“I give you thirty dollars a month,” the Chinese said, with a shrewd glance.
This offer increased Ben’s suspicion, and he flatly refused to consider it.
“You make too much money,” the other said in conclusion. “You too rich, I think. Well, I leave my card. Perhaps some time you come to see me. Some time,” he looked Ben squarely in the face, “if Mr. Fish make you trouble, you come to see me.” With which enigmatical remark he politely bowed and took his departure.
“I wonder what he was after and what he meant by that last?” Ben reflected, when he had fastened the gates after his strange visitor. “There’s something wrong about it, or he wouldn’t offer me thirty dollars a month for a part of this crazy old shed. He’ll wait a long time, I’m thinking, before he receives a call from me.”
After thinking the matter over, Ben concluded not to mention it toMundon. He was afraid he might urge him to accept it, and this he did not wish to do.
The next morning Ben saw a picture of himself above the title “Our Boy Miner,” in one of the daily papers. He felt the sensationalism of it, but he could not deny that it pleased him.
“Publicity was the penalty one had to pay for being prominent,” he told himself. And the thought pulled him very erect, like a balloon tugging at his neckband.
He was elated with success. All doubts which he had previously felt about speculation being a hazardous way of making money vanished like mists before the sun. The warnings he had heard all his life from the wiseacres about the slow way being the sure way he now felt to be all nonsense. Indeed, so egotistical is success, that he evenwondered that he could ever have felt any doubts.
Our Boy Miner
"Our Boy Miner"
“After I’ve made my fortune, I’ll be old-fogyish and save the cents,” he reflected. “This mining venture is quite as sure a way of making money as clerking in a store—and much more rapid.” His attention was attracted by something Mundon was saying to a reporter who was making a “story” of their experience.
“O, ’taint no trouble to show you our operations,” Mundon remarked; “no trouble at all. If ’twas a real mine underground that’d be another thing. Folks was so curious ’bout a mine I once had up in Placer County that I trained a dog I had to show ’em ’round. I’d fasten a candle to a strap that went ’round his forehead and he’d take ’em all over that mine. Got so knowin’ at last that when he’d pass any rich ore he’d stop and bark. Sure!” He added, as the hearer’s smileproclaimed his incredulity, “You kin put that in your paper, and I’ll vouch for it.”
“I wish Mundon wouldn’t yarn it so,” Ben said to himself. “And I wish all these folks would go home before we make the clean-up.” He drew Mundon aside. “Can’t you get rid of them before we melt the stuff?”
“Don’t know. They ’pear to be powerful interested in what we’re doin’,” the other replied.
“That’s just it; they’re too much interested. We’ve got gold on both days; but there’s no knowing how long that luck will last. Suppose we opened the crucible some night and didn’t get anything?”
“Well, ’twouldn’t kill us if we didn’t—just once.”
“Just think what they’d say!”
Mundon smiled. “What do we care what they say?” he sturdily asserted. “I tell you, Ben, I wouldn’t be a bitsorry if it got noised ’round that we weren’t makin’ such a bloomin’ lot.”
“Why?”
“Well, it’d keep folks from gettin’ envious, for one thing.”
The result of the day’s work did not greatly vary from those of the other two. About the same small quantity of gold-sponge remained in the crucible, and the crowd seemed slightly disappointed.
“That little bit wouldn’t make anybody very envious,” remarked Ben. “In fact, I doubt if most people would work as hard as we have for it.”
“You think it wouldn’t; but you don’t know much ’bout envy, and you don’t know men. This is the stuff,” Mundon said, as he carefully took the gold from the crucible, “be it much or little of it, that makes wild beasts of men. ’Most all the sins that make a man into a beast can be laid to this pretty shinin’ dirt.”
On the afternoon of the fourth day Ben and Mundon were working like beavers.
“’Bout five minutes now, and we’ll take out the amalgam,” Mundon remarked. “I b’lieve it’ll carry more than twice as much as yesterday’s. Somehow, the stuff shined more when we broke it up. I reckon I’ve got ’bout a quarter of the chimney chipped.”
“That’s slick,” said Ben. “When do you think we’d better tackle the ground?”
