Having presently finished her breakfast, Beth joined the group outside, curious to behold the workings of a placer mine in actual operation.
There was not much to see, but it was picturesque. In their lack of funds the partners had constructed the simplest known device for collecting the gold from the sand. They had built a line of sluices, or troughs of considerable length, propped on stilts, or supports about knee high, along the old bed of the canyon. The sluices were mere square flumes, set with a fairly rapid grade.
Across the bottom of all this flume, at every yard or less of its length, small wooden cleats had been nailed, to form the "riffles." Into the hoses the water from the creek was turned, at the top. The men then shoveled the sand in the running stream and away it went, sluicing along the water-chute, its particles rattling down the wooden stairway noisily. The gold was expected to settled behind the riffles, owing to its weight.
All the flume-way dripped from leakages. The sun beat down upon the place unshaded. Water escaped into all the pits the men were digging as they worked, so that they slopped around in mud above their ankles. Dave wore rubber boots and was apparently protected. As a matter of fact the boots promptly filled with water. Napoleon and Gettysburg made no effort to remain dry shod, but puddled all day with soused footgear.
Van rode off to the "reservation town," a mile below the hill, to bargain for a tent reported there for sale. Sleeping quarters here on the claim were far too crowded. Until lumber for a cabin could be purchased they must make what shifts they might.
It had taken but the briefest time for the miners to go at their work. Beth stood near, watching the process with the keenest interest. It seemed to her a back-breaking, strenuous labor. These sturdy old fellows, grown gray and stooped with toil—grown also expectant of hardship, ill-luck, and privations—were pathetic figures, despite their ways of cheer.
That Van had attached them to himself in a largeness of heart by no means warranted by their worth was a conviction at which anyone must promptly arrive. They were lovable old scamps, faithful, honest, and loyal to the man they loved—but that was all that could be stated. Perhaps it was enough. As partners with whom to share both life and fortune they might have seemed impossible to many discerning men.
Beth sat down on a rock, near Gettysburg. Someway she, too, liked the three old chaps of whom work had made three trademarks. Old Gettysburg began to sing. The words of his song, halted by grunts as he shoveled, were, to say the least, unexpected:
The frog he swore he'd have a ride,(Shovel)With a rinktum bolly kimo;Sword and pistols by his side,(Shovel)With a rinktum bolly kimo.For lunch he packed a beetle bug,(Shovel)With a rinktum bolly kimo;Tucked inside his tummy snug,(Shovel)With a rinktum bolly kimo.
Kimo, karo, pito, garo,Kimo, bolly mitty kimo.(Shovel)Shing-shang hammyriddle, allibony, ringtang,Folderolli bolly mitty kimo.(Three shovelings and some meditation)
The frog he rode a slimy eel,(Shovel)With a rinktum bolly kimo.The sun made his complexion peel,(Shovel)With a rinktum bolly kimo.The frog's legs went to join a fry,(Shovel)With a rinktum bolly kimo.The eel became a juicy pie,(Shovel)With a rinktum bolly kimo.
(Chorus)
Napoleon looked up at the end of the song and spat upon his hands.
"Gett," he said placidly, "I think that's a lie—metaphorical speakin'. Ain't mad, are you?"
Gettysburg made no response. He merely shoveled.
One of the sluices, weakened by a leak that had undermined its pinning, fell from place, at the farther end of the line. Old Dave went down to repair it. Napoleon took advantage of his absence to come to Beth, with an air of imparting something confidential.
"Splice my main brace," said he, with his head on one side, quaintly, "wasn't that a blasphermous yarn old Dave was givin' us about the wind blowing that log chain away a link at a time? Old son of a gun!"
Beth was inquisitive.
"Why do you call him a son of a gun?"
Napoleon scratched his head.
"Well, you see, Dave's mother held up his father with a Colt forty-five and makes him marry her. Then along comes Dave. I reckon that makes him a sure enough son of a gun."
Beth said: "Oh." She turned a little red.
"Yep, good old cuss, Dave is, though. No good for a seafearing man, however. He could never learn to swear—he ain't got no ear for music."
He returned to his shovel. He and Gettysburg worked in silence for fifteen minutes. Old Dave returned and joined them. Gettysburg tuned up for another of his songs, the burden of which was the tale of a hen-pecked man.
Once more at its end Napoleon looked up and spat on his hands.
"There ain't nothing that can keep some women down 'cept a gravestone—and I've seen some gravestones which was tilted."
Despite the interest and amusement she felt in it all, Beth was becoming sleepy as she sat there in the sun. She shook off the spell and arose, approaching closer to the bank and flume where Gettysburg was toiling. He labored on, silently, for several minutes, then paused, straightened up by degrees, as if the folds in his back were stubborn, and looked at their visitor steadily, his glass eye particularly fixed. One of his hands pulled down his jaw, and then it closed up with a thump.
"Guess this kind of a racket is sort of new to you, Mr. Kent," he ventured. "Ever seen gold washin' before?"
