A NEW EXPEDITION.
There wasn't much sleeping done in the cabin that night, there was so
much to talk about. To say that the hunters were very much pleased over
the success of Tom's lucky shots would be putting it very mildly. Elam
was much elated to know it was a camel, an animal he had never seen
before, and not a genuine ghost, who had stood between him and the
finding of the nugget. He was not satisfied until he had burned up three
or four brands in going out to see the object to make sure it was there
yet. To tell the truth, this Red Ghost had often stood between Elam and
the accomplishment of his hopes; and as much as he desired to possess
the nugget he did not dare face it alone.
"It is there yet," said Elam, coming in once more and throwing a
half-burned chunk upon the fire. "Tom, you have made me your everlasting
debtor. Now I hope the finding of the nugget will go the same way."
"I hope I can have the same effect upon your other work," said Tom
modestly. "If I do, you will call me a lucky omen."
"What is an 'omen'?" asked Elam, who had never heard the word before.
"Why, it is an occurrence supposed to show the character of some future
event. That is about as near as I can come to it. If I am with you, you
will find the nugget without the least trouble: if I am not, you won't."
"Well, I'll see that you don't get very far from me till I find out what
this map means. There is something hidden there, and I know it."
It was while we were talking in this way that daylight came, and I began
getting breakfast while Elam and Uncle Ezra smoked, and Ben and Tom were
packing up the skins which had fallen to Ben's rifle during the hunt. I
could see that Ben was sadly disappointed in not being permitted to
accompany Elam on his search for the nugget, but like the soldier he
was, he gave right up. He knew that his father did not believe in such
things anyway, and very likely his refusal would have been more pointed
than Uncle Ezra's. When the breakfast was over all hands turned to and
washed the dishes and put them away. We calculated to visit the camp
again during the winter, and, if we did, we wanted to know what we had
to go on. Then we went out to saddle our horses and take a last look at
the Red Ghost.
"Are we going to leave this thing here?" asked Ben.
"Sure!" replied Uncle Ezra. "We can't carry it with us."
"I'll bet I don't leave it all here," said Elam, going into the cabin
and returning with an axe in his hand. "The folks down there won't
believe that we killed anything, and I am going to have one of the
feet."
The thing was hideous when we came to look at it by daylight, and
especially the great hoofs with which it had tramped so far. They were
lacerated in every direction, and one cut had hardly had time to heal
before it got another. Elam plied the axe vigorously, and in a few
moments each boy had a foot which he was to take along to show to the
people "down there." Finally Uncle Ezra said he would take the head. It
was scarred and seamed all over, but he thought that anyone who had seen
a camel would be sure to recognize it. Then we brought up the horses,
but I tell you it took two men to saddle them. They couldn't bear the
scent of the camel; I had to take my nag out of sight of it, and it was
a long time before he quit snorting. With a good deal of merriment we
got them all saddled at last, and with Tom and Ben riding my horse and
Elam's, we bid good-by to our camp in the mountains. We had twenty miles
to go and then we were among friends again.
"Say," said Elam, when he had allowed the others to get so far ahead
that there was no danger of their overhearing our conversation, "I don't
think I am crazy; do you?"
"I never thought so," said I, although I knew there had been some talk
of it in the settlement. "I was sure if that nugget was there you would
find it. I shouldn't have offered to go with you if I had thought you
were crazy."
"You have seen the map and know just what there is onto it?" continued
Elam.
"I certainly have."
"And you know the place where it starts is over there by those springs?"
"I do certainly."
"And do you think that those men would carry around a map of that kind
unless there was something on it?" said Elam, going over the argument he
had used the night before with Uncle Ezra.
"No, I don't think they would. And it's your ditty-bag that they took
from you when you were shot."
"I know it; and many's the time I have thought of it, too, and never
expected to see it again. Thank goodness, I have two men with me who
don't think I am crazy! I have told Uncle Ezra that I never would give
it up again until I have that nugget in my hands. I know that gully up
there, and it is a pretty big place. Now, that is all I have to say. If
you want to know anything more, now is the time to ask me."
"Don't you think that there are other parties up there, hunting for it?"
I asked, knowing that his story had been noised abroad. "Just think; you
have been looking for it fourteen years."
