The next afternoon he went to the fonda. Situated on the outskirts of
the town which had long outgrown it, it still bore traces of its former
importance as a hacienda, or smaller farm, of one of the old Spanish
landholders. The patio, or central courtyard, still existed as a
stable-yard for carts, and even one or two horses were tethered to the
railings of the inner corridor, which now served as an open veranda to
the fonda or inn. The opposite wing was utilized as a tienda, or
general shop,--a magazine for such goods as were used by the Mexican
inhabitants,--and belonged also to Ramierez.
Ramierez himself--round-whiskered and Sancho Panza-like in
build--welcomed the editor with fat, perfunctory urbanity. The fonda and
all it contained was at his disposicion.
The senora coquettishly bewailed, in rising and falling inflections, his
long absence, his infidelity and general perfidiousness. Truly he was
growing great in writing of the affairs of his nation--he could no
longer see his humble friends! Yet not long ago--truly that very
week--there was the head impresor of Don Pancho's imprenta himself who
had been there!
A great man, of a certainty, and they must take what they could get!
They were only poor innkeepers; when the governor came not they must
welcome the alcalde. To which the editor--otherwise Don Pancho--replied
with equal effusion. He had indeed recommended the fonda to his
impresor, who was but a courier before him. But what was this? The
impresor had been ravished at the sight of a beautiful girl--a mere
muchacha--yet of a beauty that deprived the senses--this angel--clearly
the daughter of his friend! Here was the old miracle of the orange in
full fruition and the lovely fragrant blossom all on the same tree--at
the fonda. And this had been kept from him!
“Yes, it was but a thing of yesterday,” said the senora, obviously
pleased. “The muchacha--for she was but that--had just returned from the
convent at San Jose, where she had been for four years. Ah! what would
you? The fonda was no place for the child, who should know only the
litany of the Virgin--and they had kept her there. And now--that she
was home again--she cared only for the horse. From morning to night!
Caballeros might come and go! There might be a festival--all the same to
her, it made nothing if she had the horse to ride! Even now she was with
one in the fields. Would Don Pancho attend and see Cota and her horse?”
The editor smilingly assented, and accompanied his hostess along the
corridor to a few steps which brought them to the level of the open
meadows of the old farm inclosure. A slight white figure on horseback
was careering in the distance. At a signal from Senora Ramierez it
wheeled and came down rapidly towards them. But when within a hundred
yards the horse was suddenly pulled up vaquero fashion, and the little
figure leaped off and advanced toward them on foot, leading the horse.
To his surprise, Mr. Grey saw that she had been riding bareback, and
from her discreet halt at that distance he half suspected ASTRIDE! His
effusive compliments to the mother on this exhibition of skill were
sincere, for he was struck by the girl's fearlessness. But when
both horse and rider at last stood before him, he was speechless and
embarrassed.
For Richards had not exaggerated the girl's charms. She was indeed
dangerously pretty, from her tawny little head to her small feet,
and her figure, although comparatively diminutive, was perfectly
proportioned. Gray eyed and blonde as she was in color, her racial
peculiarities were distinct, and only the good-humored and enthusiastic
Richards could have likened her to an American girl.
But he was the more astonished in noticing that her mustang was as
distinct and peculiar as herself--a mongrel mare of the extraordinary
type known as a “pinto,” or “calico” horse, mottled in lavender and
pink, Arabian in proportions, and half broken! Her greenish gray eyes,
in which too much of the white was visible, had, he fancied, a singular
similarity of expression to Cota's own!
Utterly confounded, and staring at the girl in her white, many flounced
frock, bare head, and tawny braids, as she stood beside this incarnation
of equine barbarism, Grey could remember nothing like it outside of a
circus.
He stammered a few words of admiration of the mare. Miss Cota threw out
her two arms with a graceful gesture and a profound curtsey, and said--
“A la disposicion de le Usted, senor.”
Grey was quick to understand the malicious mischief which underlay this
formal curtsey and danced in the girl's eyes, and even fancied it shared
by the animal itself. But he was a singularly good rider of untrained
stock, and rather proud of his prowess. He bowed.
“I accept that I may have the honor of laying the senorita's gift again
at her little feet.”
But here the burly Ramierez intervened. “Ah, Mother of God! May the
devil fly away with all this nonsense! I will have no more of it,” he
said impatiently to the girl. “Have a care, Don Pancho,” he turned to
the editor; “it is a trick!”
“One I think I know,” said Grey sapiently. The girl looked at him
curiously as he managed to edge between her and the mustang, under the
pretense of stroking its glossy neck. “I shall keep MY OWN spurs,”
he said to her in a lower voice, pointing to the sharp, small-roweled
American spurs he wore, instead of the large, blunt, five-pointed star
of the Mexican pattern.
The girl evidently did not understand him then--though she did a moment
later! For without attempting to catch hold of the mustang's mane, Grey
in a single leap threw himself across its back. The animal, utterly
unprepared, was at first stupefied. But by this time her rider had his
seat. He felt her sensitive spine arch like a cat's beneath him as she
sprang rocket-wise into the air.
But here she was mistaken! Instead of clinging tightly to her flanks
with the inner side of his calves, after the old vaquero fashion to
which she was accustomed, he dropped his spurred heels into her sides
and allowed his body to rise with her spring, and the cruel spur to cut
its track upward from her belly almost to her back.
She dropped like a shot, he dexterously withdrawing his spurs, and
regaining his seat, jarred but not discomfited. Again she essayed a
leap; the spurs again marked its height in a scarifying track along her
smooth barrel. She tried a third leap, but this time dropped halfway as
she felt the steel scraping her side, and then stood still, trembling.
Grey leaped off!
There was a sound of applause from the innkeeper and his wife, assisted
by a lounging vaquero in the corridor. Ashamed of his victory, Grey
turned apologetically to Cota. To his surprise she glanced indifferently
at the trickling sides of her favorite, and only regarded him curiously.
“Ah,” she said, drawing in her breath, “you are strong--and you
comprehend!”
“It was only a trick for a trick, senorita,” he replied, reddening;
“let me look after those scratches in the stable,” he added, as she was
turning away, leading the agitated and excited animal toward a shed in
the rear.
He would have taken the riata which she was still holding, but she
motioned him to precede her. He did so by a few feet, but he had
scarcely reached the stable door before she suddenly caught him roughly
by the shoulders, and, shoving him into the entrance, slammed the door
upon him.
Amazed and a little indignant, he turned in time to hear a slight sound
of scuffling outside, and to see Cota re-enter with a flushed face.
“Pardon, senor,” she said quickly, “but I feared she might have kicked
you. Rest tranquil, however, for the servant he has taken her away.”
