arrived at by a simple calculation. For instance: How much metallic silver is there in 100 pounds of Argentite, or silver glance, whose composition is Ag{2}S? Then Ag equals 108 times 2,--216. S equals 32 times 1,--32. So that in every 248 pounds of the glance there are 216 pounds of metallic silver, and by proportion we find its percentage is 87.1. The following tables give the symbols, atomic weights and specific gravities of certain abundant elements. Rare elements are omitted: Symbol. At. Wt. Sp. Gr. Aluminum Al 27.5 2.56 Antimony Sb 122.0 6.70 Arsenic As 75 5.70 Barium Ba 137 4.00 Bismuth Bi 210 9.7 Calcium Ca 40 1.58 Carbon C 12 3.50 Chromium Cr 52.5 6.81 Cobalt Co 58.8 7.70 Copper Cu 63.5 8.96 Gold (Aurum) Au 196.77 19.30 Hydrogen H 1.0 0.069 Iodine I 127.0 4.94 Iron (Ferrum) Fe 56.0 7.79 Lead (Plumbum) Pb 207.0 11.44 Manganese Mn 55.0 8.1 Mercury (Hydrargyrum) Hg 200 13.59 Nickel Ni 58.8 8.60 Nitrogen N 14.0 0.972 Oxygen O 16.0 1.105 Phosphorus P 31.0 1.83 Platinum Pt 197.4 21.53 Potassium (Kalium) K 39.0 0.865 Selenium Se 79.5 4.78 Silicon Si 28.0 2.49 Silver (Argentum) Ag 108.0 10.05 Sodium (Natrium) Na 23.0 0.972 Sulphur S 32.0 2.05 Tellurium Te 129.0 6.02 Tin (Stannum) Sn 118.0 7.28 Zinc Zn 65.0 7.14 CHAPTER XII. ODDS AND ENDS. MINER'S INCH. A miner's inch of water varies in different States, and is, therefore, not a fixed quantity. In some States it means the quantity of water that will flow through an orifice one inch square on the bottom or side of a box under a pressure of four inches. Under these conditions a miner's inch will discharge 2259 cubic feet, or 17,648 gallons every twenty-four hours, which is at the rate of 12 gallons a minute. Fifty of these miner's inches are equal to a cubic foot of water discharged every second. One cubic foot of water a second would be sufficient to supply the wants of seven thousand city dwellers. In calculating the amount of water required by a stamp mill it is usual to allow 72 gallons for every stamp, 120 gallons for every pan, 75 gallons for every settler, 120 gallons for every Fruevanner, 30 gallons for a concentrator, 350 gallons for a jig, and 7-1/2 gallons for every horse-power of a boiler each hour. If the water after passing through the mill is impounded and used over again, the loss will be about 25 per cent. LUMBER IN A LOG. To Find: Multiply the diameter in inches at the small end by one-half the number of inches, and again multiply this product by the length of the log in feet; this product divided by 12 will give the number of feet of one-inch boards the log will make. HORSE-POWER OF BOILERS. For horizontal, tubular and flue boilers, divide the number of feet of heating surface by 15; this will give the horse-power. A cord of pine wood weighing 2,000 pounds is about equal to 1,000 pounds of soft coal for steam purposes. Each foot of grate should burn 20 pounds of soft coal, or 40 of wood, per hour, with a natural draught. HORSE-POWER OF AN ENGINE. Multiply the area of the cylinder in square inches by the average effective pressure in pounds to the square inch, deducting three pounds per square inch for friction. Multiply this remainder by the speed of the piston in feet per minute, and divide by 33,000. The quotient will be the true horse-power. HORSE-POWER OF PELTON WHEEL. The Pelton wheel is in high favor with California miners. When the head of water is known in feet, multiply by 0.0024147 and the product is the horse-power that one miner's inch of water will give. ASSAYING. The muffle furnaces of the Morgan Crucible Company of Battersea are favorably known. The most useful size is that taking a "D" Muffle, 8-1/2 inches by 5 inches by 3-1/4 inches. A CHEAP "TESTING" OUTFIT. Sometimes the pioneer is forced to attempt a good many investigations with very simple apparatus. Should he possess the following, he can achieve much: A spirit lamp, candle, blow-pipe, magnet, a bottle of hydrochloric acid, quart glass jar, three test tubes with corks, two feet of glass tubing (hard glass), copper wire, two square inches of tin plate, forceps and test paper. Such an outfit could certainly be bought for $1. WEIGHT OF EARTH, SAND, GRAVEL, ETC. A ton of shingle averages 23 cubic feet. A ton of pit sand averages 22 cubic feet. A ton of earth averages 21 cubic feet. A ton of river sand averages 19 cubic feet. A ton of coarse gravel averages 19 cubic feet. A ton of clay averages 18 cubic feet. A ton of marl averages 18 cubic feet. A ton of chalk averages 14 cubic feet. WEIGHTS OF ORES AND ROCKS. Quartz, 162 pounds a cubic foot; silver glance, 455 pounds; ruby silver, 362; brittle silver, 386; horn silver, 345; antimony glance, 287; cinnabar, 549; copper pyrites, 262; gray copper, 280; galena, 461; zinc blende, 249; iron pyrites, 312; limestone, 174; clay, 162. CALIFORNIA PUMP. A very useful pump, in regions where transportation is a problem, is the California pump. It is a rough chain-pump. A box 10 inches by 3 inches, inside measurement, and 10 feet to 30 feet in length, according to requirements, forms a tube reaching from the water to be removed to the level at which it is to be discharged. In this an endless band of stout canvas or leather works, passing under a roller at the lower end, which is immersed in the water. At the higher end the belt passes around a drum worked by water, horse, or manual power. On the belt are wooden or metal projections that fit the box, forcing the water upward as the drum revolves. HYDRAULIC DATA. The prospector, and more especially the miner, will do well to commit the following figures to memory: An Imperial gallon of water weighs 10 pounds. Gallons multiplied by .1606 equals cubic feet. Cubic feet multiplied by 6.288 equals gallons. Gallons multiplied by 277.46 equals cubic inches. Cubic inches multiplied by 0.003604 equals gallons. Cubic feet multiplied by 62.8 equals pounds. Pounds multiplied by .0166 equals cubic feet. Gallons multiplied by 0.004464 equals tons. Tons multiplied by 224 equals gallons. Tons multiplied by 35.97 equals cubic feet. A head of 10 feet gives a pressure of about 4-1/3 pounds to the square inch. Let H represent the head of water in feet, and P the pressure to the square inch. Then: H equals P times 2.311. P equals H times .4326. A FIRE LUTE. To make a fire-proof joint between the lid and body of a retort, or crucible, use the following as a lute: Quartz sand. 8 parts. Clay (pure as possible) 2 parts. Horse dung 1 part. Mix and temper like mortar. CONTENTS OF A VEIN. To find the number of cubic feet per fathom of matter in a vein, multiply its thickness in inches by 3. Great care is requisite in estimating the ore in a vein or the amount of mineral in sight. Very clever men often make grave mistakes in such calculations. A MAKE-SHIFT FLUX. Rough smelting may be done with powdered white glass, though either borax or carbonate of soda is better. As soon as the gold is melted and the flux fluid and still, remove the bulk of the flux with an iron spoon, and pour the metal into a clay mould. Crush the flux for gold. SAVING BLAST SAMPLES. Place a quantity of spruce boughs over a hole before firing the shot, and very few stones will fly. A SIMPLE RETORT. Squeeze the quicksilver amalgam containing gold through a chamois skin or piece of cotton until it is as dry as you can get it. Then take a large potato, cut off one end and hollow out a piece of it large enough to receive the amalgam. Heat a shovel or a piece of sheet iron red hot, hold the potato up and press the shovel to it, covering the amalgam. As soon as the potato sticks fast to the shovel, turn it over so that the potato is on the top and place it over the fire and keep it red hot until the retorting is finished. As soon as it cools, loosen the potato with a knife, and the gold will be underneath and the quicksilver in the potato. The quicksilver may be recovered by bruising the potato to pulp in a cup with water. CLEANING AMALGAMATED PLATES. [Illustration] A very simple plan for getting the gold off an amalgamated copper plate is as follows: Take out the surface dirt for the depth of nine inches over an area a little larger than the plate to be scaled; place six bricks around the excavation as supports for the plate. Make a brick fire, and let it burn down to red hot embers. Lay the plate on three iron bars resting on the bricks, and cover the face with strips of old blanket soaked in a strong solution of borax. Keep the blankets wet with the solution, and when the amalgam is white, remove the plate and scrape. CALCULATING WEIGHT OF ORE. Measure the cubic contents of the mass; multiply this by the weight of one cubic foot of the mineral. For small masses, where no scales are at hand, fill a bucket with water, and stand it in an empty barrel. Fill the bucket brimful; introduce the rock, or ore, and measure the water it displaces. Find the number of cubic inches in the overflow by reference to the following table: 1 gallon equals 231 cubic inches. 1 quart equals 57.75 cubic inches. 1 pint equals 28.87 cubic inches. 1 gill equals 7.21 cubic inches. Multiply the total so found by the specific gravity of the ore, and the result will be the answer sought. Supposing the bottom of the bin to be wedge-shaped, measure half the height from the bottom to the top and multiply the number of feet by the width and length, both in feet. This will give number of cubic feet in the bin. Multiply the number of cubic feet by the weight of one cubic foot of the ore, and the result will show the number of pounds of ore the bin will hold. Divide by 2,000 to reduce to tons. MINING REGULATIONS. The mining regulations of every country differ, and the prospector must learn by heart the provisions of the one he works under. A claim notice written with a hard pencil or surveyor's marking lead on a soft pine board will last for years. WEIGHTS AND MEASURES. Troy Weight. 24 grains 1 pennyweight. 20 pwts. 1 ounce. 12 ounces 1 pound. Long Measure. 12 inches 1 foot. 3 feet 1 yard. 2 yards 1 fathom. 16-1/2 feet 1 rod. 4 rods 1 chain. 10 chains 1 furlong. 8 furlongs 1 mile. Square Measure. 9 sq. feet 1 sq. yard. 30-1/4 sq. yds. 1 sq. rod. 40 sq. rods 1 sq. rood. 4 sq. roods 1 sq. acre. 640 sq. acres 1 sq. mile. An acre is 209 feet square. Land Measure. 7.92 inches 1 link. 25 links 1 rod. 4 rods 1 chain. 80 chains 1 mile. Avoirdupois Weight. 16 drams 1 ounce. 16 ounces 1 pound. 25 pounds 1 quarter. 4 quarters 1 cwt. 20 cwt. (2,000 pounds) 1 ton. Apothecary's Weight. 20 grains 1 scruple. 3 scruples 1 dram. 8 drams 1 ounce. 12 ounces 1 pound. GLOSSARY. Adamantine--Having diamond luster. Adit--A horizontal tunnel from the surface draining a mine. Alluvium--Deposit by streams. Amalgamation--Combining mercury with another metal. Analysis--A chemical search whereby the nature (qualitative) and amount (quantitative) of the components of a substance are found out. Aqua regia--A mixture of 3 parts hydrochloric acid with 1 part strong nitric acid. Arenaceous--Sandy. Argentiferous--Silver-bearing. Argillaceous--Clay-bearing. Arrastra--A rotary and primitive mill. Assay--A test. Assay-ton--29.166 2-3 grammes. Auriferous--Gold-bearing. Bar--Obstruction in the bed of a river. Bar-diggings--Claims in the shallows of streams. Base Metals--Those not classed as precious. Batea--Mexican gold-washing dish. Battery--A set of stamps for crushing. Bed--A seam or deposit. Bed-rock--Solid stratum below porous material. Bench--Old river bed; also called a terrace. Booming--The sudden discharge of accumulated water. Bort--Black diamond. Calcite--Carbonate of lime. Canon--Pronounced canyon; a gorge. Carat--About 4 grains Troy. Cement--Compacted gravel. Color--A speck of gold. Country Rock--The rock enclosing a vein. Cradle--A mining apparatus; also called a rocker. Cupriferous--Copper-bearing. Decrepitate--Crackling when hot. Development--Work done in opening a mine. Dip--The inclination of a vein at right angles to its length. Dolly--A primitive stamp-mill. Drift--A horizontal gallery in a mine; or the rubbish left by the last ice age. Drifting--Driving a tunnel. Dump--A heap of vein stuff, etc. Exploitation--The actual mining following exploration. Fathom--Six feet. Fault--A break in a vein or bed. Float-gold--Fine grains that do not sink in the water. Float--Veinstone or ore by which a vein is traced. Flume--Wooden troughs carrying water. Flux--Material added to help fusion. Foliated--In thin layers. Gangue--Veinstone. Gouge--A selvage of clay between vein and country rock. Grade--The inclination of a ditch, etc. Grating--Perforated iron sheet, or bars with spaces. Gravel--Broken down, rounded rock fragments. Ground Sluice--A gutter in which gold is washed. Iridescent--Showing the hues of the rainbow. Litharge--Proto oxide of lead. Long Tom--A machine for saving alluvial gold. Marl--Clay containing lime. Miner's Inch--An arbitrary measure of water regulated by local custom. Mundic--Iron pyrites. Open Cut--A surface working. Outcrop--That part of a vein showing on the surface. Oxidation--A chemical union with oxygen. Oxide--Combination of a metal with oxygen. Panning--Washing gravel, or crushed rock, in a gold-miner's pan to detect gold, etc. Peroxide--The oxide of any substance that is richest in oxygen. Placer--A deposit of valuable metal in gravel. Plat--A map from an original survey. Plumbago--Graphite or black lead. Precipitate--Matter separated from a solution. Pulp--Pulverized ore mixed with water. Quarry--An open working. Quartz--Silica. Quartzose--Containing a large proportion of quartz. Reduce--To turn ore into metal by taking away oxygen. Riffle--A groove or strip to catch gold and mercury in a sluice. Roasting--Heating in contact with air. Shaft--A pit giving access to a vein or working. Stratum--Bed or layer. Striated--Marked with parallel workings. Strip--To remove overlying material from a vein. Sulphate--A salt containing sulphuric acid. Sulphide--A combination of sulphur and a metal. Sulphurets--When the miner employs this term he usually means pyrites. Tailings--The refuse matter after ore has been crushed. Throw--The movements of vein caused by a fault; it may be up or down. Translucent--If light passes through a mineral, it is translucent; if you can see the details of an object through it, it is transparent. Underlie--The same thing as dip. Unstratified--Without stratification or bedding. Wash Dirt--Auriferous gravel or clay. Whim--A machine for hoisting by a revolving drum. Winze--An interior shaft connecting the levels. Zinc--White oxide of zinc. 
15195	----	ROSE OF OLD HARPETH [Illustration: Rose Mary] ROSE OF OLD HARPETH BY MARIA THOMPSON DAVIESS Author of "Miss Selina Lue," "The Road to Providence," "The Melting of Molly," etc. [Illustration] WITH ILLUSTRATIONS By W.B. KING A.L. BURT COMPANY PUBLISHERS NEW YORK 1911 THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY I DEDICATE ROSE MARY TO MY MOTHER LEONORA HAMILTON DAVIESS AND THE WHOLE BOOK TO MY GRANDMOTHER MARIA THOMPSON DAVIESS ROSE OF OLD HARPETH CHAPTER I ROSE MARY OF SWEETBRIAR "Why, don't you know nothing in the world compliments a loaf of bread like the asking for a fourth slice," laughed Rose Mary as she reached up on the stone shelf above her head and took down a large crusty loaf and a long knife. "Thick or thin?" she asked as she raised her lashes from her blue eyes for a second of hospitable inquiry. "Thin," answered Everett promptly, "but two with the butter sticking 'em together. Please be careful with that weapon! It's as good as a juggler's show to watch you, but it makes me slightly--solicitous." As he spoke he seated himself on the corner of the wide stone table as near to Rose Mary and the long knife as seemed advisable. A ray of sunlight fell through the door of the milk-house and cut across his red head to lose itself in Rose Mary's close black braids. "Make it four," he further demanded over the table. "Indeed and I will," answered Rose Mary delightedly. And as she spoke she held the loaf against her breast and drew the knife through the slices in a fascinatingly dangerous manner. At the intentness of his regard the color rose up under the lashes that veiled her eyes, and she hugged the loaf closer with her left hand. "Would you like six?" she asked innocently, as the fourth stroke severed the last piece. "Just go on and slice it all up," he answered with a laugh. "I'd rather watch you than eat." "Wait till I butter these for you and then you can eat--and watch me--me finish working the butter. Won't that do as well? Think what an encouragement your interest will be to me! Really, nothing in the world paces a woman's work like a man looking on, and if he doesn't stop her she'll drop under the line. Now, you have your bread and butter and you can sit over there by the door and help me turn off this ten pounds in no time." As she had been speaking, Rose Mary had spread two of the slices with the yellow butter from a huge bowl in front of her, clapped on the tops of the sandwiches and then, with a smile, handed them in a blue plate to the man who lounged across the corner of her table. She made a very gracious and lovely picture, did Rose Mary, in her light-blue homespun gown against the cool gray depths of the milk-house, which was fern-lined along the cracks of the old stones and mysterious with the trickling gurgle of the spring that flowed into the long stone troughs, around the milk crocks and out under the stone door-sill. From his post by the door Everett watched her as she drove her paddle deep into the hard golden mound in the blue bowl in front of her, and, with a quick turn of her strong, slender wrist slapped and patted chunk after chunk of the butter into a more compressed form. The sleeves of her dress were rolled almost to her shoulders and under the white, moist flesh of her arms the fine muscles showed plainly. The strong curves of her back and shoulders bent and sprung under the graceful sweep of her arms and her round breasts rose and fell with quickened breath from her energetic movements. "Now, you're making me work _too_ hard," she laughed; and she panted as she rested her hand for a second against the edge of the bowl and looked up at Everett from under a black tendril curl that had fallen down across her forehead. "Miss Rose Mary Alloway, you are one large, husky--witch," calmly remarked the hungry man as he finished disposing of the last half of one of the thin bread and butters. "Here I sit enchanted by--by a butter-paddle, when you and I both know that not two miles across the meadows there runs a train that ought to put me into New York in a little over forty-eight hours. Won't you, won't you let me go--back to my frantic and imploring employers?" "Why no, I can't," answered Rose Mary as she pressed a yellow cake of butter on to a blue plate and deftly curled it up with her paddle into a huge yellow sunflower. "Uncle Tucker captured you roaming loose out in his fields and he trusts you to me while he is at work and I must keep you safe. He's fond of you and so are the Aunties and Stonewall Jackson and Shoofly and Sniffer and--" "And anybody else?" demanded Everett, preparing to dispose of the last bite. "Oh, everybody most along Providence Road," answered Rose Mary enthusiastically, though not raising her eyes from the manipulation of the third butter flower. "Can't you go out and dig up some more rocks and things? I feel sure you haven't got a sample of all of them. And there may be gold and silver and precious jewels just one inch deeper than you have dug. Are you certain you can't squeeze up some oil somewhere in the meadow? You told a whole lot of reasons to Uncle Tucker why you knew you would find some, and now you'll have to stay to prove yourself." "No," answered Mark Everett quietly, and, as he spoke, he raised his eyes and looked at Rose Mary keenly; "no, there is no oil that I can discover, though the formation, as I explained to your uncle, is just as I expected to find it. I've spent three weeks going over every inch of the Valley and I can't find a trace of grease. I'm sorry." "Well, I don't know that I care, except for your sake," answered Rose Mary unconcernedly, with her eyes still on her task. "We don't any of us like the smell of coal-oil, and it gives Aunt Viney asthma. It would be awfully disagreeable to have wells of it right here on the place. They'd be so ugly and smelly." "But oil-wells mean--mean a great deal of wealth," ventured Everett. "I know, but just think of the money Uncle Tucker gets for this butter I make from the cows that graze on the meadows. Wouldn't it be awful if they should happen to drink some of the coal-oil and make the butter we send down to the city taste wrong and spoil the Sweetbriar reputation? I like money though, most awfully, and I want some right now. I want to--" "Mary of the Rose, stop right there!" said Everett as he came over from his post by the door and again seated himself on the corner of the table. "I _will_ not listen to you give vent to the national craving. I _will_ hold on to the illusion of having found one unmercenary human being, even if she had to be buried in the depths of Harpeth Valley to keep her so." There was banter in Everett's voice and a smile on his lips, but a bitterness lay in the depths of his keen dark eyes and an ugly trace of cynicism filtered through the tones of his voice. "And wasn't it funny for me to count the little well-chickens before they were even hatched?" laughed Rose Mary. "That's the way of it, get together even a little flock of dollars in prospect and they go right to work hatching out a brood of wants and needs; but it's not wrong of me to want those false teeth so bad, because it's such a trial to have your mouth all sink in and not be able to talk plain and--" "Help, woman! What are you talking about? I never saw such teeth as you have in all my life. One flash of them would put a beauty show out of business and--" "Oh, no, not for myself!" Rose Mary hastened to exclaim, and she turned the whole artillery of the pearl treasures upon him in mirth at his mistake. "It's Aunt Viney I want them for. She only has five left. She says she didn't mind so long as she had any two that hit, but the hitters to all five are gone now and she is so distressed. I'm saving up to take her down to the city to get a brand new set. I have eleven dollars now and two little bull calves to sell, though it breaks my heart to let them go, even if they are of the wrong persuasion. I always love them better than I do the little heifers, because I have to give them up. I don't like to have things I love go away. You see you mustn't think of going to New York until the spring is all over and summer comes for good," she continued, with the most delightful ingenuousness, as she shaped the last of the ten flowers and glanced from her task at him with the most solicitous concern. "Of course, you feel as if the smash your lung got in that awful rock slide has healed all up, and I know it has, but you'll have to do as the doctor tells you about not running any risks with New York spring gales, won't you?" "Oh, yes, I suppose I will," answered Everett, with a trace of restlessness in his voice. "I'm just as sound as a dollar now and I'm wild to go with that gang the firm is sending up into British Columbia to thrash out that copper question. I know they counted on me for the final tests. Some other fellow will find it and get the fortune and the credit, while I--I--" He stared moodily out the door of the milk-house and down Providence Road that wound its calm, even way from across the ridge down through the green valley. Rose Mary's milk-house was nestled between the breasts of a low hill, upon which was perched the wide-winged, old country house which had brooded the fortunes of the Alloways since the wilderness days. The spring which gushed from the back wall of the milk-house poured itself into a stone trough on the side of the Road, which had been placed there generations agone for the refreshment of beast, while man had been entertained within the hospitable stone walls. And at the foot of the Briars, as the Alloway home, hill, spring and meadows had been called from time immemorial, clustered the little village of Sweetbriar. The store, which also sheltered the post-office, was almost opposite the spring-house door across the wide Road, the blacksmith shop farther down and the farm-houses stretched fraternally along either side in both directions. Far up the Road, as it wound its way around Providence Nob, could be seen the chimneys and the roofs of Providence, while Springfield and Boliver also lay like smoke-wreathed visions in the distance. Something of the peace and plenty of it all had begun to smooth the irritated wrinkle from between Mark Everett's brows, when Rose Mary's hand rested for a second over his on the table and her rich voice, with its softest brooding note, came from across her bowl. "Ah, I know it's hard for you, Mr. Mark," she said, "and I wish--I wish--The lilacs will be in bloom next week, won't that help some?" And the wooing tone in her voice was exactly what she used in coaxing young Stonewall Jackson to bed or Uncle Tucker to tie up his throat in a flannel muffler. "It's not lilacs I'm needing with a rose in bloom right--" But Everett's gallant response to the coaxing was cut short by a sally from an unexpected quarter. Down Providence Road at full tilt came Stonewall Jackson, with the Swarm in a cloud of dust at his heels. He jumped across the spring branch and darted in under the milk-house eaves, while the Swarm drew up on the other bank in evident impatience. Swung bundle-wise under his arm he held a small, tow-headed bunch, and as he landed on the stone door-sill he hastily deposited it on the floor at Rose Mary's feet. "Say, Rose Mamie," he panted, "you just keep Shoofly for us a little while, won't you? Mis' Poteet have done left her with Tobe to take care of and he put her on a stump while he chased a polecat that he fell on while it was going under a fence, and now Uncle Tuck is a-burying of him up in the woods lot. Jest joggle her with your foot this way if she goes to cry." And in demonstration of his directions the General put one bare foot in the middle of the mite's back and administered a short series of rotary motions, which immediately brought a response of ecstatic gurgles. "We'll come back for her as soon as we dig him up," he added, as he prepared for another flying leap across the spring stream. "But, Stonie, wait and tell me what you mean!" exclaimed Rose Mary, while Everett regarded Stonewall Jackson and his cohorts with delighted amusement. "I told you once, Rose Mamie, that Tobe fell on a polecat under a fence he was a-chasing, and he smells so awful Uncle Tuck have burned his britches and shirt on the end of a stick and have got him buried in dirt up to jest his nose. Burying in dirt is the onliest thing that'll take off the smell. We comed to ask you to watch Shoofly while he's buried, cause Mis' Poteet will be mad at him when she comes home if Shoofly smells. We're all a-going to stay right by him until he's dug up, 'cause we all sicked him on that polecat and we ought in honor!" Stonie looked at the Swarm for confirmation of this worthy sentiment, and it arose in a murmur. The Swarm was a choice congregation of small fry that trailed perpetually at the heels of Stonewall Jackson, and at the moment was in a state of seething excitement. Jennie Rucker's little freckled face was pale under its usual sunburn, as a result of being too near the disastrous encounter, and her little nose, turned up by nature in the outset, looked as if it were in danger of never again assuming its normal tilt. She held small Pete by one chubby hand, and with a wry face he was licking out an absurd little red tongue at least twice each moment, as if uncertain as to whether his olfactory or gustatory nerves had been offended. Billy was standing with the nonchalant unconcern of one strong of stomach, and the four other little Poteets, ranging in size from Shoofly, on the floor, to Tobe, the buried, were shuffling their bare feet in the dust with evident impatience to be off to gloat over the prostrated but important member of the family. They rolled their wide eyes at almost impossible angles, and small Peggy sniffed audibly into a corner of her patched gingham apron. "Yes, Stonie," answered Rose Mary judicially, while Everett's shoulders shook with mirth that he felt it best not to give way to in the face of the sympathetic Swarm, "you all must stay with Tobe, if he has to be buried, and go right back as fast as you can. Troubles must make us stay close by our friends." "If I get much closer to him I'll throw up," sniffed Jennie, and her protest was echoed by a groan from Peggy into the apron, while the area which showed above its folds turned white at the prospect of being obliged to draw near to this brother in affliction. "Yes, but you sicked Tobe, with the rest of us, and in this _girls_ don't count. You've got to go back, smell or no smell, sick or no sick," announced the General firmly, in the decisive tones of one accustomed to be obeyed. "Yes, Stonie," came in a meek and muffled tone from the apron, "we'll go back with you." "Can't we just set on the fence of the lot--it ain't so far?" pleaded Jennie in almost a wail. "I'm afraid Pete will cry from the smell if we go any closter. He's most doing it now." "Yes, General, let the girls sit on the fence," pleaded Everett, with his eyes dancing, but a bit of mockery in his voice, "after all they are--girls, you know." "Oh, well, yes, they can," answered Stonewall Jackson in a magnanimously disgusted tone of voice. "They always get girls when they don't want to do anything. Come on, Tobe'll be crying if we don't hurry. Billy, you help Jennie drag Pete, so he can go fast!" But during the conference the disgusted toddler had been pondering the situation, and at this mention of his being dragged back to the scene of offense he had made a quick sally across the plank that spanned the spring branch and with masculine intuition as to the safe place in time of danger, he had plunged head foremost into Rose Mary's skirts, so that only his small fat back showed to the enemy. "Please go on, Stonie, and leave him with me--he's just a baby," pleaded Rose Mary. "All right," answered the General, "Tobe don't care about him; he'd just make us go slow," and thus dropping young Peter into the category of impedimenta, the General departed at top speed, surrounded, as he came, by the loyal Swarm. On the day of his birth Aunt Viney's choice for a name for the General had balanced for some hours between that of the redoubtable Abner the Valiant, of old Testament fame, and her favorite modern hero, Jackson of the stonewall nature. And in her final choice she had seemed so to impress the infant that he had developed more than a little of the nature of his patron commander. At all times Stonie commanded the Swarm, and also at all times was strictly obeyed. Then seeing herself thus deserted by her companions, Shoofly began a low, musical hum of a wail and walled large eyes up at Everett, at whose feet she was seated. In instant sympathetic response he applied the toe of his shoe to the small of the whimpering tot's back and proceeded awkwardly, though with the best intentions in the world, to follow the General's directions as to pacification. Rose Mary laughed as she took a tin-cup from a nail in the wall, and filling it with milk from one of the crocks, she knelt at the side of the deserted one and held the brim to the red lips of Shoofly's generous mouth. With a series of gurgles and laps the consoling draft was quickly consumed and the whimperer left by this double ministration in a state of placid contentment. Peter the wise had stood viewing these attentions to the other baby with stolid imperturbability, but as Rose Mary turned away to her table he licked out his pink tongue and bobbed his head toward the milk crocks, while his solemn eyes conveyed his desire without words. Peter's vocabulary was both new and limited, and he was at all times extremely careful against any wastefulness of it. His lips quivered as if in uncertainty as to whether he was to be left out of this lactic deal, and his eyes grew reproachful. "Why, man alive, did you think I had forgotten you!" exclaimed Rose Mary as she turned with the cup to one of the crocks standing in the water, at the sight of which motion relief dawned in the serious eyes of the young petitioner. Filling the cup swiftly, she lifted the youngster in her arms and came over to sit in the door beside Shoofly at Everett's feet. With dignified deliberation Peter began to consume his draft in slow gulps, and after each one he lifted his eyes to Rose Mary's face as if rendering courteous appreciation for the consumed portion. His chubby fingers were clasped around her wrist as she held the cup for him, and her other hand cuddled one of his bare, briar-scratched knees. The picture had its instituted effect on Everett, and he bent toward the little group in the doorway and rested his elbows on his knees as his world-restless eyes softened and the lines around his mouth melted into a smile. "Rose Mary," he said with an almost abashed note in his deep voice, "we'll dispense with the lilacs--they're not needed as retainers, and I don't deserve them." "But being good will bring you the lilacs of life; whether you think you deserve them or not, I'm afraid it's inevitable," answered Rose Mary, as she smiled up at him with instant appreciation of his change of mood. "Well, I'll try it this once and see what happens," answered Everett with a laugh. "Indeed, I'm ashamed of having shown you any impatience at all--to think of impatience in this heaven country of hospitality amounts to positive sacrilege. Shrive me--and then bring on your lilacs!" "Then you'll stay with us until it's safe for you to go North and I won't have to worry about you any more?" exclaimed Rose Mary, delighted, as she beamed up over Pete's tow-head that had dropped with repletion on her breast. Shoofly, who, true to her appellation, had been making funny little dabs of delight at a fly or two which had buzzed in her direction, had crawled nearer and burrowed her head under Rose Mary's knee, rolled over on her little stomach and gone instantaneously and exhaustedly to sleep. Rose Mary adjusted a smothering fold of her dress and continued in her rejoicing over Everett's surrender to circumstance inevitable. "And do you think you can dig some more in the fields? Don't happiness and hoe mean the same thing to most men?" she questioned with a laugh. "Yes, hoe to the death and the devil take the last man at the end of the row, fortune to the first!" answered Everett with a return of his cynical look and tone. "Oh, but in the world some men just go along and chop down ugly weeds, stir up the good, smelly earth for things to grow in, reach over to help the man in the next furrow if he needs it, and all come home at sundown together--and the women have the supper ready. That's the kind of hoeing I want you to do--please dig me up those teeth for Aunt Viney and I'll have johnny-cake and fried chicken waiting for you every night. Please, sir, promise!" And Rose Mary's voice sounded its coaxing, comforting note, while her deep eyes brooded over him. "I promise," answered Everett with a laugh. "I tell you what I think I will do. As I understand it, the Briars has about three hundred acres, all told. I have been all over it for the oil and there is none in any paying quantities. But in this kind of formation any number of other things may crop up or out. I am going to go over every acre of it carefully and find exactly what can be expected of it. There may be nothing of any value in a mineral way, but as I go I am going to make soil tests, and then put it all down on a complete map and figure out just what your Uncle Tucker ought to plant in each place for years to come. It will kill a lot of time, and then it might be doing something for you dear people, who have taken a miserable, cross invalid of a stranger man in out of the wet and made a well chap of him again. "Do you know what you have done for me? That day when I had tramped over from Boliver just to get away from the Citizens' Hotel and myself and perched upon Mr. Alloway's north lot fence like a miserable funeral crow, I had reached my limit, and my spirit had turned its face to the wall. I had been down South six weeks and couldn't see that I felt one bit stronger. I had just heard of this copper expedition from one of the chaps, who had written me a heedlessly exultant letter about it, and I was down and out and no strength left to fight. I was too weak to take it like a man, and couldn't make up my mind to cry like a woman, though I wanted to. Just as it was at its worst your Uncle Tucker appeared on the other side of the fence, and when he looked at me with those great, heaven-big eyes of his I fell over into his arms with a funny, help-has-come dying gasp. As you know, when I woke I was anchored in the middle of that puffy old four-poster in my room under the blessed roof of the Briars and you were pouring something glorious and hot down my throat, while the wonderful old angel-man in the big gray hat, who had got me out in the field, was flapping his wings around on the other side of the pillows. I went to sleep under your very hands--and I haven't waked up yet--except in ugly, impatient ways. I never want to." "I wonder what you would be like--awake?" said Rose Mary softly, as she gently lowered the head of young Peter down into the hollow of her arm, where, in close proximity to Shoofly's, he nodded off into the depths. "I think I'm afraid to try waking you. I'm always so happy when Aunt Viney has snuffed away her asthma with jimson weed and got down on her pillow, and I have rubbed all her joints; when the General has said his prayers without stopping to argue in the middle, and Uncle Tucker has finished his chapter and pipe in bed without setting us all on fire, that I regard people asleep as in a most blessed condition. Won't you please try and stay happy, tucked away fast here at the Briars, without wanting to wake up and go all over New York, when I won't know whether you are getting cold or hungry or wet or a pain in your lungs?" "Again I promise! Just wake me enough to go out and hoe for you is all I ask--your row and your kind of hoeing." "Maybe hoeing in my row will make you finish your own in fine style," laughed Rose Mary. "And I think it's wonderful of you to study up our land so Uncle Tucker can do better with it. We never seem to be able to make any more than just the mortgage interest, and what we'll wear when the trunks in the garret are empty I don't see. We'll have to grow feathers. Things like false teeth just seem to be impossible." "Do you mean to tell me that the Briars is seriously encumbered?" demanded Everett, with a quick frown showing between his brows and a business-keen look coming into his eyes. "The mortgage on the Briars covers it as completely as the vines on the wall," answered Rose Mary quickly, with a humorous quirk at her mouth that relieved the note of pain in her voice. "I know we can never pay it, but if something could be done to keep it for the old folks _always_, I think Stonie and I could stand it. They were born here and their roots strike deep and twine with the roots of every tree and bush at the Briars. Their graves are over there behind the stone wall, and all their joys and sorrows have come to them along Providence Road. I am not unhappy over it, because I know that their Master isn't going to let anything happen to take them away. Every night before I go to sleep I just leave them to Him until I can wake up in the morning to begin to keep care of them for Him again. It was all about--" "Wait a minute, let me ask you some questions before you tell me any more," said Everett, quickly covering the sympathy that showed in his eyes with his business tone of voice. "Is it Gideon Newsome who holds this mortgage?" "Why, yes, how did you know?" asked Rose Mary with a mild surprise in her eyes as she raised them to his, bent intently on her. "Uncle Tucker had to get the money from him six years ago. It--it was a debt of honor--he--we had to pay." A rich crimson spread itself over Rose Mary's brow and cheeks and flooded down her white neck under the folds of her blue dress across her breast. Tears rose to her eyes, but she lifted her head proudly and looked him straight in the face. "There is a reason why I would give my life--why I do and must give my life to protecting them from the consequences of the disaster. No sacrifice is too great for me to make to save their home for them." "Do you mind telling me how much the mortgage is for?" asked Everett, still in his cool, thoughtful voice. "For ten thousand dollars," answered Rose Mary. "The land is worth really less than fifteen. Nobody but such a--such a friend as Mr. Newsome would have loaned Uncle Tucker so much. He--he has been very kind to us. I--I am very grateful to him and I--" Rose Mary faltered and dropped her eyes. A tear trembled on the edge of her black lashes and then splashed on to the chubby cheek of Peter the reposer. "I see," said Everett coolly, and a flint tone made his usually rich voice harsh and tight. For a few minutes he sat quietly looking Rose Mary over with an inscrutable look in his eyes that finally faded again into the utter world weariness. "I see--and so the bargain and sale goes on even on Providence Road under Old Harpeth. But the old people will never have to give up the Briars while you are here to pay the price of their protection, Rose Mary. Never!" "I don't believe they will--my faith in Him makes me sure," answered Rose Mary with lovely unconsciousness as she raised large, comforted eyes to Everett's. "I don't know how I'm going to manage, but somehow my cup of faith seems to get filled each day with the wine of courage and the result is mighty apt to be a--song." And Rose Mary's face blushed out again into a flowering of smiles. "A sort of cup of heavenly nectar," answered Everett with an answering smile, but the keen look still in his eyes. "See here, I want you to promise me something--don't ever, under any circumstances, tell anybody that I know about this mortgage. Will you?" "Of course, I won't if you tell me not to," answered Rose Mary immediately. "I don't like to think or talk about it. I only told you because you wanted to help us. Help offers are the silver linings to trouble clouds, and you brought this one down on yourself, didn't you? Of course, it's selfish and wrong to tell people about your anxieties, but there is just no other way to get so close to a friend. Don't you think perhaps sometimes the Lord doesn't bother to 'temper the winds,' but just leads you up on the sheltered side of somebody who is stronger than you are and leaves you there until your storm is over?" CHAPTER II THE FOLKS-GARDEN "Well," said Uncle Tucker meditatively, "I reckon a festibul on a birthday can be taken as a kind of compliment to the Lord and no special glorification to yourself. He instuted your first one Himself, and I see no harm in jest a-marking of the years He sends you. What are Sister Viney's special reasons against the junket?" "Oh, I don't know what makes Aunt Viney feel this way!" exclaimed Rose Mary with distress in her blue eyes that she raised to Uncle Tucker's, that were bent benignly upon her as she stood in the barn door beside him. "She says that as the Lord has granted her her fourscore years by reason of great strength, she oughtn't to remind Him that He has forgotten her by having an eighty-second birthday. Everybody in Sweetbriar has been looking forward to it for a week, and it was going to be such a lovely party. What shall we do? She says she just won't have it, and Aunt Amandy is crying when Aunt Viney don't see it. She's made up her mind, and I don't know what more to say to her." "Rose Mary," said Uncle Tucker, with a quizzical smile quirking at the corners of his mouth, "mighty often the ingredient of permanency is left out in the making up of a woman's mind, one way or another. Can't you kinder pervail with your Aunt Viney some? I've got a real hanker after this little birthday to-do. Jest back her around to another view of the question with a slack plow-line. Looks like it's too bad to--" "Rose Mary, oh, Rose Mary, where are ye, child?" came a call in a high, sweet old quaver of a voice from down the garden path, and Miss Amanda hove in sight, hurrying along on eager but tottering little feet. Her short, skimpy, gray skirts fluttered in the spring breezes and her bright, old eyes peered out from the gray shawl she held over her head with tremulous excitement. She was both laughing and panting as Rose Mary threw her arm around her and drew her into the door of the barn. "Sister Viney has consented in her mind about the party, all along of a verse I was just now a-reading to her in our morning lesson. Saint Luke says: '_It is meet that we should make merry and be glad, for this thy brother was dead and is alive again_,' and at the same minute the recollection of how sick Mr. Mark has been hit us both. 'There now,' she says, 'you folks can jest go on with that party to-day for the benefit of our young brother Everett's coming to so good after all his sufferings. This time I will consider it as instituted of the Lord, but don't nobody say birthday next April, if I'm here, on no account whatever.' I take it as a special leading to me to have read that verse this morning to Sister Viney, and won't you please go over and tell Sally Rucker to go on with the cake, Rose Mary? Sister Viney called Jennie over by sun-up, when she took this notion, and told her to tell her mother not to make it, even if she had already broke all the sixteen eggs." "Yes, Aunt Amandy, I'll run over and tell Mrs. Rucker, and then we will begin right away to get things ready. I am so glad Aunt Viney is--" "Rose Mamie, Rose Mamie," came another loud hail from up the path toward the house and down came the General at top speed, with a plumy setter frisking in his wake. "Aunt Viney says for you to come there to her this minute. They is a-going to be the party and it's right by the Bible to have it, some for Mr. Mark, too. Tobe Poteet said 'shoo' when I told him he couldn't come, 'cause they wasn't a-going to be no party on account of worrying the Lord about forgetting Aunt Viney, and I was jest a-going to knock him into stuffings, 'cause they can't nobody say 'shoo' at the Bible or Aunt Viney neither, to me, when there Aunt Viney called for us to go tell everybody that the party was a-going off and be sure and come. I believe God let her call me before I hit Tobe, 'cause I ain't never hit him yet, and maybe now I never will have to." The General paused, and an expression of devout thankfulness came into his small face at thus being saved the necessity of administering chastisement to his henchman, Tobe the adventurous. "I believe he did, Stonie, and how thankful I am," exclaimed little Miss Amanda, with real relief at this deliverance of young Tobe, who was her especial, both self-elected and chosen, knight from the General's cohorts. "Yes'm," answered Stonie. "Come on now, Rose Mamie! Put your hand on me, Aunt Amandy, and I'll go slow with you," and presenting his sturdy little shoulder to Miss Amanda on one side and drawing Rose Mary along with him on the other, Stonewall Jackson hurried them both away to the house. "Well," remarked Uncle Tucker to himself as he took up a measure of grain from a bin in the corner of the feed-room and scattered some in front of a row of half-barrel nests upon which brooded a dozen complacent setting hens, "well, if the Lord has to pester with the affairs of Sweetbriar to the extent Stonie and the sisters, Rose Mary, too, are a-giving Him the credit of doing looks like we might be a-getting more'n our share of His attentions. I reckon by the time He gets all the women and children doings settled up for the day He finds some of the men have slipped the bridle and gone. That would account for some of these here wild covortings around in the world we hear about by the newspapers. But He'll git 'em some day sure as--" "Am I interrupting any confidence between you and the Mrs. Biddies, Mr. Alloway?" asked Everett, as he stood in the barn door with a pan in one hand and a bucket in the other. "No, oh, no," answered Uncle Tucker with a laugh. "I was jest remarking how the Almighty had the lasso of His love around the neck of all the wild young asses a-galloping over the world and would throw 'em in His own time. Well, I hear you're a-going to get a sochul baptism into Sweetbriar along about a hour before sundown. Better part your hair in the middle and get some taller for your shoes." "I will, most assuredly, if that's what's expected of me for the ceremony," answered Everett with a delightful laugh. "Here's a pan of delicacies for the hens, and this bucket is for you to bring some shelled corn for Miss Rose Mary to parch for them, when you come to the house." "I'm not a-counting on going any time soon," answered Uncle Tucker with a shrewd glance up at Everett as he came and stood in the doorway beside the tall young man, who lounged against one of the door posts. Uncle Tucker was himself tall, but slightly bent, lean and brown, with great, gray, mystic eyes that peered out from under bushy white brows. Long gray locks curled around his ears and a rampant forelock stood up defiantly upon his wide, high brow. At all times his firm old mouth was on the eve of breaking into a quizzical smile, and he bestowed one upon Everett as he remarked further: "The barn is man's instituted refuge in the time of mop and broom cyclones in the house. I reckon you can't get on to your rock-picking in the fields now, but you really hadn't oughter dig up an oil-well to-day anyway; it might kinder overshadow the excitement of the party." "Mr. Alloway, has any other survey of this river bend been made before?" asked Everett as he looked keenly at Uncle Tucker, while he lit his cigar from the cob pipe the old gentleman accommodatingly handed him. "Well, yes, there was a young fellow came poking around here not so long ago with a little hammer pecking at the rocks. I didn't pay much attention to him, though. He never stayed but one day, and I was a-cutting clover hay, and too busy to notice him much 'cept to ask him in to dinner. He couldn't seem to manage his chicken dumplings for feeding his eyes with Rose Mary, and he didn't have time to give up much information about sech little things as oil-wells and phosphate beds. You know, they has to be a good touch of frost over a man's ears before he can tend to business, with good-looking dimity passing around him." And Uncle Tucker laughed as he resumed the puffing of his pipe. "And after the frost they are not at all immune--to such dimity," answered Everett with an echo of Uncle Tucker's laugh, as a slight color rose up under the tan of his thin face. As he spoke he ruffled his own dark red mop of hair, which was slightly sprinkled with gray, over his temples. Everett was tall, broad and muscular, but thin almost to gauntness, and his face habitually wore the expression of deep weariness. His eyes were red-brown and disillusioned, except when they joined with his well-cut mouth in a smile that brought an almost boyish beauty back over his whole expression. There was decided youth in the glance he bestowed upon Uncle Tucker, whose attention was riveted on the manoeuvers of the General and Tobe, who were busy with a pair of old kitchen knives in an attack upon the grass growing between the cracks of the front walk. "So you have had no report as to what that survey was?" Everett asked Uncle Tucker, again bringing him back to the subject in hand. "Do you know who sent the man you speak of to prospect on your land?" "Never thought to ask him," answered Uncle Tucker, still with the utmost unconcern. "Maybe Rose Mary knows. Women generally carry a reticule around with 'em jest to poke facts into that they gather together from nothing put pure wantin'-to-know. Ask her." And as he spoke Uncle Tucker began to busy himself getting out the grease cans, with the evident intention of putting in a morning lubricating the farm implements in general. "Your friend, Mr. Gideon Newsome, said something about a rumor of paying phosphate here in the Harpeth bend when I met him over in Boliver before I came to Sweetbriar. In fact, I had tried to come to look over the fields just to kill time when I nearly killed myself and fell down upon you. Do you suppose he could have sent the prospector?" Again Everett brought Uncle Tucker back to the uninteresting topic of what might lay under the fields, the top of which he was so interested in cultivating. "Oh, I reckon not," answered Uncle Tucker, puffing away as he laid out his monkey-wrenches. "The Honorable Gid is up to his neck in this here no-dram wave what is a-sweeping around over the state and pretty nigh rising up as high as the necks of even private liquor bottles. Gid's not to say a teetotaler, but he had to climb into the bandwagon skiff or sink outen sight. He's got to tie down his seat in the state house with a white ribbon, and he's got no mind for fooling with phosphate dirt. He's a mighty fine man, and all of Sweetbriar thinks a heap of him. Do you want to help me lift this wagon wheel on to this jack, so I can sorter grease her up against the next time I use her?" "Say, Uncle Tuck, Aunt Viney says for you to come right there now and bring Mr. Mark and a spade and a long string with you," came just at the critical moment of balancing the notched plank under the revolving wagon wheel, in Stonewall Jackson's young voice, which held in it quite a trace of Miss Lavinia's decisive tone of command. Stonie stood in the barn door, poised for instant return along the path of duty to the front walk, only waiting to be sure his summons would be obeyed. Stonie was sturdy, freckled, and in possession of Uncle Tucker's big gray eyes, Rose Mary's curled mouth and more than a tinge of Aunt Viney's austerity of manner. "Better come on," he further admonished. "Rose Mary can't hold that vine up much longer, and if she lets go they'll all fall down." And as he raced up the path Everett followed almost as rapidly, urged on by the vision of Rose Mary drooping under some sort of unsupportable burden. Uncle Tucker brought up the rear with the spade and a long piece of twine. "Oh, I thought you would never come," laughed Rose Mary from half way up the step-ladder as she lowered herself and a great bunch of budding honeysuckle down into Everett's upstretched arms. "I held it up as long as I could, but I almost let it tear the whole vine down." [Illustration: "That's what comes from letting that shoot run catawumpas"] "That's what comes from letting that shoot run catawumpas three years ago. I told you about it at the time, Tucker," said Miss Lavinia with a stern glance at Uncle Tucker, who stood with spade and twine at the corner of the porch. Miss Lavinia sat in a large, calico-cushioned rocking-chair at the end of the porch, and had been issuing orders to Rose Mary and little Miss Amanda about the readjustment of the fragrant vine that trailed across the end of the porch over her window and on out to a trellis in the side yard. Her high mob cap sat on her head in an angle of aggression always, and her keen black eyes enforced all commands issuing from her stern old mouth. "Now, Amandy, train that shoot straight while you're about it," she continued. "It comes plumb from the roots, and I don't want to have to look at a wild-growing vine right here under my window for all my eighty-second and maybe last year." "I've gone and misplaced my glasses and I can't hardly see," answered Miss Amanda in her sweet little quaver that sounded like a silver bell with a crack in it. "Lend me your'n, Tucker!" "You are a-going to misplace your eyes some day, Sister Amandy. Then you'll be a-wanting mine, and I'll have to cut 'em out and give 'em to you, I suppose," said Uncle Tucker as he handed over his huge, steel-rimmed glasses. "The Bible says 'an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,' Tucker, but not in a borrowing sense of the word, as I remember," remarked Miss Lavinia in a meditative tone of voice. "And that would be the thing about my getting the new teeth. Don't either of you need 'em, and it would be selfish of me to spend on something they couldn't anybody borrow from me. Amandy, dig a little deeper around that shoot, I don't want no puny vine under my window!" "I'm a-trying, Sister Viney," answered Miss Amanda propitiatingly. "I've been a-bending over so long my knees are in a kinder tremble." "Let me finish digging and put in the new dirt for you, Aunt Amandy," begged Rose Mary, who had given the armful of vine to Everett to hold while Uncle Tucker tied the strings in the exact angle indicated by Miss Lavinia. "I can do it in no time." "No, child, I reckon I'd better do it myself," answered Miss Amanda as she sat back on the grass for a moment's rest. "I have dug around and trained this vine the last week in April for almost sixty years now. Mr. Lovell brought it by to Ma one spring as he hauled his summer groceries over the Ridge to Warren County. By such care it's never died down yet, and I have made it my custom to give sprouts away to all that would take 'em. I'm not a-doubting that there is some of this vine a-budding out all over Harpeth Valley from Providence Nob to the River bend." "No, Amandy," interrupted Aunt Viney, "it wasn't sixty years ago, it was jest fifty-seven. Mr. Lovell brought the switch of it with him the first year Mr. Roberts rode this circuit, and he was a-holding that big revival over to Providence Chapel. Mr. Lovell came into the fold with that very first night's preaching, and we all were rejoiced. Don't you remember he brought you that Maiden Blush rose-bush over there at the same time he brought this vine to Ma? And one bloom came out on the rose the next year jest in time to put it in his coffin before we buried him when he was taken down with the fever on the Road and died here with us. Fifty-six years ago come June, and him so young to die while so full of the spirit of the Lord!" Feebly Miss Amanda rose to her knees and went on with the digging around the roots of the vine, but Rose Mary knelt beside her and laid her strong, young arm around the bent and shaking little shoulders. Uncle Tucker rested on his spade and looked away across the garden wall, where the little yard of graves was hid in the shadow of tall pine trees, and his big eyes grew very tender. Miss Lavinia fingered a shoot of the vine that had fallen across her thin old knees with a softened expression in her prophet-woman face, while something new and sweet stirred in Everett's breast and woke in his tired eyes, as across half a century was wafted the perfume of a shattered romance. And then by the time the vine had been trained Miss Lavinia had thought of a number of other spring jobs that must be attended to along the front walk and around all the clumps of budding shrubs, so with one desperate glance toward the barn, his deserted haven, Uncle Tucker fell to with his spade, while Everett obtained a fork from the tool house and put himself under command. Rose Mary was sharply recalled and sent into the house to complete the arrangements for the festivities, when she had followed the forker down by the lilac hedge, rake in hand, with evident intention of being of great assistance in the gardening of the amateur. "Pull the dirt up closter around those bleeding-hearts, Tucker," commanded Miss Lavinia from her rocker. "They are Rose Mary's I planted the identical day she was born, and I don't want anything to happen to 'em in the way of cutworms or such this summer." "Well, I don't know," answered Uncle Tucker with a little chuckle in Everett's direction, who was turning over the dirt near a rose-bush in his close vicinity, "it don't do to pay too much attention to women's bleeding-hearts; let alone, they'll tie 'em up in their own courage and go on dusting around the place, while if you notice 'em too much they take to squeezing out more bleed drops for your sympathy. Now, I think it's best--" "Mister Tucker, say, Mister Tucker," came in a giggle from over the front gate as Jennie Rucker's little freckled nose appeared just above the top plank, only slightly in advance of that of small Peggy's. "Mis' Poteet's got a new baby, just earned, and she says she is sorry she can't come to Mis' Viney's party; but she can't." "Now, fly-away, ain't that too bad!" exclaimed Uncle Tucker. "That baby oughter be sent back until it has got manners to wait until it's wanted. Didn't neither one of you all get here on anybody's birthday but your own." Uncle Tucker's sally was greeted by a duet of giggles, and the announcement committee hurried on across the street with its news. "Tucker, you Tucker, don't you touch that snowball bush with the spade!" came in a fresh and alarmed command from the rocker post of observation. "You know Ma didn't ever let that bush be touched after it had budded. You spaded around it onct when you was young and upty and you remember it didn't bloom." "Muster been a hundred years ago if I was ever upty about this here flower job," he answered in an undertone to Everett as he turned his attention to the rose-bushes at which his apprentice had been pegging away. "At weddings and bornings and flower tending man is just a worm under woman's feet and he might as well not even hope to turn. All he can do is to--" But it was just at this juncture when Uncle Tucker's patience was about to be exhausted, that a summons from Rose Mary came for a general getting ready for the birthday celebration. And in a very few hours the festivities were in full swing. Miss Lavinia sat in state in her rocker and received the offerings and congratulations of Sweetbriar as they were presented in various original and characteristic forms. Young Peter Rucker, still a bit unsteady on his pink and chubby underpinning, was steered forward to present his glossy buckeye, hung on a plaited horse-hair string that had been constructed by small Jennie with long and infinite patience. Miss Lavinia's commendations threw both donor and constructor into an agony of bashfulness from which Pete took refuge in Rose Mary's skirts and Jennie behind her mother's chair. But at this juncture the arrival on the scene of action of young Bob Nickols with a whole two-horse wagon-load of pine cones, which the old lady doted on for the freshing up of the tiny fires always kept smoldering in her andironed fireplace the summer through, distracted the attention of the company and was greeted with great applause. Bob had been from early morning over on Providence Nob collecting the treasures, and, seated beside him on the front of the wagon, was Louisa Helen Plunkett, blushing furiously and most obviously avoiding her mother's stern eye of inquiry as to where she had spent the valuable morning hours. The sensation of young Bob's offering was only offset at the unpacking of the complacent Mr. Crabtree's gift, which he bore over from the store in his own arms. With dramatic effect he placed it on the floor at Miss Lavinia's feet and called for a hatchet for its opening. And as from their wrappings of paper and excelsior he drew two large gilt and glass bottles, one containing bay rum and the other camphor, that precious lotion for fast stiffening joints, little Miss Amanda heaved a sigh of positive rapture. Mr. Crabtree was small and wiry, with a hickory-nut countenance and a luscious peach of a heart, and, though of bachelor condition, he at all times displayed sympathetic and intuitive domestic inclinations. He kept the Sweetbriar store and was thus in position to know of the small economies practised by the two old ladies in the matter of personal necessities. For the months past they had not bought the quantity of lubricating remedies that he considered sufficient and this had been his tactful way of supplying enough to last for some time to come. And from over the pile of gifts heaped around her, Miss Lavinia beamed upon him to such an extent that he felt like following young Pete's example, committing the awful impropriety of hiding his embarrassment in any petticoat handy, but just at this juncture up the front walk came the birthday cake navigating itself by the long legs of Mr. Caleb Rucker and attended by a riot of Sweetbriar youth, mad with excitement over its safe landing and the treat in prospect. In its wake followed Mrs. Rucker, complacent and beaming over the sensation caused by this her high triumph in the culinary line. "Fly-away, if that's not Providence Nob gone and turned to a cake for Sister Viney's birthday," exclaimed Uncle Tucker, as amid generous applause the offering was landed on a table set near the rocker. And again at this auspicious moment a huge waiter covered with little mountains of white ice-cream made its appearance through the front door, impelled by the motive power of Mr. Mark Everett's elegantly white-flannel-trousered legs, and guided to a landing beside the cake by Rose Mary, who was a pink flower of smiles and blushes. Then it followed that in less time than one would think possible the company at large was busy with a spoon attached to the refreshments which to Sweetbriar represented the height of elegance. Out in the world beyond Old Harpeth ice-cream and cake may have lost caste as a fashionable afternoon refreshment, having been succeeded by the imported custom of tea and scones or an elaborate menu of reception indigestibles, but in the Valley nothing had ever threatened the supremacy of the frozen cream and white-frosted confection. The men all sat on the end of the long porch and accepted second saucers and slices and even when urged by Rose Mary, beaming with hospitality, third relays, while the Swarm in camp on the front steps, under the General's management, seconded by Everett, succeeded in obtaining supplies in a practically unlimited quantity. "Looks like Miss Rose Mary's freezer ain't got no bottom at all," said Mr. Rucker in his long drawl as he began on a fourth white mound. "It reminds me of 'the snow, the snow what falls from Heaven to earth below,' and keeps a-falling." Mr. Rucker was a poet at heart and a husband to Mrs. Rucker by profession, and his flights were regarded by Sweetbriar at large with a mixture of pride and derision. "Cal," said Mrs. Rucker sternly, "don't you eat more'n half that saucer. I've got no mind to top off this here good time with mustard plasters all around. Even rejoicings can get overfed and peter out into ginger tea. Jennie, you and Sammie and Pete stop eating right now. Lands alive, the sun has set and we all know Miss Viney oughter be in the house. Shoo, everybody go home to save your manners!" And with hearty laughs and further good-by congratulations the happy little company of farmer folk scattered to their own roof trees across and along Providence Road. The twilight had come, but a very young moon was casting soft shadows from the trees rustling in the night breezes and the stars were lighting up in competition to the rays that shot out from window after window in the little village. Uncle Tucker had hurried away to his belated barn duties and little Miss Amanda into the house to stir up Miss Lavinia's fire in preparation for their retirement, which was a ceremony of long duration and begun with the mounting of the chickens to their roosts. Miss Lavinia sat with her hands folded in her lap over a collection of the smaller gifts of the afternoon and her eyes looked far away cross the Ridge, dim in the failing light, while her stern old face took on softened and very lovely lines. Rose Mary stood near to help her into the house and Everett leaned against a post close on the other side of the rocker. "Children," she said with a little break in her usual austere voice, "I'm kinder ashamed of accusing the Lord of forgetting me this morning when I look at all these remembers of me here that my neighbors have given me. I found friends when I came here eighty-two years ago to-day and as they have died off He has raised up a new crop outen their seed for me. This rheumatism buckeye here is the present of the great grandson of my first beau, and this afternoon I have looked into the kind eyes of some of my friends dead and gone many a day, and have seen smiles come to life that have been buried fifty years. I'm a-feeling thankful to be here another summer to see my friends and flowers a-blooming onct more, and come next April I am a-going to want just such another infair as this one. Now help me into bed! Young man, you can lift me up some, I'm stiff with so long setting, and I'm a-going to want a power of rubbing this night, Rose Mary." So, thus held by her duties of ministration, it was quite an hour later that Rose Mary came out of the house, which was dark and sleep-quiet, and found Everett still sitting on the front steps smoking and--waiting. "Tired?" he asked as she sank down on to the step beside him and leaned her dark head back against one of the posts that supported the mass of honeysuckle vine. "Not much--and a heap happy," she answered, looking up at him with reflected stars in her long-lashed blue eyes. "Wasn't it a lovely party?" "Yes," answered Everett slowly as he watched the smoke curl up from his cigar and blow in the soft little night wind across toward Rose Mary; "yes, it was a nice party. I seriously doubt if anywhere on any of the known continents there could have been one just like it pulled off by any people of any nation. It was unique--in sentiment and execution; I'm duly grateful for having been a guest--even part honoree." "I always think of old people as being the soft shadows that sturdy little children cast on the wall. They are a part of the day and sunshine, but just protected by the young folks that come between them and the direct rays. They are strangely like flowers, too, with their quaint fragrance. Aunt Viney is my tall purple flag, but Aunt Amandy is my bed of white cinnamon pinks. I--I want to keep them in bloom for always. I can't let myself think--that I can't." Rose Mary's voice trembled into a laugh as she caught a trailing wisp of honeysuckle and pressed a bunch of its buds to her lips. "You'll keep them, Rose Mary. You could keep anything you--you really wanted," said Everett in a guardedly comforting voice. "And what are Mr. Alloway and Stonie in your flower garden?" he asked in a bantering tone. "Oh, Uncle Tucker is the briar rose hedge all around the place, and Stonie is all the young shoots that I'm trying to prune and train up just like him," answered Rose Mary with a quick laugh. "You're my new-fashioned crimson-rambler from out over the Ridge that I'm trying to make grow in my garden," she added, with a little hint of both audacity and tenderness in her voice. "I'm rooted all right," answered Everett quickly, as he blew a puff of smoke at her. "And you, Rose Mary, are the bloom of every rose-bush that I ever saw anywhere. You are, I verily believe, the only and original Rose of the World." "Oh, no," answered Rose Mary lifting her long lashes for a second's glance at him; "I'm just the Rose of these Briars. Don't you know all over the world women are blooming on lovely tall stems, where they have planted themselves deep in home places and are drinking the Master's love and courage from both sun and rain. But if we don't go to rest some you'll wilt, Rambler, and I'll shatter. Be sure and take the glass of cream I put by your bed. Good night and good dreams!" CHAPTER III AT THE COURT OF DAME NATURE "Well, Rose Mary," said Uncle Tucker as he appeared in the doorway of the milk-house and framed himself against an entrancing, mist-wreathed, sun-up aspect of Sweetbriar with a stretch of Providence Road winding away to the Nob and bending caressingly around red-roofed Providence as it passed over the Ridge, "there are forty-seven new babies out in the barn for you this morning. Better come on over and see 'em!" Uncle Tucker's big eyes were bright with excitement, his gray lavender muffler, which always formed a part of his early morning costume, flew at loose ends, and a rampant, grizzly lock stuck out through the slit in the old gray hat. "Gracious me, Uncle Tuck, who now?" demanded Rose Mary over a crock of milk she was expertly skimming with a thin, old, silver ladle. "Old White has hatched out a brood of sixteen, assorted black and white, that foolish bronze turkey hen just come out from under the woodpile with thirteen little pesters, Sniffer has got five pups--three spots and two solids--and Mrs. Butter has twin calves, assorted sex this time. They are spry and hungry and you'd better come on over!" "Lovely," laughed Rose Mary with the delight in her blue eyes matching that in Uncle Tucker's pair of mystic gray. "I'll come just as soon as I get the skimming done. We'll want some corn meal and millet seed for the chirp-babies, but the others we can leave to the maternal ministrations. I'm so full of welcome I don't see how I'm going to keep it from bubbling over." "That's jest like you, Rose Mary, a-welcoming a whole passel of pesters that have deluged down on you at one time," said Uncle Tucker with a dubiously appreciative smile at Rose Mary's hospitable enthusiasm. "Looks to me like a girl tending three old folks, one rampage of a boy, a mollycuddle of a strange man, and a whole petting spoiled village has got enough on her shoulders without this four-foot, two-foot landslide." "But it's in my heart I carry you all, old Sweetie," answered Rose Mary with a flirt of her long lashes up at Uncle Tucker. "A woman can carry things as a blessing in her heart that might be an awful burden on her shoulders. Don't you know I don't allow you out before the sun is up good without your muffler tied up tight? There; please go on back to the barn and take this crock of skimmed milk to Mrs. Sniffie--wait, I'll pour back some of the cream! And in just a few minutes I'll be ready to--" "Rose Mary, Rose Mary," came a wild, enthusiastic shout from up the path toward the Briars and in a moment the General appeared around the row of lilac bushes through which the milk-house trail led down under the hill to Rose Mary's sanctum of the golden treasure. Stonie had taken time before leaving the seclusion of his apartment to plunge into his short blue jeans trousers, but he was holding them up with one hand and struggling with his gingham shirt, the tail of which bellowed out like a sail in the morning breeze as he sped along. And in his wake came Tobe with a pan in one hand and a cup in the other. "It's two calves, Tobe says, with just Mrs. Butter for the mother and Sniffie beat her with three more puppies than two calves. It's sixteen chickens and a passel of turkeys and we waked up Mr. Mark to tell him and he said--" Stonie paused in the rapid fire of his announcement of the morning news and then added in judicial tone of voice, as if giving the aroused sleeper his modicum of fair play: "Well, he didn't quite say it before he swallowed, but he throwed a pillow at Tobe and pulled the sheet over his head and groaned awful. Aunt Viney was saying her prayers when I went to tell her, and Aunt Mandy was taking down her frizzles, but she stopped and gave Tobe some corn-bread for the chickens and some pot-licker with meat in it for Sniffie. Can't you come with me to see 'em now, Rose Mary? It won't be any fun until you see em!" The General had by this time lined up in the doorway with