The girl studied his fine profile attentively. "I'm glad he fell in with
a strong man like you--an experienced miner. He might have made a
mistake and lost all his small fortune. My! but it's fine up here!
What's that wonderful snowy range off there?"
"That's the Sangre de Cristo Range."
"Sangre de Cristo--Blood of Christ! Those old Spaniards had a lot of
poetry in them, didn't they?"
"I reckon so--and a whole lot of stiffening, too. You go through the
Southwest and see the country they trailed over--the hot, dry places and
the quicksands and canyons and all that. They sure made them Injuns
remember when they passed by."
"You know that country?"
"I may say I do. It was my parade-ground for about fifteen years. I
roamed over most of it. It's a fine country."
"Why did you leave it? Do you like this better?"
"I like any new country. I like to explore."
"But you're settled for a while?"
"Well, I don't know--if my partner will take my interest, I think I'll
shift along. I want to get into Alaska finally. I'd like to climb one of
them high peaks."
Fred, who was seated in front, turned. "Mother wants to know what the
mine paid last year--you tell her."
"It didn't pay much," replied Kelley, cautiously. "You see, we had some
new machinery to put in and some roads to grade and one thing or
another--I reckon it paid about"--he hesitated--"about three hundred a
month. But it's going to do better this year."
Florence, who was studying the men sharply, then said, "You wrote you
were getting about five dollars a day."
Fred's face showed distress. "I meant _net_," he said. "I didn't want to
worry you about details of machinery and all that."
Kelley began to feel that the girl's ears and eyes were alert to all
discrepancies, and he became cautious--so cautious that his pauses
revealed more than his words. But the mother saw nothing, heard nothing,
but the face and voice of her son, who pointed out the big mines that
were still running and the famous ones that were "dead," and so kept her
from looking too closely at the steep grades up which the car climbed.
At length, on the very crest of the high, smooth hill, they alighted and
Fred led the way toward a rusty old hack that looked as much out of
place on that wind-swept point as a Chinese pagoda.
Florence spoke of it. "Looks like Huckleberry Springs. Whom does its
owner find to carry up here?"
"Mostly it carries the minister and undertaker at funerals," replied
Kelley.
"Cheerful lot!" exclaimed the girl. "It smells morbific."
"You can't be particular up here," responded Fred. "You'll find our
boarding-place somewhat crude."
"Oh, I don't mind crudeness--but I hate decayed pretensions. If this
were only a mountain cart now!"
"It was the only kerridge with springs," explained Kelley.
The little mother now began to take notice of her son's partner. "My son
tells me you have been very good to him--a kind of big brother. I am
very grateful."
"Oh, I've done no more for him than he has for me. We both felt kind of
lonesome and so rode alongside."
"It's wonderful to me how you could keep Mr. Kelley out of your
letters," said Florence. "He looks exactly like a Remington character,
only his eyes are honester and his profile handsomer."
Kelley flushed and Fred laughed. "I never did understand why Remington
made all his men cross-eyed."
Mrs. Morse put her small, cold hand on Kelley's wrist. "Don't mind my
daughter. She's got this new fad of speaking her mind. She's a good
daughter--even if she does say rude things."
"Oh, I don't mind being called 'a good-looker,'" said Kelley, "only I
want to be sure I'm not being made game of."
"You needn't worry," retorted Fred. "A man of your inches is safe from
ridicule."
"Ridicule!" exclaimed Florence, with a glance of admiration. "You can't
ridicule a tall pine."
"I told you she'd have you a part of the landscape," exulted Fred.
"She'll have you a mountain peak next."
Kelley, who felt himself at a disadvantage, remained silent, but not in
a sulky mood. The girl was too entertaining for that. It amused him to
get the point of view of a city-bred woman to whom everything was either
strange or related to some play or story she had known. The cabins, the
mills, the occasional miners they met, all absorbed her attention, and
when they reached the little shaft-house and were met by old Hank
Stoddard, Kelley's partner, her satisfaction was complete, for Hank had
all the earmarks of the old prospector--tangled beard, jack-boots, pipe,
flannel shirt, and all. He was from the South also, and spoke with a
drawl.
"Oh, but he is a joy!" Florence said, privately, to Kelley. "I didn't
know such Bret Harte types existed any more. How did you find him?"
"I used to know him down on the Perco. He had a mine down there that
came just within a hair-line of paying, and when I ran across him up
here he had a notion the mine would do to lease. I hadn't much, only a
horse and saddle and a couple of hundred dollars, but we formed a
partnership."
"That was before my brother came into the firm."
Kelley recovered himself. "Yes; you see, he came in a little later--when
we needed a little ready cash."
She seemed satisfied, but as they went into the mine she listened
closely to all that Kelley and Stoddard said. Stoddard's remarks were
safe, for he never so much as mentioned Kelley's name. It was all "I"
with old Hank--"I did this" and "I did that"--till Florence said to
Kelley:
"You junior partners in this mine don't seem to be anything but
'company' for Mr. Stoddard."
"Hank always was a bit conceited," admitted Kelley. "But then, he is a
real, sure-enough miner. We are only 'capitalists.'"
"Where did Fred get all the signs of toil on his trousers and boots?"
she asked, with dancing eyes.
"Oh, he works--part of the time."
She peered into his face with roguish glance. "Does it all with his
legs, I guess. I notice his hands are soft as mine."
Kelley nearly collapsed. "Good Lord!" he thought. "You ought to be a
female detective." He came to the line gamely. "Well, there's a good
deal of running to be done, and we let him do the outside messenger
work."
"His sunburn seems quite recent. And his trousers don't fit as his
trousers usually do. He used to be finicky about such things."