"No," Beth confessed, "and I don't see where the gold is to come from now."
Gettysburg chuckled. "Holy toads! Miners do a heap of work and never see it neither. Me and Van and Napoleon has went through purg and back, many's the time, and was lucky to git out with our skeletons, sayin' nuthin' about the gold."
"Oh." She could think of nothing else to say.
"In fact Van was all that got me out onct—Napoleon, too. We wasn't worth it, prob'ly. That's the joke on Van. Since then us three cusses has starved, and froze, and clean roasted, chasin' gold."
"Oh."
"We was lost in the snow, one winter, with nuthin' to eat but a plug of tobacker, a can of vasolene, and a porous plaster. We lived on that menu fer a week—that and snow-soup. But Van got us out all right—packed Napoleon about five miles on his back. Nap was so thin there wasn't enough of him to die." His one good eye became dreamily focused on the past. He smiled. "But someways the desert is worse than the snow. We got ketched three times without no water. Never did know, Nap or me, how Van got our two old dried-up carcasses out the last time, down to Death Valley. He's a funny cuss, old Van."
Once more Beth merely answered: "Oh."
"You bet!" resumed Gettysburg. "He never quits. It ain't in him. He works his hands off and his soul out of its socket, every time." He laughed heartily. "Lord! we have done an awful lot of fool work fer nuthin'! We've tackled tunnels and shafts, and several games like this, and pretty near died a dozen different styles—all uneasy kinds of dyin'—and we've lived when it was a darn sight uneasier than croakin', and kept on tryin' out new diggin's, and kept on bein' busted all the time. 'Nuff to make a lemon laugh, the fun we've had. But now, by Jupe! we've struck it at last—and it ain't a-goin' to git away!"
"Oh, I'm glad—I'm glad!" said Beth, winking back a bit of suspicious moisture that came unbidden in her eyes as she looked on this weather-beaten, hardship-beaten old figure, still sturdily ready for the fates. "I'm sure you all deserve it! I'm sure of that!"
"Wal, that's a question fer God Almighty," Gettysburg replied. "But there's the gold, the good yellow gold! And I'm awful glad fer Van!"
Into the water he dipped his crooked old fingers, and scratching down behind a riffle he fetched up a small amount of gold, doubly bright with the water and the sunlight upon it.
"Gold—and we git it easy," he added, repeating: "I'm awful glad fer Van. You ought to see him shovel!" He dropped the gold back into the water carelessly. "It ain't a-goin' to do us old jack-legged cusses much good, at our age, but I would like to go to San Francisco this summer once, and shoot the chutes!"
Beth and Van rode away from the claim just after lunch; she on a borrowed horse. The girl had not slept, but she had rested well and was far more fit for the journey back to town than either she or Van had expected.
He went with her part way only—far enough to put her safely on a trail from which she could not wander. They talked but little as they rode—perhaps because they had so much to say that could not be approached. Never for a moment did Van relax his vigilance upon himself, or treat her otherwise than as a man for whom he had conceived a natural liking.
When they came to the place of parting he pulled up his broncho and faced about in the trail.
"Well, Kent," he said, "so long. You'll have no trouble now." He held forth his hand.
Beth gave him hers—and all her heart. Nevertheless, his clasp was as brief as he would give to one of his sex.
"So long," she answered. "Good luck. I am under many obligations."
"They won't make you very round shouldered," he said. "See you again."
That was their parting. He rode back at once—and Beth continued on her way. She turned three times in her saddle to watch him as he went, but she did not catch him glancing back.
About sundown she rode into Goldite, went at once to Mrs. Dick's, and tied her horse to a post. Mrs. Dick she met in the hall.
"Snakes alive!" exclaimed that lively little person. "If you ain't back as natural as life!" The garb had not deceived her for a moment. "Where in the world have you been, in such a rig?"
Beth's answer was ready.
"I went to see my brother, and had to spend the night on the desert."
Mrs. Dick stared at her in wonder. "Talk to me about the Eastern women being mollycuddles! You don't mean his cabin was blown down by the storm?"
Beth was ill-prepared for this, but she met it.
"I wish you could have seen that roof go by!"
"Are you hungry?" the hostess demanded. "You look all wore out."
"I am," Beth admitted. "Has Mr. Bostwick been here in my absence?"
"He ain't been here in anything—nope."
Beth's relief was inexpressible. She was safe, with everything behind her! No one knew, or would ever need to know, the secret in possession of herself and Van.
"If anyone comes that you can send, will you kindly have my horse taken over to the stable?" she said. "I must go upstairs and rest."
"Here's Billy Stitts a-comin' now," replied the housewife, moving towards the door. "He's been worried to death about you bein' gone!"
Beth ran at once for the stairs, and later, from the window, saw the faithful old Billy leading her pony away. She closed her door, darkened the light, and soon clambered wearily into bed, where she dropped off to sleep like a child, lost to the world through the dinner hour and till something like three in the morning. She awaked then for a moment, long enough to think of Van, then sighed in absolute comfort and turned to sleep again.