She pointed to a slouching peon with a malevolent face, who was angrily
driving the mustang toward the corral.
“Consider it no more! I was rude! Santa Maria! I almost threw you, too;
but,” she added, with a dazzling smile, “you must not punish me as you
have her! For you are very strong--and you comprehend.”
But Grey did not comprehend, and with a few hurried apologies he managed
to escape his fair but uncanny tormentor. Besides, this unlooked-for
incident had driven from his mind the more important object of his
visit,--the discovery of the assailants of Richards and Colonel
Starbottle.
His inquiries of the Ramierez produced no result. Senor Ramierez was not
aware of any suspicious loiterers among the frequenters of the fonda,
and except from some drunken American or Irish revelers he had been free
of disturbance.
Ah! the peon--an old vaquero--was not an angel, truly, but he was
dangerous only to the bull and the wild horses--and he was afraid even
of Cota! Mr. Grey was fain to ride home empty of information.
He was still more concerned a week later, on returning unexpectedly
one afternoon to his sanctum, to hear a musical, childish voice in the
composing-room.
It was Cota! She was there, as Richards explained, on his invitation, to
view the marvels and mysteries of printing at a time when they would
not be likely to “disturb Mr. Grey at his work.” But the beaming face of
Richards and the simple tenderness of his blue eyes plainly revealed
the sudden growth of an evidently sincere passion, and the unwonted
splendors of his best clothes showed how carefully he had prepared for
the occasion.
Grey was worried and perplexed, believing the girl a malicious flirt.
Yet nothing could be more captivating than her simple and childish
curiosity, as she watched Richards swing the lever of the press,
or stood by his side as he marshaled the type into files on his
“composing-stick.” He had even printed a card with her name, “Senorita
Cota Ramierez,” the type of which had been set up, to the accompaniment
of ripples of musical laughter, by her little brown fingers.
The editor might have become quite sentimental and poetical had he not
noticed that the gray eyes which often rested tentatively and meaningly
on himself, even while apparently listening to Richards, were more than
ever like the eyes of the mustang on whose scarred flanks her glance had
wandered so coldly.
He withdrew presently so as not to interrupt his foreman's innocent
tete-a-tete, but it was not very long after that Cota passed him on the
highroad with the pinto horse in a gallop, and blew him an audacious
kiss from the tips of her fingers.
For several days afterwards Richards's manner was tinged with a certain
reserve on the subject of Cota which the editor attributed to the
delicacy of a serious affection, but he was surprised also to find that
his foreman's eagerness to discuss his unknown assailant had somewhat
abated. Further discussion regarding it naturally dropped, and the
editor was beginning to lose his curiosity when it was suddenly awakened
by a chance incident.
An intimate friend and old companion of his--one Enriquez Saltillo--had
diverged from a mountain trip especially to call upon him. Enriquez
was a scion of one of the oldest Spanish-California families, and in
addition to his friendship for the editor it pleased him also to affect
an intense admiration of American ways and habits, and even to combine
the current California slang with his native precision of speech--and a
certain ironical levity still more his own.
It seemed, therefore, quite natural to Mr. Grey to find him seated with
his feet on the editorial desk, his hat cocked on the back of his head,
reading the “Clarion” exchanges. But he was up in a moment, and had
embraced Grey with characteristic effusion.
“I find myself, my leetle brother, but an hour ago two leagues from this
spot! I say to myself, 'Hola! It is the home of Don Pancho--my friend!
I shall find him composing the magnificent editorial leader, collecting
the subscription of the big pumpkin and the great gooseberry, or gouging
out the eye of the rival editor, at which I shall assist!' I hesitate no
longer; I fly on the instant, and I am here.”
Grey was delighted. Saltillo knew the Spanish population thoroughly--his
own superior race and their Mexican and Indian allies. If any one could
solve the mystery of the Ramierez fonda, and discover Richards's unknown
assailant, it was HE! But Grey contented himself, at first, with a
few brief inquiries concerning the beautiful Cota and her anonymous
association with the Ramierez. Enriquez was as briefly communicative.
“Of your suspicions, my leetle brother, you are right--on the half! That
leetle angel of a Cota is, without doubt, the daughter of the adorable
Senora Ramierez, but not of the admirable senor--her husband. Ah! what
would you? We are a simple, patriarchal race; thees Ramierez, he was the
Mexican tenant of the old Spanish landlord--such as my father--and we
are ever the fathers of the poor, and sometimes of their children. It
is possible, therefore, that the exquisite Cota resemble the Spanish
landlord. Ah! stop--remain tranquil! I remember,” he went on, suddenly
striking his forehead with a dramatic gesture, “the old owner of thees
ranch was my cousin Tiburcio. Of a consequence, my friend, thees angel
is my second cousin! Behold! I shall call there on the instant. I shall
embrace my long-lost relation. I shall introduce my best friend, Don
Pancho, who lofe her. I shall say, 'Bless you, my children,' and it is
feenish! I go! I am gone even now!”
He started up and clapped on his hat, but Grey caught him by the arm.
“For Heaven's sake, Enriquez, be serious for once,” he said, forcing him
back into the chair. “And don't speak so loud. The foreman in the other
room is an enthusiastic admirer of the girl. In fact, it is on his
account that I am making these inquiries.”
“Ah, the gentleman of the pantuflos, whose trousers will not remain! I
have seen him, friend. Truly he has the ambition excessif to arrive
from the bed to go to the work without the dress or the wash. But,” in
recognition of Grey's half serious impatience, “remain tranquil. On him
I shall not go back! I have said! The friend of my friend is ever the
same as my friend! He is truly not seducing to the eye, but without
doubt he will arrive a governor or a senator in good time. I shall gif
to him my second cousin. It is feenish! I will tell him now!”
He attempted to rise, but was held down and vigorously shaken by Grey.
“I've half a mind to let you do it, and get chucked through the window
for your pains,” said the editor, with a half laugh. “Listen to me. This
is a more serious matter than you suppose.”
And Grey briefly recounted the incident of the mysterious attacks on
Starbottle and Richards. As he proceeded he noticed, however, that
the ironical light died out of Enriquez's eyes, and a singular
thoughtfulness, yet unlike his usual precise gravity, came over his
face. He twirled the ends of his penciled mustache--an unfailing sign of
Enriquez's emotion.
“The same accident that arrive to two men that shall be as opposite as
the gallant Starbottle and the excellent Richards shall not prove that
it come from Ramierez, though they both were at the fonda,” he said
gravely. “The cause of it have not come to-day, nor yesterday, nor
last week. The cause of it have arrive before there was any gallant
Starbottle or excellent Richards; before there was any American in
California--before you and I, my leetle brother, have lif! The cause
happen first--TWO HUNDRED YEARS AGO!”