"Longer than that; and I ought to get it, for they say that perseverance
conquers all things. As for other parties looking for it, why, they can
get it if they want it. But where's the map?"
"That's so. I think you have got the only one there is in existence."
"I only hope there are other fellows looking for the nugget," said Elam,
shifting his rifle from one shoulder to the other, "because we won't
have to work where they have been. It will make matters so much easier
for us."
After that Elam kept still about the nugget, and during the whole of the
twenty miles I never heard him speak of it again. We accomplished the
journey just about dark, Elam and I walking all the way, and Tom I know
was glad to get back among civilized people once more. My headquarters
were right there with Uncle Ezra, for I had only four men to take care
of my small herd, and didn't think it best to get too far away from him.
We rode up to the shanty and began to dismount, when the door flew open
and the foreman of the ranch appeared on the threshold.
"Well, I declare, if there aint Uncle Ezra!" he exclaimed in a
stentorian voice. "What you got? Enough furs to load one horse with?"
While the foreman was speaking he untied the bundle of skins and laid it
upon the porch, when he happened to discover Tom Mason. He did not say
anything, but nodded to Tom, and then turned his attention to his
employer's horse, whom he had unsaddled while one was thinking about it.
"Are you here all alone?" asked Uncle Ezra.
"All alone!" replied the foreman. "You see, there has been a blizzard
lately, and we thought we had better look up the sheep. I have just got
in. What have you got in that bag?"
"Something that will make your eyes bulge out," replied Uncle Ezra.
"Wait till we get in, and we will show it to you."
The horses, being unsaddled, were turned loose to go where they chose;
the foreman carried Ben's bundle of skins into the cabin, and Uncle Ezra
brought up the rear with the bag containing what was left of the prize.
There was a fire burning brightly at one end of the room, and Tom and
Ben drew camp-stools up in front of it to get some heat, while Elam and
I took our overcoats off and waited for Uncle Ezra to turn out the
contents of the bag. We waited until the old frontiersman had hung up
his coat and hat where they belonged and seated himself on a camp-stool
before the fire, and then the head and four feet of the camel were
tumbled out on the floor.
"What in the name of common sense are those?" cried the foreman in
astonishment.
"They are part of the Red Ghost," said Uncle Ezra; and then he went on
to tell the story much as I have told it, although he put in some
additions of his own. The foreman was profoundly amazed. Not daring to
use his hands, he used a poker to move the things about, so that he
could see on all sides of them. The antics he went through were enough
to make the hunters laugh.
"What do you think now about my being crazy?" demanded Elam. "I've shot
at that thing, and I don't see why I didn't get him; but I can see now
why it was. He was so big that a bullet had to be put in the right place
to get him."
"That's about the case with everything I have shot, Elam," said the
foreman. "I had to put the ball in the right place, or I didn't get him.
But you have removed a heap from my mind. Who shot him?"
"Here's the man, right here."
Seeing that the foreman began to take a deeper interest in Tom after
that, Uncle Ezra introduced him, and he failed to say that Tom had got
into a "little trouble" down in Mississippi where he used to live, and
had come out West to get clear of it. Uncle Ezra didn't think that was
any of his business. He said that Tom wanted to see new sights, and he
reckoned he had already had his fill of them, having been lost in the
mountains and shot the Red Ghost besides. Now, he was going into
partnership with Elam after the nugget, and Uncle Ezra thought he had a
boy who could be depended upon. The foreman shook hands with Tom, and
said he was glad to see him. Then he wanted to know whether they had
eaten supper yet.
"Well, no," replied Uncle Ezra. "You see, we started from our camp up
there sooner than we expected. Elam has got a map telling him where to
look to find his nugget."
"Ah, get out!" said the foreman. He had heard so many things about a
"map" that he did not believe a word of it.
"Well, he has, sure enough. It came from the man who tried to rob him.
And you haven't heard anything about the Indians, have you?"
"Indians!" exclaimed the foreman. "Have they broken out?"
"Just give your knife to Elam and sit down," said Uncle Ezra. "It
appears to me that we have heard of a heap of things that you don't know
anything about."
The man gave Elam his knife, which he had in his hand to begin work with
upon the ham he had laid upon the table, and sat down.
"I wondered all the time what was the matter with Elam's hand," said he.