It was nine o'clock in the morning when at last she appeared on the scene.
"Land snakes!" said Mrs. Dick, who had heard her coming down. "Ain't you the sleeper! Well, I've kept your breakfast, but I couldn't keep last night's supper. Your friend, Mr. Bostwick, was here about eight, but I told him he'd have to wait if it took you a week to come to."
"You didn't tell him I'd been away, I hope," said Beth, suddenly alarmed at the thought of Searle's presence in the town. "I'd rather no one knew but you."
"Lord! I wouldn't tell him if a rat was dead in his pocket!" Mrs. Dick expostulated. "I can't abide the man, and you might as well know it, even if it does hurt your feelings."
Beth sat down to her breakfast. "You're as good as you can be."
"Well, the breakfast ain't—'taint fresh," said Mrs. Dick. "But I'll see you git a decent lunch."
She bustled off into the kitchen. Beth had barely finished eating when Bostwick again appeared.
The man was tanned from his trip in the desert. He seemed alert, excited, keen over prospects rapidly coming to a head.
"Well, well, Beth," he said as he came inside the dining-room, "I'm back, you see, but I've certainly had a time of it! The car broke down, and Glen had left Starlight when at last I arrived, and I hunted for him all through the mountains and only found him four days ago, and we've been going ever since. I couldn't write, but I did feel cut up, I assure you, about leaving you here alone for so long a time."
He advanced as if to kiss her, but Beth avoided his caress. She was calm and possessed. She meant to ascertain just how far the man was trying to deceive her.
"Won't you sit down, and tell me all about it," she said. "You saw Glen four days ago?" She resumed her place in her chair.
"Three or four days ago—I'm mixed in my dates," he said, as he also took a seat. "He's looking fine, and sent his love, of course."
That the man was lying, in every particular, she began to feel convinced.
"You left him well? He was feeling strong and well?"
"Never better," he assured her. "You can see what this wonderful sunlight does, even to me."
"Yes, I see. And you left Starlight yesterday?"
"Yesterday afternoon. I had trouble running back. Otherwise we'd have been here in the evening."
She glanced at him quickly. "We? Glen didn't come along? He isn't here?"
"Oh, no, no, certainly not," he hastened to say. "I brought in a man who—who is interested in the purchase we have made."
That served to arouse her sense of wonderment at what he had really been doing with her money. He was attempting to deceive her concerning Glen, and perhaps his entire story was a fabrication.
"Oh," she said. "Then you have purchased the mine—you and Glen?"
"Well—a few minor details remain to be concluded," he said off-handedly. "We are not yet in actual possession of the property. There will be no further hitches, however—and the claim is certainly rich."
For the life of her she could not tell what lay at the bottom of the business. The strange conflicts and discrepancies between Glen's very own letters made the riddle utterly obscure. She felt that Searle was fashioning falsehoods in every direction. That he had not visited Glen at all was her fixed conviction. A sudden distrust, almost a loathing for this heavy-browed man, was settling down upon her, inescapably. Someway, somehow she must know about Glen for herself. Her own attempted trip to Starlight had discouraged all thought of further adventure, and no reliance whatsoever could be placed on Searle's reports. Perhaps the reputed mining property was likewise a myth—or if such a property existed, Glen might never have heard of it at all. But Glen's letter—she was always forgetting that letter—the one he had written to Searle.
She said: "Where is this mine that Glen has found?"
He colored slightly. "We have all agreed not to talk too much about it yet. It's not very far from here—I can tell you that. Precautions are necessary where a hundred men follow every prospector about, night and day, if he happens to have found a bit of valuable ore. A thousand men would be after this property if they knew the way to secure it."
Perhaps, after all, Glen, had purposely concealed this matter from herself. Bostwick sounded plausible. Her mind reverted to her brother's illness, for Glen to her was of far more importance than all the mines in Nevada.
"I am glad to hear that Glen iswell," she said, determined on another tack. "He hasn't answered my letter."
Once more Bostwick colored, beneath his tan and the gun-metal tint of his jaw.
"I suppose he's been too busy," he answered. "Have you written again?"
"Not yet," she answered honestly. "I wasn't sure of his whereabouts. You are sure he's in Starlight now?"
"Yes—but you needn't write," he hastened to say. "He said he might come, perhaps to-morrow." He rose from his chair. "I've got to hurry off, little girl. These negotiations cannot wait. I'll run in when I can—this afternoon at the latest. I'm glad to see you looking so well." He approached her with lover-like intent. "My heart has been empty and forlorn, away from you, Beth. Surely you have a little—a little something for me, pet? You know how starved——"
"Oh—Mrs. Dick is coming!" she interrupted desperately. "You must have a great deal to do."
Mrs. Dick was making a large and lively noise in the kitchen.
Bostwick listened for a second, his deep-set eyes keenly fixed on the girl, like very orbs of suspicion and jealousy. He lowered his voice.
