Chapter Thirty One.An Awakening.After the first fit of startling I don’t think I was much surprised, for something seemed to have suggested that this might be Mrs John’s brother.He smiled at us, as if amused, and led the way to one of the wooden buildings, where wood was burning in a stone fire-place.“This is our travellers’ hotel,” he said, as we entered the bare-looking room, which was beautifully clean. “Don’t trouble about cooking or preparing anything, for you are my guests. There is a sleeping-place here.”He walked across to a door at one corner, and showed me another fair-sized place, bare as the first, but beautifully white and clean, and with some of the boards looking quite ornamental from the fine grain. There was a row of sleeping-bunks and plenty of water ready, and plain and rough as everything was, it seemed princely to the style of sleeping accommodation we had been accustomed to for so long.He nodded and left us, and we had to explain to Quong that he was not to cook and prepare our evening meal, an explanation which for the first time made the little yellow-faced fellow look discontented.“You all velly angly? What Quong been do?”“Nothing at all. Mr Raydon’s people are going to send us our supper.”“Don’t like—don’t like,” he said, shaking his head. “All angly. Quong no make good blead?”“Yes; everything has been capital,” I said. “Don’t you understand?”“No; can’t undlestan. Quong velly solly. Go now?”“No, no. Stop.”He shook his head and went and sat doleful-looking and unhappy in one corner; out of which he had to be almost dragged at last to partake of the evening meal Mr Raydon sent in for us, absolutely refusing to join us, and waiting patiently till we had done.There was capital bread, plenty of tea with milk and sugar, cold ham, and hot slices of the deer-meat we had brought with us, and when we had finished and set Quong to his supper, Gunson went to the door to smoke his pipe, while Esau came to me smiling.“Rather lonely sort of place,” he said, “but it will do, eh?”“Oh yes, if Mr Raydon is willing for us to stay.”“Eh? Why, of course he will be, won’t he? I say, though, what lovely ham!”“What’s the matter with Quong?” I said, for the little fellow was muttering and grumbling as he sat on the wooden bench at the well-scrubbed table.I went to him, and asked what was wrong.“Allee dleadful,” he said. “No cookee meat plopelly. No makee tea plopelly. Blead bad.”“Why, I’m sure it isn’t,” I said, crumbling off a piece to taste.“Yes; allee bad. No bake blead to-day. Blead high.”“High?” I said; “you mean stale?”“Yes; stale high. Keep blead too long. Not good to eat.”“Why, Quong,” I cried; “you’re grumbling because somebody else cooked and baked,” and I burst out laughing.The little fellow jumped up with his yellow forehead all wrinkles and his eyes flashing and twinkling comically with resentment. But as I still laughed at him, the creases began to disappear from his face, and the angry look to depart, till he too smiled up at me.“You velly funny,” he said. “Laugh at me.”“Well, you made me by grumbling for nothing.”“Quong cook well—better allee this? Cookee ploply.”“Yes; everything you have done has been delicious. Here, go on with your supper.”“Quong cook bleakfast?”“Yes; I’ll ask Mr Raydon to let you. Here, go on.”This pacified the little fellow, and he finished his meal quickly. He was busy clearing up when Mr Raydon came in, and I saw him glance sharply at the busy little fellow, whose tail was whisking about in all directions as he bobbed here and there, just as if he not been walking all day.“Had a good supper?” said Mr Raydon. “That’s right. Now then come to my office, and let us have a talk.”I followed him with some trepidation, Esau coming on nervously behind; and as we went outside, and then along to another building, catching sight of men and women at different places about the enclosure, our host went on to where I now saw that Gunson was waiting for us by a wooden house that had some show of comfort.“Come in,” said our host, and he pointed to roughly-made, strong chairs, while he seated himself behind a deal desk.The walls were covered with weapons, and heads and horns of the various animals that I presumed had fallen to his rifle were nailed up here and there, the white deal floor being nearly covered with skin rugs. These various objects of interest kept my eyes busy for a few moments, and then I was called back to my position by Mr Raydon’s voice, as he addressed Gunson.“You are quite welcome,” he was saying, “and I dare say I could give you a little shooting if you were disposed to stay.”