leaning from the saddle to kiss the top of his head as she rode past.
"Bill's about all in, I reckon. We got a late start and hustled right
along."
"Just keep that pace up till you hit the supper table," Don suggested,
and fastened the gate behind them before he returned to the porch.
"They're here, Momma," he called within, and stood in the dusk of the
doorway, waiting.
Bill had stridden ahead and opened the corral gate, and Wise One
nipped through the opening and made for the manger along one side
where fresh hay was piled. Rambler crowded past Bill hurriedly and
went trotting after the burro. Doris rode through, kicked her right
foot free of the stirrup and swung down, landing unexpectedly in
Bill's arms.
"Oh, Bill--daddy'll see us!" she protested weakly as Bill lifted her
face with a palm under her chin.
"Just one more kiss--and say you love me," Bill pleaded softly. "I
can't believe it--it seems it like a dream. Kiss me, little Doris."
In the last few hours Bill had attained a certain masterful manner,
though he still suffered uneasy moments of incredulity that demanded
instant proof of the sweet reality.
Curiously, while they actually hurried, and Bill held her no longer
than a few seconds in his arms, Don Hunter's voice came bellowing from
the porch before they reached the corral gate. He looked at them
searchingly too, when they came into the big kitchen where the light
was mellow and homelike, and where Mrs. Don was spearing mealy, white
potatoes out of an old-fashioned iron kettle.
They were sighing in gastronomic bliss over the thick, quivery custard
pie when Doris looked across at Bill in mild dismay.
"Bill! You forgot Luella! I'll bet she's swearing herself black in the
face, out there."
Bill pushed back his chair and rose. "She must be hungry--thirsty,
too," he said contritely. "Excuse me just four seconds and I'll bring
her in."
"First time I ever knew Bill to forget the parrot," Don observed
drily. "Where's Sister Mitchell and Hezekiah? Didn't leave them
behind, did he?"
"Oh, Bill has a fellow with him in camp. Yes, he only brought Luella.
She doesn't seem to like Tommy very well. She wouldn't say a word,
hardly. Oh, come on, Luella!" But the smile Doris sent toward the door
was too intimate to be wasted on a mere parrot. Don Hunter lifted one
eyebrow, then pulled them both together in a puzzled frown.
"Luella hungry? Let me have her, Bill. Here's a lovely wishbone,
Luella."
Luella tilted her head sidewise and regarded the proffered dainty
suspiciously.
"I can't believe it," she remarked with startling distinctness. "One
more kiss--say you love me. Seems like a dream. Kiss me, Doris.
Daddy'll see us. I can't believe it. We're rich, Bill, dear. I can't
believe it. Do you love me?"
Then, and then only, Luella accepted the wishbone and began daintily
picking off tiny shreds of chicken meat.
CHAPTER TEN
"WE'RE RICH, BILL, DEAR"
Bill started for the door, stumbling against a chair in his flight.
"I'll kill this darned bird!" he threatened viciously. "That's the
second time she's tipped my hand lately."
Luella looked up at him sidewise and blinked in the effort to remember
something.
"Bill Dale's parrot tipped Bill's hand," she muttered, and turned her
head the other way. "We'll lay low. See the recorr-r----" She turned
and walked up Bill's arm to his shoulder, tilting forward there and
making kissy sounds against his crimson cheek. "I can't believe it.
We're rich, Bill, dear." Then she laughed in a shrill falsetto.
"Better come on back and finish your pie before I boot you outside,"
Don observed drily. "I reckon maybe you can explain where the bird
learned all that. Never saw yuh on the run before, Bill."
At that, Bill returned and stood behind his chair, looking down
honestly into Don Hunter's searching eyes.
"She learnt it eavesdropping," Bill said bluntly. "She does that
trick, every once in awhile. She got it straight, too. I--asked Doris
to marry me, and she said it would be a good deal as you two say. I
didn't ask her until I was dead certain I'd be able to give her
luxuries a prospector couldn't afford. I struck the richest vein of
gold-bearing quartz, Don, that I ever saw in the ground. I've got
three claims on the lead, and I located one for Doris, too.