"Has that ruffian, Van Buren, been here recently?"
She raised her brows in well-feigned astonishment,
"I haven't heard of any ruffian being in town."
Bostwick studied her face for a moment in silence.
"I'll be around this afternoon," he repeated. "Good-by."
He departed hurriedly, glancing at his watch as he went.
Not a block from the house he met old Billy Stitts, who, though quite unknown to the New York man, knew Bostwick in a way of his own.
"Morning, Uncle.—Howdy?" he said, blocking Bostwick's path. "Back, I see. Welcome home. I guess you don't know me as well as I know you. My name is Stitts—Billy Stitts—and I'm gittin' on fine with your niece. I'm the one which runs her errands and gits the inside track."
Bostwick, staring at Billy ominously, and about to sweep him aside as a bit of old rubbish, too familiar and impudent for tolerance, paused abruptly in his impulse, at a hint which Billy had supplied.
"Oh," he said. "How are you? So you are the friend who runs Miss Kent's errands? You must be the one she asked me to befriend."
"Did she?" said old Billy, inordinately pleased. "What did I tell you about the inside track?"
"I'm glad if you have been of use," Bostwick told him insidiously. "You didn't say what your services have been. Just a few little errands, I suppose?"
"Never you mind," said Billy, with a profoundly impressive wink. "That's between her and me. That ain't even fer you, Uncle Bostwick," and he winked again.
"Of course, of course," agreed Bostwick, half consumed with rage at the old fellow's abominable manners and familiarity. "I'll keep you in mind and add some reward of my own on the next occasion."
He bowed and hastened on his way, boiling with curiosity to know what it was that Beth had been doing to require this old tattler's services. He meant to ascertain. His suspicions went at once to Van, at thought of whom he closed down his jaw like a vise.
Filled with a turmoil of thoughts that seethed in his brain, like a brew in a witch's cauldron—some of them dark and some golden bright, and some of them red with lust for many things—he proceeded down street to McCoppet's place, to find himself locked out of the private den, where the gambler was closeted with Lawrence.
Bostwick had told Beth partial truths. His journey had been hard. His car had been twice disabled on the desert; Lawrence had been difficult to find; delays had confronted him at every turn, and not until midnight of the day before this had he come with his quarry to Goldite—barely in time to save the situation, with the reservation opening less than forty-eight hours away.
He had not seen Glen, nor approached the town of Starlight closer than fifteen miles. He had not yet expended Beth's money, which only that morning had been practically placed at McCoppet's disposal. But having finally landed the Government surveyor in camp, he had achieved the first desirable end in the game they were playing, and matters were moving at last with a speed to suit the most exacting.
During the interim between Searle's departure and return affairs had been a trifle complicated in another direction—affairs that lay between the gambler and his friend, the lumberman, big Trimmer.
Trimmer had been paid one thousand dollars only of the sum agreed upon when he gave the name of Culver to the half-breed Indian, Cayuse. He had since spent his money, demanded the balance due, and threatened McCoppet with exposure, only to be met with a counter threat of prison for life as the half-breed's accomplice in the crime. McCoppet meant to pay a portion of the creature's price, but intended to get it from Bostwick. Indeed, to-day he had the money, but was far too much engrossed with Lawrence to give the lumberman a thought.
Trimmer, waxing greedy through the ease with which he had blackmailed McCoppet, had developed a cunning of his own. Convinced that the gambler was accustomed to incubating plans in his private office, the lumberman made shift to excavate a hole beneath the floor of that particular den of privacy, and, after having spent half a night in vain, in this place of concealment, was at last being duly rewarded as he listened to McCoppet and Lawrence.
With his ear to a knot-hole he gathered in everything essential to a knowledge of the plot. He became aware that Lawrence "fell" for twenty thousand dollars; he overheard the details of the "survey" about to be made; but to save his very life he could not have fathomed the means that were about to be employed to "jump" the mining property belonging to Van Buren and his partners.
Equipped with this latest means of squeezing McCoppet, the creature emerged from his hole in time to meet the gambler at the bar, during a moment of Bostwick's temporary absence.
"Opal," he said significantly, "I need to see you fer a minute. It won't be no healthier to refuse me now than it was the first time I come."
The gambler looked at him coldly. "I haven't got time to talk now, Larry, but some of your money is at your order any time you want it, in gold, or poker chips, or gin."
Trimmer was placated. "All right," he said, and cunningly resolved, upon the spot, to keep his latest secret on the ice.
Lawrence had already disappeared to hasten arrangements for getting out upon his work.
Bostwick had waited half an hour in the utmost impatience. With a hundred things to increase his restlessness of mind and body, he had finally gone to the postoffice and there discovered a letter from Glenmore Kent.
It was short, and now no longer fresh. It had been composed just after the young man's accident, and after relating how he had received a not inconsiderable injury, requested Searle to come to Starlight at once, if possible, and not to divulge any needless facts to Beth.
