A "GILT-EDGED" SPECULATION.
"Ned, were you drunk last night, or am I dreaming?" asked Chance next
morning, as the two sat over their breakfast, while the canoes of the
early Indian fishers stole out along the edges of the great kelp beds.
It was a lovely scene upon which Corbett's tent looked out, but Chance
at the moment had no eyes for the blue water, or the glories of the snow
range beyond, all he could think of was "three claims at two thousand
dollars apiece."
"Neither, that I am aware of, Steve. You eat as if you had all your
faculties about you, and I've no head ache."
"Then you did not buy three claims from Cruickshank at two thousand
dollars apiece?"
"Yes, I did; and why not?"
"Where is the money to come from?"
"I'll see to that," replied Corbett. "I am quite aware that six thousand
dollars is twelve hundred pounds; but if you don't want to take a share
in my speculation, I propose to invest that much of my capital in the
venture, and even if I lose it all I shall still have something left,
besides my muscles, thank God. You two, Phon and yourself, can work for
me on wages if you like, or we'll make some other arrangement to keep
the party together."
For a minute or two Chance said nothing, and then he began laughing
quietly to himself.
"Say, Ned, you took scarlatina pretty bad when you were a kiddy, didn't
you?"
"I don't remember, old chap. Why do you ask?"
"And whooping-cough, and measles, and chicken-pox, and now its gold
fever, and my stars isn't it a virulent attack?" and Chance broke out
laughing afresh.
"I don't see," began Corbett, growing rather red in the face.
"Oh, no; you don't see what all this has to do with me," interrupted
Chance, "and it's infernal impertinence on my part to criticise your
actions, and if I wasn't so small you would very likely punch my head. I
know all that. But, you see, we two are partners, and I am not going to
dissolve partnership because I think you are taking bigger risks than
you ought to. If you put up three thousand dollars I will put up as
much, and part of it can come out of the money owing to the firm."
"But why do this if you think the risk too big?" asked Corbett.
"Why ask questions, Ned? I feel like taking the risk; I am a Yankee,
and therefore a natural gambler. You of course are not, are you? And
then it's spring-time, and from twenty-three to the other end of
threescore years and ten is a long, long time; and even if we 'bust,'
there'll be lots of time to build again. So we will go halves, the third
claim to be held in Phon's name, and Phon to work on wages."
"Let us have old Phon in. Phon! Phon!" shouted Corbett.
The Chinaman, who was cleaning the tin plates by a creek hard by, came
slowly towards them.
"Well, Phon, did you lose all your dollars last night?" asked his
master.
"Me tell you debbil say me win--debbil know, you bet," replied Phon
coolly.
"And did you win?"
"Me win a hundred dollars--look!" and the little man held out a roll of
dirty notes, amounting to something more than the sum named.
"You were in luck, Phon. 'Spose I were you, I no go gamble any more,"
remarked Corbett, dropping into that pigeon English, which people seem
to think best adapted to the comprehension of the Chinaman.
"Oh yes, you go gamble too. Debbils bodder me very bad last night. They
say you go gamble, Chance he go gamble, Phon he go gamble too. All go
gamble togedder. And then debbil he show me gold, gold,--so much gold me
no able to carry it. Where you goin' now?"
"I guess your friends, the devils, might have told you that too,"
remarked Chance. "Don't you know?"
"No, me no savey. You tell me."
"Corbett and myself are going up to Cariboo mining, and if you like you
can come as cook, or you can come and work on wages in our claims. How
would you like that?"
"Me come, all-lite me come; only you give me one little share in the
claims--you let me put in one hundred dollars I win last night."
"Better keep what you've got and not gamble any more," replied Corbett
kindly.
"Halo! Halo keep him. 'Spose you not sell me share I go gamble again
to-night."
"Better let him have his way, Ned. Let the whole crowd go in together,
'sink or swim.'"
"Very well, Phon, then you will come."
"You bet you, Misser Corbett. Who you 'spose cook for you 'spose I no
come?" And having proposed this final conundrum, Phon retired again to
his kitchen.
"Rum, the way in which he seemed to know all about our movements, Ned,"
remarked Chance, when the Chinaman had done.
"Oh, he overheard what we said last night, or at breakfast this
morning," replied Corbett.
"He wasn't here last night, and he was down by the stream whilst we were
at breakfast."
"All right, old man, perhaps his 'debbil' told him. It doesn't much
matter anyway. Did you see this piece in the _Colonist_?"