"I hope the Indians didn't shoot him."
"Didn't they, though?" said Elam. "You just wait and hear Uncle Ezra
tell the story."
It was a long narrative that the old frontiersman had to tell, and I saw
that Elam was so much interested in it that he forgot all about the
supper, and I got up and assisted him; and that was all he wanted. He
left me to do the work, and sat down. The foreman heard Uncle Ezra
through without interruption, and then turned and gave Elam a good
looking over. After that he got up and assisted me with the supper.
"So Elam has really got a map of the place where that nugget is hid?"
were the first words he uttered. He didn't seem to care a straw about
the Indians, but he did care about the gold. "I wish I knew the man he
shot to get it."
After that the evening was just what you would expect of one spent in a
hunter's camp, or one passed in a sheep-herder's ranch, which was the
same thing. We ate supper; then those who were inclined to the weed
enjoyed their good-night smoke, and talked of ghosts, Indians, and
sheep-herder's life until we were all tired out and went to bed. We had
regular bunks to sleep in, and could thrash around all we had a mind to
without fear of disturbing anyone else. The foreman got up once to
replenish the fire and take a look at the weather, and I heard him say,
when he crawled back into his bunk, that it was a clear, cold
night--just the one that sheep enjoy.
When I awoke I found the foreman busy in the storeroom in putting up our
three months' supplies and Uncle Ezra engaged in cooking breakfast. Ben
was seated at one end of the table, engaged in writing a letter to his
father, and Elam had gone out after a certain stockman to carry it to
the fort for him. It was dark, and you couldn't see a thing.
"I think it best to let the boy's father know when he is well off," said
Uncle Ezra, returning my greeting. "It aint everybody who would go to
that trouble, I confess--sending a lone man off in a country that has
been infested with Indians. But I know how it is myself. If I had a
boy----"
"You have got one," I said. "There's Elam."
"Elam!" said the frontiersman in a tone of contempt. "Elam went to work
and got himself into a fuss without saying a word to me about it. Elam!
now he's got a map that he thinks will show him where the gold is
hidden."
"But don't you think there is something hidden there?" asked Ben.
"Now, wait till I tell you. I don't know; but every scrap he gets hold
of he thinks it is a map. That's what makes me mad at Elam. And you,
dog-gone you! You have got better sense than that."
I had heard all I wanted to out of Uncle Ezra. It was plain that he
didn't think there was anything in that map. Well, as Elam said, it was
all in a lifetime. My time wasn't worth anything to me, for I had men to
do the work, and if I made a botch of it, if there wasn't anything to be
made by digging up that gully, there was one thing out of the way. Elam
was bound to become a cattle-herder in case this thing failed. He was
determined to go to Texas, for he couldn't live there and have that
nugget thrown at him by every man he met, and I would go with him. Uncle
Ezra had often made offers for my cattle, intending to leave
sheep-herding on account of the wolves, and invest all his extra money
in steers, and if this thing turned out a failure he could have them and
welcome. I would be as deep in the mud as Elam was, and I didn't care to
have the thing thrown up at me all the time. Texas was the land of
promise with us fellows, any way. The fellows there had got into the way
of driving cattle to northern markets and selling them, and in that way
we could at least see our friends once every year. So I didn't care what
Uncle Ezra said about it.
In about an hour Elam came back with the stockman of whom he had been in
search. His name was Sandy; I never heard him called by any other name,
and if his pluck only equalled his red hair and whiskers he certainly
had lots of it. Of course we had to go through with the Red Ghost and
Tom's being lost, the discovery of the map and Elam's escape from the
Indians, but Sandy never said a word about it. He just sat on his
camp-stool with his elbows resting on his knees, and looked up at Uncle
Ezra. When the latter got through with his story he simply said:
"Where's the letter?"
Of course it was arranged that Sandy should go with us as far as the
canyon that led to the springs, and beyond that he was to take care of
himself. With his letter tucked away in his pocket, he shook Ben by the
hand, and told him that his father would receive what he had written by
noon the next day; and then we all mounted and rode off. Tom had been
supplied with a pair of boots to take the place of his moccasons, and
rode a horse that belonged to Uncle Ezra. We had two mules with us, Elam
leading the one and I the other, which carried our supplies and also our
digging tools; for we intended to dig as no people had ever dug before
for that nugget.