"I'm broke, and this knock puts me down and out," the letter concluded. "Come down, like a good old chap, and cheer me up."
Bostwick destroyed the letter promptly, lest it fall by some accident into other hands than his own. Not without a slight feeling of guilt, the man shut out all thought, for the present, of deserting Goldite and the plot. That Beth would learn nothing from himself as to Glen's condition was a certainty. He was glad of this wisdom in the boy—this show of courage whereby he had wished his sister spared.
But the more he thought upon Beth's attitude towards himself, and the mystifying confessions old Billy Stitts had made, concerning the errands he was running for the girl, the more Bostwick fretted and warmed with exasperation, suspicion, and jealousy. He returned to McCoppet's. The door to the den was still barred. Impatiently he started again for Mrs. Dick's. He was not in the least certain as to what he meant to do or say, but felt obliged to do something.
Meantime, Beth had written to her brother. Bostwick's evasions and lies had aroused more than merely a vague alarm in her breast. She had begun to feel, perhaps partially by intuition, that something was altogether wrong. Searle's anxiety to assure her she need not write to Glen—that he was coming to Goldite—had provided the one required element to excite a new trend in her thought. She knew that Glen would not come soon to town. She knew she must get him word. She had thought of one way only to insure herself and Glen against deceit—ask Van to go in person with her letter, and bring her Glen's reply.
Had she felt the affair to be in the slightest degree unimportant she might have hesitated to think of making this request, but the more she dwelt upon it the more essential it seemed to become. Her brothers very life might be dependent upon this promptness of action. A very large sum of money was certainly involved in some sort of business of which, she felt, both she and Glen were in ignorance. Bostwick had certainly not seen Glen at all. His deceptions might mean anything!—the gravest of dangers to them all!
It had taken her the briefest time only to resolve upon her course—and then old Billy came upon the scene, as if in answer to a question she had asked—how to get her request and the letter to Glen across the hills to Van, at the "Laughing Water" claim?
Three letters she wrote, and tore to scraps, before one was finally composed to express all she felt, in the way that she wished it expressed. Old Billy went off to wait and returned there duly, enormously pleased by his commission. He knew the way to the "Laughing Water" claim and could ride the borrowed pony.
As pleased as a dog with a parcel of meat, entrusted to his keeping by a confident master, he finally started for the hay-yard, with two dainty letters in his keeping. One was to Van, with Beth's request; the other was, of course, to her brother.
Bostwick met the proud old beau at the corner of the street.
"Say, Uncle, what did I tell you," said Billy at once. "This time it's the biggest errand yet."
Bostwick had wondered if he might not catch Mr. Stitts in some such service as he boasted now, and his wit was worthy of his nature.
"Yes," he said readily, "Miss Kent was saying she thought perhaps she could get you to carry a note to Mr. Van Buren." It was a hazardous coup but he dared it with the utmost show of pleasure in his smile. For a second, however, as he watched the old man's face, he feared he had overshot the mark.
Old Billy was pleased and disappointed together. However, his wish to prove his importance greatly outweighed his chagrin that Beth should have taken even "Uncle" Bostwick into her confidence.
"That ain't all she give me," he announced, as foolishly as a child. "I've got her letter to her brother, over to Starlight, too, and nothin' couldn't stop me from takin' it up to the 'Laughing Water' claim. You bet I'll see Van Buren gits it right into his hand from me!"
If Bostwick had contemplated making an attempt to bribe the old beau into permitting him a glance at the letters, he abandoned the thought with sagacious alacrity. He must think of something safer. A letter to Van Buren and one to Glen was more than he had counted on discovering. It made him decidedly uneasy.
"I'm sure you'll deliver everything safely," he said, masking his annoyance with a smile. "Before you go, perhaps, you'd take something to drink."
The suggestion in his mind was crude, but at least it was something.
"Huh!" said old Billy, "Me!—drink and git a jag when she's expectin' me to hike right out of camp? Guess you don't know me, Uncle, not worth a mice! Didn't I say nuthin' couldn't stop me? And I'm goin' right now."
He clapped his bony old hand over his pocket, where the two precious letters reposed, and winking prodigiously at Bostwick, departed forthwith from the scene.
Bostwick could have run him down, beaten him to the ground and snatched the letters from him, but he did not dare. Instead, he merely continued to grin while Billy remained in sight. Then instead of going on to Beth's, he circled a building and returned down street towards McCoppet's.
Unfortunately for Bostwick he knew no ruffians in the camp—none of the Trimmers who would, perhaps, accept a sum of money to waylay a man, bash him over the head, and filch required letters from his pocket. He was not precisely willing, moreover, to broach such an undertaking to the gambler. This, after all, was his private affair, to be shared with no one he knew.
The man had arrived at the truth concerning the letters with commendable skill in deduction. He had himself destroyed Beth's earlier letter to her brother, for reasons of policy. He had found her conduct cold, if not suspicious, this morning. How far she had been excited to distrust himself or the mails he could not estimate. He was certain, however, she had sent a request to Van Buren to carry a letter to Glen.