"I didn't come over to go to work. I came to ask you if you'd have me
in the family, and I wanted to get your advice about what to do with
my claims. There are several thousand dollars' worth in sight--at a
rough guess. And the vein looks strong." He smiled at Mrs. Don, who
smiled back mistily. "I didn't mean to spring it all on you folks this
evening. I--kind of wanted to get my nerve tuned up, and tell you with
trimmings. But the darned parrot beat me to it, so----"
"So you'd better sit right down and eat your pie," Mrs. Don finished
for him, laughing tremulously. "You're a good boy, Bill. We--we'd hate
awfully to lose our girl; she's all we've got. But--far as I'm
concerned, I'd rather it would be you--if you're sure you can take
care of her."
"The boss has said it." Don gave his wife the look one bestows upon
some treasured thing. "Sit down--sit down! Don't look as if you
expected to be lynched for it. The women folks run this house, Bill.
So you struck it rich! You say you're sure it ain't just a fluke?"
Doris rose hastily, asking permission with her eyes.
"Fluke!" She glanced eloquently at Bill, then at her father. "You wait
a minute. I'll show you whether it's a fluke. There. I hid it under my
gloves because I was going to wait till morning before we said
anything. Look at _that_, will you, Mother? And cast your critical
glance at _that_, Dad Hunter!" She placed a piece of ore beside each
plate and returned triumphantly to her seat.
A lump came into Bill's throat as he watched those two, slipping past
middle age, never quite reaching rainbow's end except in love. Mrs.
Don lifted the sample, looked at it, leaned and held it under the
direct rays of the lamp, glanced diffidently at Bill, then looked
questioningly across the table at Don.
"It's--gold, isn't it? Without my glasses I--but it looks----"
Don deliberately produced his reading glasses from an inner pocket of
his vest, tucked the bows over his ears and picked up the specimen
which Bill had chipped off the vein and given to Doris. Don moved his
tongue in his cheek while he looked, slanting the rock so that the
lamp shone on it. He was not a miner himself, but he had lived too
long in Nevada not to know minerals fairly well. He pushed his glasses
down his nose until he could look over them at Bill.
"How much of this have you got in sight, did you say?"
"I estimated it roughly at about five thousand dollars. When I first
located the vein I mortared and panned enough to get a fair idea of
how it was running. The vein averaged about ten inches, fairly uniform
so far. The storm last night uncovered it so now it stands out clean
from the side of the cut like an outcropping; or it did, before I
covered it up. I didn't want to come away and leave it open. There are
some strangers camped right beside me. Government men--but I didn't
like the look of their packer."
"Didn't like the look--my goodness, Mother! The fellow came to the
tent when I was there getting ready to start home, and he started
snooping around in the corner where Bill had a lot of this ore. He was
bound and de-_ter_-mined he'd see what was in the sack. I told him
more than once to go--but I had to shoot into the ground beside him
before he'd go. He went then, all right!"
Her mother looked alarmed. "Why, Doris! And where was Bill?"
"I was up at the claims with Tommy," Bill explained. "You can see,
maybe, why I can't be away long--and why I covered up this vein."
"Oh dear!" Mrs. Hunter leaned her head on her hand as if she had
become suddenly aware of a great weariness. "Must _you_ go through all
that fighting and grasping over gold? A boom always seems to me like a
lot of wild animals fighting and tearing at one another, to get a bone
which the first one on the hunting ground has already cleaned." She
closed her eyes tightly for an instant, then looked wistfully from
Doris to Bill. "I don't know but what gold costs more than it's worth,
after all," she said. "And the more you have, the more terrible the
price. I don't know but what I'd just about as soon see you two face
poverty together, as to see you face a boom. You know," she added
apologetically, "I was born in Virginia City. I've seen sudden wealth
and sudden poverty. And the sudden wealth was worse, sometimes--though
I never heard of a man shooting himself because he struck it rich, and
they do sometimes when they lose everything."
"That's what Mr. Rayfield meant, I guess. He said if Bill had a lot of
ore like the sample he saw, he'd have Bill's friends pray that wealth
wouldn't spoil him." Doris smiled tolerantly at her mother, as youth
is wont to smile at experience.
"Who's Rayfield?" Don Hunter pushed back his chair with a rasping
sound on the bare floor. "How did he come to see a sample? Doris, you
help your mother with the dishes; you ought to have a lot to talk
over. Bill, come on out on the porch and let's get at the bottom of
this. So far I can't make head nor tail of anything."
Out on the porch the two men smoked in silence, watching the twinkling
of camp fires half a mile away, where travelers were availing
themselves of running water and shade for one comfortable camp on the
desert. The Hunter ranch saw many such wayfarers, for it lay close to
the highway (such as it was) and formed a sort of oasis, all the more
enticing because one could buy fresh eggs and milk and, if one were
lucky, a loaf or two of delicious bread. Mrs. Don called such revenue
her pin money, and Don himself grinned and wondered sometimes what she
ever did with it.
