SOME EXCITING MOMENTS
Exactly at three o'clock, by Mr. Conroyal's big silver watch, the last
shovel of dirt and the last stone was thrown on the dam; and, with
cheers that echoed and reëchoed up and down the narrow gulch, our
friends saw all the water of the little stream flowing into its new
channel.
"Now get your pans and pails, and we'll hustle the water out of the
hole, so that we can get at the dirt," Mr. Conroyal cried excitedly, the
moment it was seen that the dam was working perfectly and that the old
bed of the stream below the dam was fast becoming dry.
With another cheer, each grabbed up a pan or a pail, and all made a rush
for the hole in the elbow of the now nearly drained bed of the stream,
acting more like an excited troop of school boys than gray-haired and
long-bearded men, as some of them were.
The old bed of the stream was solid rock, worn smooth by the action of
the water; and, as Thure and Bud, in their anxiety to be the first to
reach the hole, raced down this, Thure's feet suddenly slipped on the
wet rock and down he went, the gold-pan he was carrying flying from his
hands and banging loudly as it slid for a short distance over the hard
rock. He jumped quickly to his feet, fortunately unhurt, and bent
hastily to pick up the pan. As he lifted the pan, which had been stopped
by a bit of rock that projected a couple of inches above the level of
the bed, his eyes caught a bright gleam that came from the upper side of
the projecting rock.
For an instant Thure stared wildly at the shining bit of metal lodged
against the rock; and then, with a yell that brought everybody to a
halt, he dropped the pan and grabbed the bit of metal.
"Gold! Gold!" he shouted excitedly, as he held up between the thumb and
finger of his right hand the bit of metal he had picked up, which was
about the size and something the shape of his thumb.
In a moment all were crowded around him, eagerly examining the nugget.
"It certainly is gold!" declared Marshall, as he hefted the nugget on
the palm of his hand.
"Hurra, that's a durned good sign that that thar hole is chuck full of
it!" cried Ham, excitedly swinging the gold-pan he held in his hand
around his head. "Come on! Let's git that water out of th' way an' down
tew pay-dirt, jest as quick as th' Lord'll let us," and he started on
the run for the hole, followed by all the others.
The hole in the point of the elbow of the old channel of the stream was
about twenty feet across; and now, of course, was level full of water,
which had to be thrown out before any digging could be done.
Ham, who had a long pair of rubber boots, bought on purpose for this
occasion, now slipped them on his feet, pulled the legs up to his waist,
where he fastened them to his belt, seized one of the pails, and stepped
into the hole. At the first step he went down to the knee, at the
second, nearly to the tops of his rubber boots, but the third step
lowered him in the water only a couple of inches.
"Gosh, 'tain't deep! We can have th' water out of here in no time. Now,
jest git in line an' I'll pass th' water out tew you," and he plunged
the pail down into the water, and quickly passed it to the man standing
the nearest to him, who passed it on down a line that had been quickly
formed until the last man was far enough down for the water, when thrown
on the ground, to run off down the old channel.
There were enough pans and pails to keep a constant stream of them
passing up and down the line; and, as everybody, under the spur of the
thought of what might lie hidden there in that hole, worked with
feverish haste, the water was speedily lowered, until after an hour of
as hard and tiresome work as was ever done by men, the bottom of the
hole was laid bare.
"We'll dig a hole first off right in th' center of th' hole plumb down
to bed-rock," declared Ham, as he passed out the last pailful of water.
"Then, if thar's any gold here, we'll strike it shore. Throw me a
shovel!" Ham's face was flushed and his eyes were sparkling with
excitement; for now the great moment was near, the moment that would
tell whether or not all their labor had been in vain, whether or not
they were to find the expected gold.
"Here! Here!" and Thure caught up a shovel and rushed to Ham; and almost
collided with Bud, who, shovel in hand, was also rushing to Ham.
"Let us help you dig! Let us help you dig!" cried both boys, almost
beside themselves with excitement.
"Now, jest hold y'ur hosses an' git out of here. This is men's work,"
and Ham good-naturedly thrust the two boys aside, caught up a shovel,
and began throwing up the moist sand and gravel like an animated steam
shovel.
The hole was partly filled with coarse sand and gravel; and, since gold
is so heavy that it will sink down through sand and gravel until it
comes to something more solid, all this had to be thrown off before they
could hope to come to pay-dirt, which is usually a thin layer of gravel
or clay lying on top of the bed-rock. Ham was now digging down to this
bed-rock; and, when he reached it, he would throw a few shovels of the
dirt directly on its top into a gold-pan, and then a few minutes'
washing of the dirt in the pan would show whether or not they had struck
gold. The hole he was digging was not large enough for more than one man
to work in it at a time, consequently the others formed a circle around
Ham and watched his progress with faces feverish with excitement, any
one of them ready the moment Ham tired to seize a shovel and jump into
the hole in his place. But the shoveling was not hard and the sturdy
muscles of Ham did not tire.
In the excitement of these thrilling minutes nobody saw anything but
Ham, nobody heard anything but the push of his shovel through the moist
gravel and the thud of the dirt as it fell on top of the ground. It is
doubtful if a cannon fired within a rod of them, would have made one of
them jump. Hence it is not to be wondered at that none of them saw the
black clouds gathering about the tops of the mountains to the northeast
and swiftly sweeping down toward them, nor heard the peals of distant
thunder, sounding louder and nearer with the passing of each minute. The
gold-fever was hot in their blood; and they were deaf and blind to all
but the digging man.