Uncle Tucker, and Tobe's black head and keen face peered over his shoulder. The expression in all three pairs of eyes fixed on hers was the same--the wild desire to make her presentation at the interesting court Dame Nature was holding in the barn. A most natural masculine instinct for feminine interpretive companionship when face to face with the miracle of maternity. "Just one more crock of milk to skim and I can go," answered Rose Mary as she poised the skimmer over the last yellow surface down the line of huge, brown, earthen bowls that in Harpeth Valley were known as crocks. The milk-house was cool and clean and smelled of the fresh cream lifted from the milk into the stone jars to be clabbered for the to-morrow churning. And Rose Mary herself was a fresh, fragrant incarnation of the spirit of a spring sun-dawn that had come over the Ridge from Old Harpeth. Her merry voice floated out over the hillside as she followed in the wake of Uncle Tucker, Stonie and Tobe, with the provender for the new arrivals, and it made its way as a faint echo of a dream through one of the vine-covered, gable windows of the Briars and the effect thereof was well-nigh instantaneous. Everett, after a hasty and almost as incomplete toilet as the one made by the General in his excitement, arrived on the scene of action just in time to witness the congratulatory interview between Mrs. Sniffie and the mistress of her undying affections. The long-eared, plumy, young setter-mother stood licking the back of Rose Mary's neck as she sat on the barn floor with all five of the young tumblers in her lap, with Tobe and Stonie hanging rapturously over her and them, while Uncle Tucker was expatiating on some points that had made themselves evident even at this very early stage of the existence of the little dog babies. "They ain't not a single stub nose in the bunch, Uncle Tuck, not a one and everybody's of thems toes stick way apart," exclaimed the General, his cheeks red with joyous pride. "Watch 'em, Miss Ro' Mary; watch 'em smell Sniffie when I call her over here," exclaimed Tobe as he held out the pan to Mrs. Sniffer and thus coaxed her from the side of Rose Mary and the small family. And, sure enough, around squirmed every little white and yellow bunch and up went every little new-born nose as it sniffed at the recession of the maternal fount. One little precocious even went so far as to attempt to set his wee fore paddies against Rose Mary's knee and to stiffen a tiny plume of a tail, with a plain instinct to point the direction of the shifting base of supplies. Rose Mary gave a cry of delight and hugged the whole talented family to her breast, while Stonie and Tobe yelled and danced as Uncle Tucker turned with evident emotion to Everett to claim his congratulations. "Never saw anything like it in my life," Everett assured him with the greatest enthusiasm, and, as he spoke, he laughed down into Rose Mary's lifted blue eyes that were positively tender with pride over the puppies in her arms. "It's a sight worth losing the tale of a dream for--taken all together." "And all the others--I'll show you," and, gathering her skirts basketwise, Rose Mary rose to her feet and led the way across the barn, with Sniffer snuffing along at the squirming bundle in her skirts, that swung against the white petticoat ruffling around her slim ankles. With the utmost care she deposited the puppies in an overturned barrel, nicely lined with hay, that Stonie and Tobe had been preparing. "They are lovely, Sniffie," she said softly to the young mother, who jumped in and huddled down beside the babies as her mistress turned to leave them with the greatest reluctance. And it was well that the strata of Everett's enthusiasm lay near the surface and was easily workable, for in the next half-hour there was a great demand of continuous output. Mrs. Butter stood switching her tail and chewing at a wisp of hay with an air of triumphant pride tinged with mild surprise as she turned occasionally to glance at the offspring huddled against her side and found eight wobbly legs instead of the four her former experiences had led her to expect, and felt two little nuzzling noses instead of one. "Which one do you guess was the surprise calf to her, Rose Mamie?" demanded the General. "Shoo!" said Tobe in answer to the General's question. "Old Butter have had them two calfs to purpose, boy and girl, one to keep and one to kill. She got mixed about whether Mr. Tuck keeps heifers or bulls and jest had both kinds so as to keep one sure." "Well, Aunt Viney read in her book of a place they kills girls and keeps boys. At this place they jest gits it mixed up with the cows and it's no use to tell 'em," answered the General in a disgusted tone of voice, and with a stem glance at Uncle Tucker, as he and Tobe passed on over to the feed-room door, to lead the way to the display of the little turks and cheeps for Everett's further edification. And just as the introductions were all completed two deep notes of the mellow old farm bell sounded over the hill in a hospitable and reverent summons to prayers and breakfast ensuing. On the instant two pairs of pink heels were shown to the company as Stonie and Tobe raced up the walk, which were quickly followed by Uncle Tucker, intent on being on hand promptly for the assembling of his household. More slowly Rose Mary and Everett followed, walking side by side along the narrow path. "Rose Mary, have you let me sleep through such exciting scenes as this every morning for a month?" demanded Everett quizzically. "What time do you get up--or is it that the sun waits for your summons or--" "No, not my summons--old lame Shanghi's. I believe he is of French extraction from his elaborate manner with the hens," answered Rose Mary, quickly applying his plagiarized compliment. "Let's hurry or I'll be late for prayers. Would you like--will you come in to-day, as you are already up?" The color rose in Rose Mary's cheeks up under her long lashes and she gave him just one shy glance that had a tinge of roguishness in it. "Thank you, I--I would like to. That is, if I may--if I won't be in the way or--or--or--will you hold my hand so I won't go wrong?" he finished in laughing confusion as the color came under the tan of his cheeks to match that in hers and the young look lay for a moment in his eyes. "It'll be my début at family worship," he added quickly to cover his confusion. "Don't worry, Uncle Tucker leads it," answered Rose Mary as they ascended the front steps and came across the front porch to the doorway of the wide hall, which was the living-room, as well as the artery of the Briars. And a decorous and seemly scene they stepped in upon. Uncle Tucker sat back of a small table, which was placed at one side of the wide open fireplace, in which crackled a bit of fragrant, spring fire. His Bible and a couple of hymn-books rested in front of him, his gray forelock had been meekly plastered down and the jocund lavender scarf had been laid aside to display a straight white collar and clerical black bow tie. His eyes were bent on the book before him as he sought for the text for the morning lesson. Aunt Viney sat close beside him as if anxious to be as near to the source of worship as possible, though the strain of refraining from directing Uncle Tucker in the conducting thereof was very great. The tradition which forced silence upon women in places of public worship had held with Miss Lavinia only by the exercising of the sternest and most rigorous self-suppression, which at any time might have been broken except for the curbing of her iron will. But even though silent she was still dominant, and over her glasses her eyes shot glances of stern rebuke at two offenders in a distant corner, while Uncle Tucker fluttered the leaves of his hymn-book, oblivious to the unseemly contention. The General and Tobe, who came as near to living and having his being at the Briars as was possible in consideration of the fact that he was supposed to have his bed and board under his own paternal roof, were kneeling demurely beside a small rocking-chair, but a battle royal was going on as to who would possess the low seat on which to bow the head of reverence. Little Miss Amanda from across the room, in terror of what might befall her favorites at the hands of Miss Lavinia in a later hour of reckoning, was making beseeching gestures of alarm, warning and reproof that were entirely inadequate to the situation, which was fast becoming acute, when the two tardy members arrived on the scene of action. It took Rose Mary one second to grasp the situation, and, motioning Everett to a chair beside the rocker, she seated herself quickly in the very midst of the scuffle. In a half-second Tobe's head was bowed in triumph on the arm of her chair, while the General's was ducked with equal triumph upon her knee as Uncle Tucker's sweet old voice rose in the first words of his prayer. But after a few minutes of most becoming reverence Stonie's eyes opened and revealed his surprise at Everett's presence as he knelt by the chair across from Tobe and almost as close to Rose Mary's protective presence as either of the two combatants. With a welcoming smile the General slipped the little brown hand of fellowship into the stranger's, thereby offering a material support to the latter's agony of embarrassment, which only very slowly receded from face and demeanor as the services proceeded. Then as across the crackle of the fire came the confident word of David the Singer: "_The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof; the world and they that dwell therein_," intoned in the old man's reverent voice, something led Everett's glance out through the open door to see the bit of divine dominion that spread before him with new eyes and a newer understanding. Harpeth Valley lay like the tender palm of a huge master hand with the knuckles of rough blue hills knotted around it, and dotted over the fostering meadows were comfortable homes, each with its morning altar fire sending up opal wreaths of mist smoke from the red brick or stone chimneys. Long creek lines marked their way across the fields which were growing tender green with the upbringing of the spring grain. "_Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of His hand_," droned Uncle Tucker. "_The hollow of His hand_," assented Everett's conscience in artistic appreciation of the simile. "_And stretched out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in_," came as another line of interpretation of the picture spread before the strangely unshackled eyes of the bowed man with the little boy kneeling beside him. Quickly he turned toward Rose Mary with almost a startled glance and found in her eyes the fact that she had been faring forth over Harpeth Valley on the wings of Uncle Tucker's supplication as had he. The wonder of it rose in his eyes, which were about to lay bare to her depths never before stirred, when a fervent "Amen! I beat you that time, Tobe!" fairly exploded at his ear as the General took the final word out of Uncle Tucker's very mouth in rival to his worshipping opponent. "I said it first, but it got blowed into Miss Ro' Mary's sleeve," avowed Tobe with a flaunt at his competitor. "If nobody he'r'n it, it don't count," decided the General with emphasis. And in friendly dispute he escorted his rival down the front walk, while Uncle Tucker, as was his custom, busied himself straightening hymn-book and Bible, so leaving the family altar in readiness for the beginning of a new day. And thus the primitive ceremonial, the dread of which had kept Everett late in bed every morning for a month, had resolved itself into what seemed to him but the embrace of a tender, whimsical brotherhood in which the old mystic both assumed and accounted for a stewardship in behalf of the others assembled under his roof-tree. But in the eyes of Miss Lavinia all forms of service were the marshalling of the hosts in battle array and at all times she was enlisted in the ranks of the church militant, and upon this occasion she bore down upon Everett with banners unfurled. "We are mighty gratified to welcome you at last in the circle of family worship, young man," she declaimed, as reproach and cordiality vied in her voice. "I have been a-laying off to ask you what church you belonged to in New York, and have a little talk with you over some of our sacred duties that young people of this generation are apt--" "Rose Mary," came Miss Amanda's cheery little voice from the doorway just in time to save Everett from the wish, if not even a vain attempt, to sink through the floor, "bring Mr. Mark right on in to breakfast before the waffles set. Sister Viney, your coffee is a-getting cold." Little Miss Amanda had seen and guessed at his plight and the coffee threat to Miss Lavinia had been one of the nimble manoeuvers that she daily, almost hourly, employed in the management of her sister's ponderosity. Thus she had saved this day, but Everett knew that there were others to come, and in the dim distance he discerned his Waterloo. And as he worked carefully with his examining pick over beyond the north pasture through the soft spring-warm afternoon, he occasionally smiled to himself as the morning scene of worship, etched deep on his consciousness by its strangeness to his tenets of life, rose again and again to his mind's eye. They were a wonderful people, these Valley folk, descendants of the Huguenots and Cavaliers who had taken the wilderness trail across the mountains and settled here "in the hollow" of old Harpeth's hand. They were as interesting scientifically from a philosophical standpoint as were the geological formations which lay beneath their blue-grass and clover fields. They built altars to what seemed to him a primitive God, and yet their codes were in many cases not only ethically but economically and democratically sound. The men he had found shrewd and as a whole more interested and versed in statescraft than would seem possible, considering their shut-in location in regard to the places where the world wheels seem to revolve. But were there larger wheels revolving, silently, slowly, but just as relentlessly, out here where the heavens were stretched "_as a curtain_," and "_as a tent to dwell in_?" "_'The earth and the fullness thereof,'_" he mused as he raised his eyes to the sky; "it's theirs, certainly, and they dedicate it to their God. I wonder--" Suddenly the picture of the woman in the barn rose to his mind, strong and gracious and wonderful, with the young "fullness" pressing around her, teeming with--force. What force--and what source? Suddenly he dropped his pick behind a convenient bush, shouldered his kit of rocks and sand, climbed the fence and tramped away down Providence Road to Sweetbriar, Rose Mary and her cold milk crocks, thither impelled by deep--thirsts. And under the hospitable eaves of the milk-house he found Rose Mary and her cooling draft--also Mrs. Caleb Rucker, with small Pete in tow. "Howdy, Mr. Mark," the visiting neighbor answered in response to his forcedly cordial greeting. If a man has walked a mile and a half with a picture of a woman handing him a glass of cool milk with a certain lift of black lashes from over deep, black blue eyes it is--disconcerting to have her do it in the presence of another. "I just come over to get a bucket of buttermilk for Granny Satterwhite," he found Mrs. Rucker saying as he forced his attention. "She won't touch mine if there's any of Rose Mary's handy. Looks like she thinks she's drinking some of Rose Mary's petting with every gulp." Everett had just raised the glass Rose Mary had handed him, to his lips, as Mrs. Rucker spoke, and over its edge he regarded the roses that suddenly blushed out in her cheeks, but she refused to raise her lashes the fraction of an inch and went calmly on pressing the milk from the butter she had just taken from the churn. "Granny knows that love can be sent just as well in a glass of buttermilk as in a valentine," she finally said, and as she spoke a roguish smile coaxed at the comer of her mouth. "Don't you suppose a piece of hemp twine would turn into a gold cord if you tied it around a bundle of true love?" she ventured further in a spirit of daring, still with her eyes on the butter. "Now that's something in meaning like my first husband, Mr. Satterwhite, said when we was married," assented Mrs. Rucker with hearty appreciation of the practicality in Rose Mary's sentiment. "He gave me two sows, each with a litter of pigs, for a wedding present and said they'd be a heap more to me than any kind of jimcracks he could er bought for half the money they'd bring. And they was, for, in due course of time, I sold all them hogs and bought the plush furniture in the front room, melojeon and all. Now Mr. Rucker, he give me a ring with a blue set and 'darling' printed inside it that cost fifty cents extra, and Jennie Rucker swallowed that ring before she was a year old. I guess she has got it growed up inside her, for all I know of it, and her Paw is a-setting on Mr. Satterwhite's furniture at present, speaking still. Sometimes it makes me feel sad to think of Mr. Satterwhite when Cal Rucker spells out, _Shall we meet beyond the river_ with two fingers on that melojeon. But then I even up my feelings by remembering how Cal let me name Pete for Mr. Satterwhite, which is a second-husband compliment they don't many men pass; and it pleased Granny so." "Mr. Rucker is always nice to Granny Satterwhite," said Rose Mary with the evident intention of extolling the present incumbent of the husband office to her friend. But at the mention of his name a moment earlier, young Peter, the bond between the past and present, had sidled out the door and proceeded to sit calmly down on the rippling surface of the spring branch. His rescue and retirement necessitated his mother's departure and Everett was left in command of the two-alone situation he desired. "Hasn't this been a lovely, long day?" asked Rose Mary as she turned the butter into a large jar and pressed a white cloth close over it with a stone top. "To-night is the full April moon and I've got a surprise for you, if you don't find it out too soon. Will you walk over to Tilting Rock, beyond the barn-lot, with me after supper and let me show you?" "Will I cross the fields of Elysium to gaze over the pearly ramparts?" demanded Everett with boyish enthusiasm, if not a wholly accurate use of mythological metaphor. "Let's cut supper and go on now! What do you say? Why wait?" "I'm afraid," laughed Rose Mary as she prepared to close up the wide window and leave everything in shipshape for the night. "A woman oughtn't to risk feeding a hungry man cold moonbeams instead of hot hoecake. Besides, I have to see everybody safely tucked in before I can leave. Aren't they all a precious houseful of early-to-bed chickens? The old Sweeties have forgotten there is such a thing as the moon and Stonie hasn't--found it out--yet." And with a mischievous backward glance, Rose Mary led the way up the lilac path to the Briars on top of the hill just as the old bell sounded two wobbly notes, their uncertainty caused by the rivalry of the General and Tobe over the pulling of the ropes. And it was quite two hours later that she and Everett made their way across the barn-lot over to the broad, moss-covered Tilting Rock that jutted out from a little hackberry-covered knoll at the far end of the pasture. "Now look--and smell in deep!" exclaimed Rose Mary excitedly as she pointed back to the Briars. "Why--why!" exclaimed Everett under his breath, "it's enchantment! It's a dream--am I awake?" And indeed a very vision spread itself out before the wondering man. The low roof and wide wings of the Briars, with the delicate traceries of vines over the walls and gables, shone a soft, old-brick pink in the glow of moonlight, and over and around it all gushed a very shower of shimmering white blossoms, surrounding the house like a mist around an early blooming rose. And as he looked, wave on wave of fragrance beat against Everett's face and poured over his head. "What is it?" he demanded breathlessly, as if dizzy from a too deep drinking of the perfume. "Don't you know? It's the locust trees that have bloomed out since sunset!" exclaimed Rose Mary in as breathless a tone as his own. "For a week I have been watching and hoping they would be out in the full moon. They are so delicate that the least little cold wind sets them back days or destroys them altogether. I wanted them so very much this year for you, and I was so afraid you would notice them before we got over here where you could get the full effect. I promised you lilacs for being good, but this is just because--because--" "Because what?" asked Everett quietly. "Because I felt you would appreciate it," answered Rose Mary, as she sank down on the stone that still held a trace of the warmth from the sun, and made room for Everett beside her with one of her ever-ready, gracious little gestures. "And it's lovely to have you here to look at it with me," she added. "So many times I have sat here alone with the miracle, and my heart has ached for the whole world to get the vision of it at least. I've tried sending my love of it out in little locust prayers to folks over the Ridge. Did you ever happen to get one any spring?" "Last April I turned down a commission for a false test for the biggest squeeze-out copper people in the world, fifty thousand in it to me. I thought it was moral courage, but I know now it was just on account of the locusts blooming in Harpeth Valley at Sweetbriar. Do you get any connection?" he demanded lightly, if a bit unevenly. "To think that would be worth all the loneliness," answered Rose Mary gently. "Things were very hard for me the first year I had to come back from college. I used to sit here by the hour and watch Providence Road wind away over the Ridge and nothing ever seemed to come or go for me. But that was only for a little while, and now I never get the time to breathe between the things that happen along Providence Road for me to attend to. I came back to Sweetbriar like an empty crock, with just dregs of disappointment at the bottom, and now I'm all ready every morning to have five gallons of lovely folks-happenings poured into a two-and-a-half-gallon capacity. I wish I were twins or twice as much me." "Why, you have never told me before, Rose Mary, that you belong to the new-woman persuasion, with a college hall-mark and suffragist leanings. I have made the mistake of putting you in the home-guard brigade and classing you fifty years behind your times. Don't tell me you have an M.A. I can't stand it to-night." "No, I haven't got one," answered Rose Mary with both a smile and a longing in her voice. "I came home in the winter of my junior year. My father was one of the Harpeth Valley boys who went out into the world, and he came back to die under the roof where his fathers had fought off the Indians, and he brought poor little motherless me to leave with the aunts and Uncle Tucker. They loved me and cared for me just as they did Uncle Tucker's son, who was motherless, too, and a few years after he went out into the world to seek the fortune he felt so sure of, I was given my chance at college. In my senior year his tragedy came and I hurried back to find Uncle Tucker broken and old with the horror of it, and with the place practically sold to avoid open disgrace. His son died that year and left--left--some day I will tell you the rest of it. I might have gone back into the world and made a success of things and helped them in that way, from a distance--but what they needed was--was me. And so I sat here many sunset hours of loneliness and looked along Providence Road until--until I think the Master must have passed this way and left me His peace, though my mortal eyes didn't see Him. And now there lies my home nest swung in a bower of blossoms full of the old sweetie birds, the boy, the calf, puppy babies, pester chickens and--and I'm going to take a large, gray, prowling night-bird back and tuck him away for fear his cheeks will look hollow in the morning. I'm the mother bird, and while I know He watches with me all through the night, sometimes I sing in the dark because I and my nesties are close to Him and I'm not the least bit afraid." [Illustration: "I hope you feel easy in your mind now"] CHAPTER IV MOONLIGHT AND APPLE-BLOW "I hope you feel easy in your mind, child, now you've put this whole garden to bed and tucked 'em under cover, heads and all," said Uncle Tucker, as he spread the last bit of old sacking down over the end of the row of little sprouting bean vines. "When I look at the garden I'm half skeered to go in the house to bed for fear I haven't got a quilt to my joints." "Now, honey sweet, you know better than that," answered Rose Mary as she rose from weighting down the end of a frilled white petticoat with a huge clod of earth and stretched it so as to cover quite two yards of the green shoots. "I haven't taken a thing of yours but two shirts and one of your last summer seersucker coats. I'm going to mend the split up the back in it for the wash Monday. Aunt Amandy lent me two aprons and a sack and a petticoat for the peony bushes, and Aunt Viney gave me this shawl and three chemises that cover all the pinks. I've taken all the tablecloths for the early peas, and Stonie's shirts, each one of them, have covered a whole lot of the poet's narcissus. All the rest of the things are my own clothes, and I've still got a clean dress for to-morrow. If I can just cover everything to-night, I won't be afraid of the frost any more. You don't want all the lovely little green things to die, do you, and not have any snaps or peas or peonies at all?" "Oh, fly-away!" answered Uncle Tucker as he tucked in the last end of a nondescript frill over a group of tiny cabbage plants, "there's not even a smack of frost in the air! It's all in your mind." "Well, a mind ought to be sensitive about covering up its friends from frost hurts," answered Rose Mary propitiatingly as she took a satisfied survey of the bedded garden, which looked like the scene of a disorganized washday. "Thank you, Uncle Tucker, for helping me--keep off the frost from my dreams, anyway. Don't you think--" "Well, howdy, folks!" came a cheerfully interruptive hail from across the brick wall that separated the garden from the cinder walk that lay along Providence Road, which ran as the only street through Sweetbriar, and Caleb Rucker's long face presented itself framed in a wreath of budding rose briars that topped the wall in their spring growth. "Tenting up the garden sass ag'in, Miss Rose Mary?" "No, we're jest giving all the household duds a mooning instead of a sunning, Cal," answered Uncle Tucker with a chuckle as he came over to the wall beside the visitor. "What's the word along the Road?" "Gid Newsome have sent the news as he'll be here Sad'ay night to lay off and plow up this here dram or no-dram question for Sweetbriar voters, so as to tote our will up to the state house for us next election. As a state senator, we can depend on Gid to expend some and have notice taken of this district, if for nothing but his corn-silk voice and white weskit. It must take no less'n a pound of taller a week to keep them shoes and top hat of his'n so slick. I should jedge his courting to be kinder like soft soap and molasses, Miss Rose Mary." And Mr. Rucker's smile was of the saddest as he handed this bit of gentle banter over the wall to Rose Mary, who had come over to stand beside Uncle Tucker in the end of the long path. "It's wonderful how devoted Mr. Newsome is to all his friends," answered Rose Mary with a blush. "He sent me three copies of the Bolivar _Herald_ with the poem of yours he had them print last week, and I was just going over to take you and Mrs. Rucker one as soon as I got the time to--" "Johnnie-jump-ups, Miss Rose Mary, don't you never do nothing like that to me!" exclaimed Mr. Rucker with a very fire of desperation lighting his thin face. "If Mis' Rucker was to see one verse of that there poetry I would have to plow the whole creek-bottom corn-field jest to pacify her. I've done almost persuaded her to hire Bob Nickols to do it with his two teams and young Bob, on account of a sciattica in my left side that plowing don't do no kind of good to. I have took at least two bottles of her sasparilla and sorgum water and have let Granny put a plaster as big and loud-smelling as a mill swamp on my back jest to git that matter of the corn-field fixed up, and here you most go and stir up the ruckus again with that poor little _Trees in the Breeze_ poem that Gid took and had printed unbeknownst to me. Please, mam, burn them papers!" "Oh, I wouldn't tell her for the world if you don't want me to, Mr. Rucker!" exclaimed Rose Mary in distress. "But I am sure she would be proud of--" "No, it looks like women don't take to poetry for a husband; they prefers the hefting of a hoe and plow handles. It's hard on Mis' Rucker that I ain't got no constitution to work with, and I feel it right to keep all my soul-squirmings and sech outen her sight. The other night as I was a-putting Petie to bed, while she and Bob was at the front gate a-trying to trade on that there plowing, a mighty sweet little verse come to me about "'The little shoes in mother's hand Nothing like 'em in the land,' and the tears was in my eyes so thick 'cause I didn't have nobody to say 'em to that one dropped down on Pete and made him think I was a-going to wash his face, and sech another ruckus as she had to come in to, as mad as hops! If I feel like it, I'm a-going to clean every weed outen the garden for her next week to try and make up to her for--" "Aw, Mr. Rucker, M-i-s-t-e-r Rucker, come home to get ready for supper," came in a loud, jovial voice that carried across the street like the tocsin of a bass drum. The Rucker home sat in a clump of sugar maples just opposite the Briars, and was square, solid and unadorned of vine or flower. A row of bright tin buckets hung along the picket fence that separated the yard from the store enclosure, and rain-barrels sat under the two front gutters with stolid practicability, in contrast to the usual relegation of such store-houses of the rainfall to the back of the house and the planting of ferns and water plants under the front sprouts, as was the custom from the beginning of time in Sweetbriar. Mrs. Rucker in a clean print dress and with glossy and uncompromisingly smoothed hair stood at the newly whitewashed front gate. "Send him on home, Rose Mary, or grass'll grow in his tracks and yours, too, if he can hold you long enough," she added by way of badinage. "I'm a-coming, Sally, right on the minute," answered the poet-by-stealth, and he hurried across the street with hungry alacrity. The poem-maker was tall and loose-jointed, and the breadth of his shoulders and long muscular limbs decidedly suggested success at the anvil or field furrow. He made a jocular pass at placing his arm around the uncompromising waist-line of his portly wife, and when warded off by an only half-impatient shove he contented himself by winding one of her white apron strings around one of his long fingers as they leaned together over the gate for further parley with the Alloways across the road. "When did you get back, Mrs. Rucker?" asked Rose Mary interestedly, as she rested her arms on the wall and Uncle Tucker planted himself beside her, having brushed away one of the long briar shoots to make room for them both. "About two hours ago," answered Mrs. Rucker. "I found everybody in fine shape up at Providence, and Mis' Mayberry sent Mr. Tucker a new quinzy medicine that Tom wrote back to her from New York just day before yesterday. I made a good trade in hogs with Mr. Hoover for myself and Bob Nickols, too. Mr. Petway had a half-barrel of flour in his store he were willing to let go cheap, and I bought it for us and you-all and the Poteets. Me and you can even up on that timothy seed with the flour, Mr. Tucker, and I'm just a-going to give a measure to the Poteets as a compliment to that new Poteet baby, which is the seventh mouth to feed on them eighty-five acres. I've set yeast for ourn and your rolls for to-morrow, tell your Aunt Mandy, Rose Mary, and I brought that copy of the _Christian Advocate_ for your Aunt Viney that she lost last month. Mis' Mayberry don't keep hern, but spreads 'em around, so was glad to let me have this one. I asked about it before I had got my bonnet-strings untied. Yes, Cal, I'm a-going on in to give you your supper, for I expect I'll find the children's and Granny's stomicks and backbones growing together if I don't hurry. That's one thing Mr. Satterwhite said in his last illness, he never had had to wait--yes, I'm coming, Granny," and with the encomium of the late Mr. Satterwhite still unfinished Mrs. Rucker hurried up the front path at the behest of a high, querulous old voice issuing from the front windows. "Well, there's no doubt about it, no finer woman lives along Providence Road than Sallie Rucker, Marthy Mayberry and Selina Lue Lovell down at the Bluff not excepted, to say nothing of Rose Mary Alloway standing right here in the midst of my own sweet potato vines," said Uncle Tucker reflectively as he glanced at the retreating figure of his sturdy neighbor, which was followed by that of the lean and hungry poet. "Yes, she's wonderful," answered Rose Mary enthusiastically, "but--but I wish she had just a little sympathy for--for poetry. If a husband sprouts little spirit wings under his shoulders it's a kind thing for his wife not to pick them right out alive, isn't it? When I get a husband--" "When you get a husband, Rose Mary, I hope he'll hump his shoulders over a plow-line the number of hours allotted for a man's work and then fly poetry kites off times and only when the wind is right," answered Uncle Tucker with a quizzical smile in his big eyes and a quirk at the corner of his mouth. "But I'm going always to admire the kites anyway, even if they don't fly," answered Rose Mary with the teasing lift of her long lashes up at him. "Maybe just a woman's puff might start a man's kite sky high that couldn't get off right without it. You can't tell." "Yes, child," answered Uncle Tucker as he looked into the dark eyes level with his own with a sudden tenderness, "and you never fail to start off all kites in your neighborhood. When I took you as a bundle of nothing outen Brother John's arms nearly thirty years ago this spring jest a perky encouraging little smile in your blue eyes started my kite that was a-trailing weary like, and it's sailed mostly by your wind ever since--especially these last few years. Don't let the breeze give out on me yet, child." "It never will, old sweetie," answered Rose Mary as she took Uncle Tucker's lean old hand in hers and rubbed her cheek against the sleeve of his rough farm coat. "Is the interest of the mortgage ready for this quarter?" she asked quietly in almost a whisper, as if afraid to disturb some listening ear with a private matter. "It lacks more than a hundred," answered Uncle Tucker in just as quiet a voice, in which a note of pain sounded plainly. "And this is not the first time I have fallen behind with Newsome, either. The repairs on the plows and the food chopper for the barn have cost a good deal, and the coal bill was large this winter. Sometimes, Rose Mary, I--I am afraid to look forward to the end. Maybe if I was younger it would be different and I could pay the debt, but I am afraid--if it wasn't for your aunts, looks like you and I could let it go and make our way somewhere out in the world beyond the Ridge, but they are older than us and we must keep their home as long as we can for 'em. Maybe in a few years--Newsome won't press me, I'm mighty sure. Do you think you can help me hold on for 'em? I don't matter." "We'll never let it go, Uncle Tuck, never!" answered Rose Mary passionately as she pressed her cheek closer to his arm. "I don't know why I know, but we are going to have it as long as they--and you, _you_ need it--and I'm going to die here myself," she added with a laughing sob as she shook two tears out of her lashes and looked up at him with adorning stars in her eyes. "It's as He wills, daughter," answered Uncle Tucker quietly as he laid a tender hand on the dark braids resting against his shoulder. "It isn't wrong for us to go on keeping it if we can jest pay the interest to our friend--pay it to the day. That is the only thing that troubles me. We must not fall behind and--" "Oh, but honey-sweet, let me tell you, let me tell you!" exclaimed Rose Mary with shining eyes, "I've got just lots of money, more than twenty dollars, nearly twice more. I've saved it just in case we did need it for this or--or--or any other thing," she added hastily, not willing to disclose her tooth project even to Uncle Tucker's sympathetic ear. Uncle Tucker's large eyes brightened with relief for a second and then clouded with a mist of tears. "What were you saving it for, child?" he asked with a quaver in his sweet old voice, and his hand clasped hers more closely. "You don't ever have what pretty women like you want and need, and that's what grinds down on me most hardest of all. You are young and--and mighty beautiful, and looks like it's wrong for you to lay down yourself for us who are a good long way on the other side of life's ridge. I ought to send you back across the hills to--to find your own--no matter what happens!" "Try it!" answered Rose Mary, again lifting her star eyes to his. "I was saving that money to buy Aunt Viney a set of teeth that she thinks she wants, but I know she couldn't use them when she gets them. If I'm as beautiful as you say, isn't this blue homespun of great Grandmother Alloways, made over twentieth century style, adornment enough? Some people--that is, some one--Mr. Mark said this morning it was--was _chic_, which means most awfully stylish. I've got one for my back and one for the tub all out of the same old blue bed-spread, and a white linen marvel contrived from a pair of sheets for Sunday. Please don't send me out into the big world--other people might not think me as lovely as you do," and her raillery was most beautifully dauntless. "The Lord bless you and keep you and make the sun to shine upon you, flower of His own Kingdom," answered Uncle Tucker with a comforted smile breaking over his wistful old face. "I had mighty high dreams about you when that young man talked his oil-wells to me a month ago, and I wanted my rose to do some of her flowering for the world to see, but maybe--maybe--" "She'll flower best here, where her roots go down into Sweetbriar hearts--and Sweetbriar prayers, Uncle Tucker; she knows that's true, and so do you," answered Rose Mary quickly. "And anyway, Mr. Mark is making the soil survey for you, and if we follow his directions there is no telling what we will make next year, maybe the interest and some of the money, too, and the teeth and--and a sky-blue silk robe for me--if that's what you'd like to see me wear, though it would be inconvenient with the milking and the butter and--" "Tucker, oh Brother Tucker!" came a call across the garden fence from the house, in a weak but commanding voice, and Rose Mary caught a glimpse of Miss Lavinia's white mob cap bobbing at the end of the porch, "that is in Proverbs tenth and nineteenth, and not nineteenth and tenth, like you said. You come right in here and get it straight in your head before the next sun sets on your ignorance." "Fly-away!" exclaimed Uncle Tucker, "now Sister Viney's never going to forgive me that Bible slip-up if I don't persuade her from now on till supper. But there is nothing more for you to do out here, Rose Mary, the sun'll put out the light for you," and he hurried away down the path and through the garden gate. Rose Mary remained leaning over the garden wall, looking up and down the road with interest shining in her eyes and a laugh and nod for the neighbors who were hurrying supperward or stopping to talk with one another over fences and gates. A group of men and boys stood and sat on the porch in front of the store, and their big voices rang out now and again with hearty merriment at some exchange of wit or clever bit of horse-play. Two women stood in deep conclave over by the Poteet gate, and the subject of the council was a small bundle of flannel and lawn displayed with evident pride by a comely young woman in a pink calico dress. Seeing Rose Mary at the wall, they both smiled and started in her direction, the bearer of the bundle stepping carefully across the ditch at the side of the walk. "Lands alive, Rose Mary, you never did see nothing as pretty as this last Poteet baby," exclaimed Mrs. Plunkett enthusiastically. "The year before last one, let me see, weren't that Evelina Virginia, Mis' Poteet? Yes, Evelina Virginia was mighty pretty, but this one beats her. I declare, if you was to fail us with these spring babies, Mis' Poteet, it would be a disappointment to the whole of Sweetbriar. Come next April it will be seven without a year's break, astonishing as it do sound." "It would be as bad as the sweetbriar roses not blooming, Mrs. Poteet," laughed Rose Mary as she held out her arms for the bundle which cuddled against her breast in a woman-maddening fashion that made her clasp the mite as close as she dared. "Yes, I tell you, seven hand-running is enough for any woman to be proud of, Mis' Poteet, and it ought to be taken notice of. Have you heard the news of the ten acres of bottom land to be given to him, Rose Mary? That's what all the men are a-joking of Mr. Poteet about over there at the store now. They are a-going to make out the deed to-night. They bought the land from Bob Nickols right next to Mr. Poteet's, crops and all, ten acres of the best land in Sweetbriar. I call it a nice compliment. 'To Tucker Poteet, from Sweetbriar, is to go right in the deed." "'Tucker Poteet,' oh, Mrs. Poteet, have you named him for Uncle Tucker?" exclaimed Rose Mary with beaming eyes, and the rapture of her embrace was only modified by a slight squirm from the young heir of all Sweetbriar. "Well, I had had that name in my mind from the first if he come a boy, but when Mr. Poteet got down to the store for some tansy, when he weren't a hour old, he found all the men-folks had done named him that for us, and it looked like we didn't have the chance to pass the compliment. We ain't told you-all nothing about it, for they all wanted Mr. Tucker to read it in the deed first." "And ain't them men a-going to have a good time when they give Mr. Tucker that deed to read? Looks like, even if it is some trouble, you couldn't hardly begrudge Sweetbriar these April babies, Mis' Poteet," said Mrs. Plunkett in a consoling voice. "Law, Mis' Plunkett, I don't mind it one bit. It ain't a mite of trouble to me to have 'em," answered the mother of the seven hardily. "You all are so kind to help me out all the time with everything. Course we are poor, but Jim makes enough to feed us, and every single child I've got is by fortune, just a hand-down size for somebody else's children. Five of 'em just stair-steps into clothes of Mis' Rucker's four, and Mis' Nickols saves me all of Bob's things to cut down, so I never have a mite of worry over any of 'em." "Yes, I reckon maybe the worry spread over seven don't have a chanct to come to a head on any one of 'em," said Mrs. Plunkett thoughtfully, and her shoulders began to stoop dejectedly as a perturbed expression dawned into her gray eyes. "Better take him on home now, Mis' Poteet, for sundown is house-time for babies in my opinion. Hand him over, Rose Mary!" Thus admonished, with a last, clinging embrace, Rose Mary delivered young Tucker to his mother, who departed with him in the direction of the Poteet cottage over beyond the milk-house. "Is anything worrying you, Mrs. Plunkett? Can I help?" asked Rose Mary as her neighbor lingered for a moment and glanced at her with wistful eyes. Mrs. Plunkett was small, though round, with mournful big eyes and clad at all times in the most decorous of widow's weeds, even if they were of necessity of black calico on week days. Soft little curls fell dejectedly down over her eyes and her red mouth defied a dimple that had been wont to shine at the left corner, and kept to confines of straight-lipped propriety. "It's about Louisa Helen again and her light-mindedness. I don't see how a daughter of mine can act as she does with such a little feeling. Last night Mr. Crabtree shut up the store before eight o'clock and put on his Sunday coat to come over and set on the front steps a-visiting of her, and in less'n a half hour that Bob Nickols had whistled for her from the corner, and she stood at the front gate talking to him until every light in Sweetbriar was put out, and I know it muster been past nine o'clock. And there I had to set a-trying to distract Mr. Crabtree from her giggling. We talked about Mr. Plunkett and all our young days and I felt real comforted. If I can jest get Louisa Helen to see what a proper husband Thomas Crabtree will make for her we can all settle down comfortable like. He wants her bad, from all the signs I can see." "But--but isn't Louisa Helen a little young for--" began Rose Mary, taking what seemed a reasonable line of consolation. "No, she's not too young to marry," answered her mother with spirit. "Louisa Helen is eighteen years old in May, and I was married to Mr. Plunkett before my eighteenth birthday. He was twenty-one, and I treated him with proper respect, too. I never said no such foolish things as Louisa Helen says to that Nickols boy, even to Mr. Crabtree, hisself." "Oh, please don't worry about Louisa Helen, Mrs. Plunkett. She is just so lovely and young--and happy. You and I both know what it is to be like that. Sometimes I feel as if she were just my own youngness that I had kept pressed in a book and I had found it when I wasn't looking for it." And Rose Mary's smile was so very lovely that even Mrs. Plunkett was dazzled to behold. "Lands alive, Rose Mary, you carry your thirty years mighty easy, and that's no mistake. You put me in mind of that blush peony bush of yourn by the front gate. When it blooms it makes all the other flowers look like they was too puny to shake out a petal. And for sheep's eyes, them glances Mr. Gid Newsome casts at you makes all of Bob Nickols' look like foolish lamb squints. And for what Mr. Mark does in the line of sheeps--Now there they come, and I can see from Louisa Helen's looks she have invited that rampage in to supper. I'll have to hurry on over and knock up a extra sally-lunn for him, I reckon. Good-by 'til morning!" And Mrs. Plunkett hurried away to the preparation of supper for the suitor of her disapproval. For a few moments longer Rose Mary let her eyes go roaming out over the valley that was lying in a quiet hush of twilight. Lights had flashed up in the windows over the village and a night breeze was showering down a fall of apple-blow from the gnarled old tree that stood like a great bouquet beside the front steps of the Briars. All the orchards along the Road were in bloom and a fragrance lay heavy over the pastures and mingled with the earth scent of the fields, newly upturned by the plowing for spring wheat. "Is that a regiment you've got camping in the garden, Rose Mary?" asked Everett as he came up the front walk in the moonlight some two hours later and found Rose Mary seated on the top of the front steps, all alone, with a perfectly dark and sleep-quiet house behind her. Rose Mary laughed and tossed a handful of the pink blow she had gathered over his shoulder. "Did you have your supper at Bolivar?" she asked solicitously. "I saved you some; want it?" "Yes, I had a repast at the Citizens', but I think I can manage yours an hour or two later," answered Everett as he seated himself beside her and lighted a cigar, from which he began to puff rings out into the moonlight that sifted down on to them through the young leaves of the bloom-covered old tree. "You weren't afraid of frost such a night as this, were you?" he further inquired, as he took a deep breath of the soft, perfume-laden air. "I'm not now, but a cool breeze blew up about sundown and made me afraid for my garden babies. Now I'm sure they will all wilt under their covers, and you'll have to help me take them all off before you go to bed. Isn't it strange how loving things make you afraid they will freeze or wilt or get wet or cold or hungry?" asked Rose Mary with such delightful ingenuousness that a warm little flush rose up over Everett's collar. "Loving just frightens itself, like children in the dark," she added musingly. "And you saved my supper for me?" asked Everett softly. "Of course I did; didn't you know I would?" asked Rose Mary quickly, in her simplicity of heart not at all catching the subtle drift of his question. "They all missed you, and Uncle Tucker went to bed almost grumpy, while Stonie--" "Rose Mamie," came in a sleepy but determined voice as the General in a long-tailed nightshirt appeared in the dark doorway, "I went to sleep and you never came back to hear me pray. Something woke me; maybe the puppy in my bed or maybe God. I'll come out there and say 'em so you won't wake the puppy, because he's goned back to sleep," he added in a voice that was hushed to a tone of extreme consideration for the slumber of his young bedfellow. "Yes, honey-heart, come say them here. Mr. Mark won't mind. I came back, Stonie, to hear them, truly I did, but you were so fast to sleep and so tired I hated to wake you." And Rose Mary held out tender arms to the little chap who came and knelt on the floor at her side, between her and Everett. "But, Rose Mamie, you know Aunt Viney says tired ain't no 'scuse to the Lord, and I don't think it are neither. I reckon He's tired, too, sometimes, but He don't go back on the listening, and I ain't a-going to go back on the praying. It wouldn't be fair. Now start me!" and having in a completely argumentative way stated his feelings on the subject of neglected prayer, the General buried his head on Rose Mary's shoulder, folded one bare, pink foot across the other, clasped his hands at proper angle and waited. "_Now I lay me_," began Rose Mary in a low and tender tone. "No," remonstrated Stonie in a smothered voice from her shoulder, "this is 'Our Father' week! Don't tire out the Lord with the '_Now I lay me_,' Rose Mamie!" With an exclamation of regret Rose Mary clasped him closer and led the petition on through to its last word, though it was with difficulty that the sleepy General reached his Amen, his will being strong but his flesh weak. The little black head burrowed under Rose Mary's chin and the clasped pink feet relaxed before the final words were said. For a few minutes Rose Mary held him tenderly and buried her face against the back of the sunburned little neck, while as helpless as young Tucker Stonie wilted upon her breast and floated off into the depths. And for still a few seconds longer Everett sat very still and watched them with a curious gleam in his eyes and his teeth set hard in his cigar; then he rose, bent over and very tenderly lifted the relaxed General in his arms and without a word strode into the house with him. Very carefully he laid him in the little cot that stood beside Rose Mary's bed in her room down the hall, and with equal care he settled the little dog against the bare, briar-scratched feet, returned to the moonlight porch and resumed his seat at Rose Mary's side. "There is something about the General," he remarked with a half smile, "that--that gets next. He has a moral fiber that I hope he will be able to keep resistent to its present extent, but I doubt it." "Oh," said Rose Mary, quickly looking up with pierced, startled eyes, "he must keep it--he must; it is the only hope for him. Tell me if you can how to help him keep it. Help me help him!" "Forgive me," answered Everett in quick distress. "I was only scoffing, as usual. He'll keep what you give him, never fear, Rose Mary; he's honor bound." "Yes, that's what I want him to be--'honor bound.' You don't know about him, but to-night I want to tell you, because I somehow feel you love him--and us--and maybe if you know, some day you will help him. Just after I came back into the Valley and found them all so troubled and--and disgraced, something came to me I thought I couldn't stand. Always it seemed to me I had loved him, my cousin, Uncle Tucker's son, and I thought--I thought he had loved me. But when he went out into the world one of the village girls, Granny Satterwhite's daughter, had followed him and--yes, she had been his wife for all the time we thought she was working in the city. They had been afraid--afraid of Uncle Tucker and me--to acknowledge it. She was foolish and he criminally weak. After his--his tragedy she came back--and nobody would believe--that she was his wife. I found her lying on the floor in the milk-house and though I was hurt, and hard, I took her into my room--and in a few hours Stonie was born. When they gave him to me, so little and helpless, the hurt and hardness all melted for ever, and I believed her and forgave her and him. I never rested until I made him come back, though it was just to die. She stayed with us a year--and then she married Todd Crabtree and moved West. They didn't want Stonie, so she gave him to me. When my heart ached so I couldn't stand it, there was always Stonie to heal it. Do you think that heartaches are sometimes just growing pains the Lord sends when He thinks we have not courage enough?" And in the moonlight Rose Mary's tear-starred eyes gleamed softly and her lovely mouth began to flower out into a little smile. The sunshine of Rose Mary's nature always threw a bow through her tears against any cloud that appeared on her horizon. "I don't believe your heart ever needed any growing pains, Rose Mary, and I resent each and every one," answered Everett in a low voice, and he lifted one of Rose Mary's strong slim hands and held it close for a moment in both his warm ones. "Oh, but it did," she answered, curling her fingers around his like a child grateful for a caress. "I was romantic--and--and intense, and I thought of it as a castle for--for just one. Now it's grown into a wide, wing-spreading, old country house in Harpeth Valley, with vines over the gables and doves up under the eaves. And in it I keep sunshiny rooms to shelter all the folks in need that my Master sends. Yours--is on the south side--corner--don't you want your supper now?" CHAPTER V THE HONORABLE GID "Now, Amandy, stick them jack-beans in the ground round side upwards. Do you want 'em to have to turn over to sprout?" demanded Miss Lavinia, as she stood leaning on her crotched stick over by the south side of the garden fence, directing the planting of her favorite vine that was to be trained along the pickets and over the gate. Little Miss Amanda, as usual, was doing her best to carry out exactly the behests of her older and a little more infirm sister. Miss Amanda was possessed of a certain amount of tottering nimbleness which she put at the disposal of Miss Lavinia at all times with the most cheery good-will. Miss Amanda was of the order of little sisters who serve and Miss Lavinia belonged to the sisterhood dominant by nature and by the consent of Miss Amanda and the rest of her family. "It's such a long row I don't know as I'll hold out to finish it, Sister Viney, if I have to stop to finger the beans in such a way as that. But I'll try," answered the little worker, going on sticking the beans in with trembling haste. "Let me help you, please, Miss Amanda," entreated Everett, who had come out to watch the bean planting with the intention of offering aid, with also the certainty of having it refused. "No, young man," answered Miss Lavinia promptly and decidedly. "These jack beans must be set in by a hand that knows 'em. We can't run no risks of having 'em to fail to come up. I got the seed of 'em over to Springfield when me and Mr. Robards was stationed there just before the war. Mr. Robards was always fond of flowers, and these jack beans in special. He was such a proper meek man and showed so few likings that I feel like I oughter honor this one by growing these vines in plenty as a remembrance, even if he has been dead forty-odd years." "Was your husband a minister?" asked Everett in a voice of becoming respect to the meek Mr. Robards, though he be demised for nearly half a century. "He was that, and a proper, saddlebags-riding, torment-preaching circuit rider before he was made presiding elder at an astonishing early age," answered Miss Lavinia, a fading fire blazing up in her dark eyes. "He saved many a sinner in Harpeth Valley by preaching both heaven and hell in their fitten places, what's a thing this younger generation don't know how to do any more, it seems like. A sermon that sets up heaven like a circus tent, with a come-sinner-come-all sign, and digs hell no deeper than Mill Creek swimming pool, as is skeercely over a boy's middle, ain't no sermon at all to my mind. Most preaching in Sweetbriar are like that nowadays." "But Brother Robards had a mighty sweet voice and he gave the call of God's love so as to draw answers from all hearts," said Miss Amanda in her own sweet little voice, as she jabbed in the beans with her right hand and drew the dirt over them with her left. "Yes, husband was a little inclined to preach from Psalms more'n good rousing Proverbs, but I always belt him to the main meat of the Gospel and only let him feed the flock on the sweets of faith in proper proportion," answered Miss Lavinia, with an echo in her voice of the energy expended in keeping the presiding elder to a Jeremiah rather than a David rôle in his ministry. "It was a mighty blow to the Methodist Church when he was taken away so young," said Miss Amanda gently. "I know I said then that they never would be--" "Lands alive, if here ain't Miss Viney and Miss Amandy out planting the jack beans and I ain't got down not a square foot of summer turnip greens!" exclaimed a hearty voice as Mrs. Rucker hurried up across the yard to the garden gate. "Now I know I'm a behind-hander, for my ground's always ready, and in go the greens when you all turn spade for the bean vines. Are you a-looking for a little job of plowing, Mr. Mark? I'd put Mr. Rucker at it, but he give his left ankle a twist yestidy and have had to be kinder quiet, a-setting on the back porch or maybe a-hobbling over to the store." "Yes, I'll plow, if you don't care whether your mule or plow or hame strings come out alive," answered Everett with a laugh. Miss Amanda had risen, hurried eagerly over to her favorite neighbor and held out her hand for the pan tendered her. "Them's your sally luns, Miss Amandy, and they are a good chanct if I do say it myself. I jest know you and Rose Mary have got on the big pot and little kettle for Mr. Newsome, and I'm mighty proud to have the luns handed around with your all's fixings. I reckon Rose Mary is so comfusticated you can't hardly trust her with no supper rolls or such like. Have you seen him yet, Rose Mary?" she asked of Rose Mary, who had appeared at the garden gate. "No; I've just come up from the milk-house," answered Rose Mary with a laughing blush. "When did Mr. Newsome come?" "Just now," answered Mrs. Rucker, with further banter in her eyes. "And none of Solomon's lilies in all they glory was ever arrayed like one of him. You better go frill yourself out, Rose Mary, for the men ain't a-going to be able to hold him chavering over there at the store very long." "It will only take me a few minutes to dress," answered Rose Mary, with a continuation of the blush. "The Aunties are all ready for supper, and Stonie and Uncle Tucker. Mag has got everything just ready to dish up, and I'll take in the sally luns to be run in the stove at the last moment. Isn't it lovely to have company? Friends right at home you can show your liking for all the time, but you must be careful to save their share for the others to give to them when they come. Mr. Mark, don't you want to--" But before Rose Mary had begun her sentence Mr. Mark Everett, of New York City, New York, was striding away across the yard with a long swing, and as he went through the front gate it somehow slipped out of his hand and closed itself with a bang. The expression of his back as he crossed the road might have led one versed in romantics to conclude that a half-unsheathed sword hung at his side and that he had two flintlocks thrust into his belt. And over at the store he found himself in the midst of a jubilation. Mr. Gideon Newsome, of Bolivar, Tennessee, stood in the doorway, and surrounding him in the store, in the doorway and on the porch was the entire masculine population of Sweetbriar. Mr. Newsome was tall and broad and well on the way to portliness. His limbs were massive and slow of movement and his head large, with a mane of slightly graying hair flung back from a wide, unfurrowed brow. Small and very black eyes pierced out from crinkled heavy lids and a bulldog jaw shot out from under a fat beak of a nose. And over the broad expanse of countenance was spread a smile so sweet, so deep, so high that it gave the impression of obscuring the form of features entirely. In point of fact it was a thick and impenetrable veil that the Senator had for long hung before his face from behind which to view the world at large. And through his mouth, as through a rent in the smile, he was wont to pour out a volume of voice as musical in its drawl and intensified southern burr as the bass note on a well-seasoned 'cello. He was performing the obligato of a prohibition hymn for the group of farmers around him when he caught sight of Everett as he came across the street. Instantly his voice was lowered to a honeyed conversational pitch as he came to the edge of the porch and held out a large, fat, white hand, into which Everett laid his own by courtesy perforced. "I'm delighted to see you, Mr. Everett, suh, delighted!" he boomed. "And in such evident improved health. I inquired for you at Bolivar as soon as I returned and I was informed that you had come over here to find perfect restoration to health in the salubrious climate of this wonderful town of Sweetbriar. I'm glad to see your looks confirm the answer to my anxious inquiries. And is all well with you?" "Thank you, Senator, I'm in pretty good shape again," answered Everett with a counter smile. "Ten pounds on and I'm in fighting trim." The words were said pleasantly, but for the life of him Everett could not control the hostility of a quick glance that apparently struck harmlessly against the veil of smiles. "That there ten pounds had oughter be twenty, Senator, at the rate of the Alloway feeding of him, from milk-house to cellar preserve shelf," said Mr. Crabtree from behind the counter where he was doing up a pound of tea for the poet, who found it impossible to take his eyes off the politician. "Miss Rose Mary ain't give me a glass of buttermilk for more'n a week, and they do say she has to keep a loaf handy in the milk-house to feed him 'fore he gets as far as Miss Amandy and the kitchen. We're going to run him in a fattening race with Mis' Rucker's fancy red hog she's gitting ready for the State Fair and the new Poteet baby, young Master Tucker Poteet of Sweetbriar." "So there's a new Poteet young man, and named for my dear friend, Mr. Alloway! My congratulations, Mr. Poteet!" exclaimed the senator as he pumped the awkward, horny hand of the embarrassed but proud Mr. Poteet up and down as if it were the handle of the town pump. "I must be sure to have an introduction to the young man. Want to meet all the voters," he added, shaking out the smile veil with energy. And at this very opportune moment he looked down the Road and espied a procession of presentation approaching. The General in the midst of the Swarm was coming at a breakneck speed and clasped firmly in his arms he held a small blue bundle. On his right galloped Tobe with Shoofly swung at her usual dangerous angle on his hip, and Jennie Rucker supported his left wing, with stumbling Petie pulled along between her hand and that of small Peggy. Around and behind swarmed the rest of the Poteet seven, the Ruckers and the Nickols, with Mrs. Sniffer and the five little dogs bringing up the rear. "Well, well, and what have we here?" exclaimed the great man as he descended and stood in front of the lined-up cohorts. "It's the Poteet baby," answered the General with precision. "We bringed him to show you. He's going to be a boy; they can't nothing change him now. Shoofly is a girl, but Mis' Poteet didn't fool us this time. Besides if he'd been a girl we wouldn't a-had him for nothing." "Why, young man, you don't mean to discredit the girls, do you?" demanded the Senator with a gallantly propitiating glance in the direction of Jennie, Peggy and the rest of the bunch of assorted pink and blue little calico petticoats. "Why could anything be finer than a sweet little girl?" And as he spoke he rested his hand on Jennie's tow-pigtailed head. "Well, what's sweet got to do with it if we've got too many of 'em?" answered the General in his usual argumentative tone. "Till little Tucker comed they was three more girls than they was boys, and it wasn't fair. Now they is just two more, and four of Sniffie's puppies is boys, so that makes it most even until another one comes, what'll just _have_ to be a boy." And the General cast a threatening glance in the direction of the calico bunch as he issued this ultimatum to feminine Sweetbriar. "I'll ask Maw," murmured Jennie bashfully, but Miss Peggy turned up her small nose and switched her short skirts scornfully as the men on the porch laughed and the Senator emitted a very roar in his booming bass. "Well, well, we'll have to settle that later," he said in his most propitiating urge-voter voice as he cast a smile over the entire Swarm. "Hadn't you better carry the young man back to his mother? He seems to be restless," he further remarked, taking advantage of a slight squirm in which young Tucker indulged himself, though he was not at all uncomfortable in Stonie's arms, accustomed as he was to being transported in any direction at any time by any one of his confrères. And with this skilful hint of dismissal the Senator bent down and bestowed the imperative political kiss on the little pink Poteet head, smattered one or two over Shoofly and Pete, landed one on the tip of Jennie Rucker's little freckled nose and started them all up the Road in good order as he turned once more to the men in the store. But the advent of the Swarm had served to remind the group of his friends that the time for the roof-tree gathering was fast approaching, and Mr. Crabtree was busy filling half-forgotten supper orders for impatient waiters, while most of the men had gone up or down the Road in the wake of the scattering Swarm. For a few minutes the Senator and Everett were left on the porch steps alone. "I hear from some of the men that you have been able to do some prospecting in the last weeks, Mr. Everett," remarked the Senator casually from behind the veil, as he accepted and lighted a cigar. "Just knocked around a bit," answered Everett carelessly. "The whole Mississippi Valley is interesting geologically. There is quite a promise of oil here, but practically no outcrop." "Your examination been pretty thorough--professional?" queried the Senator, still in an equally careless voice, though his little eyes gleamed out of their slits. "Oh, yes, I thrashed it all out, especially Mr. Alloway's place. I'd like to have found oil for him--and the rest of Sweetbriar, too, but it isn't here." Everett spoke decidedly, and there was a note in his voice as if to end the discussion. His own eyes he kept down on his cigar and, as he lounged against a post he had an air of being slightly bored by an uninteresting shop topic. The Senator looked at him a few seconds keenly, started to make a trivial change in the conversation, then made a flank movement, bent toward Everett and began to speak in a suave and most confidential manner. "I'm sorry, too, you didn't find the oil on the old gentleman's place," he said in his most open and dulcet tones. "I am very fond of Mr. Alloway; I may say of the whole family. Farming is too hard work for him at his years and I would have liked for him to have had the ease of an increased income. Some time ago a phosphate expert examined these regions, but reported nothing worth working. I had more hope of the oil. As I say, I am interested in Mr. Alloway and the family--I may say it to you in confidence, particularly interested in one of the members." And the smile that the Senator bestowed upon Everett aroused a keen desire for murder in the first degree. There was a challenge and a warning in it and a cunning, too, that was deeper than both. Controlling his impulse to smash the Senatorial bulldog jaw, Everett's mind went instantly after the cunning. "So you only got the phosphate in your examination report of the Alloway place?" he asked in a friendly, interested tone, as if the hint had failed to make a landing. The cunning in his own glance and tone he was shrewd enough to hide. "That was about all--nothing that was worth taking up then," answered the Senator again carelessly, and at that moment Mr. Crabtree came out to join them. In a few minutes Everett threw away his cigar, glanced across at the Briars, where he could see Rose Mary and Uncle Tucker establishing Miss Lavinia, in her high company cap, in the big chair on the front porch, and without a word he strode out the back door of the store and across the fields toward Boliver. He stopped at the Rucker side fence and entrusted a message to the willing Jenny, and then went on into the twilight in the direction of the lights of the distant town. And as he walked along his mood was, to say the least, savage, and he cut, with a long switch he had picked up, at some nodding little wind bells that had begun to show their colors along the side of the road. He was hungry and he was having his supper in detached visions. Now Rose Mary was handing the Senator a plate of high-piled supper rolls, each with a golden stream of butter cascading down the side, and as her lovely bare arm held them across to the guest probably she was helping Stonie's plate with her other hand to a spoonful of cream gravy over his nicely browned chicken leg. On her side of the table Miss Lavinia was pouring the rich cream over her bowl of steaming mush and the materialized aroma from Uncle Tucker's cup of coffee that Rose Mary had just poured him brought tears to Everett's eyes. Then came a flash of Aunt Amandy helping herself under Rose Mary's urging to a second crisp waffle, and the Senator was preparing to accept his sixth, impelled by the same solicitous smile that had landed the second on the little old lady's plate. Again Rose Mary was pouring the Senator's second cup and stirring in the cream. If she had lifted the spoon to her lips, as she always did with Uncle Tucker's and sometimes forgot and did with his, Everett would have--And at this point he turned the bend and ran smash into the dramatic scene of a romance. Seated by the side of the road was Louisa Helen Plunkett, and before her stood young Bob Nickols, an agony of helplessness showing in every line of his face and big loose-jointed figure, for Louisa Helen was weeping into a handkerchief and one of her blue muslin sleeves. And it was not a series of sentimental sobs and sighs or controlled and effective sniffs in which Louisa Helen was indulging, but she was boo-hooing in good earnest with real chokings and gurgles of sobs. Bob was screwing the toe of his boot into the dust and saying and doing absolutely and desperately nothing. "Why, Louisa Helen, what is the matter?" demanded Everett as he seated himself beside the wailer and endeavored to bring down the pitch of the sobs by a kindly pat on the heaving shoulder. "What's happened, Bob?" he demanded of the silent and dejected lover, who only shook his head as he answered from the depths of confusion. "I don't know; she just of a sudden flung down and began to hollow and I ain't never got her to say." "Oh, I want a supper and a veil and a bokay!" came in a perfect howl from the folds of the sleeve. "I want some supper, too, Louisa Helen," said Everett quickly, and a smile lifted the corners of his mouth as the situation began to unravel itself to his sympathetic concern. "I guess I could take the bouquet and veil, too," he added to himself in an undertone. "I ain't a-going to let Maw insult Bob no more, but I don't want no Boliver wedding in the office of no hotel. I want to be married where folks can look at me, and have something good to eat, and throw old shoes and rice at me," came in a more constrained and connected flow, as the poor little fugitive raised her head from her arm and reached down to settle her skirts about her ankles, from which she had flirted them in the kicks of one of her most violent paroxysms. Louisa Helen was very young and just as pretty as she was young. She was rosy and dimpled and had absurd little baby curls trailing down over her eyes, and her tears had no more effect on her face than a summer shower. "Why, what did your mother say to Bob?" asked Everett, thus drawn into the position of arbitrator between two family factions. "She told him that Jennie Rucker would be about his frying size when he got old enough to pick a wife, and it hurt his feelings so he didn't come to see me for a week, and he says he ain't never coming no more. If I want him I will have to go over to Boliver and marry him to-morrow." A sob began to rise again in the poor little bride prospective's throat at the thought of the horrible Boliver wedding. The autocrat shifted uneasily, and in the dusk Everett could see that he was completely melted and ready to surrender his position if he could only find the line of retreat. "Well," said Everett judicially, as he looked up at Bob with a wink, which was answered by the slightest beginning of laugh from the insulted one, "I don't believe Bob wants to do without that bouquet and veil and supper either. They are just the greatest things that ever happen to a man"--another wink at Bob--"and Bob don't want to give them up. Now suppose you go on back home to-night and don't say anything to your mother about the matter, and to-morrow I'll ask Mr. Crabtree to step over and make it up with Bob for her. I feel sure she'll invite them both in to supper, and then sometime soon we can all discuss the veil-bouquet question. You aren't in a hurry, are you?" "Naw," answered Bob promptly. "Me and Paw ain't got all the winter wheat in yet, and we've got to cut clover next week. We're mighty busy now. I ain't in no hurry." "And I don't want to get married no way except when the briar roses is in bloom so I can have the church tucked out in 'em. And I've got to get some pretty clothes made, too," answered Louisa Helen, thus putting in direct contrast the feminine and masculine attitude towards nuptials in general and also in particular. "Then go on back home, you two," said Everett with a laugh, as he rose to his feet and drew to hers the now smiling Louisa Helen. "And I predict that by the time the briar roses are out something will happen to make it all right. Put your faith in Mr. Crabtree, I should advise, I suspect that he has--er influence with your mother." A giggle from Louisa Helen and a guffaw from Bob, as the two young people started on back along the Road, showed that they had both appreciated his veiled sally. And as