"Who's Rayfield?" Don repeated his question abruptly, after a lapse of
several minutes.
Bill told him, making few words of it but contriving to paint a very
clear picture in Don's mind.
"They didn't come this way--or if they did, they didn't stop." Don
seemed to consider that omission somewhat derogatory to the character
of the government men.
"They didn't mention this place at all," Bill said. "I got the idea
they diverged from the trail and cut towards the likeliest mineral
showings. That would put them south."
"What's your plan, Bill? Or haven't you got any?" Don inspected his
pipe, prodding at the tobacco with his finger. "Yuh want to cash in as
soon as yuh can, I reckon--anxious for the honeymoon."
"You've been there," Bill retorted. "Sure, I'm anxious. That little
girl has been hankering for the ocean and palm trees all her life, she
said."
"They won't run away in the next year or so, that I know of. Well, I'm
no mining shark, but I reckon I better trail over to your diggin's and
see what you've got. Maybe them fellows over there can be some help,
and then again, maybe you want to steer clear of them. Just because a
man draws down his pay from Uncle Sam don't give him any guarantee
from the Almighty that he's a he angel. Doris seems to think so."
"What I want, Don, is for you to take a hand and help me get started
off on the right foot. I can see it's going to be a mighty big
proposition, and I don't want to have the same experience my dad had.
On the other hand, I don't want to act the darned fool sitting over my
claims with a shotgun, afraid somebody's going to rob me. There's a
safe line betwixt and between that I want to take and keep. And I
wouldn't ask you to make the trip over there, if I didn't _know_ the
stuff's there; acres of it, by the looks."
Don sucked at his pipe for some time before he spoke. Then,
"I'll do all I can, Bill. If you're going to be one of the family I
might as well start bossing yuh now. I want to see yuh make good
without hurting the other fellow. It can be done, and if it's done
rightly, there ain't any cleaner money in the world than what comes
out of the ground. Mines or ranches, you're giving the world something
it never had before; something it needs. Most money-making is just
swapping the ownership of necessities, or else changing the shape and
form of them and selling them that way. But when you take something
outa old Mother Earth, you've got it clean. What I can't stomach is
the way crooks come flockin' around every new strike, and making it
rotten business.
"Every boom suffers from 'em. When the news of this leaks out--_has_
it leaked out, yet?"
Bill shook his head, though Don could not see him in the dark.
"Not so far as I know. I just brought down supplies and a mucker from
Goldfield--and there's something funny happened up there. The darn
parrot was outside while I was in recording the claims, and when I
came out, she commenced talking a new speech that I'll swear _I_ never
taught her. She got it off to-night, if you noticed." Bill blushed
consciously, but went on. "She said, 'Bill Dale's parrot has tipped
Bill's hand. We'll lay low--see the recorder.' Only, she couldn't
quite get the last word out. Now, she heard that said in Goldfield,
while I was in the recorder's office, or she couldn't have repeated
it. I've learned that much about parrots. She talks right along, and
seems to know what she means--way she calls me down, sometimes, is
right human--but she has to hear a sentence before she can say it. One
hearing's enough, if she happens to take a notion to the words. But it
was funny, her saying that." He flicked the ash off his cigarette. "I
shut her up till I was ready to leave," he added. "I guess it didn't
amount to anything. I wasn't trailed, anyway."
"What about these fellows camped up there? You sure they ain't----"
"Oh, they came from Las Vegas way. No, they're not on my trail--or if
they are they're pretty damned smooth."
"Crooks are," Don remarked laconically. "How would the parrot be able
to tip your hand? Ever think that out?"
"No-o--only, I talk to the menagerie in camp, of course. When a fellow
doesn't see a human for weeks at a time, he'll talk to anything; and
Luella's next to human, seems like. Yes, I talked about buying her a
gold perch, I remember, and about striking it. I was one tickled man,
Don, when I first uncovered that vein and saw the gold showing right
up in the rock."
"Mh-hm--well, I reckon she must have overheard you talking about it.
