away at his knot, "and I insist upon the circuit-rider story. And,"
continued the young man, with one mighty pull at the knot, "he's _got_
to be a circuit-rider, and I'm going to make one of him. Do you hear
that, young man? I'm the man that's setting you free and giving you to
your father!"
"You can make anything you please out of me," said the prisoner. "Only
hurry!"
"As you say, parson," remarked the sheriff, with admirable meekness;
"he's _your_ prisoner, but I _could_ make a splendid deputy out of him
if you'd let him take my advice. And I'd agree to work for his
nomination for my place when my term runs out. Think of what he might
get to be!--there _has_ sheriffs gone to the Legislature, and I've heard
of one that went to Congress."
"Circuit-riders get higher than that, sometimes," said the preacher,
leading his prisoner toward old Wardelow's cabin; "they get as high as
heaven!"
"Oh!" remarked the sheriff, and gave up the contest.
Both men accompanied the prisoner toward his father's house. The
preacher began to deliver some cautionary remarks, but the young man
burst from him, threw open the door, and shouted:
"Father!"
The old man started from his bed, shaded his eyes, and exclaimed:
"Stevie!"
The father and son embraced, seeing which the sheriff proved that even
sheriffs are human by snatching the circuit-rider in his arms and giving
him a mighty hug.
* * * * *
The father recovered and lived happily. The son and the preacher
fulfilled their respective promises, and the sheriff, always, on meeting
either of them, so abounded in genial winks and effusive handshakings,
that he nearly lost his next election by being suspected of having
become religious himself.
[Illustration]
TOM CHAFFLIN'S LUCK.
"Luck? Why, I never seed anything like it! Yer might give him the
sweepin's of a saloon to wash, an' he'd pan out a nugget ev'ry time--do
it ez shure as shootin'!"
This rather emphatic speech proceeded one day from the lips of Cairo
Jake, an industrious washer of the golden sands of California; but it
was evident to all intelligent observers that even language so strong as
to seem almost figurative did not fully express Cairo Jake's conviction,
for he shook his head so positively that his hat fell off into the
stream, which found a level only an inch or two below Jacob's boottops,
and he stamped his right foot so vigorously as to endanger his
equilibrium.
"Well," sighed a discontented miner from New Jersey, "Providence knows
His own bizness best, I s'pose; but I could have found him a feller that
could have made a darn sight better use of his good luck--ef he'd had
any--than Tom Chafflin. _He_ don't know nothin' 'bout the worth of
money--never seed him drunk in my life, an' he don't seem to get no fun
out of keerds."
"Providence'll hev a season's job a-satisfyin' _you_, old Redbank,"
replied Cairo Jake; "but it's all-fired queer, for all that. Ef a feller
could only learn how he done it, 'twouldn't seem so funny; but he don't
seem to have no way in p'tickler about him that a feller ken find out."
"Fact," said Redbank, with a solemn groan. "I've studied his face--why,
ef I'd studied half ez hard at school I'd be a president, or
missionary, or somethin' now--but I don't make it out. Once I 'llowed
'twas cos he didn't keer, an' was kind o' reckless--sort o' went it
blind. So I tried it on a-playin' monte."
"Well, how did it work?" asked the gentleman from Cairo.
"Work?" echoed the Jerseyman, with the air of an unsuccessful candidate
musing over the "saddest words of thought or pen;" "I started with
thirteen ounces, an' in twenty minutes I was borryin' the price of a
drink from the dealer. _That's_ how it worked."
Certain other miners looked sorrowful; it was evident that they, too,
had been reckless, and had trusted to luck, and that in a place where
gold-digging and gambling were the only two means of proving the
correctness of their theory, it was not difficult to imagine by which
one they were disappointed.
"Long an' short of it's jest this," resumed Cairo Jake, straightening
himself for a moment, and picking some coarse gravel from his pan, "Tom
Chafflin's always in luck. His claim pays better'n anybody else's; he
always gets the lucky number at a raffle, his shovel don't never break,
an' his chimbly ain't always catchin' a-fire. He's gone down to 'Frisco
now, an' I'll bet a dozen ounces that jest cos he's aboard, the old
boat'll go down an' back without runnin' aground a solitary durned
time."
No one took up Cairo Jake's bet, so that it was evident he uttered the
general sentiment of the mining camp of Quicksilver Bar.
