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SILVER CAVES.
[Illustration: THE IMPASSABLE CHASM (Page 91).
Silver Caves, Frontispiece.]
THE SILVER CAVES
_A MINING STORY_
BY
ERNEST INGERSOLL
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT,
1890,
By DODD, MEAD & COMPANY.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE “LAST CHANCE,” 1
II. THE FURNISHING OF A NEW HOME, 11
III. A DISCOURAGING EXPLORATION, 19
IV. MAX HAS AN IDEA, 31
V. OLD BOB TAKES A PARTNER, 47
VI. PROGRESS IN MINING, 55
VII. A DIME NOVEL HERO, 63
VIII. HOW LEN FOOLED THE PROFESSOR, 79
IX. SANDY MCKINNON’S EAVESDROPPING, 91
X. FACING THE NEW SITUATION, 101
XI. PREPARATIONS FOR WAR, 111
XII. THE ENEMY APPEARS, 127
XIII. A FLAG OF TRUCE, 139
XIV. SOME DANGEROUS TARGET PRACTICE, 151
XV. OLD BOB TAKES A THRASHING, 167
XVI. THE FIGHT AT THE FORD, 177
XVII. THE CAPITALIST EXAMINES THE MINE, 193
XVIII. SUCCESS ACHIEVED, 209
THE “LAST CHANCE.”
THE SILVER CAVES.
CHAPTER I.
THE “LAST CHANCE.”
Matters had come to a crisis with Len and Max, when Sandy McKinnon
arrived at the camp, with a letter of introduction from a friend in
Denver.
These two young men had not been at all fortunate, so far, and, like the
rest of the community, were sorely discouraged. They had wavered for
some days between deserting the place and another alternative, the
nature of which they kept to themselves, for they knew that they might
not only be laughed at, but perhaps prevented from carrying out their
plan, were it announced.
The camp I refer to is now a flourishing town, the center of many small
side-villages on the northern slope of Sierra San Juan; but twenty-five
years ago, when my story occurred, it was at the point of collapse, and
perhaps would never have recovered had not what I am about to relate
occurred; and you must bear with me while I explain the circumstances
that led up to its revival.
The beginnings of the town had been made half a dozen miles higher up
Panther Creek, almost at its source, in fact; but after digging
numberless prospect-holes and driving three fairly long tunnels,
everybody voted that locality a failure, and came down to the present
town-site where paying mines had since been worked for two or three
years.
The two young men had become the owners, some time before, of one of
these early tunnels (that one nearest the source of the Creek), through
taking it as payment of a joint debt because nothing better was to be
had. It was called the _Last Chance_, and the boys accepted the name as
significant, and proposed to risk what means they had left in giving
the mine a new trial.
About 200 feet down stream was a second tunnel, the _Aurora_, owned by
two men who were friendly to our heroes, one of whom, named Bowen, was
famous for his reckless yet good-natured exploits of bravado.
Some distance still farther down the cañon, on the same side (the
right-hand wall of the narrow gulch, looking down stream), was the third
old tunnel, the _Cardinal_. This last was the property of a thorough
scallawag, despised and avoided by all respectable citizens, and only
kept from being a positive criminal by his natural cowardice. The enmity
of this man, whose real name was lost in the nick-names “Old Bob” and
“Squint-eye,” had been incurred by the boys through their exposing a
fraud by which he had once proposed to sell to a stranger named
Anderson, as a productive mine, this very property--the Last
Chance--although he neither owned it nor believed it worth anything.
It was not strange, therefore, that, while trying to avoid general
curiosity, they were especially anxious to keep their intentions secret
from Old Bob.
And just at this juncture came Mr. Alexander McKinnon, straight from
Glasgow, and hoping to do something at the camp which might teach him
how silver mining should be carried on, and perhaps open a way to make
his fortune. Placing all the chances of failure, and their poverty,
fairly before him, they offered to let him into their new partnership,
to be called Brehm, Bushwick & Co., on very liberal terms, and he
accepted.
So they fitted him out with the kind of clothing, tools, and general
outfit which were needful, purchased enough provisions to last a
fortnight, after which they could come to town for more, and to-morrow
the three were to start bright and early to their new home and the Last
Chance.
When the rising sun of the next morning had begun to tinge the
snow-peaks with rose-color, but hours before his beams could scale the
mountain wall of this deep valley and flood it with warmth and light,
our hopeful adventurers were awake and busy with breakfast.
Sandy showed himself a much more skillful cook than either of his
American friends, and was warmly applauded.
“There’s a difference between fend and fare weell,” he remarked,
sententiously, when they told him of some of their troubles in this
matter; “by which I mean,” he added, as he saw their puzzled faces,
“that shifting for a meal is bad policy beside knowing how to have
plenty of good food and how to prepare it. It’s poor economy, I’m
thinkin’, to half-starve one’s self. ‘Lang fasting hains’--that’s
_saves_, ye ken--‘nae bread.’”
McKinnon dropped more and more into broad Scotch as he became better
acquainted, and his fund of old saws, into each of which whole chapters
of worldly experience had been boiled down, were a constant source of
enjoyment to his partners.
Breakfast out of the way in a hurry, the three _burros_ (Mexican
donkeys) hired to carry their luggage were brought around, the little
sawbuck saddles placed upon their backs, and cinched to them with a
tightness that made them groan and grunt lustily; then the load of each
was placed between the forks, or hung to the four horns of the saddle,
surmounted by the long-handled tools, and securely lashed on by ropes
and thongs of twisted rawhide, which never break or stretch, and rarely
get loose from the “squaw-hitch.”
The whole baggage made about six fair burro-loads, and these were to be
carried in two trips. It was not necessary for them to burden themselves
with a great amount of furniture or provisions, since the former could
be left locked up in town, and the provisions could be replenished when
they ran short. Besides, the lads expected to catch an abundance of
trout and perhaps shoot an occasional deer or mountain sheep, an
expectation in which they would not have been disappointed had the
extraordinary affair which happened later left time for hunting and
fishing.
The trail was a steep and little-used pathway up the mountain, through
dense woods, where it straggled about to avoid rocks and fallen logs. It
was built up, shelf-fashion, around projecting knobs, crossed fierce
torrents upon narrow bridges, and was full of sharp turns, miry holes,
and bad going of every description. Here and there an opening in the
forest gave a magnificent view, far out over the foot-hills, for the
elevation, toward the head of the creek, was more than four thousand
feet above the valleys and fully ten thousand feet above the sea.
Beyond the woods the party found itself on the brink of a deep gorge, at
the bottom of which Panther Creek tore down in a series of cascades. The
torrent ran four or five hundred feet below, and above them the
mountains rose to invisible heights. Along this cliff-face the narrow
trail had been carried irregularly and often very dangerously, but the
hardy little beasts picked their way cautiously up and down, and never
sank too deep in a bog or got too far over the edge of a precipice.
Finally the trail reached the edge of the creek, near its head, and here
was a ford, beyond which it led through the willows and over the
Aurora’s dump to the Last Chance, whose cabin, perched on a bench, or
terrace, was gained by a stiff climb up a zigzag in the face of the
rocky bluff.
The burros were turned loose in a small meadow above the cabin, and
after a hearty supper the tired boys quickly made beds of boughs and
blankets, and slept as their long tramp entitled them to do.
FURNISHING A NEW HOME.