“O, that’ll keep till we’re through with the chimney. You see, a good deal works through the cracks now, and we kin make a thorough clean-up afterwards. I b’lieve there’s lots of copper as well as gold and silver in that slag under the old wharf.”
“You do?”
“I’m ’most as certain of it as I am of the chimney. If we make as much as the opium brought, I s’pose you’ll be satisfied?”
“That would be good enough.”
“Queer them smuggler fellers never showed up, ain’t it? The more I think of it the more certain I am that that was what the burglar was after.”
“But we couldn’t find any traces of the drug.”
“Mebbe he got it before we run out. Well, most likely some one of those Government chaps warned ’em not to come here while the watch was bein’ kept up. There’s gen’rally some one gits wind of such a plan in time to make fools of the rest. I s’pose the temptation to be tricky is too much for ’em.”
“Yes. And I suppose there are many temptations to a man in such a position.”
“Bless you! I guess there is! There’s lots of men who’d be square enough, if they was let alone; but put ’em in a place where there’s a chance to cheat and some one to show ’em theway, and they don’t need no coaxin’. Did you suspicion any of ’em in partic’lar?”
“Well,” Ben hesitated, “it’s an awful mean thing to say about a man when you’ve got no proof,”—he dropped his voice,—“but you know I didn’t like the man who was put in charge of the case.”
“What’s his name?”
“Cutter. I couldn’t help feeling that he wasn’t straight. He didn’t seem sincere.”
“He wasn’t ’round here at all, was he?”
“No. But there wasn’t any need of his coming. He just stays in the office and directs others. How easily he could warn the men who stowed away the stuff here not to come after it!”
“They made me mad with their suspicions!” Mundon exclaimed. “I should think that ’sperience would have taught ’em to suspect one oftheirselves sooner than us. ’Twas only one man as showed any suspicions outright, and like as not he was one of the rogues himself. I was half a mind to tell him so once, but I knowed ’twouldn’t do no good.”
“Not a bit,” Ben agreed; “and it might do harm.”
“Mining’s a curious business. It’s the only business on earth, though, where you ain’t cuttin’ the ground away from under some other man’s feet. You’re just a-gettin’ somethin’ that everybody wants and needs, and, consequently, everybody’s glad you’re gettin’ it. It’s a gamble, and that’s why it’s so thunderin’ fascinatin’. There’s one drawback, though; it makes a man distrustful of his kind,—I s’pose ’cause it’s so mighty easy to get fooled. An old miner doesn’t b’lieve in any one but just himself—from principle. It’s astonishin’, how completely he kin pin his faith to rocks,and how he balks when it comes to tryin’ it on human nature.”
“Father wasn’t much so,” remarked Ben; “but he was an exception, I suppose.”
“He wasn’t rich, was he?”
“No; although he often thought he was. His riches never came near enough to capture.”
“That’s it, you see. But you take an old miner who’s made his fortunes, and lost ’em through havin’ salted mines worked off on him,—if he ain’t the scariest bird ever seen! Talk about saltin’ a bird’s tail! Why, he wouldn’t trust his own twin brother!”
“Well, there’s no danger of ours being salted.”
“No; ’cause ’twasn’t thought to be a mine. I’ve seen some queer tricks played in that line. Once I knew a man who went to look at a mine. He saw the samples taken from all over the mine, put ’em in canvas bags himself,and never took his eyes off these bags till they was sealed up with his private seal. Just as the rest of the party was gettin’ into the stage to leave, the man who was a-thinkin’ of buyin’ the mine had a kind of a feelin’ that he’d ben fooled. He couldn’t explain it nohow, but he just had that feelin’. So, he wouldn’t get on that stage, but he went all over the mine a second time and took another set of samples. Well, the assays told the story. The first set went more’n a hundred dollars to the ton, and the last set went less ’n a dollar.”
“How did they break the seals?”
“They didn’t break ’em. They salted the bags after he sealed ’em by squeezin’ a quill toothpick through the canvas and blowin’ gold-dust into ’em. I don’t wonder that——”
Mundon was interrupted by a pounding on the gates.
“I’ll go,” said Ben.
When he had unfastened the gates, two men walked into the yard. The first handed Ben a paper.