Her reasons for taking precautions so extraordinary were undoubtedly significant. He was galled; his anger against Van Buren was consuming. But first and foremost he must block the harm Beth's letter to her brother might accomplish. For two days more young Kent and Beth must remain in ignorance of what was being done through the use of her money—of the fact that no mine of Glen's discovery was the object of the scheme he was working, and that none of his own alleged money was being employed in the game.
He made up his mind to go to Starlight himself—to be on hand when Van Buren should arrive. With Glenmore ill, or injured, in his bed, the case might offer simple handling, Further neglect of Glenmore might, indeed, be fatal, at a juncture so delicate. From every possible viewpoint the thing to do was to intercept Van Buren.
He found McCoppet just returned from launching Lawrence forth upon his work. Three of the gambler's chosen men had accompanied the Government's surveyor. They had taken Bostwick's car. Instructions had been simple enough. Push over the reservation line to cover the "Laughing Water" claim, by night of the following day.
Searle was taken to the private den. McCoppet imparted his information with the utmost brevity.
"Nothing for us to do but to wait till six o'clock, day after to-morrow morning," he concluded, "then play our cards—and play 'em quick."
"You've taken my car?" said Bostwick, whose personal plans were thrown into utter confusion, for the moment. "I wanted that car for my own use. I've got to go to Starlight to-morrow."
"Sit down," said McCoppet, throwing away his unsmoked cigar and taking another from his pocket. "What's going on at Starlight?"
Bostwick had no intention of divulging his personal affairs, but there was something in this that trenched upon "company" concerns.
"Van Buren's going over there, to see young Kent," he admitted. "I've got to see him first."
McCoppet looked up at him sharply.
"Young Kent ain't next to anything?" he demanded.
"Not yet."
"Look here," said the gambler, whose wits were inordinately keen, "is anything leaking, Bostwick? What about the girl—the young chump's sister? You're not putting her wise to the layout?"
"Certainly not!" said Bostwick. "She knows nothing. But it wouldn't be safe for this mix-up to occur. At any rate, I propose to be there when Van Buren arrives."
McCoppet arose, plunged his hands in his pockets, and paced up and down reflectively.
"Someways I'm glad Van Buren's going," he said. "I've been trying to figure how I could play the game to have him away when we come to take the trick. He's hostile in a fight. I guess it's all right. Don't need you here. You can copper any possible harm down there at Starlight, and meantime I'll see if there's any known way of delaying Van Buren's return."
"But how am I going to get down there and back?" said Bostwick, intent upon the need for haste. "I can't get around without a car."
"Don't get tropical," said McCoppet calmly. "I can get you a car in fifteen minutes. It ain't as good as yours, but we needed the one that was surest to keep on its legs. If you ain't got anything more on your mind, I want to chase around for a lumberman—a friend of mine—before he gits any drunker."
Bostwick arose.
"Arrange for that car to take me to-night, after dinner. I think that's all."
He repaired to his room to attend to a dozen small affairs, then went once more to Beth's. She was not in the least surprised to hear him say he meant to return to Starlight and to Glen that night, on business of importance to them all, but she did not believe him in the least. He remained in the hope of entrapping her into some sort of self-betrayal as to what she had recently done, but without avail.
The hour that he spent at Mrs. Dick's was dull for them both—dull and distasteful to the girl, growing so rapidly to hate and distrust him, dull and aggravating to Bostwick, with jealousy increasing upon him. His one consolation lay in the fact that in less than two days Van Buren would be no better off than a pauper at best with scarcely a shelter for his head.
One of the interesting and vital chapters in the whole affair was meanwhile in McCoppet's hands and receiving his attention. Trimmer had been captured, far more sober than the gambler could have hoped. The two were in the den once more, the lumberman smoking an excellent cigar as if it had been a stick of candy.
McCoppet came to his subject promptly.
"Look here, Larry," he said, "you know Van Buren when you see him."
Trimmer glanced up sharply, ready in an instant to resent what he felt to partake of the nature of a personal affront.
"Don't git funny, Opal. If ever I fight Van Buren when I'm sober I'll eat him alive. I was drunk when he licked me, and you know it!"
McCoppet leaned back in his chair and half closed his eyes.
"I didn't know but what you'd like to sober up and lick him."
Trimmer stared, shifted uneasily in his seat, and demanded:
"Where? Where is he at?"
"He's going to Starlight to-morrow—from up by the reservation—from his claim. If he don't git back for a couple of days—I could make it worth your while; and you could cash in for that time he licked you when you wasn't in condition."
Again Trimmer fidgeted. "I guess he licked me fair enough. I admit he's all right in a scrap. I ain't holdin' nuthin' agin him. Goldite's good enough fer me."
McCoppet knew the creature was afraid to meet his man—that Trimmer's attack on Van Buren, once before, had been planned with much deliberation, had amounted to an ambush, in point of fact, resulting in disaster to the bully.