"A feller does get kind of careless up here in the hills," Kelley
argued.
They did not stay long in the mine, for there wasn't much to see. It was
a very small mine--and walking made the mother short of breath. And so
they came back to the office and Hank arranged seats on some
dynamite-boxes and a keg of spikes, and then left them to talk things
over.
"I'm so glad you're up here--where it's so clean and quiet," said the
mother. "I'm told these mining towns are dreadful, almost barbaric, even
yet. Of course they're not as they were in Bret Harte's time, but they
are said to be rough and dangerous. I hope you don't have to go down
there often."
"Of course I have to go, mother. We get all our supplies and our mail
down there."
"I suppose that's true. But Mr. Kelley seems such a strong, capable
person"--here she whispered--"but I don't think much of your other
partner, Mr. Stoddard."
"Who? Old Hank? Why, he's steady as a clock. He looks rough, but he's
the kindest old chap on the hill. Why, he's scared to death of you and
Flo--"
"He has the appearance of a neglected old bachelor."
"Well, he isn't. He has a wife and seven children back in Tennessee--so
he says."
"Fred," said Florence, sharply, "I hope you aren't playing off on these
partners of yours."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean--letting them do all the hard and disagreeable work."
Kelley interposed. "Don't you worry about us, miss. We aren't
complaining. We can't do the part he does. He does all the buying and
selling--and--correspondence--and the like of that. But come, it's
pretty near noon. I reckon we'd better drift along to Mrs. Finnegan's.
The first table is bad enough in our boarding-place."
Again Fred took his mother and left Kelley to lead the way with
Florence.
"Now, Mr. Kelley," began the girl, "I must tell you that I don't believe
my brother has a thing to do with this mine except to divide the
profits. Furthermore, you are trying to cover something up from me.
You're doing it very well, but you've made one or two little 'catches'
which have disturbed me. My brother has never mentioned you or Hank in
his letters, and that's unnatural. He told us he was interested in a
mine which was paying one hundred and fifty dollars a month. Now, why
did he say that? I'll tell you why. It's because you pay him a salary
and he's not really a partner." She paused to watch his face, then went
on. "Now what does he do--what can he do to earn five dollars per day?
His palms are as soft as silk--the only callous is on his right
forefinger."
Kelley's face, schooled to impassivity, remained unchanged, but his eyes
shifted. His astonishment was too great to be entirely concealed.
"There's a whole lot of running--and figuring--and so on."
"Not with that little mine. Why, you can't employ more than five men!"
"Six," corrected Kelley, proudly.
"Well, six. You can't afford to pay my brother five dollars a day just
to run errands and keep accounts for these six men. You're fooling him.
You're paying him a salary out of sheer good nature because you like
him. Deny it if you can!"
Kelley looked back to see that Fred was well out of earshot. "He _is_
mighty good company," he admitted.
"There!" she exclaimed, triumphantly. "You can't fool me. I knew there
was something queer about this whole arrangement." Then her voice
changed. "It's very, very kind of you, Mr. Kelley, and I deeply
appreciate it, and if you don't want me to do it--I will not let mother
into our secret."
"What's the use? He's happier being called a partner."
"Very well--we'll let it go that way."
Thereafter her manner changed. She was more thoughtful; she looked at
him with softer eyes. It seemed to her very wonderful, this friendship
between a rough, big man and her brother, who had always been something
of a scapegrace at home. Her own regard for Kelley deepened. "Men aren't
such brutes, after all."
Her smile was less mocking, her jests less pointed, as she sat at Mrs.
Finnegan's long table and ate boiled beef and cabbage and drank the
simmered hay which they called tea. She was opposite Kelley this time,
and could study him to better advantage.
Kelley, on his part, was still very uneasy. The girl's uncanny
penetration had pressed so clearly to the heart of his secret that he
feared the hours which remained. "I'm at the end of my rope," he
inwardly admitted. "She'll catch me sure unless I can get away from
her."
Nevertheless, he wondered a little and was a trifle chagrined when the
girl suddenly turned from him to her brother. He was a little uneasy
thereat, for he was certain she would draw from the youngster some
admissions that would lead to a full confession.
As a matter of fact, she sought her brother's knowledge of Kelley. "Tell
me about him, Fred. Where did you meet him first? He interests me."
"Well," Morse answered, cautiously, "I don't know exactly. I used to see
him come down the hill of an evening after his mail, and I kind of took
a shine to him and he did to me. At least that's what he said afterward.
He has had a wonderful career. He's been all over Arizona and New Mexico
alone. He's been arrested for a bandit and almost killed as city
marshal, and he has been associated with a band of cattle-rustlers. Oh,
you should get him talking. He nearly died of thirst in the desert once,
and a snake bit him in the Navajo country, and he lay sick for weeks in
a Hopi town."
"What a singular life! Is he satisfied with it?"
"He says he is. He declares he is never so happy as when he is leading a
pack-horse across the range."
"I don't wonder you like him," she said, thoughtfully. "But you should
do your part. Don't let him be always the giver and you the taker. I'm
afraid you shirk on him a little, Fred."
"Why? What makes you think that?"
"Well, your hands are pretty soft for a working miner."
He met her attack bravely. "You don't suppose we do all the pick work in
the mine, do you?"
"No. I don't see how you could possibly do any of it. Come now, Freddy,
''fess up.' You've been playing the gentleman in this enterprise and all
this make-up is for our benefit, isn't it?"
Young Morse saw that the safest plan was to admit the truth of her
surmise. "Oh, well, I never did have any hand in the actual mining, but
then there is plenty of other work to be done."