he stood watching them out of sight down the Road the twilight faded from off the Valley and darkness came down in a starlit veil from over old Harpeth. Everett climbed up and seated himself on the top rail of the fence and again gave himself over to his moods. This time one of bitterness, almost anger, rose to the surface. The same old wheel grinding out here in the wilderness that he had left in the market places of the world. The vision he had caught of the great cycle being turned by some still greater source above the hills was--a vision. The wheels ground on with the victims strapped and the cogs dripping. Loot and the woman--loot and the woman! And he had thought that out here "_in the hollow of His hand_" he had lost the sound of that grind. And such a woman--the lovely gracious thing with the unfaithful, dishonored lover's child in her arms, other women's tumbling children clinging to her skirts and with hands outstretched to protect and comfort the old gray heads in her care! A woman with a sorrow in her heart but with eyes that were deep blue pools in which there mirrored loves for all her little world! For a long time he sat and looked out into the darkness, then suddenly he squared his shoulders, gripped the rail tight in his hands for a half second and then slipped to the ground. Picking up his switch he turned and strode off toward Sweetbriar, which by this time was a little handful of fireflys glowing down in the sweet meadows. When he got as far as the blacksmith's shop Everett climbed the wall and approached the house through the garden, for in front of the store had been piled high a bonfire of empty boxes and dry wood boughs, and most of the inhabitants of Sweetbriar, small fry and large, were assembled in jocular groups around its blaze of light. He could see Mr. Crabtree and Bob rolling out an empty barrel to serve as a speaking stand for the Honorable Gid, who stood in the foreground in front of the store steps talking to Uncle Tucker, with an admiring circle around him. Horses and wagons and buggies were hitched at various posts along the road, which indicated the gathering of a small crowd from neighboring towns to hear the coming oration, and the front porch of the store presented a scene of unwonted excitement. Everett clicked the garden gate and steered around to the back door of the kitchen in hopes of finding black Mag still at her post and begging of her a glass of milk and a biscuit. But as he stood in the doorway, instead of Mag he discovered Rose Mary with her white skirts tucked up under one of her long kitchen aprons, putting the final polishing touch to a shining pile of dishes. She looked up at him for a second, and then went on with her work, and Everett could see that her curled lips were trembling like a hurt child's. "I--I thought I might get a bite of something from--from Mag if she hadn't left--the kitchen--I--I--" Everett hesitated on the threshold and in speech. "I--I am sorry to trouble you," he finished lamely. "I don't believe you care--care if you do," answered Rose Mary, and her blue eyes showed a decided temper spark under their black lashes. "I see I made a mistake in expecting anything of you. A friend's fingers ought not to slip through yours when you need them to hold tight. But come, get your supper--" "Please, Rose Mary, I'm most awfully ashamed," he said as he came and stood close beside her, and there was a note in his voice that fairly startled him with its tenderness. "I'm just a cross old bear, and I don't deserve anything, no supper and no--no Rose Mary to care whether I'm hungry or not and no--" "But I put the supper up," said Rose Mary, with a little laugh and catch in her voice. "I couldn't let you be hungry, even if you did treat me that way." "Didn't Jennie Rucker come to tell you I couldn't get here to supper?" asked Everett with what he felt to be a contemptible feint of defense. "Yes, she came; but you knew we were going to have company and that I wanted you to be here. You know Mr. Newsome is the best friend we have in the world and your staying away meant that you didn't care if he had been good to us. It hurt me! And the first bowl of lilacs was on the table; I had been saving them for a surprise for you for two days, and everything was so good and just as you like it and--" Rose Mary's voice faltered again and a little tear splashed on the saucer she held poised in her hand. "Well," answered Everett, like a sulky boy, "I didn't want any of the Honorable Gid Newsome's lilacs or waffles or fried chicken, and I didn't want to see you fix any coffee for him," he ended by blurting out. "I didn't--I--that is--you are _horrid_," answered Rose Mary, but she raised her eyes to his in which smiles waltzed around with tears and the glint of her white teeth showed through red lips curling with laugh that was forcing itself over them by way of the dimple in the corner of her chin. "Anyway, what I have here on the top of the stove is your waffles and your fried chicken, and these are your lilacs," and she drew out a purple spray from her belt and dropped it on the table beside him. "Sit down and I'll give it all to you right here while I finish wiping the dishes. Mag was taken with a spell before supper was over and had to go lie down and I stayed to finish things while the others went over to the speaking," she added as she began to bustle about with her usual hospitable concern. "You are an angel, Rose Mary Alloway," said Everett as he placed himself on a split-bottom kitchen chair, bestowed his long legs under the table and drew up as near to Rose Mary and her dish-towel as was possible to be sure of keeping out of the flirt. "And I--I'm a brute," he added contritely, though he dared a quick kiss on the bare arm next and close to him. "No, you're not--just a boy," answered Rose Mary, as she set his supper on the table before him. She had poured his coffee, stirred in the cream and sugar and then laid the spoon decorous and straight in the saucer beside the cup. For an instant Everett sat very still and looked at her, then she picked up the cup and tipped it against her lips, sipped judiciously and set it down with a satisfied air. For just a second her eyes had gleamed down at him over the edge of the cup and a tiny laugh gurgled in her throat as she swallowed her sip of his beverage. "That was mine, anyway--he can have his chicken wings," said Everett with a laugh as he began operations on the food before him. "It wasn't a very nice party," answered Rose Mary as she went on with her work on the pile of china. "Stonie acted awfully. He piled up his plate with pieces of chicken, and when Aunt Viney reproved him he said he was saving it for you. And Aunt Viney said she was sure you were sick, and then Uncle Tucker wanted to go look for you and I had to tell him before them all that you had sent me word. Then Aunt Amandy said she was afraid you were not a Prohibitionist, and Aunt Viney said she would have to talk to you in the morning. Then they all told Mr. Newsome all about you, and I don't think he liked it much because he likes to tell us things about himself. We are so fond of him, and we always want to hear him talk about where he has been and what he has done. I tried to stop them and make him talk, but I couldn't. It's strange how liking a person gets them on your mind so that even if you don't talk about them you think about them all the time, isn't it? But I oughtn't to blame them, for I was so afraid they wouldn't leave enough of things for you that I forgot to talk myself. I was glad Stonie acted that way about the chicken, for the piece he saved made three pieces of white meat for you. Oh, please let's hurry, because we will miss the speaking if we don't. Mr. Newsome makes such beautiful speeches that I want you to hear him. Is there any kind of pride in the world like that you have over your friends?" CHAPTER VI THE ENEMY, THE ROD AND THE STAFF And the days that followed the Senator's prohibition rally at Sweetbriar were those of carnival for jocund spring all up and down Providence Road and out over the Valley. Rugged old Harpeth began to be crowned with wreaths of tender green and pink which trailed down its sides in garlands that spread themselves out over meadow and farm away beyond the river bend. Overnight, rows of jonquils in Mrs. Poteet's straggling little garden lifted up golden candlestick heads to be decapitated at an early hour and transported in tight little bunches in dirty little fists to those of the neighbors whose spring flowers had failed to open at such an early date. In spite of what seemed an open neglect, the Poteet flowers were always more prolific and advanced than any others along the Road, much to the pride of the equally prolific and spring-blooming Mrs. Poteet. And in a spirit of nature's accord the white poet's narcissus showed starry flowers to the early sun in the greatest abundance along the Poteet fence that bordered on the Rucker yard. They peeped through the pickets, and who knows what challenge they flung to the poetic soul of Mr. Caleb Rucker as he sat on the side porch with his stockinged feet up on a chair and his nose tilted to an angle of ecstatic inhalation? Down at the Plunketts the early wistaria vine that garlanded the front porch hung thick with long purple clusters which dropped continually little bouquets of single blossoms with perfect impartiality on the head of widow and maid, as the compromise of entertaining both young Bob and Mr. Crabtree at the same time was carried out by Louisa Helen. And often with the most absolute unconsciousness the demure little widow allowed herself to be drawn by the wily Mr. Crabtree into the mystic circle of three, which was instantly on her appearance dissolved into clumps of two. And if the prodigal vine showered blessings down upon a pair of clasped hands hid beside Louisa Helen's fluffy pink muslin skirts nobody was the wiser, except perhaps Mr. Crabtree. And perched on the side of the hill the Briars found itself in a perfect avalanche of blossoms. The snowballs hung white and heavy from long branches, and gorgeous lilac boughs bent and swayed in the wind. A clump of bridal wreath by the front gate was a great white drift against the new green of a crimson-starred burning bush, while over it all trailed the perfume-laden honeysuckle which bowered the front porch, decorated trellis and trees and finally flung its blossoms down the hill to well-nigh cloister Rose Mary's milk-house. One balmy afternoon Everett brushed aside a spray of the pink and white blossoms and stood in the stone doorway with his prospecting kit in his hands. Rose Mary lifted quick welcoming eyes to his and went on with her work with bowl and paddle. Everett had some time since got to the point where it was well-nigh impossible for him to look directly into Rose Mary's deep eyes, quaff a draft of the tenderness that he always found offered him and keep equanimity enough to go on with the affairs in hand. What business had a woman's eyes to be so filled with a young child's innocence, a violet's shyness, a passion of fostering gentleness, mirth that ripples like the surface of the crystal pools, and--could it be dawning--love? Everett had been in a state of uncertainty and misery so abject that it hid itself under an unusually casual manner that had for weeks kept Rose Mary from suspecting to the least degree the condition of his mind. There is a place along the way in the pilgrimage to the altar of Love, when the god takes on an awe-inspiring phase which makes a man hide his eyes in his hands with fear of the most abject. At such times with her lamp of faith a woman goes on ahead and lights the way for both, but while Rose Mary's flame burned strongly, her unconsciousness was profound. "I'm so glad you came," she said with the usual rose signal to him in her cheeks. "I've been wondering where you were and just a little bit uneasy about you. Mr. Newsome has been here and wants to see you. He stayed to dinner and waited for you for two hours. Stonie and Tobe and all the others looked for you. I know you are hungry. Will you have a drink of milk before I go with you to get your dinner I saved?" "What did the Honorable Gid want?" asked Everett, and there was a strange excitement in his eyes as he laid his hand quickly on a small, irregular bundle of stones that bulged out of his kit. His voice had a sharp ring in it as he asked his question. "Oh, I think he just wanted to see you because he likes you," answered Rose Mary with one of her lifted glances and quick smiles. "A body can take their own liking for two other people and use it as a good strong rope just to pull them together sometimes. I'm awfully fond of Mr. Newsome--and you," she added as she came over from one of the crocks with Peter Rucker's blue cup brimming with ice cold cream in her hand and offered it to Everett. Instead of taking the cup from her Everett clasped his fingers around her slender wrist in the fashion of young Petie and thus with her hand raised the cup to his lips. And as his eyes looked down over its blue rim into hers the excitement in them died down, first into a very deep tenderness that changed slowly into a quiet determination which seemed to be pouring a promise and a vow into her very soul. Something in the strange look made Rose Mary's hand tremble as he finished the last drop in the cup, and again her lovely, always-ready rose flushed up under her long lowered lashes. "Is it good and cold?" she asked with a little smile as she turned away with the cup. "Yes," answered Everett quietly, "it's all to the good and the milk to the cold." "Is that a compliment to me and the milk, too?" laughed Rose Mary from over by the table as she again took up her butter-paddle. "It's nice to find things as is expected of them, women good and milk cold, isn't it?" she queried teasingly. "Yes," answered Everett from across the table. "And any way a woman must be a comfort to folks, just as a rose must smell sweet, because they're both born for that," continued Rose Mary as she lifted a huge pat of the butter on to a blue saucer. "Men are sometimes a comfort, too--and sweet," she added with a roguish glance at him over the butter flower she was making. "No, Rose Mary, men are just thorns, cruel and slashing--but sometimes they protect the rose," answered Everett in his most cynical tone of voice, though the excitement again flamed up in his dark eyes and again his hand closed over the kit at his side. "Do you know what I think I'll do?" he added. "I think I'll take old Gray and jog over to Boliver for a while. I'll see the Senator, and I want to get a wire through to the firm in New York if I can. I'll eat both the dinner and supper you have saved when I come back, though it may be late before I get my telegram. Will you be still awake, do you think?" "I may not be awake, for Stonie got me up so awfully early to help him and Uncle Tucker grease those foolish little turkeys' heads to keep off the dew gaps, but I'll go to sleep on the settee in the hall, and you can just shake me up to give you your supper." "I'll do nothing of the kind, you foolish child," answered Everett. "Go to bed and--but a woman can't manage her dreams, can she?" "Oh, dreams are only little day thoughts that get out of the coop and run around lost in the dark," answered Rose Mary, with a laugh. "I've got a little bronze-top turkey dream that is yours," she added. "Is it one of the foolish flock?" Everett called back from the middle of the plank across the spring stream, and without waiting for his answer he strode down the Road. And the smile that answered his sally had scarcely faded off Rose Mary's face when again a shadow fell across the plank and in a moment Mr. Crabtree stood in the doorway. Across the way the store was deserted and from the chair he drew just outside the door he could see if any shoppers should approach from either direction. "Well, Miss Rose Mary, I thought as how I'd drop over and see if you had any buttermilk left in that trough you are fattening Mr. Mark at, for the fair in the fall," he said with a twinkle in his merry little blue eyes. And Rose Mary laughed with appreciation at his often repeated little joke as she handed him a tall glassful of the desired beverage. "I'm afraid Stonie will get the blue ribbon from over his head if he keeps on drinking so much milk. Did you ever see anybody grow like my boy does?" asked Rose Mary with the most manifest pride in her voice and eyes. "I never did," answered Mr. Crabtree heartily. "And that jest reminds me to tell you that a letter come from Todd last night a-telling me and Granny Satterwhite about the third girl baby borned out to his house in Colorado City. Looked like they was much disappointed. I kinder give Todd a punch in the ribs about how fine a boy General Stonewall Jackson have grown to be. I never did hold with a woman a-giving away her child, though she couldn't have done the part you do by Stonie by a long sight." "Oh, what would I have done without Stonie, Mr. Crabtree!" exclaimed Rose Mary with a deep sadness coming into her lovely eyes. "You know how it was!" she added softly, claiming his sympathy with a little gesture of her hand. "Yes, I do know," answered the store-keeper, his big heart giving instant response to the little cry. "And on him you've done given a lesson in child raising to the whole of Sweetbriar. They ain't a child on the Road, girl or boy, that ain't being sorter patterned after the General by they mothers. And the way the women are set on him is plumb funny. Now Mis' Plunkett there, she's got a little tin bucket jest to hold cakes for nobody but Stonie Jackson, which he distributes to the rest, fair and impartial. I kinder wisht Mis' Plunkett would be a little more free with--with--" And the infatuated old bachelor laughed sheepishly at Rose Mary across her butter-bowl. "When a woman bakes little crisp cakes of affection in her heart, and the man she wants to have ask her for them don't, what must she do?" asked Rose Mary with a little laugh that nevertheless held a slight note of genuine inquiry in it. "Just raise the cover of the bucket and let him get a whiff," answered Mr. Crabtree, shaking with amusement. "'Tain't no use to offer a man no kind of young lollypop when he have got his mouth fixed on a nice old-fashioned pound-cake woman," he added in a ruthful tone of voice as he and Rose Mary both laughed over the trying plight in which he found his misguided love affairs. "There comes that curly apple puff now. Howdy, Louisa Helen; come across the plank and I'll give you this chair if I have to." "I don't wanter make you creak your joints," answered Louisa Helen with a pert little toss of her curly head as she passed him and stood by Rose Mary's table. "Miss Rose Mary, I wanter to show you this Sunday waist I've done made Maw and get you to persuade her some about it for me. I put this little white ruffle in the neck and sleeves and a bunch of it down here under her chin, and now she says I've got to take it right off. Paw's been dead five years, and I've most forgot how he looked. Oughtn't she let it stay?" "I think it looks lovely," answered Rose Mary, eying the waist with enthusiasm. "I'll come down to see your mother and beg her to let it stay as soon as I get the butter worked. Didn't she look sweet with that piece of purple lilac I put in her hair the other night? Did she let that stay?" "Yes, she did until Mr. Crabtree noticed it, and then she threw it away. Wasn't he silly?" asked Louisa Helen with a teasing giggle at the blushing bachelor. "It shure was foolish of me to say one word," he admitted with a laugh. "But I tell you girls what I'll do if you back Mis' Plunkett into that plum pretty garment with its white tags. I'll go over to Boliver and bring you both two pounds of mixed peppermint and chocolate candy with a ribbon tied around both boxes, and maybe some pretty strings of beads, too. Is it a bargain?" And Rose Mary smiled appreciatively as Louisa Helen gave an eager assent. At this juncture a team driven down the Road had stopped in front of the store, and from under the wide straw hat young Bob Nickols' eager eyes lighted on Louisa Helen's white sunbonnet which was being flirted partly in and partly out of the milk-house door. As he threw down the reins he gave a low, sweet quail whistle, and Louisa Helen's response was given in one liquid note of accord. "Lands alive, it woulder been drinking harm tea to try to whistle a woman down in my day, but now they come a-running," remarked Mr. Crabtree to Rose Mary, as he prepared to take his departure in the wake of the pink petticoats that had hurried across the street. Then for another hour Rose Mary worked alone in the milk-house, humming a happy little tune to herself as she pounded and patted and moulded away. Every now and then she would glance down Providence Road toward Boliver, far away around the bend, and when at last she saw old Gray and her rider turn behind the hill she began to straighten things preparatory to a return to the Briars. In the world-old drama of creation which is being ever enacted anew in the heart of a woman, it is well that the order of evolution is reversed and only after the bringing together and marshaling of forces unsuspected even by herself comes the command for light on the darkness of the situation. Rose Mary was as yet in the dusk of the night which waited for the voice of God on the waters, and there was yet to come the dawn of her first day. And in the semi-mist of the dream she finally ascended the hill toward the Briars with a bucket in one hand and a sunbonnet swinging in the other. But coming down the trail she met one of the little tragedies of life in the person of Stonewall Jackson, who was dragging dejectedly across the yard from the direction of the back door with Mrs. Sniffer and all five little dogs trailing in his wake. And as if in sympathy with his mood, the frisky little puppies were waddling along decorously while Sniffer poked her nose affectionately into the little brown hand which was hanging without its usual jaunty swing. Rose Mary took in the situation at a glance and sank down under one of the tall lilac bushes and looked up with adoring eyes as Stonie came and took a spread-legged stand before her. "What's the matter, honey-sweet?" she asked quickly. "Rose Mamie, it's a lie that I don't know whether I told or not. It's so curious that I don't hardly think God knows what I did," and the General's face was set and white with his distress. "Tell me, Stonie, maybe I can help you decide," said Rose Mary with quick sympathy. "It was one of them foolish turkey hens and Tobe sat down on her and a whole nest of most hatched little turkeys. Didn't nobody know she was a-setting in the old wagon but Aunt Amandy, and we was a-climbing into it for a boat on the stormy sea, we was playing like. It was mighty bad on Tobe's pants, too, for he busted all the eggs. Looks like he just always finds some kind of smell and falls in it. I know Mis' Poteet'll be mad at him. And then in a little while here come Aunt Amandy to feed the old turkey, and she 'most cried when she found things so bad all around everywhere. We had runned behind the corn-crib, but when I saw her begin to kinder cry I comed out. Then she asked me did I break up her nest she was a-saving to surprise Uncle Tucker with, and I told her no ma'am I didn't--but I didn't tell her I was with Tobe climbing into the wagon, and it only happened he slid down first on the top of the old turkey. It don't _think_ like to me it was a lie, but it _feels_ like one right here," and Stonie laid his hand on the pit of his little stomach, which was not far away from the seat of his pain if the modern usage assigned the solar-plexus be correct. "And did Tobe stay still behind the corn-crib and not come out to tell Aunt Amandy he was sorry he had ruined her turkey nest?" asked Rose Mary, bent on getting all the facts before offering judgment. "Yes'm, he did, and now he's mighty sorry, cause Tobe loves Aunt Amandy as well as being skeered of the devil. He says if it was Aunt Viney he'd rather the devil would get him right now than tell her, but if you'll come lend him some of my britches he will come in and tell Aunt Amandy about it. He's tooken his off and he has to stay in the corn-crib until I get something for him to put on." "Of course I'll come get some trousers for Tobe and a clean shirt, too, and I know Aunt Amanda will be glad to forgive him. Tobe is always so nice to her and she'll be sorry he's sorry, and then it will be all right, won't it?" And thus with a woman's usual shrinking from meeting the question ethical, Rose Mary sought to settle the matter in hand out of court as it were. "No, Rose Mamie, I ain't sure about that lie yet," asserted the General in a somewhat relieved tone of voice, but still a little uneasy about the moral question involved in the case. "Did I tell it or not? Do you know, Rose Mamie, or will I have to wait till I go to God to find out?" "Stonie, I really don't know," admitted Rose Mary as she drew the little arguer to her and rested her cheek against the sturdy little shoulder under the patched gingham shirt. "It was not your business to tell on Tobe but--but--please, honey-sweet, let's leave it to God, now. He understands, I'm sure, and some day when you have grown a big and wise man you'll think it all out. When you do, will you tell Rose Mamie?" "Yes, I reckon I'll have to wait till then, and I'll tell you sure, Rose Mamie, when I do find out. I won't never forget it, but I hope maybe Tobe won't get into no more mess from now till then. Please come find the britches for me!" And consoled thus against his will the General followed Rose Mary to the house and into their room, eager for the relief and rehabiting of the prisoner. And in a few minutes the scene of the _amende honorable_ between little Miss Amanda and the small boys was enacted out on the back steps, well out of sight and hearing of Miss Lavinia. A new bond was instituted between the little old lady, who was tremulous with eagerness to keep the culprit from any form of self-reproach, and Tobe, the unfortunate, who was one of her most ardent admirers at all times. And it was sealed by a double handful of tea-cakes to both offenders. After she had watched the boys disappear in the direction of the barn, intent on making a great clean-up job of the disaster under Miss Amanda's direction, Rose Mary wended her way to the garden for a precious hour of communion with her flowers and vegetable nursery babies. She had just tucked up her skirts and started in with a light hoe when she espied Uncle Tucker coming slowly up Providence Road from the direction of the north woods. Something a bit dejected in his step and a slightly greater stoop in his shoulders made her throw down her weapon of war on the weeds and come to lean over the wall to wait for him. "What's the matter, old Sweetie--tired?" she demanded as he came alongside and leaned against the wall near her. His big gray eyes were troubled and there was not the sign of the usual quizzical smile. The forelock hung down in a curl from under the brim of the old gray hat and the lavender muffler swung at loose ends. As he lighted the old cob his lean brown hands trembled slightly and he utterly refused to look into Rose Mary's eyes. "What is it, honey-heart?" she demanded again. "What's what, Rose Mary?" asked Uncle Tucker with a slight rift in the gloom. "They are some women in the world, if a man was to seal up his trouble in a termater-can and swoller it, would get a button-hook and a can-opener to go after him to get it out. You belong to that persuasion." "I want to be the tomato-can--and not be 'swollered'," answered Rose Mary as she reached over and gently removed the tattered gray roof from off the white shock and began to smooth and caress its brim into something of its former shape. "I know something is the matter, and if it's your trouble it's mine. I'm your heir at law, am I not?" "Yes, and you're a-drawing on the estate for more'n your share of pesters, looks like," answered Uncle Tucker as he raised his eyes to hers wistfully. "Is it something about--about the mortgage?" asked Rose Mary in the gently hushed tone that she always used in speaking of this ever couchant enemy of their peace. "Yes," answered Uncle Tucker slowly, "it's about the mortgage, and I'm mighty sorry to have to tell you, but I reckon I'll have to come to accepting you from the Lord as a rod and staff to hobble on. I--I had that settlement with the Senator this evening 'fore he left and it came pretty nigh winding me to see how things stood. Instead of a little more'n one hundred dollars behind in the interest we are mighty near on to six, and by right figures, too. It just hasn't measured out any year, and I never stopped to count it at so much. Gid was mighty kind about it and said never mind, let it run, but--but I'm not settled in my mind it's right to hold on like this; he maybe didn't mean it, but before dinner he dropped a word about being mighty hard pressed for money to keep up this here white ribbon contest he's a-running against his own former record. No, I'm not settled in my mind about the rights of it," and with this uneasy reiteration Uncle Tucker raised his big eyes to Rose Mary in which lay the exact quest for the path of honor that she had met in the young eyes of the General not two hours before. In fact, Uncle Tucker's eyes were so like Stonie's in their mournful demand for a decision from her that Rose Mary's tender heart throbbed with sympathy but sank with dismay at again having the decision of a question of masculine ethics presented to her. "I just don't know what to say, Uncle Tucker," she faltered, thus failing him in his crisis more completely than she had the boy. "The time for saying has passed, and I'm afraid to look forwards to what we may have to do," answered Uncle Tucker quietly. "After Gid was gone on up the road I walked over to Tilting Rock and sat down with my pipe to think it all over. My eyes are a-getting kinder dim now, but as far as I could see in most all directions was land that I had always called mine since I come into a man's estate. And there is none of it that has ever had a deed writ aginst it since that first Alloway got it in a grant from Virginy. There is meadow land and corn hillside, creeks for stock and woodlands for shelter, and the Alloways before me have fenced it solid and tended it honest, with return enrichment for every crop. And now it has come to me in my old age to let it go into the hands of strangers--sold by my own flesh and blood for a mess of pottage, he not knowing what he did I will believe, God help me. I'm resting him and the judgment of him in the arms of Mercy, but my living folks have got to have an earthly shelter. Can you see a way, child? As I say, my eyes are a-getting dim." "I can't see any other shelter than the Briars, Uncle Tucker, and there isn't going to be any other," answered Rose Mary as she stroked the old hat in her hand. "You know sometimes men run right against a stone wall when a woman can see a door plainly in front of them both. She just looks for the door and don't ask to know who is going to open it from the other side. Our door is there I know--I have been looking for it for a long time. Right now it looks like a cow gate to me," and a little reluctant smile came over Rose Mary's grave face as if she were being forced to give up a cherished secret before she were ready for the revelation. "And if the gate sticks, Rose Mary, I believe you'll climb the fence and pull us all over, whether or no," answered Uncle Tucker with a slightly comforted expression coming into his eyes. "You're one of the women who knot a bridle out of a horse's own tail to drive him with. Have you got this scheme already geared up tight, ready to start?" "It's only that Mr. Crabtree brought word from town that the big grocery he sells my butter to would agree to take any amount I could send them at a still larger price. If we could hold on to the place, buy more cows and all the milk other people in Sweetbriar have to sell I believe I could make the interest and more than the interest every year. But if Mr. Newsome needs the money, I am afraid--he might not like to wait. It would be a year before I could see exactly how things succeed--and that's a long time." "Yes, and it would mean for you to just be a-turning yourself into meat and drink for the family, nothing more or less, Rose Mary. You work like you was a single filly hitched to a two-horse wagon now, and that would be just piling fence rails on top of the load of hay you are already a-drawing for all of us old live stock. You couldn't work all that butter." "Don't you know that love mixed in the bread of life makes it easy for the woman to work a large batch for her family, Uncle Tucker?--and why not butter? Will you talk to Mr. Newsome the next time he comes and see what he thinks of the plan? I would tell him about it myself--only I--I don't know why, but I don't--want to." Rose Mary blushed and looked away across the Road, but her confusion was all unnoticed by Uncle Tucker, who was busily lighting a second pipeful of tobacco. "Yes, I'll talk to him and Crabtree both about it," he answered slowly. "I can't hardly bear the idea of your doing it, child, and if it was just me I wouldn't hear tell of it, but Sister Viney and Sister Amandy--moved they'd be like a couple of sprouts of their own honeysuckle vine that you had pulled up and left in the sun to wilt. Home was a place to grow in for women of their day, not just a-kinder waiting shack between stations like it has come to be in these times of women's uprising--in the newspapers." "We don't get much new woman excitement out here in Harpeth Valley, Uncle Tucker," laughed Rose Mary, glad to see him rise once more from the depth of his depression to his usual philosophic level. "You wouldn't call--er--er Mrs. Poteet a modern woman, would you?" "Fly-away, Peggy Poteet is the genuine, original mossback and had oughter be expelled from the sex by the confederation president herself," answered Uncle Tucker as they both glanced down past the milk-house where they saw the comely mother of the seven at her gate administering refreshment in the form of bread and jam to all of her own and quite a number of the other members of the Swarm, including the General and the reclothed and shriven Tobe. "If there is another Poteet output next April we'll have to report her," he added with a laugh. "But there never was a baby since Stonie like little Tucker," answered Rose Mary in quick defense of the small namesake of whom Uncle Tucker was secretly but inordinately proud. "Yes, and I'm a-going to report you to the society of suppression of men folks as a regular spiler, Rose Mary Alloway, if you don't keep more stern than you are at present with me and Stonie, to say nothing of all the men members of Sweetbriar from Everett clean on through Crabtree down to that very young Tucker Poteet. You are one of the women that feed and clothe and blush on men like you were borned a hundred years ago and nobody had told you they wasn't worth shucks. Are you a-going to reform?" "I'll try when I get time," answered Rose Mary with a smile as she bestowed both a fleeting kiss and the old hat on Uncle Tucker's forelock over the wall. "Now I want to run in and make a few cup custards, so I can save one for Mr. Mark when he gets home to-night. He loves them cold. Little cooking attentions never spoil men, they just nourish them. Anyway, what is a woman going to have left to do in life if she sheds the hovering feathers she keeps to tuck her nesties underneath?" CHAPTER VII THE SATSUMA VASE "Well, howdy to-day, Mis' Poteet!" exclaimed Mrs. Rucker as she came across her side yard and leaned over the Poteet fence right opposite the Poteet back porch. "I brought you this pan of rolls to set away for Mr. Poteet's supper. When I worked out the sponge looked like my pride over 'em riz with the dough and I just felt bound to show 'em off to somebody; I know I can always count on a few open mouths in this here nest." "That you can and thanky squaks, too, Mis' Rucker. I don't know however I would feed 'em all if it wasn't for the drippings from your kitchen," answered the placid and always improvident Mrs. Poteet as she picked up Shoofly and came over to the fence, delighted at a chance for a few minutes parley with the ever busy and practical Mrs. Rucker. She balanced the gingham-clad bunch on its own wobbly legs beside her, while through the pickets of the fence in greeting were thrust the pink hands of Petie, the bond, who had followed in the wake of his own maternal skirts. Shoofly responded to this attention with a very young feminine gurgle of delight and licked at the chubby fist thrust toward her like an overjoyed young kitten. "Well, Monday is always a scrap day, so I try to kinder perk up my Monday supper. Singing in the quire twict on Sunday and too much confab with the other men on the store steps always kinder tires Mr. Rucker out so he can't hardly get about with his sciatica on Monday, and I have to humor him some along through the day. That were a mighty good sermon circuit rider preached last night." "Yes, I reckon it were, but my mind was so took up with the way Louisa Helen flirted herself down the aisle with Bob on one side of her and Mr. Crabtree on the other, I couldn't hardly get my mind down to listening. And when she contrived Mr. Crabtree into the pew next to Mis' Plunkett, as she moved down for 'em, I most gave a snort out loud. Didn't Mis' Plunkett look nice in that second mourning tucker it took Louisa Helen and all of Sweetbriar to persuade her into?" "Lou Plunkett is as pretty as a chiny aster that blooms in September and what she's having these number-two conniptions over Mr. Crabtree for is more than I can see. I look on a second husband as a good dessert after a fine dinner and a woman oughter swallow one when offered without no mincing. I wouldn't make two bites of taking Mr. Crabtree after poor puny Mr. Plunkett if it was me. Of course there never was such a man as Mr. Satterwhite, but he was always mighty busy, while Cal Rucker is a real pleasure to me a-setting around the house on account of his soft constitution. Mr. Satterwhite, I'm thankful to say, left me so well provided for that I can afford Mr. Rucker as a kind of play ornament." "Yes, they ain't nothing been thought up yet to beat marrying," answered Mrs. Poteet. "Now didn't Emma Satterwhite find a good chanct when Todd Crabtree married her and took her away after all that young Tucker Alloway doings? It were a kind of premium for flightiness, but I for one was glad to get her gone off'en Rose Mary's hands. I couldn't a-bear to see her tending hand and foot a woman she were jilted for." "Well, a jilt from some men saves a woman from being married with a brass ring outen a popcorn box, in my mind, and Tucker Alloway were one of them kind of men. But talking about marrying, I'm kinder troubled in my mind about something, and I know I can depend on you not to say nothing to nobody. Mr. Gid Newsome stopped at my gate last week and got me into a kinder hinting chavering that have been a-troubling me ever since. Now that's where Mr. Rucker is such a comfort to me, he'll stay awake and worry as long as I have need of, while I wouldn't a-dared to speak to Mr. Satterwhite after he put out the light. But this is about what I've pieced outen that talk with the Senator, with Cal's help. That mortgage he has got on the Briars about covers it, like a double blanket on a single bed, and with the interest beginning to pile up it's hard to keep the ends tucked in. The time have come when Mr. Tucker can't make it no more and something has got to be done. But they ain't no use to talk about moving them old folks. I gather from a combination of what Mr. Gid looked and _didn't_ say that he were entirely willing to take over the place and make some sorter arrangement about them all a-staying on just the same. That'd be mighty kind of him." "You don't reckon he'd do no such take-me-or-get-out co'ting to Rose Mary, do you?" asked the soft-natured little Mrs. Poteet with alarmed sympathy in her blue eyes. "Oh, no, he ain't that big a fool. Every man knows in marrying an unwilling woman he's putting himself down to eat nothing but scraps around the kitchen door. But I wisht Rose Mary could make up her mind to marry Mr. Newsome. She might as well, for in the end a woman can't tell nothing about taking a man; she just has to choose a can of a good brand and then be satisfied, for they all season and heat up about alike. I never gave him no satisfaction about talking his praises to her, but I reckon I'm for the tie-up if Rose Mary can see it that way." And Mrs. Rucker glanced along the Road toward Rose Mary's milk-house with a kindly, though calculating matchmaking in her practical eyes. "I'm kinder for Mr. Mark," ventured the more sentimental Mrs. Poteet with a smile. "He's as handsome as Rose Mary are, and wouldn't they have pretty--" "Oh, shoo, I don't hold with no marrying outen the Valley for Rose Mary! She's needed here and ain't got no call to gallivant off to New York and beyont with a strange man, beauty or no beauty. Besides she's pretty enough herself to hand it down even to the third and fourth generation. But I must go and see to helping Granny out on the side porch in the sun. I never want to neglect her, for she's the only child poor Mr. Satterwhite left me. Now Mr. Rucker--Why there comes Mis' Amandy down the front walk! Let's you and me go to meet her and see what she wants. We can help her across the Road if she is a-going to see anybody but us!" And with eager affection the two strong young women with their babies in their arms hurried across the street in order to serve if need be the delicate little old lady who, with her gray skirts fluttering and the little shawl streaming out behind, was coming at her tottering full speed in that direction. In her hand she held carefully a bit of sheer, yellow, old muslin, and her bright eyes were beaming with delight as she met the two neighbors at the gate. "It's the dress," she exclaimed, all out of breath and her sweet little voice all a-tremble. "Sister and me and Tucker were all baptized in it when we were babies. Sister Viney has had me a-going through boxes and bundles for it ever since little Tucker was named for us, and here it is! It's hand-made and fine linen, brought all the way from New York down to the city in a wagon before the railroad run. It's all the present we have got for little Tucker, but we thought maybe--" And Miss Amanda paused with a shy diffidence in offering her gift. "Gracious me, Miss Amandy, they didn't nothing ever happen to me like this little dress being gave to one of my children. I am going to let him be named in it and then keep it in the box with my Bible, where it won't be disturbed for nothing," exclaimed Mrs. Poteet in a tone of voice that was tear-choking with reverence as she took the dainty yellow little garment into her hand. "And to think how you all have wored yourself out a-looking for it!" she further exclaimed. "Oh, me and Sister Viney have had a good time a-going through things; we haven't seen some of them for thirty or forty years. We found the flannel petticoat Ma was a-making for me when she died over forty-five years ago. The needle is a-sticking in it, and I'm a-going to finish it to wear next winter. I'll feel like it is a comfort for my old age she just laid by for me. I've got a little lace collar Ma's mother wore when she come over from Virginy, and it's in the very style now, so we're going to bleach it out to give to Rose Mary. Come on up to the house with me and see it and set with Sister Viney a spell, can't you? She's got mighty sore joints this morning, though Rose Mary rubbed her most a hour last night" And in response to the eager invitation they all three went back up the front walk together. The thrifty Mrs. Rucker cast a satisfied glance back towards her own side yard, where upturned tub and drying wash were in plain view. Mrs. Poteet had put off the task of the wash until a later day of the week and thus could make her visit with a mind unharrassed by the vision of suds boiling over on the stove and soap melting in the tub. And there ensued several hours of complete absorption for the four women closeted in Miss Lavinia's room in reviewing the events of the last half century by means of the reminiscences which were inspired by one unearthed heirloom after another. Pete and Shoofly were happy on the floor enveloping themselves and each other in long wisps of moth-eaten yarn that Miss Amandy had unearthed in a bureau drawer and donated to their amusement. Mrs. Poteet had with her usual happy forgetfulness of anything but the very immediate occupation, lost sight of the fact that she had left young Tucker asleep on the bed in her room, which location, counting the distance across the two yards and down the Road, was at least slightly remote from aid in case of a sudden restoration to consciousness for the young sleeper. And in the natural course of events the young Alloway namesake did awaken and gave lusty vent to a demand for human companionship, which was answered promptly by the General, who happened to be passing the front gate in pursuits of his own. Finding the house deserted, with his usual decision of action Stonie picked up the baby and kept on his way, which led past the garden up the hill to the barn. Young Tucker accepted this little journey in the world with his usual imperturbability, and his sturdy little neck made unusual efforts to support his bald head over the General's shoulders as if in pride at being in the company of one of his peers and not in the usual feminine thraldom. Finding the barn also deserted, Stonie laid young Tucker on the straw in the barrel with two of Sniffer's sleeping puppies and began to attend to his errand, which involved the extraction of several long, stout pieces of string from a storehouse of his own under one of the feed bins and the plaiting of them into the cracker of a whip which he had brought along with him. Down below the store the rest of the Swarm were busy marking out a large circus ring and discussing with considerable heat their individual rights to the various star parts to be performed in the coming exhibition. The ardors of their several ambitions were not at all dampened by the knowledge of the fact that the audience that would be in attendance to witness their triumphs would in all probability consist of only Granny Satterwhite, whom little Miss Amanda always coaxed to attend in her company, with perhaps a few moments of encouragement from Mr. Crabtree if he found the time. To which would always be added the interested and jocular company of Mr. Rucker, who always came, brought a chair to sit in and stayed through the entire performance. And in the talented aggregation of performers there was of course just one rôle that could have been assumed by General Jackson, that of ringmaster; so to that end he sat on the floor of the barn beside the sleeping puppies and young Tucker and plaited the lash by means of which he intended to govern the courses of his stars. And it was here that Everett found him a few minutes later as he walked rapidly up the milk-house path and stood in the barn door in evident hurried search for somebody or some thing. "Hello, General," he said with a smile at the barrel full of sleepers at Stonie's side, "do you know where Rose Mary is?" "Yes," answered the General, "she are in her room putting buttermilk on the five freckles that comed on her nose when she hoed out in the garden without no sunbonnet. I found 'em all for her this morning, and she don't like 'em. You can go on in and see if they are any better for her, I ain't got the time to fool with 'em now." "Not for worlds!" exclaimed Everett as he sat down on an upturned peck measure in close proximity to the barrel. "Have you decided to have Mrs. Poteet and Mrs. Sniffer swap--er--puppies, Stonie?" he further remarked. "No, I didn't," answered Stonie with one of his rare smiles which made him so like Rose Mary that Everett's heart glowed within him. Stonie was, as a general thing, as grave as a judge, with something hauntingly, almost tragically serious in his austere young face, but his smiles when they came were flashes of the very divinity of youth and were a strange incarnation of the essence of Rose Mary's cousinly loveliness. "He was crying because he was by hisself and I bringed him along to wait till his mother came home. He belongs some to us, 'cause he's named for Uncle Tuck, and I oughter pester with him same as Tobe have to. It's fair to do my part." "Yes, General, you always do your part--and always will, I think," said Everett, as he looked down at the sturdy little chap so busy with his long strings, weaving them over and over slowly but carefully. "A man's part," he added as two serious eyes were raised to his. "In just a little while I'll be a man and have Uncle Tucker and Aunt Viney and Aunt Amandy to be mine to keep care of always, Rose Mamie says," answered Stonie in his most practical tone of voice as he began to see the end of the long strings draw into his weaving of the cracker. "What about Rose Mamie herself?" asked Everett softly, his voice thrilling over the child's name for the girl with reverent tenderness. "When I get big enough to keep care of everything here I'm going to let Rose Mamie get a husband and a heap of children, like Mis' Poteet--but I'm a-going to make 'em behave theyselves better'n Tobe and Peggie and the rest of 'em do. Aunt Viney says Mis' Poteet spares the rod too much, but I'll fix Rose Mamie's children if they don't mind her and me." The General's mouth assumed its most commanding expression as he glanced down at the little Poteet sleeping beside him, unconscious of the fact that he was, in the future, to be the victim of a spared rod. "Stonie," asked Everett meekly, "have you chosen a husband for Rose Mary yet?" "No," answered Stonie as he wove in the last inch of string. Then he paused and raised his eyes to Everett thoughtfully. "It's jest got to be the best man in the world, and I'm a-going to find him for her. If I can't I'll keep care of her as good as I can myself." "General," said Everett as he held the child's eyes with a straight level compelling glance, "you are right--she must have only the best. And you 'keep care' until he comes. I am going away to-night and I don't know when I can come back, but you must always--always 'keep care' of her--until the good man comes. Will you?" "I will," answered the General positively. "And if anybody of any kind bothers her or any of them I'll knock the stuffins outen 'em, and Tobe'll help. But say," he added, as if suddenly inspired by a brilliant idea, "couldn't you look for him for me? You'd know the good kind of a man and you could bring him here. I would give you one of the spotted puppies to pay for the trouble," and a hot wave engulfed Everett as the trustful friendly young eyes looked straight into his as Stonie made this extremely practical business proposition. "Yes, General, I will come and bring him to you, and when he comes he will be the best ever--or he will have died in the attempt." "All right," answered Stonie, completely satisfied with the terms of the bargain, "and you can take your pick of the puppies. Are you going on the steam cars from Boliver?" "Yes," answered Everett, "and I want to find your Uncle Tucker to ask him--" "Well, here he is to answer all inquiries at all times," came in Uncle Tucker's quizzical voice as he stood in the doorway of the barn with a bucket in one hand and a spade in the other. "Old age is just like a hobble that tithers up stiff-jinted old cattle to the home post and keeps 'em from a-roving. I haven't chawed the rope and broke over to Boliver in more'n a month now. Did you leave Main Street a-running east to west this morning?" "Yes," answered Everett, "still the same old Boliver. But I wanted to see you right away to tell you that I have had a wire from the firm that makes it necessary for me to get back to New York immediately. I must catch that train that passes Boliver at midnight." "Oh, fly away, you can't pick up and go like that!" exclaimed Uncle Tucker with alarmed remonstrance. "Such a hurry as that are unseemly. Good-byes oughter to be handled slowly and careful, like chiny, to save smashed feelings. Have you told Rose Mary and the sisters?" "No; I've just come back from Boliver, and I couldn't find Rose Mary, and Miss Lavinia and Miss Amanda had company. I must go on over to the north field while there is still light to--to collect some--some instruments I--that is I may have left some things over there that I will need. I will hurry back. Will--you tell them all for me?" As Everett spoke he did not look directly at Uncle Tucker, but his eyes followed the retreating form of the General, who, with the completed whip, the nodding baby and the two awakened puppies was making his way down Providence Road in the direction of the circus band. There was a strange controlled note of excitement in his voice and his hands gripped themselves around the handles of his kit until the nails went white with the strain. "Yes, I'll tell 'em," answered Uncle Tucker with a distressed quaver coming into his voice as he took in the fact that Everett's hurried departure was inevitable. "I'm sorry you have got to go, boy, but I'll help you get off if it's important for you. I'll have them get your supper early and put up a snack for the train." "I don't want anything--that is, it doesn't matter about supper. I--I will be back to see Miss Lavinia and Miss Amanda before they retire." And Everett's voice was quiet with a calmness that belied the lump in his throat at the very mention of the farewell to be said to the two little old flower ladies. "I'll go on and tell 'em now," said Uncle Tucker with an even increased gloom in his face and voice. "Breaking bad news to women folks is as nervous a work as dropping a basket of eggs; you never can tell in which direction the lamentations are a-going to spatter and spoil things. I'll go get the worst of the muss over before you get back." "Thank you," answered Everett with both a laugh and a catch in his voice as they separated, he going out through the field and over the hill and Uncle Tucker along the path to the house. And a little later Uncle Tucker found Rose Mary moving alone knee deep in the flowers and fruit of her beloved garden. For long moments she bent over the gray-green, white-starred bed of cinnamon pinks which sent up an Arabian fragrance into her face as she carefully threaded out each little weed that had dared rear its head among the white blossoms. As she walked between the rows the tall lilies laid their heads against her breast and kissed traces of their gold hearts on her hands and bare arms, while on the other side a very riot of blush peonies crowded against her skirts. Long trails of pod-laden snap beans tangled around her feet and a couple of round young squashes rolled from their stems at the touch of her fingers. She was the very incarnation of young Plenty in the garden of the gods, and she reveled as she worked. "Rose Mary," said Uncle Tucker as he came and stood beside her as she began to train the clambering butter-bean vines around their tall poles, "young Everett has got to go on to New York to-night on the train from Boliver, and I told him you would be mighty glad to help him off in time. I'd put him up a middling good size snack if I was you, for the eating on a train must be mighty scrambled like at best. We'll have to turn around to keep him from being late." And it was thus broadside that the blow was delivered which shook the very foundations of Rose Mary's heart and left her white to the lips and with hands that clutched at the bean vines desperately. "When did he tell you?" she asked in a voice that managed to pass muster in the failing light. "Just a little while ago, and the news hit Sister Viney so sudden like it give her a bad spell of asthma, and Sister Amandy was sorter crying and let the jimson-weed smoke get in her mouth and choke her. They are a-having a kind of ruckus, with nobody but Stonie helping 'em put Sis' Viney to bed, so I reckon you'd better go in and see 'em. He's gone over to the north field to get a hammer or something he left and will be back soon. Hurry that black pester up with the supper, I'm so bothered I feel empty," with which injunction Uncle Tucker left Rose Mary at the kitchen steps. And it was a strenuous hour that followed, in which things were so crowded into Rose Mary's hands that the fullness of her heart had to be ignored if she was to go on with them. After a time Miss Lavinia was eased back on her pile of pillows and might have dropped off to sleep, but she insisted on having her best company cap arranged on her hair and a lavender shawl put around her shoulders and thus in state take a formal leave of the departing guest--alone. And it was fully a half hour before Everett came out of her room, and Rose Mary saw him slip a tiny pocket testament which had always lain on Miss Lavinia's table into his inside breast pocket, and his face was serious almost to the point of exhaustion. The time he had spent in Miss Lavinia's room little Miss Amanda had busily occupied in packing the generous "snack," which Uncle Tucker hovered over and saw bestowed to his entire satisfaction with the traps Everett had strapped up in his room. Stonie's large eyes grew more and more wistful, and after he and Uncle Tucker retired with their good-byes all said he whispered to Rose Mary that he wanted to say just one more thing to Mr. Mark. Tenderly Everett bent over the cot until the blush rosebud that Miss Amanda had shyly pinned in his buttonhole as her good-by before she had retired, brushed the little fellow's cheek as he ran his arm under the sturdy little nightgowned shoulders and drew him as close as he dared. "Say," whispered Stonie in his ear, "if you see a man that would buy Sniffer's other two spotted pups I would sell 'em to him. I want to get them teeth for Aunt Viney. I could get 'em to him in a box." "How much do you want for them?" asked Everett with a little gulp in his voice as his heart beat against the arm of the young provider assuming his obligations so very early in life. "A dollar a-piece, I guess, or maybe ten," answered Stonie vaguely. "I'll sell them right away at your price," answered Everett. "I'll see that Mr. Crabtree has them packed and shipped." He paused for a moment. He would have given worlds to have taken the two little dogs with him and have left the money with Stonie--but he didn't dare. "And," murmured Stonie drowsily, "don't forget that good man for Rose Mamie if you see him--and--and--" but suddenly he had drifted off into the depths, thus abandoning himself to the crush of a hug Everett had been hungry to give him. And out in the starlit dusk he found Rose Mary sitting on the steps, freed at last, with her responsibilities all asleep--and before him there lay just this one--good-by. Silently he seated himself beside her and as silently lit his cigar and began to puff the rings out into the air. In the perfect flood of perfume that poured around and over them and came in great gusts from the garden he detected a new tone, wild and woodsy, sweet with a curious tang and haunting in its alien and insistent note in the rhapsody of odors. "There's something new in bloom in your garden, Lady of the Rose?" he asked questioningly. "Yes, it's the roses on the hedges coming out; don't they smell briary and--good? Just this last night you will be able to carry away with you a whiff of real sweetbriar. To-morrow the whole town will be in bloom. It is now I think if we could only see it." Rose Mary had gained her composure and the poignant wistfulness in her voice was but a part of the motif of the briar roses in the valley dusk. "I'll see it all right to-morrow and often. Sweetbriar--it's going to blind me so that I won't be able to make my way along Broadway. Everything hereafter will be located up and down Providence Road for me." Everett's voice held to a tone of quiet lightness and he bravely puffed his rings of smoke out on the breezes. "Perhaps some day you'll pass us again along the road to your Providence," said Rose Mary gently, and the wistful question was all that her woman's tradition allowed her to ask--though her heart break with its pride. "Some day," answered Everett, and underneath the quiet voice sounded a savage note and his teeth bit through his cigar, which he threw out into the dew-carpeted grass. Just then there came from up under the eaves a soft disturbed flutter of wings and a gentle dove note was answered reassuringly and tenderly in kind. "Rose Mary," he said as he turned to her and laid his hand on the step near her, "once you materialized your heart for me, and now I'm going to do the same for mine to you. Yours, you say, is an old gabled, vine-clad, dove-nested country house, a shelter for the people you love--and always kept for your Master's use. It is something just to have had a man's road to Providence lead past the garden gate. I make acknowledgement. And mine? I think it is like one of those squat, heathen, Satsuma vases, inlaid with distorted figures and symbols and toned in all luridness of color, into which has been tossed a poor sort of flower plucked from any bush the owner happened to pass, which has been salted down in frivolity--or perhaps something stronger. I'll keep the lid on to-night, for _you_ wouldn't like the--perfume." "If you'd let me have it an hour I would take it down to the milk-house and empty and scrub it and then I could use it to pour sweet cream into. Couldn't you--you leave it here--in Uncle Tucker's care? I--I--really--I need it badly." The raillery in her voice was as delicious and daring as that of any accomplished world woman out over the Ridge. It fairly staggered Everett with its audacity. "No," he answered, coolly disapproving, "no, I'll not leave it; you might break it." "I never break the crocks--I can't afford to. And women never break men's hearts; they do it themselves by keeping a hand on the treasure so as to take it back when they want it, and so between them both it sometimes gets--shattered." "Very well, then--the lid's off to you--and remember you asked for--the rummage, Rose Mary," answered Everett in a tone as light as hers. Then suddenly he rose and stood tall and straight in front of her, looking down into her upraised eyes in the dusk. "You don't know, do you, you rose woman you, what a man's life can hold--of nothingness? Yes, I've worked hard at my profession and thrown away the proceeds--in a kind of--riotous living. Other men's vast fortunes have been built on my brains, and my next year I'm going to enter as a penniless thirty-niner. When I came South three months ago I drew the last thousand dollars I had in bank, I have a couple of hundreds left, and that's all, out of over twenty thousand made in straight fees from mineral tests in the last year. Yes--a bit of riotous living. It's true about those poor flowers plucked off frail stems off frailer bushes--but--if it hadn't been--a sort of fair play all around I wouldn't stand here telling you about it, you in your hedge of briar roses. And now suddenly something has come into my life that makes me regret every dollar tossed to the winds and every cent burned in the fires--and in spite of it all I must make good. I'm going away from you and I don't know what is going to happen--but as I tell you from now on my feet do not stray from Providence Road, my eyes will turn from across any distance to catch a sight of the crown of old Harpeth, and my heart is in your milk-house to be of any kind of humble use. Ah, comfort me, rose girl, that I can not say more and that go I must if I catch my train." And he stretched out his hands to Rose Mary as she arose and stood close at his side, her eyes never leaving his and her lips parted with the quick breathing of her lifted breast. "And you'll remember, won't you, when things go wrong, or you are tired, that the sunny corner in the old farm-house is yours? Always I shall be here in Harpeth Valley with my nest in the Briars, and because you are gone I'll be lonely. But I won't be in the least anxious, for whatever it is that calls you, I know you will give the right answer, because--because--well, aren't you one of my own nesties, and don't I know how strong and straight your wings can fly?" CHAPTER VIII UNCLE TUCKER'S TORCH "And how do you do, Mr. Crabtree? Glad to see you, suh, glad to see you again! How is all Sweetbriar? Any new voters since young Tucker, or a poem or so in the Rucker family? And are you succeeding in keeping the peace with Mrs. Plunkett for young Bob?" And firing this volley of questions through the gently agitated smile-veil the Honorable Gideon Newsome stood in the door of the store, large-looming and jocular. "Well, howdy, howdy, Senator, come right in and have a chair in the door-breeze!" exclaimed Mr. Crabtree as he turned to beam a welcome on the Senator from behind the counter where he was filling kerosene cans. "We ain't seen you in most a month of Sundays, and I'm sure glad you lit in passing again." "I never just light in passing Sweetbriar, friend Crabtree," answered the senator impressively. "I start every journey with a stop at Sweetbriar in view, and it seems a long time until I make the haven I assure you, suh. And now for the news. You say my friend, Mrs. Plunkett, is enjoying her usual good health and spirits?" "Well, not to say enjoying of things in general, but it do seem she has got just a little mite of spirit back along of this here bully-ragging of Bob and Louisa Helen. She come over here yesterday and stood by the counter upwards of an hour before I could persuade her to be easy in her mind about letting Bob take that frizzling over to Providence to a ice-cream festibul Mis' Mayberry was a-having for the church carpet benefit last night. After I told her I would put up early, and me and her could jog over in my buggy along behind them flippets to see no foolishness were being carried on, she took it more easy, and it looked like onct and a while on the road she most come to the point of enjoying her own self. But I reckon I'm just fooling myself by thinking that though," and Mr. Crabtree eyed the Senator with pathetic eagerness to be assured that he was not self-deceived at this slight advance up the steep ascent of his road of true love. "Not a bit of doubt in my mind she enjoyed it greatly, suh, greatly, and I consider the cause of diverting her grief has advanced a hundred per cent by her consenting to go at all. Did any of the other Sweetbriar friends avail themselves of the Providence invitation--Miss Rose Mary and er--any of the other young people?" "No, Miss Rose Mary didn't want to go, though Mr. Rucker woulder liked to hitch up the wagon and take her and Mis' Rucker and the children. She have been mighty quiet like sinct Mr. Everett left us, though she'd never let anybody lack the heartening of that smile of hern no matter how tetched with lonesome she was herself. When the letters come I just can't wait to finish sorting the rest, but I run with hers to her, like Sniffie brings sticks back to Stonie Jackson when he throws them in the bushes." "Ahm--er--do they come often?" asked the Senator in a casual voice, but his eyes narrowed in their slits and the veil became impenetrable. "Oh, about every day or two," answered the unconsciously gossipy little bachelor. "Looks like the whole family have missed him, too. Miss Viney has been in bed off and on ever since he left, and Miss Amandy has tooken a bad cold in her right ear and has had to keep her head wrapped up all the time. Mr. Tucker's mighty busy a-trying to figure out how to crap the farm like Mr. Mark laid off on a map for him to do--but he ain't got the strength now to even get a part of it done. If Miss Rose Mary weren't strong and bendy as a hickory saplin she couldn't prop up all them old folks." "Yes," answered the Senator in one of his most judicial and dulcet tones as he eyed the little bachelor in a calculating way as if deciding whether to take him into his confidence, "what you say of Mr. Alloway's being too old to farm his land with a profit is true. I have come this time to talk things over with him and--er--Miss Rose Mary. Did I understand you to say our friend Everett is still in New York? Have you heard of his having any intention of returning to Sweetbriar any time soon?" "No, I haven't heard tell of his coming back at all, and I'm mighty sorry and disappointed some, too," answered Mr. Crabtree with an anxious look coming into his kind eyes. "I somehow felt sure he would scratch up oil or some kind of pay truck out there in the fields of the Briars. I shipped a whole box of sand and gravel for him according to a telegram he sent me just last week and I had sorter got my hopes up for a find, specially as that young city fellow came out here and dug another bag full outen the same place not any time after that. He had a map with him, and I thought he might be a friend of Mr. Mark's and asked him, but he didn't answer; never rested to light a pipe, even, so I never found out about him. I reckon he was just fooling around and I hadn't oughter hoped on such a light ration." "When was it that the man came and prospected?" asked the Senator with a quick gleam coming into his ugly little eyes and the smile veil took on another layer of density, while his hand trembled slightly as he lighted his cigar. "Oh, about a week ago," answered Mr. Crabtree. "But I ain't got no hopes now for Mr. Tucker and the folks from him. We'll all just have to find some way to help them out when the bad time comes." "The way will be provided, friend Crabtree," answered the Senator in an oily tone of voice, but which held nevertheless a decided note of excitement. "Do you know where I can find Mr. Alloway? I think I will go have a business talk with him now." And in a few minutes the Senator was striding as rapidly as his ponderosity would allow up Providence Road, leaving the garrulous little storekeeper totally unconscious of the fuse he had lighted for the firing of the mine so long dreaded by his friends. "Well now, Crabbie, don't bust out and cry into them dried apples jest to swell the price, fer Mis' Rucker will ketch you sure when she comes to buy 'em for to-morrow's turnovers," came in the long drawl of the poet as he dawdled into the door and flung the rusty mail-sack down on to the counter in front of Mr. Crabtree. "They ain't a thing in that sack 'cept Miss Rose Mary's letter, and he must make a light kind of love from the heft of it. I most let it drop offen the saddle as I jogged along, only I'm a sensitive kind of cupid and the buckle of the bag hit that place on my knee I got sleep-walking last week while I was thinking up that verse that '_despair_' wouldn't rhyme with '_hair_' in for me. Want me to waft this here missive over to the milk-house to her and kinder pledge his good digestion and such in a glass of her buttermilk?" "No, I wisht you would stay here in the store for me while I take it over to her myself. I've got some kind of business with her for a few minutes," answered Mr. Crabtree as he searched out the solitary letter and started to the door with it. "Sample that new keg of maple drip behind the door there. The cracker box is open," he added by way of compensation to the poet for the loss of the buttermilk. The imagination of all true lovers is easily exercised about matters pertaining to the tender passion, and though Mr. Crabtree had never in his life received such a letter he divined instantly that it should be delivered promptly by a messenger whose mercury wings should scarcely pause in agitating the air of arrival and departure. And suiting his actions to his instinct he whirled the envelope across the spring stream to the table by Rose Mary's side with the aim of one of the little god's own arrows and retreated before her greeting and invitation to enter should tempt him. "Honey drip and women folks is sweet jest about the same and they both stick some when you're got your full of 'em at the time," philosophized the poet as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Say, Crabbie, don't tell Mis' Rucker I have come home yet, please. I want to go out and lay down in the barn on the hay and see if I can get that '_hair-despair_' tangle straightened out. She hasn't seen me to tell me things for two hours or more and I know I won't get no thinking done this day if I don't make the barn 'fore she spies me." And with furtive steps and eyes he left the store and veered in a round-about way toward the barn. And over in the milk-house Rose Mary stood in the long shaft of golden light that came across the valley and fell through the door, it would seem, just to throw a glow over the wide sheets of closely written paper. Rose Mary had been pale as she worked, and her deep eyes had been filled with a very gentle sadness which lighted with a flash as she opened the envelope and began to read. "Just a line, Rose girl, before I put out the light and go on a dream hunt for you," Everett wrote in his square black letters. "The day has been long and I feel as if I had been drawn out still longer. I'm tired, I'm hungry, and there's no balm of Gilead in New York. I can't eat because there are no cornmeal muffins in this howling wilderness of houses, streets, people and noise. I can't drink because something awful rises in my throat when I see cream or buttermilk, and sassarcak doesn't interest me any more. I would be glad to lap out of one of your crocks with Sniffie and the wee dogs. "And most of all I'm tired to see you. I want to tell you how hard I am working, and that I don't seem to be able to make some of these stupid old gold backs see things my way, even if I do show it to them covered with a haze of yellow pay dust. But they shall--and that's my vow to-- "I wish I could kneel down by your rocking-chair with Stonie and hear Uncle Tucker chant that stunt about '_the hollow of His hand_.' Is any of that true, Rose Mamie, and are you true and is Aunt Viney as well as could be expected, considering the length of my absence? I've got the little Bible book with Miss Amanda's blush rose pressed in it, and I put my hand to my breast-pocket so often to be sure it is there and some other things--letter things--that the heat and friction of them and the hand combined have brought out a great patch of prickly heat right over my heart in this sizzling weather. I know it needs fresh cold cream to make it heal up, and I haven't even any talcum powder. How's Louisa Helen and doth the widow consent still not at all? Tell Crabtree I say just walk over and try force of arms and not to--That force of arms is a good expression to use--literally in some cases. Something is the matter with my arms. They don't feel strong like they did when I helped Uncle Tucker mow the south pasture and turn the corn chopper--they're weak and--and sorter useless--and empty. Tell Stonie he could beat me bear-hugging any day now. Has Tobe discovered any new adventure in aromatics lately, and can little Poteet sit up and take notice? Help, help, I'm getting so homesick that I'm about to cry and fall into the ink! "Good night--with all that the expression can imply of moonlight coming over the head of