The Goldsmith Comes to Town.
Timber Town was in a state of commotion. The news of the discovery of
the new gold-field had spread far and wide, and every steamer which came
into the port was crowded with clammering diggers. Every boarding-house
was full to overflowing, every inn was choked with men in heavy boots
and corduroy trousers; the roads on the outskirts of the town were lined
with rows of tents; everybody talked of the El Dorado in the mountains;
there was no thought but of gold; men were buying stores in every shop;
pack-horses stood with their heavy loads, in every inn-yard; and towards
the bush, threading their way through the tortuous gorge that led into
the heart of the mountains, a continual string of diggers, laden with
heavy "swags" or leading patient over-laden horses, filed into the
depths of the forest.
Jake Ruggles had lived a troubled life since his legal head and
overlord, the official sponsor of his promising young life, had dropped
out of his existence, as a stone drops to the bottom of a well and is
no more seen. Upon his immature shoulders rested all the worry of the
goldsmith's business. He was master of Tresco's bench; the gravers and
the rat-tail files, the stock-drills and the corn-tongs were under
his hand for good or for evil. With blow-pipe and burnisher, with
plush-wheel and stake-anvil he wrought patiently; almost bursting with
responsibility, yet with anxiety gnawing at his heart. And the lies he
told on behalf of his "boss"!--lies to men with unpaid accounts in their
hands, lies to constables with bits of blue paper from the Clerk of the
Court, lies to customers whose orders could not be executed except by
the master-goldsmith. On all sides the world pressed heavily on Jake.
His wizened face was quickly assuming the aspect of a little old man's;
his furtive eyes began to wear a scared look; sleep had ceased to visit
his innocent couch with regularity; his appetite, which formerly had
earned him a reputation with his peers, was now easily appeased with a
piece of buttered bread and a cup of milkless tea; the "duff" and rice
puddings, of the goldsmith's making, had passed out of his life even as
had the "boss" himself. Never was there a more badgered, woe-begone
youth than Jake.
It was night time. The shutters of the shop were up, the door was
bolted, the safe, with its store of gold-set gewgaws, was locked, and
the key rested securely in the apprentice's pocket, but by the light of
a gas-jet, his head bent over the bench, Jake was hard at work on a
half-finished ring. In one hand he held a tapering steel rod, on which
was threaded a circle of metal which might have been mistaken for brass;
in the other he held a light hammer with which he beat the yellow
zone. Tap-tap. "Jerusalem, my 'appy 'ome, oh! how I long for thee!"
Tap-tap-tap went the hammer. "If the 'old man' was on'y here to lend a
hand, I'd give a week's pay. The gold's full o' flaws--all along of the
wrong alloy, in smeltin'--full o' cracks and crevices." He took the gold
hoop off the steel rod, placed it on a piece of charred wood, pulled the
gas-jet towards him, and with the blow-pipe impinged little jets of
flame upon the yellow ring. "An' the galloot that come in this afternoon
said, 'I always find the work turned out of this shop ah--excellent,
ah--tip-top, as good as anything I ever bought in the Old Country,
don'tcherknow.' Yah! Gimme silver, that's all. Gimme a butterfly buckle
to make, or a monogram to saw out, an' I wouldn't call the Pope my
uncle." His eye lifted from his work and rested on a broken gold brooch,
beautiful with plaited hair under a glass centre. "An' that fussy old
wood-hen'll be in, first thing to-morrow, askin' for 'the memento of my
poor dear 'usband, my child, the one with the 'air in it'--carrotty
'air. An' those two bits of 'air-pins that want them silver bangles by
ten o'clock, they'll be here punctual. I'm just fair drove silly with
badgerin' wimmen. I'm goin' ratty with worry. When the boss comes back
from his spree, I'll give 'im a bit o' my mind. I'll tell 'im, if he
_must_ go on a bend he should wait till the proper time--Christmas,
Anniversary of the Settlement, Easter, or even a Gov'ment Holiday. But
at a time like _this_, when the town's fair drippin' with dollars ...
stupid ole buck-rabbit! An' when he can't be found, the mutton-headed
bobbies suddenly become suspicious. It's no good for me to tell 'em it's
his periodical spree--_they_ say it's robbery. Oh, well, I back my
opinion, that's all. But whether it's the one, or the other, of all the
chuckle-headed old idiots that ever was born"--Tap-tap. It was not the
noise of Jake's hammer, but a gentle knocking at the side-door of the
workshop.
