It is not a little remarkable that the six dwellers in Gold Cave Camp
should represent four of the five types into which scientists divide the
human race, but this though curious in itself, is not nearly so much so
as their being residents of this sparsely settled wilderness, and
living, as it were, in caves in the depths of the earth.
Mr. Willett had been a merchant in Detroit, Michigan, where his only
child, Sam, was born.
He had been very happy in his married life and very prosperous in his
business; but, alas, for the stability of human affairs, his wife died.
Following this awful calamity came a series of reverses in business
which no human foresight could prevent. His property was swept away, and
in his fortieth year he found himself a poor man, with a son to educate
and care for and all life's battle to fight over again.
Mr. Willett had been educated as a mining engineer, and though he had
never followed his profession he, very naturally, looked to it as a
means of support when all his other resources were gone.
In the days of his great distress and perplexity he read of sudden
fortunes being made in the newly-discovered gold fields of the San Juan
country in Southwestern Colorado, and thither he determined to go.
Although still in the prime of life, Mr. Willett concentrated all the
love of his brave heart on his son and resolved to devote his time and
thought to his care and education.
Sam's maternal grandfather, Mr. Shirley, was a very rich, but a very
morose and eccentric old man, who chose never to become reconciled to
his daughter's marriage to Mr. Willett. But when Sam's mother died, the
old gentleman offered to adopt his grandson and make him his sole heir,
if the father would consent to renounce all claims to him.
In his son's interest Mr. Willett might have considered this proposal
favorably had not Sam himself upset the scheme by saying stoutly:
"Father, do not ask me to leave you, for I feel it would be sending me
to death. If you go to the West, I shall go with you. There are only two
of us left, why should we be parted?"
Mr. Willett replied to this query by kissing his son, and so it was
settled that they should go to the West together.
Ike was an orphan lad who, in some inexplicable way, had drifted up to
Michigan from Kentucky. Mr. Willett found and cared for the boy, and he
repaid this generosity by a fidelity and devotion worthy of all praise.
Mr. Willett could see no use for Ike in the West, but when the time for
departure came, the black boy appeared at the depot with an old hunting
bag, containing all his clothing, slung at his back, and a
remarkable-looking shot-gun folded in his arms.
"Dar's no use a talkin' to me, boss," he said to Mr. Willett, when that
gentleman expressed his surprise at the boy's appearance. "Ize bound to
go 'long wid Mistah Sam. Oh, don't yeh feel skeat 'bout de cash foh de
passage. Ize got ebery cent I ever earned stored away har; its more'n
fifty dollar, an' I'll foot de bills till de las' red cent's gone."
In proof of this bold statement, Ike drew from the depths of his
trousers' pockets a bag containing several pounds weight of bronze,
nickel and silver coins.
Ike found an eloquent advocate in Sam; and so it came about that at the
very last moment Mr. Willett decided to take the colored boy with him,
though he could not be made to avail himself of the generous fellow's
hoardings.
The three went to Denver, thence over the Rocky range to St. Luis Park,
and over the Sierra Madre mountains to the San Juan country.
They had procured horses to ride on, and two pack mules to carry their
supplies and mining tools.
While at Port Garland in the St. Luis Park, they met with Hank Tims and
the Ute boy, Ulna, who was a nephew of the great chief Uray, whom the
writer of this narrative knew very well and greatly admired.
Hank Tims and Ulna were themselves thinking about going into the San
Juan country, and, as they were well acquainted with that region and
appeared to take to Mr. Willett's party at once, they were readily
induced to join his expedition.
It would be out of place in this brief but essential review to recount
all the adventures that beset our friends till they reached the scene of
their proposed labors.
After much wandering, they found Gold Cave Camp, but it was in the
possession of a wild, dissolute fellow named Tom Edwards.
As Edwards was working his claim all alone and was eager to leave it,
Mr. Willett bought him out at his own price, and at once made
preparations to pan for such gold as might be found in the bed of the
canyon.
A few days after the commencement of operations, Wah Shin appeared in
the camp.
He looked as if he had been blown in from the bleak hills, but he
managed to explain in his broken English that he had lost himself coming
up from Santa Fe, and that he was a first-class cook.
He asked for "a job," but even before Mr. Willett had made up his mind
to hire him, he set to work to give an exhibition of his skill; and the
result was so entirely satisfactory that he was retained on his own
terms.
But it is much easier to explain the presence of these people than it is
to account for the strange home in which they lived.
Learned men claim that long before the coming of the white men to this
continent, long, indeed, before the coming of the Indians, that there
was a strange race of people in that Western land, whom, for the want of
a better name, they call "The Cave Dwellers."
But no matter how formed, or by whom they were first inhabited, these
caves--they are quite common in that land--made ready and comfortable
homes for the mining adventurers.
Those occupied by Mr. Willett and his associates, consisted of a series
of eight apartments, all opening on the plateau and all connected by
passage ways that must have been the work of human hands.
The apartments were circular in shape, and the largest, which was used
as a kitchen and general store room, was about twenty feet in diameter
and ten feet in height.
As before stated there was an ample spring of delicious cool water in
this apartment, and the original hewers of the caves, no doubt, selected
the place on this account.
After a hearty supper, Mr. Willett and Hank Tims lit their pipes and sat
before the fire, for though the days are warm in this land the nights
are unusually cool.
Drift wood, picked up from the crevices of the rocks in which it had
been lodged by floods caused by the melting of snow in the mountains,
constituted the fuel of the camp, and the great pile near the fire
showed that it was to be had in abundance.
All had been working hard that day, so after a desultory talk about the
great success that was meeting their search for gold, they lay down on
their blanket cots in the other apartments and went to sleep--that is,
all but Sam and his father.
Mr. Willett and his son slept together in the nearest room, but though
they lay down side by side they did not go to sleep at once.
"Sam," said Mr. Willett in a troubled voice, "since you left this
morning that fellow, Tom Edwards, has been here again."
"What did he want?" asked Sam.
"He appeared to be drunk, and he threatened to kill me if I did not give
him more money."
"But you have paid him the price agreed on?"
"Yes."
"Then I should not heed him."
"Still, I am afraid he will cause me trouble, so, to-morrow, I will ride
over to Hurley's Gulch and consult a lawyer, and as that is our nearest
market and post-office, I will take Hank and Ulna along with two pack
mules so as to carry back supplies."
"That is forty miles away, so that you will be gone several days. But if
you must go, father, I will do the best I can while you are absent,"
said Sam, laying his hand soothingly on his father's broad breast.
"I know you will, my boy, but there is another matter I wished to speak
with you about."
"What is that, father?"
"Why, this Tom Edwards brought me a letter from your grandfather's
lawyer in Michigan. It tells me that the old man is dead, and that in
his will he leaves all his property to you, but you are not to have a
cent of it till you are twenty-one years of age----"
"Four years and a half, dear father!" cried the excited Sam.
"But," continued Mr. Willett, "the will further says that if you should
die in the meantime that the property is to go to your grandfather's
nephew, Frank Shirley."
"A bad, disreputable man to whom neither you nor mother would speak,"
said Sam.
"He is all that, I fear, and it troubles me to learn from Edwards that
Frank Shirley has recently come into this land," said Mr. Willett.