"About us? No. Read it out."
"'We understand that Colonel Cruickshank, the Napoleon of Victorian
finance, the mammoth hustler of the Pacific coast, has determined to
conduct those gentlemen who have bought his bonded claims to the
fortunes which await them. This additional proof of the colonel's belief
in the property which he offers for sale should ensure a keen
competition for the one claim still left upon his hands, which we
understand will be raffled for this afternoon at 4 p.m. at Smith's
saloon. Tickets, ten dollars each. We are informed that amongst the
purchasers of claims in the Cruickshank reserve are an English gentleman
largely interested in the lumber business, and an American artist
rapidly rising into public notice.'"
"What cheer, my lumber king!" laughed Chance as Corbett laid down the
paper. "These journalists are wonderful fellows, but I suspect most of
that paragraph was inspired and paid for by the 'mammoth hustler.' By
the way, if it is true that he means to personally conduct a party to
Williams Creek, it does really look as if he had some belief in the
claims."
"Yes, IF he means to; but I expect that is simply to draw people to his
raffle this afternoon."
"Probably; but if he were to go up to Williams Creek we might as well go
up with him. You see, he has travelled along the trail before."
"Well, I'll see about that, and make any arrangements I can for getting
up to Cariboo, if you will try to get our accounts settled up, Steve.
I'm no good at figures, as you know."
"That's what!" replied Chance laconically; and the two young men got
upon their legs and prepared to start on their day's business.
It will be as well here to enter upon a short explanation of the law as
it then stood in British Columbia with regard to the bonding of claims.
Experience had shown that in the upper country, early winters and late
springs, with their natural accompaniment of deep snows, made mining
impossible for about half the year. In consequence of this a law had
been passed enabling miners to "bond" claims taken up late in the fall
until the next spring. Upon claims so bonded it was not necessary to do
any work until the 1st of June of the ensuing year, so that from
November to June the claims lay safe under the wing of the law; but
should their owners neglect to put in an appearance or fail to commence
work upon the 1st of June, they forfeited all right to the claims, which
could then be "jumped" or seized upon by the first comer.
It was under this law that Corbett and Chance had bought, so that it was
imperatively necessary that they should reach their claims by the 1st of
June; and although there was still ample time in which to make the
journey, there was no time to waste. The Cariboo migration had already
begun, and every day saw fresh bands of hard-fists leave Victoria for
the mines. Already the gamblers had gone, the whisky trains and other
pack trains had started, and the drain upon the stock of full-grown
manhood in Victoria was easily noticeable. It was no vain boast which
the miners made that the men of Cariboo were the pick of the men of
their day. Physically, at any rate, it would have been hard indeed to
find a body of men tougher in fibre and more recklessly indifferent to
hardships than the pioneers who pushed their way through the Frazer
valley to the gold-fields beyond. In that crowd there was no room for
the stripling or the old man. The race for gold upon the Frazer was one
in which only strong men of full age could live even for the first lap.
And this was the crowd which Corbett and Chance sought to join. To some
men the mere idea of a railway journey, entered upon without due
consideration and ample forethought, is fraught with terrors. Luckily
neither Corbett nor Chance were men of this sort. Chance was a Yankee to
the tips of his fingers, and had therefore no idea of distance or fear
of travel. The world was _nearly_ big enough for him, and he cared just
as little about "crossing the herring-pond" as he did about embarking on
a ride in a 'bus. As for Corbett, nature had made him a nomad--one of
those strangely restless beings, who, having a lovely home, and knowing
it to be lovely, still long for constant change, and circle the world
with tireless feet, only to bring home the report that "after all
England is the only place fit for a fellow to live in." The odd part of
it all is, that that being their conviction, most of these wanderers
contrive to live out of England for three parts of their lives.
It was no wonder, then, that when Corbett and Chance met again at dusk
everything had been, as Chance said, "fixed right away."
"It's a true bill about Cruickshank, old man," Corbett said. "And if you
can get the bills paid and our kit packed he wants us to start with him
on the _Umatilla_ for Westminster the day after to-morrow."
"I don't know about getting the bills paid," replied Chance. "A good
many fellows who owe us money appear to have gone before to Cariboo, but
I reckon we must look upon that as the opening of an account to our
credit in the new country."
"Not much of an account to draw upon; but I suppose it can't be helped.