The editor's start of impatient incredulity was checked by the
unmistakable sincerity of Enriquez's face. “It is so,” he went on
gravely; “it is an old story--it is a long story. I shall make him
short--and new.”
He stopped and lit a cigarette without changing his odd expression.
“It was when the padres first have the mission, and take the heathen and
convert him--and save his soul. It was their business, you comprehend,
my Pancho? The more heathen they convert, the more soul they save, the
better business for their mission shop. But the heathen do not always
wish to be 'convert;' the heathen fly, the heathen skidaddle, the
heathen will not remain, or will backslide. What will you do? So the
holy fathers make a little game. You do not of a possibility comprehend
how the holy fathers make a convert, my leetle brother?” he added
gravely.
“No,” said the editor.
“I shall tell to you. They take from the presidio five or six
dragons--you comprehend--the cavalry soldiers, and they pursue the
heathen from his little hut. When they cannot surround him and he fly,
they catch him with the lasso, like the wild hoss. The lasso catch
him around the neck; he is obliged to remain. Sometime he is strangle.
Sometime he is dead, but the soul is save! You believe not, Pancho? I
see you wrinkle the brow--you flash the eye; you like it not? Believe
me, I like it not, neither, but it is so!”
He shrugged his shoulders, threw away his half smoked cigarette, and
went on.
“One time a padre who have the zeal excessif for the saving of soul,
when he find the heathen, who is a young girl, have escape the soldiers,
he of himself have seize the lasso and flung it! He is lucky; he catch
her--but look you! She stop not--she still fly! She not only fly, but of
a surety she drag the good padre with her! He cannot loose himself, for
his riata is fast to the saddle; the dragons cannot help, for he is drag
so fast. On the instant she have gone--and so have the padre. For why?
It is not a young girl he have lasso, but the devil! You comprehend--it
is a punishment--a retribution--he is feenish! And forever!
“For every year he must come back a spirit--on a spirit hoss--and swing
the lasso, and make as if to catch the heathen. He is condemn ever to
play his little game; now there is no heathen more to convert, he catch
what he can. My grandfather have once seen him--it is night and a storm,
and he pass by like a flash! My grandfather like it not--he is much
dissatisfied! My uncle have seen him, too, but he make the sign of
the cross, and the lasso have fall to the side, and my uncle have much
gratification. A vaquero of my father and a peon of my cousin have both
been picked up, lassoed, and dragged dead.
“Many peoples have died of him in the strangling. Sometime he is seen,
sometime it is the woman only that one sees--sometime it is but the
hoss. But ever somebody is dead--strangle! Of a truth, my friend, the
gallant Starbottle and the ambitious Richards have just escaped!”
The editor looked curiously at his friend. There was not the slightest
suggestion of mischief or irony in his tone or manner; nothing, indeed,
but a sincerity and anxiety usually rare with his temperament. It struck
him also that his speech had but little of the odd California slang
which was always a part of his imitative levity. He was puzzled.
“Do you mean to say that this superstition is well known?” he asked,
after a pause.
“Among my people--yes.”
“And do YOU believe in it?”
Enriquez was silent. Then he arose, and shrugged his shoulders. “Quien
sabe? It is not more difficult to comprehend than your story.”
He gravely put on his hat. With it he seemed to have put on his old
levity. “Come, behold, it is a long time between drinks! Let us to the
hotel and the barkeep, who shall give up the smash of brandy and the
julep of mints before the lasso of Friar Pedro shall prevent us the
swallow! Let us skiddadle!”
Mr. Grey returned to the “Clarion” office in a much more satisfied
condition of mind. Whatever faith he held in Enriquez's sincerity, for
the first time since the attack on Colonel Starbottle he believed he had
found a really legitimate journalistic opportunity in the incident. The
legend and its singular coincidence with the outrages would make capital
“copy.”
No names would be mentioned, yet even if Colonel Starbottle recognized
his own adventure, he could not possibly object to this interpretation
of it. The editor had found that few people objected to be the hero of
a ghost story, or the favored witness of a spiritual manifestation. Nor
could Richards find fault with this view of his own experience, hitherto
kept a secret, so long as it did not refer to his relations with the
fair Cota. Summoning him at once to his sanctum, he briefly repeated the
story he had just heard, and his purpose of using it. To his surprise,
Richards's face assumed a seriousness and anxiety equal to Enriquez's
own.
“It's a good story, Mr. Grey,” he said awkwardly, “and I ain't sayin'
it ain't mighty good newspaper stuff, but it won't do NOW, for the whole
mystery's up and the assailant found.”
“Found! When? Why didn't you tell me before?” exclaimed Grey, in
astonishment.
“I didn't reckon ye were so keen on it,” said Richards embarrassedly,
“and--and--it wasn't my own secret altogether.”
“Go on,” said the editor impatiently.
“Well,” said Richards slowly and doggedly, “ye see there was a fool that
was sweet on Cota, and he allowed himself to be bedeviled by her to ride
her cursed pink and yaller mustang. Naturally the beast bolted at once,
but he managed to hang on by the mane for half a mile or so, when it
took to buck-jumpin'. The first 'buck' threw him clean into the road,
but didn't stun him, yet when he tried to rise, the first thing he
knowed he was grabbed from behind and half choked by somebody. He was
held so tight that he couldn't turn, but he managed to get out his
revolver and fire two shots under his arm. The grip held on for a
minute, and then loosened, and the somethin' slumped down on top o' him,
but he managed to work himself around. And then--what do you think he
saw?--why, that thar hoss! with two bullet holes in his neck, lyin'
beside him, but still grippin' his coat collar and neck-handkercher in
his teeth! Yes, sir! the rough that attacked Colonel Starbottle, the
villain that took me behind when I was leanin' agin that cursed fence,
was that same God-forsaken, hell-invented pinto hoss!”
In a flash of recollection the editor remembered his own experience, and
the singular scuffle outside the stable door of the fonda. Undoubtedly
Cota had saved him from a similar attack.
“But why not tell this story with the other?” said the editor, returning
to his first idea. “It's tremendously interesting.”
“It won't do,” said Richards, with dogged resolution.
“Why?”
“Because, Mr. Grey--that fool was myself!”
“You! Again attacked!”
“Yes,” said Richards, with a darkening face. “Again attacked, and by the
same hoss! Cota's hoss! Whether Cota was or was not knowin' its tricks,
she was actually furious at me for killin' it--and it's all over 'twixt
me and her.”
“Nonsense,” said the editor impulsively; “she will forgive you! You
didn't know your assailant was a horse WHEN YOU FIRED. Look at the
attack on you in the road!”