"I counted on you to help me, Larry," he said, drumming on the table with his fingers. "You're the only man of your kind with brains in all the camp."
Trimmer had smoked his cigar to within an inch of his mouth. He extinguished the fire and chewed up the stump voraciously.
"Say!" he suddenly ejaculated, leaping to his feet and coming around the table, "I can fix him all right," and he lowered his voice to a whisper. "Barger would give up a leg to git a show at Van Buren!"
"Barger?" echoed McCoppet. "Matt? But they got him! Got 'em all."
"Got nuthin'," the lumberman ejaculated. "What's the good of all these lyin' papers when I seen Matt myself, readin' the piece about him goin' back to the pen?"
McCoppet rose, went to the window, and returned again.
"Larry, you're all right," he said. "Where's Barger now?"
Trimmer winked. "That's his business, and mine."
"All right—that's all right," agreed the gambler. "Wouldn't he take it as a favor if you passed him some money and the word about Van Buren's hike to Starlight?"
Trimmer got out a new cigar, lit up, and began to smoke as before.
"I was goin' to pass him some of mine," he confessed. "Yours will suit me just as good."
"Five hundred ought to help him some," said the gambler. "Come out to the bar."
At dark the lumberman left the camp on foot, heading for the mountains. Bostwick departed in the borrowed car at eight. The whole town was ablaze with light, and tumultuous with sound. Glare and disturbance together, however, only faintly symbolized the excitement and fever in the camp. A thousand men were making final preparations for the rush so soon to come—the mad stampede upon the reservation ground, barely more than a day removed.
Miners with outfits, gamblers with their paraphernalia, saloon men with case on case of liquors, assayers, lawyers, teamsters, cooks—even a half dozen women—comprised the heterogeneous army making ready for the charge. The streets were filled with horses, men, and mules. The saloons were jammed to suffocation. Musical discord filled the air. Only the land, the silent old hills, the ancient, burned-out furnace of gold, was absolutely calm. Overhead a few clouds blurred the sky. Beyond them the eternal march of the stars proceeded in the majesty of space, with billions of years in which to fulfil the cosmic cycle of existence.
In the night, far out to the northward, a storm descended like a cataclysm. Torrential rains were poured upon the hills from a cloudburst exceptionally savage. Only the scattered outposts, as it were, of the storm were blown as far as Goldite. A sprinkle of rain that dried at once was the most those mountains received.
Van made an early start from the "Laughing Water" claim, to deliver Beth's letter in Starlight. Her note to himself he read once more as his pony jogged down the descent.
"Dear Mr. Van: I wonder if I dare to ask a favor—from one who has done so much already? My brother, in Starlight, is ill. He has hurt himself, I do not know how badly. A letter I sent has never been received, and I am worried. The effort I made to see him—well—at least, I'm glad I made the effort. But meantime, what of poor Glen? Some little fear I have may be groundless. I shall therefore keep it to myself—but I have it, perhaps because I am a woman. I must know the truth about my brother—how he is—what has been happening. It is far more important than I dare confess. I have written him a letter and sent it to you in the hope you may not find it impossible to carry it to Glen in person. If I am asking too much, please do not hesitate to say so. I am sure you will be friendly enough for that—to say 'no' if need be to another friend—yourfriend, BETH KENT."
She did not regret that desert experience—that was almost enough for him to know! He had lived in a glow since that wonderful night—and this letter provided another. He rode like a proud young crusader of old, with his head in a region of sunshine and gold, his vision transfixed by a face. Her love had become his holy grail—and for that he would ride to death itself.
His way he shortened, or thought to shorten, by dropping down from the reservation heights to the new-made town a mile below. He came upon the place abruptly, after dipping once into a canyon, and looked with amazement on the place. In the past twelve hours it had doubled in size and increased twenty-fold in its fever. The face of the desert was literally alive with men and animals. Half of Goldite and practically all of a dozen lesser camps were there. Confusion, discomfort, and distraction seemed hopelessly enthroned. The "rush" was written in men's faces, in their actions, in their baggage, words, and rising temperature.
A dozen stalwart stampeders pounced upon Van like wolves. They wanted to know what he thought of the reservation, where to go, whether or not there was any more ground like that of the "Laughing Water" claim, what he had heard from his Indian friends, and what he would take for his placer. The crowd about him rapidly increased. Men in a time of excitement such as this flock as madly as sheep whenever one may lead. Anything is news—any man is of interest who has in his pocket a piece of rock, or has in his eye a wink. No man is willing to be left outside. He must know all there is to be known.
It was utterly useless for Van to protest his ignorance of the reservation ground. He owned a deposit of placer gold. Success had crowned his efforts. It was something to get in touch with success, rub shoulders with a man who had the gold.
His friends were there in the red-faced mob. They said they were his friends, and they doubtless knew. Some were, indeed, old acquaintances whom Van would gladly have assisted towards a needed change of fortune. He was powerless, not only to aid these men, but also to escape. Despite his utmost endeavors they held him there an hour, and to make up the time, he chose the hottest, roughest trail through the range, when at last he was clear of the town.