Same as she must have heard some remarks, coming over, that was kind
of embarrassing for a minute, when repeated. I reckon I'll have to get
you outa bed early, to-morrow morning, Bill. I'm getting mighty
curious to see those government men and have a talk with them." He
knocked the ashes from his pipe and rose. "I've learned that one hoof
track is good as a dozen when you're trailin' stock. A critter's got
to be present, to make one track. And I can't seem to see you teachin'
that parrot to say that she's tipped your hand, and you'll lie low.
Some other critter made that track, Bill. If I don't miss my guess,
you'll have somebody trying to horn in somehow. Let's go in. I want to
talk to Doris about that feller she took a shot at, that was nosin'
around your samples."
CHAPTER ELEVEN
MR. RAYFIELD GIVES ADVICE
"I c'uldn't turrn 'em out, Mr. Dale," Tommy explained in a worried
tone, and pensively inspected a plug of tobacco before helping
himself. "Al Freeman packed the burros an' hit the trail yistiddy, he
did--an' phwat was I t' do wit' them experts but leave 'em eat uh your
grub? They're t' pay fer the board--I made that plain to 'em 'fore
they swallied a mout'ful--I did that."
Bill stood with his hands on his hips, looking across to the junipers,
where trampled brush and a tin can or two marked the spot where the
government men had made their camp. Al Freeman had evidently made a
clean job of it, though Tommy had said that the blankets of Rayfield
and Emmett had been left in a pile on a convenient rock. But no food
of any kind. Their canteens and prospectors' picks and sample bags,
and the clothes they walked in constituted their sole equipment for
camping on the desert. Of course, there was nothing for Tommy to do
but take them in and feed them, at least until Bill's return.
"What do you make of it, Don?" Bill relaxed his muscles and turned to
unsaddle.
"Tell you better when I've sized up the experts," Don replied warily.
"Of course, this Al Freeman could expect to hear from you when you got
back; he maybe decided to go while the going was good and he could
have burros and plenty of grub. When his bosses heard about his
performance in your tent, I don't see how they could do anything less
than haze him outa camp with a back pack--do you? The average skunk
like him would beat 'em to it and choose his own pack. He seems to of
been right liberal with himself."
"Wanted to fix it so they couldn't follow him up, I reckon," Bill
added. "When did Rayfield and Emmett find it out, Tommy?"
"When they come in at night, Mr. Dale." Tommy had his chew, now, and
felt more at ease. "Uh coorse, I seen him packin', an' I coulda
stopped 'im easy. But not knowin' their plans, how sh'd I know they
wasn't movin' on, an' Al under orrders t' pack an' go?"
"You couldn't butt in, of course," said Bill. "I'd have stood right
here and watched him carry off the works, and I'd never have thought
to say a word against it. It was sure bold--and he could get away with
it, too. And you couldn't do any less than feed the experts. Where
did they sleep?"
Tommy tilted his head much like Luella. "They slept outa doors, Mr.
Dale. They did, that! I seen 'em look longin' at your bunk, but I says
I has me orrders, an' they slept outside. They did, that! It was Hez
that had the tent to hisself, Mr. Dale--barrin' the turkle which I
left alone, she was that bashful wit' me." He grinned, showing broken
teeth. Then he thought of something.
"They was a growlin' an' a grumblin' from that dorg, Mr. Dale. "But if
anny one wished to enter the tent, he changed his wish, I'm thinkin'.
An' it might 'a' been Mr. Rayfield wantin' a drink from the bucket,
fer I heard him tellin' that other how he was like to make a trip to
the spring in the night, but recalled the canteen not bein' empty. He
got no drink from the bucket befoor sun-up, that I c'ld swear to, Mr.
Dale."
Bill nodded and went thoughtfully about his cooking of an early
supper. Riding the desert--or walking, for that matter--puts an edge
on one's hunger, and eating is the first thought on arriving in camp.
There would still be time to show Don his gold vein on Number One, and
he quizzed Tommy carefully about the movements of the experts. Tommy
had a deep, wide cut in the sidehill to show how his own time had
been spent, and he had seen to it that Bill's tent had not been
entered. Further than that he was vague. The experts had struck off to
the west, that morning. They could have swung back around the hill and
gone up the gulch without Tommy's knowledge, however, and Bill was
uneasy; though with Al Freeman gone there could be no valid reason for
being nervous.
But there is a certain hypnotic quality in native gold. The very sight
of it in its natural form will leave a mark on any man's mind. The
possessor is affected according to his mental caliber. He will lose
his head and spend money recklessly, feeling that he has all nature
behind him; or he will grow wary, eyeing his fellow men with
suspicion, haunted by the fear of being robbed. The higher the
mentality, the more subtle the effect; but it is there, nevertheless.