“No,” said Gunson, “I thank you; but I have finished one part of my task here. I am not going of course to make any secret of my mission. I am a prospector.”“Yes.”“It was my fortune to come out with these lads, and when I heard that they were journeying up the river, I determined to get up to the higher waters by the same route as they did for the sake of helping them.”“Then you would not have come this way, Mr Gunson?” I said.“No, my lad,” he replied, smiling. “I should have struck up one of the side rivers sooner.”“Oh!” I ejaculated.“For it seemed to me that it was utter madness for two boys like these to attempt the journey alone in perfect ignorance of what they had undertaken.”“And you made up your mind to see them through?”“I did, for they would never have done it alone.”“Indeed we should,” I said, quickly.Gunson laughed, leaned forward, and patted me on the shoulder.“No, no, Mayne, my lad,” he said kindly. “There’s all the pluck—the English spirit in you; but there was more than you could have done by yourselves. You would have struggled on, but Master Dean here would have broken down long enough ago, and wanted to go back home to his mother.”“How could I have wanted to go back home to mother when she ain’t at home?” cried Esau, angrily.“Well, to have gone back,” said Gunson. “There, I am in real earnest, my lads. It was more than you could have done.”“But we should have persevered,” I said, warmly.“And failed, as better men have done. Besides, there were the Indians, my lad. They always seemed very peaceable towards us, but you had a well-armed man with you; and it may have made some difference. There, I don’t want to rob you of any credit you deserve, and I tell Mr Raydon here before you that I have derived no little assistance from you both, and enjoyed my journey all the better for your company. What do you say, Mr Raydon—would they have found their way up here alone?”“In time, perhaps,” he replied; “if they had met with other people making the trip they might have got here. Certainly not alone, and it would have been madness to have attempted it. It has been a mad project altogether.”Gunson looked at me and smiled.“But there, you have reached your goal safe and sound, and to-morrow morning we’ll shake hands and say good-bye.”“Please understand, Mr Gunson,” said our host, quietly, “that you have no occasion to hurry.”“I beg your pardon,” replied Gunson; “you are wrong. Time is gliding on, sir. I have spent years already in my quest and have no time to spare.”“The quest of wealth?” said Mr Raydon, rather sarcastically.“Yes, sir; the quest of wealth to redeem the past. You do not know my early life, and I’m not going to tell of it.”“I only know enough to prove to me that Mr Gunson was educated as an English gentleman.”“And is now the rough prospector you see,” replied Gunson. “There, sir, one lives for the future, not the past. To-morrow morning, thanking you warmly for your hospitality, I start; and I ask you to give my young friends here what you have offered so generously to me.”“Your Chinese servant going with you, of course. You said ‘I start.’”“My Chinese servant!” said Gunson, laughing. “I keep no servants. The poor fellow attached himself to us, and has worked for us patiently ever since. He is one of the poor patient Celestials, hunting for gold, and if ever he scrapes together fifty pounds’ worth he will account himself rich.”“And you?”“Ah, my desires are far higher,” said Gunson, laughing. “Now, if you will excuse me, I’ll go outside and enjoy a pipe in this delicious evening air.”“Let me offer you a cigar, Mr Gunson,” said our host. “I have a few good ones for my visitors.”“Thanks, no. I’ll keep to my pipe till better times come. Now, my lads, it is your turn to have your chat with our host.”He rose.“One moment, Mr Gunson,” said Mr Raydon. “There is a powder magazine in the enclosure.”“Yes; I caught sight of it,” was the reply. “I shall not drop any matches near.”I saw our host watch him very thoughtfully as he went out of the office. Then turning to us sharply he looked from one to the other, his clear eyes seeming to search us in a way that was far from encouraging.“Now, young fellows,” he said, “I need not ask your names: Mayne Gordon and Esau Dean. I have been expecting you.”“Expecting us, sir?” I said.“Of course. Because you have been six months coming; a letter would not be all this while. I have known of your proposed visit for some time, though I tell you frankly that when I read my thoughtless, inconsistent brother-in-law’s letter, I never expected to see you here. You have been very lucky, that’s all.”