Every man, in the temporary silence which followed Jake's summary, again
bent industriously over his pan, until the scene suggested an amateur
water-cure establishment returning thanks for basins of gruel, when
suddenly the whole line was startled into suspension of labor by the
appearance of London George, who was waving his hat with one hand and a
red silk handkerchief with the other, while with his left foot he was
performing certain _pas_ not necessary to successful pedestrianism.
"Quicksilver Bar hain't up to snuff--oh, no! Ain't a-catchin' up with
Frisco--not at all! Little Chestnut don't know how to run a saloon, an'
make other shops weep--not in the least--not at all--oh, no!"
"Eh?" inquired half a dozen.
"Don't b'leeve me if you don't want to, but just bet against it 'fore
you go to see--that's all!" continued London George, fanning himself
with his hat.
"George," said Judge Baggs, with considerable asperity, "ef you _are_ an
Englishman, try to speak your native tongue, an' explain what you mean
by actin' ez ef you'd jes' broke out of a lunatic 'sylum. Speak quick,
or I'll fine you drinks for the crowd."
"Just as lieve you would," said the unabashed Briton, "seein'--seein'
Chestnut's got a female--a woman--a lady cashier--there! Guess them San
Francisco saloons ain't the only ones that knows what's what--not any!"
"I don't b'leeve a word of it," said the judge, washing his hands rather
hastily; "but I'll jest see for myself."
Cairo Jake looked thoughtfully on the retreating form of the judge, and
remarked:
"He'll feel ashamed of hisself when he gits thar an' finds he'll hev to
drink alone. Reckon I'll go up, jest to keep him from feelin' bad."
Several others seemed impressed by the same idea, and moved quite
briskly in the direction of Chestnut's saloon.
The judge, protected by his age and a pair of green spectacles, boldly
entered, while his followers dispersed themselves sheepishly just
outside the open door, past which they marched and re-marched as
industriously as a lot of special sentries.
There was no doubt about it. Chestnut had installed a lady at the end of
the bar, and as, between breakfast and dinner, there was but little
business done at the saloon, the lady was amusing herself by weighing
corks and pebbles in the tiny scales which were to weigh the metallic
equivalent for refreshments.
The judge contemplated the arrangements with considerable satisfaction,
and immediately called up all thirsty souls present.
Those outside the door entered with the caution of veterans in an
enemy's country, and with a bashfulness that was painful to contemplate.
They stood before the bar, they glanced cautiously to the right, and
gently inclined their heads backward, until only a line of eyes and
noses were visible from the cashier's desk.
Then the judge raised his green glasses a moment, and smiled benignantly
on the new cashier as he raised his liquor aloft; then he turned to his
party, and they drank the toast as solemnly as if they were the soldiers
of Miles Standish fortifying the inner man against fear of the Pequods.
Then they separated into small groups, and conversed gravely on subjects
in which they had not the slightest interest, while each one pretended
not to look toward the cashier, and each one saw what the others were
earnestly striving to do.
But when the judge settled the score, and chatted for several minutes
with the receiver of treasure, and the lady--young, and rather pretty,
and quite pleasant and modest and business-like--laughed merrily at
something the judge said, an idea gradually dawned upon the bystanders,
and within a few moments the boys feverishly awaited their chances to
treat the crowd, for the sole purpose of having an excuse to speak to
the new cashier, and to stand within three feet of her for about the
space of a minute.
Great was the excitement on the Creek when the party returned, and
testified to the entire accuracy of London George's report.
Every one went to the saloon that night--there _had_ been some games
arranged to take place at certain huts, but they were postponed by
mutual consent.
Even the Dominie--an ex-preacher, who had never yet set foot upon the
profane floor of the saloon--appeared there that evening in search of
some one so exceeding hard to find that the Dominie was compelled to
make several tours of all the tables and benches in the room.
Chestnut himself, when questioned, said she had come by the way of the
Isthmus with her father and mother, who had both died of the Chagres
fever before reaching San Francisco--that some friends of her family and
his had been trying to get her something to do in 'Frisco, and that he
had engaged her at an ounce a day; and, furthermore, that he would be
greatly obliged if the boys at Quicksilver wouldn't marry her before she
had worked out her passage-money from 'Frisco, which he had advanced.
But the boys at Quicksilver were not so thoughtful of Chestnut's
interests as they might have been. They began to buy blacking and
neckties and white shirts, and to patronize the barber.