“What does this mean?” Ben wonderingly asked. He did not at first comprehend the meaning of the proceeding, but his eye caught the word “injunction,” and he knew that meant “stop.”
“It’s an injunction served upon you,” the man replied.
“Are you an officer?”
“I am.”
“What ground—” Ben stopped, for he felt his voice tremble.
“It’s to compel you to stop working another man’s property.”
“But I bought the right to work it—from the owner!” Ben cried.
“That he did,” Mundon spoke up stoutly, “and I signed as a witness.”
“Where is the owner? Where is old Madge? I’ve got his signature to the paper! He can’t go back on that!”the boy exclaimed. “He’s done this from spite, because I refused to take him into partnership!”
“Don’t get excited,” the officer said. “Mr. Madge has nothing to do with this.”
There was an angry light in Ben’s eyes.
“Well, who has, then?” he defiantly inquired.
“I have,” the other man replied.
He had not spoken before, and he seemed to enjoy the boy’s distress. He was a small man, shabbily dressed, and there was nothing about his appearance to indicate that he could be possessed of wealth.
He paused after those two words and appeared to relish prolonging the suspense.
Ben turned upon him. “What have you got to do with it?” he asked.
“I happen to be the owner of the land—and improvements.”
“But you leased it, and the lease does not expire until next November. The improvements belong to the man who leased the land and put them on it.”
“The lease expired a month ago.”
“That is false!” Ben’s indignation was so great that he could hardly speak.
“Mr. Madge told us that the lease ran for thirty-five years, and commenced in November, 1866!”
“That was the date on which the building was commenced; the lease dated from four months earlier.”
Ben turned to Mundon sick at heart. “Can’t you remember what he said when I filled in the dates?”
“He said the first pile for the buildin’ was drove in November, 1866; but he meant fur us to think that were the date of the lease, too. ’Pears like we’ve ben taken in, Ben.”
“The building belongs to me and the rubbish that’s here. I’ve paid for itfairly and squarely, and it’s only right that I should be allowed to work here until November. I bought the right to do it.”
“We’re not talking about any rights now, young man, except those the law allows,” the owner remarked with a dryness that was irritating. “You can’t trespass on another man’s property to work anything.” He turned to Mundon, who was bending over the “jigger.” “Stop that! That’s mine!” he cried.
Mundon straightened himself. In his hand he held a wide-mouthed bottle partly filled with amalgam.
“No, it ain’t,” he replied. “It b’longs to this young man. He’d just about finished with his day’s work when you came in,—and it b’longs to him.”
“I’ve got the law on my side. He can’t take anything off this property—my property—now.”
“Well then,” responded Mundon, setting the bottle on the floor of the“jigger,” “neither kin you. If you touch this stuff before this thing’s settled, I’ll have the law on you.”
The two men looked at each other for a moment.
Then Mundon drew Ben aside. “’Tain’t no use talkin’ to him. I know him—his name’s Fish and he’s a reg’lar old shark. Rich as anythin’—owns piles of tenements and grinds his tenants down ter their marrer bones. I saw him nosin’ ’round here on the day we made our first clean-up. The question is, What are you goin’ to do?”
“O, I don’t know!” Ben cried in despair.
The two strangers were leisurely surveying the arastra and its contents.
“Know any lawyer?” Mundon asked.
“No.”
A recollection of Mr. Hale, who had been in the Collector’s office on the day of his visit, flashed before him. Hebelieved him to be the great lawyer of whom he had heard. He had appeared interested in the venture, if skeptical; and since then the scheme had proved a success. Ben was thinking very hard.
“’Cause if you do,” Mundon continued, “he might find some hole fur us to crawl out of.”
This view of the situation was humiliating, but Ben was forced to accept it.
“Stay here and watch things, while I go down town and see what can be done,” he answered. He was angrier than he had ever been in his life. The injustice of being made a victim of fraud seemed to sear his spirit like hot iron. To be tricked, cheated, and have no redress was such a monstrous wrong!
“To think,” he said to himself on his way down-town, “how I resisted the temptation not to tell old Madge my whole plan! This is the reward Iget for being too conscientious. I ought not to have told a soul!”