Ham's shovel bit swiftly down into the soft, moist sand. Now he is down
to his waist. Now only his shoulders show above the top of the hole.
Suddenly, with a violent grunt, he straightens up.
"Bed-rock!" he yells, and begins digging again.
The excitement is now intense. Nearly every one has a gold-pan in his
hand, and is holding it out toward Ham, ready to receive the first
shovel of pay-dirt. That first shovel of dirt means so much, possibly a
fortune for all! Even the graybeards, Mr. Conroyal and Rad Randolph and
Frank Holt, men who could, who often had faced death without the quiver
of a muscle, are now all of a tremble with excitement. Thure and Bud are
both bending forward so far that there is danger of their tumbling into
the hole on top of Ham.
For a couple of minutes longer Ham shovels out the dirt, but more slowly
and carefully now.
"Give me a pan," and he suddenly straightens up, seizes one of the pans,
and disappears in the hole. A moment later he jumps out of the hole, the
pan nearly filled with dirt in his hands, and races like a mad man with
it to the little stream of water, followed by all the others.
In the excitement of the moment no one notices how dark it is becoming,
nor hears an ominous sound, a distant roar, each second growing louder,
and coming from far up the gulch.
Ham reaches the water, and, plunging the pan down into it, begins
carefully stirring its contents with his big fingers. Around him bend
the others, regardless of wet feet. In a few minutes the larger part of
the sand and the gravel is washed out of the pan by the water. Now only
a thin layer of black sand remains on the bottom of the pan. The crucial
instant has come. Ham slowly straightens up, carefully pours all the
water out of the pan, bends his head down close over it, and begins
moving the thin layer of black sand about with his fingers.
"Is there, is there any gold?" queries Thure, unable longer to keep
silent.
Ham does not answer for a moment, but continues to stir the sand with
his big fingers, bending his head still closer to the pan.
"Not a durned smell!" and he suddenly hurls the pan violently from him.
At this moment Mr. Conroyal utters a startled exclamation and glances
quickly up the gulch. One look is sufficient to turn his face white.
From where he stands he can see straight up the gulch for nearly half a
mile; and half that distance up the gulch he sees a dark gray wall, ten
feet high, topped with white, rushing down toward him with the speed of
a race horse, and hears a roar like the rushing charge of a thousand
cavalrymen.
"My God, a flood!" he yells. "Climb for your lives!"
There was no need of a second warning. All could now see the advancing
flood, could hear the deafening roar, could feel the solid earth
beginning to tremble beneath their feet; and all began to climb for
their lives up the steep side of the gulch. There was no time to stop to
pick up anything. Pans, shovels, picks, and such parts of their clothes
as happened to be off their bodies they left where they lay.
Thure and Bud happened to be climbing almost directly under Marshall.
Suddenly, before they were above the danger line and when the flood was
almost upon them, Marshall's feet slipped and he slid past the boys down
directly in front of the advancing flood. It looked like death to stop
to help him; but neither boy hesitated an instant.
"Here, grip wrists!" yelled Thure, who was a little above Bud. "I will
hold you while you pull Marshall up."
Bud instantly saw what was wanted; and, in another moment the two arms
of the boys were locked together in a grip almost impossible to break.
"Now reach down and try and get hold of one of Marshall's hands. Quick!"
and Thure gripped, with the strength of desperation, the point of a
projecting rock with his free left hand and planted his feet firmly on
the narrow ledge where he stood.
"Here, catch hold of my hand, quick," and Bud bent and stretched his
free hand down to Marshall, who, with a face as white as death, was
vainly struggling to climb up the almost perpendicular side of the rock
down which he had slid.
[Illustration: BUD BENT AND STRETCHED HIS FREE HAND DOWN TO MARSHALL.]
Marshall saw the hand and caught it, as a drowning man would grasp a
beam of wood floating within his reach.
There was a terrible wrench on the arms and bodies of the two boys, but
neither broke his hold; and, with a tremendous pull, Marshall was jerked
up on the ledge of rock on which they were standing, and, in another
moment the three had climbed to safety, just as the flood swept by them,
so close that they were covered with the foam that rode on its top.
For a minute the three stood panting and trembling where they were; and
then they climbed to the broad ledge where all had halted out of reach
of the flood.
Mr. Conroyal gripped Thure's hand and held it warmly for a minute; but
he did not speak a word. There was no need; for Thure understood.
Mr. Randolph was a little more demonstrative, but he said little.
The two boys had done exactly what the two men expected their sons to
do; and the hearts of both were glad and proud, but neither man showed
his pride in their brave action, only his joy that they had escaped the
flood.
Marshall, the moment their fathers dropped their hands, seized a hand of
each boy in each of his hands and started to thank them, with tears in
his eyes; but both boys quickly jerked their hands away.
"Forget it," Thure said impatiently. "We only did what you or any other
man would have done under the same circumstances--Great Moses, just look
at that water!" and Thure's eyes turned to the flood that was now
foaming and boiling a few feet beneath them.
At this moment the edge of the black clouds swept over them, and the
rain fell down in torrents; but in a quarter of an hour the clouds had
passed, and the sun was shining again, and the violence of the flood was
beginning to slacken. In half an hour the flood had swept by; and with
it had gone every vestige of the wing dam they had builded with so much
labor and with so many high hopes.
"Durn th' durned dam!" and, without another word, Ham turned his back on
the scene of their fruitless labors, and strode off toward Hangtown,
followed by all the others, who fervently echoed his words in their
hearts.