"I hope you will get it, boys," said Sandy, as he lifted his hat to us
when we reached the canyon that branched off from his trail. "But I have
my doubts."
"Oh, of course we're cranks!" said Elam.
"I never said that of you," said Sandy reproachfully. "I always said
that if the nugget was there you'd get it."
"And how am I going to find out where the nugget is unless I have a
map?" demanded Elam. "I've got one now, and if I make a failure of this
thing, I am going to Texas. When you see me again I'll have the nugget.
Good-by."
We saw no Indians, although we kept a bright lookout for them, and about
three o'clock in the afternoon arrived at the springs, for I do not know
what else to call them. We had had no dinner, intending to leave it
until we got to our camping place, and while Tom and I unsaddled and
staked out the horses, Elam strolled away with his rifle on his shoulder
to look up the springs. He was gone fully an hour, and when he came back
he set his rifle down and never said a word. I knew that something was
the matter, but I thought I would wait until he got ready to tell it. He
ate his dinner; he ate a good hearty one, too, so that the news he had
brought did not interfere with his appetite, and filled his pipe; and
then I knew that something was coming.
"Carlos," said he, as he stretched his legs out in front of him, "those
springs have all been tampered with."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"They have been tampered with the same as this one has," continued Elam,
pointing to the spring at which our horses had drank. "All the stuff and
leaves have been pulled out of them."
"Well, what of it?"
"What of it? It means that somebody has been going in on our trail."
"All right; let it be so. You found all the springs, didn't you? We're
on their trail, and if we overtake them at the end of a week we will see
what we can do with them. You said yourself that it would make things
easier for us."
"Yes, I know I said it, but I don't like to see that people are so hot
after that nugget."
It did seem to me that everyone had got wind of that nugget, and were
going after it at the same time. How it came about I did not know. Here
they had gone on for two years and let Elam dig where he had a mind to,
and now when he knew where the gold was, other people knew it too and
were determined to have it. I suggested that it might be those men who
had robbed him, but Elam laughed at it.
"Those men never came near here," said Elam. "Otherwise, how did they
strike my camp fifty miles away? It has been done by somebody nearer
than that, and has been done by somebody within three weeks, too."
From this time out (we were all of two weeks on the trail) Elam was
moody. He would ride all day and wouldn't say a word to either of us,
and when we made camp at night he would go off and stay until dark. And
the worst of it was, we camped every single night right where the men
had slept. I began to shake in my boots, and did not wonder at Elam's
contrary mood. In fact we were all that way. It was very seldom that we
exchanged an opinion with one another. Elam kept his map constantly at
hand and referred to it at every turn in the road. Sometimes he would be
gone all day, and we would hear nothing of him until night, when he
would come in, ask for supper, and roll himself up in his blanket and go
to sleep. Things went on in this way for two weeks, as I said, and then
one day, as we were watering our horses at the brook that ran through
the canyon, we were suddenly surprised by the appearance of two men who
stood on the opposite bank. They were a hard-looking set, but then that
was to be expected in a country where all men lived out of doors. To
show that they were friendly they threw their rifles into the hollow of
their arms.
"Howdy, pard?" said one.
"Howdy?" replied Elam. As he was the chief man we allowed him to do all
the talking.
"You're just the men we wanted to see," said the man in a delighted
tone. "We haven't had anything to eat since yisterday. Will ye give us a
bite?"
"Sure!" replied Elam. "What are you doing so far away in the mountains?"
"We got lost, and are now trying to find our way out. This stream leads
to some water on the prairie, I reckon? How far is the fort from here?"
Elam made some reply, I didn't know what it was, while I began to look
the men over to see if I could discover any signs of their being lost.
Their moccasons were whole, or as much so as could be expected, and the
wear and tear of their buckskin shirts was no more than our own. They
were strangers to me, and I confess that I was not at all pleased to see
them. The talk about their being lost was one thing that did the
business for me. The men were hunters or trappers on the face of them;
they never would be taken for anything else, and the idea of their
getting bewildered in the mountains that they had probably passed over a
dozen times was a little too far fetched. I caught a glimpse of Elam's
face as he was leading his horse up the opposite bank, and there was a
look on it that boded mischief.