The apprentice rose quietly, and put his ear to the key-hole.
Tap-tap-tap.
"Who's there?"
"Open the door," said a soft voice. "It's me. I want to come in."
"Very likely you do. There's many more'd like to come in here."
"Is that you, Jake?"
"Never you mind. Who're you?"
"You weasel-faced young imp, am I to burst open my own door?"
The mystery was at an end. In a moment, the bolt was withdrawn and
Benjamin Tresco stood in his workshop.
But before he spoke, he bolted the door behind him. Then he said,
"Well?"
"So you've come back?" said Jake, fiercely.
"Looks like it," said the goldsmith. "How's things?"
"Gone to the devil. How d'you expect me to keep business goin' when you
go on a howling spree, for weeks?"
"Spree? Me? My dear innocent youth, I have clean forgotten the very
taste of beer. At this present moment, I stand before you a total
abstainer of six weeks' duration. And yet what I ask for is not beer,
but bread--I'm as hungry as a wolf; I've hardly eaten anything for two
days. What have you got in the house?"
"Nothin'."
"What!"
"_I_ don't 'ave no time to cook. When I can find time, I go up to The
Lucky Digger and get a good square feed. D'you expect me to do two men's
work and cook as well?"
Tresco undid the small "swag" which he carried, and before the
astonished eyes of his apprentice he disclosed fully a hundred ounces of
gold.
"Jee-rusalem! Blame me if you ain't been diggin'!"
"That's so, my son."
"And the police are fair ratty because they thought you were hiding from
the Law."
"So I am, my son."
"Garn!"
"Solemn fact--there's a writ out against me."
"Well?"
"I ain't got a mind to be gaoled at such a glorious time in the history
of Timber Town. I want to get more gold, stacks of it."
"An' where do _I_ come in?"
"You come in as owner of this business by and by--if you're a good boy."
"Huh! I want to go diggin' too."
"All in good time, my energetic youth, all in good time. But for the
present, give me some food."
"Didn't I tell you there isn't any?" yelled Jake.
"Very good, very good, but don't talk so loud. Take this half-crown, and
go to The Lucky Digger. Tell the young lady in the bar that you have a
friend who's dying of hunger. Tell her to fill a jug with a quart of
beer, and a basket with tucker of sorts. And hurry back; for, by my
sacred aunt, if I don't get something better presently, I shall turn
cannibal and eat _you_!"
While the boy was gone, Tresco weighed the gold that lay on the bench.
It came to 111 ounces, and this, valued at the current price of gold
from Bush Robin Creek--the uninitiated are possibly unaware that as one
star differeth from another star in glory, so the gold from one locality
differs in price from that found in another--came to L430 2s. 6d.
Finding the safe locked, Tresco, whistling softly, turned down the gas,
and sat at his bench in the gloom.
When Jake returned he was cautiously admitted, the door was re-bolted,
and the gas was turned up sufficiently to show the goldsmith the way to
his mouth.
"Where's the key of the safe, Jake?"
"Where it ought to be."
"You young imp, anty up."
Jake produced the key from his pocket. "D'you suppose I label it and put
it in the winder?"
"Put this gold away--there's 111 ounces. I'll bring some more next time
I come. Now." He lifted the jug, and drank. When he set it down again,
it was half empty. "That's what I call a moment of bliss. No one who
hasn't spent a month in the bush knows what a thirst really is; he ain't
got no conception what beer means. Now, what's in the basket?" He lifted
the white napkin that covered his supper. "Ham!" A beautific smile
illumined his face. "Ham, pink and white and succulent, cut in thin
slices by fair hands. Delicious! And what's this? Oyster patties, cold
certainly, but altogether lovely. New bread, cheese, apple turn-over!
Couldn't be better. The order of the menu is; first, entrees--that means
oysters--next, ham, followed by sweets, and topped off with a morsel of
cheese. Stand by and watch me eat--a man that has suffered
semi-starvation for nearly a month."
Jake lit a cigarette, an indulgence with which in these days of worry
and stress he propitiated his overwrought nerves. He drew in the smoke
with all the relish of a connoisseur, and expelled it through his
nostrils.
"Is this gold the result of six weeks' work?" he asked.
"No, barely one week's," answered Tresco, his mouth full of ham and new
bread.
