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[Illustration: She reached out smiling wistfully and touched him with
her hand.]
SHADOW MOUNTAIN
BY
DANE COOLIDGE
AUTHOR OF THE DESERT TRAIL, ETC.
FRONTISPIECE BY
GEORGE W. GAGE
[Illustration]
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS NEW YORK
COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY
W. J. WATT & COMPANY
CONTENTS
Chapter Page
I. The Last of Ten Thousand 1
II. The Shotgun Widow 10
III. The Shadow 22
IV. The Ghost Man 30
V. A Load of Buckshot 38
VI. All Crazy 48
VII. Between Friends 58
VIII. The Tip 68
IX. A Peace Talk 78
X. The Best Head in Town 89
XI. A Touch 98
XII. The Expert 106
XIII. A Sack of Cats 118
XIV. The Explosion 127
XV. The God of Ten Per Cent 135
XVI. A Showdown With the Widow 143
XVII. Peace--and the Price 151
XVIII. On Christmas Day 160
XIX. The Enigma 170
XX. An Appeal To Charley 179
XXI. The Dragon's Teeth 187
XXII. Virginia Explains--Nothing 196
XXIII. On Demand 204
XXIV. Double Trouble 214
XXV. Virginia Repents 223
XXVI. The Call 231
XXVII. The Thunder Clap 239
XXVIII. The Way Out 248
XXIX. Across Death Valley 259
XXX. An Evening With Socrates 269
XXXI. The Broken Trust 279
XXXII. A Huff 290
XXXIII. The Fiery Furnace 299
XXXIV. A Clean-up 305
SHADOW MOUNTAIN
CHAPTER I
THE LAST OF TEN THOUSAND
Under the rim of Shadow Mountain, embraced like a pearl of great price
by the curve of Bonanza Point and the mined-out slope of Gold Hill, the
deserted city of Keno lay brooding and silent in the sun. A dry, gusty
wind, swooping down through the northern pass, slammed the great iron
fire-doors that hung creaking from the stone bank building, caught up a
cloud of sand and dirt and, whirling it down past empty stores and assay
offices, deposited it in the doorways of gambling houses and dance
halls, long since abandoned to the rats. An old man, pottering about
among the ruins, gathered up some broken boards and hobbled off; and
once more Keno, the greatest gold camp the West has ever seen, sank back
to silence and dreams.
A round of shots wakened the echoes of Shadow Mountain; a lonely miner
came down the trail from Gold Hill, where in the old days the Paymaster
had turned out its million a month; and then, far out across the floor
of the desert on the road that led in from the railroad, there appeared
an arrow-point of dust. It grew to a racing streak of white, the distant
purring of the motor gave way to a deep-voiced thunder and as the
powerful car glided swiftly up the street the doors of old houses opened
unexpectedly and the last of ten thousand looked out.
There were old men and cripples, left stranded by the exodus; and
prospectors who had moved into the vacant houses along with the other
desert rats; but out on the gallery of the old Huff mansion--where the
creepers still clung to the lattice--there was a flutter of white and a
girl came out with a kitten in her arms. In the days of gold--when ten
thousand men, the choice spirits of two hemispheres, had tramped down
this same deserted street--the house of Colonel Huff, the discoverer of
the Paymaster, had been the social center of Keno. And so it was still,
for the Widow Huff remained; but across the front of the hospitable
gallery where the Colonel had entertained the town, a cheap cloth sign
announced meals fifty cents and Virginia, his daughter, was the waiter.
She stood by the sign, still high-headed and patrician, and when the
driver of the car saw her he came to a sudden stop. He was long and
gaunt, with deep lines around his mouth from bucking the wind and dust
and after a moment's hesitation he threw on his brake and leapt out.
"Did you want something?" she asked and, glancing warily about, he
nodded and came up the steps.
"Yes," he said, still eying her doubtfully, "what's the chance for
something to eat?"
"Why, good," she answered with a suspicion of a smile. "Or--well, come
in; I'll speak to mother."
She showed him into the spacious dining room, where the Colonel had
once presided in state, and hurried into the kitchen. The young man
gazed after her, looked swiftly about the room and backed away towards
the door; then his strong jaw closed down, he smiled grimly to himself
and sat down unbidden at a table. The table was mahogany and, in a
case against the wall, there was a scant display of cut glass; but the
linen was worn thin and the expensive velvet carpet had been ruined by
hob-nailed boots. Heavy workingmen's dishes lay on the tables, the
plating was worn from the knives, and the last echoing ghost of
vanished gentility was dispelled by a voice from the kitchen. It was
the Widow Huff, once the first lady of Keno, but now a boarding-house
cook.
"What--a dinner now? At half-past three? And with this wind fairly
driving me crazy? Well, I can't _hire_ anybody to keep such hours
for _me_ and----"
There was a murmur of low-voiced protest as Virginia pleaded his cause
and then, as the Widow burst out anew, the young man pushed back his
chair. His blue eyes, half hidden beneath bulging brows, turned a
steely, fighting gray, his wind-blown hair fairly bristled; and as he
listened to the last of the Widow's remarks his lower lip was thrust up
scornfully.
"You danged old heifer," he muttered and then the kitchen door flew
open. The baleful look which he had intended for the Widow was surprised
on his face by Virginia and after a startled moment she closed the door
behind her.
"Why--Wiley Holman!" she cried accusingly and a challenge leapt into his
eyes.
"Well?" he demanded and gazed at her sullenly as she scanned him from
head to foot.
"I knew it," she burst out. "I'd know that stubborn look anywhere! You
double up your lip like your father. Honest John!" she added
sarcastically and brushed some crumbs from the table.