Richards shook his head with dogged hopelessness. “It's no use, Mr.
Grey. I oughter guessed it was a hoss then--thar was nothin' else in
that corral. No! Cota's already gone away back to San Jose, and I reckon
the Ramierez has got scared of her and packed her off. So, on account
of its bein' HER hoss, and what happened betwixt me and her, you see my
mouth is shut.”
“And the columns of the 'Clarion' too,” said the editor, with a sigh.
“I know it's hard, sir, but it's better so. I've reckoned mebbe she was
a little crazy, and since you've told me that Spanish yarn, it mout
be that she was sort o' playin' she was that priest, and trained that
mustang ez she did.”
After a pause, something of his old self came back into his blue eyes as
he sadly hitched up his braces and passed them over his broad shoulders.
“Yes, sir, I was a fool, for we've lost the only bit of real sensation
news that ever came in the way of the 'Clarion.'”
A JACK AND JILL OF THE SIERRAS
It was four o'clock in the afternoon, and the hottest hour of the day
on that Sierran foothill. The western sun, streaming down the mile-long
slope of close-set pine crests, had been caught on an outlying ledge of
glaring white quartz, covered with mining tools and debris, and
seemed to have been thrown into an incandescent rage. The air above it
shimmered and became visible. A white canvas tent on it was an object
not to be borne; the steel-tipped picks and shovels, intolerable to
touch and eyesight, and a tilted tin prospecting pan, falling over,
flashed out as another sun of insufferable effulgence. At such moments
the five members of the “Eureka Mining Company” prudently withdrew to
the nearest pine-tree, which cast a shadow so sharply defined on the
glistening sand that the impingement of a hand or finger beyond that
line cut like a knife. The men lay, or squatted, in this shadow,
feverishly puffing their pipes and waiting for the sun to slip beyond
the burning ledge. Yet so irritating was the dry air, fragrant with the
aroma of the heated pines, that occasionally one would start up and walk
about until he had brought on that profuse perspiration which gave
a momentary relief, and, as he believed, saved him from sunstroke.
Suddenly a voice exclaimed querulously:--
“Derned if the blasted bucket ain't empty ag'in! Not a drop left, by
Jimminy!”
A stare of helpless disgust was exchanged by the momentarily uplifted
heads; then every man lay down again, as if trying to erase himself.
“Who brought the last?” demanded the foreman.
“I did,” said a reflective voice coming from a partner lying comfortably
on his back, “and if anybody reckons I'm going to face Tophet ag'in
down that slope, he's mistaken!” The speaker was thirsty--but he had
principles.
“We must throw round for it,” said the foreman, taking the dice from his
pocket.
He cast; the lowest number fell to Parkhurst, a florid, full-blooded
Texan. “All right, gentlemen,” he said, wiping his forehead, and lifting
the tin pail with a resigned air, “only EF anything comes to me on that
bare stretch o' stage road,--and I'm kinder seein' things spotty and
black now, remember you ain't anywhar NEARER the water than you were! I
ain't sayin' it for myself--but it mout be rough on YOU--and”--
“Give ME the pail,” interrupted a tall young fellow, rising. “I'll risk
it.”
Cries of “Good old Ned,” and “Hunky boy!” greeted him as he took the
pail from the perspiring Parkhurst, who at once lay down again. “You
mayn't be a professin' Christian, in good standin', Ned Bray,” continued
Parkhurst from the ground, “but you're about as white as they make 'em,
and you're goin' to do a Heavenly Act! I repeat it, gents--a Heavenly
Act!”
Without a reply Bray walked off with the pail, stopping only in the
underbrush to pluck a few soft fronds of fern, part of which he put
within the crown of his hat, and stuck the rest in its band around
the outer brim, making a parasol-like shade above his shoulders. Thus
equipped he passed through the outer fringe of pines to a rocky trail
which began to descend towards the stage road. Here he was in the
full glare of the sun and its reflection from the heated rocks, which
scorched his feet and pricked his bent face into a rash. The descent was
steep and necessarily slow from the slipperiness of the desiccated pine
needles that had fallen from above. Nor were his troubles over when,
a few rods further, he came upon the stage road, which here swept in
a sharp curve round the flank of the mountain, its red dust, ground by
heavy wagons and pack-trains into a fine powder, was nevertheless so
heavy with some metallic substance that it scarcely lifted with the
foot, and he was obliged to literally wade through it. Yet there were
two hundred yards of this road to be passed before he could reach
that point of its bank where a narrow and precipitous trail dropped
diagonally from it, to creep along the mountain side to the spring he
was seeking.
When he reached the trail, he paused to take breath and wipe the
blinding beads of sweat from his eyes before he cautiously swung
himself over the bank into it. A single misstep here would have sent him
headlong to the tops of pine-trees a thousand feet below. Holding his
pail in one hand, with the other he steadied himself by clutching the
ferns and brambles at his side, and at last reached the spring--a niche
in the mountain side with a ledge scarcely four feet wide. He had merely
accomplished the ordinary gymnastic feat performed by the members of the
Eureka Company four or five times a day! But the day was exceptionally
hot. He held his wrists to cool their throbbing pulses in the clear,
cold stream that gurgled into its rocky basin; he threw the water over
his head and shoulders; he swung his legs over the ledge and let the
overflow fall on his dusty shoes and ankles. Gentle and delicious rigors
came over him. He sat with half closed eyes looking across the dark
olive depths of the canyon between him and the opposite mountain. A hawk
was swinging lazily above it, apparently within a stone's throw of him;
he knew it was at least a mile away. Thirty feet above him ran the stage
road; he could hear quite distinctly the slow thud of hoofs, the dull
jar of harness, and the labored creaking of the Pioneer Coach as it
crawled up the long ascent, part of which he had just passed. He thought
of it,--a slow drifting cloud of dust and heat, as he had often seen
it, abandoned by even its passengers, who sought shelter in the wayside
pines as they toiled behind it to the summit,--and hugged himself in
the grateful shadows of the spring. It had passed out of hearing and
thought, he had turned to fill his pail, when he was startled by a
shower of dust and gravel from the road above, and the next moment he
was thrown violently down, blinded and pinned against the ledge by the
fall of some heavy body on his back and shoulders. His last flash of
consciousness was that he had been struck by a sack of flour slipped
from the pack of some passing mule.
How long he remained unconscious he never knew. It was probably
not long, for his chilled hands and arms, thrust by the blow on his
shoulders into the pool of water, assisted in restoring him. He came
to with a sense of suffocating pressure on his back, but his head and
shoulders were swathed in utter darkness by the folds of some soft
fabrics and draperies, which, to his connecting consciousness, seemed as
if the contents of a broken bale or trunk had also fallen from the pack.