"Crikey!" Jake inhaled more cigarette smoke. "'Seems to me our potty
little trade ain't in it. I move that we both go in for the loocrative
profession of diggin'."
"Mumf--mumf--muff--muff." The ham had conquered Tresco's speech.
"Jes' so. That's what _I_ think, boss."
Benjamin gave a gulp. "I won't take you," he said, as plainly as
possible.
"Oh, you won't?"
"I won't."
"Then, suppose I go on my own hook, eh?"
"You've got to stop and look after this shop. You're apprenticed to
_me_."
"Oh, indeed!"
"If a man chooses to spend a little holiday in the bush, is his
apprentice to suppose his agreement's cancelled? Not a bit of it."
"An' suppose a man chooses to spend a little holiday in gaol, what
then?"
"That's outside the sphere of practical politics, my son."
"I don't know so much about that. I think different. I think we'll cry
quits. I think I'll go along with you, or likely there'll be trouble."
"Trouble?"
"Yes, trouble."
"What sort of trouble, jackanapes?"
"Why, crimson trouble."
"Indeed."
"I've got you tied hand and foot, boss. You can take that from _me_."
"Is that so? What do you think you can do?"
"I intend to go along with you."
"But I start to-night. If I can scrape together enough food to last a
week or two. But I'll take you along. You shall come. I'll show you how
I live. Now, then, what d'you say?" There was a twinkle in Tresco's eye,
and the corners of his mouth twitched with merriment.
"Think I don't know when I've got a soft thing on?" Jake took off his
apron, and hung it on a nail. "Shan't want _that_, for a month or two
anyway." Then he faced the "boss" with, "Equal whacks, you old
bandicoot. I'll find the tucker, and we'll share the gold."
Tresco's smile broke into a hearty laugh. He put his hands to his sides,
threw back his head, and fairly chortled.
"I don't see any joke." Jake looked at his master from beneath his
extravagant eyebrows.
"You'll ... you'll get the tucker ... see?"
"Why, yes--how's a man to live?"
"An' you'll help swag it?"
"'Course."
"You'll implicitly obey your lawful lord and master, out on the
wallaby?"
"'Spect I'll 'ave to."
"You won't chiack or poke borak at his grey and honoured head when, by
reason of his endowment of adipose tissue, his wind gives out?"
"Oh, talk sense. Adipose rabbits' skins!"
"All these several and collective points being agreed upon, my youthful
Adonis, I admit you into partnership."
"Done," said the apprentice, with emphasis. "It's a bargain. Go and
sleep, and I'll fossick round town for tucker--I'm good for a
sixty-pound swag, and you for eighty. So-long."
He turned off the gas, took the key of the side door, which he locked
after him, and disappeared, whilst Tresco groped his way to bed.
The surreptitious goldsmith had slept for two hours when the stealthy
apprentice let himself quietly into the dark and cheerless house. He
bore on his back a heavy bag of flour, and carried on his arm a big
basket filled with minor packages gleaned from sleepy shopkeepers, who
had been awakened by the lynx-eyed youth knocking at their backdoors.
In the cheerful and enlivening company of an alarum clock, Jake retired
to his couch, which consisted of a flax-stuffed mattress resting on a
wooden bedstead, and there he quickly buried himself in a weird tangle
of dirty blankets, and went to sleep.
At the conclusion of three brief hours, which to the heavy sleeper
appeared as so many minutes, the strident alarum woke the apprentice to
the stress of life. By the light of a tallow candle he huddled on his
clothes, and entered the goldsmith's chamber.
"Now, then, boss, three o'clock! Up you git!"
Benjamin rubbed his eyes, sat up in bed, and yawned.
"''Tis the voice of the sluggard, I heard him complain: You've waked me
too soon--I must slumber again.'
What's the time, Jake?"
"Ain't I tellin' you?--three o'clock. If we don't want to be followed by
every digger in the town, we must get out of it before dawn."
"Wise young Solomon, youth of golden promise. Go and boil the kettle.
We'll have a snack before we go. Then for fresh fields and pastures
new."
The goldsmith bounded out of bed, with a buoyancy which resembled that
of an india-rubber ball.
"Ah-ha!
'Under the greenwood tree
Who loves to lie with me,
And tune his merry note
Unto the sweek bird's throat,
Come hither.'
You see, Jakey, mine, we were eddicated when we was young." Benjamin
had jumped into his clothes as he talked. "A sup and a snack, and we
flit by the light of the moon."