No one had any opportunity for love-making, for the lady's working hours
were all spent in public, and in a business which caused frequent
interruptions of even the most agreeable conversation.
It soon became understood that certain men had proposed and been
declined, and betting on who would finally capture the lady was the most
popular excitement in camp.
Cool-headed betting men watched closely the countenance of Sunrise (as
some effusive miner had named the new cashier) as each man approached to
pay in his coin or dust, and though they were intensely disgusted by its
revelations, they unhesitatingly offered two to one that Dominie would
be the fortunate man.
To be sure, she saw less of the Dominie than of any one else, for,
though he did not drink, or pay for the liquor consumed by any one else,
he occasionally came in to get a large coin changed, and then it was
noticed that Sunrise regarded him with a sort of earnestness which she
never exhibited toward any one else.
"Too bad!" sighed Cairo Jake. "Somebody ort to tell her that he's only a
preacher, an' she'll only throw herself away ef she takes him. Ef any
stranger wuz to insult her, Dominie wouldn't be man 'nuff to draw on
him."
"Beats thunder, though!" sighed Redbank, "how them preachers kin take
folks in. Thar's Chestnut himself, _he's_ took with Dominie--'stead of
orderin' him out, he talks with him an' her just ez ef he'd as lieve get
rid of her as not."
[Illustration: TOM WALKED RAPIDLY TO THE CASHIER'S DESK, AND GAVE
SUNRISE SEVERAL HEARTY KISSES.]
"Boat's a-comin'!" shouted Cairo Jake, looking toward the place, half a
mile below, where the creek emptied into the river. "See her smoke? Like
'nuff Tom Chafflin's on board. He wuz a-goin' to try to come back by the
first boat, an' of course he's done it--jest his luck. Ef he'd only come
sooner, somebody besides the preacher would hev got her--you kin just
bet your bottom ounce on it. Let's go down an' see ef he's got any
news."
Several miners dropped tools and pans, and followed Jake to the landing,
and gave a hearty welcome to Tom Chafflin.
He certainly looked like anything but a lucky man; he was good-looking,
and seemed smart, but his face wore a dismal expression, which seemed
decidedly out of place on the countenance of a habitually lucky man.
"Things hain't gone right, Tom?" asked Cairo Jake.
"Never went worse," declared Tom, gloomily. "Guess I'll sell out, an'
try my luck somewheres else."
"_Ef_ you'd only come a little sooner!" sighed Jake, "you'd hev hed a
chance that would hev made ev'rything seem to go right till Judgment
Day. I'll show yer."
Jake opened the saloon-door, and there sat Sunrise, as bright, modest,
and pleasant-looking as ever.
With the air of a man who has conferred a great benefit, and is calmly
awaiting his rightful reward, Jake turned to Tom; but his expression
speedily changed to one of hopeless wonder, and then to one of delight,
as Tom Chafflin walked rapidly up to the cashier's desk, pushed the
Dominie one side and the little scales the other, and gave Sunrise
several very hearty kisses, to which the lady didn't make the slightest
objection--in fact, she blushed deeply, and seemed very happy.
"That's what I went to 'Frisco to look for," explained Tom, to the
staring bystander, "but I couldn't find out a word about her."
"Don't wonder yer looked glum, then," said Cairo Jake; "but--but it's
jest your luck!"
"Dominie here was going down to hurry you back," said Sunrise; "but--"
"But we'll give him a different job now, my dear," said Tom, completing
the sentence.
And they did.
OLD TWITCHETT'S TREASURE.
Old Twitchett was in a very bad way. He must have been in a bad way, for
Crockey, the extremely mean storekeeper at Bender, had given up his own
bed to Twitchett, and when Crockey was moved with sympathy for any one,
it was a sure sign that the object of his commiseration was going to
soon stake a perpetual claim in a distant land, whose very streets, we
are told, are of precious metal, and whose walls and gates are of rare
and beautiful stones.
It was Twitchett's own fault, the boys said, with much sorrowful
profanity. When they abandoned Black Peter Gulch to the Chinese, and
located at Bender, Twitchett should have come along with the crowd,
instead of staying there by himself, in such an unsociable way. Perhaps
he preferred the society of rattlesnakes and horned toads to that of
high-toned, civilized beings--there was no accounting for tastes--but
then he should have remembered that all the rattlesnakes in the valley
couldn't have raised a single dose of quinine between them, and that the
most sociable horned toad in the world, and the most obliging one,
couldn't fry a sick man's pork, or make his coffee.