“If you mean Mr John Dempster is thoughtless and inconsistent, sir,” I said warmly, “I must speak. He is all that is kind, thoughtful, and gentlemanly, and he is the best—almost the only—friend I have in the world.”“What, sir? Isn’t it thoughtless and inconsistent of a man to send two raw boys nearly all round the world on such a mad journey as this? A thoughtful man would say the person who planned it was a fool.”“No thoughtful man who knew Mr John Dempster would speak of him like that, sir,” I said, angrily.“Why you might just as well say so of some one who set him and poor Mrs John to travel thousands of miles the other way here,” cried Esau, coming to my help.“Means that I am a fool!” said our host, sharply, as he turned on Esau. “Here, you hold your tongue, sir, till your turn comes.”I saw Esau shrink, and Mr Raydon went on—“I sent for my sister to come, because I believed the journey would be her salvation, as to her health, and because I wanted to end her sad life of penury. Your best friend, Mr Gordon, has not behaved well to her.”“Why they are as happy and affectionate as can be,” I said. “You don’t know.”“I knew that for twenty years he has been a dreamer, growing poorer, and wearing out her life with anxiety, my lad, and I wanted to get them here, where I can start them in a new life. He is a good fellow in his way, but weak and helpless as to getting on in the world. If I lead him, I believe it will be different. But enough of that. Here is my complaint. As soon as, after long and careful thought, I decided to bring them here, and send them the funds for the purpose, my thoughtful brother-in-law writes me word that they are coming, and that he has sent me two lads, friends of his, to take under my charge, and do the best I can for them. Why, sir, it came upon me like a thunderclap.”All the high spirits and hopefulness at our journey being successfully ended, oozed away, and a despairing sensation came over me that was horrible. Then my pride came to my help, and I spoke out.“I am very sorry, sir,” I cried, “and I will not impose on your kindness. To-morrow morning Esau Dean and I will make a fresh start.”“What start?” he said, harshly.“Perhaps go with Mr Gunson, prospecting.”“Out of the question, sir. More madness.”“Then we’ll go to work.”“What at?”“For some settler. We are both young, and willing.”“I should just think we are,” cried Esau, sharply.“Silence! Hold your tongue, please.”Esau subsided.“Where are you going to find your settler? Those here have only enough work for themselves.”“But other people have got on.”“Where you two could not, sir. You two boys think it all easy enough, but you are not beasts of the field, to be able to pick up a living in this wild solitary land. Do you think you can join some tribe, and become young Indian chiefs? Rubbish. Find gold? What’s the use of it hundreds of miles away from places where it can be sold. Play Robinson Crusoe in the woods? Bah! Where is your ship to go to for stores? Why, you pair of silly ignorant young donkeys, do you know what your projects would end in?”“Success, sir; fighting our own way in life,” I cried, proudly.“For the carrion birds,” he said, grimly; “good meals for them, and later on some hunter finding a couple of whitened skeletons, lying beneath a great sheltering pine.”“Oh, I say!” cried Esau; “don’t, don’t talk like that.”“I am compelled to, my lads, so as to get some common manly sense in your heads.”“Here, I say, Mayne Gordon,” cried Esau, rising; “let’s go back at once.”I rose too, slowly and thoughtfully, waiting to speak, but unable to find suitable words. I was cruelly hurt and surprised at the rough reception I had met with, for I had at least expected to be made welcome for Mrs John’s sake. At the same time though, much as it pained me to hear Mr John spoken of so harshly, I began to see dimly that what Mr Raydon said was right, and that it had been a wild idea for us two lads to make such a journey in so speculative a manner. But before I had made up my mind what to say, and while I was standing there hesitating, Mr Raydon began again, in a sharp authoritative tone.“What have you lads been?” he said.“Writers—clerks in an office,” said Esau, glumly.“Hah! yes: about the most unsuitable avocation for any one coming out here. You did not expect to find a post at a desk, I suppose?”“No,” said Esau, gloomily, “I meant to build myself a house, and start a farm.”“How?” said Mr Raydon, with a contemptuous laugh.“Dunno,” said Esau.