old Harpeth, pouring down its sides, rippling out over the corn-fields and flooding over a tall rose girl thing who stands in the doorway with her 'nesties' all asleep in the dark house behind her--and if any man were lounging against the honeysuckle vine getting a last puff out of his cigar I should know it, and a thousand miles couldn't save him. I'm all waked up thinking about it, and I could smash--Good night! M.E. P.S. I don't think it at all square of you not to let Stonie sell me the little dogs. Women ought to keep out of business affairs between men." And as she turned the last page, slipped it back into place and promptly began at the beginning of the very first one, Rose Mary's face was an exquisite study in what might have been entitled pure joy. Her roses rioted up under her lashes, her rich lips curled like the half-blown bud between the flower of her cheeks, and her eyes shone like the two first stars mirrored in a woman's pool of life. Also it is one of the mysteries of the drama why a woman will scan over and over pages whose every letter is chiseled inches deep into her heart; and exactly one-half hour later Rose Mary was still standing motionless by her table, with the letter outspread in her hand. And this was a very wonderful woman Old Harpeth had cradled in the hollow of His hand, nurtured on the richness of the valley and breathed into her with ever-perfumed breath the peace of faith--in God and man, for to any but an elemental, natural, faith-inspired woman of the fields would have come crushing, cruel, tearing doubts of the man beyond the hills who said so little and yet so much. However, Rose Mary was one of the order of fostering women whose arms are forever outheld cradle-wise, and to whose breast is ever drawn in mother love the child in the man of her choice, so her days since Everett's hurried departure had been filled with love and longing, with faith and prayers, but there had been not one shadow of doubt of him or his love for her all half-spoken as he had left it. And added to her full heart had been burdens that had made her hands still fuller. She had gone on her way day by day pouring out the richness of her life and strength where it was so sorely needed by her feeble folk, with a song in her heart for him and them and to answer every call from along Providence Road. Thus it is that the motive power for the great cycles that turn and turn out in the wide spaces between time and eternity, regardless of the wheels of men that whirl and buzz on broken cog with shattered rim, is poured through the natures of women of such a mold for the saving of His nations. At last Rose Mary folded her letter, hesitated, and with a glint of the blue in her eyes as her lashes fell over a still rosier hint in her cheeks, she tucked it into the front of her dress and smoothed and patted the folds of her apron close down over it, then turned with praiseworthy energy to the huge bowl of unworked butter. And it was nearly an hour later, still, that the Honorable Gid loomed in the doorway under the honeysuckle vines, a complacent smile arranged on his huge face and gallantry oozing from every gesture and pose. "Why, Mr. Newsome, when did you come? How are you, and I'm glad to see you!" exclaimed Rose Mary all in one hospitable breath as she beamed at the Senator across her table with the most affable friendship. Rose Mary felt in a beaming mood, and the Honorable Gid came under the shower of her affability. "Do have that chair by the door, and let me give you a glass of milk," she hastened to add as she took up a cup and started for the crocks with a still greater accession of hospitality. "Sweet or buttermilk?" she paused to inquire over her shoulder. "Either handed by you would be sweet" answered the Senator with praiseworthy ponderosity, and he shook out the smile veil until the very roots of his hair became agitated. "Yes, Mr. Rucker says my buttermilk tastes like sweet milk with honey added," laughed Rose Mary, dimpling from over the tall jar. "He says that because I always pour cream into it for him, and Mrs. Rucker won't because she says it is extravagant. But I think a poet ought to have a dash of cream in his life, if just to make the poetry run smoother--and orators, too," she added as she poured half a ladleful of the golden top milk into the foaming glass in her hand and gave it to the Senator, who received it with a trembling hand and gulped it down desperately; for this once in his life the Honorable Gideon Newsome was completely and entirely embarrassed. For many a year he had had at his command florid and extravagant figures of speech which, cast in any one of a dozen of his dulcet modulations of voice, were warranted to tell on even the most stubborn masculine intelligence, and ought to have melted the feminine heart at the moment of utterance, but at this particular moment they all failed him, and he was left high and dry on the coast of courtship with only the bare question available for use. "Miss Rose Mary," he blurted out without any preamble at all, and drops of the sweat of an agony of anxiety stood out all over the wide brow, "I have been talking with Mr. Alloway, and I have come to you to see if we can't all get together and settle this mortgage question to the profit of all concerned. I lent him that money six years ago with the intention of trying to get you to be my wife just as soon as you recovered from your--your natural grief over the way things had gone with you and young Alloway. I have waited longer than I had any intention of doing, because I was absorbed in this political career I had begun on, but now I see it is time to settle matters, as the farm is running us all into debt, and I'm very much in need of you as a wife. I hope you see it in that light, and the marriage can't take place too soon to suit me. You are the handsomest woman in my district, and my constituents can not help but approve of my choice." Something of the Senator's grandiloquence was returning to him, and he regarded Rose Mary with the pride of one who has appraised satisfactorily and is about to complete a proposed purchase. And as for Rose Mary, she stood framed against the fern-lined dusk at the back of the milk-house like a naiad startled as she emerged from her tree bower. Quickly she raised her hand to her breast and just as quickly the pressure of the letter laying there against her heart sent a flood over her face that had grown pale and still, but she raised her head proudly and looked the Senator straight in the face with a questioning, hurt surprise. "You didn't make the terms clear when you lent the money to us," she said quietly. "Well," he answered, beginning to take heart at her very tranquil acceptance of the first bombardment, "I thought it best to let a time elapse to soothe your deceived affections and cure your humiliation. For the time being I was content to enjoy culling the flowers of your friendship from time to time, but I now feel no longer satisfied with them, but must be paid in a richer harvest. We will take charge of this place, assure a comfortable future for the aged relatives in your care, and as my wife you will be both happy and honored." The Senator was decidedly coming into his own, and smile, glance and voice as he regarded Rose Mary were unctuous. In fact, through their slits his eyes shot a gleam of something that was so hateful to Rose Mary that she caught her breath with horror, and only the sharp corner of her letter pressed into her naked breast kept her from reeling. But in a second she had herself in hand and her quick mother-wit was aroused to find out the worst and begin a fight for the safeguarding of her nesties--and the nest. "And if I shouldn't want to--to do what you want me to?" she asked, and she was even able to summon a smile with a tinge of coquetry that served to draw the wily Senator further than he realized. "Oh, I feel sure you can have no objections to me that are strong enough to weigh against thus providing suitably for your old relatives," was the bait he dangled before her humiliated eyes. "It is the only way to do it, for Mr. Alloway is too old to care any longer for the place, which has been run at a loss for too long already. We may say that in accepting me you are accepting their comfortable future. Of course you could not expect things to go on any longer in this impossible way, as I have need of the home and family I am really entitled to, now could you?" The Senator bent forward and finished his sentence in his most beguiling tone as he poured the hateful glance all over her again so that her blood stopped in her veins from very fear and repulsion. "No," she said slowly, with her eyes down on the bowl of butter on the table before her; "no, things couldn't go on as they have any longer. I have felt that for some time." She paused a second, then lifted her deep eyes and looked straight into his, and the wounded light in their blue depth was shadowed in the pride of the glance. "You are right--you must not be kept out of your own any longer. But you will--will you give me just a little time to--to get used to--to thinking about it? Will you go now and leave me--and come back in a few days? It is the last favor I shall ever ask of you. I promise when you come back to--to pay the debt." And the color flooded over her face, then receded, to leave her white and controlled. "I felt sure you would see it that way; immediately, immediately, my dear," answered the Senator, as he rose to take his departure. A triumphant note boomed in his big gloating voice, but some influence that it is given a woman to exhale in a desperate self-defense kept him from bestowing anything more than an ordinary pressure on the cold hand laid in his. Then with a heavy jauntiness he crossed the Road, mounted his horse and, tipping his wide hat in a conquering-hero wave, rode on down Providence Road toward Boliver. And for a long, quiet moment Rose Mary stood leaning against the old stone table perfectly still, with her hand pressing the sharp-edge paper against her heart; then she sank into a chair and, stretching her arms across the cold table, she let her head sink until the chill of the stone came cool to her burning cheeks. So this was the door that was to be opened in the stone wall--she had been blind and hadn't seen! And across the hills away by the sea he was tired and cold and hungry--with only a few hundred dollars in his pocket. He was discouraged and overworked, and a time was coming when she would not have the right to shelter his heart in hers. Once when he had been so ill, before he ever became conscious of her at all, his head had fallen over on her breast as she had tended him in his weakness--the throb of it hurt her now. And perhaps he would never understand. She couldn't tell him because--because of his poverty and the hurt it would give him--not to be able to help--to save her. No, he must not know until too late--and _never_ understand! Desperately thus wave after wave swept over her, crushing, grinding, mocking her womanhood, until, helpless and breathless, she was tossed, well nigh unconscious, upon the shore of exhaustion. The fight of the instinctive woman for its own was over and the sacrifice was prepared. She was bound to the wheel and ready for the first turn, though out under the skies, "_stretched as a tent to dwell in_," the cycle was moving on its course turned by the same force from the same source that numbers the sparrows. "Rose Mary, child," came in a gentle voice, and Uncle Tucker's trembling old hand was laid with a caress on the bowed head before she had even heard him come into the milk-house, "now you've got to look up and get the kite to going again. I've been under the waters, too, but I've pulled myself ashore with a-thinking that nothing's a-going to take _you_ away from me and them. What does it matter if we were to have to take the bed covers and make a tent for ourselves to camp along Providence Road just so we all can crawl under the flap together? I need nothing in the world but to be sure your smile is not a-going to die out." "Oh, honey-sweet, it isn't--it isn't," answered Rose Mary, looking up at him quickly with the tenderness breaking through the agony in a perfect radiance. "It's all right, Uncle Tucker, I know it will be!" "Course it's all right because it _is_ right," answered Uncle Tucker bravely, with a real smile breaking through the exhaustion on his face that showed so plainly the fight he had been having out in his fields, now no longer his as he realized. "Gid has got the right of it, and it wasn't honest of us to hold on at this losing rate as long as we did. There is just a little more value to the land than the mortgage, I take it, and we can pay the behind interest with that, and when we do move offen the place we won't leave debt to nobody on it, even if we do leave--the graves." "Did he say--when--when he expected you to--give up the Briars?" asked Rose Mary in a guarded tone of voice, as if she wanted to be sure of all the facts before she told of the climax she saw had not been even suggested to Uncle Tucker. "Oh, no; Gid handled the talk mighty kind-like. I think it's better to let folks always chaw their own hard tack instead of trying to grind it up friendly for them, cause the swalloring of the trouble has to come in the end; but Gid minced facts faithful for me, according to his lights. I didn't rightly make out just what he did expect, only we couldn't go on as we were--and that I've been knowing for some time." "Yes, we've both known that," said Rose Mary, still suspending her announcement, she scarcely knew why. "He talked like he was a-going to turn the Briars into a kinder orphan asylum for us old folks and spread-eagled around about something he didn't seem to be able to spit out with good sense. But I reckon I was kinder confused by the shock and wasn't right peart myself to take in his language." And Uncle Tucker sank into a chair, and Rose Mary could see that he was trembling from the strain. His big eyes were sunk far back into his head and his shoulders stooped more than she had ever seen them. "Sweetie, sweetie, I can tell you what Mr. Newsome was trying to say to you--it was about me. I--I am going to be his wife, and you and the aunties are never, never going to leave the Briars. He has just left here and--and, oh, I am so grateful to keep it--for you--and them. I never thought of that--I never suspected such--a--door in our stone wall." And Rose Mary's voice was firm and gentle, but her deep eyes looked out over Harpeth Valley with the agony of all the ages in their depths. But in hoping to conceal her tragedy Rose Mary had not counted on the light love throws across the dark places that confront the steps of those of our blood-bond, and in an instant Uncle Tucker's torch of comprehension flamed high with the passion of indignation. Slowly he rose to his feet, and the stoop in his feeble old shoulders straightened itself out so that he stood with the height of his young manhood. His gentle eyes lost the mysticism that had come with his years of sorrow and baffling toil, and a stern, dignified power shone straight out over the young woman at his side. He raised his arm and pointed with a hand that had ceased to tremble over the valley to where Providence Road wound itself over Old Harpeth. "Rose Mary," he said sternly in a quiet, decisive voice that rang with the virility of his youth, "when the first of us Alloways came along that wilderness trail a slip of an English girl walked by him when he walked and rode the pillion behind him when he rode. She finished that journey with bleeding feet in moccasins he had bought from an Indian squaw. When they came on down into this Valley and found this spring he halted wagons and teams and there on that hill she dropped down to sleep, worn out with the journey. And while she was asleep he stuck a stake at the black-curled head of her and one by the little, tired, ragged feet. That was the measure of the front door-sill to the Briars up there on the hill. Come generations we have fought off the Indians, we have cleared and tilled the land, and we have gone up to the state house to name laws and order. In our home we have welcomed traveler, man and beast, and come sun-up each day we have worshipped at the altar of the living God--but we've never sold one of our women yet! The child of that English girl never leaves my arms except to go into those of a man she loves and wants. Yes, I'm old and I've got still older to look out for, but I can strike the trail again to-morrow, jest so I carry the honor of my women folks along with me. We may fall on the march, but, Rose Mary, you are a Harpeth Valley woman, and not for sale!" CHAPTER IX THE EXODUS "Well, it just amounts to the whole of Sweetbriar a-rising up and declaring of a war on Gid Newsome, and I for one want to march in the front ranks and tote a blunderbuss what I couldn't hit nothing smaller than a barn door with if I waster try," exclaimed Mrs. Rucker as she waited at the store for a package Mr. Crabtree was wrapping for her. "I reckon when the Senator hits Sweetbriar again he'll think he's stepped into a nest of yellar jackets and it'll be a case of run or swell up and bust," answered Mr. Crabtree as he put up the two boxes of baking-powder for the spouse of the poet, who stood beside his wife in the door of the store. "Well," said Mr. Rucker in his long drawl as he dropped himself over the corner of the counter, "looks like the Honorable Gid kinder fooled along and let Cupid shed a feather on him and then along come somebody trying to pick his posey for him and in course it het him up. You all 'pear to forget that old saying that it's all's a fair fight in love and war." "Yes, fight; that's the word! Take off his coat, strap his galluses tight, spit on his hands and fight for his girl, not trade for her like hogs," was the bomb of sentiment that young Bob exploded, much to the amazement of the gathering of the Sweetbriar clan in the store. Young Bob's devotion to Rose Mary, admiration for Everett and own tender state of heart had made him become articulate with a vengeance for this once and he spat his words out with a vehemence that made a decided impression on his audience. "That are the right way to talk, Bob Nickols," said Mrs. Rucker, bestowing a glance of approval upon the fierce young Corydon, followed by one of scorn cast in the direction of the extenuating-circumstances pleading Mr. Rucker. "A man's heart ain't much use to a woman if the muscles of his arms git string-halt when he oughter fight for her. Come a dispute the man that knocks down would keep me, not the buyer," and this time the glance was delivered with a still greater accent. "Shoo, honey, you'd settle any ruckus about you 'fore it got going by a kinder cold-word dash and pass-along," answered the poet propitiatingly and admiringly. "But I was jest a-wondering why Mr. Alloway and Miss Rose Mary was so--" "Tain't for nobody to be a-wondering over what they feels and does," exclaimed Mrs. Rucker defensively before the query was half uttered. "They've been hurt deep with some kind of insult and all we have got to do is to take notice of the trouble and git to work to helping 'em all we can. Mr. Tucker ain't said a word to nobody about it, nor have Rose Mary, but they are a-getting ready to move the last of the week, and I don't know where to. I jest begged Rose Mary to let me have Miss Viney and Miss Amandy. I could move out the melojion into the kitchen and give 'em the parlor, and welcome, too. Mis' Poteet she put in and asked for Stonie to bed down on the pallet in the front hall with Tobe and Billy and Sammie, and I was a-going on to plan as how Mr. Tucker and Mr. Crabtree would stay together here, and I knew Mis' Plunkett would admire to have Rose Mary herself, but just then she sudden put her head down on my knee, her pretty arms around me, and held on tight without a tear, while I couldn't do nothing but rock back and forth. Then Mis' Poteet she cried the top of Shoofly's head so soaking wet it give her a sneeze, and we all had to laugh. But she never answered me what they was a-going to do, and you know, Cal Rucker, I ain't slept nights thinking about 'em, and where they'll move, have I?" "Naw, you shore ain't--nor let me neither," answered the poet in a depressed tone of voice. "I mighter known that Miss Viney woulder taken it up-headed and a-lined it out in the scriptures to suit herself until she wasn't deep in the grieving no more, but little Mis' Amandy's a-going to break my heart, as tough as it is, if she don't git comfort soon," continued Mrs. Rucker with a half sob. "Last night in the new moonlight I got up to go see if I hadn't left my blue waist out in the dew, which mighter faded it, and I saw something white over in the Briar's yard. I went across to see if they had left any wash out that hadn't oughter be in the dew, and there I found her in her little, short old nightgown and big slippers with the little wored-out gray shawl 'round her shoulders a-digging around the Maiden Blush rose-bush, putting in new dirt and just a-crying soft to herself, all trembling and hurt. I went in and set down by her on the damp grass, me and my rheumatism and all, took her in my arms like she were Petie, and me and her had it out. It's the graves she's a-grieving over, we all a-knowing that she's leaving buried what she have never had in life, and I tried to tell her that no matter who had the place they would let her come and--" "Oh, durn him, durn him! I'm a-going clear to the city to git old Gid and beat the liver outen him!" exclaimed young Bob, while his sunburned face worked with emotion and his gruff young voice broke as he rose and walked to the door. "I wisht you would, and I'll make Cal help you," sobbed Mrs. Rucker into a corner of her apron. Her grief was all the more impressive, as she was, as a general thing, the balance-wheel of the whole Sweetbriar machinery. "And I don't know what they are a-going to do," she continued to sob. "Well, I know, and I've done decided," came in Mrs. Plunkett's soft voice from the side door of the store, and it held an unwonted note of decision in its hushed cadences. A deep pink spot burned on either cheek, her eyes were very bright, and she kept her face turned resolutely away from little Mr. Crabtree, over whose face there had flashed a ray of most beautiful and abashed delight. "Me and Mr. Crabtree were a-talking it all over last night while Bob and Louisa Helen were down at the gate counting lightning-bugs, they said. They just ain't no use thinking of separating Rose Mary and Mr. Tucker and the rest of 'em, and they must have Sweetbriar shelter, good and tight and genteel, offered outen the love Sweetbriar has got for 'em all. Now if I was to marry Mr. Crabtree I could all good and proper move him over to my house and that would leave his little three-room cottage hitched on to the store to move 'em into comfortable. They have got a heap of things, but most of 'em could be packed away in the barn here, what they won't let us keep for 'em. If Mr. Crabtree has got to take holt of my farm it will keep him away from the store, and he could give Mr. Tucker a half-interest cheap to run it for him and that will leave Rose Mary free to help him and tend the old folks. What do you all neighbors think of it?" "Now wait just a minute, Lou Plunkett," said Mr. Crabtree in a radiant voice as he came out from around the counter and stood before her with his eyes fairly glowing with his emotion. "Have you done decided _yourself_? This is twixt me and you, and I don't want no Sweetbriar present for a wife if I can help it. Have _you_ done decided?" "Yes, Mr. Crabtree I have, and I had oughter stopped and told you, but I wanted to go quick as I could to see Mr. Tucker and Rose Mary. He gave consent immediately, and looked like Rose Mary couldn't do nothing but talk about you and how good you was. I declare I began to get kinder proud about you right then and there, 'fore I'd even told you as I'd have you." And the demure little widow cast a smile out from under a curl that had fallen down into her bright eyes that was so young and engaging that Mr. Crabtree had to lean against the counter to support himself. His storm-tossed single soul was fairly blinded at even this far sight of the haven of his double desires, but it was just as well that he was dumb for joy, for Mrs. Rucker was more than equal to the occasion. "Well, glory be, Lou Plunkett, if that ain't a fine piece of news!" she exclaimed as she bestowed a hearty embrace upon the widow and one almost as hearty upon the overcome Mr. Crabtree. "And you can't know till you've tried what a pleasure and a comfort a second husband can be if you manage 'em right. Single folks a-marrying are likely to gum up the marriage certificate with some kind of a mistake until it sticks like fly-paper, but a experienced choice generally runs smooth like melted butter." And with a not at all unprecedented feminine change of front Mrs. Rucker substituted a glance of unbridled pride for the one of scorn she had lately bestowed upon the poet, under which his wilted aspect disappeared and he also began to bloom out with the joy of approval and congratulation. "And I say marrying a widow are like getting a rose some other fellow have clipped and thorned to wear in your buttonhole, Crabtree; they ain't nothing like 'em." Thus poet and realist made acknowledgment each after his and her own order of mind, but actuated by the identical feeling of contented self-congratulation. "I'm a-holding in for fear if I breathe on this promise of Mis' Plunkett's it'll take and blow away. But you all have heard it spoke," said the merry old bachelor in a voice that positively trembled with emotion as he turned and mechanically began to sort over a box of clothespins, mixed as to size and variety. "Shoo, Crabbie, don't begin by bein' afraid of your wife, jest handle 'em positive but kind and they'll turn your flapjacks peaceable and butter 'em all with smiles," and Mr. Rucker beamed on his friend Crabtree as he wound one of his wife's apron strings all around one of his long fingers, a habit he had that amused him and he knew in his secret heart teased her. "Now just look at Bob tracking down Providence Road a-whistling like a partridge in the wheat for Louisa Helen. They've got love's young dream so bad they had oughter have sassaprilla gave for it," and the poet cast a further glance at the widow, who only laughed and looked indulgently down the road at the retreating form of the gawky young Adonis. "Hush up, Cal Rucker, and go begin chopping up fodder to feed with come supper time," answered his wife, her usual attitude of brisk generalship coming into her capable voice and eyes after their softening under the strain of the varied emotions of the last half hour in the store. "Let's me and you get mops and broom and begin on a-cleaning up for Mr. Crabtree before his moving, Lou. I reckon you want to go over his things before you marry him anyway, and I'll help you. I found everything Cal Rucker had a disgrace, with Mr. Satterwhite so neat, too." And not at all heeding the flame of embarrassment that communicated itself from the face of the widow to that of the sensitive Mr. Crabtree, Mrs. Rucker descended the steps of the store, taking Mrs. Plunkett with her, for to Mrs. Rucker the state of matrimony, though holy, was still an institution in the realm of realism and to be treated with according frankness. Meanwhile over in the barn at the Briars Uncle Tucker was at work rooting up the foundations upon which had been built his lifetime of lordship over his fields. In the middle of the floor was a great pile of odds and ends of old harness, empty grease cans, broken tools, and scraps of iron. Along one side of the floor stood the pathetically-patched old implements that told the tale of patient saving of every cent even at the cost of much greater labor to the fast weakening old back and shoulders. A new plow-shaft had meant a dollar and a half, so Uncle Tucker had put forth the extra strength to drive the dull old one along the furrows, while even the grindstone had worn away to such unevenness that each revolution had made only half the impression on a blade pressed to its rim and thus caused the sharpening to take twice as long and twice the force as would have been required on a new one. But grindstones, too, cost cents and dollars, and Uncle Tucker had ground on patiently, even hopefully, until this the very end. But now he stood with a thin old scythe in his hands looking for all the world like the incarnation of Father Time called to face the first day of the new régime of an arrived eternity, and the bewilderment in his eyes cut into Rose Mary's heart with an edge of which the old blade had long since become incapable. "Can't I help you go over things, Uncle Tucker?" she asked softly with a smile shining for him even through the mist his eyes were too dim to discover in hers. "No, child, I reckon not," he answered gently. "Looks like it helps me to handle all these things I have used to put licks in on more'n one good farm deal. I was just a-wondering how many big clover crops I had mowed down with this old blade 'fore I laid it by to go riding away from it on that new-fangled buggy reaper out there that broke down in less'n five years, while this old friend had served its twenty-odd and now is good for as many more with careful honing. That's it, men of my time were like good blades what swing along steady and even, high over rocks and low over good ground; but they don't count in these days of the four-horse-power high-drive, cut-bind-and-deliver machines men work right on through God's gauges of sun-up and down. But maybe in glory come He'll walk with us in the cool of the evening while they'll be put to measuring the jasper walls with a golden reed just to keep themselves busy and contented. How's the resurrection in the wardrobes and chests of drawers coming on?" And a real smile made its way into Uncle Tucker's eyes as he inquired into the progress of the packing up of the sisters, from which he had fled a couple hours ago. "They are still taking things out, talking them over and putting them right back in the same place," answered Rose Mary with a faint echo of his smile that tried to come to the surface bravely but had a struggle. "We will have to try and move the furniture with it all packed away as it is. It is just across the Road and I know everybody will want to help me disturb their things as little as possible. Oh, Uncle Tucker, it's almost worth the--the pain to see everybody planning and working for us as they are doing. Friends are like those tall pink hollyhocks that go along and bloom single on a stalk until something happens to make them all flower out double like peonies. And that reminds me, Aunt Viney says be sure and save some of the dry jack-bean seed from last year you had out here in the seed press for--" "Say, Rose Mamie, say, what you think we found up on top of Mr. Crabtree's bedpost what Mis' Rucker were a-sweeping down with a broom?" and the General's face fairly beamed with excitement as he stood dancing in the barn door. Tobe stood close behind him and small Peggy and Jennie pressed close to Rose Mary's side, eager but not daring to hasten Stonie's dramatic way of making Rose Mary guess the news they were all so impatient to impart to her. "Oh, what? Tell me quick, Stonie," pleaded Rose Mary with the eagerness she knew would be expected of her. Even in her darkest hours Rose Mary's sun had shone on the General with its usual radiance of adoration and he had not been permitted to feel the tragedy of the upheaval, but encouraged to enjoy to the utmost all its small excitements. In fact the move over to the store had appealed to a fast budding business instinct in the General and he had seen himself soon promoted to the weighing out of sugar, wrapping up bundles and delivering them over the counter to any one of the admiring Swarm sent to the store for the purchase of the daily provender. "It were a tree squirrel and three little just-hatched ones in a bunch," Stonie answered with due dramatic weight at Rose Mary's plea. "Mis' Rucker thought it were a rat and jumped on the bed and hollowed for Tobe to ketch it, and Peg and Jennie acted just like her, too, after Tobe and me had ketched that mouse in the barn just last week and tied it to a string and let it run at 'em all day to get 'em used to rats and things just like boys." And the General cast a look of disappointed scorn at the two pigtailed heads, downcast at this failure of theirs to respond to the General's effort to inoculate their feminine natures with masculine courage. "I hollered 'fore I knewed what at," answered the abashed Jennie in a very small voice, unconsciously making further display of the force of her hopeless feminine heredity. But Peggy switched her small skirts in an entirely different phase of femininity. "You never heard me holler," she said in a tone that was skilful admixture of defiance and tentative propitiation. "'Cause you had your head hid in Jennie's back," answered the General coolly unbeguiled. "Here is the letter we comed to bring you, Rose Mamie, and me and Tobe must go back to help Mis' Rucker some more clean Mr. Crabtree up. I don't reckon she needs Peg and Jennie, but they can come if they want to," with which Stonie and Tobe, the henchman, departed, and not at all abashed the humble small women trailing respectfully behind them. "That women folks are the touch-off to the whole explosion of life is a hard lesson to learn for some men, and Stonie Jackson is one of that kind," observed Uncle Tucker as he looked with a quizzical expression after the small procession. "Want me to read that letter and tell you what's in it?" he further remarked, shifting both expression and attention on to Rose Mary, who stood at his side. "No, I'll read it myself and tell you what's in it," answered Rose Mary with a blush and a smile. "I haven't written him about our troubles, because--because he hasn't got a position yet and I don't want to trouble him while he is lonely and discouraged." "Well, I reckon that's right," answered Uncle Tucker still in a bantering frame of mind that it delighted Rose Mary to see him maintain under the situation. "Come trouble, some women like to blind a man with cotton wool while they wade through the high water and only holler for help when their petticoats are down around their ankles on the far bank. We'll wait and send Everett a photagraf of me and you dishing out molasses and lard as grocer clerks. And glad to do it, too!" he added with a sudden fervor of thankfulness rising in his voice and great gray eyes. "Yes, Uncle Tucker, glad and proud to do it," answered Rose Mary quickly. "Oh, don't you know that if you hadn't seen and understood because you loved me so, I would have felt it was right to do--to do what was so horrible to me? I will--I will make up to you and them for keeping me from--it. What do you suppose Mr. Newsome will do when he finds out that you have moved and are ready to turn the place over to him, even without any foreclosure?" "Well, speculating on what men are a-going to do in this life is about like trying to read turkey tracks in the mud by the spring-house, and I'm not wasting any time on Gid Newsome's splay-footed impressions. Come to-morrow night I'm a-going to pull the front door to for the last time on all of us and early next morning Tom Crabtree's a-going to take the letter and deed down to Gid in his office in the city for me. Don't nobody have to foreclose on me; I hand back my debt dollar for dollar outen my own pocket without no duns. To give up the land immediate are just simple justice to him, and I'm a-leaving the Lord to deal with him for trying to _buy_ a woman in her time of trouble. We haven't told it on him and we are never a-going to. I wisht I could make the neighbors all see the jestice in his taking over the land and not feel so spited at him. I'm afraid it will lose him every vote along Providence Road. 'Tain't right!" "I know it isn't," answered Rose Mary. "But when Mrs. Rucker speaks her mind about him and Bob chokes and swells up my heart gets warm. Do you suppose it's wrong to let a friend's trouble heat sympathy to the boiling point? But if you don't need me I'm going down to the milk-house to work out my last batch of butter before they come to drive away my cows." And Rose Mary hurried down the lilac path before Uncle Tucker could catch a glimpse of the tears that rose at the idea of having to give up the beloved Mrs. Butter and her tribe of gentle-eyed daughters. And as she stood in the cool gray depths of the old milk-house Rose Mary's gentle heart throbbed with pain as she pressed the great cakes of the golden treasure back and forth in the blue bowl, for it was a quiet time and Rose Mary was tearing up some of her own roots. Her sad eyes looked out over Harpeth Valley, which lay in a swoon with the midsummer heat. The lush blue-grass rose almost knee deep around the grazing cattle in the meadows, and in the fields the green grain was fast turning to a harvest hue. Almost as far as her eyes could reach along Providence Road and across the pastures to Providence Nob, beyond Tilting Rock, the land was Alloway land and had been theirs for what seemed always. She could remember what each good-by to it all had been when she had gone out over the Ridge in her merry girlhood and how overflowing with joy each return. Then had come the time when it had become still dearer as a refuge into which she could bring her torn heart for its healing. And such a healing the Valley had given her! It had poured the fragrance of its blooming springs and summers over her head, she had drunk the wine of forgetfulness in the cup of long Octobers and the sting of its wind and rain and snow on her cheeks had brought back the grief-faded roses. The arms of the hearty Harpeth women had been outheld to her, and in turn she had had their babies and troubles laid on her own breast for her and their comforting. She had been mothered and sistered and brothered by these farmer folk with a very prodigality of friendship, and to-day she realized more than ever with positive exultation that she was brawn of their brawn and built of their building. And then to her, a woman of the fields, had come down Providence Road over the Ridge from the great world outside--the _miracle_. She slipped her hand into her pocket for just one rapturous crush of the treasure-letter when suddenly it was borne in upon her that it might be that even that must come to an end for her. Stay she must by her nest of helpless folk, and was it with futile wings he was breasting the great outer currents of which she was so ignorant? His letters told her nothing of what he was doing, just were filled to the word with half-spoken love and longing and, above all, with a great impatience about what, or for what, it was impossible for her to understand. She could only grieve over it and long to comfort him with all the strength of her love for him. And so with thinking, puzzling and sad planning the afternoon wore away for her and sunset found her at the house putting the household in order and to bed with her usual cheery fostering of creaking joints and cumbersome retiring ceremonies. At last she was at liberty to fling her exhausted body down on the cool, patched, old linen sheets of the great four-poster which had harbored many of her foremothers and let herself drift out on her own troubled waters. Wrapped in the compassionate darkness she was giving way to the luxury of letting the controlled tears rise to her eyes and the sobs that her white throat ached from suppressing all day were echoing on the stillness when a voice came from the little cot by her bed and the General in disheveled nightshirt and rumpled head rose by her pillow and stood with uncertain feet on his own springy place of repose. "Rose Mamie," he demanded in an awestruck tone of voice that fairly trembled through the darkness, "are you a-crying?" "Yes, Stonie," she answered in a shame-forced gurgle that would have done credit to Jennie Rucker in her worst moments of abasement before the force of the General. "Does your stomach hurt you?" he demanded in a practical though sympathetic tone of voice, for so far in his journey along life's road his sleep had only been disturbed by retributive digestive causes. "No," sniffed Rose Mary with a sob that was tinged with a small laugh. "It's my heart, darling," she added, the sob getting the best of the situation. "Oh, Stonie, Stonie!" "Now, wait a minute, Rose Mamie," exclaimed the General as he climbed up and perched himself on the edge of the big bed. "Have you done anything you are afraid to tell God about?" "No," came from the depths of Rose Mary's pillow. "Then don't cry because you think Mr. Mark ain't coming back, like Mis' Rucker said she was afraid you was grieving about when she thought I wasn't a-listening. He's a-coming back. Me and him have got a bargain." "What about, Stonie?" came in a much clearer voice from the pillow, and Rose Mary curled herself over nearer to the little bird perched on the edge of her bed. "About a husband for you," answered Stonie in the reluctant voice that a man usually uses when circumstances force him into taking a woman into his business confidence. "Looked to me like everybody here was a-going to marry everybody else and leave you out, so I asked him to get you one up in New York and I'd pay him for doing it. He's a-going to bring him here on the cars his own self lest he get away before I get him." And the picture that rose in Rose Mary's mind, of the reluctant husband being dragged to her at the end of a tether by Everett, cut off the sob instantly. "What--what did you--he say when you asked him about--getting the husband--for you--for me?" asked Rose Mary in a perfect agony of mirth and embarrassment. "Let me see," said Stonie, and he paused as he tried to repeat Everett's exact words, which had been spoken in a manner that had impressed them on the General at the time. "He said that you wasn't a-going to have no husband but the best kind if he had to kill him--no, he said that if he was to have to go dead hisself he would come and bring him to me, when he got him good enough for you by doing right and such." "Was that all?" asked Rose Mary with a gurgle that was well nigh ecstatic, for through her had shot a quiver of hope that set every pulse in her body beating hot and strong, while her cheeks burned in the cool linen of her pillow and her eyes fairly glowed into the night. "About all," answered the General, beginning to yawn with the interrupted slumber. "I told him your children would have to mind me and Tobe when we spoke to 'em. He kinder choked then and said all right. Then we bear-hugged for keeps until he comes again. I'm sleepy now!" "Oh, Stonie, darling, thank you for waking up and coming to comfort Rose Mamie," she said, and from its very fullness a happy little sob escaped from her heart. "I tell you, Rose Mamie," said the General, instantly, again sympathetically alarmed, "I'd better come over in your bed and go to sleep. You can put your head on my shoulder and if you cry, getting me wet will wake me up to keep care of you agin, 'cause I am so sleepy now if you was to holler louder than Tucker Poteet I wouldn't wake up no more." And suiting his actions to his proposition the General stretched himself out beside Rose Mary, buried his touseled head on her pillow and presented a diminutive though sturdy little shoulder, against which she instantly laid her soft cheek. "You scrouge just like the puppy," was his appreciative comment of her gentle nestling against his little body. "Now I'm going to sleep, but if praying to God don't keep you from crying, then wake me up," and with this generous and really heroic offer the General drifted off again into the depths, into which he soon drew Rose Mary with him, comforted by his faith and lulled in his strong little arms. CHAPTER X IN THE HOLLOW OF HIS HAND And the next morning a threatening, scowling, tossed-cloud dawn brought the day over the head of Old Harpeth down upon little Sweetbriar, which awakened with one accord to a sense of melancholy oppression. A cool, dust-laden wind blew down Providence Road, twisted the branches of the tall maples along the way, tore roughly at the festoons of blooming vines over the gables of the Briars, startled the nestled doves into a sad crooning, whipped mercilessly at the row of tall hollyhocks along the garden fence, flaunted the long spikes of jack-beans and carried their quaint fragrance to pour it over the bed of sober-colored mignonette, mixing it with the pungent zinnia odor and flinging it all over into the clover field across the briar hedge. The jovial old sun did his very best to light up the situation, but just as he would succeed in getting a ray down into the Valley a great puffy cloud would cast a gray shadow of suppression over his effort and retire him sternly for another half hour. And on the wings of the intruding, out-of-season wind came a train of ills. Young Tucker Poteet waked at daylight and howled dismally with a pain that seemed to be all over and then in spots. When he went to take down the store shutters Mr. Crabtree smashed one of his large, generous-spreading thumbs and Mrs. Rucker's breakfast eggs burned to a cinder state while she tied it up in camphor for him. In the night a mosquito had taken a bite out of the end of Jennie's small nose and it was swelled to twice its natural size, and Peter, the wise, barked a plump shin before he was well out of the trundle bed. One of young Bob's mules broke away and necessitated a trip half way up to Providence for his capture, and Mrs. Plunkett had Louisa Helen so busy at some domestic manoeuvers that she found it impossible to go with him. And before noon the whole village was in a fervid state of commotion. Mrs. Rucker had insisted on moving Mr. Crabtree and all his effects over into the domicile of his prospective bride, regardless of both her and his abashed remonstrance. "Them squeems are all foolishness, Lou Plunkett," she had answered a faint plea from the widow for a delay until after the ceremony for this material mingling of the to-be-united lives. "It's all right and proper for you and Mr. Crabtree to be married at night meeting Sunday, and his things won't be unmarried in your house only through Saturday and Sunday. I'm a-going to pack up his Sunday clothes, a pair of clean socks, a shirt and other things in this basket. Then I'll fix him up a shake-down in my parlor to spend Saturday night in, and I'll dress him up nice and fine for the wedding you may be sure. We ain't got but this day to move him out and clean up the house good to move Rose Mary and the old folks into early Saturday morning, so just come on and get to work. You can shut your eyes to his things setting around your house for just them one day or two, can't you?" "They ain't nothing in this world I couldn't do to make it just the littlest mite easier for Rose Mary and them sweet old folks, even to gettin' my house into a unseemly married condition before hand," answered Mrs. Plunkett as she brushed a tear away from her blue eyes. "That's the way we all feel," said Mrs. Rucker. "Now if I was you I'd give Mr. Crabtree that middle bureau drawer. Men are apt to poke things away careless if they has the top, and the bottom one is best to use for your own things. Mr. Satterwhite always kept his clothes so it were a pleasure to look at 'em, but Cal Rucker prefers a pair of socks separated across the house if he can get them there. I found one of his undershirts full of mud and stuck away in the kitchen safe with the cup towels last week. There comes Mis' Poteet to help at last! I never heard anything yell like Tucker has been doing all morning. Is he quiet at last, Mis' Poteet?" "Yes, I reckon he's gave out all the holler that's in him, but I'm afraid to put him down," and Mrs. Poteet continued the joggling, swaying motion to a blue bundle on her breast that she had been administering as a continuous performance to young Tucker since daylight. "I'm sorry I couldn't come help you all with the moving, but you can count on my mop and broom over to the store all afternoon, soon as I can turn him over to the children." "We ain't needed you before, but now we have got Mr. Crabtree all settled down here with Mrs. Plunkett we can get to work on his house right after dinner. Have you been over to the Briars to see 'em in the last hour?" "Yes, I come by there, but they didn't seem to need me. Miss Viney has got Miss Amandy and Tobe and the General at work, and Rose Mary has gone down to the dairy to pack up the last batch of butter for Mr. Crabtree to take to the city in the morning. Mr. Tucker's still going over things in the barn, and my feelings riz so I had to come away for fear of me and little Tucker both busting out crying." And over at the Briars the scenes of exodus being enacted were well calculated to touch a heart sterner than that of the gentle, sympathetic and maternal Mrs. Poteet. Chilled by the out-of-season wind Miss Lavinia had awakened with as bad a spell of rheumatism as she had had for a year and it was with the greatest difficulty that Rose Mary had succeeded in rubbing down the pain to a state where she could be propped up in bed to direct little Miss Amanda and the children in the last sad rites of getting things into shape to be carried across the road at the beginning of the morrow, which was the day Uncle Tucker had sternly set as that of his abdication. Feebly, Miss Amanda tottered about trying to carry out her sister's orders and patiently the General and Tobe labored to help her, though their hearts were really over at the store, where the rest of the Swarm were, in the midst of the excitement of Mr. Crabtree's change of residence. In all their young lives of varied length they had never before had an opportunity to witness the upheaval of a moving and this occasion was frought with a well-nigh insupportable fascination. The General's remaining at the post of family duty and his command of his henchman to the same sacrifice was indeed remarkable, though in a way pathetic. "You, Stonewall Jackson, don't handle those chiny vases careless!" commanded Aunt Viney in a stern voice. "Put 'em in the basket right side up, for they were your great grandmother's wedding-present from Mister Bradford from Arkansas." "Yes'm," answered Stonie, duly impressed. "But I've done packed 'em in four different baskets for you, and if this one don't do all right, can't me and Tobe together carry 'em over the Road to-morrow careful for you, Aunt Viney?" "Well, yes, then you can take 'em out and set 'em back in their places," answered Miss Lavinia, which order was carried out faithfully by the General, with a generous disregard of the fact that he had been laboring over them under a fire of directions for more than a half-hour. "Now, Amandy, come away from those flower cans and get out the grave clothes from the bureau drawers and let the boys wrap them in that old sheet first and then in the newspapers and then put 'em in that box trunk with brass tacks over there!" directed Miss Lavinia as Miss Amandy wandered over by the window, along which stood a row of tomato cans into which were stuck slips of all the vines and plants on the land of the Briars, ready for transportation across Providence Road when the time came. There was something so intensely pathetic in this effort of the fast-fading little old woman to begin to bud from the old life flower-plants to blossom in a new one, into which she could hardly expect to make more than the shortest journey, that even the General's young and inexperienced heart was moved to a quick compassion. "I'm a-going to carry the flowers over and plant 'em careful for you, Aunt Amandy," he said as he sidled up close to her and put his arm around her with a protective gesture. "We'll water 'em twice a day and just _make_ 'em grow, won't we, Tobe?" "Bucketfuls 'til we drap," answered Tobe with a sympathy equal to and a courage as great as that of his superior officer. "Is the blue myrtle sprig often the graves holding up its leaves, Amandy?" asked Miss Lavinia in a softened tone of voice. "Yes, it's doing fine," answered Miss Amandy, bending over to the last of the row of cans. "Then come on and get out the burying things and let's get that job over," Miss Lavinia continued to insist. "Don't get our things mixed! Remember that my grave shift has got nothing but a seemly stitched band on it while you would have linen lace on yours. And don't let anything get wrinkled. I don't want to rise on Judgment Day looking like I needed the pressing of a hot iron. Now pull out the trunk, boys, lift out the tray so as I can--" But at this juncture Rose Mary appeared at the door with a tray on which stood a bowl of soup, and Miss Lavinia lay back on her pillows weakly, with the fire all gone out of her eyes and exhaustion written on every line of her determined old face. "Go get dinner, everybody, so we can get back to work," she directed weakly as she raised the spoon to her lips and then rested a moment before she could take another sip. And with the last spoonful she looked up and whispered to Rose Mary, "You'll have to do the rest child, I can't drive any farther with a broke heart. I've got to lay myself in the arms of prayer and go to sleep." And so rested, Rose Mary left her. Then finding the motive powers which had been driving her removed, little Miss Amandy stole away to the cedar grove behind the garden fence, the boys scampered with the greatest glee across the Road to the scene of mop and broom action behind the store, and Uncle Tucker stiffly mounted old Gray to drive the cows away to their separate homes. The thrifty neighbors had been glad to buy and pay him cash for the sleek animals, and their price had been the small capital which had been available for Uncle Tucker to embark on the commercial seas in partnership with Mr. Crabtree. Thus left to herself in the old house, Rose Mary wandered from room to room trying to put things in shape for the morrow's moving and breasting her deep waters with what strength she could summon. Up to this last day some strange hope had buoyed her up, and it was only at this moment when the inevitable was so plainly closing down upon her and her helpless old people that the bitterness of despair rose in her heart. Against the uprooting of their feebleness her whole nature cried out, and the sacrifice that had been offered her in the milk-house days before, seemed but a small price to pay to avert the tragedy. Doubt of herself and her motives assailed her, and she quivered in every nerve when she thought that thus she had failed them. What! Was she to save herself and let the sorrow fall on their bent shoulders? Was it too late? Her heart answered her that it was, for her confession of horror of her purchaser to Uncle Tucker had cut off any hope of deceiving him and she knew he would be burned at the stake before he would let her make the sacrifice. She was helpless, helpless to safeguard them from this sorrow, as helpless as they themselves! For a long hour she stood at the end of the porch, looking across at Providence Nob, behind whose benevolent head the storm clouds of the day were at last sinking, lit by the glow of the fast-setting sun. The wind had died down and a deep peace was settling over the Valley, like a benediction from the coming night. Just for strength to go on, Rose Mary prayed out to the dim, blue old ridge and then turned to her ministrations to her assembling household. Uncle Tucker was so tired that he hardly ate the supper set before him, and before the last soft rays of the sun had entirely left the Valley he had smoked his pipe and gone to bed. And soon in his wake retired the General, with two of the small dogs to bear him company in his white cot. But the settling of Miss Lavinia for the night had been long, and had brought Rose Mary almost to the point of exhaustion. Tired out by her afternoon over in the little graveyard, Miss Amanda had not the strength to read the usual chapters of retiring service that Miss Lavinia always required of her, and so Rose Mary drew the candle close beside the bed and attempted to go on with her rubbing and read at the same time. And though, if read she must, the very soul of Rose Mary panted for the comfort of some of the lines of the Sweet Singer, Aunt Viney held her strictly to the words of her favorite thunderer, Jeremiah, and little Aunt Amandy bunched up under the cover across the bed fairly shook with terror as she buried her head in her pillow to keep out the rolling words of invective that began with an awful "_Harken_" and ended with "_Woe is me now, for my soul is wearied_!" "Now," concluded Miss Lavinia, "you can put out the light. Rose Mary, and if me and Amandy was to open our eyes on the other side of the river it would be but a good thing for us. Lay the Bible in that newspaper on top of that pile of _Christian Advocates_, with a string to tie 'em all up after morning lesson, to be carried away. The Lord bless and keep you, child, and don't forget to latch the front door on us all for the last time!" Softly Rose Mary drew the door partly closed and left them in the quiet of the fast-deepening purple dusk. She peeped into Uncle Tucker's room and assured herself by his sonorous breathing that rest at last was comforting him, and for a moment in her own room she bent over the little cot where the General and his two spotted servitors lay curled up in a tangle and fast in the depths of sleep. Then she opened wide the old hall door that had for more than a century swung over the sill marked off by the length of the intrepid English foremother who had tramped the wilderness trail to possess what she, herself, was giving up. And as she stood desperate, at bay, with her nest storm tossed and threatened, suddenly the impossibility of it all came down upon her, and stern with a very rigidity of resolve she went into the house, lighted a candle by the old desk in the hall, and wrote swiftly a few words of desperate summons to the Senator. She knew that Friday night always found him over the fields at Boliver, and she told him briefly the situation and asked him to come over in the early morning to the rescue--and sacrifice. When she had first come out on the porch she had seen young Bob ride up to the store on one of his colts, and she ran fleetly down to the front gate and called to him. He consented instantly to ride over and deliver the note for her, but he shot an uneasy glance at her from beneath his wide hat as he put the letter in his pocket. "Is anything wrong, Miss Rose Mary?" he asked anxiously but respectfully. "No, Bob, dear, nothing that--that I can't make--right," she answered in a soft, tearless voice, and as he got on his horse and rode away she came slowly up the long front walk that was moonflecked from the leaves of the tall trees. Then once more she stood on the old door sill--at bay. And as she looked at the old Ridge across the sweet, blooming clover-fields, with the darkened house behind her, again the waters of despair rose breast-high and heart-high, beat against her aching throat and were just about to dash over her head as she stretched out one arm to the hills and with a broken cry bent her white forehead in the curve of the other, but suddenly bent head, tear-blinded eyes, quivering breast and supplicating arms were folded tight in a strong embrace and warm, thirsty lips pressed against the tears on her cheeks as Everett's voice with a choke and a gulp made its way into her consciousness. "I feel like shaking the very life out of you, Rose Mary Alloway," was his tender form of greeting. "You're squeezing it out," came in all the voice that Rose Mary could command for an answer. And the broad-shouldered, burden-bearing, independent woman that was the Rose of Old Harpeth melted into just a tender girl who crushed her heart against her lover's and clung as meekly as any slip of vine to her young lord oak. "But I don't care," she finished up under his chin. And Everett's laugh that greeted and accepted her unexpected meekness rang through the hall and brought a commotion in answer. The wee dogs, keen both of ear and scent, shot like small electric volts from Stonie's couch, hurled themselves through the hall and sprang almost waist-high against Everett's side in a perfect ecstasy of welcome. They yelped and barked and whined and nosed in a tumbling heap of palpitating joy until he was obliged to hold Rose Mary in one arm while he made an attempt to respond to and abate their enthusiasm with the other. "Now, now, that's all right! Nice dogs, nice dogs!" he was answering and persuading, when a stern call from the depths of Miss Lavinia's room, the door of which Rose Mary had left ajar, abstracted her from Everett's arm on the instant and sent her hurrying to answer the summons. "Is that young man come back? and light the candle," Miss Lavinia demanded and commanded in the same breath. And just as Rose Mary flared up the dim light on the table by the bed Everett himself stood in the doorway. With one glance his keen eyes took in the situation in the dim room in which the two old wayfarers lay prepared for the morning journey, and what Miss Lavinia's stately and proper greeting would have been to him none of them ever knew, for with a couple of strides he was over by the bed at Rose Mary's side and had taken the stern old lady into his strong arms and landed a kiss on the ruffle of white nightcap just over her left ear. "No leaving the Briars this season, Miss Lavinia," he said in a laughing, choking voice as he bent across and extracted one of little Miss Amandy's hands from the tight bunch she had curled herself into under the edge of her pillow and bestowed a squeeze thereon. "It's all fixed up over at Boliver this afternoon. There's worse than oil on the place--and it's all yours now for keeps." With Rose Mary in his arms Everett had entirely forgotten to announce to her such a minor fact as the saving of her lands and estate, but to the two little old ladies his sympathy had made him give the words of reprieve with his first free breath. The bundles on the floor and the old trunk had smote his heart with a fierce pain that the impulsive warmth of his greeting and the telling of his rescue could only partly ease. "The news only reached me day before--" he was going on to explain when, candle in hand, Uncle Tucker appeared in the doorway. His long-tailed night-shirt flapped around his bare, thin old legs, and every separate gray lock stood by itself and rampant, while his eyes seemed deeper and more mystic than ever. "Well, what's all this ruckus?" he demanded as he peered at them across the light of his candle. "Have any kind of cyclone blowed you from New York clean across here to Harpeth Valley, boy?" "He has come back with the mercy of our Lord in his hands to save our home; and you go put on your pants before your pipes get chilled, Tucker Alloway," answered Aunt Viney in her most militant tone of voice. "And, Rose Mary, you can take that young man on out of here now so Amandy can take that shame-faced head of hers out of that feather pillow. It's all on account of that tored place in her night-cap I told her to mend. You needn't neither of you come back no more, because we must get to sleep, so as to be ready to unpack before sun-up and get settled back for the day. And don't you go to bed, neither one of you, without reading Jeremiah twelfth, first to last verse, and me and Amandy will do the same." With which Everett found himself dismissed with a seeming curtness which he could plainly see was an heroic control of emotion in the feeble old stoic who was trembling with exhaustion. Uncle Tucker, called to account for the lack of warmth and also propriety in his attire, had hastened back to his own apartment and Everett found him sitting up in his bed, lighting the old cob with trembling fingers but with his excitement well under control. He listened intently to Everett's hurried but succinct account of the situation and crisis in his own and the Alloway business affairs, as he puffed away, and his old eyes lighted with excitement at the rush of the tale of high finance. And when at last Everett paused for lack of breath, after his dramatic climax, the old philosopher lay back on his high-piled feather pillows and blinked out into the candle-light, puffed in silence for a few minutes, then made answer in his own quizzical way with a radiant smile from out under his beetling white brows: "Well," he said between puffs, "looks like fortune is, after all, a curious bird without even tail feathers to steer by nor for a man to ketch by putting salt on. Gid failed both with a knife in the back and a salt shaker to ketch it, but you were depending on nothing but a ringdove coo, as far as I can see, when it hopped in your hand. I reckon you'll get your answer." "Are you willing--to have me ask for it, Mr. Alloway?" asked Everett with a radiant though slightly embarrassed smile. "Yes," answered Uncle Tucker as he knocked the ashes out of his pipe against the table and looked straight into Everett's eyes. "After a man has plowed a honest, straight-furrowed field in life it's no more'n fair for Providence to send a-loving, trusting woman to meet him at the bars. Good night, and don't forget to latch the front door when you have finally torn yourself away from that moonlight!" And the call of the young moon that came with the warm garden-scented gusts of winds that were sweeping across Harpeth Valley was a riot in Everett's veins as he made his way through the silent hall toward the moonlit porch on the top step of which he could see Rose Mary sitting in the soft light, but a lusty young snore from a dark room on the left made him remember that there was one greeting he had missed. He bent over the General's little cot, across which lay a long shaft of the white light from the hilltops, and was about to press his lips on the warm, breath-stirred ones of the small boy, but he restrained himself in time from offering to the General in his defenseless sleep what would have been an insult to him awake, and contented himself with a most cautious and manly clasp of the chubby little hand. "Ketch it, Tobe, ketch it--don't let Aunt Viney's vase be broked," murmured Stonie as he turned on his side and buried his head still deeper in the pillow. "No, General, Aunt Viney's vase--is--not going to be broken, thank God," answered Everett under his breath as he turned away and left the General, who, even in sleep, carried his responsibilities sturdily. "Rose Mary," he said a little later as he stood on the bottom step below her, so that his eyes were just on a level with hers as she sat and smiled down upon him, "for a woman, you have very little curiosity. Don't you want to ask me where I've been, why I went and what I've been doing every minute since I left you? Can it be indifference that makes you thus ignore your feminine prerogative of the inquisition?" "I'm beginning at being glad you are here. Joy's just the white foam at the top of the cup, and it ought not to be blown away, no matter--how thirsty one is, ought it? Now tell me what brought you back--to save me," and Rose Mary held out her hand, with one of her lovely, entreating gestures, while her eyes were full of tender tears. And it was with difficulty that Everett held himself to a condition to tell her what he wanted her to know without any further delay. "Well," he answered as he raised his lips from a joy draft at the cup of her pink palms, "the immediate cause was a telegram that came Tuesday night. It said '_Gid sells out Mr. Tucker and wants your girl_,' and it was signed '_Bob_.' All these weeks a bunch of hard old goldbugs had been sitting in conclave, weighing my evidence and reports and making one inadequate syndicating offer after another. They were teetering here and balancing there, but at eleven o'clock Wednesday morning the cyclone that blew me down here across Old Harpeth originated in the directors' rooms of the firm, and I guess the old genties are gasping yet. "I had that telegram in my pocket, tickets for the three-o'clock Southern express folded beside 'em, and I put enough daylight into my proposition to dazzle the whole conclave into setting signatures to papers they'd been moling over for weeks. I don't know what did it, but they signed up and certified checks in one large hurry. "Then I beat it and never drew breath until I made the Farmers' and Traders' Bank in Boliver this afternoon, covered those notes of Mr. Alloways, killed that mortgage and hit Providence Road for Sweetbriar. I met Bob out about a mile from town, and he put me next to the whole situation and gave _me_ your note. I don't know which I came nearest to, swearing or crying, but the Plunkett-Crabtree news made me raise a shout instead of either. But if I did what I truly ought, Rose Mary Alloway, I _would_ shake the life out of you for not writing me about it all. I may do it yet." "Please don't!" answered Rose Mary with a little smile that still held its hint of the suffering she had gone through. "I thought you were out of work yourself and couldn't help us, and I didn't want to trouble you. It would have hurt you so to know if you couldn't help me, and I didn't--" "God, that's it! Fool that I was to go away and risk leaving you without an understanding!" exclaimed Everett in a bitterly reproachful tone of voice. "But I was afraid to let you know what I had discovered until I could get the money to settle that mortgage. I was afraid that you or Mr. Alloway would unconsciously let him get a hint of the find, and I knew he could and would foreclose any minute. He was suspicious of me and my prospecting, anyway, and as he was an old, and as you both thought, tested friend, what way did I have of proving him the slob I knew him to be? I thought it best to go and get the company formed, the option money paid to cover the mortgage and all of it out of his hands before he could have any chance to get into the game at all. And that was really the best way to manage it--only I hadn't counted on his swooping down on--you. Again, God, what I risked!" "Yes," answered Rose Mary in a voice that barely controlled the cold horror of the thought that rose between them, "it almost happened. I thought I ought to--to save them, even if Uncle Tucker wouldn't let me, and I gave Bob that note--to--to him. It almost happened--to-morrow. Quick, hold me close--don't let me think about it--ever!" and Rose Mary shuddered in the crush of Everett's arms. [Illustration: "You won't ever leave me any more?"] "Out in the world, Rose Mary," said Everett as he lifted his lips from hers, "it would have happened--the tragedy, and you would have been the loot; but down here in Harpeth Valley they grow men like your Uncle Tucker, and they turn, by a strange motive power, wheels that do not crush, but--lift. I left you in danger because I had schemed it out in my world's way, fool, fool that I--" "Please, please don't say things about yourself like that to me," pleaded Rose Mary, quickly raising her head and smiling through her tears at him. "Go on and tell me what you did find out there in the pasture; don't blow off any more of my foam!" "Cobalt, if you care to know," answered Everett with an excited laugh, "the richest deposit in the States I found out--beats a gold mine all hollow. I came on it almost accidentally while testing for the allied metals up the creek. Your money will grow in bunches now, for the biggest and the best mining syndicate in New York has taken it up. You can just shake down the dollars and do what you please from now on." "You'll have to do that sort of orchard work, I'll be busy in the house," answered Rose Mary, with a rapturous, breathless shyness, and she held out her hand to him with the most lovely of all her little gestures of entreaty. "You promised once to farm for me and--you won't ever leave--_ever_ leave me any more, will you?" "No, never," answered Everett as he took both her hands and at arms' length pressed them against his breast, "I'm not going to enact over again the rôle of poor chap obliged to be persuaded into matrimony by heiress, but I'm going to take my own and buckle down and see that you people get every cent of that dig-up that's coming to you. With the reputation this find gives me I'll be able to jolly well grubstake with commissions from now on, but I'll hit no trail after this with a mule-pack that can't carry double, Mary of the Rose." "And that doesn't always lead back in just a little time to--to the nesties?" she asked with the dove stars deep in the pools of her eyes, while ever so slightly her hands drew him toward her. "Always a blazed, short cut when they need--us," he answered, yielding, then paused a moment and held himself from her and said, looking deep into the eyes raised to his, "Truly, rose woman, am I that beggar-man who came over the Ridge, cold, and in the tatters of his disillusion? Do you suppose Old Harpeth has given me this warm garment of ideals that wraps me now for keeps?" "Of course, he has, for it's made for you of your--Father's love. And isn't it--rose-colored?" THE END 