With a tremendous effort he succeeded in getting his arm out of the
pool, and attempted to free his head from its blinding enwrappings. In
doing so his hand suddenly touched human flesh--a soft, bared arm! With
the same astounding discovery came one more terrible: that arm belonged
to the weight that was pressing him down; and now, assisted by his
struggles, it was slowly slipping toward the brink of the ledge and the
abyss below! With a desperate effort he turned on his side, caught the
body,--as such it was,--dragged it back on the ledge, at the same
moment that, freeing his head from its covering,--a feminine skirt,--he
discovered it was a woman!
She had been also unconscious, although the touch of his cold, wet hand
on her skin had probably given her a shock that was now showing itself
in a convulsive shudder of her shoulders and a half opening of her eyes.
Suddenly she began to stare at him, to draw in her knees and feet toward
her, sideways, with a feminine movement, as she smoothed out her skirt,
and kept it down with a hand on which she leaned. She was a tall,
handsome girl, from what he could judge of her half-sitting figure in
her torn silk dust-cloak, which, although its cape and one sleeve were
split into ribbons, had still protected her delicate, well-fitting gown
beneath. She was evidently a lady.
“What--is it?--what has happened?” she said faintly, yet with a slight
touch of formality in her manner.
“You must have fallen--from the road above,” said Bray hesitatingly.
“From the road above?” she repeated, with a slight frown, as if to
concentrate her thought. She glanced upward, then at the ledge before
her, and then, for the first time, at the darkening abyss below. The
color, which had begun to return, suddenly left her face here, and
she drew instinctively back against the mountain side. “Yes,” she half
murmured to herself, rather than to him, “it must be so. I was walking
too near the bank--and--I fell!” Then turning to him, she said, “And you
found me lying here when you came.”
“I think,” stammered Bray, “that I was here when you fell, and I--I
broke the fall.” He was sorry for it a moment afterward.
She lifted her handsome gray eyes to him, saw the dust, dirt, and leaves
on his back and shoulders, the collar of his shirt torn open, and a
few spots of blood from a bruise on his forehead. Her black eyebrows
straightened again as she said coldly, “Dear me! I am very sorry; I
couldn't help it, you know. I hope you are not otherwise hurt.”
“No,” he replied quickly. “But you, are you sure you are not injured? It
must have been a terrible shock.”
“I'm not hurt,” she said, helping herself to her feet by the aid of the
mountain-side bushes, and ignoring his proffered hand. “But,” she
added quickly and impressively, glancing upward toward the stage road
overhead, “why don't they come? They must have missed me! I must have
been here a long time; it's too bad!”
“THEY missed you?” he repeated diffidently.
“Yes,” she said impatiently, “of course! I wasn't alone. Don't you
understand? I got out of the coach to walk uphill on the bank under
the trees. It was so hot and stuffy. My foot must have slipped up
there--and--I--slid--down. Have you heard any one calling me? Have you
called out yourself?”
Mr. Bray did not like to say he had only just recovered consciousness.
He smiled vaguely and foolishly. But on turning around in her
impatience, she caught sight of the chasm again, and lapsed quite white
against the mountain side.
“Let me give you some water from the spring,” he said eagerly, as she
sank again to a sitting posture; “it will refresh you.”
He looked hesitatingly around him; he had neither cup nor flask, but he
filled the pail and held it with great dexterity to her lips. She drank
a little, extracted a lace handkerchief from some hidden pocket, dipped
its point in the water, and wiped her face delicately, after a certain
feline fashion. Then, catching sight of some small object in the fork of
a bush above her, she quickly pounced upon it, and with a swift sweep
of her hand under her skirt, put on HER FALLEN SLIPPER, and stood on her
feet again.
“How does one get out of such a place?” she asked fretfully, and then,
glancing at him half indignantly, “why don't you shout?”
“I was going to tell you,” he said gently, “that when you are a little
stronger, we can get out by the way I came in,--along the trail.”
He pointed to the narrow pathway along the perilous incline. Somehow,
with this tall, beautiful creature beside him, it looked more perilous
than before. She may have thought so too, for she drew in her breath
sharply and sank down again.
“Is there no other way?”
“None!”
“How did YOU happen to be here?” she asked suddenly, opening her
gray eyes upon him. “What did you come here for?” she went on, almost
impertinently.
“To fetch a pail of water.” He stopped, and then it suddenly occurred
to him that after all there was no reason for his being bullied by this
tall, good-looking girl, even if he HAD saved her. He gave a little
laugh, and added mischievously, “Just like Jack and Jill, you know.”
“What?” she said sharply, bending her black brows at him.
“Jack and Jill,” he returned carelessly; “I broke my crown, you know,
and YOU,”--he did not finish.
She stared at him, trying to keep her face and her composure; but a
smile, that on her imperious lips he thought perfectly adorable, here
lifted the corners of her mouth, and she turned her face aside. But
the smile, and the line of dazzling little teeth it revealed, were
unfortunately on the side toward him. Emboldened by this, he went on,
“I couldn't think what had happened. At first I had a sort of idea that
part of a mule's pack had fallen on top of me,--blankets, flour, and all
that sort of thing, you know, until”--
Her smile had vanished. “Well,” she said impatiently, “until?”
“Until I touched you. I'm afraid I gave you a shock; my hand was
dripping from the spring.”
She colored so quickly that he knew she must have been conscious at the
time, and he noticed now that the sleeve of her cloak, which had been
half torn off her bare arm, was pinned together over it. When and how
had she managed to do it without his detecting the act?
“At all events,” she said coldly, “I'm glad you have not received
greater injury from--your mule pack.”
“I think we've both been very lucky,” he said simply.
She did not reply, but remained looking furtively at the narrow trail.
Then she listened. “I thought I heard voices,” she said, half rising.
“Shall I shout?” he asked.
“No! You say there's no use--there's only this way out of it!”
“I might go up first, and perhaps get assistance--a rope or chair,” he
suggested.
“And leave me here alone?” she cried, with a horrified glance at the
abyss. “No, thank you! I should be over that ledge before you came back!
There's a dreadful fascination in it even now. No! I think I'd rather
go--at once! I never shall be stronger as long as I stay near it; I may
be weaker.”
She gave a petulant little shiver, and then, though paler and evidently
agitated, composed her tattered and dusty outer garments in a deft,
ladylike way, and leaned back against the mountain side, He saw her also
glance at his loosened shirt front and hanging neckerchief, and with a
heightened color he quickly re-knotted it around his throat. They moved
from the ledge toward the trail. Suddenly she started back.