The climb he made on his pony to slice a few miles from his route was over a mountain and through a gulch that was known as The Devil's Slide. It was gravel that moved underfoot with never-failing treachery, gravel made hot by the rays of the sun, and flinging up a scorching heat while it crawled and blistered underfoot. On midsummer days men had perished here, driven mad by the dancing of the air and the dread of the movement where they trod. The last two miles of this desolate slope Van walked and led his broncho.
He entered "Solid Canyon" finally, and mounting once more let Suvy pick the way between great boulders, where gray rattlesnakes abounded in exceptional numbers. These were the hardships of the ride, all there were that Van felt worth the counting. He had reckoned without that far-off storm, which had raged in the darkness of the night.
He came to the river, the ford between the banks where he and Beth had found a shallow stream. For a moment he stared at it speechlessly. A great, swiftly-moving flood was there, tawny, roiled with the mud torn down and dissolved in the water's violence, and foaming still from a plunge it had taken above.
It was ten to twenty feet deep. This Van realized as he sat there on his sweating horse, measuring up the banks. The depth had encroached upon the slope whereon he was wont to ascend the further side. There was one place only where he felt assured a landing might be achieved.
"Well, Suvy," he said to the animal presently, "it looks more like a swim than a waltz quadrille, and neither of us built web-footed."
Without further ado he placed Beth's letter in his hat, then rode his pony down the bank and into the angry-looking water. Suvy halted a moment uncertainly, then, like his master, determined to proceed.
Five feet out he was swimming, headed instinctively up the stream and buried deep under the surface. Van still remained in the saddle. He was more than waist under, loosely clinging to his seat and giving the pony the reins.
Suvy was powerful, he swam doggedly, but the current was tremendous in its sheer liquid mass and momentum. Van slipped off and swam by the broncho's side. Together the two breasted the surge of the tide, and now made more rapid progress. It required tremendous effort to forge ahead and not be swept headlong to a choppy stretch of rapids, just below.
"Up stream, boy, up stream," said Van, as if to a comrade, for he had noted the one likely place to land, and Suvy was drifting too far downward.
They came in close to the bank, as Van had feared, below the one fair landing. Despite his utmost efforts, to which the pony willingly responded, they could not regain what had been lost. The broncho made a fine but futile attempt to gain a footing and scramble up the almost perpendicular wall of rock and earth by which he was confronted. Time after time he circled completely in the surge, to no avail. He may have become either confused or discouraged, Whichever it was, he turned about, during a moment when Van released the reins, and swam sturdily back whence he come.
Van, in the utmost patience, turned and followed. Suvy awaited his advent on the shore.
"Try to keep a little further up, boy, if you can," said the man, and he mounted and rode as before against the current.
The broncho was eager to obey directions, eager to do the bidding of the man he strangely loved. All of the first hard struggle was repeated—and the current caught them as before. Again, as formerly, Van slipped off and swam by his pony's side. He could not hold his shoulder against the animal, and guide him thus up the stream, but was trailed out lengthwise and flung about in utter helplessness, forming a drag against which the pony's most desperate efforts could not prevail.
They came to the bank precisely as they had before, and once again, perhaps more persistently, Suvy made wild, eager efforts to scramble out where escape was impossible. Again and again he circled, pawed the bank, and turned his eyes appealingly to Van, as if for help or suggestions.
At last he acknowledged defeat, or lost comprehension of the struggle. He swam as on the former trial to the bank on the homeward side.
There was nothing for Van but to follow as before. When he came out, dripping and panting, by the animal, whose sides were fairly heaving as he labored for breath, he was still all cheer and encouragement.
"Suvy," said he, "a failure is a chap who couldn't make a fire in hell. We've got to cross this river if we have to burn it up."
He took the broncho's velvety nose in his hands and gave him a rough little shake. Then he patted him smartly on the neck.
"For a pocket-size river," he said as he looked at the flood, "this is certainly the infant prodigy. Well, let's try it again."
Had the plunge been straight to sudden death that broncho would have risked it unswervingly at the urging of his master. Suvy was somewhat exhausted by the trials already made, in vain. But into the turgid down-sweep he headed with a newly conjured vigor.
Van now waited merely for the pony to get started on his way, when he lifted away from the saddle, with the water's aid, and clung snugly up to the stirrup. He swam with one hand only. To keep himself afloat and offer no resistance to the broncho was the most that he could do, and the best.
The struggle was tremendous. Suvy had headed more obliquely than before against the current, and having encountered a greater resistance, with his strength somewhat sapped, was toiling like an engine.
Inch by inch, foot by foot, he forged his way against the liquid wall that split upon him. Van felt a great final quiver of muscular energy shake the living dynamic by his side, as Suvy poured all his fine young might into one supreme effort at the end. Then he came to the landing, got all his feet upon the slope, and up they heaved in triumph!