But, then, Twitchett was queer, they agreed--he always was queer. He
kept himself so much apart from the crowd, that until to-night, when the
boys were excited about him, few had ever noticed that he was a
white-haired, delicate young man, instead of a decrepit old one, and
that the twitching of his lips was rather touching than comical.
At any rate it was good for Twitchett that two old residents of Black
Peter Gulch had, ignorant of the abandonment of the camp, revisited it,
and accidentally found him insensible, yet alive, on the floor of his
hut. They had taken turns in carrying him--for he was wasted and
light--until they reached Crockey's store, and when they laid him down,
while they should drink, the proprietor of the establishment (so said a
pessimist in the camp), seeing that his presence, while he lived, and
until he was buried, would attract trade and increase the demand for
drinks, insisted on putting Twitchett between the proprietary blankets.
Twitchett had rallied a little, thanks to some of Crockey's best brandy,
but it was evident to those who saw him that when he left Crockey's he
would be entirely unconscious of the fact. Suddenly Twitchett seemed to
realize as much himself, and to imagine that his exit might be made very
soon, for he asked for the men who brought him in, and motioned to them
to kneel beside him.
"I'm very grateful, boys, for your kindness--I wish I could reward you;
but haven't got anything--I've got nothing at all. The only treasure I
had I buried--buried it in the hut, when I thought I was going to die
alone--I didn't wan't those heathens to touch it. I put it in a can--I
wish you'd git it, and--it's a dying man's last request--take it--and--"
If Twitchett finished his remark, it was heard only by auditors in some
locality yet unvisited by Sam Baker and Boylston Smith, who still knelt
beside the dead man's face, and with averted eyes listened for the
remainder of Twitchett's last sentence.
Slowly they comprehended that Twitchett was in a condition which,
according to a faithful proverb, effectually precluded the telling of
tales; then they gazed solemnly into each other's faces, and each man
placed his dexter fore-finger upon his lips. Then Boylston Smith
whispered:
"Virtue is its own reward--hey, Sam?"
"You bet," whispered Mr. Baker, in reply. "It's on the square now,
between us?"
"Square as a die," whispered Boylston.
"When'll we go for it?" asked Sam Baker.
"Can't go till after the fun'ril," virtuously whispered Boylston.
"'Twould be mighty ungrateful to go back on the corpse that's made our
fortunes."
"Fact," remarked Mr. Baker, holding near the nostrils of Old Twitchett a
pocket-mirror he had been polishing on his sleeve. After a few seconds
he examined the mirror, and whispered:
"Nary a sign--might's well tell the boys."
The announcement of Twitchett's death was the signal for an animated
discussion and considerable betting. How much dust he had washed, and
what he had done with it, seeing that he neither drank nor gambled, was
the sole theme of discussion. There was no debate on the deceased's
religious evidences--no distribution of black crape--no tearful beating
down of the undertaker; these accessories of a civilized deathbed were
all scornfully disregarded by the bearded men who had feelingly drank to
Twitchett's good luck in whatever world he had gone to. But when it came
to deceased's gold--his money--the bystanders exhibited an interest
which was one of those touches of nature which certifies the universal
kinship.
Each man knew all about Twitchett's money, though no two agreed. He had
hid it--he had been unlucky, and had not found much--he had slyly sent
it home--he had wasted it by sending it East for lottery tickets which
always drew blanks--he had been supporting a benevolent institution. Old
Deacon Baggs mildly suggested that perhaps he only washed out such gold
as he actually needed to purchase eatables with, but the boys smiled
derisively--they didn't like to laugh at the deacon's gray hairs, but he
_was_ queer.
Old Twitchett was buried, and Sam Baker and Boylston Smith reverently
uncovered with the rest of the boys, while Deacon Baggs made an
extempore prayer. But for the remainder of the day Old Twitchett's
administrators foamed restlessly about, and watched each other narrowly,
and listened to the conversation of every group of men who seemed to be
talking with any spirit; they kept a sharp eye on the trail to Black
Peter Gulch, lest some unscrupulous miner should suspect the truth and
constitute himself sole legatee.
But when the shades of evening had gathered, and a few round drinks had
stimulated the citizens to more spirited discussion, Sam and Boylston
strode rapidly out on the Black Peter Gulch trail, to obtain the reward
of virtue.