Bitter thoughts crowded fast upon him as he hurried along. He recalled a conversation he had once heard between two young men. One had said that there was not a rich man living who had acquired his wealth—unless it had been inherited—honestly and with a clear conscience. Ben had been impressed with this statement and had repeated it to his father, who had denounced it as false. “There are plenty of knaves among rich men, but there are honest men, too,” his father had said. “It must have been a poor man, envious of the wealth of others who said that thing.”
Still, Ben reflected that his father had been a poor man, credulous, trusting in all men, to his own disadvantage sometimes.
“In order to get on in the world was it necessary to deceive and cheat?” theboy questioned. “No, it isn’t true!” he exclaimed aloud, causing the passers-by to regard him curiously. “I’d rather be in my place and know that I’ve done the square thing than be in his! I wouldn’t stain my immortal soul for gold!”
Sustained by this thought, he found courage to make his appeal.
Mr. Hale was in his office, and in a few words Ben told him what had happened.
“So, you’ve come to grief already, my boy,” the lawyer said. “Well, let’s see what can be done.”
He asked Ben a few questions and dispatched a messenger to the City Hall to search for the recording of the lease.
“Now, go home and wait,” he said in conclusion. “And don’t worry about it any more than you can help.”
“Thank you. About paying you, Mr. Hale,—” Ben began, but the other interrupted him.
“Never mind about that. I don’t expect any pay. I sometimes do things for pure love of humanity. Queer way to do business, isn’t it? But I made my own way in the world, boy, and I know what it is. Why, when I first went in for law, it was like climbing a greased pole backwards.”
Ben left the office with a lighter heart; as, indeed, did most people. Like them, too, he had a conviction that the lawyer would find a way out of the dilemma.
Mr. Hale had told Ben that he had no right to occupy or work the property while the injunction was pending; so he hastened back to consult with Mundon as to the best course to be pursued.
He found the latter disconsolately sitting upon the fence. The mule was tied to a post alongside, and the pair presented a sorry appearance.
The men had departed, Mundon said, after nailing up the gates.
The partners agreed to take turns in keeping guard over the premises until the result of Mr. Hale’s search was known; and it was decided that Ben should take the first night.
“It’s exasperating not to know how much there is in the amalgam. In all justice, it’s mine!” said Ben, with flashing eyes. “And I intend to watch it,—and fight for it too, if need be.”
“You’ve got to fight such mean sneaks with one weapon—and only one—and that’s the law,” remarked Mundon, carefully whittling a stick he held. “There ain’t no other way you kin git the best of ’em.” He pointed up the hillside. “There’s your cousin now. She’s ben down here askin’ after you.”
“Come out on the Point for a while, Ben,” said Beth. “It will rest you.”
With a grave face he joined her, and they slowly walked along the beach.
“I’ve met one square man, and that’s Mr. Hale,” Ben said with emphasis, after he had told her about his trouble.
“Then, you don’t think Mundon’s square?”
Ben stopped and faced her. “What have you heard?” he asked.
“They say that he was in with the smugglers and led you to discover their opium so that you’d get the reward,—and then he’d cheat you out of it.”
“What nonsense! How could he?”
“O, I don’t know,—somehow.”
“I suppose Mr. Hodges and his wife started that. What more did they say?” He stooped and picked up a smooth bit of driftwood which he flung far out into the water. “I don’t care that for their opinion!”
“They say that you’ll never get your money back; that Mr. Fish is the meanest man in town; that he won’t give you any show at all, and won’t let you take another cent out of the Works.”
“Then, they’ve heard about it already?” he asked. She nodded. “Quick work! And that it serves me right. I dare say that’s another thing they say?”
The girl’s face flushed. “Yes, they did. Mrs. Hodges was the worst. She said that Mundon was a sharper and that you were a greeny.”
“Well, it isn’t over yet.”
They walked on for a few moments in silence. Although Ben spoke up stoutly, he was very despondent.
“Tell you what I wish you’d do, Beth?” he suddenly said. “I’m going to watch to-night at the Works; and if you should hear me blow a whistle, do you blow Hodges’ as loud as you can. Three times, you know. Does he still keep one at the house?”