I believe, though, that to do the thing properly we ought both to get
stone-broke before starting," remarked Corbett.
"That will come later. Hullo, Cruickshank! what is in the wind now?"
cried Steve, turning to the new-comer.
"Gold, gold, nothing but gold, Chance. But I say, gentlemen, are those
your packs?" asked the colonel, pointing to two small mountains of
luggage which nearly filled the interior of the tent.
"Yes. That is Chance's pack, and this is mine. There will be a sort of
joint-stock pack made up to-morrow of the kitchen stuff and the tent.
And I think that will be all."
"And you think that will be all, Mr. Corbett?" repeated Cruickshank.
"You are a strong man; can you lift that pack?" and he pointed to the
biggest of the two.
"Oh yes, easily; carry it a mile if necessary," replied Corbett,
swinging the great bundle up on to his shoulders.
"You _are_ a stout fellow," admitted Cruickshank admiringly; "but hasn't
it occurred to you that you may have to carry all you want for a good
many miles? And even if you can do that, who is to carry the joint-stock
pack? Not Phon, surely?"
"Well, but won't there be any pack ponies?" asked Corbett.
"For hire on the road, do you mean? Certainly not."
"All right, then," replied Corbett, after a minute or two spent in
solemnly and somewhat sadly contemplating all the neatly-packed camp
equipage. "I can do with two blankets and a tin pannikin if it comes to
that. Can't you, Steve?"
"A tin pannikin and blanket goes," answered Chance. "To blazes with all
English outfits anyway!"
"Well, I don't know about that," put in Cruickshank, who seemed hardly
as well pleased at his comrade's readiness to forswear comfort as might
have been expected. "I thought that you fellows might like to take a few
comforts along with you, so I had mentally arranged a way in which we
might combine pleasure with profit."
"Pleasure with profit by all means, my boy. Unfold your scheme, colonel;
we are with you," cried Chance.
"Well, stores are terribly high up in Cariboo. Whisky is about the only
thing these packers think of packing up to the mines, and if you fellows
had the coin I could easily buy a little train of cayuses down at
Westminster pretty cheap, and load them up with stuff which would pay
you cent per cent, and between us the management of a little train like
that would be a mere nothing."
"How about packing? You cain't throw a diamond hitch by instinct,"
remarked Chance, who knew a little from hearsay of the life of the road.
"Oh, I can throw the hitch, and so I guess can your heathen, and we'll
deuced soon teach both of you to take the on-side if you are wanted to."
"How much would such a train cost?"
"The ponies ought not to cost more than fifty dollars apiece; as to the
stores, of course it depends upon what you choose to take. The ponies
will carry about two hundred pounds apiece, if they are good ones."
"What do you say to it, Steve?" asked Ned.
"Seems a good business," replied Chance, "and we may as well put our
last dollars into a pack-train as leave them in the bank or chuck them
into the Frazer. A pack-train goes."
And so it was settled that the two friends should invest the balance of
their funds in a pack-train and stores for Cariboo. The venture looked a
promising one, with no possibility of failure or loss, and even if
things went wrong the boys would only be stone-broke; and who cares
whether he is stone-broke or not at twenty-three, in a new country with
no one dependent upon him?
It was only eighteen months before that Edward Corbett had left home, a
home in which it was part of the duty of about five different human
beings to see that Master Edward wanted for nothing. At about the same
time one of the finest houses in New York would have been disturbed to
its very foundations if it were suspected that Mr. Steve Chance wanted
for any of the luxuries of the nineteenth century, and yet here were
Steve Chance and Ned Corbett, their last dollar invested in a doubtful
venture, their razors abandoned, their toilet necessaries reduced to one
cake of soap and a towel between two (Cruickshank condemned the habit of
washing altogether upon the road), and their whole stock of household
goods reduced to two light packs, to be carried mile after mile upon
their own strong shoulders. There was daily labour ahead of them such as
a criminal would hardly have earned for punishment at home, there was a
certainty before them of bad food, restless nights, thirst, hunger, and
utter discomfort, and yet this life was of their own choosing, and a
smile hovered round the lips of each of them as the pipes dropped out of
their mouths and they turned over to sleep.
As for "gold," the prize which both of them appeared to be making all
these sacrifices for, neither of the boys, oddly enough, had thought of
it that night. With Phon it was different, but then he was a celestial.
He played for the stakes. Both the whites played, though in different
ways, for the fun of the game.