"There ain't no moon."
"So much the better. We'll guide our steps by the stars' pale light and
the beams of the Southern Cross."
By back lanes and by-roads the goldsmith and his boy slunk out of the
town. At the mouth of the gorge where diggers' tents lined the road,
they walked delicately, exchanging no word till they were deep in the
solitude of the hills.
As the first streak of dawn pierced the gloom of the deep valley,
they were wading, knee-deep, a ford of the river, whose banks they had
skirted throughout their journey. On the further side the forest, dank,
green, and dripping with dew, received them into its impenetrable
shades, but still the goldsmith toiled on; his heavy burden on his back,
and the panting, weary, energetic, enthusiastic apprentice following his
steps.
Leaving the track, Tresco led the way up a steep gully, thickly choked
with underscrub, and dark with the boughs of giant trees. Forcing their
way through tangled supple-jacks and clinging "lawyer" creepers which
sought to stay their progress, the wayfarers climbed till, as day
dawned, they paused to rest their wearied limbs before a sheer cliff
of rock.
"It's not very far now," said the goldsmith, as he wiped his dripping
brow. "This is the sort of work to reduce the adipose tissue, my son.
D'you think you could find your way here by yourself, indomitable
Jakey?"
"Huh! 'Course," replied the breathless youth, proud to be his master's
companion in such a romantic situation, and glorying in his "swag". "Is
this your bloomin' camp?"
"No, sir." Tresco glanced up the face of the great limestone rock which
barred their path. "Not exactly. We've got to scale this cliff, and then
we're pretty well there."
A few supple-jacks hung down the face of the rock. These Tresco took in
his hand, and twisted them roughly into a cable. "'Look natural, don't
they?" he said. "'Look as if they growed t'other end, eh? Now, watch
me." With the help of his rope of lianas he climbed up the rugged cliff,
and when at the summit, he called to Jake to tie the "swags" to separate
creepers. These he hoisted to the top of the cliff, and shortly
afterwards the eager face of the apprentice appeared over the brow.
"Here we are," exclaimed Benjamin, "safe as a church. Pull up the
supple-jacks, Jake."
With an enthusiasm which plainly betokened a mind dwelling on
bushrangers and hidden treasure, the apprentice did as he was told.
Out of breath through his exertions, he excitedly asked, "What's the
game, boss? Where's the bloomin' plant?"
"Plant?" replied the goldsmith.
"Yes, the gold, the dollars?"
"Dollars? Gold?"
"Yes, gold! 'Think _I_ don't know? Theseyer rocks are limestone. Who
ever saw gold in limestone formation? Eh?"
"How do _you_ know it's limestone?"
"Yah! Ain't I bin down to the lime-kiln, by Rubens' wharf, and seen the
lime brought over the bay? What's the game? Tell us."
"The thing that I'm most interested in, at this present moment,"--the
goldsmith took up his heavy "swag"--"is tucker."
Without further words, he led the way between perpendicular outcrops
of rocks whose bare, grey sides were screened by fuchsia trees, birch
saplings, lance-wood, and such scrub as could take root in the shallow
soil. Turning sharply round a projecting rock, he passed beneath a tall
black birch which grew close to an indentation in the face of the
cliff. Beneath the great tree the heels of the goldsmith crushed the
dry, brown leaves deposited during many seasons; then in an instant he
disappeared from the sight of the lynx-eyed Jake, as a rabbit vanishes
into its burrow.
"Hi! Here! Boss! Where the dooce has the ole red-shank got too?"
A muffled voice, coming as from the bowels of the earth, said, "Walk
inside. Liberty Hall.... Free lodging and no taxes."
Jake groped his way beneath the tree, surrounded on three sides by the
limestone cliff. In one corner of the rock was a sharp depression, in
which grew shrubs of various sorts. Dropping into this, the lad pushed
his way through the tangled branches and stood before the entrance of a
cave.
Inside Tresco held a lighted candle in his hand. In front of him stood
Jake, spellbound.
Overhead, the ceiling was covered with white and glistening stalactites;
underfoot, the floor was strewn with bits of carbonate and the broken
bases of stalagmites, which had been shattered to make a path for the
ruthless iconoclast who had made his home in this pearly-white temple,
built without hands.
Tresco handed Jake another lighted candle.