“Yes. Ever since he had that trouble about the land it has hung behind the kitchen door. I can easily take it up to my room.”
“All right. Your house is so near that you’d be sure to hear me. The gates are nailed up, but I can’t help feeling a little nervous. Keep what I’ve told you to yourself.”
“Do you think you will lose it all, Ben?”
“I can’t tell. I’m going to make a fight for it.”
“You’re awfully worried. I can tell by your face.”
“Well, what if I am? Most men are—most of the time. It’s life.” Beth sighed. “We’re rushed along, just as if we were on a river, and all we can do is to do the best we can. If we do that, it’s enough.”
He stopped and ground the heel of his shoe in the damp sand. “I heard a man describe it oddly once. Helikened life to a dog-pit. He called it an ‘arena,’ but he meant a dog-pit. And he said a man had to take hold with a bulldog’s grip to succeed. I thought it was horrible then, but somehow it comes back to me now.”
“I never saw you in fighting mood before.”
“Haven’t I had enough to make me so? To have that rich old miser take what belongs to me! It’s mine, and he knows it, and so does everybody else! And if he sneaks through this hole he’s found in the lease and takes my gold, he’s just as much a thief as if he’d broken into my house and stolen what didn’t belong to him! I don’t care if the law does back him up,—it’s dishonest trickery!”
“Maybe you won’t be a millionaire, after all.” The girl’s face wore a blank expression. Then she suddenly brightened. “But millionaires always go through this sort of thing, don’t they?Mr. Palmer landed in San Francisco with only fifty cents in his pocket and chopped wood to earn his dinner. I’ve heard him tell about it lots of times. I think he’d rather talk about it than anything else in the world. Perhaps,” she glanced at Ben, “you’re too well dressed, Ben, to turn out a millionaire. Perhaps you ought to go barefooted, or, at least, wear ragged shoes first.”
Her companion smiled. “Girls are always thinking of appearances,” he said. “But I think you had better give up the hope of my being a millionaire; that’s a fairy tale. If I make a few thousand out of this,—provided I can beat this old devil-fish,—I’ll be satisfied.”
“I’d set my heart on a million,” she replied; “but if you’re satisfied, I ought to be. You think girls are funny to be always thinking of looks. How can we help it? We’re never reallyinanything; we have to stand one side and see the boys do things.”
“Fighting, for instance,” Ben remarked.
They had retraced their steps, and were again at the entrance of the Works. Mundon still sat on the fence, thoughtfully gazing at the nailed gates. The mule was wistfully looking at them, too, with an injured air; as indeed was quite fitting in a tenant who had been evicted.
“Good-night,” said Ben. “Don’t forget.”
“I won’t,” Beth replied. Then she added in an undertone, “Don’t tell him,”—she indicated Mundon,—“that I’m going to listen.” She turned quickly away, before Ben had time to reply.
Through the long hours of the night, as Ben sat in the shadow of a wall across the street from the Works, he had plentyof time for reflection. Although he had indignantly refused to believe the imputation against Mundon’s honesty, still it kept persistently recurring to him.
“Can it be possible that he was in with that smuggling gang, and that fear of personal safety made him use me as a catspaw to inform on them?” he asked himself, but dismissed this as being highly improbable. Mundon’s surprise when the opium was discovered had been too genuine to be doubted.
Besides, had he been a party to the smuggling, by exposing it he would have put an end to the business in the future, as far as he was concerned. The Custom House authorities had held a theory that he had been one of the ring, from the fact that no one came to remove the opium. As an offset to this Mundon maintained that one or more of the Government employees must have been in with the smugglers and warned them. It was a block-puzzle,the pieces of which Ben placed in many different positions as the night wore on.
How long that night seemed to him! His brain was too excited to permit sleep to trouble him, and his position harassed him.
About two o’clock in the morning he saw a figure stealing along in the shadow of the building. The moon was shining and Ben could see that the man stopped and looked around, as if to make sure that he was not observed.
“He’s going to climb up and drop through that hole in the roof!” Ben said to himself. “That’s the way he got in before. I’ve got the burglar at last!”
The figure paused as if to listen, and then cautiously climbed up the rough side of the building and disappeared through the hole in the roof.
