GOLD
The gray of dawn had passed. Now the rosy light of day was spreading
its fresh beauty across the heavens, and gladdening the warming air,
and painting afresh with generous brush the rolling, open world
below.
Yes, the drab of dawn was past, and, as it was with all Nature about
them, the rosy light of hope brushed lightly the weary hearts of those
who had just passed through the fiery trials of the furnace of
despair.
There were three people only standing beneath the tree, under whose
shadow a man's life so recently was to have been offered a sacrifice
to human justice--two men and a woman. There was something else there,
but life had passed from it, and it lay there waiting, in the calm
patience of the last, long sleep, to return to the clay from which it
sprang.
Eve was kneeling beside the deformed body of her poor brother. Her
tears were falling fast as she bent over the pale upturned face, even
more beautiful still since Death had hugged him to its harsh bosom.
All the woman's passionate love and regrets were pouring out over the
unconscious clay. His cruelties, his weaknesses were forgotten,
brushed away by an infinite love that had no power nor inclination to
judge.
She loved him, and he was dead. He was gone beyond her ken; and for
the moment in her grief she longed to be with him. In the midst of
her tears she prayed--prayed for the poor weak soul, winging its way
in the mysterious Beyond. She asked Him that his sins might be
forgiven. She prayed Him that the great loving forbearance, so readily
yielded to suffering humanity, might be shed upon that weak, benighted
soul. She poured out all the longings of her simple woman's heart in a
passionate prayer that the Great Christ, who had shed His blood for
all sinners, would stretch out His saving hand, and take her brother's
erring spirit once again to His bosom.
The two men stood by in silence. Their heads were bowed in reverence.
They, too, felt something of the woman's grief.
But presently Peter Blunt raised his head. His kindly blue eyes were
full of sympathy. He moved across the intervening grass, and laid a
hand with infinite tenderness upon the woman's shoulder.
"We must take him with us," he said gently.
The woman started, and looked up through her tears.
"Take him? Take him?" she questioned, without understanding.
Peter nodded.
"We'll take him to--his new home."
Eve bowed her head and covered her eyes with her hands.
"He's yours, Eve," the man went on softly. "Shall I?"
The woman nodded silently and rose to her feet. Peter stooped and
picked the boy up in his arms to carry him as he had carried him
before. Then he moved off and Eve followed him.
Jim hesitated for a moment. It almost seemed as though he had no right
to force himself upon the woman's grief. It seemed to him like
sacrilege, and yet---- Finally he, too, joined in the silent
procession.
They followed whither Peter chose to lead. There was no question. It
was not a moment for question. The kindly heart dictated. It was only
for the others to acquiesce. Peter, too, perhaps in lesser degree, had
loved the boy. But then it was in his nature to love all suffering
humanity. He had never had anything but kindness for Elia in life. Now
that he was dead his feelings were no less.
So they trailed across the prairie--on, slowly and solemnly on. Their
course was marked straight as an arrow's flight in Peter's mind. Nor
did he pause till the mound of gravel beside his cutting was reached.
He stood at the brink of the shallow pit. There in its depths lay a
broad, jagged, soil-stained ridge. Here and there on its rough surface
patches of dazzling white, streaked with the more generous tints of
deep red, and blue, and green, showed where the hard-driven pick had
split the gold-bearing quartz.
Eve stared wonderingly down. Jim looked on in silent awe. He knew
something of that which was in Peter's mind. Peter had found the
deposits for which he had so long searched. Here--here was the great
reef, round which the Indian stories had been woven.
He laid his burden on the edge of the pit. Then he clambered down into
it. He signed to Jim, and the waiting man understood. He carefully
passed the boy's body to the man below.
Then he stood up, and Eve came to his side. Silently she rested one
hand upon his shoulder, and together they watched the other at his
work.
With the utmost tenderness Peter laid the boy down on his gravelly
bed. They saw that the dead lad's face was turned so that its cheek
rested against the cold, auriferous quartz. Then the man untied the
silk scarf about his own neck and laid it over the waxen face. Then he
stood up and stripped the shoring planks from the walls of the pit,
and placed them a solid covering over the boy's body, resting them on
two large stones, one at his head and one at his feet. Finally he
tested their solidity, and climbed out of the grave.
Now he joined the others, and gazed silently down into the pit. For
some moments he stood thus, until presently he glanced across at the
eastern sky. A fiery line, like the light of a distant prairie fire,
hovered upon the horizon. He knew it was the rising of the sun.
He turned to the still weeping woman.
"Little Eve," he said gently, pointing into the pit. "There's gold
lies there. He wanted it, and--and I promised he should have it. Jim,"
he turned, and looked into the dark eyes of his friend, "that poor,
weak, suffering lad saved you, because--because you'd been good to
him. Well, old lad, I guess now that we've found some of the gold that
lies here in Barnriff, we--we must be content. We mustn't take it with
us, we mustn't rob those who need. We've found it, so we'll just cover
it up again, and hope and pray that it may multiply and bear fruit.
Then we'll mark it with a headstone, so that others may know that this
gold is to be found if folks will only seek long enough, and hard
enough beneath the surface."
Jim nodded. He understood.
Then, as the great arc of the morning sun lifted above the horizon,
both men picked up the shovels lying close by them, and buried forever
the treasure Peter had found.