23391	----	Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustration. See 23391-h.htm or 23391-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/2/3/3/9/23391/23391-h/23391-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/2/3/3/9/23391/23391-h.zip) SALLY OF MISSOURI by R. E. YOUNG [Illustration] New York: McClure, Phillips & Co.: Mcmiii Copyright, 1903, by McClure, Phillips & Co. Published, October, 1903 _Dedicated to Florence Wickliffe_ CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. STEERING OF NEW YORK, 3 II. PINEY OF THE WOODS, 23 III. THE PROMISED LAND, 36 IV. FOR THE BENEFIT OF CARINGTON, 62 V. BOOM TIME IN THE TOWN THAT JACK BUILT, 73 VI. FATHER AND DAUGHTER, 95 VII. THE GARDEN OF DREAMS, 109 VIII. WHEN A GIRL FINDS HERSELF, 119 IX. GOOD-BYE! 137 X. WHO'S GOT THE TIGMORES? 153 XI. TALL THINGS, 170 XII. THE COLOSSUS OF CANAAN, 194 XIII. MISS SALLY MADEIRA'S SWEETHEART, 203 XIV. WHEN THE MEAL GAVE OUT, 222 XV. A MISTAKE SOMEWHERE, 242 XVI. MADEIRA'S PEACE, 251 XVII. JUST A BOY, 258 XVIII. A PRETTY PRECARIOUSNESS, 268 XIX. WHEN DREAMS COME TRUE, 274 SALLY OF MISSOURI PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS IN THE STORY Steering, of New York Old Bernique, of French St. Louis Piney, of the Woods Crittenton Madeira, of Canaan Sally, of Missouri _There are also some kind-hearted people:_ _Farmers, Housewives, Store-keepers, Miners, etc._ _Chapter One_ STEERING OF NEW YORK "Hoo-ee-ow-ohme!" It was half a sob, half a laugh, and, half sobbing, half laughing, the young man stopped his horse on the crest of the Tigmore Hills, in the Ozark Uplift, raised in his stirrups, and looked the country through and through, as though he must see into its very heart. In the brilliant mid-afternoon light the Southwest unrolled below him and around him in a ragged bigness and an unconquered loneliness. As far as eye could reach tumbled the knobs, the flats, the waste weedy places, the gullies, the rock-pitted sweeps of table-land and the timbered hills of the Uplift. The buffalo grass trembled across the lowlands in long, shaking billows that had all the effect of scared flight. From the base of the Tigmores a line of river bottom stretched westward, and beyond the bottom curved a pale, quiet river. In the distance wraiths of blue smoke falteringly bespoke the presence of people and cabins; on a cleared hill an object that might be horse or dog or man was silhouetted, small and vague; and in the farthest west the hoister of a deserted zinc mine cut up against the sky a little lonely way. The near and dominant things were constantly those tremulous, fleeing billows of grass, the straight strong trees, the sullen rocks, the silent, shivering water. "_Hoo-ee-ow!_" It was too vast, too urgent. Waiting, ready, it lay there aggressively, like a challenge. As the young man faced it, it claimed him, forcing back his past life, his old habits, his old haunts, into the realm of myth and moonshine. His old habits! His old haunts! They hung aloof in his consciousness, shadow pictures, colourless and remote.... That zestful young life at New Haven, the swift years of it, the fine last day of it, Yale honours upon him, his enthusiasms cutting away into the future, his big shoulders squared, his face set toward great things, the righting of wrongs, grand reforms, the careers of nations.... A bachelor hotel; a club whose windows looked out on the avenue; an office where Carington and he had pretended to work down on Nassau Street; drawing-rooms where Carington and he had pretended to be in love, on various streets; the whole gay, meaningless panorama of his life as a homeless, unplaced New York sojourner, who had considered that he had too much money to be anything seriously and too little money to do anything effectively.... Then another picture, jerking, mazy, a study in kinematics--"Crazy Monday" on the Street, Carington and he swept along in that day's whirlwind of speculation.... A blank in the panorama while he got used to things and thought things out.... Then a wintry twilight at the club, Carington and he by the window, talking it over, looking out upon the drifted light of the city, loving the city, in the way of New Yorkers. Then Carington's voice saying, "Bruce? Bruce, m' son? Why don't you try Missouri?" Saying it with that in his voice to indicate that there was nothing else left to try. Then the long thoughtful talk, Carington and he still by the window, while he showed Carington how little chance he had even in Missouri; then Carington's strong-hearted insistence that, in view of the agitation over the ore discoveries at Joplin, he go on "out there" and prospect; and then Carington's foolishly irrelevant heel-piece, "Miss Gossamer sails for Europe Saturday!" and the sudden appeal of the notion to go "out there," its sharp striking-in.... Carington and he taking counsel with some of the other fellows in his rooms later on, all the deep voices roaring at once, all the boys insulting him at once, belittling his cigars, saying sharp things about his pictures, that being their way of showing him that they were badly broken up over his leaving them; all their eyes shining interest in him and hope for him and even envy of him, as the young man who was "going out West," while the great soft fluff of smoke in the room made the past a dream and the present an illusion and the future a phantasm.... Then the long journey overland, the little impetus toward the new life flickering drearily, while he gripped up his heart for any fate, growing quieter and quieter, but more and more determined to take Missouri as she came.... Then Missouri herself, the stop at St. Louis, the dip into the State southwestward, toward the lead and zinc country and his own debatable land; good-bye to the railroad; by team, in company with other prospectors, through the sang hills, up and down stony ridges, along vast cattle ranges.... And now here, quite alone, twenty miles from the railroad, Missouri on all sides of him, close-timbered, rock-ribbed, gulch-broken, mortally lonely, billowing around him, over him, possessing him. That sense of being possessed by Missouri, committed to her, had grown upon him intolerably all day. All day he had been fighting it and resenting it. At various points along the rocky ridge road he had come upon hill cabins and hill people, and, facing them, his fight and his resentment had been momentarily vicious. "Gudday, stranger!" the people had called from the porches of the hill cabins, "Hikin' over the Ridge?" "Yes, friend," Steering had called back, and had then projected his unfailing, anxious question: "Can you tell me how far it is to Poetical?" At that the people from the porches had got up and come across the baked weeds of the cabin yard. Assembled at the stile-block in front of him, the people invariably lined up as a long, gaunt farmer, a thin, flat-chested woman, a troop of dusty children, and a yellow dog. "Yass, I cand tell you. It's six sights and a right smart chanst f'm here to Poetical, stranger," the long, gaunt farmer had invariably drawled, with more accommodation than information. "Six sights--six sights and a right what _what_?" "W'y," the Missourian had explained forbearingly, blinking toward the sun, and waving his loosely jointed arms westward, "it's this-a-way--you'll git sight of Poetical f'm six hills, an' whend you git to the bottom of the sixt' hill they's a right smart chanst you won't be to Poetical evum yit awhile. You cand see far in this air. It's some mild f'm here to Poetical, an' sharp ridin' at that." Each time that Steering had heard that, little varied in phraseology, save for the number of "sights," according to his progress, he had felt so dismal and looked so dismal that, each time, the native before him had added quickly, "Better git off an' spin' the night with us. Aint got much, but what we got's yourn." Each time the house beyond the stile-block had looked miserably uninviting,--a plough on the front porch, harness on the porch posts; all around the house the yard litter of cheap farm life, a broken-down harrow, broken-backed furniture, straw, corn-shucks, ghosts of past winters and past summers on the farm, that had shuffled out there and died there; each time the cleared patches beyond the house had looked lean; each time the native had been sallow and toil-worn; but each time that welcome word had been a finely perfect thing, good to hear. Steering had noticed that in declining each invitation he had suddenly stopped short in his inner fight and resentment and assumed his best manner, as though his finest and highest courtesy had responded instinctively to something in kind. Idling on for a more expansive moment at each cabin door, the conversation had usually shaped itself like this: "Two has already rid over the Ridge to-day--Old Bernique and the tramp-boy. Old Bernique he's on the trail ag'in. The tramp-boy he's kim along so far with Old Bernique." In saying this, or something very like it, the hill farmer who spoke had always seemed to want it definitely understood that the neighbourhood had its excitements, and seemed to argue that if the stranger knew anything he must know Old Bernique and the tramp-boy. Proceeding leisurely and reflectively, as though he had decided in his own mind how to classify the stranger, the farmer had generally added, "Lots of prospectors ride by nowadays. They head in to the relroad f'm here,--you know you aint a-goin' to ketch the relroad at Poetical?" "Yes, I know, but when I left my friends at Bessietown yesterday I was hoping I could make it all the way across country to Canaan before to-night." "Oh, you goin' on to Canaan?" "Yes, going on to Canaan." Each time the words had echoed through Steering's head with an old-time promise in a mocking refrain, "Going on to Canaan! Going on to Canaan!" Immediately the hill tribe had eyed him with renewed interest. "Going on to Canaan!" the farmer at their head had repeated, an impressive esteem in his treatment of the word Canaan. "Gre't taown, Canaan! You strike the relroad tha' all righty. Dog-oned ef th'aint abaout ev'thing tha'. Got the cote-haouse an' all, the relroad an' all--Miss Sally Madeira, Mist' Crit Madeira's daughter, _she_ lives tha'." It had gone like that every time. Not once in the last twenty miles had Steering exchanged a word with man or woman without this sort of reference to Canaan and, collaterally, to Miss Sally Madeira. Miss Sally, he had perceived early, excited in the hill-farm people a species of awe, as though she were on a par with the circus, thaumaturgic, almost too good to be true. "The court house, the railroad and Miss Sally!" he had finally learned to murmur, in order to meet the demands of the situation. "Yass, oh yass." The farmer had given his head a dogged twist, and looked as though he were cognisant of the fact that in certain essential particulars Canaan did not have to yield an inch of her title to equality with the biggest and best anywhere. "Yass, saouthwest Mizzourah's hard to beat in spots; th'aint no State in the Union quite like her. She's different," he had said, rocking on his heels, his chest lifting. "I think you must be right about that," Steering had answered, every time with profounder emphasis. Off here alone on the ridge road now, Missouri's unspeakable difference was coming over him in great submerging waves. Though he tried bravely to face the State and have it out with her, he couldn't do it. "Missouri," he said at last to himself, and to her confidentially, "I'd like to cry. I'd give five hundred plunkerinos if I might be allowed to cry." Then he flicked his riding-crop over his leg in a devilishly nonchalant way, and rode straight forward. The road went on interminably, its dust-white line, with the rocky ridge through the middle, dipping and rising and getting nowhere. The horse grew nervous and shied repeatedly from sheer loneliness. The road entered a wood. Deep in its leafy fastness wild steers heard the beat of the horse's hoofs, laid back their ears and galloped into safer depths, bellowing with alarm. Steering gave up, as helplessly homesick as a baby, his head dropped forward on his chest in a settled melancholy, from which he did not rouse until he had cleared the timber; and then only because he saw a horseman down the ridge road ahead of him. What instantly attracted Steering's attention was the man's back. It was a small but proud back. It had none of the hill stoop. It was erect, sinewy, soldierly. Steering was so lonely that he would have welcomed companionship with a chipmunk. The chance of companionship with a man who had an interesting back grew luminous. He urged his horse forward eagerly, almost hysterically glad of his opportunity. "Good-afternoon," he called, having recourse to his well-tried form of greeting. "Can you tell me how far it is to Poetical?" The man addressed half turned, disclosing a thin and delicate face to Steering. Then he reined his horse in gently. "Good-evening, sair. Is it that you inquire to Poetical? It is a vair' long five miles f'm here, sair." Steering rode up beside the man, more and more pleased, regarding and analysing. The man's hickory shirt, his warped boots, his blue jean trousers, his heavy buskins were mean and earth-stained, but inherent in the quality of his low, musical voice and courteous manner was an intangible suggestion of something different, some bigger and happier past, to which, go where he would and clothe himself as he might, voice and manner had remained true. "I wonder," said Steering, almost sighing, "if you will mind a little of my company. The road is terribly lonely, sir. The country is terribly lonely in fact." "Yes, sair, a tr-r-ue word that. It is lonely. But sair, what will you of this particulaire portion? It is vair' yong in the Tigmores. It cannot be populate' in a day, a year. You, sair, come from the East, hein? Sair, relativement, effort against effort, they have not done as much in the East in feefty years as we have done in the Southwest in twenty,--believe that, sair." It was that same feeling for the State, that quick, leaping passion of nativity that Steering had thus far found in every Missourian with whom he had come in contact. "You are a Missourian, I see," said Steering, to keep his companion talking along the line of this enlivening enthusiasm. "Indeed, sair, yes. From that Saint Louis--François Placide DeLassus Bernique, at your service." "Thank you. My name is Steering, from New York, if you please, but very deeply interested in Missouri just now, sir." From that on they made easy progress into acquaintance. Bernique proved talkative, full of anecdotes about Missouri's past, and full of belief in her future. In his rich loquacity he roamed the history of the State painstakingly for the edification of Steering, as one who stood at Missouri's gates, inquiring of her true inwardness. He told Missouri's history back to Spain and France, forward to unspeakable splendour. He was intelligent, naïve, unusual. Steering, responsive to the attraction that was by and by to hold them strongly together, listened delightedly. "Yessair,"--through Bernique's speech ran a reminiscence of his native tongue, faint, sweet, fleeting, like the thought of home,--"yessair, it is I know the fashion in the eastern States to considaire all the West as vair' yong countree, and it is tr-r-ue, sair, that you, par example, have come upon the most yong part of thees gr-r-eat State of Missouri, but it is to be remembaire that this Missouri is not all rocks and wood, uncultivate', standing toward the future, but that her story date back to a remoter period and a fuller and finer civilisation, in that day when France and Spain held sway over the province of Louisiana, than does the story of many of the eastern States who hold this countree new, raw, uncivilise'. I myself,"--continued the speaker, spreading out one slender hand with an exquisite grace,--"have gr-r-own up in this State of Missouri, at that St. Louis, with the most profound convincement, aftaire much travel and observation, that for elegance we have in that city the most to it belong people in the United States of America, yessair!" "Ah, well," admitted Steering, borne along rapidly on the vehement current of Bernique's ardour, "with your sort of spirit in the people of Missouri, whatever she was and whatever she is can be but a mighty promise of what she will become----" "Ah, there you have it, the note!" interrupted François Placide DeLassus Bernique eagerly, "What she will become! That is the gr-r-and thought, sair. I who say it have preserve' my belief in what she will become through the discouragement ter-r-ible. I who speak have prospec' this land from end to end. I know her largesse. Believe me, sair, the tr-r-easures that were sought by the Castilian knights of old through all thees parts are indeed to be found here,--not the white silvaire of Castilian dreams, but iron! Coppaire! Lead! Zinc!" "I suppose," ventured Steering, "that it would be foolish to hope for deposits in this part of the State similar to the deposits about Joplin, and all through the thirty-mile stretch?" "Pouf!" Old Bernique made one of his pretty gestures, but said nothing. "You have," went on Steering, "you have to the west here the Canaan Tigmores, Mr. Bernique?" "Eh? Yessair, the Canaan Tigmores," repeated old Bernique, looking out over the ridges of hills and the flats listlessly; so listlessly that, by one of those flashes of intuitive perception that light us far along waiting paths, Steering knew suddenly that he had to deal with a man whose experience had somehow crossed the Canaan Tigmores.--"And also, Mistaire Steering, we have to the far south the Boston Range, in Arkansas, and far to the west the Kiamichi, in the Territoree." "Yes, but about these Canaan Tigmores, Mr. Bernique," insisted Steering, not at all deflected by Bernique's effort, "what about your Canaan Tigmores, Mr. Bernique?" Steering's experience with the French Missourian had been too fragmentary for anything but conjecture to come of it, and his own plans were too immature and too heavily conditioned for him to project them directly, but he had a feeling that he should want to know Bernique better some fine day, and he was moved to get some sort of grip upon the old man's interest while the chance lasted. "The Canaan Tigmores are not as far away as the Boston Mountains, Mr. Bernique. Much nearer than the Kiamichi. What's your idea about the Canaan Tigmores--in relation to zinc, Mr. Bernique?" "Pouf!" The old man made airy rings of smoke from the cigar with which Steering had furnished him. He would not talk about the Canaan Tigmores at all. "You will see Mr. Crittenton Madeira in Canaan about all that," he said. "And now, sir, I have the regret to leave you. Our roads part at the sign-post yonder. I ride east." "Well, tell you what I wish!" cried Steering, with the pertinacity that was a part of him. "I am on my way to Mr. Crittenton Madeira now, and I wish you would come to me in Canaan some soon day and let me tell you the result of my business with him." Time was limited, for the horses were close to the cross-roads sign-post. "The Canaan Tigmores won't always belong to old Bruce Grierson, Mr. Bernique!" It was a random shot, but it told against Bernique's glumness. "Pouf! The bat-fool! The blind mole!" "The Canaan Tigmores are entailed, Mr. Bernique! The next owner may have eyes!" "God grant!" growled Old Bernique. "Grey eyes, eh, Mr. Bernique?" Steering flashed his own eyes smilingly at the French Missourian. The horses were at the sign-post. "Eh, what?" cried Old Bernique, "is it that----?" "We shall meet again, Mr. Bernique?" "I ride east for many a day, I think," said Bernique dubiously. "But you come back to Canaan?" "Ah, God in Heaven, yes!" cried the old man then, with a sudden fierce impetuosity, "I ride east, ride west, ride the wide world ovaire, but always I come back,--come back to Canaan." He stopped abruptly, as though afraid of himself, and faced Steering for a silent moment. Up to the silence, cleaving it gently, musically, there came unexpectedly the notes of a rollicking song: "_The taters grow an' grow, they grow!_" On the instant old Bernique's face relaxed pleasantly. He half grunted, half laughed. "The potato song!" he cried, his eyes gay, his mouth twitching. "Mistaire Steering, if you will ride on a little way you will have fine company. That is the tramp-boy yondaire. He is in the woods above the gulch there. He will have emerge' to the road presently. The yong scamp is musical, sair!" "Aye, hear that!" cried Steering appreciatively, "gloriously musical!" Out of the great green timber mounted the tenor notes, piercingly sweet, pure, true, like a bird-call: "_A tater's good 'ith 'lasses._" Bernique's horse was growing restless. The old man rode a little nearer Steering and regarded him searchingly. "Good-bye, sair," he said then, "it shall be what you say. I shall come back to you in Canaan." "Good-bye, Mr. Bernique. I'm glad to have you decide that way." Steering clung to his notion that he and Bernique were to know each other better. They shook hands under the cross-roads sign-post with understanding. The rain was coming on fast. All the east lay grey behind Steering, all the west grey before him as he moved away from the cross-roads. But out of the west rolled the melody of the carolling boy, the voice of one singing in the wilderness, young and undismayed. Under the cross-roads sign-post old Bernique sat his horse motionless for a time, looking after Steering. From Steering his eyes roamed afar toward the Canaan Tigmores. A little shiver caught him. "The man that was expect'," he mused, "the man that was expect'!" Then he, too, rode away. _Chapter Two_ PINEY OF THE WOODS Where the ridge road dropped down close to the pale river at a dip in the hills, Steering overtook the tramp-boy, hallooed to him, and watched him, as he turned his pony about and sat waitingly. He was a youth of sixteen or seventeen, and from under the peak of his felt hat, slouched and old, peered out a slim young gypsy face, crowned by a thick mop of black hair that tumbled about wide temples. Motionless there, the tremble of his song still on his lips and the gladness of youth and health on his face, the tramp-boy made Steering think of the rosy young shepherd Adonis, he was so glowing, so fine and fresh. "I have been right after you all the way from the cross-roads," explained Steering, by way of a beginning, riding up to the lad's side, "I have just parted from a friend of yours,--Mr. Bernique,--so you see we are almost friends ourselves." "A'most." The boy smiled, showing white teeth. He seemed to like Bruce's method of dealing with him. "Wuz Unc' Bernique cross because I didn't go rat back like I said I'd do?" he queried slily. "No, I think not. And for my part, I am glad you didn't, for I am hoping that if you are going toward Poetical you won't mind my company. You see, it's pretty dog-on lonely." A very little of the ridge road sufficed to make Bruce sick for comradeship, and his voice showed it. The boy turned an impressionable, sympathetic face. "Come rat along," he said. He looked at Bruce a moment questioningly before adding, "Reckin's haow you aint usen to the quiet yit. Taint so lonely, the woods an' the hills whend you know um." He twisted his head like a bird and looked out across the extensive sweep of the land and the long slow curve of the river, a deep inspiration swelling his chest. "Simlike they up an' talk to you, the woods an' the hills an' the quiet, whend you know um," he said. All on the instant Steering knew that, as in the case of Old Bernique, here again was character. "Character" seemed distinctly the richest and the pleasantest thing in Missouri. He rode in a little closer to his companion, drawn to him irresistibly, recognising in him the sweet, untutored poetry of a wildwood nature, whose young timidity was trembling and steadying into the placating, magnetic assurance of a boy, fresh-hearted as a berry. Steering had encountered the same sort of poetry in other unspoiled boys, splendid child-men whom he had known in other walks of life, and he had a quick affection for it. It was always as though on its crystal clearness a man might see the white sails of his own youth set back toward him. "Yes," he answered, "I think you are right about that. They do talk, the hills and the woods and the quiet,--only a fellow grows dull, gets his ears full of electric gongs and push-bells, and forgets to listen." The boy looked up with quick-witted question. "Y'aint f'm this part of the kentry, air you?" he asked. "No. I am from--well, from Bessietown last. Where are you from?" The boy laughed and glanced gaily at his briar-torn clothes. "F'm the woods," he said. "My name is Bruce Steering." "Mine's Piney." They fell then to talking of many things, as they rode toward Poetical, but inevitably they spoke chiefly of the great State of Missouri. On the subject of Missouri the boy talked, as old Bernique had talked, with expansive naïveté. In his roamings he had ridden the State up and down, and had found much to love in it. "You'll like her, too, all righty," he told Bruce confidently, "whend you git broke to her." On one of youth's candid impulses to speak up for the life on the inside, the cherished desire, the gallant ideal, the buoyant fancy, he made a supple, sudden divergence in the conversation. "D'you know," he said, "they aint _no_ place whur I'd drur be than Mizzourah ceppen only one." "Where's that?" asked Bruce, and to his immense astonishment the boy answered quickly: "Italy." "Why, how does that happen, Piney? Ever been there?" "Nope. Hearn Unc' Bernique tell abaout it, thass all. It 'ud suit me, though. I know that." His eyes grew dreamy and he seemed to be looking far beyond Missouri. One could almost see the fine, illusory spell of the far Latin land upon him, the spiritual bond, the pull of temperament that made the hill boy at one with Italy, blest of poetry. "I d'n know huccome I want to go so bad," he went on with a deep breath, "wouldn' turn araoun' th'ee times on my heels to go anywhur else, but I shoo do want to go to Italy." "Were your people Italians, Piney?" "Nope. Kim f'm S'loois. But still, I got that feelin' abaout Italy. Simlike I'd be--oh, sorta at home tha'. Had that same feelin' ev' since Unc' Bernique begand to tell me abaout Italy. I'm a-goin' tha', tew, some day, all righty," he concluded at last, waking up from his little dream slowly. "Goin' to be long over to Poetical, Mist' Steerin'?" he diverged again, with his lively mental agility. "No, son. From Poetical I am going on to"--Bruce stopped to gather strength to project the word with the large and cadenced inflection he had enjoyed in the hill farm people,--"going on to Canaan!" "Gre't gosh!" said the boy, and something in the way he said it made Bruce look at him quickly. Piney's brows were lifted and his lips were pulled back. He seemed to try to be as much impressed as Bruce expected him to be. To Steering this sort of comradeship was growing golden. "Well, now," he said, playing with the little joy of being understood, "haven't they the court-house at Canaan? And the railroad? And haven't they Miss Betsy,--or Miss--Miss----" "Sally." "Ah, yes, Sally! Know Sally, son?" "Ev'body in the Tigmores knows her." "I am beginning to want to know Sally myself." Bruce let his eyes go drowsing toward the pale river up which the slow rain was beating, and talked foolishness idly: "Red-cheeked Sally! Freckled Sally! Roly-poly Sally! What's a Missouri girl like anyway, Piney?" "Wy, people think she's purty," protested the boy with a quick palpitant shyness, "an' most people l----," he stopped trying to talk, laughing brusquely and flushing with a very young man's self-consciousness. "All of which goes to prove me an ass," cried Bruce, "for talking about a lady whom I have never seen." Looking repentantly at Piney, he felt a sudden ache for him. He was not very familiar with conditions in Canaan, but it occurred to him suddenly that even in Canaan there might be social gradations, and that the tramp-boy, rare little chap though he seemed to be, was probably miles away from the daughter of the promoter, Mr. Crittenton Madeira. "I retract, Piney," he added gravely. "Aw!--not as I keer whut you say abaout her,--or whut anybody says." Piney slashed at some brilliant sumach by the wayside and his mobile lips jerked and quivered. "I should have supposed that she was older--well, than you," said Bruce, trying to set himself right. "May be in what she knows,--aint in what she feels,--not as I keer----" The boy was so deliciously new to his own emotions that they flashed away beyond his control, minute by minute. His eyes looked misty, with a little spark of high light cutting bravely through. He would not finish his sentence. "Did Unc' Bernique say whend he's comin' back to Canaan?" he asked moodily. "No, he didn't, though I urged him to. That's a fine old man, Piney." Piney's eyes softened beautifully. "Takes mighty good keer of me," he said. "Is he kin to you?" "I d'n know abaout that. He's took my side always. Y'see, I aint got no people an' I just ride araoun'. Y'see,"--Piney quivered with boyish fire,--"I just _got_ to ride araoun'. I cayn't stay on no farm an' in no haouse. Kills me. I got to git to the woods an' the hills. An' Unc' Bernique he stands by me, an' keeps me in his shack whend they's any trouble abaout it. Y'see, some people think I oughter--oughter work!" Piney laughed from the gay, melodious depths of his vagabond heart and Bruce laughed with him. "An' Unc' Bernique has he'ped me abaout that," explained the tramp-boy. He let his dancing eyes dart off to the west where the hills were shouldering into a thickening drift of grey. "Hi, look yonder!" he cried. "We got to cut and run to git to Poetical before that rain." So they cut and ran, the boy setting the pace and singing lustily, with that high melody of voice, as of temperament, of his, as they dashed down the road in the first cool scattering pelt of the rain. "Want to go to the _ho_tel, don't you?" he called over his shoulder, and Bruce called yes. It was grey, rainy twilight now, and through the gloom five or six houses sprawled out across the little plateau toward which the road twisted. Some geese flew up under the feet of the horses, squawking wildly, some "razor-back" hogs grunted from the dust-wallows, some cow-bells tinkled, some small yellow spheres of light shone through windows. "How far from Poetical, Piney?" shouted Steering. "'Baout a foot," answered Piney. He made his lightning-like pony go more slowly so that Bruce's horse might come alongside, and he shook his head, his ready sympathy again on his face. "Say, it's goin' to be kinder tough on you to stay here to-night, aint it? This is ev' spittin' bit there is tew Poetical. Here's the _ho_tel." They drew rein before a rickety two-story frame building and Bruce lifted his shoulders shudderingly. A man came out on the hotel porch, said "Howdy," and waited. "Say,"--Piney in a lower tone, voiced a notion that evidently drifted in to him on the high tide of his sympathy,--"why don't you ride over to Mist' Crit Madeira's? Taint so far. I'll show you the way. They cand take care of you over tha'. They'd be glad to have you. You cand caount on that. It's that-a-way in Mizzourah." The boy's conscientious earnestness was sweet. He was in good spirits again and he whisked one roughly-booted foot out of its stirrup and laid it across his saddle-horn, while he regarded Bruce. "You cand git ter see Miss Sally ef you do that," he added, pursing up his lips, a subtle sense of humour on his face. "You cand see what Mizzourah girls are like." "Now come, Piney, you know I've been thinking everything beautiful about Miss Sally since I found out--something----" "Aw! Tisn't no such thing. She jes likes to hear me sing. _You're crazy!_" The tramp-boy's young voice had its fashion of breaking and shrilling into a high soprano, like a girl's, for emphasis; he was as red as a beet, and he put his foot back in the stirrup, thrust out his under jaw and looked at the stirrup as though he had to determine how much wood had gone into its making. Again Bruce was conscious of a little ache for the boy. "But you go on over tha'," insisted Piney. "No! Thank you for trying to look out for me, son, but I shouldn't like to do that. Oh, I can stand this all right," cried Bruce, with a flare of big bravery and, turning to face the hotel, was seized by his loneliness so violently that he shuddered again. "Here Piney!" he cried on a sudden inspiration, "why won't you come in and stay with me? Huh? How would that suit you? We can talk and smoke." "Naw," Piney extended his hand and shook his head, as though to push the hotel out of the range of possibilities for him, "I couldn't. Much oblige'. But I cayn't sleep in haouses. Got to git back to the shack in the woods. Wisht you'd go on over to Madeira's." "No. I'll buck it out here alone," lamented Bruce. He hated to lose Piney and take up the gloomy, rainy evening alone on this little, high, remote place in the Missouri hills. "See you again some day, then," Piney promised in final farewell. "I'm up an' daown the Ridge rat frequent, I'll run 'crosst you." "Well now, I should hope so," cried Bruce cordially. "Don't you ever come to Canaan?" "Nope. Hate a taown! But me an' Unc' Bernique will strike you sometime, somewheres along the trail. S'long!" "So long, Piney, so long!" The boy turned his pony to the hills. The man on the porch came on out to take charge of Bruce and Bruce's horse. Black night settled down. Through the darkness cut the sound of the squawking geese, the tinkling cow-bells, the grunting hogs. Lonely, lonely Missouri! Bruce went inside, to sit in a little room upstairs, with his chin in his hand, his eyes staring through the window, his thoughts roaming after Carington, the office on Nassau Street, a girl who was a dainty fluff of lace and silk. In his ears rang the sound of Carington's voice: "Why don't you try Missouri,--Miss Gossamer sails,--Why don't you try Missouri,--Miss Gossamer sails--" a faint, recedent measure, and intermingling with it the sound of a boy's voice singing gaily on the misty hills: "_A tater's good 'ith 'lasses._" Steering leaned far out of the window, eager for the lad's music. It was so sweet. _Chapter Three_ THE PROMISED LAND From the remotest beginning of things for the Southwest, Canaan had been a "gre't taown." From the beginning she had been the county seat, and from the beginning there had poured through her one long street, with its two or three short tributaries, the whole volume of business of Tigmore County; the strawberries, the chickens, the ginseng. Almost from the beginning, too, she had had the newspaper and the hotel and some talk about a bank. Canaanites held their heads high. So high that when it began to be rumoured that the railroad was showing a disposition to curve down toward Tigmore County, the Canaanites, unable to see past their noses, appointed a committee to go up to Jefferson City to protest to the Legislature against the proposed innovation. The committee contended to the Legislature that the railroad would cut off trade by starting up rival towns. It also contended that ox-teams had been used for many years and were reliable, rain or shine, whereas in wet weather the railroad tracks would get slick and be impracticable. Moreover, and moreunder, there was no danger of an ox-team blowin' up and bustin' and killin' somebody. The railroad was melted to acquiescence by the appeal, and went its way some ten miles west of Canaan. Towns sprang into being along the line of the serpent's coil. Canaan said all right, but wait till the spring rains come. The rains came, the trains went by over the slick tracks gracefully. Canaan said all right, but wait till something busts. Time passed, nothing busted. The County was careening westward. There was no stopping it. Canaan kept her head high, but her heart grew as cold as ice. Then the paper up at the new railroad station of Shaleville crudely referred to Canaan as "that benighted hamlet." It was too much. When Crittenton Madeira reached Canaan from St. Louis, the first thing that he proposed for the city of his adoption was the Canaan Short Line, and, coming at the opportune moment, the consummation of that proposition placed Madeira at the head of Canaan's municipal life for the rest of his days. In a very short time after he came to Canaan, Canaan not only had a railroad, but her own railroad. Reassured, bland, she caught step with progress, by and by saw that she was progress, and settled back into her old superiority. Her trade prospered anew, the cotton came to her depot, she got accustomed to the noise of her two trains daily, and had lived through many contented years when the twentieth of September of 1899 opened up like a rose, fair, fragrance-laden, warm, around her. Out on the face of the day there was nothing to suggest change or crisis, nothing to be afraid of, nothing to be hopeful for, a day like yesterday, like to-morrow, a golden link in a golden monotony. At Court House Square, a few farm-teams, strapping mules and big Studebakers, stood at the hitching rail. A few people came and went up and down and across the Square. Occasionally a mean-natured man said "huh-y!" to a cow or "soo-y!" to a hog in the middle of Main Street. Some coatless clerks, with great elbow-deep sleeve protectors on their arms and large lumps of cravats at their throats, lounged in store doors. The most conspicuous, as the most institutional, feature of the landscape was the group idling on boxes in front of the old Grange store--just as they had idled on boxes before the war. They were the same men, it was the same store, and it was not inconceivable that they were the same boxes. As the men idled they spat, somewhat to the menace of the passers-by, though in defence of this avocation it may be argued that any truly agile person, by watching carefully and seizing opportunity unhesitatingly, could get by undefiled. Sometimes a vehicle rolled into the street toward the Square, and when this happened it was amusement to the men to say whose vehicle without looking up--jack-knives, watch-fobs, and other valuables occasionally changing hands on an erring guess between the slow, solemn trot of Mr. Azariah's Pringle's Bess and the duck-like waddling of Mrs. Molly Jenkins' Tom, or between the swinging canter of Miss Sally Madeira's Kentucky blacks and the running walk of the small-hoofed Texas ponies from We-all Prairie. Once a great waggon, piled high with cotton, creaked by; once a burnt-skinned boy, hard as a nut, shrieking with an irrepressible sense of being alive, loped past on a mustang. Once a small, old man, in mean clothes and with a fine bearing, crossed the Square, cracking his whip nervously, his spur clicking on his boot as he walked. Once a large florid man and a tall girl came down the street and entered the door of a two-story brick building next the Grange. The man had an expansive, blustering way. The girl looked as though she were accustomed to admire the man and to badger him; her face was turned up to his adoringly, while her fun-hunting eyes, just sheathed under her lids, gleamed gaily. The building had a plate-glass window across the front of it, and on the window, in gold letters bordered in black, two legends were flung to the public: BANK OF CANAAN CRITTENTON MADEIRA When the man and the girl had gone into the Bank of Canaan, the group at the Grange stopped gambling on the incoming teams and talked less drowsily. "Looks like that girl gets purdier and purdier." "Mighty pleasant ways she keeps. Never gone back on her raisin'. Never got too good for Mizzourah." "As far as I go, I like her ways better'n her pappy's ways." "Crit _is_ a little toploftical." "They mighty fond of each other, though. Seems like she's not in a hurry to marry and leave her pappy." "Wall naow, I shouldn't be s'prised ef Miss Sally never did git married, talkin' abaout marryin'. 'Twould not s'prise me a-tall, 'twouldn't." Mr. Quin Beasley was talking. Mr. Beasley was the keeper of the Grange store and admittedly a man of fine conversational powers. His jaws worked on and he seemed able to get nutriment out of his ruminations long after a cow would have gone back to grass hungrily. "Aint sayin' I never am s'prised, becuz am, but do say that that wouldn't s'prise me, an' no more would it." Mr. Beasley brought his jaws in from their loose meanderings just as the clatter of a horse's hoofs became audible down the side street that, a little way along, became the road to Poetical. "Name the comer, Beasley. Up to the sugar-tree about now. Name-er, name-er!" The challenger took from his pocket a huge horn knife, covered it with his hand and shook it in the face of Mr. Beasley, who responsively got his hand into his pocket and drew forth a knife, which he held covered after the manner of his opponent. "Unsight, unseen," said Mr. Beasley. "It's Price Mason's pony." The challenger chuckled deprecatingly over the carelessness of judgment evinced: "Price Mason's pony comes down with a hippety-hop," he remarked pityingly--"lemme listen--it's--no, taint, aint favorin' his right front foot--it's--wy!" the challenger suddenly twisted his head to one side and held it there like a lean-crawed chicken deciding where to peck. Simultaneously the other men glanced down the side street where it came into the Square, and when someone said, or whistled, "Wy, who the h-e-double-l _is_ it?" everybody was waiting for an answer. They had not long to wait. The horseman in question galloped straight toward the group and drew rein in front of them only a few minutes later. He was a big fellow, broad and lithe of shoulder and chest, and young and alert of face. "Gentlemen," he called from his horse's back, "I want to find Mr. Crittenton Madeira. Ah!" he laughed, a deep, rich note, as he saw the gold and black sign, "gentlemen, I have found Mr. Madeira!" He leaped from his horse and began to tether him to a staple, set in the pavement in front of the Grange. "Yes," replied a member of the Grange group, all of whom rose sociably, "Crit and Miss Sally,"--the young man laughed again, softly, as though he could not help it,--"Crit and Miss Sally jes went into the bank; I don't reckin they've come out again." "Miss Sally's come out again," interposed another Granger, "because I seen her." "It's the father that I want to see," said the horseman, with smiling emphasis, "not the daughter, not Miss Sally." He passed through the bank door, still smiling, and the Grange group looked at each other, rife with speculation on the instant. "Hadn't-a said not, I'd-a said it wuz Miss Sally he wanted to see. Looks to me like he might be one of her beaux. Wears sumpin the same clothes." "Looked like a Yank to me." "Uh-huh, betchew he lets his biscuits cool before he butters 'em." "Haven't heard Crit say he was looking for a stranger." "Reckon if you keep up with Crit's business, my friend, you'll have to walk faster." While the Grangers were wondering, supposing, reckoning, the man who probably let his biscuits cool before he buttered them entered the Bank of Canaan. When the cage for the clerical force had been put into the Bank of Canaan, there was not a great deal of the bank left, so the man stopped where he thought he was least apt to be scraped, in the little space in front of the Force's window. The Force put his pen behind his ear, and, without waiting for inquiry or request, called off to the rear of the room. "Mist' Madeira! He's here! Can he come on in? If you'll go right down there"--went on the Force,--"to that door in front of you, you can go through it." The thing seemed feasible, as the door was half open, so the visitor attempted it. As he reached the door, however, his way was temporarily blocked by a big red-faced man who held out both hands to him and took possession of him with violent cordiality. "God bless my soul! Howdy, howdy, howdy!" cried the big man. "Been looking for you for a week. Only last night I told Sally that I wasn't going to look for you any longer. Just eternally gave you up. How in the Sam Hill have you taken so long to get here? Come on in and have a seat." As he talked, the Missourian led his guest inside a small private office, handed him to a chair and stood up before him, big, colossal, dominating the younger man, or at least meaning to. "I am very rapidly concluding that you are Mr. Madeira, and that you know that I am Steering," smiled the visitor, sinking into a chair adaptably, though he realised that, for two men who had never seen each other before, the meeting had been unusual. He also realised that, off somewhere in the sphere of imponderable influences, the effect when his hand clasped the big man's hand had been exactly that of the clashing of two swords. "Oh, God love you, there's no black magic about my knowing you for Steering--only stranger that's been expected in Canaan for six weeks!" cried Madeira, "and as for your guessing that I'm Madeira, you don't deserve a bit of credit for it. My sign's out." His manner conveyed that his sign was quite as much his personality as the black and gold letters on the window. "Yes, I'm Madeira, and you are Steering, and we both might as well own up to it. And now what's kept you so long on the road? How'd you manage to put in a whole week between here and Springfield?" Madeira seated himself in a swivel chair in front of his desk and eyed his visitor with that aggressive geniality, that tremendous sense of himself, warm and vivid in his face and manner. And, as in the moment when he had faced Missouri from the top of the Tigmore Hills, Steering had a feeling that he was being claimed, absorbed. "Why, the explanation is of the simplest. At the very last minute, there at Springfield, too late to get a word of advice out to you, I fell in with some fellows who were going to ride across country toward the Canaan Tigmores, and I joined them. They gave out at Bessietown, but I've come every foot of the way over the Ridge on horseback, and alone at that. I wanted to see Missouri, get acquainted with the home of my ancestors, at close range, as it were." Madeira chuckled. "God bless you, you certainly went in at the back door to do it," he said. Madeira's God-bless-you's and God-love-you's were valuable crutches to his conversation. With them and his bluster he seemed able to cover a great deal of ground. "And then I didn't hurry," went on Steering, "because I thought, from what you wrote me, that it would, without doubt, be some weeks before that amiable relative of mine could be dragged around to any real attention to our projects." "Ah, but that's where you missed out!" cried Madeira, a great ring of triumph in his voice. He crossed his legs, leaned back in his chair, and pushed out his chest. "That's where you didn't know C. Madeira. Young man, I've been hammering at Bruce Grierson night and day ever since I got you interested in this scheme,"--Steering looked at Madeira with a little quick motion of inquiry, but Madeira's arrangement of subject and object was evidently advised; Madeira showed that it was by repeating, "ever since _I_ got _you_ interested, I've been trying to get Grierson interested. We couldn't move hand or foot without him, you know that. The land is his, you know, even though you are the heir apparent, and there was no use trying to do anything with the land without him. I had got you into it without much trouble,"--Madeira paused just long enough to take the cigar that Steering offered him. (Steering could always see better through smoke.) "Yes, I had got you!" cried Madeira, biting off the end of the cigar with a sharp snap of his teeth, "and having got you, the next thing was to get Grierson. Well, I got him, got him since you left New York." He chuckled his spill-over chuckle again, swung around to his desk and took from one of its pigeon-holes an envelope addressed to him in a deep-gouging hand. The expression of geniality lingered about the wings of his nose and the corners of his mouth, as though it had been moulded there by long habit, but his eyes narrowed and the play of light from them was by now like the whisk of a sharp knife through the air. "You know I chased that old fellow all over Colorado with my letters about my scheme to open up the Tigmores, until I got him mad," he said, holding the letter up to say it, as though the contents would be illumined by his saying it. Then he handed it to Steering, who took it from its cover, flapped it open, and read: "DEAR CRIT: "Use this power of attorney to open up hell if you want to, but don't you write to me. "Your obedient servant, "B. GRIERSON." It was the sort of letter to make a man laugh, and Steering laughed. Then the phrase "open up hell" caught his eye again, like a sign of sinister warning. "I've never been able to understand," he began with a questioning inflection in his voice, "what's the trouble with the scion of the house of Grierson. Why is he so indifferent to a project for the development of his property that may mean a million to him?" "Aw, you know he's cracked!" replied Madeira quickly and harshly. "No, I don't know him at all, you will remember. Never saw him, never had a line from him." "Well, he's cracked. He fooled around here in the Tigmores for twenty years hunting silver, God bless you! Spent everything he had riding that hobby, then got another hunch, for zinc this time, borrowed money, sank it, borrowed more, sank that, then got a feeling that he was abused and went away from here declaring that the Canaan Tigmores could slide into the Di before he would ever raise a finger to stop them. That's why he wouldn't write you. I've handled his affairs--what's left of them--for years, and I've had enough trouble handling them, let me tell you." He took the letter from Steering and replaced it in the pigeon-hole. "But I've got him settled now," he said, "and we can go right on--oh! for the matter of going on, things are pretty far on already." He began rummaging through his desk in other pigeon-holes. "I'll just show you what I've drawn up." Steering found himself unable to keep up with Madeira. He took his cigar from his mouth, conscious of a sensation that he was being jerked along by the hair. He tried to get the best of the sensation by leaning back comfortably in his chair and observing Madeira leisurely. He tried to feel that he was following Madeira voluntarily, that he didn't have to if he didn't want to. When he had quitted New York he had been sustained by an idea that he had, in his correspondence, put before Madeira a plan that had some merit and promise in it, in the way that it got around the terms of a will, under which he was heir apparent to a vast acreage of land whose title now rested in another man, his relative. He and Carington had worked the thing over conscientiously, and, there in New York, they had taken some pride in the thought that they had hacked out a good base for the operations of a potential Steering-Grierson Mining and Development Company. Here, in Missouri, in Madeira's office, before the on-roll of Madeira's manner, Steering was no longer sure that he and Carington had had anything to do with the case. "Here's my prospectus," Madeira was saying, his voice ringing triumphantly again, "and here are the articles. God bless you, we are right up to the point where we can effect the organisation and issue the first one hundred thousand shares of stock. There are some Tigmore County men that I want you to meet, some fellows who can be used to fill out the directorate, and, first thing you know, we'll be filing an application for a charter, my boy." "Just so," said Steering absently. He had the papers in his hand, and was running them over. Both men were pulling at their cigars with strong puffs, and the room was so vaporous with smoke that Steering was beginning to see very clearly indeed, as he went through the papers. They were couched in good, clear English, the succinct English that Carington used, with admirable changes here and there, which brought out Carington's points still more clearly. "I am familiar with these," said Steering, looking up presently. "You seem to have let it stand about as we drafted it in the New York office. What changes you have made I like." "Oh, God bless you! you can rely upon liking the things of this kind that I do." Madeira's assumption was comprehensive and bland. There was absolutely no sense in going against that manner of his at this stage of developments. Steering began to ask questions and to wait. "Now, according to what we set forth here,"--Steering tapped the paper,--"the object and purpose of our corporation will be the mining of zinc and lead ore in the Canaan Tigmores. We are projecting upon the hypothesis that there is ore in the Tigmores, but we can't go too far upon hypothesis. There in New York it seemed worth while to take up the idea that, as there was ore all around through southwestern Missouri, there might be ore in the Canaan Tigmores. Then, being equipped for theorising only, Carington and I passed easily into the consideration of the possibilities _if_ there were ore in the Canaan Tigmores. You say that we are ready to organise, but it looks to me just now as though before we organise it might be in order to solidify hypothesis into fact. I don't think organisation is the next step at all; the next step, according to my notion, is to get off paper into the ground. Question now is, _is_ there any ore in the Canaan Tigmores?" "Question now is," interrupted Madeira baldly, "are there enough fools in the United States to donate us a fortune while we are finding out whether there is or isn't ore in the Canaan Tigmores? Oh, God bless you, my boy, you must bear in mind that gold isn't the only thing that can be minted! You can mint a man's thirst for gold, if you are up to it. The Southwest is zinc crazy right now. The time is as ripe as a nut----" "Well, one minute--what's your private opinion about the chance for ore in the Canaan Tigmores, Mr. Madeira?" "I d'n know a thing about it. And God bless you, I don't care a thing about it. I know that old Bruce Grierson butted his brains out on the Tigmore rocks, on the jack-trail, for twenty years, and I know, that all over the country,--not here in Tigmore County, but farther southwest,--men are drilling into rock that looks rich, and cuts blind, quick enough to ruin them; and I know that we are not going into this thing to lose money, but to make it, coming and going; I know that we've got to stand to win, coming and going. That's business." Face to face with this sort of frank self-commitment to "business," Steering was impressed into silence, and Madeira took advantage of the silence to push on in the big way he had that was like the broad-paddling, tooting vehemence of a river steamer. "I'm for getting a drill into the hills right away, just as much as ever you can be, my boy, understand. It will look better. We'll do it. But Lord love you, we won't hold back the organisation for that. Just leave these things to me. I've got a programme arranged here that will suit you, I think. First thing is to take you around and let you see that document in the recorder's office,--I believe you said you wanted to read the Bruce Peele will,--then you can come out and have dinner with Sally and me. I've got a nice place three miles out, and I've got a daughter that is not to be beat, in New York or out of it. Then this evening we'll get together some of the fellows that I handle around here, and take up some of the preliminary business." Madeira had risen, preparatory to conducting Steering to the recorder's office in accord with the first number of his programme, and Steering got up, too. While Madeira shut up his desk, Steering threw away the stump of his cigar and brought his flexed arms back to his shoulders with an expansive pull on his chest that sent a big influx of air into his lungs. After his séance with Madeira he felt as though he had been pummelled down flat. Madeira had to open his desk again for something he had forgotten and Steering passed on to the door, impatient for some outside air. As he opened the door, with his eyes rather thoughtfully fixed upon the floor, he saw, peeping around the curve where the Force's cage elbowed its way out into the room, a foot. Being a slender foot, in a well-fitting walking boot, it held him an unconscionably long time, then drew him on mandatorily, up the little space between the Force's cage and the wall, until he had rounded the curve and had come out by the Force's window, where a bare-headed girl leaned, talking merrily, gouging a hat-pin into the hat that she had taken off. "Oh, it's Mr. Steering,--isn't it?" she asked at once, and put her hand out to him. "I heard Father say that he was expecting you. And then, too, a friend of yours, who seemed much concerned about your fate over at Poetical, rode to our house last night and made me promise to welcome you to Canaan. I am Sally Madeira." "Hi, Pet, you there?" Madeira's big voice came through the door of the private office and took possession of the minute and the girl--"entertain the New Yorker until I get through here, will you? I got to monkey with this blasted lock again." "Yes, Father, I'm entertaining him," Madeira's daughter called back, while Bruce held helplessly to the hand she had given him. A peculiar mistiness had come over his senses. He could have sworn that through it he saw a picture that had been with him a good deal during the past year of his life, a picture of a woman's flower face, her fluffiness,--as of silk and lace,--lose colour, outline, significance, like a daguerreotype in the sunlight. A swift joy that he was in Canaan possessed him. All he could say was, "So you are Miss Sally?" It sounded very dull, so dull that he hastened to add, "So you know Piney?--Awfully kind of Piney to attract your attention to me." Remembering with horror some of his conversation with Piney about Miss Madeira, he repeated solemnly, "Awfully kind." "Well, I think you can give the little vagabond credit for a kind heart." Miss Madeira laughed softly. "I give him credit for much more than that," said Bruce. He was envying Piney, seeing that the tramp-boy's intuitive appreciations matched his vigorous young beauty, that he was far more poet than vagabond, that he, Bruce, had attempted to play clownishly upon what was a worthy and lovely idyl in the boy's heart. As though she, too, had some faint, perturbing consciousness of Piney, the girl flushed a little, laughed a little, and turned the subject readily. "I know yet another friend of yours," said she. "I am glad of that." Bruce had released her hand, forgotten the business that had brought him to Missouri, forgotten Crittenton Madeira, and stood with his arms folded, looking down upon her, glad that she was so tall, glad that he was taller, glad about everything. "Yes, another friend," she nodded with fleeting meaning, "I was at Vassar with Elsie Gossamer." Face to face with a woman like Sally Madeira the thought of a woman like Miss Gossamer must necessarily stay hazy in a man's brain. As with another Romeo, Rosaline had but laid the velvet up which came the surer feet of Juliet. "Well," said Steering happily, "all this is going to make us acquainted, isn't it?" "It may, if you like." She had a splendid comradeship of manner. Her father's energy stopped short of bluster in her. Borne up on her breezy westernism was a fragrant reserve, a fine reticence that disengaged a tantalising promise. "Oh, I'll like!" cried Bruce with conviction. "Do you live in Canaan?" "Out at Madeira Place. Father said you were to come out to dine with us to-day. I hope you will." "He will, he will! Trust me for that!" Madeira came through the space between the wall and the Force's cage noisily. For the first time that morning Steering felt no repugnance to that disposition of Madeira's to take charge of him, and he went off with Madeira, a moment later, across Court House Square to the recorder's office, with tread elastic and eyes sparkling. When the two men had left her, the girl moved over to the plate-glass window and watched Steering, a little smile on her lips, an adequate enjoyment of his undoing dancing mercilessly in her long amber-hued eyes. Steering stopped behind Madeira at the door of the recorder's office and, looking back at the plate-glass window unexpectedly, saw the girl's eyes fixed demurely on the floor where her boot showed under the hem of her long straight gown. It was a very little moment that they stood thus, he with his eyes on her, she with her eyes on her boot, but it was an electric moment. With him it was a cycle of self-abuse for the unadvised rot that he had talked to Piney, an era of gratitude to Piney for being the sort who would not report any of it to Miss Madeira. (Even so little did Steering understand that a boy like Piney would necessarily have to tell a woman like Miss Madeira about all that he knew; tell it exuberantly, bubblingly, without ever being quite conscious that he was telling anything.) Steering followed Madeira inside the recorder's office slowly, and the girl went on standing at the plate-glass window, studying her foot. "Yes, indeed, sir," she began calling to him soundlessly, and broke off abruptly and stood there at the window for a time, motionless and thoughtful. She was a tall girl, of a broad-shouldered, athletic type, a college girl by the sign of the austere cut of her gown, but a western girl by the sign of the flying ends of the scarf about her throat, the unafraid looseness of her bright hair. Her face, lit by her amber eyes and crowned by those loose masses of hair, had a rare, dusky-gold beauty. Despite her hair she was dark-skinned, smooth and warm like bisque, and that same gold-dusted radiance that was in her hair and that same amber-gold light that was in her eyes glowed ineffably from beneath her skin. She was a pulse of light, colourful and vibrant. "Yes, indeed, sir," she resumed after a while, jabbing the hat-pin into the hat relentlessly, "_this_ is what a Missouri girl is like!" _Chapter Four_ FOR THE BENEFIT OF CARINGTON My dear Carry: I should have written you sooner, save that the developments here have given me so little that is pleasant to write about. My experience with Grierson's agent has been too exasperating for description, and I should have given up and have got out at once had it not been for the Missouri in me, and had I not got a feeling of encouragement from other experiences. To begin with: When I reached Missouri, I lit out for the southwestern part of the State by train. At Springfield I fell in with some English fellows who are over at Joplin in the interests of a Welsh company. They had an expedition all planned to take in some of the Southwest by team on their way back to Joplin, and as they were going to push down pretty close to my objective point, I joined the expedition. There was a great deal of enthusiasm among us about zinc,--jack they call it down here,--and the talk at first was all of the stupidity of Missourians in not getting at this part of their State, as well as the section about Joplin, in the search for ore. I noticed that as we got into the rough-going of the ridge roads, and the hills got steeper and the woods denser and the rocks thicker, the opinion seemed to grow upon us that Missourians might understand their country better than we did. We had a driver who knew the roads well, when he could find them. We had a geological expert who got sadder and sadder every time we spilled out of the waggons and speared around in the rocks for a little while. And we had a great deal of bacon. Still, when we reached Bessietown, where we struck the steam-cars, the Joplin crowd broke for the train on a run. From Bessie there was a straight trail over the Ridge to Canaan and I decided to make the trip on horseback. I had got stubborn. Well, by and by, and more and more full of bacon, I was at Canaan, and had found Crittenton Madeira, that agent with whom we had the correspondence. I walked in upon Madeira with a pretty little notion that you and I had had something to do with the projection of a plan for developing and mining the Tigmores; I could have sworn that we originated the idea of hypothecating my heirship to the Canaan Tigmores; I remembered that in New York the fact that I would inherit from Grierson seemed to make my association with any enterprise for the development of the Tigmores of vital importance. I had not forgotten that that was our argument, and I was nursing a feeling that I was fairly necessary to any permanency of operations in the Tigmores. I am all straightened out on that score now, thanks to Madeira. The situation that I find here is this: Madeira has calmly taken over our ideas, and his plans of organisation are about complete. He is qualified to act for Grierson absolutely. The company that he will organise is to be known as The Canaan Mining and Development Company. He appreciates stingily that it may be some advantage to have me associated with the company, for the purpose of imparting a feeling of confidence to investors, but he does not begin to attach the importance to me that you and I did. He will let me in if I want to come in, but it is quite evident that he can get along without me, and yet more evident that if he takes me in, I must resign myself to his dictation,--dictating is his strong suit. To the gentleman who expected to be the president of the Steering-Grierson Company, that is not a pleasant programme; yet, my dear Carington, my circumstances are so precarious that I might attempt to fill it, if I did not see through Madeira's lack of principle, negatively speaking,--rascality, positively speaking. Now, I may have winked one eye occasionally during my business career, but I have never yet been able to shut both at once. It may be taste and it may be morals. Heretofore I have taken business too casually really to know how I am equipped for it. I have never before really met myself, spoken to myself, as I hustled through the few commercial hours of each day of my life. But out here business has become a thing of wider import on the instant, and already I am face to face with something stiff and hard on the inside of me that promises not to be very malleable under Madeira's hands. Madeira's hands, my dear boy, are pot-black. The plan that with us was a fair and square enterprise has become with him a clap-trap scheme to rob investors. I don't know how he means to do it, but he will do it. There is a chance that the company may get good money out of the Canaan Tigmores in zinc, but there is a much richer chance that Madeira will get good money out of the company, zinc or no zinc. So here I am in a pleasant situation. I can take my choice between a block of shares in the new company, my vote to be in Madeira's control, and a place far back, where I can watch Madeira operate my land to his profit while I wait for old Grierson to die. I am holding off as yet, dazzled by both prospects. Meantime the organisation of Madeira's company is being effected among the local capitalists, the store-keepers and the substantial farmers, and it's only a question of a few days until the directorate shuts in my face. Madeira is to take me over to Joplin to-morrow,--to let the showing there have its effect upon me, to let me catch the ore fever, I suspect. Immediately upon my arrival here, I looked into the history of my relationship to Grierson, and also looked up the record of the Peele will. Grierson is the grandson of one of the sisters of old Bruce Peele, while I am the great-great-grandson of another sister. My great-grandfather did not like pioneer life and went back East to live and cultivate the Steering family-tree into me, as the last, topmast, splendid blossom. The Grierson family stayed in Missouri and petered out into this Bruce Grierson. He is of my grandfather's generation, though he is a much younger man than a grandfather of mine could possibly be with the record of my age and my father's age to be accounted for. [Illustration: Two branches of the family tree.] I got profoundly excited in studying out the two branches of the family that are involved in the entail. Here is a map of the relationship for your benefit. You can understand from that, can't you, Carington?[1] The Peele will is simple. Old Bruce Peele lived a long life as a bachelor, with a strong aversion to matrimony. Toward the end he suffered one of those revolutions in valuations that sometimes upturn people of extreme prejudices. His will sets forth emphatically that he came tardily to realise that posterity is the best thing a man can leave behind him. He had two sisters, both of whom were well along in life, unmarried, and possessed of their brother's disinclination to marry. To encourage them to cross the Rubicon he made the will that entailed the Canaan Tigmores to the heirs, first of one and then the other, under the following provisions: the land was to go to the male heirs of his sister Nancy Peele, from oldest son to oldest son so long as there were male heirs, provided that in each generation the oldest male representative of Nancy married before he reached the age of thirty-five. If, in any generation, Nancy's representative fails to marry at thirty-five, the Canaan Tigmores pass to the male representative of Kate Peele, upon the death of the man who failed. Nancy Peele married a Grierson, and so pronounced was the inherited aversion to matrimony in the house of Grierson that compliance with the terms of the will has lasted through two generations only. The present Bruce Grierson let the time-limit overtake and pass him twenty years ago, but, unmarried and grouchy, he has stood between me and the Canaan Tigmores ever since. I don't count until he dies, and not then unless I am married before I am thirty-five. (However, I feel that I might be more disposed to meet the will's requirements than the Griersons have been.) The present Grierson is utterly unapproachable. He has not lived in this section for many years. He is particularly unapproachable on the subject of the Canaan Tigmores because he spent a great part of his youth prospecting through these hills, hoping and being disappointed. At last he turned his back upon Canaan, bitterly disillusioned, and he has been a wanderer upon the face of the earth ever since, sometimes hunting gold in the Rockies, sometimes after silver in Mexico. Half the time even Madeira does not know where he is. The queerest thing about the mining business, Carington, is the "hunches." The Englishmen told me that down at Joplin a man would rather have a dream that he walks two miles sou'-sou-west, turns around three times on his heels and finds ore under his left heel, than to have a geologist assure him that his house sits on a ledge of Cherokee limestone that ought to be all right for zinc. I have met great numbers of miners who are hunchers. The most interesting is a man named Bernique, an old chap of education and refinement from St. Louis. He has a hunch about the Canaan Tigmores--at least so far in my intercourse with him I have not found anything more tangible than a hunch. I fell in with him just before I reached Canaan, and though he then declared his intention of being absent for some days, he did not go away, sought me out in Canaan next day and has spent a good deal of time with me ever since. He is a splendid old character. Missouri is chuck full of character, for the matter of that. Besides old Bernique, I have made another friend, named Piney. Isn't that a pretty nice name? He is a sort of gipsy lad who roams the woods in company with old Bernique. I have seen him nearly every day since I have been here, because old Bernique and I ride about the Tigmores, and Piney is sure to fall in with us somewhere along the road. I have also met some others. You can have no conception, Carry, of the strength of pull that Missouri can exert over a fellow. You stand up on a hill and look at her, and something, your dead forefathers maybe, comes up to you in waves of influence. "Come back to your own!" says the Something, "I am waiting for you! By me conquer!" The longer I stay in Missouri, the longer I mean to stay. I have accepted the challenge of this great unconquered, waiting land. It is my own country. Sorry to have kept you so long over all this, but I thought that you ought to know. Shall write you the out-look after the Joplin trip. I have a notion that things will be adjusted toward the future after that. Give my love to the fellows. Yours, B. S. P. S. Please express me one of those fold-up, carry-around-with-you bath-tubs. When Carington, in the office down on Nassau Street, had read that, all of it, he turned over the last sheet and looked blankly at its blankness, quoted from the first paragraph, "Had I not got a feeling of encouragement from other experiences"; reread the entire letter, and was still afflicted with a sense of something lacking. "Now where the dickens did he get the encouragement?" cried Carington fretfully. "Psha! he has not put that in at all!" As a matter of entity and quiddity, it is well-nigh impossible to put into a letter the little quivering lift of spirit that may come to a man just because a girl's hair is lustrous, her eyes winey, her voice delicious, her smile one of gay fellowship. FOOTNOTE: [1] Carington could not. _Chapter Five_ BOOM TIME IN THE TOWN THAT JACK BUILT "Here we are! This is the town that jack built, this is the town the poet wrote about!" Madeira was leaning forward from the rear seat of a high road-cart to talk to Steering, who sat on the front seat beside the driver. Madeira had the back seat by himself, but, leaning forward, with both arms spraddled out behind Steering and the driver, he seemed now and then to take possession of the front seat, too. "Yes!" cried the driver, who, fearless, confident, glowing, was managing her spirited horses skilfully, "at Joplin's gates, you must chant the classic, 'Hey this, what's this?'" "And up from the city rolls the triumphant answer, 'This is the town that jack built!'" declaimed Steering, glancing down into the driver's face with accordant appreciation. He felt accordant and he felt appreciative. He had enjoyed the little railway journey from Canaan in company with the Madeiras. He had enjoyed the night before, which he had spent at the house of a Joplin friend of the Madeiras. He was enjoying the ride now. The friend of the Madeiras had put good horses at Madeira's disposal and Miss Sally Madeira could get speed out of good horses as easily as other women get a purr out of a kitten. Even Madeira, just behind him, crowding forward upon him, did not very much bother Steering. It was all enjoyable. They were on a long wide street that presented violently contrasted activities, hard to encompass with one pair of eyes. For blocks the buildings lined off on either side, low, flimsy and hastily constructed--mining-camp architecture, that gave way at abrupt intervals to tall and sightly brick-and-stone structures, built for the future metropolis rather than for the present camp. A section of an electric railway that was thirty-two miles long ran through the street, and the handsomely equipped cars on it clipped past mud-encrusted mule teams from distant hill farms, prairie schooners, and dilapidated carryalls. The scene was tremendously, occidentally irregular, setting forth that merciless clutch of the future upon the past that makes the present mere transition. The town was hard pushed to catch up with its own vast possibilities. A small place, set suddenly forward as one of the world's great ore markets, it could not even house the mining business that had poured in upon it, and that made of its main thoroughfare a tossing, turbulent stream of people. Almost every building that Steering saw was crowded to the doors with mining brokers' desks, mining brokers' desks spilled out on the side-walk, desks could be seen at the doors of the retail stores and desks kept banking-house doors from shutting. The windows of the newspaper offices and of the mineral companies were crowded with displays of ore. The hub-bub about these places was fierce, unbearable. Young men, with their handkerchiefs in their collars, hurried from one office to another, warm with excitement, flapping great bunches of letters and memoranda in their hands as they hurried. Messenger boys ran up and down the streets with telegrams. Buyers from the Kansas smelters, smelters in Illinois, smelters up about St. Louis, smelters in Indiana, smelters in Wales, nosed around like ferrets. Fine young men, who were supposed to look after the interests of the big foreign companies, sauntered out of bar-rooms, doing violence to the supposition. Map-sellers whacked their hands with folders. Wooden booths flung signs to the streets bigger than the booths themselves: "Mineral Companies Promoted," "Mining and Smelting," "Mines, Options, Leases,"--there was no end to the variations of the eternal theme of mining. Town lots, switches of flats, and hill ridges were being swapped and sold and leased from the curb-stone; leases were being made from buggies and options were being granted from a horse's back. "Whewee!" marvelled Steering, with a little itch of fear for the ore-mad people, "legal forms are being put to fearful strains, are they not, with all this heedless buying and selling?" Madeira laughed loudly, "God bless you, legal forms! All that a man who wants to sell has to do is to throw a plank, any little rotten plank, across the chasm of future litigation and ten buyers will walk it with nerves of steel." He patted Steering's shoulder. "My boy, it's this headlong impetus that assures the success of the Canaan Company. If I get that thing started once, all I have to do is to advertise it down here a week. The stock will go like hot-cakes. People don't care what they buy, just so they buy. They've got no sense of value left. Why, a man found an outcrop of a zinc lode under his chicken-coop yesterday--and to-day the price of chicken-coops has gone up." Madeira patted Steering's shoulder again and laughed again, pleased at his aptness in figuring the thing out. "He's just exactly right," said the girl, nodding at Steering. "Over here the average man needs a guardian to keep him out of the clutches of the 'boodlers.' I almost hate to see this sort of excitement come into Canaan. Father has been pretty busy all his life looking after infant men, but from now on his plight is going to be pitiable. I saw that yesterday afternoon, Dad, when the farmers were filing into the bank to put their money into your hands." The girl, turning back to smile at Madeira, was the cause of Steering's turning back, too, and he was surprised to see a patriarchal, benign expression on Madeira's face, as though a reflection of the girl's illusions about his character lay warm upon him. "Oh, I don't mind my job as nurse for the Canaanites, Pet," said Madeira softly, and then waved one hand out toward the city and changed the subject. "Pretty good for a lazy semi-southern State, eh, Steering?" He nudged the girl next and added: "Before we are through with him we'll have convinced the New Yorker that a good deal happens outside New York. Won't we, Pet?" "Yes, sirree," said the girl, imitating her father's manner adroitly, as she put her horses through the crowded thoroughfare, "the United States of America has more than one way of living the life strenuous, and Broadway, New York, doesn't begin to be the only place where she lives it. Look abroad, look abroad!" She was altogether fascinating as she pointed out to Steering little typical features that he would have missed without her humourous, boastful sallies. As they continued on their way, Madeira and the girl bowed and smiled to acquaintances, and once the horses were stopped at the curb to enable Madeira to talk to some man whom he knew well. While waiting, with the road-cart drawn up close to the curb, Steering and the girl could hear talk all about them,--zinc and lead, jack, jack, jack! Flying chips of conversation assailed their ears as the people scurried by; references to old companies and their latest projects, and to new companies and new finds; talk about the menace of the runs pinching out, and talk about the danger of over-stocking the world's zinc markets; grumbling talk about the wildcat exploitation going on at every corner, and envious talk about a report that some wildcat promoter had just succeeded in selling a face of ore that had cut blind under the drill of the buyer in a few lamentable days; condemnatory talk about what an extremely gold-brick country this was, and awed talk about the remarkable prices that some of the gold bricks fetched. All the talk was frankly of millions. The scale was gigantic. Even poor men seemed to have acquired a familiarity with the sound of great sums that made them take themselves as somehow richer and bigger. Voices shook with eagerness and avidity; hands worked constantly at button-holes, or at lapels, or with watch-guards. When acquaintances passed on the street they did not say "how-do-you-do"; they looked at each other's bulging pockets and said, "lemme see your rock." What Steering and the girl heard as they waited in the road-cart was fragmentary but significant: "Scotch Company will divide off another one hundred thousand acres, so they say--No, sirree-bob, no more hand-jigging for me--Wouldn't take one-quarter of a million for it, if you'd give it to me--Boston Company is bound to make millions--Yes, that's Madeira,--Canaan Tigmores--Oh, he will mint money out of it, no doubt in the world about that he goes in to win----" The girl turned to Steering with pleased pride. "You see? He always wins. People expect him to." Madeira was over at the edge of his seat, talking earnestly to the man on the curb. Steering, beside the girl, looking down at her, not seeing Madeira because of her, nodded approvingly, the approval being for her honesty, her sweetness, her vitality. Something, perhaps the near climax for her father's enterprise at Canaan, seemed to have keyed her to a high pitch. Steering, who by now had had opportunities to see her often, had never seen her so beautiful, nor so quick of expression in word and look. Her voice thrilled him; and while he was thrilling, Madeira's voice came on to him: "You needn't hold back on that account," Madeira was saying: "God bless you, I've got the next heir in the deal, too." "Oh-ho," said the girl, who also heard, "we are taking you for granted, aren't we?" Steering only smiled at her again. He had fallen into the habit of smiling at her, and some prescience seemed to urge him to exercise the habit while he could. Madeira was turning from the man on the curb: "All right, I'll allot you one thousand shares, eh? Good-day.