Ben decided to go around the building and enter through the opening onthe water side. He was obliged to climb the high bulkhead which ran out into the bay, and then he swiftly ran along the beach. Peering within, he saw the man stooping over the “jigger” and searching for its contents by the aid of a bull’s-eye lantern. He was of slight physique, and there was something about the figure that was strangely familiar. Just then the man raised his head in a listening attitude, and Ben recognized him.
“Syd!” he exclaimed. “I always knew he was a mean sneak, but I never thought he’d be a thief!”
Ben sprang toward him and grasped his arm. “That’s mine! You are stealing my gold!” he cried.
The other tried to shake off his accuser. “Let go!” he screamed.
But Ben did not relax his hold. “Not till you give me what you’ve stolen!”
“I won’t! I’ve as much right to what I find as you have,” Syddoggedly replied; “and I’m goin’ to keep what I’ve got. Let go, I say!”
For answer Ben flung himself upon him.
They were about equally matched and both fought desperately. A misstep on the ground sent them sprawling among the broken bricks and rubbish.
Ben was uppermost, and soon would have vanquished his adversary, when something flashed before his eyes and he felt the thrust of a knife in his breast.
With his remaining strength he blew a blast on his police-whistle, and then a faintness overpowered him and he knew nothing more.
The house in which Beth lived was a dreary structure perched on the northern slope of the steep hill above the Works. A dispute, common in the settlement of property boundaries in California, had arisen in regard to the land on which the house stood, and in consequence it had never been painted nor the ground around it inclosed by a fence.
From the interior, however, one overlooked these deficiencies, because of the gorgeous panorama of bay, mountain, and sky that was framed by every window.
Dame Trot, as Ben called her, was the wife of Beth’s stepfather; for the girl’s own mother had died shortly after her second marriage. The home wasnot congenial to the young girl; but as Mr. Hodges had used all the money which her mother had left, she was compelled to remain under his roof.
Sydney Chalmers was the son of the present Mrs. Hodges by a former marriage.
It was in Mr. Hodges’ house that Ben regained consciousness on the morning of the encounter at the Works.
He was conscious of a severe pain in his head and a feeling of great weakness. Some one was talking, and gradually a dim realization came to Ben that he was the subject of the conversation.
He recognized the voice of Mr. Hodges.
“He’s been trying to mine the inside of the old Smelting Works, and Fish the owner served an injunction on him yesterday, just as he was going to get the clean-up for his day’s work.”
“That’s a strange enterprise,” someone replied. Ben recognized the doctor’s voice.
“Yes; I’m thinking he’s throwing his money away. ’Course he got a little gold, but in my opinion there ain’t enough in the whole shebang to pay for the mule he’s bought.”
“Then, he put money into the scheme?”
“Every cent he had in the world went into it. Crazy! Might just as well stand on the sea-wall and fling his dollars into the bay. Mine chimneys! Don’t you suppose if there was any gold in that chimney, old Madge, who leased the property, would have got it out years ago? He’s got Ben’s two hundred dollars, though; that’s what suits him better than mining soot.” He laughed at his poor witticism.
“Don’t talk about it now,” the doctor said. “He’ll come to, presently.”
Ben opened his eyes to see the doctor bending over him.
“It’s all right, my boy,” he said. “Don’t be frightened.”
Ben dimly wondered where he was. The wound in his breast was painful and he felt very weak.
He noticed that Mr. Hodges was standing at the foot of the bed and he surmised that he must have been carried to his house. He closed his eyes and tried to think over the events of the previous night.
“It wasn’t much of a knife,” the doctor said, “or it would have done more damage. When you feel able to talk,” he kindly said to Ben, “you can tell us all about it.”
The patient nodded and closed his eyes again. Everything seemed slipping from him.
“Guess there ain’t much to tell,” Hodges said gruffly. “It’s pretty certain who done it.”
Ben’s senses faintly rallied at this remark.
“Could it be possible,” he thought, “that they did not know who his assailant was?” He instantly surmised that Hodges suspected Mundon. “Syd must have made good his escape before they found me,” he mentally concluded. “What a coward!”