“But it's only wide enough for ONE, and I never--NEVER--could even stand
on it a minute alone!” she exclaimed.
He looked at her critically. “We will go together, side by side,” he
said quietly, “but you will have to take the outside.”
“Outside!” she repeated, recoiling. “Impossible! I shall fall.”
“I shall keep hold of you,” he explained; “you need not fear that. Stop!
I'll make it safer.” He untied the large bandanna silk handkerchief
which he wore around his shoulders, knotted one end of it firmly to his
belt, and handed her the other.
“Do you think you can hold on to that?”
“I--don't know,”--she hesitated. “If I should fall?”
“Stay a moment! Is your belt strong?” He pointed to a girdle of yellow
leather which caught her tunic around her small waist.
“Yes,” she said eagerly, “it's real leather.”
He gently slipped the edge of the handkerchief under it and knotted it.
They were thus linked together by a foot of handkerchief.
“I feel much safer,” she said, with a faint smile.
“But if I should fall,” he remarked, looking into her eyes, “you would
go too! Have you thought of that?”
“Yes.” Her previous charming smile returned. “It would be really Jack
and Jill this time.”
They passed out on the trail. “Now I must take YOUR arm,” he said
laughingly; “not you MINE.” He passed his arm under hers, holding it
firmly. It was the one he had touched. For the first few steps her
uncertain feet took no hold of the sloping mountain side, which seemed
to slip sideways beneath her. He was literally carrying her on his
shoulder. But in a few moments she saw how cleverly he balanced himself,
always leaning toward the hillside, and presently she was able to help
him by a few steps. She expressed her surprise at his skill.
“It's nothing; I carry a pail of water up here without spilling a drop.”
She stiffened slightly under this remark, and indeed so far overdid her
attempt to walk without his aid, that her foot slipped on a stone,
and she fell outward toward the abyss. But in an instant his arm was
transferred from her elbow to her waist, and in the momentum of his
quick recovery they both landed panting against the mountain side.
“I'm afraid you'd have spilt the pail that time,” she said, with a
slightly heightened color, as she disengaged herself gently from his
arm.
“No,” he answered boldly, “for the pail never would have stiffened
itself in a tiff, and tried to go alone.”
“Of course not, if it were only a pail,” she responded.
They moved on again in silence. The trail was growing a little steeper
toward the upper end and the road bank. Bray was often himself obliged
to seek the friendly aid of a manzanita or thornbush to support them.
Suddenly she stopped and caught his arm. “There!” she said. “Listen!
They're coming!”
Bray listened; he could hear at intervals a far-off shout; then a nearer
one--a name--“Eugenia.” So that was HERS!
“Shall I shout back?” he asked.
“Not yet!” she answered. “Are we near the top?” A sudden glow of
pleasure came over him--he knew not why, except that she did not look
delighted, excited, or even relieved.
“Only a few yards more,” he said, with an unaffected half sigh.
“Then I'd better untie this,” she suggested, beginning to fumble at the
knot of the handkerchief which linked them.
Their heads were close together, their fingers often met; he would have
liked to say something, but he could only add: “Are you sure you will
feel quite safe? It is a little steeper as we near the bank.”
“You can hold me,” she replied simply, with a superbly unconscious
lifting of her arm, as she yielded her waist to him again, but without
raising her eyes.
He did,--holding her rather tightly, I fear, as they clambered up the
remaining slope, for it seemed to him as a last embrace. As he lifted
her to the road bank, the shouts came nearer; and glancing up, he saw
two men and a woman running down the hill toward them. He turned to
Eugenia. In that instant she had slipped the tattered dust-coat from her
shoulder, thrown it over her arm, set her hat straight, and was calmly
awaiting them with a self-possession and coolness that seemed to
shame their excitement. He noticed, too, with the quick perception of
unimportant things which comes to some natures at such moments, that
she had plucked a sprig of wild myrtle from the mountain side, and was
wearing it on her breast.
“Goodness Heavens! Genie! What has happened! Where have you been?”
“Eugenia! this is perfect madness!” began the elder man didactically.
“You have alarmed us beyond measure--kept the stage waiting, and now it
is gone!”
“Genie! Look here, I say! We've been hunting for you everywhere. What's
up?” said the younger man, with brotherly brusqueness.
As these questions were all uttered in the same breath, Eugenia replied
to them collectively. “It was so hot that I kept along the bank here,
while you were on the other side. I heard the trickle of water somewhere
down there, and searching for it my foot slipped. This gentleman”--she
indicated Bray--“was on a little sort of a trail there, and assisted me
back to the road again.”
The two men and the woman turned and stared at Bray with a look of
curiosity that changed quickly into a half contemptuous unconcern. They
saw a youngish sort of man, with a long mustache, a two days' growth of
beard, a not overclean face, that was further streaked with red on the
temple, a torn flannel shirt, that showed a very white shoulder beside
a sunburnt throat and neck, and soiled white trousers stuck into muddy
high boots--in fact, the picture of a broken-down miner. But their
unconcern was as speedily changed again into resentment at the perfect
ease and equality with which he regarded them, a regard the more
exasperating as it was not without a suspicion of his perception of some
satire or humor in the situation.
“Ahem! very much obliged, I am sure. I--er”--
“The lady has thanked me,” interrupted Bray, with a smile.
“Did you fall far?” said the younger man to Eugenia, ignoring Bray.
“Not far,” she answered, with a half appealing look at Bray.
“Only a few feet,” added the latter, with prompt mendacity, “just a
little slip down.”
The three new-comers here turned away, and, surrounding Eugenia,
conversed in an undertone. Quite conscious that he was the subject of
discussion, Bray lingered only in the hope of catching a parting glance
from Eugenia. The words “YOU do it,” “No, YOU!” “It would come better
from HER,” were distinctly audible to him. To his surprise, however,
she suddenly broke through them, and advancing to him, with a dangerous
brightness in her beautiful eyes, held out her slim hand. “My father,
Mr. Neworth, my brother, Harry Neworth, and my aunt, Mrs. Dobbs,” she
said, indicating each one with a graceful inclination of her handsome
head, “all think I ought to give you something and send you away. I
believe that is the way they put it. I think differently! I come to
ask you to let me once more thank you for your good service to me
to-day--which I shall never forget.” When he had returned her firm
handclasp for a minute, she coolly rejoined the discomfited group.
“She's no sardine,” said Bray to himself emphatically, “but I suspect
she'll catch it from her folks for this. I ought to have gone away at
once, like a gentleman, hang it!”