--Pet, you'd better drive on out to Chitwood, lickety-split." Miss Madeira put the whip to her horses, and they left the Joplin streets behind them, and sped out a gritty white road that crossed a lean sweep of prairie. Ahead of them Steering could see presently a sort of settlement; wooden sheds, wide and low; hoister shafts, tall and slim, on stilts; scaffolding; pipes; chimneys; tramways; surface railways. His eyes leaped from moundlike piles of tailings, the powdery crush spit out by the concentrating mills, to boulder-like heaps of rocks that had been wheeled away to save the teeth of the mills, and his ears turned distraught from the groaning clank of unwieldy iron tubs, swinging up through skeleton shafts, to the sputtering plunk-plunk of drill engines and the booming roar of machinery. "Hard to keep up with, eh? God bless us, it certainly _is_ hard to keep up with!" cried Madeira. "Drive into the enclosure there at the Howdy-do, Pet, Throcker will be expecting us. I telephoned him. Yes, sir, this is the place to see what zinc means." Madeira was leaning forward again, one arm about his daughter and the other arm fathering Steering. "This is the place to understand what can be done by seeing what has been done." He seemed to want to fire Steering with the idea that just such another astounding development could be wrought out down there in the Canaan Tigmores, and though Steering was aware that he would soon be at a crisis where he would need an austere strength of judgment, uncoloured by enthusiasm of any kind, he could not help responding to the aura of enthusiasm into which he was entering. The great plant of the Howdy-do mine disseminated enthusiasm in shaking vibrations. Milled enthusiasm stood about in cars, ready for the smelters. Enthusiasm roared and whirred from the concentrating mill where wheels were turning and bands were slipping; where a tub, ore-laden, was jerking and clanking through the hoister shaft; where men on an upper platform were shovelling the dump from the tub into great crusher rolls; where the rolls were grinding and pounding, and the water was fashing and gurgling down the jigs. The whirr of it all, the whizz and bang of it, the whole effect of it all, was, to any man interested in the development of ore, a great forward impetus that swung him far out, limp and dizzy. "Waiting for you, Mr. Madeira!" cried a man, who fairly shone with enthusiasm, and whose voice tinkled gladly as he came across to the hitching rail where Miss Madeira had stopped her horses. "Mighty glad to see you, Miss Sally--Mr. Steering, glad to meet you, sir. Here you, Mike! come and look after these horses. Miss Sally, I'm a-going to have to take you round to the tool-house for some covers, please ma'am." The accommodating and friendly mine-boss of the Howdy-do led Madeira's party to a shed opposite his mill and there outfitted them with rubber coats and caps, talking to them all the while in that tinkling voice, with the glad note singing in it. "God bless my soul, Throcker, how much did the last blast bring down?" Madeira turned to Steering before Throcker could reply. "Whenever a miner's voice shakes and sings like that, his last blast has meant a heap." "You are right, sir!" cried Throcker, "we opened up a face yesterday that,--well, it's going to take us weeks to handle even the loose ore we've brought down, sir. Come this way, Miss Sally, please ma'am." Steering began to wish that the mine-boss were not so happy. It had an electric effect upon him. And he began to wish that he himself were not so happy. He dreaded developments that would surely be change. "Well, Throcker, my boy, my ledge of Cherokee runs up here from the Canaan Tigmores, d'you know that?" said Madeira. He put his thumbs in his pockets and rocked upon the balls of his feet with a springing, tip-toe movement, as Throcker stopped them in front of a shaft out of whose cavernous depths a cage was swinging toward them. From Madeira's manner you might have inferred that the Cherokee had a Madeira permit to "run up here." In the cage it was necessary for Steering to extend his arm behind Miss Madeira, as there were no sides between the great cables at the four corners. It was not a very large cage and the number on it crowded it, so that the girl rested lightly on Steering's arm. He could think of no place so deep down that he would not be well satisfied to journey to it like that. But there came a jolt and a jar, the cage settled upon the stope, and the journey was over. Throcker led the way through a thick underground gloom. Great masses of crush-rock slid under foot, there was a black drip from ceiling and walls, and the excavation was filled with the hollow boom of the water-and air-pumps. With lights flaring uncertainly, they followed the mine-boss out upon a rocky crag that gave upon a deep abyss, faintly illuminated by the flicker of the lamps of the working force below and by torches set in the wall. There was an upward slope in the formation of the ledge from the bottom of the cavern to the spur upon which they stood, but it was made by irregular juttings with ugly, saw-tooth projections. Unless they were very near the edge they could not follow the dim outline of the slope at all. Throcker in his eagerness to point out the ore, shining like specks of gold all up and down the slope, worked dangerously near the edge, but he was accustomed and recovered his balance easily when a piece of his support crumbled away under his feet. Steering, who was agile and athletic, had no difficulty in keeping up with the miner, but Madeira had to be watchful. The miner would not let Miss Madeira come far out on the crag, though he let the men follow him, calling warnings to them as they came. "From where you stand, Miss Sally," Throcker turned toward the girl who waited below the summit of the crag, "from where you stand up to here, the loose ore is worth about sixty-five thousand dollars!" The girl looked up at them responsively. Standing there under the strange flickering light of her torch, with the black folds of the rubber coat swathing her, her face, with its fine eyes, was cut out for Steering sharp as a cameo. "I am delighted for your sake, Mr. Throcker," she called gaily, but with a little uneasiness in her voice. "Father, please be careful." "Sixty-five thousand dollars! Why, Lord love you, Throcker, a hundred thousand, if one." Madeira, taking charge of the probabilities in the case, moved toward the edge to support his estimate by measuring with his eye the distance down the crag. "Father, please be careful. Watch him, Mr. Steering,--O-h-h-h!" A woman's cry of horror rang though the tunnelled walls as Madeira's great frame toppled on the edge of the crag, and disappeared. Throwing out his right arm protectingly, as though in answer to the girl below, Steering had been able to knot the sinewy fingers of one hand about Madeira's collar as the latter fell. The force of the fall brought Steering to his knees, then flat out across the ledge, to get all the purchase power he could. Madeira's weight was terrific, even after Steering had brought his other hand into requisition; and though Throcker sprang to the rescue, Throcker was a weak man and the best aid that he could render was to assume a small share of Madeira's weight by getting down flat upon the ledge, after Steering's fashion. In the black hole below the miners saw what had happened and two burly men began to clamber up the treacherous slope. "Gently, boys, gently," warned Throcker, as the men came on; he and Steering could feel the rock upon which they lay vibrate; there was a rending and splitting going on all through the ledge. "Can you hold on a minute alone, sir?" gasped Throcker suddenly. "I have a bad heart and it's going back on me,"--he fell weakly beside Steering. "Yes, I can hold on alone." Steering's face was in the loose crush, and his lips were cut by the rock when he opened them, so he stopped trying to talk. "Get back, Mr. Throcker--let me get my hands down and help Mr. Steering." It was the girl's voice, and the girl was beside Steering, quiet and capable. "Oh, you?" said Steering. He had known all these seconds that he was doing this for her, but the strain that he was on had somehow pulled him beyond the comprehension of her as actual; for the last ten seconds she had been rather a big abstraction, a high principle of his soul, a good desire in his heart. To see her there before him was to see abstraction, principle, desire becoming adequately incarnate. "No, you mustn't try to reach down here,--your arms aren't long enough,--the commotion on the edge here is dangerous,--if you will just put something, your handkerchief, under my face where the sharp little rocks are at it,--ah, you should not have done _that_!"--she had slipped her hands beneath his face, and the touch of her fingers was like velvet as she worked away the sticking, stinging bits of ore and rock that worried him. He had not known how chief a part in his sensation of discomfort those bits had played until he could bury his face in the relief of her soft hands. As a matter of fact, with those bits out of his cheeks,--and his face in her hands,--he felt no great discomfort at all. If it had not been for her shivering sigh of relief he would have been sorry when the miners drew Madeira up. Madeira had not spoken, and he was purple as they carried him to a place of safety some distance back on the ledge. "He is just the sort of man physically who ought not to be subjected to choking experiences," said Steering. One of the miners had brought water, and Steering and Miss Madeira were reviving Madeira with it. Madeira did not seem to be unconscious, but his senses were obtunded, and it was some minutes before he could sit up. "God bless my soul! God bless my soul!" he said, at last, and shivered. Then he turned to Steering: "My boy, you know how to hold on. I believe you've got as much stick-to-it-iveness as I have." It was his supremest form of acknowledgment, and, in making it, he made, too, an impression upon Steering that he resented the circumstances that compelled him to make it. They got back to the upper air presently, followed by a cheer from the mine force below. The miners had watched Steering perform one of those supernatural feats of strength and endurance that an onlooker can never explain afterward. Usually the performer knows that the thing was a matter of motive and will, not muscle. Up in the daylight again, Madeira was quickly himself again. He resumed charge of affairs in his comprehensive way, and though the mine-boss, frightened and remorseful, was limp now, all his enthusiasm gone, Madeira's welled up again strong within him. They went back to their horses without loss of time, and, waving adieux to Throcker and some of his men who had gathered about, they were soon journeying back down the white road toward Joplin. Miss Madeira's hands were in bad condition for driving, Steering thought, but she had taken the reins just the same. "We are all dilapidated for the matter of that," she said. "Father is as grey-faced as a rat, your cheeks are all cut and pricked--my hands don't count." Twilight was coming on and a full moon was rising. The great sweep of flat stretched out about them in a mesh of soft light. The ride back was gay, and when they stopped at the house of the Joplin man, who was their host, all three were still in nervously high spirits. A negro servant came out for the horses, and Steering helped Miss Madeira to alight. The girl had drawn off her driving gauntlets, and the ungloved hand that she gave him was scratched and scarred across its brown back. "Isn't that shameful,--and you did it for me!" mourned Steering. "Oh, if I could have done more!" she cried breathlessly, "if I could do more,--as much as you have done for me! If I have not thanked you, you know,"--what she was saying was fragmentary and confused, but her eyes were shining sweetly upon him,--"it's because I can't. You must understand that. I never can talk when I am busy feeling. How are your shoulders?" "I don't know that I have any," replied Steering, with wretched prevarication. "Come on, Honey, come on." Madeira was at the stone steps of the Joplin house, and the girl took his arm and climbed the steps with him. At the top Madeira turned back to Steering, who was a step behind. "Well, old man, let's have it out now, before we go in and get mixed up with these strangers. What about those shares? Coming in with us, I reckon?" It was like Madeira to select a position of advantage like that, a higher place from which he could look down and dominate, with his daughter beside him, and it was like him to select a moment like that, a moment when the three were close, on the very summit of their friendship and sympathy. "We are to be all together on that deal, aren't we?" Though the girl, her arm linked through her father's, was waiting for his answer, and though Steering saw that she expected his acquiescence as the right and natural thing, her influence upon him, despite that, was all for the rejection of Madeira's proposition. She looked so young, so straight, so honest, that, as an influence, she was ranged against Madeira, even though, in her ignorance, she imagined herself to be in harmony with him. Steering, looking at her first and Madeira next, knew that she really fashioned his answer, that it was really all because of her that his words came, swiftly, earnestly: "Don't allot me any shares at all, Mr. Madeira. I have decided not to go into the company." Madeira emitted a breezy "All right. God bless you, all right." The girl looked sorry and puzzled. Steering came on up the steps behind them, with a sense of mingled elation and sadness, and the three passed through the door of the Joplin man's house. _Chapter Six_ FATHER AND DAUGHTER Madeira Place was the old Peele Farm, whose square brick house had been the boast of Canaan township ever since it had been put up,--out of brick hauled by team across three counties,--by the man who had established, but failed, despite his effort, to make permanent the fortunes of his family. When the grandnephew, Bruce Grierson, came on, the brick house was plastered with a mortgage that somehow passed eventually into the hands of the then alert young sapling land-agent, Crittenton Madeira. Crittenton took the house, and, by and by, Bruce Grierson, the second, took himself, with money borrowed from Madeira, out of Canaan, never to return. It was not long after this that Crittenton Madeira, who was still a slight man, with a young wife and a pretty baby out at the brick house, began to be named "our esteemed fellow townsman" by the _Canaan Call_. Madeira built a hotel for Canaan, promoted the Canaan Short Line, and established the Bank of Canaan. His wife died, and his little girl grew, and he became large of girth. It was not until his daughter was twelve that he had to share honours with anyone as the foremost personage of Tigmore County. At twelve the daughter began to show that she had inherited her father's vitality, though the sphere of her activities was different. He bought and sold and made money. She lassoed heifers, broke colts, and rode up and down the Di in rickety skiffs. The community took as much pride in her adventures as it did in his achievements. The Madeiras were very happy together all through those days, and very proud of each other. She recognised that her father was superior to the Canaan men, that they did what he told them to do, and he recognised that she was the most wonderful child, and the most beautiful, that had ever come into the world. His convictions on that score were so profound that they seemed to him something surer and bigger than the customary paternal pride and affection. As the girl grew older he spent a great deal of his money on her education and pleasure--at first blindly, guided only by a big impulse to have her as good as the best, an impulse that resulted in some funnily pathetic scenes where the little girl, frightfully over-dressed, wandered through the St. Louis shops, holding to the big man's finger, trying to think up something else that she might possibly want. Later, under the girl's own direction, the money went to better purpose. His daughter's way of spending the money early became, in Madeira's manner of getting at the thing, a sort of balance-wheel to his way of making it. Although he had made money in the same way before she was born, and although he would have made it in the same way had she never been born, he grew to like the feeling that what he did he did for her, and that his desire to make money had a soul in his desire to have her spend it. This feeling was in the ascendant always when he was with her. Unconsciously she fanned it within him. She had spent her young life couched rosily on his love for her and hers for him; at home she was lonely; at home Madeira was well-nigh perfect, and the girl's imagination made all her ideals live in the big, handsome, assertive man who was at once father to her and hero. Perceiving this, Madeira, with her, entered into a sort of world of make-believe, and, with her, was sometimes able to take himself for what she held him, a man whose honour matched his ability, and, with her, sometimes surprised in himself the little glow that she seemed to get when she was profoundly appreciating him. One Sunday afternoon they were sitting, father and daughter, in the garden, behind the brick house, he with a St. Louis paper on his knee, his head bare, his waistcoat loose, his feet in slippers. His chair was tilted back against a crab-apple tree at the side of one of the garden walks. For several weeks his face had been showing some sort of strain, but at this moment he looked comfortable. She had been telling him that she was glad that he had put up the new watering trough in Court House Square, and the way she had talked about it had made him feel sure that he had had some notion, when he did it, of benefiting the community, instead of insuring that the farmers would stop in front of the Grange store, in which he was interested. She sat on a bench near him, quite idle; her gown, a tawny drapery, whose half-hidden suggestions of blue were like shy spring flowers, was sheathed closely about her; her eyes were following the pale wide river below the garden; her hair, so light that it made her eyes seem lighter, was piled above the warm, creamy tan of her forehead; there was a little drowsy droop on her face; the dusky-gold radiance was all about her. "Daddy," she said, by and by, "do you know that I swam the Di once?" He laughed sleepily. He remembered. "I wonder if I could do it now--I was pretty awful as a youngster, wasn't I, Daddy?" "You certainly had a reputation," he admitted. "Do you know that I still have a good deal of a reputation"--she turned upon him with more directness and a little laughing pugnacity--"as though I were the same terrible child, up to the same riotous tricks as when I was twelve!" "Hump-mmh, hump-mmh!" He looked at her from under his slanted lids and shook his head, while his big face quivered with amusement. "You haven't given up all your riotous tricks even yet--don't tell me." He spoke with the indulgence that had allowed free rein to her caprices all her life. "Never you mind, I do precious little that is riotous any more; I am getting used to harness," she made answer, and looked as though she did not mean to be interfered with in the precious little that was riotous that she still clung to, and then looked as though she were threatening herself with sweeping reform. "Go back to sleep, Daddy. You will be in my way presently, anyhow." "Anybody coming?" "Your Mr. Steering." "'My!'" Madeira's face clouded over, and he thrust out his jaw grimacingly. "If he _were_ mine, you know what I should do with him?" he asked, in a sharp voice. "No, I don't know. What would you do with him?" "I should send him packing back East. This country don't need,--aw, the people of this country are good enough for the country and the country is good enough for them. We don't need outsiders." He was so vehement that she regarded him questioningly. "Don't you like him any more?" she inquired, with a little dubious shake of her head. "I don't like"--Madeira got up and walked back and forth under the crab-apple tree--"I don't like for a man without any practical knowledge or experience to get a lot of ideas about a thing and bring them to a field and try to push other chaps out, other chaps who are already in the field." "Yes, but----" It occurred to her that she was defending Steering--"but if he brings the ideas, he ought to have the credit for originating the ideas, oughtn't he?" "No! No!" Madeira's voice rang up, urgent, strident; he did not seem conscious that he was talking to her; he seemed rather to be having something out with himself. The strain of the past weeks had come back to his face. "Plenty of people before this Steering have thought of ore in the Canaan Tigmores. Look at old Grierson himself! Originate the idea! Grierson had the idea before Steering was born! We can get ideas in this country, and work 'em out, too, without any help from outsiders." "Mr. Steering is not exactly an outsider, is he?" "Yes, he is, too. He hasn't any more claim to this land now than you have; it isn't any more his business what's done here during Grierson's lifetime than it's Rockefeller's business. Not a bit. Let Steering wait till the land is his." "Well,"--she was troubled,--"in the meantime, what is old Grierson going to do?" Madeira seemed to be trying to quiet himself. He went down to the garden fence and looked at the oak forest on the other side of the Di, puckered up his mouth, as though to whistle, but stopped short of it, and came sauntering back toward his daughter. "He is going to do what I tell him to do, Honey," he made answer. "And I'm telling him to put the Canaan Mining and Development Company into the Tigmores after zinc." "I should think, though," she said then, slowly, "that even if the matter is in your hands now, it would be to your ultimate advantage to have Mr. Steering in with you. He is the next owner, and, if old Grierson should die, whatever work you have done on the Tigmores would go for nothing. I should think it would be almost essential for you and Mr. Steering to be together." He let his chair down angrily. "There isn't a big enough scheme in the universe to accommodate Steering and me together! He is a blamed idiot," he said doggedly. And it became clear to her that in his bull-headed way he had forged all the links of one of his intense antagonisms. He had been like that all his life; of pronounced personality himself, he had never been able to abide pronounced personality in those with whom he came in contact. He had ridden rough-shod over inferior men all his life; he liked to ride rough-shod; he was never pleased when his path crossed people over whom he could not ride rough-shod. Generally she had accepted his classification of those who opposed him strongly as "blamed idiots"; sometimes with a little of her laughing banter, but usually, his superiority standing out sharp and clear when opposed to the dull Canaanites, endorsing his opinion. "I sort of wish," he went on, with that keen, wire-edged exasperation still sawing in his voice, "that you wouldn't have much to do with that chap. He isn't my kind of people. I shouldn't mind if, now that you've given him a good high swing, you'd let him drop." "Why, Father! You oughtn't to forget that there was one time in your life when he might have let you drop--and didn't!" He saw that he had got himself before her in too keen a light. "Yes, but you don't expect me to let him hold me up by the collar forever, do you, Pet? That's his dog-on way, anyhow--wants to dictate. I can't stand a man who wants to dictate. I think we've had enough of him. That's what I mean, and all I mean." He patted her hands and got up from his chair again. "There comes Samson with the mail," he said nervously. A negro man rode up through the big gate at the front of the grounds and came on to Madeira, who took two letters from him. "One for you, Sally," said Madeira, "and one for me." "Oh, from Elsie Gossamer!" she cried, and took her letter and sat, unobservant of him, for several moments, the little frown that his words had brought out still on her brow. Presently she looked up and saw that he had read his letter, and had put it in his pocket; he was tilted back against the crab-apple tree again, his forehead knit, his eyes brilliant, a peculiar fixity in their gaze. "Oh, here!" she cried protestingly, "you look as though you had just decided to become the President of the United States of America! Stop scowling and listen; Elsie is after me again to join her in Europe. She is fairly eloquent with the project----" He broke in upon her with a sudden intensity of interest: "Do it!" he cried. "It's the very thing. You go. You go and have a good time." "I don't want to go so awfully," she began hesitatingly. "I've been away from you a lot in the last two years. I don't care so much about it." "Yes, you do; you go." He was always keen for her pleasure, but in the present case he seemed especially earnest. "Want to get rid of me, huh?" "No; you know I'll half die without you. But I am going to be fearfully busy from now on,"--his mouth seemed hot and dry as he talked,--"it will suit better now than ever. You go." "Well, maybe," she said. She was accustomed to let her own fancy settle such questions for her. "Maybe I'll go. Maybe I shan't." There was a click at the front gate. "I expect that's Mr. Steering," she announced. Madeira got out of his chair quickly. "If it is, I don't want to see him," he said, "he--oh, he irritates me, that man,--always wanting to dictate. I'll go in. Don't want ever to see him again,--and say, Pet?" "Well, Dad?" "I'd be glad if you would never see him again. Just stop where you are, will you?" She drew a long sighing breath. "Just stop where I am? Well, I'll see," she said, laughing and flushing in the warm, rich fashion of her skin, but there was the faint far call of uneasiness in her laughter, like a wind-whisper of coming rain. "Tell Samson to bring Mr. Steering out here to me," she commanded, and Madeira went off toward the house and disappeared through the green-latticed porch. Inside the house he retired to the room that was known as his office, locked the door and came over to his desk. As he did it a peculiar consciousness of himself suffused him like the first fumes of a deadly narcotic. He began to see that he was lifting his feet stealthily, advancing them stealthily, stealthily setting them down, with the soundless fall of a cat's foot on velvet. Reaching his desk, he half fell into a chair there, a thin line of white froth between his lips, his big face purplish. "Eh, God?" he cried, "what's this? what's this?" The seizure passed as suddenly as it had come. By and by he heard Steering pass through the house under Samson's escort. When the sound of Steering's foot-steps had died away, Madeira took a letter from his pocket, spread it open before him and read it over and over. "Dear Crit," [the letter said] "I have thought this thing to a finish. I want you to turn the Tigmores over to my cousin, Bruce Steering. Let him start at once on the jack trail, that primrose path of dalliance. As for me, my dear sir, by the time this reaches you, I shall be on the long trail. You needn't blow any trumpets about it, for B. G. will have no funeral. The name that I gave you as the name that I live here under is good enough to die here under. The certain fact for your consideration is that I die at once, and that the question of this property entail is now confided to you to arrange for my heir, young Steering. Write to the clerk of Snow Mountain County for the documents that I have left with him for you. They establish everything. Tell my cousin that, besides the Tigmores, I bequeath him my debts to you. This leaves me not at all envious of the job ahead of him, and, as ever, "Your blindly devoted servant, "BRUCE GRIERSON." _Chapter Seven_ THE GARDEN OF DREAMS Crittenton Madeira's daughter wandered down the garden path, singing softly, after her father had left her, but there was in her song, as there had been in her laughter, a little tremble of unrest. The garden was a delicious place, whose fragrance beat up in waves of sweetness at every turn. All the flowers were in their luxuriant last bloom. There were great roses and sweet elysium, mignonette, peppermint pinks, crêpe myrtle, riotous vines and creepers. Long ago she had taken everything out of the garden that was not sweet. She had a fancy that fragrance was one of the spirit's tremulous paths into heaven, and out in the garden she liked to shut her eyes and, with her little straight nose in the air, go drifting off toward what was infinitely good, fine, strong, imperishable. It sometimes seemed to her that the most intimate and exquisite happinesses of her life had come to her with her eyes shut in that garden. She called it the Garden of Dreams. When Steering found her, she was waiting for him, her arms on an old vine-covered stump, that dusky-gold radiance of hers playing over her and from her, the most beautifully, glowingly alive woman in the world. What he said to her was "How-do-you-do?" But what he wanted to say was, "Oh, stand there so forever, and let every grace, every beauty burn into my brain, so that all my life I may carry you about with me, your wine-warm eyes, your sunlit hair, the whole sweet glow of you,--having you perfectly, knowing you perfectly everywhere, everyhow, near, far, in the sunshine, in the dark!" And when a man wants to talk like that "how-do-you-do" is as good a catchphrase as the next to keep his tongue discreet. "I do very well," she told him, smiling at him, maddening him, "I always do well, here in my garden,--but you, you put my sense of well-being to shame. You look so glad!" "I am the gladdest man on earth," Bruce told her, knowing chiefly that he had her hand in his. He barely remembered in time that she was rich in gold and lands and cattle, and that he was poor, and that the positivism of his personality had already incurred the ill-will of her father. "Still, I don't think there is any doubt in the world how it is all going to end," he said hazily. He still had her hand. She had the hardest hand to put down that he had ever taken up. "I don't quite follow? All what?" She bit her lip; her eyes flashed off across the Di, bright and swift as mating birds, as she drew her hand gently away. "I was only thinking that a man may go on and on through so many meaningless years, of no special significance to himself or to anybody else and then suddenly,--think everything is going to be all right some day." He clasped his hands and leaned on the other side of the vine-covered stump and looked at her wishfully, and she laughed at him, with her eyes still on the pale river. "How do you like my garden?" she asked divertingly. For answer he shut his eyes and breathed deeply. "Oh, how good!" she cried, satisfied, "that's the only way really to follow the path of fragrance,--that's my own way!" He blessed his stars that he had sniffed at the roses. "Where did the path lead you?" she queried, as he opened his eyes dreamily upon her golden beauty. "Into heaven," he murmured with sublime conviction, and she clasped her slender hands, delighted at their mystical congeniality. "I am so glad that we like the same thing," she continued, hurrying a little; "haven't you noticed?--we both like the garden,--and we both like Piney. When did you see Piney?" "Piney? Oh, I see Piney often." He rather wished that she had not mentioned Piney. Since he had come to know the tramp-boy better his first ache for him had become sharper and sharper. "Piney and I were out on the hills together only yesterday. Poor Piney!" "Why," she took his hand and led him forward through a tangle of rose-bushes; she would not look at him, but the bewildering sweetness of her hair, her gown, the curve of her cheek came back to him--"why _poor_ Piney?" She was guiding him to a bench of twisted grape-vines from which they might look down upon the river. "Sit down," she said, "and tell me why poor Piney?" "Well," he sat down and looked at the river, half-frowning, "it has seemed to me--I've had a notion--oh, I don't know. I suppose it is not poor Piney after all." "Tell me," she insisted, "tell me what you started to tell me." "Well, it has seemed to me ever since I first met Piney that he was in the way of trouble," he dashed on more abruptly, thinking only of Piney for a moment--"I have come to love that boy. I find myself clinging to him. I think it is because he stands to me for the spirit of my own boyhood; perhaps that, perhaps because he stands for the spirit of the woods he loves; because he stands for simplicity, honesty, spontaneity. At any rate he is rare, what with his musical gift and his high melody of living--and--oh well, I've sometimes felt sorry that he is not all wood-spirit, that he is part human." The characteristics that had made Steering stand too determinedly to suit Crittenton Madeira made him forge ahead determinedly now. "Piney would be apt to suffer less if he were wholly the sylvan, irresponsible creature, the faun, he sometimes seems to be. But, alas, Piney has a man's heart, Miss Madeira. He will have to suffer for that, for he will have to love. That's why 'poor' Piney; because he will have to love." "Would that be so terrible?" The flash from the amber eyes that she turned up to him made the world go zig-zagging through a long space while Steering looked on with a great tremulous intake of breath. Then he steadied again to what he wanted to say to her and could say to her for Piney's sake. "It would be for Piney. Piney is going to love hopelessly," he saw that a little shiver caught her and he was glad of it. "Yes, it would be terrible to love hopelessly, wouldn't it?" he said, to strengthen his hidden appeal for Piney. He wanted to make her realise what she was doing for Piney, realise that for sheer kindness, kindness as to a dumb thing, she should never let the lad come near her. He had forgotten the woman in her when he began to formulate that appeal. She laughed a light, mocking laugh. "I believe that you think that Piney loves me!" she cried. "Piney, the spirit of the oaks! the song of the night-wind! Piney suffer! Piney love!" Steering was sorry to hear the note of evasion in her voice. No woman, he remembered, too late, could be brought to treat man's love or boy's love quite honestly. His eyes clouded. He felt masculinely, sanely sympathetic with Piney. "I wish," he said gloomily, "that you would sometimes put yourself in the place of a man who loves you, put yourself in Piney's place." Her eyes crinkled up again. "I'll just do it," she said gaily, "I'll do it now. Presto," she shut her eyes. "Now I have his point of view. Now I'm seeing what he sees--that Miss Sally Madeira likes to hear him sing, and humours him and pets him because he is gay and glad to be alive, and because Uncle Bernique says that he needs somebody to mother him. I mother Piney. Can't you see that." She laughed again and arose and stood in front of him, gay, mocking, nonchalant. "Piney love! And if Piney could love, that you should fancy that he might dare love Salome Madeira!" He forgot about Piney. She blocked his farther vision like a shaft of light. He could not see an inch beyond her. Madeira's voice rang down the garden walk. Steering did not hear it. "Salome! Salome!" he murmured, "Is that it, Salome?" "Yes, that's it, Salome. Isn't it foolish? The Di down there is the Diaphanous, too. Some pioneer poet named it for its shimmer, but what good did it do? Missouri promptly called it the 'Di.' No more good is it to name a child Salome in the backwoods of Missouri. She's bound to grow up Sally. I've always been Sally, except at school. I'll always be Sally down here with my own people." "No, you won't always be Sally--no you won't always be down here with your own people either,"--he leaned back on the bench and watched her, his eyes half shut, his whole sense of being illumined by her, his tongue playing audaciously with his discretion. "Yes, I shall always be Sally, too." That bisque-warm skin of hers flushed wondrously and she seemed to talk out of a little confused audacity of her own. Madeira's voice rang down the walk again. "Yes, Father!--and down here with my own people, too. Yes, Father!" "Company's here, Sally." "All right, Father, coming." "And I have to go?" asked Steering piteously. "Oh no, come up to the house and meet our sixteen-to-one congressman, Quicksilver Sam." "No--I'll go," chose Steering. "Say, can't I get through from the garden here, and go down the river road?" "Yes, you can. Samson shall bring your horse around, if you like. There's a bridle-path down to the river; it's Piney's way." "Well, if you will be so good as to have the horse brought, I'll take Piney's path. I'm going to the hills to try to find Piney and Uncle Bernique. Think I'll sleep in the hills with them to-night. I feel so sad. When may I come back?" "Well, you see," the trouble crept into her voice again, misty, tremulous--"you see, I may go away." "Oh!" he cried, and then again, "Oh!" a bitter wailing note. "Yes, I may," she said hastily. "You see, your friend, Miss Gossamer, wants me to join her in Europe. She is very insistent about it." "And you may go?" "And I may go." He knew that she said that she would see him again before going, if it came to pass that she decided to go, and that she pressed his hand, with the grateful look that she had bestowed upon him when she had tried to thank him for holding on to her father in the Joplin mine; and that afterwards she stole away through the garden, and a negro man-servant brought his horse around to the rear grounds and showed him a bridle-path to the river; but these things were hazy. The vivid thing was an imprecation that by and by took awful form, like a monster of the mist, hissingly, from between his clenched teeth: "_Damn Miss--Europe!_" _Chapter Eight_ WHEN A GIRL FINDS HERSELF Sally Madeira went to her own room early that Sunday night. It was a large room, sheer and white, with its wall space broken here and there by cool, calm etchings, cows knee-deep in clover, sunsets on small rivers, old windmills, wheat fields in harvest, hills where the snow lay thick. When she had lit her lamp a rosy light suffused the room through the tinted globe. The pictures on the walls looked so tonefully tender, intimate, in the soft glow, that the girl, noticing them for the thousandth time, moved from one to another, admiring and loving them. They were, in a way, sign-posts of her development. She had begun to buy them when she had stopped working in colour with a man who had a famous studio in New York. One day she had gone with the man to an exhibition of oil paintings which were infused with a matchless poetry of colour. "If I paint all my life am I ever going to be able to paint like that?" she had asked of the man earnestly. "No, my child, you are not," he had answered, quite as earnestly. "I wonder why I should try to do something poorly that someone else can do so well?" she had mused. And then, because she had talent, and, finest of all, an exquisite temperament in whose pulses the sense of colour beat in veritable tides of joy, the man from the studio had encouraged her with warm words of praise. "You will some day paint well enough to win a high place," he had reminded her. But she had stayed thoughtful, and a day or two later had talked to him again. "I don't believe, since I have thought it all out, that I can get what's in life for me out of it in a high place," she had said, shy but eager. Then, on that line, she had forged on to a swift and comprehensive conclusion. "You have told me," she had continued to the studio man, "that what I have in me for painting is not the real thing, and since I have seen the real thing I know for myself that colour is too rich and assertive, too apt to run away with one, for any but master hands to use it. I feel that I don't want even to see poor colouring on canvas any more. I shan't ever even have poor colour pictures around me. I can get my colour stories outside. Inside, the stories shall all be told in light and shadow. And I am not going to paint bad pictures myself any more." "Ah, but the work, the beautiful work!" cried the painter. "Well, as for me, do you know, I've come to believe that my work is just living--for a time anyhow." "Well, then, the fame!" cried the painter. "I don't seem to care for the fame." It had gone much like that with her music. She had a fine voice, and her New York teacher had told her over and over that she "must go on." She had been pleased with his praise and had worked hard for a time. Then she had gone to him, too, one day, open-eyed and inquiring. "Go on to what?" she had asked. "Why, to glory," the singer had said. She had shaken her head, unconvinced. "I don't seem to care for the glory," she had said. And beyond learning to use her voice well she would not work with it. "It is not that I am lazy," she had protested to the singer, "but I couldn't get what's in life for me out of it by singing." "What's in life for you?" queried the singer, interested, for the girl was beautiful and rich and aspirant. "Ah, I don't quite know yet," said the girl, the pretty pathos of youth and waiting upon her, "but some day I shall find myself; then I shall know." All through her college days she had been looking for herself. When the time had come that she had gone to Elsie Gossamer's house to visit, and there had met men--college boys at first and later on men of a larger world--she had still been looking for herself. But though in the meantime she had learned how to meet men and how to treat them--capably, Elsie Gossamer said--she had not found herself. During the past summer, since her return from college, she had idled on here through a little interim with her father, comfortable, dreamy, waiting, seeking. But she had not found herself. As she began to make ready for bed that Sunday night she had, suddenly and subtly, a quiver of consciousness that the waiting and the seeking were nearly over. Just how she knew it she could not have told, or just what she meant by knowing it, or just what would happen because of knowing it. Moving about the large room softly, her harmonious strength and grace were revealed in the swing of her long lithe limbs, the reach of her satiny brown arms, the breadth of her sweet smooth breast, the straightness and firmness of her tall frame. Only a self-reliant girl could have moved as she moved, a girl made self-reliant by exuberant health and ideals and hope. When she stopped moving about and stood before her mirror, her hand on the great rope of shining hair that hung over her shoulder, her body assumed a rare natural poise, classically, ancestrally beautiful, Grecian. By and by she roused from the little reverie before the mirror, put out the light, and came over to the window. "Oh," she cried at once, "that was what was the matter with me, that was why I felt that something was about to happen! It was the storm!" Beyond the window a Missouri tempest was rising. The girl, responsive as a reed to the wind, sat down in a low chair, the subtle quiver of consciousness intensified within her, and watched the lightning that began to play over the hills, and the rain that began to beat through the trees. Strangely enough, as she sat there, in the flashes she could see little, but in the dark--a warm, wind-blown, sweet-smelling dark--she saw several things. For one thing, she saw that, most probably, she would never again in her life spend an evening with a sixteen-to-one congressman. It had been a very tiresome evening. For another thing, she saw that she was not going to Europe. Her father needed her; or if he didn't he ought to. For a third thing, she saw that, in some way, she was going to have to make her father like Bruce Steering again. Then she saw the fourth thing. There had not been a flash for some minutes. Seeing that fourth thing, in the intense dark, she gave a trembling sigh, put one of her hands on top of the other on her breast and pushed, as though she were pushing her heart down. Then presently the pressure of her hands relaxed, her head dropped down until her chin touched her fingers, and a great flush that was like a charge from something electric surged through her. "Oh," she cried, "oh, is it you! Have you come!" It was a triumphant, shy, thrilling greeting to something, something that she had been waiting for, born for. The dark grew intenser, sweeter, warmer. She lifted her arms and held them out yearningly toward the Tigmore hills, half-leaning out the window, catching the rain on her eager young face, in her shining hair, on her broad low breast. "I am so glad of it!" she panted, in a singing whisper, "I am so glad----" A great sheet of lightning unrolled across the Tigmore hills and held steadily magnificent for a moment, revealing everything to everybody, so it seemed to Sally Madeira. She crept into bed shaking, ecstatic, afraid. Next morning she made her toilet away from the mirror as much as was possible, not being quite ready to face her whole found self as yet. But before she went downstairs she crossed to the window and looked out at the tumbling Tigmore line, a kissing sigh on her lips. When she reached the dining room she found that Madeira had not yet come down, so she walked out into the garden, where she stood for a little while by the vine-covered stump, her eyes closed, her little straight nose in the air, the broad daylight beating down on her. Then presently she opened her eyes determinedly. "Yes, I can stand it," she said, as though she had been afraid that she couldn't, and looked straight up into the rain of light over-head. "I can stand it, in the daytime as in the dark, from now on forever." In the air was an autumn mellowness that had not been there the day before. It nipped, with a strong, winey flavour, as it went down. All around her lay drifts of petals, rain-beaten roses, ragged lilies. The storm had stolen the garden's glory. "To put it into my heart!" cried the girl, in her all-conquering joy. "Oh, you Garden of Dreams, you! See, my eyes are wide open, and this, _this_ is better than dreams!" She went back to the house with her arms full of the very last roses. "For now, I must go bring my father around," she said. Madeira had had a bad night. He had not slept at all as far as he could tell. For hours he had had to lie on his bed and face the dark, with Bruce Grierson's letter under his pillow, licking out at his temples like a tongue of flame. But he had not taken the letter away all night long. "Let it burn," he had said. "Let it find out who's stronger, me or it. That's my way." All night long he had made plans, with his face set toward the dark. When he got to the dining room that morning he went to the window and stood there waiting for Sally, revolving one of the night's plans in his head, deciding with how much force to project it, how to hit the mark patly with it. "For I won't have him here at my house again," Madeira was telling himself there at the window. "God! I _can't_ have him here." He caught at the vest pocket above his heart. His teeth were chattering. His daughter, with the roses in her arms, entered the room just then. As long as she lived Sally Madeira never forgot the way the dining room looked that morning, as she came into it from the Garden of Dreams: the dull green wall spaces, broken by some of her beloved cool etchings, and by great walnut panels that deepened and toned and strengthened the room beautifully; the old walnut side-board that had been her mother's mother's; in the centre of the room the heavy round table, unlaid, snowy, waiting for her effective interference; Madeira, her big handsome father, idling by the window, his fine physical maturity cut out strongly against the light, his deep chest, his great height, his wide, well-featured face, his good clothes, the adaptability with which he wore them; and on beyond Madeira, outside the window, the satin green foliage of the pet magnolia tree. It was all finely satisfying. She had tried her hardest to kiss the foolish gladness out of her eyes and voice into the roses in her hands, but things grew so increasingly pleasant that all her endeavour went for nothing. As soon as her father saw her and heard her, he said: "Well, Honey-love, are you as happy as _that_?" She put her roses into an old blue bowl and went over to him, and he sat down in one of the big chairs by the window and drew her to his knee. Then they fell into a caressing habit of theirs, he with both arms about her body, she with both arms about his neck, half-choking him with tenderness, rumpling his thick hair with the tip of her chin. She looked as much mother as child like that. "What a big girl you are, Pet!" "I have a big excuse for it, Dad." "But your mother, now, was little, Sally. My, yes, reckon that was why I loved her so. Such a little, little thing!" "And I'm so big--'reckon' that's why you love me so, huh?" "Reckon," he said. They sat on for a moment silent, looking out of the window. There was a lost cardinal whisking among the satin leaves of the pet magnolia, gazing wistfully at an old nest that swung in the branches like the ragged ghost of a summer's completeness and happiness. The nest seemed to arouse memories and hopes in the cardinal's breast. He had to flirt about it nervously for some minutes before he could satisfy himself that his housekeeping notions were unseasonable. Finally he perched himself on an humble syringa bush and stared at the nest, quiet, depressed. "Are you betting on the magnolia tree with anybody this winter?" she asked, her eyes, too, on the high nest. "No one left to bet with, Pet. Everybody knows now that it can live through the worst that can come to it. Let's see, it's twenty years since I planted it there, and I've won twenty jack-knives betting that it would live, twenty different winters. Twenty years! Sally, that's a good while, my honey. Why, twenty years ago you didn't come knee-high to a puddle-duck. We had just moved down here from St. Louis, your mother and I, twenty years ago." As he talked, the moment shaped itself for Madeira as a little negligible interim, wedged in between the restless night, with its defined purposes, and the next hour, when he should have consummated at least one of the night's purposes. "That mother of yours was a lovely little thing, Sally." The girl was sure of it. She had felt the loveliness of her mother all her life. Once she had gone to her mother's old Kentucky home, and though her mother's people were all dead long ago, the great Kentucky house was still there, and, standing before it, she had been almost able to see the aura of influence that it had been in the moulding of the loveliness of her mother, the southern girl, lifting from it to ensphere her, the western girl. "I know she was lovely," said Sally. "Oh my, yes,--just about at her loveliest twenty years ago. But as for twenty years, Sally, why, I can go a lot farther back than that. I can go back forty years, close to my beginning. This is all sort of different from my beginning, Sally." Out beyond the window, into the September sunshine, rolled the fat corn lands, hundreds upon hundreds of acres, the wheat flats, the miles of cattle range of Madeira Place. Around them shut the strong walls of the old Peele house, a memorable house in its way, massive and wide-porched and staunch. "You can hardly imagine anything more different from this than was my beginning," went on Madeira. "This is pretty luxurious, isn't it? In its way, though it is down here on the Di, it's just about as good for a country house as the places you saw on the Hudson, aint it?" "Oh, it has a lot more soul and story than the Hudson places," she acquiesced at once. Sometimes she could feel that desire of his to give her as good as the best palpitate like a pulse through his words. "Well, anyhow, Lord knows it's mighty different from what I began with, Sally. Why, Honey, in my boy-days living on a farm in Missouri was mighty much like living on the fringes of hellen-blazes. Br-r-rt!" He clamped and unclamped his big hand, watching the strong muscle-play in it. "I can feel my fingers burn to this day where the frozen fodder sawed and rasped 'em in winter and the hot plough-handles bit and blistered 'em in summer. And then, afterwards, those old St. Louis days meant hard pulling, too, of another kind. From grocery clerk, to dry-goods clerk, to old Peele's real estate office, it was pull, pull, if not over one thing, over another. Takes a thundering lot of pulling to pull out in this world, Sally." All in a minute his voice sounded perplexed and resentful. "Well, you did it, didn't you? You pulled out. I'm proud of you. I like the way you did it." "Do you, Pet? Do you like me?" he queried with a peculiar anxiety. "Yes, sir, I do." Black Chloe, who had been making slow trips between kitchen and dining-room for some minutes, stopped now to say, in a sort of Arabian Nights measure, "Ef you raddy fuh yo' brekfus, yo' brekfus raddy fuh you." "Better than anybody?" pursued Madeira, but his daughter was drawing him to the table, and he did not notice that her only answer was a quivering laugh. They sat down to a breakfast-table whose delightful appearance was due to that sense of colour in Sally Madeira's temperament. Both ate some fruit, because it was juicy and went down easily, and both looked at their coffee-cups. "Why don't you eat your breakfast, Daddy?" "Why don't you?" Perhaps if he had waited for her to tell him, her gladness would have sent her story bubbling to her lips, but he did not wait. "I'm bothered, Honey, that's why I can't eat." "What's the bother, Dad?" Madeira, considering that this was his opportunity, closed in determinedly, with that iron grip of his. "It's that man Steering, Honey." "Taken a foolish old dislike to him, haven't you, Dad?" She was ready for him, eager to get her case before him, to make her points quickly and surely. "Foolish," Madeira gasped and put his hand to his vest pocket. "Sally, girl, it's a matter of life and death, I take it." He rose from his chair, his face grey. Staggering a little to the left, he moved to the window, where he stood with his hands in his pockets, his eyes on the Garden of Dreams. Behind him the girl sat on quietly. She had put one hand to her chin, so that her face was up-tilted. The light from the window was strong on it. "Sally," began Madeira again, "I've never asked very much of you, have I? Always let you do as you please, haven't I? And it's too late now to try to force you to do anything, isn't it? Besides, I wouldn't do it anyway. I wouldn't like it that way. But I'm going to ask you to do something for me. Then I'm going to leave the doing wholly to you. I'm going to ask you to drop that man Steering. I thought it all out last night, Sally. I know that he and I are going to mix up if he doesn't keep well out of my sight. I'm going to ask you to drop him, for my sake, Pet." He came back toward her, and again he half reeled as he started. With one hand on her shoulder, he looked down at her. By now she was staring unseeingly at the bird that stared at the nest in the magnolia tree. "Are you going to do what I want, Honey?" His hand shook on her shoulder and when she turned to look up at him the ashen hue of his face frightened her. She nestled her cheek into his hand. "It's the God's truth I'm telling you, Sally," went on Madeira, "it's life or death, I think. I've got to get rid of Steering--I--I--oh, I hate him so." "And you won't tell me why, Daddy?" "And I won't--I can't--there's reason enough, Sally, that's all I can say. Can't you let it go at that, and help me out?" "Yes, Dad, yes," she said. "You've done such a lot for me, you've helped me out--it--be--a pity,"--her voice went astray in her throat, and in the strong light Madeira saw a wild pain on her upturned face--"pity if I couldn't do anything you ask me to--wouldn't it?" She got up suddenly and ran to the door. "Sally!" he called, "Sally, you don't mean--you don't--it isn't that"--but she was gone. _Chapter Nine_ GOOD-BYE! Madeira went off in the buckboard late that morning, and, having left word with black Chloe that he might have dinner at the Canaan Hotel, did not come home at all at noon. His daughter stayed in her room all morning, and far past her lunch hour. About the middle of the afternoon she got up from the bed where she had been lying and sat by the window that looked out across the Tigmores. Her father's face, in its frame of entreaty, trouble, unrest, hung between her and the hills, so that, for a time, she saw nothing but Madeira. Little by little, however, the hills themselves became insistent. They were very beautiful, a long, massed glory of colour, red and gold and green, all looped about by the silver cord of the Di. As the girl watched, a lone horseman came out of one of the wooded knobs and galloped down the ridge road toward Canaan. She could see him plainly, his breadth of shoulders, his high-headedness, his good horsemanship. She got up quickly, swaying toward the window, her hands over her heart, with the strange little pushing gesture, as though she must push her heart down. The horseman went on down the road toward Canaan. "Oh!" cried the girl presently, pleadingly, "if I may see him just once again! If I just don't have to lose him all at once!" She ran then across the room to another window, through which she whistled shrilly at the negro man dozing in the succulent grass in front of the stable. "Samson!" she shouted, "saddle Ribbon the quickest you ever did in your life!" And when she saw that the negro had roused sufficiently to execute her commands, she turned from the window hurriedly, went to her clothes-closet hurriedly, changed her house gown for a riding-habit hurriedly, and was out in the yard at the mounting block as the saddle mare was led up from the stable. Taking the bridle from the negro's hand, she leaped into the saddle and was off across the yard like a flash, while the lip of the astonished Samson sagged with impotent inquiry. Out on the ridge road, she urged the mare to a gallop. All the way she was talking to Madeira, almost praying to him. His face with its trouble and pain still moved before her. "Ah, but you will forgive me!" she was saying to it. "You wait. Wait and see how this ride turns out. I'm going to give myself just one chance, Dad. I'm going to find him, and I'm going riding with him. And I'm not going to say anything. But I look nice, don't I, when I'm riding--and loving--and hoping--and maybe he can't stand it, and if he can't stand it, and rides up close, and stops his horse and tells me--oh, what I hope he will tell me--why, Daddy, dear, I _must_ lean over into his arms for just one minute, mustn't I? You see that, don't you? And maybe after that, everything will be all right, and we can all be happy ever after. I don't see how we could help being happy ever after that, Dad!" And, praying so, on the galloping mare, Sally Madeira came into the main street of Canaan, and drew rein at last in front of her father's bank. Madeira saw her at once and hurried out to her. "I'm going to take a little last ride with Mr. Steering, Dad," she said, her head as high as a queen's and her voice strong and sweet. "I didn't want you to think that I was deceiving you. I wanted you to know about it before I did it." Often there was a good deal of the child in Sally's straight gaze, and Madeira saw it there now and loved it. "You do just exactly whatever you want to, Honeyful," he said. "I don't know--I----" He could not go on at all for a minute, and when he could go on he said abruptly, "I'm going to see Steering, too, before I quite bust up with him, Sally." Then he went quickly back to the bank, and the girl passed on down the street to the post-office, in front of which she saw Steering's horse at the hitching-rail. She sent a bare-footed boy inside to post a letter to Elsie Gossamer and to ask Mr. Steering to come out to her. While she waited, she could see Steering at the pen-and-ink desk, loitering there, one arm on the desk, watching the thin stream of people that went by him to the convex glass-and-pine booth where the post-office boxes were. The men from the Canaan stores, a lonely drummer from the hotel, some belated farmers and several Canaan young ladies passed Steering, the young ladies seeming not to see him, but, in some subtly feminine way, making it impossible for Steering not to see them--their glowing young faces, their enormous hats, the way their gowns didn't fit, the slip-shod carriage of their bodies, all the differences between them and the only other real western girl he knew. None of the people went out of the post-office at once, all idling at the door for a few minutes. From time to time there was quite a little crush at the door, so that Steering did not see Miss Madeira until her messenger reached him. Then he ran out to her quickly. "I shan't get down," she told him, speaking in a lower tone than the listening Canaanites approved of. "I was hoping that I might find you here. Get on your horse and let's go to the woods. Wouldn't you like to? The hills are one long glory to-day." It was not the note of her prayer, it was well-ordered and calm. Still, Steering's heart leaped like a boy's at her friendliness, and he began to speak his gratitude in a lyric tune: "Ah, what fortune! Just to be young and alive and off on the hills with you!" he said, and vaulted to his horse's back from the curb, so easily that even the Missourians who were candidly watching and listening, remarked, "Oh, well, it's because he's got some Missouri in him, that's why-for." Side by side, the horses moved down Main Street. At the bank Crittenton Madeira was standing at the plate-glass window. He had his thumbs in his trousers pockets, and he was rocking to and fro, shifting his weight from his heels to the balls of his feet peculiarly, as though seeking for balance. His eyes were moodily thoughtful, and he kept snapping at his lower lip with his big white teeth. "Why, God bless you, Steering!" he cried pleasantly, moving out to the curb as the horses came up, "I made a mistake in missing you at the house yesterday. Want to see you again, as soon as I can. What about to-night, young man? Going to get in home early, aren't you, Sally?" "Yes, Dad, early." "Well then, my boy, you just stop by the bank, when you get in from the hills, will you? I shan't leave the bank before eight o'clock. Shan't be home to supper, Honeyful." "All right, Mr. Madeira, I'll come," assented Steering; "look for me sometime before eight." "All right, my boy. So long, Honeyful." Again the horses moved off, side by side. Soon the town lay far behind the riders, who were following the shimmering Di around the blue hills. Where the road ran up the bluff into heavy timber they got into deep odorous silences, the silences of young unspoiled places; musical, too, somehow, over and beyond the stillness. Where the road came down to the bottom land along the river the silence shook with the river's silver mystery. No matter where the road ran, always off beyond them lay the hills, ridge upon ridge, beautiful, glorious. "Aren't they tremendous?" said the girl, "Aren't you glad they are almost yours?" A sense of possession was indeed mounting into a cry of rejoicing within Steering. He admitted it and then laughed at it. "It's the house of Grierson that should rejoice," he said longingly. "Wait until I bring you out above Salome Park," said the girl. "I, too, have some land up here that's worth while. From my land you can look straight across the country for miles, back again into your land." Sometimes, as they journeyed, they passed log cabins backed up against the long hills, or squatting close to the shining river. Sometimes, as they journeyed, the red bluffs beetled up above them, tall and frowning. Sometimes the trees, trailing long green veils, all but met across the Di below them. Once they passed a saw-mill, set and buzzing; once they had to wait in the woods while a string of cattle stampeded by; once they saw a man in a skiff far down the Di. He raised his hand and waved to them for loneliness' sake. He looked sick with loneliness. "You know your Missouri by heart," Steering commented admiringly, as she led him through bridle-paths and by short cuts with a fine woodsmanship. "Well, I ought to. The times that I have been over it, with Piney, a ragged Robin-goodfellow at my heels! This is the apple-jack country that we are in now. Did you know that? Apple-jack stands for our big red apples and for zinc. There's some of both down here, see!" She stopped him on a high spur in the ridge road and waved her riding whip toward the flats below, whose miles upon miles of apple trees made him wonder. "But wait for Salome Park," she insisted, and led him on. Riding along beside her, listening to her, forgetful of his complications, his hills billowing toward him, Steering grew intensely happy. Just to look at her was enough to make a man happy. Her black, semi-fitting riding-habit outlined her graces of form enchantingly, the admirable litheness of her broad deep chest, her firmly-knit back. In her vigour of well-shaped bone and sinew and muscle she constantly emphasised the unpoetic nuisance of superfluous flesh. Beneath her little black hat her burnished hair lay coiled in soft smooth masses low on her neck. The wonderful vitality that beat through her veins brought the red colour to her cheeks in delicate waves. In her sunny amber eyes the high lights danced far back, dazzlingly. "Now," she cried at last, "one more climb, and here we are at the summit! Fine, isn't it? That's Salome Park, all of it, as far as you can see, until you see the Tigmores curving around way off yonder to the west again. Ah, yes, I thought you would like it!" From the summit of the Tigmore Ridge, on which they had stopped, there spread out an endless stretch of country, with small cleared spaces where the wheat and corn could grow, and with trout glens gleaming here and there through the trees, and with bosky places and woodsy places in between. "Oh, it's wonderful," said Steering. "This is the best view in the Tigmores," said the girl. "From here you can imagine that you see the Boston Mountains on a clear day. And away off down there run the Kiamichi--you will have to take my word for it, you can't see them. Cowskin Prairie, where the three States and the Territory come together, is off that way, too." The big Missouri loneliness hung over it all, shutting them in, shutting the world out. "Psha! there isn't any world outside," said Steering, and drew his horse nearer to hers. "There isn't any world outside. This is all there is to it, and just you and I in it. Don't you believe me?" "We will play that's the way of it," she said, the spell of the land upon her, too, the spell of the day upon her, her own heart's red spell upon her. "Oh, me! Oh, me!" He brought his horse up closer, his eyes finding hers, and pleading with them. "Well?" she cried, "well?" a wavering, waiting smile on her lips. Even like that, even leaning toward him she had a splendid self-trust; she was confidential, but a little remote. Suddenly the man beside her clamped his jaws together harshly and held his tongue imprisoned behind his teeth. His chest lifted and shook as he sucked down a deep breath. There, near her, the glory of the hills outrolled before him, the keen snap of the elixir of love, the deathless, in his blood, life seemed hard, brutally hard. Everything was hard, and wrong. He had come down here for practical purposes, he had come needing every ounce of his energies for those purposes, yet, day by day, and minute by minute, he was being confronted by psychic or moral crises, of one kind and another, that used up all the force in him. Here and now the demand upon him was terrific. His love for Sally Madeira had grown upon him daily, hourly, engaging all that was best in him, pulling him away beyond his old best, inspiring, and remaking him. To have to fight it, even for her sake, even because he must protect her from so hard a fate as fate with him promised to be, was like sacrilege. The force of his self-conflict took all the colour from his lips, all the light from his eyes. "My God! My God!" he cried, a short, sharp cry, that beat up the Tigmores and broke and splintered into the big loneliness futilely. Then he jerked his horse about abruptly. "We must go back now," he said. But the girl, who had been watching, turned her eyes from him and held her horse still for a short moment. The glory of the hills came on across the wide park to her and enfolded her, met in kind by the radiance of her wonderful hair, her sunny eyes, her glowing skin. The joy of the night before, the morning's passionate grief, the ingenuous hope and prayer in her ride after Steering, the sweet, anxious torture of the journey to Salome Park were all giving place to a large, impersonal comprehension of the conflict in Steering's soul. She had known before that there was trouble brewing between him and her father. She knew now, past all doubting, that he loved her, knew it from his face, his voice. And even while her heart filled and quivered with knowing it, some higher power of divination made her know, too, that he was caught between his love of her and his difficulty with her father in an inexplicable, soul-shaking way. When Steering, a few feet below her, turned again towards her, she looked finer, fairer, more immortally young and strong than he had ever seen her look. She rode down to him fearlessly and put her hand out. "Sometimes the thing to do is just to stand steady," she said, "isn't that it?"