He lay with his eyes closed a great deal of the time and reviewed the situation. Should he expose Syd? It was hard to keep from doing so when he thought of all he had suffered at his hands. He had been such a brazen thief, too, so shameless in his villainy.
Still, by the ramifications of marriage, he occupied the relation of a brother to Beth; at least she treated him as one, and he lived under the same roof with her. Besides, his family had received Ben in his helpless state and were caring for him.
A sudden generosity pleaded with him not to expose the culprit. It was such a noble impulse, so far above thestandards to which he was accustomed that he was almost ashamed to follow it, and tried to belittle it by placing a value upon it. He said to himself half-contemptuously: “There wasn’t more than thirty or forty dollars in the amalgam, anyway, and that’s a low price for a reputation. When he finds out that I haven’t told on him he can return the gold. At any rate, I’m going to give him a chance.” He resolved upon this course, although it annoyed him that Mundon should be suspected, and he felt that he must exonerate the latter.
“You said just now, Mr. Hodges, that you were pretty certain who—who did this to me.”
“Yes, I did; and I am,” emphatically replied Mr. Hodges. “It’s that man Mundon you’ve been taken in by who’s done it.”
“You’re all wrong,” Ben answered. “He had nothing to do with it.”
“Where was he then? Where is he now?”
“He had to find a place for the mule; then he went down-town to sleep. Of course, he couldn’t sleep in the room we built, because the place doesn’t belong to us, they say.”
Mr. Hodges looked the doubt he felt.
“Let him give an account of himself first, Ben, before you’re too sure of his innocence.”
“He’ll come around just as soon as he hears of this.” Ben closed his eyes wearily, but suddenly opened them again. “There he is now. I can hear his voice!” he cried, as Mundon appeared.
“Well, Ben my boy, how’d this happen?” Mundon’s distress was too genuine to be doubted.
“I saw a man taking the amalgam, and I tried to stop him. We got into a fight over it and he scratched me a little; that’s all.”
“All! Isn’t it enough?” Mundon indignantly cried. “How white you are, Ben! Why, you’re almost faintin’ away now.”
“No; I’m all right,” Ben hastened to say.
“You don’t look it. What sort of a lookin’ man was he?”
Ben closed his eyes. “I don’t know. It was dark, you know.”
“’Twas bright moonlight,—and there’s a lot shines through the holes in the roof on a clear night. Ain’t you got no idee what he looked like?”
Ben shook his head.
Mundon reflected a moment. “That’s queer, Ben. You don’t tell us enough about the man for us to git hold of anything,” he said. “I’d like to git at him. You had a tussle with him, yet you don’t say whether he was fat or thin, or tall or short. We ain’t got nothin’ ter go by.”
Ben smiled faintly. “What’s theuse of going? We couldn’t afford to hire a detective; it would cost more than the clean-up amounted to. Besides, the fellow’s got away by this time.”
“You ’pear to take it mighty easy like. Might have killed you. I’d like ter give him a good drubbing on my own account,” said Mundon.
Hodges cast a lowering look from one to the other. He was too stubborn to relinquish at once his theory that Mundon was guilty; yet the man’s bearing and conversation were puzzling.
“He’s the boldest chap that ever lived, and Ben’s the greatest fool, or else I’m on the wrong tack,” he reflected. “I b’lieve I’ll find out whether he turned up at his hotel at three o’clock in the morning or not.”
As soon as he heard the front door close upon Mundon, Ben called out to little Jim, who hung around the bed in mute sympathy, “Where’s Syd?”
“He didn’t sleep at home last night,” the boy replied.
Mr. Hodges looked surprised, and there was an awkward pause, during which Ben thought best to close his eyes again.
“He said last night that he was goin’ to stay all night with Tom Miles, ’cause they was goin’ clammin’ early this mornin’,” Jim added.
“Then, why didn’t you say so in the first place?” his father said, as he strode from the room.
Ben’s pale cheeks had grown quite pink.
“Jim,” he said in a low voice, “will you do something for me!”
“Sure!”
“Well, I wish you’d find out where Syd is and tell him I want to see him. You can tell him how I got hurt, and that nobody knows who did it. Tell him that the doctor says I’ll be all right in a few days.”