He was even angrily debating with himself whether he ought not to follow
her to protect her from her gesticulating relations as they all trailed
up the hill with her, when he reflected that it would only make matters
worse. And with it came the dreadful reflection that as yet he had
not carried the water to his expecting and thirsty comrades. He
had forgotten them for these lazy, snobbish, purse-proud San
Franciscans--for Bray had the miner's supreme contempt for the moneyed
trading classes. What would the boys think of him! He flung himself over
the bank, and hastened recklessly down the trail to the spring. But here
again he lingered--the place had become suddenly hallowed. How deserted
it looked without her! He gazed eagerly around on the ledge for any
trace that she had left--a bow, a bit of ribbon, or even a hairpin that
had fallen from her.
As the young man slowly filled the pail he caught sight of his own
reflection in the spring. It certainly was not that of an Adonis!
He laughed honestly; his sense of humor had saved him from many an
extravagance, and mitigated many a disappointment before this. Well! She
was a plucky, handsome girl--even if she was not for him, and he might
never set eyes on her again. Yet it was a hard pull up that trail once
more, carrying an insensible pail of water in the hand that had once
sustained a lovely girl! He remembered her reply to his badinage,
“Of course not--if it were only a pail,” and found a dozen pretty
interpretations of it. Yet he was not in love! No! He was too poor and
too level headed for that! And he was unaffectedly and materially tired,
too, when he reached the road again, and rested, leaving the spring and
its little idyl behind.
By this time the sun had left the burning ledge of the Eureka Company,
and the stage road was also in shadow, so that his return through its
heavy dust was less difficult. And when he at last reached the camp, he
found to his relief that his prolonged absence had been overlooked by
his thirsty companions in a larger excitement and disappointment; for
it appeared that a well-known San Francisco capitalist, whom the
foreman had persuaded to visit their claim with a view to advance and
investment, had actually come over from Red Dog for that purpose, and
had got as far as the summit when he was stopped by an accident, and
delayed so long that he was obliged to go on to Sacramento without
making his examination.
“That was only his excuse--mere flap-doodle!” interrupted the
pessimistic Jerrold. “He was foolin' you; he'd heard of suthin better!
The idea of calling that affair an 'accident,' or one that would stop
any man who meant business!”
Bray had become uneasily conscious. “What was the accident?” he asked.
“A d----d fool woman's accident,” broke in the misogynist Parkhurst,
“and it's true! That's what makes it so cussed mean. For there's allus
a woman at the bottom of such things--bet your life! Think of 'em comin'
here. Thar ought to be a law agin it.”
“But what was it?” persisted Bray, becoming more apprehensive.
“Why, what does that blasted fool of a capitalist do but bring with him
his daughter and auntie to 'see the wonderful scenery with popa
dear!' as if it was a cheap Sunday-school panorama! And what do these
chuckle-headed women do but get off the coach and go to wanderin'
about, and playin' 'here we go round the mulberry bush' until one of 'em
tumbles down a ravine. And then there's a great to do! and 'dear popa'
was up and down the road yellin' 'Me cheyld! me cheyld!' And then there
was camphor and sal volatile and eau de cologne to be got, and the coach
goes off, and 'popa dear' gets left, and then has to hurry off in a
buggy to catch it. So WE get left too, just because that God-forsaken
fool, Neworth, brings his women here.”
Under this recital poor Bray sat as completely crushed as when the fair
daughter of Neworth had descended upon his shoulders at the spring. He
saw it all! HIS was the fault. It was HIS delay and dalliance with her
that had checked Neworth's visit; worse than that, it was his subsequent
audacity and her defense of him that would probably prevent any renewal
of the negotiations. He had shipwrecked his partners' prospects in his
absurd vanity and pride! He did not dare to raise his eyes to their
dejected faces. He would have confessed everything to them, but the
same feeling of delicacy for her which had determined him to keep her
adventures to himself now forever sealed his lips. How might they not
misconstrue his conduct--and HERS! Perhaps something of this was visible
in his face.
“Come, old man,” said the cheerful misogynist, with perfect innocence,
“don't take it so hard. Some time in a man's life a woman's sure to get
the drop on him, as I said afore, and this yer woman's got the drop on
five of us! But--hallo, Ned, old man--what's the matter with your head?”
He laid his hand gently on the matted temple of his younger partner.
“I had--a slip--on the trail,” he stammered. “Had to go back again for
another pailful. That's what delayed me, you know, boys,” he added. “But
it's nothing!”
“Nothing!” ejaculated Parkhurst, clapping him on the back and twisting
him around by the shoulders so that he faced his companions. “Nothing!
Look at him, gentlemen; and he says it's 'nothing.' That's how a MAN
takes it! HE didn't go round yellin' and wringin' his hands and sayin'
'Me pay-l! me pay-l!' when it spilt! He just humped himself and trotted
back for another. And yet every drop of water in that overset bucket
meant hard work and hard sweat, and was as precious as gold.”
Luckily for Bray, whose mingled emotions under Parkhurst's eloquence
were beginning to be hysterical, the foreman interrupted.
“Well, boys! it's time we got to work again, and took another heave at
the old ledge! But now that this job of Neworth's is over--I don't mind
tellin' ye suthin.” As their leader usually spoke but little, and to
the point, the four men gathered around him. “Although I engineered this
affair, and got it up, somehow, I never SAW that Neworth standing on
this ledge! No, boys! I never saw him HERE.” The look of superstition
which Bray and the others had often seen on this old miner's face,
and which so often showed itself in his acts, was there. “And though I
wanted him to come, and allowed to have him come, I'm kinder relieved
that he didn't, and so let whatsoever luck's in the air come to us five
alone, boys, just as we stand.”
The next morning Bray was up before his companions, and although it was
not his turn, offered to bring water from the spring. He was not in love
with Eugenia--he had not forgotten his remorse of the previous day--but
he would like to go there once more before he relentlessly wiped out her
image from his mind. And he had heard that although Neworth had gone on
to Sacramento, his son and the two ladies had stopped on for a day or
two at the ditch superintendent's house on the summit, only two miles
away. She might pass on the road; he might get a glimpse of her again
and a wave of her hand before this thing was over forever, and he should
have to take up the daily routine of his work again. It was not love--of
THAT he was assured--but it was the way to stop it by convincing himself
of its madness. Besides, in view of all the circumstances, it was his
duty as a gentleman to show some concern for her condition after the
accident and the disagreeable contretemps which followed it.
Thus Bray! Alas, none of these possibilities occurred. He found the
spring had simply lapsed into its previous unsuggestive obscurity,--a
mere niche in the mountain side that held only--water! The stage road
was deserted save for an early, curly-headed schoolboy, whom he found
lurking on the bank, but who evaded his company and conversation.
He returned to the camp quite cured of his fancy. His late zeal as a
water-carrier had earned him a day or two's exemption from that duty.