--bridging all the unspoken thought and feeling between them, understanding, helping. He clung to her hand, and its answering pressure was that of a comrade's, strong and reassuring. "Miss Madeira," he said, at last, simply, "things are so bad with me that if I don't stand steady and face them exactly as they come, not giving in an inch anywhere along the line, I shan't be able to stand at all." "Ah, but you will stand that way--steady," she said, and drew her hand from his, and led the way homeward. She had accepted her fate to wait and endure while he "faced things." They went back into the sunset together, almost silent. Far and wide rolled the hills in their flaunting glory, and, now and again, the girl's breath trembled and stung her,--that tidal sense of colour leaping and rioting within her, perhaps. Now and again the man's jaws set together more firmly. When they talked at all it was of little things. "Why didn't I ever meet you at Miss Gossamer's?" he asked once. "You were in Philadelphia when I was visiting Elsie, that was why. Neither you nor Mr. Carington were in New York that month. I remember that I got an idea that Elsie missed Mr. Carington, or you, or both. Mr. Carington was in love with her, wasn't he?" "Yes, he's always been in love with her, I think.--Do you like the East?" he asked again, not caring for the subject of Miss Gossamer. "To get an education in." "You are well educated," he said, as though making comparisons. In that matter of education, her selective abilities had been indeed good. She had taken from her opportunities developmental elements and used them within herself wisely. She had fine conceptions of art, she was well-read; and because she had foreseen that she would be too rich to have any separate use for the things of art and learning, she had seized upon and welded all her inclinations and accomplishments into an harmonious, delightful completeness as Woman. In the result, her education seemed to be one of the especial reasons that you liked her. "But as for that," said Steering, speaking his thought aloud, "reasons don't count. There are plenty of reasons, but one really never gets at the biggest reason of all." "You hardly expect me to understand that," she said, laughing frankly, a musical laugh that had in it the shaking, white flash of a rock-fluted hill-stream. "No, no! I don't expect you to understand that," he said. They went on through the deep, odorous wood, down close to the river's pale, shallow mystery again, and so back to the big gate at Madeira Place. There at the gate the girl put out her hand to him again. "Good-bye!" she said softly, "good-bye!" As he bent to kiss the hand his breath came hard. "It is not good-bye," he said. "It shall not be. I swear it." Then he dashed on down the ridge road toward Canaan, to find Crittenton Madeira. _Chapter Ten_ WHO'S GOT THE TIGMORES? That Monday was hard on Madeira. It was his normal mental habit to come to a conclusion instantly, and cut a way for it across other people's ideas and notions with the impetus and onslaught of a cannon-ball. That Monday his mentality was below--or above--normal. He kept telling himself that he was mixed. His desire to crush Steering, pick him up and crumple him and thrust him aside, stood before him constantly, like the picture of the physical thing. Up to the time that he had seen his daughter run out of the dining-room that morning, her face averted, the desire had been steadily taking on colour and size. But, with the girl's brave broken cry, there had come on to him an intolerable question. For a long time he would not let the question get into words, or in any way define itself within his brain. Still, all morning long, he recognised that the question and that desire of his to crush Steering were ranged before him in some sort of fierce competitive effort. A thousand times he wished that he had had the courage to ask Sally candidly just what she had meant, just where she stood with regard to Steering, but he knew that he could never have asked her. Good friends though he and his daughter were, there was between them the definite reserve that lies between all good friends in the sphere of the big things of life. He could not have asked her, and she could not have told him if he had asked her. He fretted through a busy morning in a terrible uncertainty. When Sally had come by the bank to tell him of her proposed ride with Steering, he had watched her with painful, anxious scrutiny. But the girl's control had become perfect by that hour, and Madeira had to go back into the bank with the uncertainty still thickly upon him. Pausing there in the bank at the plate-glass window for a reflectful moment, he came to a swift resolve. He saw that he could not afford to make any mistake. He resolved to give Steering another chance to get right on the company matter. When he had gone out to the curb to make an appointment for the evening with Steering, he had told himself that it was because the boy might as well have the chance as not have it, and, when he had gone back, he had known that, lie to himself about it as he might, it was because he was afraid for Sally Madeira, afraid that this Steering was about to mean something in her life, afraid that he, as the girl's father, might bring some unhappiness upon her. All the long afternoon the thing continued to worry him; added to the torment he was suffering from the burning letter in his vest-pocket, it was well-nigh unendurable. He had to work vehemently to make the time pass. Toward six o'clock, he began to realise that he had been shaping the time toward the evening's appointment with Steering. As he got it shaped he grew more peaceful. He was arranging things so that he could win out with Steering. Little by little he came to accept the winning out as an assured thing, and in accepting it his grievance against Steering lightened, finally appearing to him as an easy thing to dispose of. Even the letter in his pocket grew less scorching. Sometimes he forgot, for minutes together, that it was there. Upon the hypothesis that Steering would "come around" everything smoothed out. Resting securely upon that hypothesis, Madeira even formulated the words with which he would take Steering's surrender: "God love us, that's all right! You just trust to me from now on. From now on I'll look out for you, my boy." He could hear himself saying that. At six o'clock, still shaping the day toward the appointment with Steering, he took a great bevy of men, farmers, stockmen, storekeepers, to the Canaan Hotel for supper. Headed by Madeira,--who kept close to him a man named Salver, to whom he constantly referred as "our engineering friend from Joplin,"--the party stamped into the hotel dining-room. And though various members of the party were heavily booted, big, brawny, and in other ways cut out as assertive, it was much as though they were not there, so completely did Madeira fill the room. In the hotel office, after the supper had been disposed of, though every man had a cigar or a pipe in his mouth, it seemed as though Madeira were really doing all the smoking, so insistently did the smoke wreaths twist about his big face, as the others edged nearer him and closed in upon him. On the outside, on the way back up town, the street seemed full of Madeira. Even when some few of the satellites broke away from him and scattered into other parts of the town, at the livery stable, the drug store, the Grange, talking a little dubiously, the impression was definite that they were only meteoric scraps, cast-off clinkers that could not stand the fire and the fizz and the whirl in Madeira's orbit. The superintendent of the Tigmore County schools, a long, lean man with a trick of covert sarcasm, happened to be in Canaan that day, and he cracked a joke about Madeira's "galley-gang," as the bevy of men swept past him on their way back to the bank. In Canaan almost any joke had a fair chance to become classic through immediate and long-drawn repetition, and the superintendent's joke was soon going up and down the street as majestically as though swathed in a Roman toga. By seven o'clock the joke had come on to Madeira's ears. At eight o'clock the superintendent was one of seven men who sat in conference with Madeira in the private office of the bank. That was Madeira's way. Besides Salver, the Joplin man, and the superintendent, there were at the conference Larriman, a man who counted his acres by the thousands in We-all Prairie; Heinkel, the German sheep-raiser from the southern part of the county; Shelby, from the cotton lands of the Upper Bottom; Pegram, the Canaan postmaster, and Quin Beasley, from the Grange store. They were all still there when Steering came in. Fresh from the hills, young, alert, deep-lunged, brown-faced, Steering was a good sort to look at as he strode into the room. He had ridden on into Canaan to the tune of high, purposeful music, after parting with Sally Madeira. His experience with her out there on the hills, his profounder impression of her fineness, had acted upon him like unbearably sweet harmonies, urgent, inspirational. He was this minute keen for something to do, something hard, earnest, momentous. If the whole truth were told, he wanted to fight. Madeira got up and shook hands with him, the more vigorously and noisily because of a sharp lambent flare that leaped out from the younger man's consciousness like a warning, and, reaching Madeira, stung and irritated him. As they stood gripping each the other's hand, both big, both vigorous, both determined, there was yet a fine line of distinction between them. On one side of the line stood the younger man with his ideals. On the other side stood Madeira, without any ideals. "Come in, Steering, my boy!" In spite of himself, in spite of the "my boy," Madeira's voice rang harshly. "Lord love us, we are having a little preliminary meeting here. You know all these gentlemen, I think? I'm just reading to them some matter that I have got ready. I'll go on reading, if you don't mind. Sit down over there and listen." And, Steering, shaking hands with the men nearest him, and bowing to the men farthest from him, sat down and listened. As Madeira resumed his chair at his desk, he seemed to brace himself toward some sort of finality. His voice, when he spoke, was ominously quiet for a noisy man's voice. "Here's something about the country in general," he began slowly, dispassionately, "that I think might interest a fellow who is considering coming down here either to mine or to farm. See what you think of this: 'It was in 1874 that the first carload of zinc ore went up to the zinc works in Illinois. That was the beginning. Heretofore Missouri had been supposed to be agricultural only, but here was a new Missouri, whose wheat and corn and fruit wealth was found to be supplemented by a mineral wealth of mammoth greatness. Settlers who wanted to mine began to come in, towns to spring up, and capital to be invested. The country was developed with lightning-like speed. From the Joplin stretch as a nucleus, lines of development have been steadily projected since 1874 to this day. There are not a great many undeveloped big acreages of land left in any of the southern Missouri counties. Of the few that remain by far the largest and most promising is the country known as the Tigmore Stretch. A remarkable feature of this region, besides its great agricultural possibilities, is that the surface exposure in the hillsides shows distinct mineral-bearing horizons, beds of zinc carbonates, whose promise of zinc sulphide at a greater depth is absolutely reliable. That it needs only deep shafting and drilling to unearth more remarkable riches than even Missouri herself has as yet yielded up, is evident from the outcrops'--by the way, gentleman," Madeira here interrupted himself to say, still in his quiet, dispassionate tone, "Salver has spent a good many days in the hills lately, and he has decided that the deeper-seated sulphides are just as surely in the hills as are the carbonates. He has done a lot of verifying. Aint that right, Salver?" Salver shuffled his feet and said yes, that was right, and Madeira read again from his notes, picking out bits here and there, and beginning each time, "Now take this. See what you think of this," his voice staying monotonously even. "'But, besides the zinc and lead and iron and coal, Missouri's well-improved farms invite the intending settler.'" (Steering thought of the lean hill farms as he listened.) "'There is an abundance of timber, in itself a great saving to the house-builder, and there are innumerable streams and water-courses and lakes. The altitude is over one thousand feet above the sea-level, and the climate is the healthiest in the United States. Both mining and farming can be carried on the year round.' ... And now, lastly, about this form letter that I have drafted for intending investors--it runs like this: 'Dear Mr. So-and-So,' (I mean to have the name filled in in each one, I want it to be a personal letter) 'May I ask you to examine the status of our Canaan Mining and Development Company, as set forth briefly in the enclosed pamphlet. A careful reading will convince you that we are organised for legitimate business and development, rather than for speculation. From personal knowledge, I am able to vouch for all the representations made by the Company. There are a half hundred Tigmore County men already in the Company'--which will, of course, be the fact when the letter is sent," explained Madeira. "'If you are not already one of them, I should like for you to be. I think you know my record in this part of the country, as well as the record of the enterprises for which I have stood sponsor, and I am confident that when you begin to feel interested in the mining developments through this section, you will investigate the Canaan Company before investing with the other companies that are sure to spring up like mushrooms in our track.' ... And then, this: 'The chief working properties of the Canaan Company, the Tigmores, can without doubt be made to pay from one hundred to five hundred per cent, on any investment within the first year. The Canaan Company will not have to depend upon shallow sheets of mineral against dead rock, as do many of the speculative enterprises of the mining section. The Canaan Company will not cut blind. It knows its field, it knows its chances, it knows its future'--and so on, and so on--how do you think it goes, boys?" They thought it went rapidly, and they said so with loud endorsement. "Well, I decided I'd get the thing moving here at home first," elaborated Madeira; "when all's said and done, a fellow likes to see his own place and people profit by what's going on. I'm going to send that letter out first to the Tigmore County people, and then move out in wider circles later. Shouldn't you think that was the way to work it out?" Yes, they thought that was the way. Indeed, the way seemed such a good one, and the work was evidently to be so carefully, so conscientiously performed that, to Steering, as he had listened, the crying shame of it all had been not that it wasn't true,--it might be true, there was no telling,--but that Madeira, its promoter, didn't care a rap whether it was true or not. Or, after all, was he, Steering, wrong about that? Had Madeira changed about? Been himself convinced that the actual prospects were so good that it was senseless not to depend upon them, without any of the wings that his fancy might give them? Had the thing become with Madeira, during these more recent days, something larger, something legitimate? All the other men were taking Madeira's attitude seriously. They showed that they were by the emotionalism, effusive, admiring, with which they hung upon Madeira for a few last words, by their blind dependence, their awe. When the séance broke up finally, they strayed away from him haltingly, like lost sheep. The impression of Madeira upon the men, as he let them out of the door, was so profound that it came on to Steering with the value of a reflection. He felt himself growing a little hopeful that the thing really was to be right and straight, as he watched Madeira turn from the door. For his part, Madeira came back toward his desk with a peculiar revulsion of feeling upon him. This effort of his to bring Steering around by strategy was galling him. He resented that any such effort should ever have been saddled upon him. He considered that from the start Steering should have been with him. Most fiercely of all he resented that he, Crittenton Madeira, should have let himself get into the position of trying to mollify Steering. "By God!" he was saying to himself with a convulsive anger, "Me to have to mollify! By God! Me!" Then the thought of Sally came back to him, goading him and confusing him. On a sudden impulse of candour he cried out to Steering, as he came on to his desk. "Steering! God love you, why do you want trouble between you and me? Don't you see that I have this thing here under my thumb? Don't you see that you mustn't go against me, my boy? Here's your chance back again. I'm handing it out to you. Stand by me. You won't be sorry. All my plans are made now. I have once or twice in my life thought the thing to do down here was to stir up a furore over some of the lakes and the springs and the scenery and make a health resort out of the region, but I have settled away from that now, settled straight at zinc. But Lord bless you! zinc or no zinc we can't fail to make a pile of money out of this. Why do you want to be a fool and hold back from me when I'm willing to pull you along? You ought to see by now that you can't do anything without me, or go against me. 'Tisn't everybody I'm willing to pull along, Steering. Why, boy, from the start, I've treated you on the square, let you know me on the inside--let--and, here and now, I'm still willing to pull you along, if you'll come along!--eh, what?" With Madeira's words, matching Madeira's excitement, blazing furiously and whitely, out leaped the slower, stronger fire of the younger man's personality. "See here!" shouted Steering, "twice now I've done my best to hope that somehow, somewhere you were going to throw me one line of commercial honesty and decency. I haven't asked you to measure up to very high standards, I'd have been satisfied with damned little; I've waited on you and hoped for you and let you try to bull-doze me, but by God! I'm done. You hear, I'm done!" He got up and the lean strength of his determination and the long reach of his body were all-powerful. "Don't you try this game with me again, Mr. Madeira! Don't you ever try any game with me again--No! Keep back! Not that either!" Madeira had gone crazy for the time. Possessed only by that desire to crush the thing that opposed him, he lifted his big clenched fists straight up over his head and came at Steering, fiery-eyed, perfervid with relish of the moment when he could close down on his enemy and make an end of him. He panted as he came, and as he came the veins in his temples stood out, purple and knotted. A little line of froth lay upon his lower lip. "Eh, God! You!--Wait there!--You!--You!----" Steering, with the old prowess that had made the boys on the gridiron stand aside and howl for him, reached up and brought Madeira's arms down with a circling, sweeping blow, then caught the bulky, staggering body and thrashed it into a chair, forgetful that it was Madeira, forgetful of Sally Madeira, forgetful of everything for one red instant save a savage masculine joy in his own strength. Then he took out a cigar and lit it, and his mental readjustment followed quickly. "Mr. Madeira," he said, puffing slowly at the cigar, the match's yellow light on his face showing that he was pale, "I am sorry that you made me do that, sir. Still, I must add this to what I've said,--don't, please, ever try to pull me along with you again. I guess I'm going in a different direction. This leaves everything settled between us. Our paths aren't apt to cross again. You aren't hurt, I hope? There is nothing that I can do for you?" Madeira made no answer. He was sitting, a wooden figure, in front of his desk where Steering had thrashed him down. His temples were still purplish, but the crazy light was no longer in his eyes. They were dull and fishy. Steering had gone to the office door, then the bank door had clanked to behind him before Madeira moved. He began working his fingers then, watching them questioningly, stupidly. They felt stiff and numb. Suddenly he leaned forward exhausted. His head rolled on the desk. "Sally?" he whimpered, in a furtive, scared way, "Sally?" Then, all in a moment, he jumped to his feet, clutching at the pocket that held the Grierson letter, while words came from his mouth in vehement staccato yelps: "Eh, God! He'll go against me, will he? Wait. I'll show him. Who's got the Tigmores? Answer me that now? Who's got the Tigmores?" Off beyond his window tumbled the long Tigmore line. He crossed the room, all his strength back with him, and looked out upon the high black hills. "Eh, God!" he shouted, and beat at his chest where the letter lay, "Dead men tell no tales! _I've got the Tigmores!_" _Chapter Eleven_ TALL THINGS One late fall afternoon a man and a boy lingered under the shadow of tall trees and pondered tall things. The boy was propped against the trunk of an oak; his hat was pushed back from his face; his black tumbling hair made his slim brown face seem browner, his long eyes darker than they were; his young intensities of fancy and feeling were aroused, and manifest in the tremble of his lip, the vibrancy of his voice, the shaking light of his glance. The man lay flat on his back with a book spread out over his stomach and his long white fingers interlaced across the book fondly. Down at their feet the Di flowed swiftly, with the eyrie shiver on her bosom, making haste, like a frightened woman, past the lonely Tigmores toward the livelier corn and cotton lands. All around the horizon the sky so throbbed that here and there it rent the sheer cloud-veil that lay in delicate illusion over the blue. Through the trees played frightened flashes of colour, the whisk of a cardinal's wing, the burnt-red plume of a fox-squirrel's tail. In the air there was a palpitancy that was to the dream senses what colour vibrations are to the eye. The man took up the book and began to read from it, and this was the burden of the reading: "'Nobody can pretend to explain in detail the whole enigma of first love. But a general explanation is suggested by evolutional philosophy,--namely, that the attraction depends upon an inherited individual susceptibility to special qualities of feminine influence, and subjectively represents a kind of superindividual recognition,'" the man smiled gravely and repeated the last stave with questioning care, "'and subjectively represents a kind of superindividual recognition?--a sudden wakening of that inherited composite memory which is more commonly called passional affinity.'--I have a notion that that may mean something or other, Piney?" "Don't ast me." The reader began again: "'Certainly if first love be evolutionally explicable, it means the perception by the lover of something differentiating the beloved from all other women,--something corresponding to an inherited ideal within himself, previously latent, but suddenly lighted and defined,'--an inherited ideal--something differentiating the beloved from all other women," murmured the reader earnestly. He put the book back upon his stomach, and there was a long silence in the woods, broken by a distant reverberation, short, sharp, suggestive. Piney jumped, like the highly strung, alert young animal that he was. "Whut wuz it, Mist' Steerin'?" "Uncle Bernique's blasts, Piney. He's on the trail." The silence remained unbroken for another long period. "Mist' Steerin'," began Piney at last; he had a long spear of sere grass in his mouth and he chewed at it argumentatively, "d'you think,--I couldn't adzackly tell whut that writin' wuz a-aimin' at, but simlike f'm the way it goes on that ef the sort of thing it makes aout to happen happens onst, it oughtn't never to happen agin, hmh?" Piney's long drawn notes of rising inflection were musical. "Simlike, ef a man onst finds the right woman they oughtn't never to be no more right women, hmh?" "There ought not to be, Piney, son." "Well, but they gen'ly is, hmh?" Bruce straightened out one foot with an impatient kick. Ever since they had fallen into the habit of abstracted talks on this imponderable subject, Piney had seemed able, with a sort of elfin craft, to make Bruce remember Miss Elsie Gossamer's light, fleeting touch upon his life. He had never mentioned Miss Gossamer to Piney in all their mutual experience, yet the tramp-boy was constantly skirmishing up from afar with a generalisation, like a high-held transparency, that illuminated Miss Gossamer's memory for Bruce. Three hypotheses had presented to Bruce in the way of explanation: one, that he himself was possessed by a little embarrassed consciousness that he should have had any past at all in view of the present; another, that Miss Sally Madeira had just possibly set Piney on to worry him about Miss Gossamer; and the last, that Piney, divining that a man could hardly reach Bruce's age without some pages of romance behind him, was forever, out of his own perspicacity, trying to make Bruce re-read those pages, so that this new page, that had been turned under the hand of Sally Madeira, might not be written. "Piney," Bruce answered at last regretfully, "it's a pagan world. Men make mistakes. I think it's largely because they want so much to love that they love somebody, anybody, till the right person comes along." "Should think they 'ud wait," demurred Piney stubbornly. "Well, n--o, that's the notion of a man who has met the right person exactly in the beginning; or it's a woman's notion; but it isn't the notion of a man who, with a sense for beauty and sweetness, waits, like a harp for its music, out in the open where beauty and sweetness beat down upon him. Out in the open a man gets blind. Lord!" went on Steering, remembering Miss Gossamer again, and trying to explain her to himself, "how can a man help loving prettiness! That's what a man loves often and always, Piney, prettiness, grace, vivacity--and then once in his life he loves a woman--Hah!" cried Steering, as though he had at last got the best of Miss Gossamer, "that's it--that sounds good." "Well, d'you think," went on Piney, jerking his spear of grass viciously, "d'you think that a man cand fall in love with a lady rat off, just knowin' her a few weeks?" This was one of Piney's ways of manifesting the jealousy that disquieted him, slurring covertly, and with his lips flickering peculiarly, at Steering's brief acquaintance with Miss Madeira. He was always showing in innumerable ways the hold that Bruce had taken upon his young affections, but he could not help showing, too, the sore spot of his valuation of Steering's regard for Miss Madeira. Though they mentioned Miss Madeira between them only casually, Bruce knew for himself that Piney, in his crude but vehement way, was living through a boy's own high tragedy of love for a woman older than he and beyond his reach, and Piney knew for himself that Steering, in the most perfect flower of his capacity, had attained his destiny as a perfect lover, under circumstances most unpropitious. The fact that the woman who was the object of the boy's enraptured fancy had levied royal tribute upon the man's love in the same purple-mannered fashion brought boy and man close. Tacitly they recognised that the bond between them was strong enough to bear the weight of Piney's jealousy, and, both watching, they allowed the boy to depend from it, swing on it and strain it just enough to make both conscious that the bond was there. "You know what I think, Piney," said Steering after a long wait, in which he had been busy remembering the fulness of one moment in the Bank of Canaan. "I think that if she is the right woman a man can fall in love in one minute. And I think that if she is the right woman all eternity will not give him time to fall out of love with her and no sort of hell of bad situations will ever be wide enough to keep his thoughts away from her." Steering spoke with a well-ordered restraint, but a sense of the combination of situations that he himself had come into lent a ringing, protesting resonance to his voice, and Piney forgot to be jealous and flashed him a long, keen look of delight. Steering realised that he sometimes put into words the things that Piney yearned toward and dreamed, but could not express; and he also realised, from the added satisfaction that he got out of his words because of Piney's satisfaction in them, that Piney sometimes enlivened and enriched his own emotions for him. Their romancing made boy and man delicately complementary to each other. Steering had taken Piney's love for the girl who was beyond him as a fine and simple thing, and, taken in that way, it played up to Bruce's love with the rich imageries and colours of youth, and made Bruce younger, quicker for it. Piney, on his side, had a keen, shy consciousness of immaturity and inexperience that made him attend upon Bruce's outbursts of passion as upon an illumination of what this thing of man's love could be and should be at its biggest and best. "That's just exactly the truth," maintained Steering earnestly. It was remarkable how earnest he could be on this line of opinion. Miss Elsie Gossamer would have marvelled to hear him. Time was when he had agreed with Miss Gossamer that only people who had known each other a long time, as he and she had, could depend upon their attitude toward each other. The attitude between Miss Gossamer and him had seemed very reliable in those prehistoric days when congeniality of taste, a flower face and the probability of getting through life without much worry on your mind and a good cigar in your mouth had seemed sufficient to him. Things like that seemed pitifully insufficient now. He wheeled about restlessly and considered. From where he and Piney were they could hear the sound of a steam-drill, thud-thud-thudding into the heart of a distant knob of the Canaan Tigmores. That notion of Carington's and his about getting into the hills had undeniably balled up into the veriest nonsense under the pressure of Crittenton Madeira's control of the Tigmores. Steering pounded on the ground with one fist and clenched his hands tightly about his knees. That was not the worst, and he might as well face the worst. There was also by now the bitterest sort of animosity toward him on Madeira's part. Old Bernique, who was very fond of Miss Madeira and loathed her father, had commented to Steering upon that being Madeira's way with everyone who promised to be too much for him to handle--bah! it made Steering angry to consider that Madeira should ever have tried to "handle" him. He loosed the clench of his hands about his knees and jumped to his feet. That was not the worst, and he might as well face the worst. Naturally enough the daughter had had to go with the father. That ride across the sunset glory of the Tigmores had been good-bye after all. It had been two weeks since he had stood with her on the spur above Salome Park, and he had seen her twice since; once at the post-office, where she had said, "Good-morning, Mr. Steering"; once on Main Street in front of her father's bank, where she had said, "Good-evening, Mr. Steering." But for all these things, he was not done with Missouri yet. Even now he was waiting for old Bernique. When Bernique should come they would be off again on a long prospect. Bernique and he had been in the hills for two weeks, skirting the Grierson entail, picking, digging, sniffing for ore by day, sleeping long sleeps on forest leaves, heaped and aromatic, by night. He had that day ridden into Canaan for some clean clothes, and was beating back toward Old Bernique now, having picked up Piney down the river road. "Well, Piney, son," Steering invaded the rush of his own thoughts ruthlessly, "I expect I ought to be toddling. Going to ride part of the way with me? I think we shall fall in with Uncle Bernique up-stream a mile or so." "Why, yes," assented Piney, rising; he made a keen calculation of the time by the sun, as he got to his feet; "I'll go a-ways with you. I'd like to see Unc' Bernique--aint seen him simlike fer a long time." Their horses were tethered in a little glade below them and they went into the glade as they talked. "We like Uncle Bernique, don't we, Piney?" suggested Steering, relishing Piney's reference to the old Frenchman. "Best old man in the world," answered Piney, with the soft, sweet shyness, like a girl's, that was always in his voice when he let his affections find expression. Before this Steering had heard, from old Bernique himself, the short story that had connected the affections of the tramp-boy and the wandering prospector. Piney, Old Bernique had said, was the child of a woman whom he had known in St. Louis in the old days. Old Bernique, who was only middle-aged Bernique then, had lived as a neighbour to the woman, whom he had loved very much. But the woman had married another man, and had gone away to the Southwest. And, later on, Old Bernique had followed. And in these later days, since the woman's death, it had been given him to keep watch and ward over her child, Piney. Piney's parents had not been Italians at all, so Old Bernique told Steering, just plain, everyday Americans, from up "at that St. Louis," quite poor and always on the move. The father had been known throughout the country-side as a "blame' good fiddler" and the mother had been, oh a vair' wonderful woman, if one could believe Old Bernique. But there was no Italian blood in Piney. His feeling for Italy had to be explained in another way. It was the great sweet note of poetry, music and beauty, of that far country, vibrating across the years and the miles, taken up as a memory in the Missouri hills by Old Bernique and, through him, reaching a Missouri boy's heart, all tuned and pitched for it. That was all there was to Piney's story. It was only a fragment. Reaching their horses in the glade, Steering and Piney mounted and started up the river road. "Can't you come with us for the rest of the week, son?" asked Bruce, as they journeyed. "Nope. Goin' trampin' by myse'f." It was Piney's habit to disappear for days, gipsy that he was. Perhaps the habit was growing upon him a little of late. He had no abiding place; sometimes he referred to one hill shanty, sometimes to another, as home; but the home-feeling with him was at its fullest and strongest when he was "trampin'." Ostensibly his vocation was that of a travelling farm-hand, but it was all ostentation. Piney would not work. Not while the pony could carry him from hospitable farm-house to hospitable farm-house. He was a knight of the saddle, the uncrowned king of the woods, and Bruce, riding along beside him now, regarding him, enjoying him, would not have exchanged comradeship with the boy's simple, high-tuned relish of life for comradeship with kings. "Miss Madeira is going to Europe, I hear, Piney," adventured Steering. "Yass." Piney said nothing more for some time. He looked very thoughtful. "Y'see," he went on after a bit, "I'm a-thinkin' abaout ridin' off--some'ere--over the Ridge,--bein' gone fer a long time." "Oh, Lord!" groaned Steering. He very well knew what was taking Piney away. It was hard on him that the boy's plan for absence should pile up on Sally Madeira's plan, but he could understand that it would be harder on the boy to stay in the Tigmores with the inspiration of the Tigmores hushed and gone. "Not thinking of going to Italy yet, Piney?" It had come to be an accepted joke with them, that penchant of Piney's for Italy. The boy was willing to laugh about it, but his eyes always sobered dreamily in the end, and invariably he wound up with, "but I'm a-goin', all righty, an' don't you fergit it." He did now. "But y'see, whilst I'm a-waitin' I git kinda tired the hills, Mist' Steerin'," he complained, trying to explain how it was with him without telling anything. "Lots er times I go off an' don't come back fer a long time." Not till Miss Madeira comes home, Bruce added out of his own intuition. "Git sorta tired the hills," repeated Piney stubbornly. "Do they stop talking to you, the hills and the woods and the quiet?" "Yass, they do, sometimes, when I'm pestered--not as I pester much," he laughed and broke off suddenly in his laughter, with a little sobbing shake in his breath, and passed on ahead of Steering, who looked away from him up the bridle road that cut into the Canaan Tigmores. "There comes Uncle Bernique!" cried Steering then, glad of a chance to divert Piney. Gazing toward Bernique welcomingly, he was diverted himself. The old man made no answer to the shouts that Piney and Steering sent out to him. He peered straight toward them, through them, his eyes dry and brilliant. He seemed hardly able to sit on his horse, because of a sort of enervating restlessness; he paid no attention whatever to his bridle; both of his hands were in the pockets of the tattered old coat that covered his body. "Hi there, Pard!" hallooed Piney, with a boy's rich assurance that recognises neither class nor age. "Found!" the old man tried to speak, but made a dry, clicking sound instead. He took his hands from his pockets and held up in each hand a lump of mineral earth. As he came toward them in that way, both hands upheld, the wild fever light in his eyes, his thin body electrified with a strange new vitality, to Steering, who saw all at once what it meant, his movement was that of the last full strain of the miner's epic. "Found! Found!" he repeated, as though the sound was blessed, and he held up the rocks, as though the sight was heaven. When they reached him, trembling by now themselves, they had to help him from his horse and quiet and rest him by the roadside before he could tell his tale. Waiting nervously, Bruce took the nuggets and regarded them; beautiful specimens, one stratum opaque, and seaming on to that stratum another, reddish and glinting, like the spiked fire of gold; and on that stratum another, grey and silver-faceted. "Pretty splendid," cried Steering, and sat down suddenly and weakly. It was not to be forgotten that Old Bernique had emerged from the bridle-path in the Canaan Tigmores. "When did you make the find, Uncle Bernique?" he asked hoarsely. "Thees minute," control was coming back to the old man, he raised his head from Piney's shoulder and leaned toward Bruce--"only thees minute! And for twenty year I have known that it must be here, the ore, lead and zinc, in the gr-r-eat quantity! For twenty year! And just thees minute have I found it!" At the wailing sound of time lost, life lost, in Bernique's voice, long lines of ghostly, bent-backed miners, with ghostly, unavailing picks and shovels, seemed to defile down the bridle-path from the Canaan Tigmores in historic illustration, conjured up by the hypnosis of the old man's words. "The troub' has been," went on Bernique feverishly, "that we have not looked for the ore in that place where the ore is----" "That's always the troub'," muttered Piney. He had got his composure back and he seemed now rather good-naturedly contemptuous. Piney's was not a nature to accommodate itself to the exaltation of an ore find. "The mother lode runs through the Canaan Tigmores," went on Bernique hurriedly, "of that I am now convince', but it comes to the surface,--it comes to the surface,--ah, God above! I expire with it,--let us go to Choke Gulch, and I will show you where it comes to the surface!" He was insistent, his breath had come back to him, and they let him have his way, following him up the bridle-path into the long shadow of the Canaan Tigmores. On the top of the first bluff they tied their horses again and took a foot trail where the bluff, having rolled back a mile from the river, tumbled precipitately into a deep yawning gully. From the timbered eminence the prospect below was as dank and gloomy as a paleolithic fern forest. Sodden, mossy, and almost impenetrable, the hill split and dropped into Choke Gulch. From far down within the black and tangled fastnesses came the solemn ripple of slow-running water. A veil of weird loneliness hung over the cavernous place and the air that shivered up to the three was cool and laden with damp, sweet odours. Old Bernique began to descend. As they proceeded, the old man's sense of something stupendous impressed itself more and more upon his companions. Farther on down, the solemn quiet of the Gulch became unbearable, but no one spoke. Little sunlight penetrated the dense curtain of brown and red leaves overhead, and what little flickered through had an electric brightness against the dead brown of the leaf-carpeted ground and the grey and hoary tree-trunks. Every bird that came to the tree-tops sang once, but it was only when he discovered his mistake, lifted his wings and careened away gladly into the upper light. "Whayee!" Piney found a shivering voice at last, "ef I never git rich till I come down into an ugly hole fer riches I'll be mighty pore all my days." Bruce smiled absently at the boy's susceptibility, but threw a reassuring arm about his shoulder. He smiled again when presently Piney drew away. That was Piney's habit, as affectionate in instinct as a kitten, and as timid of manifestation as a wild doe. Old Bernique called his little party to a halt at the bottommost dip of the Gulch, where a deep, clear and rock-bound spring wound murmurously over a rocky bed. Two red spots came out in the old man's cheeks, his eyes began fairly to flame again, his breath came in wheezy gasps, and his old face pinched up sharp and sensitive as a pointer's nose. He pointed to the débris of shattered rock about the spring. "The wataire fell over a cap-rock here," he said brusquely, the nervous constriction of his throat making it hard for him to say anything. "The strata underneath were soft and had been worn away by the wataire. I put a duck-nest of dynamite in there this morning,--and--see--there!" Anybody could see; the zinc and lead ores were disseminated, rich and warm, in the loose rocks of the out-cropping. "It's a vein thirty inches thick and it runs,--it runs str-r-aight through the Canaan Tigmores,--sometimes sinking many feet from the surface,--but always there,--I am vair' sure of that,--str-r-aight through the Canaan Tigmores----" The old man's breath began to jerk with a sick, sobbing sound. "Well,"--Steering was not so unaccustomed a miner by now but what the sight there in the Gulch had its effect upon him,--"Well," he said gingerly, "if you are right, Uncle Bernique, if the face doesn't cut blind, why, Mr. Crittenton Madeira and old Grierson have a good thing, haven't they?" "Urg-h-h!" Old Bernique made a gnashing sound and leaned his head listeningly. The thud of the stream-drill reached them faintly from its place afar in the Canaan Tigmores. "They come fas'!" he said mournfully. "Wisht I wuz aouter this," interrupted Piney, shivering. "I have been track' thees mother lode,"--began old Bernique again, his feverish gaze again seeking out Bruce,--"I think,"--he stopped and fell to musing,--"What you gawn do, Mistaire Steering," he queried suddenly, with his weary old head twisted to one side, "what you gawn do about thees?" "Lord, Uncle Bernique, I can't do anything. You might do something for yourself. You might sell your rights of discovery, might not you?" "Non! Non! There is othaire thing,--there is a most good possibilitee,--thees mother lode, Mistaire Steering, it come out,--I think it come out somewhere, eh?--Mistaire Steering, have you got leetle mawney?" "That's exactly how much, Uncle Bernique, a little." "Mistaire Steering, eef you got leetle mawney to buy leetle land, I think I know good land to buy." "I have told you all along to consider my money your money, Uncle Bernique." "We must be vair' quiet about all thees, Mistaire Steering,--Piney, you compr-r-ehend that we tr-r-us' you, as I have always tr-r-us' you, absolutement! We must be vair' quiet. Thees leetle piece land run down close to the rivaire, below Poetical, at those Sowfoot Crossing, and eet ees not vair' good land for the farming----" Thud! Thud! The old man caught his temples with both hands. "I am 'most craze' by that steam-drill," he whispered. "Eet come so close to our secret. Let us get away. That sound cr-r-aze me. Found! Found! Vair' large lode, Mistaire Steering.--Sacré! The sound of that steam-drill is to me the most worse thing. That lode run through and come out by the rivaire, eef I am not mistake', Mistaire Steering. I go to buy that land to-night. You go back with Piney, please sair. Eef you come with me, you excite the question and the price. To me it will be sold without question. I am eccentrique, they say. You return to Canaan and have your mawney ready for me, Mistaire Steering. That bat Grierson, Mistaire Steering! When I think----" Old Bernique was still throwing out riches of castigation at Grierson, Madeira, himself, fate, still half incoherent, when the three friends at last got back to their horses, and separated. Down at the foot of the bluff again, Steering, a little sore-headed with the ache of anticipation, hope, doubt, sat his horse in Piney's company and watched the old man ride off up the river unattended. Steering felt excited and exalted himself, but the old Frenchman was really, as he said, "craze'." Piney was the only sensible one left. Piney was not at all enthused and stayed very quiet until he parted with Bruce some distance out from Canaan. Bruce went on back to town to wait for Old Bernique at the hotel. Piney took the path that led up to the bluff behind Madeira Place. As he came through the Madeira grounds Crittenton Madeira came out of the house and stood on the back porch, regarding him quizzically. Piney had a peculiar, poorly hidden dislike of Madeira that, taken with the boy's charm of personality, more or less amused the Canaan capitalist. "Where have you been, young man?" "In the woods." "Look here, learning anything when you are out with that man Steering?" "Yep." "What, for instance?" "Not to talk." Madeira laughed carelessly. "You go and get Miss Madeira to sing, young Impudence," he said. "I'd just as soon hear the tenor, too. I am going to rest,"--he sighed deeply,--"I'm going to try to rest out here in the garden. I'd like some music." Madeira went to the garden and stretched out on a bench, the smile that he had given Piney staying on his face, crinkling in automatically with the grievous strain that was about his eyes and mouth in these days. After a little he closed his eyes softly, enjoyingly. From the library came the carolling sweetness of Piney's tenor. And by and by, following it, soaring up with it, the glorious fulness of Salome Madeira's velvety soprano. Bruce, far down the river road, heard, too. _Chapter Twelve_ THE COLOSSUS OF CANAAN After Crittenton Madeira had organised the Canaan Mining and Development Company the _Canaan Call_ sent him in one leaping, exultant paragraph out of his position as "our esteemed fellow townsman" into a position of far more classic significance by naming him the "Colossus of Canaan." Madeira was a man of lightning-like execution of a plan, once he had got hold of his plan, and Bruce Steering, sharpened by circumstances into a consideration of every chance about him and even beyond him, had brought Madeira the plan from far away New York. Throwing his immense energies toward the prospect of ore in the Canaan Tigmores, bringing forward every dollar of his fortunes,--as usual not so large as they were accredited with being,--to finance his new projects, Madeira had accomplished wonders within an incredibly short time. There were those, unacquainted with the contents of an envelope in Madeira's vest pocket, who marvelled that a sharp man should let his projects be entangled with entailed property, but for the most part Canaanites were too accustomed to follow where Madeira led to marvel, or to ask foolish questions. Even for those so inclined Madeira had good answers. On the one side, he could show, from the progress already made, that there must be such a great quantity of ore in the Canaan Tigmores that it would be possible to take fortunes out of them during old Grierson's possession of the hills, even though the old man lived but a few years. On the other side he could show that it was not in the Canaan Tigmores alone that he was pushing the search for ore, but in the outlying land that had passed into his control as well. It was true that he had put a steam-drill into the Canaan Tigmores, but it was equally true that he had put steam-drills up the Di at two or three points far beyond the Tigmores. He made it as plain as day that the operations of the Canaan Mining and Development Company would extend all over that section, and that the Company's chances could not be taken away even by the death of Grierson. And he made it equally and cheerfully plain that Grierson would not die. Out on the streets of Canaan, among the puppets who danced at his touch upon the strings, Madeira never faltered in his exposition of the Company's affairs and enterprises, and in the Company's offices behind the Bank of Canaan, his direction was steady, resourceful and comforting. He could build up potential profits for the investing Canaanites and build down potential failure in a manner so satisfying that the Canaanites gladly gave him their money and fondly hung upon him. It was Mr. Quin Beasley, that conclusive reasoner, who said, "Simlike ef you talk to Crit fer abaout th'ee bats of your eye he cand show you that ef innybody,--don't keer who,--would putt, wall say,--wall, don't keer haow much you say,--as much as tin thousand,--in the Comp'ny an' leave it slumber fer say--wall, don't keer haow long you say,--as much as fo', five months,--it 'ud be wuth,--be wuth,--wall, I don't keer to over-fetch, but I reckin f'm whut Crit says, th'aint no tellin' whut it _would_ be wuth." And it was the _Canaan Call_ that endorsed Mr. Madeira in that emphatic editorial, which is herewith reproduced, just as it was doled out relentlessly to the few Canaan sulkers, under the caption of "IT WILL BE DRAMATIC, BY GOSH! "When Crit Madeira, the Colossus of Canaan, accomplishes what he surely shall accomplish, when the roar of mill machinery begins to reverberate through the hills of the future Joplin, arousing the vast energies and resources of We-all, Pewee and Big Wheat, let us be generous. If there was a sponge, kicker, shirk or drone, let us cover his selfishness with the mantle of charity. Leave him under the beating light of progress to wrestle with whatever remnant of a conscience he may happen to have. If he can stand by and coolly watch us work our gizzards out for the common good, and then reach out to share the fruits of our sacrifices, energies and enterprise, without a qualm, we can remember that there are many things in this world worth far more than money, one of which is that sense of having done our neighbour's share as well as our own. It will be enough for us to watch when, bewildered by the lusty life and growth and the maze of new-made streets of the future city, the laggard stands debating with that other self, that genius that has kept him what he is. Fancy his striking attitude, thumbs in arm-pits and eyes rolling up to some tall spire, crying out to his other self, 'Thou canst not say I helped do this! Shake not thy towseled locks at me!'--By gosh, it will be dramatic!"[2] Within a month after Bruce Steering had entered the portals of Missouri, Madeira had put his first steam-drill into the hills. Within two more weeks he had put in another. It took him less time to do the things that other men think about and talk about and put off than any man Steering had ever known. One day, not so very long after old Bernique's find in Choke Gulch, word had gone over Canaan like an eagle's scream that ore had been struck in the Canaan Tigmores. Old Bernique had wrung his hands, and Steering had gone grimly back to a little up-river shack, at Redbud, below Sowfoot Crossing, where he was spending a great deal of his time these later days. As the winter broke, Madeira's ability to seize the pivotal point on which to turn theory into practice wrought so surely and so swiftly as to be inexplicable to anyone unaware of the fever that drove him on. His first face of ore had cut blind, but he only put two more drills to work, and in the early spring one of the drills struck ore again, a small face, but ore. They had not found the big lode yet, but every indication was that much to the good. The _Canaan Call_ became so jubilant over the second find that even the sulkers lost sight of the fact that the find was on entailed property. Confidence in Madeira went to high pitch, a supreme tension that a touch might snap. All Canaan was waking up in these days, all Tigmore County was nervous. Town and county were in a pleased, tortured, ante-boom consciousness that, first thing you know, there would be a new Canaan. Some new streets were laid out; a number of people bought chenille portières; and though Crittenton Madeira quietly drew his money out of the Grange, for other and weightier uses, the Grange secured new capital elsewhere and flourished mightily. For farmers from We-all Prairie and Pewee and Big Wheat Valley, cotton raisers from the "Upper Bottom" and corn and cattle men from the "Lower Bottom" came into Canaan "to trade," and filled the aisles of the Grange, gossiping, getting information about the ore developments, then crossing swiftly and determinedly to Madeira's bank to leave their money with the president of the Canaan Mining and Development Company. Out at his house, in his office, in the garden, on horseback, on foot, Madeira kept his daughter Sally near him. He watched his daughter almost constantly, just for the satisfaction of seeing her. As the girl went about her household duties, or walked in the garden with her long, supple stride, or rode the high-tempered horses from the stable, or drove with him, the fine glow on her face, her magnificent health and honesty and strength radiating from her, she was, for Madeira, a continual justification. "Catch me taking anything away from a girl like that to give it to a damn Yankee like Steering," he would tell himself over and over. "Won't she do the most good with it? It'll be hers soon. Won't she do the most good? Answer me that, now." So much for the outside where Madeira lived in the world of realities and met the various demands of each day's relations capably and coolly. Inside his private office behind the bank, at his desk, he lived in another world, a world where shadow became substance, possibility became actuality and fear made facts out of fancy. At night, after Canaan had put its lights out and had lapsed into the shroud-like stillness of a country town's sleep, Madeira was there, with his ghost, in his office,--figuring, figuring. On the roll-top of his desk he kept a letter spread out in front of him. It always happened that he took that letter out of his vest pocket for the purpose of destroying it, and it always happened that when he got up, far into the night, he picked the letter up and replaced it in his pocket. If the words of the letter had been seared across eternity with the red-hot iron of fate they could not have been more indestructible. Besides the letter, Madeira always had on the desk maps, geological surveys, time estimates. Von Moltke never figured half so carefully nor on half so many shaky hypotheses as did Madeira in his office during these nights. He came to know, through awful, blood-sweating hours, that with so much blasting, so much pick-and-shovel work, allowing for so many back-sets from water and blind rock, so many shifts of men could progress to certain points, in so many days. He sometimes realised that all this was unnecessary; that it was aging him and crazing him; that he could put his work through on the Tigmores long before word of old Grierson's death would, by any unfortuitous accident, leak into Canaan, if it ever got there; that he would never have to resort to the subways that he was figuring on to steal the ore out of the Canaan Tigmores; that all this ceaseless, merciless calculation was but the reaction of a conscience, stalking, gaunt and lunatic, through the charnel-house of its own experience. But for all that he had to go on crossing bridges that he was never to reach, covering black tracks that he was never to make. Often at his desk there, his mind became strangely obtunded and he babbled vapidly; his big face pinched up till it seemed lean and grey, and he pitched forward, face down, upon the desk. FOOTNOTE: [2] The author acknowledges a conspicuous indebtedness to a Southwestern weekly for this editorial. _Chapter Thirteen_ MISS SALLY MADEIRA'S SWEETHEART Miss Sally Madeira, trying to make her way down Main Street one Saturday afternoon, in the early spring of the year 1900, had to go very slowly because of the country people in front of the Grange. Occasionally some of the farm-wives called to her shily. The road was noisy and dusty with the passing of mule-teams, buggies, buckboards, riders on horseback. Out of the continuous rattle a child's voice piped shrilly. The owner of the voice was a little girl who wore a hat with a bunch of cherries on it. She stood up in the bed of a farm-waggon and screamed at Miss Madeira, who at once made her way to the edge of the side-walk of broken bricks and waited for the little girl's waggon to come in to the curb. The waggon was full of children, but Miss Madeira was somehow able to call them all by name. "He gimme fifty cents!" was what the cherry-hat little girl said immediately, with some genius for steering conversation toward the things that interested her. "You rich thing!" cried Miss Madeira, and then foolishly, and unnecessarily, inquired, "who is he?" "Yo' sweetheart." Miss Madeira lowered her voice in such a suggestive manner that when the little girl spoke again her voice was lowered, too. "When did you see him?" asked Miss Madeira. "See him ev' day. I cand go daown to Sowfoot by myse'f. He's sick." Miss Madeira looked quickly at some of the older members of the family in the waggon. They were a hill farm family from Sowfoot Crossing neighbourhood. "Yep, he's been sick,--with the malary simlike," was what the older members had to say upon the subject. Miss Madeira quickly left the subject and talked about the corn crop and the price of chickens for a little while, then presently went on down Main Street toward her father's bank, where her black horses were hitched. Far down Main Street, in front of one of the frame houses that edged the street on either side, some children were enjoying a bonfire of dead leaves, front doors were opening and women were coming out to watch the fire; and, by their interest-lit eyes and by what they called to each other across the slumberous afternoon air, were showing that they were skilled in getting diversion out of smaller things than bonfires. It was the neighbourhood of Canaan's biggest and best. The doors that had opened had shown glimpses of the finest three-ply carpets in all Tigmore County, and though the women who had come out on the porches had grammatical peculiarities of their own, they were distinctly unapologetic and assured. You could easily imagine them laughing, with a consciousness of advantage, at the other grades of grammar and carpets in Canaan. "Smells real good, don't it?" called one who was comfortable and portly, and who had her apron wrapped about her hands, "always makes me feel that spring's came when the rakin' and burnin' begin." "Mrs. Pringle told me that they had some big fires aout toward the Ridge las' night. Burned the rakin' aout to Madeira Place. I missed that. D'you see it? I mighta seen it just as well's not from my back porch, tew!" shrilled another woman, in whose words a well-defined jealousy was patent, the jealousy of the person whose life is too small for her to afford to miss any of it. "Yes, you oughta saw it," chimed in another. "Cert'n'y was no little-small flame. I could see Sally movin' araoun' in the flare. Had that tramp-boy taggin' abaout with her. I declare, if he di'n' look like a gipsy!" The neighbourly throng was at this moment augmented by the appearance of two ladies who fluttered out on the porch of a rose-trellised cottage, like small, proud pouter pigeons. They were the Misses Marion, twin-sisters, quite inseparable, and, because their minds had run in exactly the same groove for all of their lives and because they were of about equal mental readiness, apt to get the same impression at exactly the same time, and apt to attempt expression in exactly the same breath. Occasionally this was trying, both to the Misses Marion and to their hearers, and it was particularly trying when the two now called simultaneously from the rose-embowered porch to the women in the neighbouring yards: "Have you heard----" "Have you heard----" Miss Shelley Marion turned to Miss Blair Marion with delicate courtesy: "Continue, sister," she said, just as Miss Blair said, "Sister, continue." "Have we heard what, for goodness' sake?" snapped one of the would-be hearers, breaking in rawly upon the soft waves of the hand and the imploring taps with which each of the two gentlewomen was endeavouring to make way for the other. "I continued last time, sister." "I think not, Blair; I think I did. Proceed." "Have you heard the news?" Miss Blair having yielded with great self-rebuke to Miss Shelley, the question gurgled liquidly from yard to yard, like a small twisting brook. The two women whose yards adjoined the Misses Marions' yard came down to the separating fences and leaned their arms on the paling rails waitingly; the third woman moved up to the corner of her yard which was nearest the Misses Marion. She was the woman who had deplored missing the hill fires, and there was a resolute look on her face. "Talk loud, Miss Blair," she said commandingly. But before Miss Blair could get her mouth open to talk at all there was the sound of horses' hoofs from up toward Court House Square, and a light vehicle, drawn by two powerful Kentucky blacks, rolled into view. "Lawk, it's Sally Madeira!" cried Miss Blair impulsively, and then looked immediately convicted, for Miss Shelley had got only as far as "Lawk!" When the slender equipage, with its spirited, long-tailed horses, and its high springy seat, with the erect young figure on it, had gone by, the women looked at each other, with pursed lips and knowing eyes. "There, aint I been sayin'," cried the fat one, "she's a-lookin' peaked!" Then somebody noticed that the Misses Marion were in the throes of another spasm of courtesy, and, reminded by that of the critical juncture where Miss Blair had left off a few minutes before, one of the women called to her: "What news was that, Miss Blair? Say, you! Miss Blair! What news?" "Why," said Miss Blair, having finally effected some sort of affectionate compromise with Miss Shelley, "why, these news,--they say that that N'York man _is_ Sally Madeira's sweetheart, tew!" "Lan' alive! I've heard that m'self!" said Mrs. Beasley, the wife of the Grange storekeeper. She had heard no such thing, but Mrs. Beasley was an idealist of no mean order, and she at once got a feeling about the matter that was little short of knowledge, and went on with headlong impetus, "I've heard that m'self. Yes, he's her sweetheart." "The men up to the Grange said not, at first." "Men never know." Meantime, out beyond the town, Miss Madeira had circled around to the river road, and, coming up behind Madeira Place, passed it at a smart clip. Farther along, the river road left the river to bend through Poetical on its little plateau, and the gait at which Miss Madeira went through Poetical was disturbing to the geese and hogs there. East of Poetical she got back to the river. It was very still along the Di. She could hear her own heart beating. Once it occurred to her that life would have been much simpler if she had gone to Europe the past fall, as Miss Elsie Gossamer had insisted upon her doing. Once she murmured, "It would be all right if he would only tell me,--I can't do anything until he tells me--what _can_ a woman do until he tells her!" On ahead of her she could see a little shack perched up the bluff, and in front of the shack, on a log that served for a bench, a man sat, making something out of something. His hands were busy. He got to his feet a little unsteadily as she came toward him. It seemed to him that there was a blue veil across his eyes, but he winked it away quickly enough, shook the ache out of his shoulders, put down the shoe-string that he was making out of a squirrel's skin, and stood in front of the shack waiting, with his hat in his hand. He had on a mud-stained corduroy hunting suit and big buckskin leggings, and there was a week's growth of beard on his face. He looked not unlike a highly civilised bear, and he felt his looks. She did not seem to see him until she was close upon him. "Oh," she cried, "I was not expecting to find you here," and when that sounded a little bald, added quickly, "I heard that you were sick and I thought it likely that you were up in Canaan." "Oh, no, I am not sick," he told her, hastening down to the trap, the delicious excitement that possessed him well restrained, "and since you have found me here, won't you get out and have some,--well, let me see,--some coffee and bacon? And I can make a lovely corn-dodger. Also I have some kind of good stuff in a can, though I can't get the can open. Do please stop and dine." Steering, sick, gaunt, gay, mocking at hardship, hope deferred and far-reaching disappointment, was at his best. Her eyes slipped away from his as he pressed his invitation. Then she laughed softly, with the little shake of her laughter when a notion appealed to her happily. "I'm going to accept," she said, "I'll cook things and you can eat them." "I'll make a sacred duty of my part," he promised gravely; he was lifting her from the buggy; her hands were on his shoulders; for a little delirious minute she was in his arms; he could not keep his hands from closing about her sweet body lingeringly as he lifted her; her eyes were looking into his, her face was coming down close to his; he had a wild fleeting hallucination that she---- "Don't imagine," she began, and his senses came back to him and he set her down, "don't imagine that I can't cook. Where's your range?" He showed her a scooped-out place in the side of the bluff. "There are two bricks in the back, two on each side and two on the top," he explained with some pride. "I am afraid you have brought foolish habits of luxury out of the East with you," was her reply. She made him build her a fire and bring some water and meal and then she took things entirely out of his hands. "It's a picnic," she said. Her gown she had folded back and pinned up until a little tangle of silk and lace frou-froued beneath it bewilderingly; her sleeves she had rolled back until the creamy tan of her round slim arms showed to the elbow; her hat she had taken off, and the sun danced in the gold lustres of her hair. She was all aglow; she belonged out in the fresh air and the sunlight like this; she could stand it; that dusky-gold radiance played from her like a burnish. Steering sat down on the log bench and watched her, hypnotised by her into haunting fancies of something, somebody, somewhere. She was one of those beings whose rich magnetism of face and personality brings them close to you, not only for the present, but also for the past, one of those people who are apt to make you feel that you have known them before, forever, a feeling that flowers into elusive fragrances, suggestions, reminiscences, flown on the first stir of a thought to catch them. "What a long time since I even so much as saw you," he sighed happily, happy because here before him in the body again she was exactly the girl he remembered, exactly the girl he had dreamed of all winter. "What have you done all winter?" he asked. "Nursed Father. He has stayed at home with me a good deal. It was a lovely winter, wasn't it?" Steering thought of the long, quiet, lonely days, the weeks, the months during which he had seen her only to bow to her. Then he thought of the calendar inside his office. Every day that he had seen her on his rare trips up river to Canaan was marked with an imitation of the rising sun. There were only eight rising suns for the whole winter. Then he thought how the memory of those sun days had stayed with him and made him feel blessed. Then he answered, "Yes, it has been lovely,--nice, open weather. I have been out on the Di in a skiff almost every day." He did not add that every day his journey had been to the upper water near Madeira Place; but he might have. "Once or twice I have seen you." She did not add that she had stood at her window, behind a partly drawn blind, gazing after him through slow tears; but she might have. "What a very long time indeed since we saw each other,--and talked to each other!" "Oh, about two thousand years," he answered with careful calculation. "I wonder if you remember the ride across country into the sunset?" Should he ever forget it? Then the spring wind blew up to them from off the Di with a coolish, dampening touch. "What do you hear from Elsie?" he asked, heeding the wind's touch. "She is in love. What do you hear from Mr. Carington?" "That same. It seems very right and fit. Carington and Elsie are well mated. The wedding will happen in July. Carry wants me to come back to him for it." She was stirring the meal and water together briskly, with her back half turned to him. At his words she stopped in her work and put her hand up to her heart with her strange little pushing gesture, as though she must push her heart down. "And you will go, I suppose?" "No, I shan't go." She took her hand down and laughed lightly. He could not hear the joyful relief in the laugh, but she could. "My, but you have become attached to Redbud, haven't you? Hasn't it been lonely for you here?" "Well, the cherry hat little girl up above Sowfoot has been a comfort. And then I've studied a heap." "Studied what?" "Mizzourah!" "Redbud and Sowfoot are good teachers," she laughed; then her face sobered quickly, "but I don't think you should stay down here by the river when you are ill," she said. Her sweet, wistful interest was balsamic to him. For a moment he tried to look sicker than he was. "Oh, it's nothing, nothing," he protested in a gone voice. "Yes, it is something," she had the corn-dodgers going over a slow fire and was dubiously regarding a second skillet that he had brought her. "Don't you ever try water for it?" she interrupted herself to ask. He admitted that he was not as careful of the skillet as he should be, and she went back to her first anxiety, "Why do you stay here when you are ill?" "Oh, I'm not ill a bit, not really." He had forgotten to be ill. Regarding her dreamily from his bench he was wishing that the moment could be eternity, that he could be hungry forever and that forever she could make corn-dodgers for him. "I think you are sick. _Something_ is the matter with you?" "Yes," he changed his position a little on the bench, "something is the matter with me." "Well, why don't you go on and say what?" She put the skillet on some of the coals and the coffee-pot on the skillet, being too busy to look around at him. "Oh!"--he wanted to tell her, but his pride saved him in time. She was in rich in gold and land and cattle, in ore, too now; and he? He didn't know how he was going to fill his meal sack the next time it was empty. That was where matters had got with him. "I think I won't go on and say what, after all; let's not bother. Let's just be happy for the minute. That's something I have learned out here in Missouri, just to be happy when you get the chance, minute by minute, no matter what sort of hours are to come after. This, now, is so much more than I had hoped for. I hadn't really hoped to see you again before----" "Before what?" "Well, a fellow can't go on like this forever, can he? I expect I am going to cut all this." "_What!