Don Hunter felt it when he stood beside Bill and stared at the vein
which Bill had just uncovered. He stooped and laid a forefinger upon
one great splotch of gold in the rock. His finger could not quite
cover it from sight. He rubbed the gold almost caressingly. He feasted
his eyes upon the many specks and splotches. Even when he got out his
pipe and sat down on the edge of the cut, he could no more take his
eyes off the gold than could Doris, when she first saw it.
"My God, Bill, that's the richest stuff I ever saw!" he sighed. "I
couldn't help thinking, all along, that you and Doris had got too
excited right in the start. I was afraid maybe you both had a
disappointment coming to you--the way you talked about millions. I
take it all back."
"I knew you felt that way about it," Bill grinned. "And I knew you'd
change your tune when you saw it in the ground yourself. That's why I
wanted you to see it and help me plan the next move. Doris wants to
incorporate and let the company do the mining while we go off and
play. Poor little kid, she wants to see something besides sagebrush,
and I don't blame her. If this mine can't make Doris happy and give
her the things she wants, then it's of no use to me. What do you think
about forming a company, Don? Rayfield claims it's the only thing to
do. I hate the very name 'corporation,' but I know that's partly
prejudice. I don't want to be hidebound. I'm willing to leave it to
you."
"And I ain't going to give snap judgment on a thing the size of this."
Don opened his knife and went over to pick out that big splotch of
gold which seemed to fascinate him. This thing is going to take some
studying."
That night they talked long with the two research men. Don admired the
careful conservatism of Mr. Emmett, but he responded more freely to
Mr. Rayfield's genial manner and his clear, common-sense way of going
at the heart of the subject. He had approached the acquaintance of the
two men with mental reservations. In an hour he and Bill had both
forgotten their caution; the conversation had drifted insensibly into
a consultation.
"My, my! I wish that scoundrel had at least left us our grips," Mr.
Rayfield exclaimed regretfully. It's rather embarrassing to be obliged
to trust that you will take our word in the place of regular
credentials. All our papers, instructions, reports--everything that
could prove our identity and standing, carried off by that pitiful
sneak thief! And I suppose," he added with a grimace, "they'll go to
start his camp fire. I doubt if the man can read; if he can he'll
probably burn our papers as a means of self-protection. You can't
identify slabs of bacon--or burros, either, as far as I'm concerned.
They all look alike to me, the same as Chinamen. So he'll probably
burn all our personal belongings and travel like an honest prospector.
I don't suppose he managed to get any inkling of what you have here,
Mr. Dale?"
Bill replied that he didn't see how Al could have gotten wise to
anything; though his prowling in the tent held a sinister meaning, he
believed.
Mr. Rayfield pursed his lips. "I wouldn't think that would mean
anything more than an attempt to steal whatever he could lay his hands
on," he said judicially. "He had undoubtedly laid his plans to make
off with our outfit, and he was quite willing to add as much of yours
as he could steal. My, my, what a plucky young lady your daughter is,
Mr. Hunter! There isn't a doubt in the world but what she saved Mr.
Dale from being robbed. No," he returned to the point in question, "I
don't see how Al could suspect that you had any rich claims here. He
certainly had no time to locate any ground alongside you before he
left. And that, I think, would be his first move. It would be very
easy to sell his claims in Goldfield without ever showing up here
again. That is, if he could get hold of some of your ore and show it
to the right parties."
"You've been in Goldfield, Mr. Rayfield?" Don lifted one eyebrow at
him.
"Oh, yes. Yes, we try to keep in touch more or less with all the
mining camps. Emmett and I were there just this summer. Nice little
camp there. But the speculators are ready for another stampede,
nevertheless. Do you know, Mr. Hunter, this mining country has
produced a type of men whom I should call professional boomers. A
pernicious type, too, in the long run. For while they undoubtedly do
start things moving when they rush to a new camp, they also knock the
bottom out quite as unthinkingly when they rush off to the next boom
camp.
"I suppose you realize, Mr. Dale, that you'll have to take into
consideration that very thing. I don't see any possibility of avoiding
a boom here at Parowan. The moment the news leaks out in Goldfield
there'll be a rush down here. It will be humanly impossible to prevent
it. The only thing that you can do is to prepare yourself to handle it
when it comes and see to it that the undesirables don't get control."