His place was taken the next afternoon by the woman-hating Parkhurst,
and he was the less concerned by it as he had heard that the same
afternoon the ladies were to leave the summit for Sacramento.
But then occurred a singular coincidence. The new water-bringer was
as scandalously late in his delivery of the precious fluid as his
predecessor! An hour passed and he did not return. His unfortunate
partners, toiling away with pick and crowbar on the burning ledge, were
clamorous from thirst, and Bray was becoming absurdly uneasy. It could
not be possible that Eugenia's accident had been repeated! Or had she
met him with inquiries? But no! she was already gone. The mystery
was presently cleared, however, by the abrupt appearance of Parkhurst
running towards them, but WITHOUT HIS PAIL! The cry of consternation and
despair which greeted that discovery was, however, quickly changed by
a single breathless, half intelligible sentence he had shot before him
from his panting lips. And he was holding something in his outstretched
palm that was more eloquent than words. Gold!
In an instant they had him under the shade of the pine-tree, and were
squatting round him like schoolboys. He was profoundly agitated.
His story, far from being brief, was incoherent and at times seemed
irrelevant, but that was characteristic. They would remember that he had
always held the theory that, even in quartz mining, the deposits were
always found near water, past or present, with signs of fluvial erosion!
He didn't call himself one of your blanked scientific miners, but his
head was level! It was all very well for them to say “Yes, yes!” NOW,
but they didn't use to! Well! when he got to the spring, he noticed
that there had been a kind of landslide above it, of course, from water
cleavage, and there was a distinct mark of it on the mountain side,
where it had uprooted and thrown over some small bushes!
Excited as Bray was, he recognized with a hysterical sensation the track
made by Eugenia in her fall, which he himself had noticed. But he had
thought only of HER.
“When I saw that,” continued Parkhurst, more rapidly and coherently,
“I saw that there was a crack above the hole where the water came
through--as if it had been the old channel of the spring. I widened it
a little with my clasp knife, and then--in a little pouch or pocket of
decomposed quartz--I found that! Not only that, boys,” he continued,
rising, with a shout, “but the whole slope above the spring is a mass of
seepage underneath, as if you'd played a hydraulic hose on it, and it's
ready to tumble and is just rotten with quartz!”
The men leaped to their feet; in another moment they had snatched picks,
pans, and shovels, and, the foreman leading, with a coil of rope thrown
over his shoulders, were all flying down the trail to the highway.
Their haste was wise. The spring was not on THEIR claim; it was known to
others; it was doubtful if Parkhurst's discovery with his knife amounted
to actual WORK on the soil. They must “take it up” with a formal notice,
and get to work at once!
In an hour they were scattered over the mountain side, like bees
clinging to the fragrant slope of laurel and myrtle above the spring. An
excavation was made beside it, and the ledge broadened by a dozen
feet. Even the spring itself was utilized to wash the hastily filled
prospecting pans. And when the Pioneer Coach slowly toiled up the road
that afternoon, the passengers stared at the scarcely dry “Notice of
Location” pinned to the pine by the road bank, whence Eugenia had fallen
two days before!
Eagerly and anxiously as Edward Bray worked with his companions, it was
with more conflicting feelings. There was a certain sense of desecration
in their act. How her proud lip would have curled had she seen him--he
who but a few hours before would have searched the whole slope for
the treasure of a ribbon, a handkerchief, or a bow from her dress--now
delving and picking the hillside for that fortune her accident had so
mysteriously disclosed. Mysteriously he believed, for he had not fully
accepted Parkhurst's story. That gentle misogynist had never been an
active prospector; an inclination to theorize without practice and to
combat his partners' experience were all against his alleged process of
discovery, although the gold was actually there; and his conduct that
afternoon was certainly peculiar. He did but little of the real
work; but wandered from man to man, with suggestions, advice, and
exhortations, and the air of a superior patron. This might have been
characteristic, but mingled with it was a certain nervous anxiety and
watchfulness. He was continually scanning the stage road and the trail,
staring eagerly at any wayfarer in the distance, and at times falling
into fits of strange abstraction. At other times he would draw near to
one of his fellow partners, as if for confidential disclosure, and then
check himself and wander aimlessly away. And it was not until evening
came that the mystery was solved.
The prospecting pans had been duly washed and examined, the slope above
and below had been fully explored and tested, with a result and promise
that outran their most sanguine hopes. There was no mistaking the fact
that they had made a “big” strike. That singular gravity and reticence,
so often observed in miners at these crises, had come over them as
they sat that night for the last time around their old camp-fire on
the Eureka ledge, when Parkhurst turned impulsively to Bray. “Roll over
here,” he said in a whisper. “I want to tell ye suthin!”
Bray “rolled” beyond the squatting circle, and the two men gradually
edged themselves out of hearing of the others. In the silent abstraction
that prevailed nobody noticed them.
“It's got suthin to do with this discovery,” said Parkhurst, in a low,
mysterious tone, “but as far as the gold goes, and our equal rights to
it as partners, it don't affect them. If I,” he continued in a slightly
patronizing, paternal tone, “choose to make you and the other boys
sharers in what seems to be a special Providence to ME, I reckon we
won't quarrel on it. It's a mighty curious, singular thing. It's one
of those things ye read about in books and don't take any stock in! But
we've got the gold--and I've got the black and white to prove it--even
if it ain't exactly human.”
His voice sank so low, his manner was so impressive, that despite his
known exaggeration, Bray felt a slight thrill of superstition. Meantime
Parkhurst wiped his brow, took a folded slip of paper and a sprig of
laurel from his pocket, and drew a long breath.
“When I got to the spring this afternoon,” he went on, in a nervous,
tremulous, and scarcely audible voice, “I saw this bit o' paper, folded
note-wise, lyin' on the ledge before it. On top of it was this sprig
of laurel, to catch the eye. I ain't the man to pry into other folks'
secrets, or read what ain't mine. But on the back o' this note was
written 'To Jack!' It's a common enough name, but it's a singular thing,
ef you'll recollect, thar ain't ANOTHER Jack in this company, not on the
whole ridge betwixt this and the summit, except MYSELF! So I opened it,
and this is what it read!” He held the paper sideways toward the leaping
light of the still near camp-fire, and read slowly, with the emphasis of
having read it many times before.
“'I want you to believe that I, at least, respect and honor your honest,
manly calling, and when you strike it rich, as you surely will, I hope
you will sometimes think of Jill.'”
In the thrill of joy, hope, and fear that came over Bray, he could see
that Parkhurst had not only failed to detect his secret, but had not
even connected the two names with their obvious suggestion. “But do you
know anybody named Jill?” he asked breathlessly.