_ And leave Uncle Bernique?" "Uncle Bernique can hold the claim alone, you know. And I'm wasting hope and energy here. What's the use in staying longer?" She was very busy with the bacon now and he did not see her face. There was a wild quiver on it, of grief, fright, dismay. "You ought not to leave Uncle Bernique and Piney, I am sure of that," she said at last earnestly, almost commandingly. "Heigh-ho! I think Bernique is getting restless, too. He will be drifting off soon on that tidal wave of ore fever that comes over him; Piney has been gone for a great while. It's pretty lonely. It's getting on my nerves. Of course I shouldn't pet my nerves if I had any hope about the run here, but I haven't. I think that the work we have carried on is fairly conclusive." "But wait a minute, didn't you buy this land? Didn't you put some money in it?" Steering laughed blithely. "Not much," he said. The thing that made him laugh was the fact that though it was not much it was all that he had, and it was, in a way, amusing to consider how he was to get away from Canaan. Looking at Sally Madeira, who suggested luxury nonchalantly, trouble about ways and means was bound to be untimely and laughable. Indeed, looking at Sally Madeira all troubles were more or less laughable. "You haven't gone to Europe?" he reminded her, after he had drunk her health in the coffee. "No! I haven't gone." "Are you going?" "Not unless Father's health improves." "Isn't he well?" "No," her face clouded sadly, "he is over-working. Oh, you don't know how sorry I am," she began, and faltered. "Sorry? for him?" "Yes. And for you. And for m-- and because things have come around like this." "Let's not be sorry just now," said Steering. "Won't you, please, talk about glad things now. It's so pleasant to have you here." Since she was unhappy, he took charge of her unhappiness, and would not be serious any longer about anything. When she brought him his corn-dodger on a shingle and more coffee in a tin dipper, he was foolish with happiness, kept his own spirits high and overcame every little disposition to seriousness on her part until their picnic had to come to an end, and she must be starting back down the river road. "Do you feel like doing something for me?" she asked, her hand in his, as she made ready to go. "Something? Everything." "Then wait just as long as you can, will you?" "Yes, I will, gladly, since you ask it, just as long as I can." Steering's voice sang as he answered. She would not let him accompany her on her homeward journey, but went on down the river road alone, and Steering returned to the shack, and carefully measured the amount left in his meal sack, and carefully counted the money in his wallet. There was just about enough in the sack to last ten days, flanked by the potatoes and the bacon, and there was so little in the wallet that any kind of emotion about it seemed a waste. Still, he did not appear to appreciate the extremity of the situation as yet. His face was all lit up and the sound of his own voice pleased him. "I will wait, just as long as I can," he repeated at the end of his calculations, "and I can till the meal gives out." _Chapter Fourteen_ WHEN THE MEAL GAVE OUT Steering sat on his bunk in his shack with his elbows on his knees, his head in his hands, and his eyes upon an empty bag that hung from the bough of a weeping-willow tree. He had just written Carington to explain that it could not be said that he had conquered Missouri, and that he was leaving next day for Colorado to try his luck at gold on the Cripple Creek circuit. He had not explained to Carington that he would walk the greater part of the way. By some strange perversity of pride a man never does explain a thing of that kind to anybody, least of all to Carington, best friend and close sympathiser. Arrangements for his journey were about complete. Before he had left New York he had turned everything into ready cash that could be so turned, so that even when he first reached Missouri his personal effects had not made travel a burden to him. During the past weeks all the balance of his belongings that possessed any negotiability whatsoever had been turned into meal. And his meal sack was empty! By no sort of foreknowledge can a man accustomed to enough money for current expenses,--a goodly budget as recognised by the class of which Steering was an exemplar,--imagine, during his easy circumstances, how he would feel if ever things should so go against him that he would be left staring into an empty meal sack. Steering felt an awkward incompetence to realise the case now. He had looked at the sack at close range, patted it, as though to mollify its consequences to him, pooh-poohed it, taken it philosophically, taken it smilingly, but he had been all the time unable to get his eyes off it, even though he had finally carried it down to the river's edge and hung it upon the bough of the weeping willow tree. His eyes were still upon it, he was still regarding it at long range, through the shack door, getting the foreshorten of it, getting the middle distance, getting the perspective, utterly unable to stop his ceaseless staring into the emptiness of it, stop wondering what next and how next. He got up and went to the door of the shack and looked out. By and by it occurred to him that the case would be much worse if there were anyone besides himself concerned. All the vague fleeting sympathies that had ever been aroused within him by newspaper stories of starving families, the nearest he had ever come to the actuality of starving families, quivered and stirred within him. The first thing he knew, he was feeling infinitely relieved that he had no starving family. He had a sensitive and active imagination, and, as he pictured the hungry little children that he did not have, tears of gratitude came into his eyes, and he blew gay kisses to those airy little folks. It was glorious weather. Wild spring flowers were abundant, and there were cheerful whiskings among the trees where the birds and squirrels were busy again. The young shoots strained with the urge of the sap, making little popping noises. Steering started now and again and held his head waitingly. He had been watching and hoping for Piney for days, and was on the alert. Every noise, however, resolved itself into the noise of bird, squirrel, or sapling. There was never the voice nor the footfall of the human. Once that very afternoon, he had been so sure that he had heard Piney's pony up on the bluff that he had gone up there searchingly, joyfully. But except for a little scatter, that he took to be the lift of a covey of quail somewhere off in the Gulch bushes, not a sound or sign came up to the bluff. Steering mourned for Piney. If the tramp-boy had not gone away, things might have been more bearable. But the lad's jealousy and his love for Steering were in battle royal now, and Piney kept far from his hero, on the misty hills. Uncle Bernique was off on the hills, too, almost all the time; at the moment of this present crisis Bernique had been away for days. It was the merciless loneliness of the effort there at Redbud that had been most effective in dulling Steering's endurance. If he had been less lonely he might have devised ways of standing Missouri yet longer. Up at Dade farm they kept telling him, when he went up there for one of his visits to the little girl with the cherries on her hat, that he had "malary." It did not seem to him a very able diagnosis, but, as he had admitted to Miss Madeira, something was the matter with him, and it had now become his notion that the quicker he got out of Missouri the quicker he would be cured of the something. He was all ready to commence his treatment; he had corn-dodgers for supper that night, and for breakfast next morning, and with the morning sun he meant to travel on. The only reason that he did not start now, this minute, was because--well, she had come up the river road about this hour once, and he was waiting. Circumstanced as he was now, with the only three people whom he could count as friends in Missouri almost always away from him, life had come to mean little but this feverish, alert waiting. He went out and sat down by the shivering Di for his very last wait for any of the three. It was there that old Bernique came upon him. Steering was shivering a little, too. "Dieu! You have the malaria!" was the Frenchman's greeting. "Go 'long, I have no such thing; I'm only as lonely as the devil." Steering got up and shook hands with the old man with so much energy that Bernique made a grimace of pain. "Come up here and talk," cried Steering, his eagerness to hear the sound of a human and friendly voice making him overlook the excitement under which Bernique laboured. He tied Bernique's horse to a bush and drew the old man up the bluff. "Where have you been this time? Where is Piney? Hello! what's the matter with you anyhow? struck another lode?" Old Bernique spread out his palms avertingly. "You go fas'," he protested. "Wait, I beg. I have again had those exper-r-ience that so much disturb me. But no, I have not found anothaire lode, though I have been on the hills vair' long time. Thees day I come a-r-round by the way of Canaan. At the pos'-office I am stop'." The old man was talking now with his eyes burning into Steering's eyes, an expression of horror flattening his face; he held the four fingers of one lean hand pressed to his mouth, so that his words came out inarticulate and broken, though they seemed to scorch his throat like balls of fire. "At the pos'-office one say to me, 'Here is lettaire for you!' I take the lettaire and read.... Now, I ask you, Mistaire Steering, to take it and read." Bernique drew forth a letter from his pocket and thrust it into Steering's hand with a finely dramatic gesture. He had the appreciation of his race for climax. The letter, Steering saw at once, was in the same gnarled handwriting as that letter which Crittenton Madeira had given him to read on the first day of his arrival in Canaan, and its contents made evident the same gnarled personality that had been made evident by that first letter. "Read it aloud," said Bernique, and Steering read: "'Deep Canyon, Colorado, September 23rd, 1899,' hey! what's the matter with the date, where's the slow-boy been?" "Read on, Mistaire Steering," said Bernique grimly. But Steering looked at the post-mark on the envelope in his hand before he read on. "Post-mark's dated April 23rd, 1900--why----" "Read on!" cried old Bernique. "It is explain'," and Steering read on. "'My dear Placide:--You and I were good friends in the days that we spent in prospecting over the Canaan hills, and, even though I incurred your displeasure when I abandoned the hills, I am depending upon the old friendship to influence you to do a last friendly act for me. It is not necessary for me to acquaint you with the detail of humiliations and persecutions to which I have been subjected by the man of whom I was once so foolish as to borrow money, any more than it is necessary for me to condone to you the desire that has developed within me to make him bite the dust, even as he has made me bite it. I am not remorseless in this. I gave him his chance to escape me, but, quite as I anticipated, he has fallen into the trap that I set for him; else would you not be reading this letter to-day, nearly a year after it was written. "'Look close now, friend Placide. Nearly a year prior to the date that you will get this, that is to say on the 23rd of last September, the same day that I write this letter to you, I wrote Crittenton Madeira that I should be dead when my letter reached him, dead under an assumed name, in a strange land. It was the God's truth. I was dead when the letter reached him. You are reading a letter from the dead now, friend Placide.'" Steering stopped for a moment with a little shiver, but Bernique urged him on, and he read again--"'Placide, in that letter to Madeira were my instructions to turn over the Canaan Tigmores to Bruce Steering, because, I being dead, the hills were due to pass on to my heir. Well, Placide, has Madeira done that? Has he carried out my instructions? Has he fulfilled his trust? Has Steering possession of the Canaan Tigmores? "'Like the thief that he is, Madeira has not done his part. Had he done it, you would not be reading this letter to-day. I wrote it and placed it with the clerk of Snow Mountain County, the county in which I died, to be mailed to you on the 23rd of April, 1900, only in case no inquiry had ever come from Madeira to verify my death. No inquiry has ever come! So the clerk of the county, who is my executor, mails this letter to you. This letter, Placide, is to attest that for seven months Crittenton Madeira has been in unlawful possession of the Canaan Tigmores, defrauding my heir and holding land under my name after being advised of my death and of the means of verifying the advice. There are now, in the keeping of the clerk of Snow Mountain County, two sealed envelopes, to be delivered by him, the one to you, the one to Crittenton Madeira. Madeira's has never been called for. See that yours is. In it you will find the credentials of my identity, my sworn statements, and the documents that prove my late encumbency of the entail. I am buried in the pauper's field in the cemetery of Deep Canyon. The stone slab that I have directed to be put over me bears the inscription, "James Gray, Died September 23, 1899." "'Get your proofs together, Placide, and carry them to the defrauded heir. I have not forgotten the letters that I received from him, nor his young eagerness to get at the land that is now his and that should have been his nearly a year ago. Put the proofs before him. And I pray that he may be quick and sure to deal out judgment and retribution. He is my kinsman. Let him for me, as well as for himself, wield the lash that I put in his hands. "'Do these things for me, friend Placide, and believe that even in the grave, I remain, "'Very gratefully yours, "'BRUCE GRIERSON.'" The letter fell from Steering's hand and fluttered to the ground, while he sat with his hands hanging limply from his knees for a moment. "Grierson is dead! Grierson is dead!" he repeated. The funereal words rang through his ears like a grand Praise-God. He knew that he ought to be sorry and that he was inexpressibly glad, not because the grim old man was dead--dead, with his malevolence reaching out toward Madeira, spinning and twisting like a great cobweb snare from the grave--but because of what must now happen, because vistas of wonderful beauty were opening up through the long shadows of the Tigmores, because if the end had come to the house of Grierson, beginning had come to the house of Steering. Life, big, splendid, stretched out before him. Old Bernique had risen and was pacing the banks of the Di nervously. Steering, too, got to his feet. Going down to Bernique, he took the old man's hands in his. Neither heard a little rustle up the bluff in the leafy bushes. "Oh, Uncle Bernique!" said Steering, and stopped because of the wild sound of his own voice. He saw that it would be dangerous for him to try to talk with his mind in that high tremulous whirl. The old man clung to him, silent, too, for a teeming moment. "Now God above, why not Crit Madeira tell you that tr-r-ue way of things?" shouted Bernique at last fiercely. "Why not?" The two men looked into each other's eyes, Steering bearing up the old man, who clutched him feverishly. When the Frenchman began to talk again his teeth were chattering. "Why not? Hein? Because he t'ief. But God above! We got those proof! Dead for mont's. And Madeira know it! The Teegmores are yours for mont's, Mistaire Steering! And Madeira know it! We put that fine man where he belong. We jail him! He t'ief! We r-r-uin him, as he would r-r-uin you!" "Ruin him!" Bruce said the words over measuredly. "We can do it easily. Everything he has has gone into the company that is getting its chief encouragement out of the Tigmores. It will be easy to ruin him." "Yes, God above, it will be easy! We r-r-ruin him. We do that thing quick and glad." Bernique slid his lean hands up Steering's arms and held to him. "Wait! Wait!" The Frenchman's convulsive anger received a sudden check by the sound of Steering's voice. He clung more tightly to Steering's arms as he looked into Steering's face, then shrank back helplessly. "My God!" said the old man, "I forgot!" "Yes," answered Steering, no hesitation in his voice. "Yes, you forgot _her_. We must not do that, you know." After a while they sat down and talked it over at length from beginning to end, and then back again, from end to beginning. Up in the Tigmores Crit Madeira's drills beat and bore at the heart of the earth, deeper, deeper; by the Redbud shack, the two men, on the ground, bore into Madeira's trickery, deeper, deeper. By the light of that torch from the Rockies, they followed the twisting trail all the way from inception to finish. The tortuous, underhand curve of it now and then looked like the self-deceptive work of lunatic cunning. As they talked about it, they talked too earnestly for the little whisking movements in the growth up the bluff to reach their ears. "At least," cried old Bernique at last, "at least the Teegmores are yours! At last! At last!" At last! At last! Steering's eyes were travelling the long tumbling Tigmore line. "If they are," he said in that musing way he had developed within the last quarter of an hour, "if I take the Tigmores now, Uncle Bernique, I'll pull Madeira's house about him. That company of his is not so secure that it could stand a blow at its head. If I take the Tigmores,--Uncle Bernique, listen a minute," he was pleading, "she has been used to much all her life. I can't take her father's fortune away from him. Don't you see that? I can't do anything. You understand?" he was commanding. Bernique jumped to his feet. "God above, you mean----" The thought snapped in the old man's brain, the words stuck in his throat. "I mean that we must leave things as they are. I can't ruin her father. That's all I mean!" Bernique doubled up both fists. "I'll see him damn' before he shall keep those Teegmores! I can r-ruin him!" But Bruce caught the old man's arm in a grip that hurt. When Bernique spoke again it was to say breathlessly, "You take the Teegmores, Mistaire Steering, and protect Madeira's fortune. You can do that easy." "I know. It looks easy. But think back a little. Madeira is sure to fight. Grierson's death occurred months ago under an assumed name. To prove that he died we must prove when he died, where he died and who he was. To prove all that is to let the light in upon dark places. I hardly see how the light can be let in, Uncle Bernique, without cutting Madeira out sharp and keen as a rascal. Madeira would never allow,--at this juncture, he couldn't allow us to establish my claim to the Tigmores on my word and yours. He has done unwise, crazy things already. He would fight us. I know it, you know it. We could win. But where would our victory leave him, Uncle Bernique? Ah, you see?" The old man was shaking from head to foot. He clung close to Steering. "Oh, my God!" he moaned, "I will not let this thing be." "Yes, you will let it be! It is my affair even more than it is yours. You will do as I say about it, Uncle Bernique. Here and now, you shall swear this oath with me: I by my love for Sally Madeira, you by your love for Piney's young mother, that never, so help us God, shall one or the other of us carry word of these matters to anyone, least of all to Crittenton Madeira or his daughter Salome!" The old man's breath came gustily, his cheeks flamed, the hectic burned like fire in his shrivelled cheeks. He loosed his clinging hold and tried to shake Bruce off. "Swear," Bruce decreed again, his powerful grip on the old man, his eyes half shut, "I by my love for Sally Madeira, you by your love for Piney's young mother! Swear!" He held up his own right hand, and Bernique said brokenly: "God above, I swear!" The old man was crying. Neither heard the swish in the bluff growth, neither saw the brave light in the two eyes that peered through the bushes. "Why now, everything is all right," cried Bruce. "Are you going on into Canaan to-night, or shall you sleep here with me? I think that I shall take the skiff now and go up toward Madeira Place, then drift back down-stream, a sort of good-bye journey. What will you do meantime?" Old Bernique hardly knew. He was sore, bewildered. He thought he might spend the night on the hills, then again he might come back to the shack for the night. He wanted to go into Choke Gulch first thing. Bruce pushed away in the skiff through the swollen Di. Bernique got his horse and started off, climbing the yellow road up the bluff slowly, heading toward Choke Gulch. As he neared the top, he lifted his head and saw Piney and the pony outlined on the bald summit of the bluff. The boy made a trumpet of his hands and shouted to Bernique. "Hurry! For God's sake! So I cand talk to you!" Piney's was a reckless and impassioned young figure, cut out against the sky sharply, on a pony that danced like a dervish. The old man nodded, with a flash of pleasure at the sight of the boy, then let his head fall wearily upon his breast. He felt very powerless. When he reached Piney's side he put out his hand and held to the boy's hand as though he found its warmth and firmness sustaining. "Let's git into the timber," said Piney, and they rode forward a little way quite silent. "I don' want Mist' Steerin' to look back an' see me here," the boy explained. In the growth where the hills began to roll down toward Choke Gulch, Piney stopped short, with a detaining hand upon Bernique's bridle. "I hearn," he said. His young face was so grey and solemn that Bernique regarded him questioningly. "I was simlike half asleep up there in the bushes. Whend you begand to tell your story, I waked up an' I listened. I hearn all you said an' all he said. Ev'thing. Unc' Bernique, you cayn't tell nobody! Mist' Steerin', he cayn't tell nobody!--but Me!" the boy was breathing harder, his face was growing greyer, "Unc' Bernique, I'm f'm the hills, an' not like them," the blood began suddenly to come back to his lips; he raised in his stirrups and slashed at the branches of a black-jack tree with his riding switch, as though he cut a vow across the air, high up. "But what I can, I will!" he cried, and clenched his hands proudly. "Fer her an'--an' fer him!" he choked. Whatever he meant to do, his young passion for Salome Madeira and his young affection for Steering, his hero, leaped out on his face whitely. "She loves him, too, Unc' Bernique!" he cried in a final, broken crescendo. Old Bernique stared at the boy in exaltation. "God above!" he shouted, "if that is it, it begins to be hope in my old breast! All may come right yet, and no oaths broken!" "None broke!" cried Piney. "One more took! I'm a-ridin' saouth, to Madeira Place, Unc' Bernique;" he gathered up the reins from his pony's neck,--"I'm a-goin' to Miss Sally Madeira to tell her abaout Mist' Steerin';" he was blind with hot, young tears. "She'll do the rat thing whend she knows, Unc' Bernique;" he had put the pony about,--"I'll see you on the hills in the mornin'!" he was gone down the yellow road like a winged Mercury. On the hills behind him, Old Bernique, comprehending and envying, locked his hands on his saddle-horn in a vehement tension. His lips moved, and what he said seemed to float out after the flying figure of the boy like a benediction. _Chapter Fifteen_ A MISTAKE SOMEWHERE The afternoon of that day was golden out at Madeira Place. Through the kitchen windows the sun streamed in, in broad, unfretted bands of light. Just beyond the window the crab-apple trees and the quince trees and the pear trees and the damson trees were rioting in blossom. The kitchen itself was a place to take comfort in. By a table sat fat black Chloe, seeding raisins, when she was not asleep. Before another table stood Sally Madeira, her brown, round arms bared to the elbow, flapping cake batter with a wooden paddle. With her sense of eternal fitness the girl was a fine housekeeper as easily as she was a sweet singer and a good horsewoman. She had kept the past beautifully intact in the old brick-floored room. Overhead hung strings of red peppers, streaks of scarlet on the heavy black rafters. Little white sacks of dried things, peas and beans and apples, depended from hooks. Against the walls were quaint old tin safes, their doors gone, their shelves covered with dark blue crockery. The tin and brass stuff shone brightly. On a low shelf stood a great piggin of water, a fat yellow drinking gourd sticking out of it. The whole picture was a kitchen pastel, delicately toned, a kitchen of the long ago, Sally Madeira fitting into it exquisitely, re-establishing the stately domesticity of an old régime by her fine adaptability and appreciation. Chloe brought the raisins over to Miss Madeira at last, and let them drop slowly into the crock, watching carefully for stray bits of stem. "Simlike nowadays ef he teef go agin a hardness spile he tas' fuh de cake," she said anxiously. "We do have to humour his poor appetite, don't we, Chloe? Never mind, he'll be better soon, I hope." "Whut madder wid he, Miss Sally, innyhow, Honey?" "Just overwork, I think, Chloe. Works all the time; in the office now, bent double over his desk." The darky shuffled restlessly on her flat feet. "Simlike to me he pester'd. I d'n know. Miss Sally, who else gwine eat dishyer cake tumorreh, Honey?" "I'm not expecting any company at all, Chloe. Father isn't really well enough to care to talk to people." "Miss Honey, simlike de house gittin' mighty lonesome nowadays. Taint like it uster be." "Do you feel it, Chloe? Do you know I've grown to like it better quiet." The girl's voice was wistful, she let the batter trickle recklessly while she gazed off out of the window. Then she sighed and began to beat the batter very hard. "Miss Honey-love?" "Yes, Chloe." "That tha' Mist' Steerin' aint ben come no mo' fuh gre't while, air he?" "No." "Samson he say he gwine ride down by Redbud this evenin'." "Well, Chloe, I'm sorry that I can't send an invitation to your favourite, but I'm afraid Father isn't well enough--oh, there's Piney, Chloe!" The boy had come up the bridle-path slowly, his mission weighting him and making him languid. At the latticed porch he jumped to the ground, turned the pony's nose into the grass and came into the kitchen. "Howdy, Miss Sally. Hi, Chloe. Cand I have a drink, please'm, Miss Sally?" He drank long and greedily from the gourd dipper, so long that Sally Madeira turned to him laughingly at last. "Well, Piney, son, got Texas fever?" she began, and then, being quick of wit, saw at once that the boy's pallor, his thirst, his absorption meant something especial. "I'm glad you came, Piney," she went on capably, and gave the batter paddle to Chloe. "I've been wanting to see you all day to have a little talk with you. Let's go out under the crab-apple tree." She took off the great apron and led the way from the kitchen, the boy following her with dragging feet. Under the crab-apple tree she drew him down upon a bench beside her. The orchard blooms shut them in close. The stillness was unbroken save for the warm sibilant droning of the insect life in the air. The shadows on the orchard grass were like lace-work. "Now, Piney, lad," began Miss Madeira at once, "what's the trouble?" Her voice sounded strong, maternal, to Piney, who had been wondering how he was to tell her, calling himself a fool for having undertaken to tell her, reminding himself that he couldn't for the life of him begin. Here, suddenly, the girl was making it easier for him, showing him that the way to begin was to begin. "I wouldn' tell you the trouble ef I could he'p it, Miss Sally," he said pleadingly, his hands shut about his knees, his eyes beseeching as a fawn's. "Ef they wuz inny way to make things come aout rat lessen I told, I wouldn' tell. But I don' see no way." It was easier to talk up to the thing and around the thing, than to get directly into it. "Is it your own trouble, Piney?" she asked, helping again. "No'm." "Whose trouble, Piney?" "Mist' Steerin's, Miss Sally." "Ah!" She leaned nearer Piney. "Tell me quickly, dearie," she said, "is he ill?" "Well'm, it's your trouble, too, Miss Sally." "Yes, surely, Piney, go on, go on!" "And your father's trouble, Miss Sally." "Something about the Tigmores, I suspect, then, Piney, go on." "Yes'm, abaout the hills." Then, fortunately for both, his youth made up in directness what it lacked in finesse. "It's this-a-way, Miss Sally," he blurted savagely, "Ole Bruce Grierson is dead an' Mist' Steerin' owns the Tigmores." Her face shone with joy. "But, Piney, boy, where's the trouble in that? When did Mr. Grierson die? That's not trouble even for him, Piney. He was a weary old man. When did he die?" "Las' September, Miss Sally," answered the boy gravely. "Last September? _Last Septem_---- Why, where's the word been all this while, Piney? Why hasn't my father known?" "He--he has known, Miss Sally. Miss Sally, it was this-a-way, simlike: that ole man writtend Mist' Madeira he wuz goin' to die an' he tol' Mist' Madeira to give the hills to Mist' Steerin'. But I don't reckon your father believed ole Grierson, Miss Sally." The girl on the bench under the crab-apple tree was beginning to draw herself up proudly. "There is some mistake somewhere, I can see that, Piney, dear. Where did you learn all this?" "Wy, Miss Sally," cried the boy, a great, painful reluctance in his voice, "that old varmint Grierson writtend another letter to Unc' Bernique an' had a man hold it up an' not mail it till las' week. Then he lay daown an' died. An' here las' week the letter to Unc' Bernique was mailed, aouter ole Grierson's grave like--an' Unc Bernique he's jes got it, an' it tells him that ole Grierson died las' September an' that he writtend your father to say so." "I don't understand that, Piney. Mr. Grierson died last September and has written letters since he died, you are getting it all mixed, aren't you?" Very slowly and laboriously Piney told then what he knew, told it over and over until she had comprehended it, whether she believed it or not. When the boy had finished she was leaning back on the bench, dull and pale. "But it isn't true," she said, with white lips. "And Mr. Steering, Piney,--has Uncle Bernique told Mr. Steering this fantastic tale?" "Yes'm." "And what did Mr. Steering say and do, Piney?" The memory of what Steering had said and done seemed to come on to Piney like an inspiration. "Miss Sally, he set his jaw an' he ketched Unc' Bernique by the arm an' helt him an' made him swear like this, 'You by your love for Piney's young mother, I by my love for Salome Madeira, that never, s'help us God, will you or I carry word of this to Crittenton Madeira and his daughter Salome'--sumpin like that, Miss Sally. I don' adzackly remember the words." The dulness had all gone out of her eyes, the colour beat back into her cheeks. She had forgotten Crittenton Madeira. "'I by my love for Salome'--are you sure, Piney?" "I'm sure, Miss Sally. An' so I thought as wuzn't nobody else to tell you, I'd tell you. I d'n know as I done rat," the boy's face was all a-quiver, too, as he looked up at the girl on the misty heights of her passion. His self-abnegation, his young heroism made him for the moment as finely luminous as she was. Sally Madeira took his head between her hands and gazed into his eyes tenderly, caressingly, and there was in her touch something large and sweet and tender that comforted and soothed the boy while it made his heart leap within him. "Ah, Darling," she said, "how bitter-sweet it is, this loving! But be patient. Some day it will all seem right." She took her hands away from him and stood up straightly. "I'm going in to my father now, Piney. There's a mistake somewhere. You wait for me here until I get it all explained. Wait here till I come back." She went off toward the house then, a fragrant shower of orchard blossoms falling upon her and shutting her away from the boy's eyes as she went. _Chapter Sixteen_ MADEIRA'S PEACE Sally Madeira crept to the door of her father's study and listened. In the pallid light that was stealing up to her from Piney's story her face was shadowy, with hurtful doubt, ashamed fear, and she steadied herself by the wall with hands that shook. She had stopped to put on a white gown that her father loved and her lustrous hair lay banded closely, a halo, about her shapely head. Her face looked like a saint's. "It is not so much to save Bruce Steering's inheritance for him, it's to save my father for myself." Her lips moved stiffly as she whispered. "My old dream-father, my idol, I cannot live without him!" As she opened the door and passed in, she felt as though he had been away on a long journey and that this might be the hour of his return. Inside Madeira sat at his desk, Bruce Grierson's letter spread out before him, the ghost of his torture. At night he heard it move, with a spectral rustling, under his pillow where he kept it. By day it writhed, a small, hot thing, over his heart. He had tried again and again to destroy it. Everything else that had got in his way he had destroyed, but this he had not destroyed. He was trying to destroy it now, but he returned it to his pocket, unable to destroy it, ruled by it, when he raised his eyes and saw his daughter before him. She had not been without foresight even in her shame and sorrow. She had taken great pains to gown herself especially for him, especially to establish her influence over him. He held out his arms to her lovingly. In the sickness of soul and body now upon him he had turned more and more to her; she had to be with him almost constantly. "You look so sweet," he said. "You are sweetest like this. I love you like this." Despite the relief that came when with her, he talked nervously, his mouth jerking. His hands wandered to her head, and he held her face and peered at her. "Sally, I wish I was a girl like you," he said, "girls look so peaceful. Business tangles a man,--just to have peace, Sally." "It will come Father, it will come. Father, Piney rode in from the hills just now, and he brought me news." He could feel the tremor of her lithe body against his breast, and he moved quickly and uneasily, suspecting danger. His dreams had so long been terror-fraught that he was all nerves and suspicion. "News of what, Sally?" The whitest, deadest voice, for so simple a question; on his face the most awful strain! She drew back on his knee and looked at him steadily, lovingly, and his eyes dropped and his hands began to drum on the chair-arm. "Father," she said, "Piney has heard a long story. He was hid on the bluff-side, up at Redbud, and he heard a letter read at the shack there, a dead man's letter." "A dead--oh, God bless you--wait--Sally, did that move? eh, what foolishness is this, a dead man's letter? What dead man? eh? what dead man?" "Bruce Grierson, father." "They lie! They lie! Let them prove it!" "Ah, that was what I told Piney, Father! I knew, I knew that you could explain it. And you can now, and you will, Father?" She was really beseeching him to rise up against her and the accusation against him, rise up in a great storm of indignation; she was praying that he would do that, expecting that he would, so firm were her convictions of his nobility. She drew back a little, to give him room, as it were; her hands fell upon his knee, and she leaned from him the better to see him, her face aglow with her fierce hope, her big belief, while she waited for that storm, that outraged denial, that tremendous vindication. And while she waited, erect, hopeful, eager, he shrank in upon himself; crumpled and wrinkled in upon himself until he looked weazened and small. "Let them prove it, let them," a whining mumble. "They will not, Father." She was leaning toward him again, her face quiet as the first frightened dawn of a grey morning; her voice was beaten and sad, but she went on dauntlessly. "The letter was to Uncle Bernique, Father. And Bruce Steering read it. And though it told him that he was the owner of the Tigmores, he and Uncle Bernique will not prove it." For a moment she paused, and then, with some new purpose on her face, she began again, "There was an oath to make all sure that they would not prove it. Listen, Father, these were the words of the oath: 'Swear, I by my love for Salome Madeira, you by your love for Piney's young mother, that never, so help us God, shall one or the other of us carry word of this thing to anyone, least of all to Crittenton Madeira and his daughter, Salome!'" "Ah-h-h!" The words of the oath seemed to bring Madeira his first brief respite in a long torture. The girl shivered at such relief, then went on resolutely: "So now you see, Father, everything is safe. I have come to let you know that everything is safe, that you need not be troubled, sleeping or waking, any more about this thing. You may keep the Tigmores as long as you will," the light of her eyes beat upon him like a rain of pure gold, "you may be as rich as you like, Father. Mr. Steering is to leave here; you need never be dispossessed during your lifetime. It is all safe and sure. Uncle Bernique will not tell, Mr. Steering will not tell, Piney will not tell, I shall make no sign." The tragic strength of her endeavour to make him see that it was all with him; to leave it all to him; if so be that the better part were to be chosen, to make him choose it for himself; re-establish himself in so much as was possible for her loving regard, was in the hot clasp of the young hand that she laid upon him, the sweet earnestness of the face that leaned toward him. It was a strange fight, a battle of vast forces. He began to shake like an aspen leaf, but his eyes lifted to hers presently, to drink from them as from a fountain of life. His lips moved. "Just to have peace," he gasped hoarsely, "take that letter--take it from my pocket--send it to Steering." "Father!" It was the cry of victory well won. "Father! I am so glad!" over and over again. "All my life, Father, I have expected the good thing to happen because of you, the right thing, I am so glad!" Laughing, crying, she kissed him, took the letter and stole to the door. "Piney shall be its bearer," she cried as she went, "Piney shall take it; he will say the very best that there is to say!" She ran out, and the door swung quickly behind her, so that she did not see that he put his hand over his empty pocket and held his heart with a great relief; then pitched forward suddenly, his head on the desk, a look of late-come, profound peace on his face. _Chapter Seventeen_ JUST A BOY It was not quite dark when Piney left Miss Sally Madeira in the garden back of Madeira Place, the Grierson letter in the inside band of his hat. The pretty spring day had closed in grey and sullen, and a high wind tore through the bluffs. Up in Canaan people were going anxiously to their windows, and trying to decide what was about to happen out there in that whirl of dust and wind and high-spattering rain. Down at Madeira Place it was grey, windy, and damp, but the rain had not come on yet. Piney went down the bridle-path from the Madeira grounds and out into the river road at a gallop, and the pony sped on like mad toward the little shack down stream at Redbud. All the way Piney kept a watch on the Di, which was sucking and booming. Long before he reached Redbud the boy had begun to hope that Steering had not put through his evening programme to that last number of going back to Redbud by water, after the haunting visit to the waters about Madeira Place. The river seemed very black and restless with the long urge of the spring rains within her. Now and again, he called loudly, prompted by some fear, he knew not what: "Steerin'! Steerin'! Steerin'!" He reached Redbud by and by, to find no Steering, only the little empty shack. The lean bunks, swaddled roughly in their bedding, looked strangely deserted. Piney sat down on Steering's bunk for a moment to take breath. Once his hand patted the covers, and once he stooped down and clung to the pillow. "Oh, may God bless you! For I love him, my dear Piney! Bless you, for I love him, my dear Piney!" he kept saying over and over, with an hysterical quaver in his voice, his lips pale and moving constantly. "Oh, may God bless you, for I love him, my dear Piney!" It was what Salome Madeira had said to him when he had left her, a white, angelic figure, swaying a little toward him, there in the garden back of Madeira Place. "Oh, may God--for I love him!" The odour of Bruce's cigars hung about the shack. Piney jumped up suddenly and went down close to the Di to wait and think. At Redbud the river seemed fiercer than farther up-stream. One of the two skiffs that rocked there usually was there now, swashing up and down in the current, but the other was gone. There was a strong eddy in front of Redbud. The bar, Singing Sand, and the Deerlick Rocks choked up the bed of the river and made the water dash vehemently through a narrow channel. Logs went by and branches of trees. Piney paced the bank in a rising fever of impatience, calling, calling; but for a long time his call was without avail, the wind roared so defeatingly in the trees. Close into Deerlick Rocks drifted a great fleet of logs. "Mist' Steerin'! Mist' Steerin'!" The sweet tenor broke again and again, but again and again Piney pitched a vast effort into it. And, at last, an answer: "Halloo! That you, Uncle Bernique? I've been----" The voice was wind-blown, and slipped weakly away. "It's ME! Where are you?" No answer. "Where are you? Hi! Is that you by the bar? Lif' your han' above the drif'-wood! Cayn't you lif' your han'?" A hand shot up from the back of a log that was well hidden by other flotsam, then fell back weakly. "Ay, here I am! Dead-beat, Piney----" A long roar of wind shut off the rest. "Hold to your log. I'm a-comin'! comin'! comin'!" The tenor rang and rang across the water as Piney loosed the skiff from its moorings, took up the oars, and pushed out into the Di. With the force in that whirl of black water he realised that there was danger; the skiff trembled and leaped as though some wrathful Ægir caught and shook it. It was well for Steering that Piney was strong, with the strength of the hills and the woods and the quiet. As he went on some sort of revulsion seized Piney. He stopped calling and began to mutter blackly. "Wisht you'd draown! Wisht you uz dead! Wish-to-hell, you never needa been!" The log, with its one lamed passenger was drifting slowly in toward Singing Sand, and Piney came on, hard after it. When he reached it at last, Steering was quite speechless, but, with the boy's help, scrambled into the skiff, where he slipped like water to the bottom, the fight back being altogether Piney's. When Steering could talk at all, he gasped out how it had happened. He had gone much farther up than Madeira Place, and had not put his boat about until two hours before; and then only because a great many logs were coming down, and he decided that he did not want to be caught among them when night should drop. He had got along all right until a log smashed into his skiff and overturned him. He thought he must have struck his head as he went over. At any rate, things were very mixed for a good while. He knew that he had swum for what seemed to be hours, and that then he had realised that he was numb, and had used what little strength he had left to climb upon another log that passed him. He had been on it ever since, flat out, an eternity. Piney was getting the skiff inshore fast, as Steering talked, and once Steering stopped to admire his youthful vigour. He was a strong man himself, and it was a new sensation to lie weakly admiring strength in somebody else. "Do you know, Piney, I'm dead-beat," he whispered. "You've had a good deal to stan' in more ways than one to-day," replied Piney. "What do you mean by that?" asked Steering. "We're a'most in." It was only a few minutes later that Piney effected his landing, and, river-lashed and dripping, both scrambled out and fell on the bank by the Redbud shack. For a little while, even Piney was past any further exertion, but when he could use himself again, he got up agilely, hunted up dry wood and made a roaring fire. The twilight had closed into night now; the rain had shifted with the wind and passed by Redbud. Piney brought a blanket from the shack and wrapped Steering in it. Before the fire, Steering lay with his eyes shut for a time, a smile on his face. "You are precious good to stand by me like this, Piney," he said once. "Where have you been for so long, you stingy nigger? Why have you cut me lately?" "Well, I--oh, I d'n know adzackly." Piney's voice was flat, his face tragic. He was heaping wood on the fire, and in the yellow flare he looked pale with the exhaustion of his work on the river and the excitement under which he was labouring. During this last half hour that he had been working hard to save Steering, taking care of him, helping him, he had had another revulsion of feeling that had swung him up close to his hero again. But crisis was still following crisis in his emotions. "Well, you turned up at just the right minute for me, Piney. How did you happen along?" "Oh, I wuz a-huntin' fer you, I reckon. I wuz sent aout to hunt fer you. I gotta letter fer you,--f'm--f'm Miss Madeira." Steering opened his drowsy eyes and regarded Piney. "Yes, I have. I gotta letter fer you. Y'see, Miss Sally, she's found aout sumpin--sumpin that you didn' want her to find aout." The fire leaped and crackled; Bruce leaned away from its scorch, nearer to Piney. "Y'see, she knows abaout the Tigmores naow," went on Piney steadily. "Unc' Bernique didn' tell her. I told her." "Piney!" Steering, warm with wrath, turned upon Piney savagely, "You little fool! You brutal little fool!" he cried fiercely. "It's a good thing that you're just a boy, Piney--and you, _you_! profess to love----" "Mist' Steerin'." Piney had a man's dignity all in a minute. "I didn' ast you fer no leave to tell her, an' I don't ast you fer nothin' naow. But she had to know. I hearn Unc' Bernique tellin' you abaout that Grierson letter. I hearn you read the letter. I hearn you an' Unc' Bernique swear. Then I swore, too. Then I went an' told her. And then she saw her father, an' she leffen it to her father to make things right, an' he's made things right. She told me I wuz to tell you that. She showed him that he was safe to keep the Tigmores if he wanted to keep 'em, but he didn't want to keep 'em. She told me to tell you that. An' she told me to give you this letter." Piney's young body rocked now with a hushed, sobbing fervour; he lifted his peaked hat from his head, took the letter from the inner band, and pushed it into Bruce's hand. "This letter kim to her father a long time ago, and she ast me to ast you to think of her father abaout it gentle as you can--an' I'm a-astin' you to think of him gentle," the lad's voice suddenly rose shrilly, and he jumped to his feet, "an' I'm _a-bustin'_ to have you say you won't think of him gentle, er sumpin 'at I cayn't stan' an 'll hit you fer! I'm jesta boy, Mist' Steerin', but good God!" Bruce got to his feet, too. When he caught Piney's flaming eye at last, they stood and faced each other a great moment, then Bruce put his hand out. "Piney," he said, "I wish I were half the man that you are." "Oh, Mist' Steerin'! Mist' Steerin'!" On Bruce's shoulder, he sobbed like a child until the terrific strain that he had been on for hours slackened, and he could talk again. "She's waitin' fer you," he said at last. "She's up yonder in the garden, waitin'. She loves you, Mist' Steerin'. Don't you go fergit that, with y'all's pride an' all. She loves you." "What? What's that you are saying, Piney?" "She loves you. I know it, Mist' Steerin'. An' I'm a-tellin' ev' durn thing I know!" declared Piney vehemently, with a high-toned, stubborn self-justification in his voice. "Dog-on you, old man," Bruce said, turning to grip Piney's hand again. He had it in mind to say a great many other things, in the way of appreciation, thanks, enthusiasms, but all he said was "dog-on you, old man, dog-on you," gripping Piney's hand as he said it. "You make yourself comfortable here in the shack to-night, will you, old man, and I'll go on up there. They are in a little trouble over this up there, Piney." Steering tore the Grierson letter to bits as he spoke, and, then, his eyes wet and shining, he found Piney's pony and went to her in the garden. Piney lay back on the ground beside the fire. The glow fell squarely over his features, relaxed and softened now. He looked very hopefully and comfortingly young. There was a big, shy gratification on his face. "'Old _man_,'" he muttered once or twice. "'Old _man_.'" A little sob shivered through him. He got up quickly and went into the shack bunk, where he fell asleep at once--because he was so young--and dreamed fine dreams of Italy--because he, too, was fine. _Chapter Eighteen_ A PRETTY PRECARIOUSNESS As Bruce galloped up the river road toward Madeira Place, he found himself so weak with excitement and physical exhaustion, that he had to bow over the saddle-horn and cling there, like an old man. It was a ride to remember. Once he raised his head and looked out into the night. The storm had broken, and high in the quivering heavens the moon shone with a wild, palpitant glory. In the north and east the clouds had gathered with a mighty up-piling, from which the eye sank back affrighted, it towered so near heaven. The trees along the river, the shaking, shimmering river itself, were all shot with light. It was a grand scene, but removed, turbulent, unreal. Steering's strength failed him again, and he fell back over the saddle and hung on. There come times in a man's life, good times as well as bad times, when he can do nothing but hang on. On these dizzying peaks of happiness, Steering scarcely dared let himself look beyond the pony's nose. He was so high up, so near the consummation of--oh--of everything. It would be ridiculously easy to set matters straight now, in one way or another. She loved him! If that were true, it would make everything else come right. And that was true. Piney had been sure of it, and Piney had just left her. Everything else, all life, could be made to close around that salient, delicate fact like the rose-leaves close around the heart of the rose. Let her father keep the hills; he did not care, if he could have the girl. He did not care about anything, if he could have the girl. And he could have the girl. Thank God for that. Little by little he began to allow himself a meagre consciousness that he was drawing nearer, nearer! Now, just below the grounds of Madeira Place! Now, up along the bridle-path! Now, at the garden gate! He leaned over the pony's head, slipped the gate latch, and passed into the garden. Dismounting, he tied the pony, and turned toward the house. Dark, in the shadow of the trees behind it, the house lay very quiet, unlighted, infinitely peaceful. In front of the negro cabin at the side of the house, Bruce could see Samson, his chair tilted against the cabin wall, his pipe in his mouth, his bare feet swinging contentedly. From inside the cabin came the low croon of Samson's fat black wife. Some hens clucked sleepily in the hen-house. With the moonlight disintegrated and softened by the trees, everything up toward the house breathed peace. Out here in the garden, however, where the gold light beat down straightly, there was a sense of waiting, unrest, sweet and tumultuous. Out here in the garden it was glorious, but it was not peaceful. What was it that was responsible for that misty halation of incompleteness, longing? the shaking breath of the wide-lipped roses? the secrets within the bowed slender lilies? the tortured joy of the whole garden life of fragrance and beauty? Over by the old vine-covered stump there was a gleam of white, swaying a little, breathing a little, it seemed, and Steering went toward it, strength coming back into his limbs, his head lifting as he came, his arms outheld. "I hoped that you would come, Mr. Steering. I have been waiting a long time for you," she said, not moving, her eyes meeting his, something in her face, her rigidity, stopping him. Her hands were pale and still on the grey-green of the vines; her face had caught the wild, gold gleam of the moon. "I wanted to tell you myself about that letter, Mr. Steering. I wanted to tell you myself about the Tigmores being yours. I have grown afraid, out here in the dark, that Piney might not have been able to make you understand, might have misled you in some way about--what I said. I was very much excited when I talked to Piney, Mr. Steering, and I am not sure that I made it clear to him that I am very glad indeed that the hills are yours at last; glad because we are--or have been--such good friends, Mr. Steering, glad for that reason--for friendship's sake, and for nothing," her voice wandered, and the beat of her low broad breast was girlishly pitiful, "else, but friend----" she could not go on. "Ship," suggested Bruce, with a great desire to help her, but very much at sea. Was it to be failure, after all? Had Piney made a vast mistake? This proud, pale woman here--suddenly an awful timidity seized him, but he shook himself out of that brusquely and came on. "_She loves you, don't you go fergit that!_" Piney's admonition piped up to him on a high and tuneful memory. He realised that he was walking a path through the flower-tangled, pretty precariousness of romance as he came on toward her--potential lovers' quarrels, separation, the irate parent, a girl's pride, her foolish, solemn effort to fight him back for fear that she had led him on too far, a man's uneasy timidity, the complication of their circumstances--the memory of them all made little snares for his feet, as he came on toward her. But he came on, growing bolder as he came, deciding what to do as he came. It was a crisis for romance as he faced her across the old vine-covered stump. He put his hands down on the stump near her hands, and his face caught the gleam of the light overhead, as hers did. "Piney has just pulled me out of the river," he said in a wan voice, "and it was all I could do to get here. I--I am as shaky as a kitten." She looked up at him, betrayed into it by his careful conservation of that weakness in his voice, and, seeing how pale he was, her hands stole in under his. "Oh, but I am weak, _and_ sick!" he went on, pursuing his advantage mercilessly, his hands closing over hers, while her face leaned toward him, all lit and trembling, "I am weak, but I love you so!" "Ah--h!" she cried, a shaking, joyful cry, "you ought to have said that long ago, Bruce! Tying my hands all winter! _Now_, it doesn't matter which of us owns the old hills, does it?" It was there, under the pale, wild light of the moon, with the wide-lipped roses, the slender-bowed lilies, the tremulous fragrance, the delicate unrest, the tortured joy of the garden's life of beauty all around them, that she crept into his arms shyly and radiantly. The trees rustled with low glad music, and the night air seemed full of mystic influences, blessings, happinesses. From the quiet house beyond, there drifted toward them the sense of late-come, profound peace. _Chapter Nineteen_ WHEN DREAMS COME TRUE There was a vast turmoil in Canaan. For the matter of that, there was a vast turmoil far out the road toward Poetical, and away across Big Wheat Valley, and all over We-all Prairie. The very air was a-tremble. In Canaan all the stores were closed or closing. Court House Square was full of vehicles that seemed poised at the very moment of departure; people were laughing or talking excitedly, with foolish good-humour, as though they did not know what they were saying, but realised that it made precious little difference whether they knew or not. Children were being lifted into waggons, surreys, buggies. Great hampers were being stowed and re-arranged under the seats of the vehicles, sometimes tied to the single-trees to swing there with solemn, heavy gaiety. Young men, very alert, in red neckties and unbuttoned kid gloves, wheeled and turned recklessly through the streets in light road sulkies, drawn by high-stepping trotters. Dogs trotted about with their tails in the air, sniffing, quivering; there was a warm, cutting smell of harness, axle-grease, horse-flesh. The sun beat down upon it all and into it till the whole scene hung electrified, etched out in light, a supreme moment on the very top of Canaan's history. Then a young boy, with a red sash strapped over his right shoulder and under his left arm, cantered up on a pony, pony and boy both tremendously important. "Piney's marshal er the day," said a big man, laughing indulgently. "D'you know the Steerin's air sendin' that tramp-scamp to Italy?" called another man with a bewildered, incredulous inflection in his voice. "Well he cand go fer all me. You couldn' pull me aouter Mizzourah with pothooks these days," declared the big man earnestly. "What's that the tramp-boy's sayin' naow?" The tramp-boy was making a trumpet of his hands. "All ready!" he shouted, with one of his high, musical yodels, "Le's start!" The lesser activities of stowing away hampers, locking store doors, wiping children's noses, broadened quickly into a wide concerted movement. Everybody was picking up his reins. Everybody was clucking to his horse. Every horse was starting. Everybody was gone. Canaan was deserted. A long irregular cavalcade crept out across the country toward Razor Ridge. And as it went it was constantly augmented at the cross-roads by farmers from We-all and Big Wheat and Pewee, until waggons and surreys and buckboards and buggies and horseback riders stretched out endlessly, the balloons of the children, the red neckties of the young men, the gaily flowered hats of the girls making the spectacle joyous. Then, too, everybody was laughing, everybody was glad about something. When the cavalcade began to defile past Madeira Place, wild cheers rang out. Samson at the side of the big house, inspanning the Kentucky blacks, took the demonstration to himself with hysterical joy, bowing and gesticulating, doubling over and holding his stomach, while he danced up and down, his white teeth showing, his eyes rolling. "Hurrah furrum! Hurrah furrum!" came in a great rollicking volume of sound from the road. "Thass all ri'. Yesseh! Thanky! Thass all ri'. Yasseh! You bet!" yelled Samson up by the house. A girl in a gauzy black gown and a drooping black hat came out on the front porch of the house and waved to the passing people. "We'll be along! Yes, we are coming! Yes, we'll hurry!" There were bright tears in the girl's eyes. A man came out of the house and stood behind her, his arm on the door post, his face smiling. She turned to him, the tears in her eyes, the smile on her lips. "Aren't they pretty splendid?" she cried, a fine enthusiasm on her face as she watched the people, "Look at them! There's something in them! There's the best of all America in them! And they will have their chance now." For answer the man put his arm about her. "Greatest State in the Union, this Missouri," he said with tremendous conviction. "Where's Uncle Bernique?" "Gone an hour ago." "Well then, can't we start, too?" The same tingle of impatience seemed to reach both at once. They ran back into the house. The cavalcade wound on up Ridge Road toward the Tigmores. At its far-away end now trotted the Kentucky blacks, drawing a light trap. The man on the box-seat was a big, deep-chested man, long and powerful of forearm. He held the exuberant, snorting blacks easily with one hand. The woman beside him was a good mate for him, firmly knit, strong in her movements. Under her black hat the burnish of her hair and skin made her look gold-dusted. They were high up Razor Ridge. Below the Ridge, Big Wheat Valley and We-all Prairie stretched away from the Tigmore foot-hills in broad strips of harvest gold. The sky was brilliantly blue; even Choke Gulch's glooms were flecked with light. The scrub-oak, the dog-wood, the chinca-pin, the walnut, the hickory, sumach and sassafras trailed over the Tigmores like a giant green veil. On beyond the Tigmores the pale wide Di ran slowly, goldenly, a molten river. As the procession went on up the hill the people called from one waggon to another, their tongues set going by the passing of Madeira Place and the advent of the Kentucky blacks into the procession. "They say Miss Sally, Miz Steerin', that is, feels mighty broke up because her paw didn' live to see all that's a-goin' on this day." "Yass, reckin's haow that's true." "Howdy, Miz Dade, haow you come on?" "Huccome you to come, Asa?" "They say the Steerin's air goin' away to-night. Goin' back East on a visit." "Yass, that's true. The tramp-boy is goin' along. D'you know that? Yass, goin' to N'York, on his way to Italy. The Steerin's air sendin' him." "Well, they cand all go whur they please, I wouldn' leave Mizzourah these days, not me. Wy, ev' farm in the Tigmores is liable to turn into a zinc mine any night. Say, do you know air the Steerin's to be long gone?" "Nope, not so long. Unc' Bernique's to run things while they away." "Oh, well, then." The cavalcade's forerunners had now reached the top of the Tigmore Uplift. They began to deploy into the woods overhanging Choke Gulch. A trail had been cut, the trees were down until it was possible to get through with the vehicles, though it was rough going. At the end of the newly made road a great clearing opened up to the on-coming people. The teams were driven over to a thicket and the people spilled out of the vehicles and swarmed over the clearing. One by one, then two by two, in their hurry, the teams came in, until everybody had arrived. The Kentucky blacks came last. Then there was a waiting, a restraint, the people looked at one another. Finally their uneasiness and unspoken question were answered by an edict from the mouth of a small upright Frenchman, who mounted a stump and declaimed with a great flourish of graceful pomposity: "'Tis the wish of Mistaire and Meez Steering that none go to the mill until that the bar-r-becue shall be end." He was generously applauded and his fine shoulders stiffened responsively. This was the sort of thing that François Placide DeLassus Bernique liked. The people contented themselves within the clearing the little time that remained of the morning. At one side of the clearing, fenced off by ropes, was a long trench, across which stretched poles of tough green hickory. On top of these poles lay great quarters of beeves, whole hogs, slit through the belly and spread wide till the dressed flesh wrinkled into the back-bone in thick layers, sheep, tongues, venison, an army's rations. Down in the trench glowed the red-hot coals of a vast Vulcan fire, set going the night before and fed and beaten all night into its present perfect equability. Up and down the sides of the trench walked men in great aprons, long-handled brushes, like white-wash brushes, in their hands. These brushes they dipped into buckets of salt and pepper, strung along the trench at regular intervals, and smeared the sizzling meat, a sort of Titanic seasoning process. Rough pine boards, supported on tree stumps, formed long lines of tables on which loaves of bread were piled two feet high. Beside the bread were great buckets of pickles, preserves, jams, whole churns of butter, cheeses, cakes, pies, hundreds and hundreds of them, as though the whole world had become one enormous maw with an enormous clamour for food. The rich aroma of the sizzling meat and the slow sweet scorch of the green hickory poles drifted up into the trees and hung there, a visible odour, tantalising, insistent. The men who had got into their wives' aprons and had begun to cut sandwiches at the long tables were invited to hurry up. The men who were varnishing the meat with salt and pepper were told that they were too slow. The boys who had begun cracking ice were applauded. The girls who had begun to squeeze lemons were offered help. The women who had begun to set out knives and forks and plates were interrupted and set back by hoots of encouragement. Children were stepped on and soothed, a continuous performance. The committee-on-cooking got in the way of the committee-on-washing-the-dishes; the committee-on-waiting-on-the-table almost came to blows with the committee-on-slicing-the-bread. Toward noon the scramble for places began. Then the people began to gorge. There was a constant reaching and grabbing. The clearing resounded with phrases of intricate politeness: "Thank you to trouble you fer one them pickles, Si." "Please'm gi' me a little your tongue, Miz Dade." "Reach me some more bread, if you don't care whut you do, Quin." Beyond the long tables little private parties sat here and there, ranged around red table-cloths, flat on the ground, stuffing, greasy-fingered, hospitable, happy. Beyond these little parties, off in the young trees, in the buggies and buck-boards, were still smaller parties, the red-necktie young men and the girls with bright flowers in their hats, two and two, two and two, all through the thicket, each duet very happy, drinking out of one tin cup, the red-necktie young man assiduously putting his lips to the cup on the spot where the girl's lips had touched it. Everybody ate incessantly. At first to appease hunger; then probably because of a dim prevision that by the middle of next week some reproachful memory might assail one if one did not do one's full part by the present abundance. It was not until the sun had long passed the zenith that the gorging and stuffing came to an end, and then it was only because word began to circulate among the people that "the mill was open"; that "the people could go down now," in fine, that the great hour of that great day had come. Following upon the rumour, François Placide DeLassus Bernique again mounted a stump. This time he said: "I am authorise' to make to you the announcement that the first mill of the Canaan Mining and Development Company is now to commence to r-r-un, and to invite you in the name of Mistaire Steering to assemble in the Choke Gulch, there to behold the begin' of a new e-r-a of pr-r-osperitee for thees gr-r-eat State of Missouri. But before that we go, I ask your attention for the one moment to those word of our fellow-citizen, Mistaire Steering!" He stopped, reluctantly but heroically, and Steering, quitting the side of the girl in black, mounted the stump. "Ladies and gentlemen," said Steering, "it was my wife's idea to make the opening of the first mill of the Canaan Mining and Development Company a gala day, a holiday, and I believe that you are all prepared to agree with me that it was a good idea. All that I want to say to you now for myself and for Mr. Carington, and for the eastern gentlemen whose money Mr. Carington represents, is just this: A great opportunity has opened up for us all down here. A new Missouri is about to be made. All our dreams are coming true. The golden harvest of our wheat fields has been found to be rooted deep in mines of wonderful richness. But just because we have found something inside these hills of ours, don't let's neglect the outside of the hills. We must cultivate and improve on the outside, while we dig down deep on the inside. Life is going to give us chances from now on that we have never had before. As a people we must rise to these chances all along the line. We must come up all along the line. We must get better schools, better houses, better barns, better farming implements, better kitchen implements, better roads. Our watchword down here in the Southwest must be to _come up_. Don't forget it. We've got our chance now, now we must come up!" Bruce sat down and the people, who had listened to him attentively, the faces of the farm-women especially keen and responsive, broke into another vast applause that set the leaves astir. Somebody began to insist then that somebody else ought to make a speech of thanks, appreciation, to the Steerings for the day, and for the general satisfaction and prosperity that had come into Canaan with the new régime of the Canaan Company's affairs. Everybody began to turn toward Mr. Quin Beasley. Those nearest him nudged him. Very slowly Mr. Beasley got to his feet, mounted the stump, fell off and mounted it again. "Frien's an'," Mr. Beasley's scared eye lit upon some children just beneath him who were regarding him with awe and the ecstatic hope that he would fall off again, and, encouraged by the awe, he levelled his next words at them powerfully, "Fellow Citizens! Taint fer me to say anythin' more ceppen only that ef I did say anythin', which I shan't, it 'ud jes be to say over whut Mist' Steerin' has said as bein' the whole thing, an fer that reason I'll say nothin'." It was a master stroke! Never in his life before had Beasley refrained from saying anything because he had nothing to say. The Canaanites were impressed. They said, "Good! Good!" For fear of some anticlimax Bruce at once gave his signal and the people began to swarm down the hillside into Choke Gulch, defiling through the Gulch toward a great shed that stood backed up to the hillside arrogantly. Although all Canaan had watched the building and rigging day by day, in Choke Gulch, the sight of the shed made the people almost hysterical, as though they had never seen the "plant" of the Canaan Mining and Development Company before, the shack office, the tool-house, the big proud mill shed, the tramway, the hoister. There was a group already ranged at the door of the engine-room as the people came on. Bruce Steering and his wife, Old Bernique, and the tramp-boy were in the centre of the group. "We are all steamed up!" cried Bruce. "Make ready there, boys! Hurrah for the greatest zinc run in the greatest State in the Union! _Now_, Piney!" The tramp-boy, on his face an unaccustomed appreciation of this larger side of the workaday world, stepped back inside the engine-room, laid his hand on a throttle, and at the signal, as if by magic, there was a whirr of slipping bands, a mighty throb, the renewed fashing of water down the jigs, a grinding, a pounding, a crunching, a gurgling; and a long, resonant shout went up again and again from the elastic throats of the exalted Canaanites; for the first mill of the Canaan Mining and Development Company was running! Later on someone over in the crowd spoke. "Pity Mist' Crit Madeira aint here to see all this. Haow he woulda taken to it. That son-in-law of his woulda jes adzackly suited Mist' Crit. Pity he had to die off sudden-like jes whend ev'thing wuz comin' araoun'." It was a woman's voice and it was all softened with pity. "Yass, oh yass," said a man next her gingerly. He was a man who had not believed in Crit Madeira, but it occurred to him that this was not the time or the place to recall that. The evening of that gala day was a glorious evening. Rich and warm and beautiful, self-indulgent nature had swaddled herself about in barbaric bands of colour, a drowsy opulence of green and scarlet, soft-toned amber and pale, veiled azure. It was an hour when the senses riot in carnival, when colour sings and sound seems pink and gold, when light is fragrant and flowers emit sparks of light. Steering and his wife stood in the Garden of Dreams and the hour swirled up to them out of the sunset, mystical, urgent, sweet. The house was shut and locked behind them. Below them was the shivering Di. Off beyond them tumbled the Canaan Tigmores. Canaan, the proud, lay to the West in a fecund waiting. "Do you know," said Steering, "I do not like to leave Missouri, Sally, not even for a little while, not even to show you to Carington and Elsie. We've no business along with brides and grooms anyway, we've been married two months. I wish we weren't going to leave Missouri, Sally." She turned her face up to him banteringly; her travelling hat was in her hand; above her black gown her bright hair shone with its beautiful lustres. "They must get along without you here for a little while, Mr. President of the Canaan Mining and Development Company. I need some clothes." "Lay hold on my title gently, please, Mrs. Steering. Every time I hear it I feel that it needs more glue." "Mrs. Steering! That's something of a title, too, isn't it? But, after all, who is so proud of newcome titles as the Superintendent of the Gulch Mine, François Placide DeLassus Bernique, eh, Mistaire Steering?" "Old chap's satisfaction is good to live in. Oh, we are all happy, happy! Elsie and Carington seem to be hitting it off well, too, don't they?" Steering heaved a benevolent sigh, as though he felt that he had missed something whose missing was little short of escape. He regarded the magnificent, glowing woman beside him worshipfully. "Hark!" he cried next, "Piney's happy too, dear boy. That's the best of all! Hear that!" From the river road below the garden came the sound of the pony's galloping feet and down by the sheen of the river, the tramp-boy was outlined presently, a gallant young figure, full of life and fire. "I'm a-goin' to meet you at the station," he called up to them. "I'm a-sayin' good-bye to Mizzourah! D'you think Italy's a-goin' to beat this, Miss Sally?" He indicated the shimmering river, the woods beyond, the wonderful sky in the west, with a half-homesick gesture, then dashed on down the river road, gay with anticipation again, carolling the potato song lustily: "_The taters grow an' grow, they grow!_" "That was a fine idea of yours, Sally, to send him to Italy. I suppose he will have to be disappointed, for Italy, with him, is all dream-stuff; still, life would never have been fulfilled for Piney without Italy." "No, it wouldn't. And he won't be disappointed. You see, it's the music in him. That will count big some day. And Italy is the place for him to find himself. He won't be disappointed, and we shan't be disappointed in him. He is worth his chance. But see how low the sun is, Bruce. We, too, must say good-bye to Missouri now, if we are to make the train. Take your last look until we come back to it all." The fragrance trembled about them. The pale wide Di quivered below them. Far to the west flamed the sunset. Down through the ether dropped great swaying draperies of orange and purple. Fair into the heart of heaven unrolled a path of violet and blue and rose. Young, ancestral, sweet, she stood there beside him, his. Steering turned his eyes from the dusky-gold radiance of her face and hair to the land beyond, where his hills billowed toward him with mighty promise, submerging him again, reclaiming him, as they had done on a lonely day not one year gone, making a Missourian of him, as it had done on that day. The girl, the land, he, all the world, seemed banded in a golden irradiation. "Oh, Missouri! Missouri!" he cried, with a joyful, trembling, upleaping of spirit, his arms shut close about his wife, his eyes coming back to her as to the spirit of this new and wonderful West, "You glorious State! You sweet, wide land! I adore you!" THE END. * * * * * ADVERTISEMENTS * * * * * By Henry Harland Author of "The Cardinal's Snuff Box" MY FRIEND PROSPERO A novel which will fascinate by the grace and charm with which it is written, by the delightful characters that take part in it, and by the interest of the plot. The scene is laid in a magnificent Austrian castle in North Italy, and that serves as a background for the working out of a sparkling love-story between a heroine who is brilliant and beautiful and a hero who is quite her match in cleverness and wit. It is a book with all the daintiness and polish of Mr. Harland's former novels, and other virtues all its own. Frontispiece in colors by Louis Loeb. $1.50 * * * * * McClure, Phillips & Co. * * * * * By Stanley J. Weyman Author of "A Gentleman of France" THE LONG NIGHT Geneva in the early days of the 17th century; a ruffling young theologue new to the city; a beautiful and innocent girl, suspected of witchcraft; a crafty scholar and metaphysician seeking to give over the city into the hands of the Savoyards; a stern and powerful syndic whom the scholar beguiles to betray his office by promises of an elixir which shall save him from his fatal illness; a brutal soldier of fortune; these are the elements of which Weyman has composed the most brilliant and thrilling of his romances. Claude Mercier, the student, seeing the plot in which the girl he loves is involved, yet helpless to divulge it, finds at last his opportunity when the treacherous men of Savoy are admitted within Geneva's walls, and in a night of whirlwind fighting saves the city by his courage and address. For fire and spirit there are few chapters in modern literature such as those which picture the splendid defence of Geneva, by the staid, churchly, heroic burghers, fighting in their own blood under the divided leadership of the fat Syndic, Baudichon, and the bandy-legged sailor, Jehan Brosse, winning the battle against the armed and armored forces of the invaders. Illustrated by Solomon J. Solomon. $1.50 * * * * * McClure, Phillips & Co. * * * * * By Henry Seton Merriman Author of "The Sowers," etc. BARLASCH OF THE GUARD The story is set in those desperate days when the ebbing tide of Napoleon's fortunes swept Europe with desolation. Barlasch--"Papa Barlasch of the Guard, Italy, Egypt, the Danube"--a veteran in the Little Corporal's service--is the dominant figure of the story. Quartered on a distinguished family in the historic town of Dantzig, he gives his life to the romance of Desirée, the daughter of the family, and Louis d'Arragon, whose cousin she has married and parted with at the church door. Louis's search with Barlasch for the missing Charles gives an unforgettable picture of the terrible retreat from Russia; and as a companion picture there is the heroic defence of Dantzig by Rapp and his little army of sick and starving. At the last Barlasch, learning of the death of Charles, plans and executes the escape of Desirée from the beleaguered town to join Louis. Illustrated by the Kinneys. $1.50 * * * * * McClure, Phillips & Co. * * * * * By A. Conan Doyle Author of "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" THE ADVENTURES OF GERARD Stories of the remarkable adventures of a Brigadier in Napoleon's army. In Etienne Gerard, Conan Doyle has added to his already famous gallery of characters one worthy to stand beside the notable Sherlock Holmes. Many and thrilling are Gerard's adventures, as related by himself, for he takes part in nearly every one of Napoleon's campaigns. In Venice he has an interesting romantic escapade which causes him the loss of an ear. With the utmost bravery and cunning he captures the Spanish city of Saragossa; in Portugal he saves the army; in Russia he feeds the starving soldiers by supplies obtained at Minsk; after a wonderful ride. Everywhere else he is just as marvelous, and at Waterloo he is the center of the whole battle. For all his lumbering vanity he is a genial old soul and a remarkably vivid story-teller. Illustrated by W. B. Wollen. $1.50 * * * * * McClure, Phillips & Co.