"Allow me to introduce you, my admirable Jakey, to my country mansion,
where I retire from the worry of business, and turn my mind to the
contemplation of Nature. This is the entrance hall, the portico: observe
the marble walls and the ceiling-decorations--Early English,
perpendicular style."
Jake stood, open-mouthed with astonishment.
"Now we come to the drawing-room, the grand _salon_, where I give my
receptions." Benjamin led the way through a low aperture, on either side
of which stalactites and stalagmites had met, leaving a low doorway in
the centre. Beyond this, the candles' dim light struggled for supremacy
in a great hall, whose walls shone like crystal. On one side the
calcareous encrustations had taken the form of a huge organ, cut as
if out of marble, with pipes and key-board complete.
"Holee Christopher!" exclaimed the apprentice.
"Nature's handiwork," said the goldsmith. "Beautiful.... Been making,
this thousand years, for _me_--an' you."
"Then I reckon Nature forgot the chimbley--it's as cold as the grave."
"On the contrary, there is a chimney; but Nature doesn't believe in a
fireplace in each room. Proceed. I will now show you my private
apartments. Mind the step."
He led the way down a dark passage, strewn with huge pieces of
limestone, over which master and apprentice scrambled, into an inner
chamber, where the white walls were grimed with smoke and the black
embers of an extinguished fire lay in the middle of the floor.
"My _sanctum sanctorum_," said the goldsmith, as he fixed the butt of
his candle to a piece of rock by means of drops of melted wax poured
from the lighted end. "This is where I meditate; this is where I mature
my plans for the betterment of the human species."
"Rats! You're darn well hidin' from the police."
"My son, you grieve me; your lack of the poetic shocks me."
"Oh, garn! You robbed those mails, that's about the size of it."
"Robbed?--no, sir. Examined?--yes, sir. I was the humble instrument in
the hands of a great rascal, a man of unprincipled life, a man who
offered bribes, heavy bribes--an' I took 'em. I had need of money."
"First comes the bender and then the bribe. I know, boss. But where
d'you get the gold?"
Benjamin stooped over a mass of bedding, rolled up in a tent-fly, and
brought to light a canvas bag.
"My private store," he said, "mine and Bill's. We go whacks. We're doing
well, but expediency demands that for a short while I should retire into
private life. And, by the hokey, I can afford it."
"Gold?" asked Jake, peering at the bag.
"Nuggets," said the goldsmith.
Jake dropped his "swag" and felt the weight of the bag.
"It gits over me," he said. "Either you stole it, or you dug it. I give
it up. Any'ow, there it is."
Benjamin smiled his broadest, and began to rake together the charred
sticks scattered over the floor.
"This is my only trouble," he said. "To yank my firewood in here is
heart-breaking; that and swagging tucker from town."
"Where's the smoke go to?" Jake looked into the inky blackness above.
"Don't know. Never asked. I guess it finds its way somewhere, for after
I've hung my blanket over the doorway and lighted the fire, I sometimes
notice that the bats which live overhead buzz round and then clear out
somewhere. I imagine that there's a passage which connects with the open
air. Some day, perhaps, an over-earnest policeman will drop on our
heads. Then there'll be a picnic, eh?"
"What I want, just at present," said Jake, "is a drink."
"That's another of my troubles," replied the goldsmith. "I have to fetch
my water from outside, but it's lovely water when you've got it."
He placed his bag of gold in a corner. "Don't put all your eggs into one
basket," he said. "I believe in Jacob's plan--divide your belongings. If
I'm caught here, I have the plant in town. If I'm caught in town, I have
the plant here. Anyhow, the police can't get everything."
"An' where do I come in?" The eyes of the rabbit-faced youth peered into
his master's.
"I don't precisely know. I don't think you come in at all."
"Then what about that gold in the safe, boss?"
"The key is here." Benjamin slapped his pocket gently. "But, if you're a
good boy you shall have my business, and be the boss goldsmith of Timber
Town."
"Honest injin?"
"Perfectly honest. If I get away with my gold, all I leave behind is
yours."
"Shake hands on it."
"Certainly," said the goldsmith, and he held out his hand.
Jake took it in his.
"It's a bargain," he said.
"That's right; a bargain."
"I'll help you to get away with your gold, and you'll leave me your
business, lock, stock, and barrel."
"That's exactly it," said the goldsmith, taking up an empty "billy" from
the ground. "Now we'll go and get the water for our tea."