"Yes--Honest John!" he retorted. "And you don't need to say it like
that, either. He's my father--I know him--and I'll tell you right now he
never cheated a man in his life."
"Well, he did!" she flared back, her eyes dark with anger, "and I'll
bet--I'll bet if my father was here he'd--he'd prove it to your face!"
She ended in a sob and as he saw the tears starting the son of Honest
John relented.
"Aw, Virginia," he pleaded, "what's the use of always fighting? He's
gone now, so let's be friends. I was just going by when I saw you on the
gallery, and I thought--well, let's you and I be friends."
"What? After old Honest John robbed Papa of the Paymaster, and then
hounded him to his death on the desert?"
"He did nothing of the kind--he never robbed anybody! And as for
hounding your father to his death, the Old Man never even knew about it.
He was down on the ranch, and when they told him the news----"
"Yes, that's you," she railed, stifling back her sobs, "you can always
prove an alibi. But you'd better drift, Mr. Holman; because if mother
knows you're here----"
"Well, what?" he demanded, truculently.
"She'll fill you full of buckshot."
"Pah!" he scoffed and snapped his fingers in the air, after which he
lapsed into silence.
"Well, she will," she asserted, after waiting for him to speak, but
Wiley only grunted.
"Wait till I get that dinner," he said at last and slumped down into a
chair. He muttered to himself, gazing dubiously towards the kitchen, and
turned impatiently to look at some specimens in a case against the wall.
They were the usual chunks of high-grade gold ore, but he examined one
piece with great care.
"Where'd you get this?" he asked, holding up a piece of white rock, and
she sighed and brushed away her tears.
"Over on the dump," she answered wearily. "That's all Paymaster ore.
Don't you think you'd better go?"
"Never ran away yet," he answered briefly and balanced the rock in his
hand. "Pretty heavy," he observed, "I'll bet it would assay. Have you
got very much on the dump?"
"What--_that_?" she cried, snatching the specimen away from him and
bursting into a nervous laugh. "That assay? Well, you are a
greenie--it's nothing but barren white quartz!"
"Oh, it is, eh?" he rejoined and gazed at her hectoringly. "You seem to
know a whole lot about mineral."
"Yes, I do," she boasted. "Death Valley Charley teaches me. I've learned
how to pan, and everything. But that rock there--that's the barren
quartz that the Paymaster ran into when the values went out of the ore.
Old Charley knows all about it."
"Yes, they all do," he observed and as his lip went up her eyes dilated
suddenly in a panic.
"Oh, you went to that school--I forgot all about it--where they study
about the mines! Are you in the mining business now?"
"Why, yes," he acknowledged, "but that doesn't make much difference. I
find I can learn something from most everybody."
"Well, of course, then," she stammered, "I shouldn't have said that; but
the whole Paymaster dump is covered with that heavy quartz, and
everybody knows it's barren. Are you just looking around or----"
She hesitated politely and as he reached for another specimen she
noticed a ring on his finger. It was of massive gold and, set in
clutching claws, there were three stupendous diamonds. Not imitation
stones nor small, off-colored diamonds, but brilliants of the very first
water, clear as dew, yet holding in their hearts the faintest suggestion
of blue.
"Oh!" she gasped, and as he did not seem to notice, she drew her skirts
away with a flourish. "I'm surprised," she mocked, "that you condescend
to speak to us--of course you own your own mines!"
"Nope," he replied, shrugging his shoulders at her sarcasm, "I'm nothing
but a prospector, yet. And you don't need to be so surprised."
"No!" she retorted, giving way to swift resentment. "I guess I
don't--when you consider how you got your money. Here's Mother out
cooking for you, and I'm the waiter; and you're traveling around in
racing cars with thousand-dollar rings on your hands. But if old
Honest John hadn't sold all his stock while he was advising my father
to hold on----"
"He did not!"
"Yes, he did! He did, too! And now, after Father has been lost in Death
Valley, and we have come down to this, your father writes over and
offers to buy our stock for just the same as nothing. That's _my_
ring you're wearing, and the money that paid for it----"
"Oh, all right then," he sneered, stripping off the ring and handing it
abruptly over to her, "if it's your ring, take it! But don't you say my
father----"
"Well, he did," she declared, "and you can keep your old ring! It won't
bring back my father--now!"
"No, it won't," he agreed, "but while we're about it I just want to tell
you something. My father went broke, buying back Paymaster stock from
friends he'd advised to go in--and he's got the stock to prove it--and
when he heard that the Colonel was dead he decided to buy in your
mother's. He mortgaged his cows to raise the money for her and then that
old terror--I don't care if she is your mother--she slapped him in the
face by refusing it. Well, he didn't like to say anything, but you can
tell her from me she don't have to cook unless she wants to! She can
sell--or buy--a hundred thousand shares of Paymaster any day she says
the word; and if that isn't honest I don't know what is! I ask you, now;
isn't that fair?"
"What, at ten cents a share? When it used to sell for forty dollars!
He's just trying to get control of the mine. And as for offering to buy
or sell, that's perfectly ludicrous, because he knows we haven't any
money!"
"Well, what _do_ you want?" he demanded irritably, and then he thrust
up his lip. "I know," he said, "you want your own way! All right, I'll
never trouble you again. You can keep right on guarding that
hole-in-the-ground until you dry up and blow away across the desert.
And as for that old she-devil----"
He paused at a sudden slam from the kitchen, and Virginia's eyes grew
big; but as he rose to face the Widow Huff he slipped the white rock
into his pocket.