“Is there anything else you’d like, Ben? ’Cause if there is, I’ve got a dollar and fifty-five cents what I’m a-savin’ up to buy a ‘safety’ with, and I’d jest as soon take some of it as not.”
“No, thank you. Just do that one favor for me, and it’s all I’ll ask.”
Jim departed, and in an hour or so reported that Sydney could not be found. Tom Miles had expected to dig for clams, but as Sydney had failed to put in an appearance he had given it up. Inquiry at the store where Sydney was employed developed the fact that he had not been seen there since the evening before.
Shortly afterwards Beth and little Sue paid Ben a visit. By a few adroit questions Ben saw that they had no suspicion of Syd’s part in the night’s work.
“If you’d only made the thief give up the gold it would have been some satisfaction,” Beth said.
“Yes, that’s so. But this is only a scratch, anyway.”
“You’ll have to be careful, the doctor says.”
“I mean to be; but it frets me so to stay in bed that it does more harm than good. I want to see Mr. Hale.”
“Yes; and you want to find the robber.”
“Of course, if I can,” Ben wearily agreed. “But I sha’n’t waste much time on him.”
Ben had plenty of time for reflection during his enforced stay in bed. Ever since the day of the injunction, when Mundon had mentioned the name of the owner of the land, he had been haunted by the thought that he had known or heard something of the man before, but it was not until the second day after the robbery that it suddenly flashed upon him that he was the man of whom the mysterious Chinaman had spoken.
“Fish!” he exclaimed, and little Jim, who was hovering about his bed, was for getting him some at once.
“I was only thinking aloud,” Ben explained. “I don’t want any fish,” and added with a grim smile, “I’ve had enough of that article already.” At which Jim looked thoroughly puzzled.
“What possible connection could there have been between a band of Chinese smugglers and Mr. Fish, the wealthy miser?” Ben asked himself. “He was there on that first day, so Mundon said, and the Chinaman may have overheard something of his plans. I’ll fight him—see if I don’t, when I get out of this!”
His impatience to be able to investigate the affair increased hourly. He must see the Chinese and find out what he had meant by his strange warning.
As he had not told Mundon about the Chinaman’s offer, he decided not to tell him of his resolve to visit him.Aside from his former suspicions, a love of adventure made him anxious to undertake the thing alone.
He was forced to wait a week before he was well enough to leave the house. During this time Sydney had not been heard from. His mother would not permit a public announcement to be made of his disappearance, claiming that it was probable that he had met a cousin from San Jose and had gone to that city for a visit. Whether she had any suspicion of the truth or not, Ben could not determine; but she put an end to all open speculation on the part of the family as to the whereabouts of the absent one, by emphatically declaring, “Syd’s old enough to take care of himself. He’s my flesh and blood, and so long as I don’t fret about him I don’t see as any one else needs to.”
Although Ben had been eager to go in search of his strange informer, yet when he set forth he almost regretted not having brought a companion. He knew that the address given must be in the heart of the Chinese quarter, and, like most San Francisco boys, he knew something of that dangerous locality. He had heard of the mysterious murders which at times were of almost daily occurrence; of the sick thrust into the street to die; and of the opium dens, where white people were hidden. He had heard, too, of the fierce dogs which were kept on the roofs of the houses; of secret passages leading from house to house, until the place was a vast honeycomb of runways, through whichthe Chinese slipped like rats in their holes.
Chinatown may present a peaceful appearance in the daytime, but at night, with the weird effects caused by the many-colored lanterns, the inky recesses of the doorways, the depths of underground burrows trod by velvet-footed shadows, it is transformed into a region to strike terror to the bravest.
Perhaps a thought of these dangers induced Ben to choose broad daylight for his quest. He found the address easily enough—a house of several stories that in some earlier period of the city had been an imposing residence, but was now used by the Chinese for a fruit-canning factory. The casing of the door was plastered with gaudy bills covered with Chinese characters, and through the broken window-panes could be seen countless piles of cans.
A short flight of steps led downward from the sidewalk to a basemententrance, and as Ben approached he saw a Chinese leaning against the iron balustrade. He recognized Ng Quong, with a feeling of relief that he should not be obliged to enter the house.