“STEVE CARSON--POOR DEVIL!”
Gary went down ten feet at an incline so sharp he could not carry
the muck up in the buckets he had expected to use for the purpose.
He knew, because he spent two perspiring hours in the attempt. Could
he have done it, it would have been slow, toilsome work. But at
least he could have gone down. He would not take the time to
experiment with a ladder. To carry the necessary material up the
bluff and build a thing would consume the best part of a day, and
the richness of the vein bred impatience that could not brook delay.
He therefore decided to crosscut on the side where the vein showed
the highest values and continue throwing out the muck. It would be
slow, but Gary was thankful that he could make headway working by
himself. So he drilled a round of holes in the left wall of the
shaft, with the quartz and porphyry in the center of the face of the
proposed crosscut. The vein on that side was wider, and the values
were fully as high as on the other. He was pleased with his plan and
tried to remember all he had learned about mining, so that he would
waste neither time, effort, nor ore.
It takes practice to handle dynamite to the best advantage, and Gary
did not always shoot the gangue cleanly away from the ore, but mixed
some of his richest values with the muck. To offset that, he used
the pick as much as possible and sorted the ore carefully at the
bottom of the incline shaft, before he threw it to the surface.
Any experienced miner would have made better footage in a day, but
it is doubtful if any man would have put in longer shifts or worked
harder. And it is a great pity that Patricia could not have watched
him for a day and appreciated the full strength of his devotion to
her interests.
At the end of ten days, Gary had gone five feet into his crosscut,
and was hoping to make better footage now that his muscles had
adjusted themselves somewhat to the labor. His hands, too, had
hardened amazingly. Altogether, Gary felt that he was justified in
thinking mighty well of himself. There were so many things for which
he was thankful, and there were so few for which he felt regret.
He did not even worry about Patricia, now that he was accomplishing
something really worth while for her. It amused him to picture
Patricia’s astonishment when he returned to Los Angeles and told her
that he had investigated Johnnywater ranch very carefully, and that
she could not expect to make a nickel running cattle over there. He
would tell her that his hunch had been a bird. He dramatized for
himself her indignation and chuckled at the way she would fly at him
for daring to convince her that she had made a foolish investment.
Then, when she had called him a lot of names and argued and squared
her chin--_then_ he would tell her that he had found the makings of a
wedding ring at Johnnywater, and that he would expect her finger to
be ready for it the minute it was cool enough to wear. After he had
teased her sufficiently, he would tell her how he and the pinto cat
had located “The Pat Connolly” mine; he would ask her for the job of
general manager, because he would want to make sure that half of
Patricia’s millions were not being stolen from her.
Now that the cañon held a potential fortune, Gary could appreciate
its picturesque setting and could contemplate with pleasure the
prospect of spending long summers there with Patricia. He would
locate sufficient claims to protect the cañon from an influx of
strangers, and they would have it for their own special little
corner of the world. It is astonishing how prosperity will change a
man’s point of view.
Six feet into the crosscut, Gary’s round of holes shot unexpectedly
through hard rock into a close-packed mass of broken malapi. The
stuff had no logical right to be there, breaking short off the
formation and vein. Had the vein pinched out and the malapi come in
gradually, he might have seen some geologic reason for the change.
But the whole face of his crosscut opened up malapi bowlders and
“nigger-heads.”
Gary filled his two buckets and carried them out into the shaft,
dumping them disgustedly on the floor. It was like being shaken out
of a blissful dream. He would have given a good deal just then for
the presence of his old field boss, who was wise in all the vagaries
of mineral formations. But there was ore still in the loosened muck,
and Gary went back after it, thinking that he would make a clean job
of that side before he started crosscutting the vein to the right of
the shaft.
He filled one bucket. Then his shovel struck into something tough
and yielding. Gary stooped, holding his candle low. He groped with
his hand and pulled out a shapeless, earth-stained felt hat, with
part of a skull inside it.
He dropped the gruesome thing and made for the opening, took the
steep incline like a scared centipede and sat down weakly on a rock,
drawing the back of his hand again and again across his clammy
forehead. His knees shook. The flesh of his entire body was all
aquiver with the horror of it.
Some time elapsed before Gary could even bring himself to think of
the thing he had uncovered. He moved farther away, pretending that
he was seeking the shade; in reality, he wanted to push a little
more sunlight between the shaft and himself.
Faith came and mewed suddenly at his elbow, rubbing herself against
his arm, and Gary jumped as if some one had struck him from behind.
The contact of the cat set him quivering again, and he pushed her
away from him with a backward sweep of his arm. Faith retreated to
another rock and stood there with her back arched, regarding him
fixedly in round-eyed amazement. Gary slid off the bowlder and
started down the bluff, his going savoring strongly of retreat. He
was not particularly squeamish, nor had he ever been called a
coward; nevertheless the grisly discovery drove him from the spot
with the very unexpectedness of the disinterment.
At the cabin he stopped and looked back up the bluff, ashamed of his
flight.
“Steve Carson--the poor devil!” he muttered under his breath. “A
cave-in caught him, I reckon. And nobody ever knew what became of
him.”
He walked aimlessly to the corral, perhaps seeking the small comfort
of even the horse’s presence. He gave Jazz an extra forkful of hay
and stood leaning his elbows upon the top rail of the corral,
watching Jazz nose the heap for the tenderest morsels. The
phlegmatic content of the old horse steadied him. He could think of
the horror now, without shaking inside like joggled jelly.
He looked at his watch and saw that it lacked half an hour until
noon. There would be time enough to do what he knew must be done, if
he were to have any future peace in Johnnywater Cañon.
He found an extra pick, shouldered the long-handled irrigating
shovel and set out to find a suitable spot--not too close to the
house--where he might give the shattered bones of Steve Carson decent
burial. He chose the tiny knoll crowned with the thick-branched
juniper and dug the grave there that afternoon. For the time being
he must leave the body where it was, crushed under the cave-in.
“But he stayed there for five years,” Gary excused the seeming
slight. “One more night shouldn’t hurt him.”
It was an uncomfortable night, however, for Gary. Even in his sleep
the thought of that broken body would not leave him. It overshadowed
all his hopes and dreams, and even Patricia seemed very far away,
and life seemed very short and uncertain.
The next day Gary devoted to moving what little was left of Steve
Carson from under the mass of broken rock and burying the remains in
the grave under the juniper. The mottled cat walked solemnly behind
him all the way; and it seemed to Gary that the unseen yet sentient
spirit of the man walked beside him.