"He didn't say what kind of a can it was," remarked Mr. Baker, after the
outskirts of Bender had been left behind.
"Just what I thought," replied Boylston; "pity he couldn't hev lasted
long enough for us to hev asked him. But I've been a-workin' some sums
about different kinds of cans--I learned how from Phipps, this
afternoon--he's been to college, an' his head's cram-full of sech
puzzlin' things. It took multiplyin' with four figures to git the
answer, but I couldn't take a peaceful drink till I knowed somethin'
'bout how the find would pan out."
"Well?" inquired Mr. Baker, anathematizing a stone over which he had
just stumbled.
"Well," replied Boylston, stopping in an exasperating manner to light
his pipe, "the smallest can a-goin' is a half-pound powder-can, and
that'll hold over two thousand dollars worth--even _that_ wouldn't be
bad for a single night's work--eh?"
"Just so," responded Mr. Baker; "then there's oyster-cans an'
meat-cans."
"Yes," said Boylston, "an' the smallest of 'em's good fur ten thousand,
ef it's full. An' when yer come to five-pound powders--why, one of them
would make two fellers rich!"
They passed quickly and quietly through Greenhorn's Bar. The diggings
at the Bar were very rich, and experienced poker-players, such as were
Twitchett's executors, had made snug little sums in a single night out
of the innocent countrymen who had located at the Bar; but what were the
chances of the most brilliant game to the splendid certainty which lay
before them?
They reached Black Peter Gulch and found Twitchett's hut still
unoccupied, save by a solitary rattlesnake, whose warning scared them
not. Mr. Baker carefully covered the single window with his coat, and
then Boylston lit a candle and examined the clay floor. There were
several little depressions in its surface, and in each of these Boylston
vigorously drove his pick, while Mr. Baker stood outside alternately
looking out for would-be disturbers, and looking in through a crack in
the door to see that his partner should not, in case he found the can,
absentmindedly spill some of the contents into his own pocket before he
made a formal division.
Boylston stopped a moment for breath, leaned on his pick, stroked his
yellow beard thoughtfully, and offered to bet that it would be an
oyster-can. Mr. Baker whispered through the crack that he would take
that bet, and make it an ounce.
Boylston again bent to the labor, which, while it wearied his body,
seemed to excite his imagination, for he paused long enough to bet that
it would be a five-pound powder-can, and Mr. Baker, again willing to
fortify himself against possible loss, accepted the bet in ounces.
Suddenly Boylston's pick brought to light something yellow and
round--something the size of an oyster-can, and wrapped in a piece of
oilskin.
"You've won _one_, bet," whispered Mr. Baker, who was inside before the
yellow package had ceased rolling across the floor.
"Not ef _this_ is it," growled Boylston; "it don't weigh more'n ounce
can, wrapper and all. Might's well see what 'tis, though."
The two men approached the candle, hastily tore off the oilskin, and
carefully shook the contents from the can. The contents proved to be a
small package, labeled: "_My only treasures_."
Boylston mentioned the name of the arch-adversary of souls, while Mr.
Baker, with a well-directed blow of his heel, reduced the can from a
cylindrical form to one not easily described by any geometric term.
Unwrapping the package, Mr. Baker discovered a picture-case, which, when
opened, disclosed the features of a handsome young lady; while from the
wrappings fell a small envelope, which seemed distended in the middle.
"Gold in that, mebbe," suggested Boylston, picking it up and opening it.
It _was_ gold; fine, yellow, and brilliant, but not the sort of gold the
dead man's friends were seeking, for it was a ringlet of hair.
Sadly Mr. Baker put on his coat, careless of the light which streamed
through the window; slowly and sorely they wended their way homeward;
wrathfully they bemoaned their wasted time, as they passed by the
auriferous slumberers of Greenhorn's Bar; depressing was the general
nature of their conversation. Yet they were human in spite of their
disappointment, for, as old Deacon Baggs, who was an early riser,
strolled out in the gray dawn for a quiet season of meditation, he saw
Boylston Smith filling up a little hole he had made on top of Old
Twitchett's grave, and putting the dirt down very tenderly with his
hands.
BLIZZER'S WIFE.
The mining-camp of Tough Case, though small, had its excitements, as
well as did many camps of half a dozen saloon-power; and on the first
day of November, 1850, it was convulsed by the crisis of by far the
greatest excitement it had ever enjoyed.