“Do you understand farming?”“No, sir, but I’m going to learn.”“Where? at what farm? What do you know about crops? Why, I don’t suppose you could grow a potato. Did you ever do any gardening?”“Only grown mustard and cress, sir, in a box.”Mr Raydon laughed aloud.“And you, Mayne Gordon,” he said; “do you understand stock-raising and sheep?”I shook my head sally.“Can you ride?”“Oh yes,” I cried, as I recalled the days when I had about as wild a little Welsh pony as ever boy sat.“Come, that’s something; but you can’t ride without a horse.”“No, sir.”“And have you any capital to buy land, and stock it?”“Only a few pounds left, sir.”“Oh, you have a few pounds. Well, yours seems a lively position, and I suppose you both see that you have very little chance of getting on.”“Oh, I don’t know, sir,” said Esau. “We’ve seen lots of places where we could build a hut to begin with, and get on by degrees.”“Your eyes want opening a little wider, my lad. Suppose you took up one of the beautiful patches of land you saw near the river.”“Yes, sir, quite close, where we could catch salmon same as the Indians do, and dry them. I don’t see if the Indians can live why we couldn’t.”“For the simple reason that you are not Indians—savages, my lad. Do you know that if you did as you propose, some night you would have to climb for your life, and cling in the branches of a huge pine, while the flooded river swept away your hut.”“Don’t sweep away your huts,” said Esau, sulkily.“Because they are two hundred feet above the river. Well, what are you going to do?”“Start back again, sir, at once,” I replied.“And then?”“Try to get work somewhere.”“And what am I to say to my sister and her husband when they come?”“That we found out we had made a mistake, sir, and had set to work at once to try and remedy it.”“You will sleep here to-night though, of course?”I looked at Esau, and his eyes flashed back my opinion.“No sir,” I said. “We thank you for what you have done, but we shall start back directly, and sleep where we made our camp in the middle of the day.”“Don’t be hasty, my lad,” said our host. “It’s wise sometimes to sleep on a determination.”“It can’t be here, sir,” I said bitterly, “so goodbye, and thank you. Come, Esau, we can get on for a couple of hours before it is quite dark.”“All right,” said Esau, sturdily; “and we can find our way back if we didn’t know it coming.”“Well, perhaps you are right,” said Mr Raydon; “but of course you understand that you are going back alone. Mr Gunson will be on his way into the mountains, and I dare say that China boy will follow him.”“I suppose he will, sir,” I said. “Better sleep on it, my lad.”“No, sir,” I said, firmly. “I would rather not.”“Too proud to accept the hospitality of the man who has told you such home-truths?”“Yes, sir; but more so to stay where I feel that we are not welcome.”“But you are welcome, my lads, as visitors. Is not your friend and leader very unreasonable, young man?” he continued, turning suddenly to Esau; and I listened eagerly in dread, lest he should be won over to ask for shelter for the night.“Not a bit,” said Esau, with a scowl. “He’s all right, and knows what’s best, and always did. If it hadn’t been for him I should have been stupid enough to have gone for a soldier.”“Indeed!”“Yes, indeed!” cried Esau; “and I tried all I could to get him to go too, only he knew better. Now then, Mr Gordon, I’m ’bout tired of talking. When you’re ready, I am.”He moved toward the door and I followed him, having no words to say for the moment; but as I reached the door they came, and I faced around to see Mr Raydon’s clear eyes fixed upon me.“Good-bye, sir,” I said, “and thank you. When Mr John and dear Mrs John come, don’t scold them and talk to them as you have to me. It would only upset her, and she is sure to be still very delicate. Tell them I have gone to make a start for myself, and as soon as I am doing well I shall try and write to her. Good-bye.”“Good-bye,” said Esau, defiantly; and he put his hands in his pockets, began to whistle, and turned to me, to point to the head of a mountain sheep with enormous curled horns.“Pretty good load for a thing to carry,” he said, as we reached the door.“Stop!”That word seemed to cut its way into our brains, it sounded so fierce and sharp, and its effect was to make us both face round wonderingly, and look inquiringly at the speaker.“I should have thought, sir, that it would have been more decent if you had offered to shake hands with your host before you went.”“I beg your pardon, sir,” I said, holding out my hand. “Good-night—good-bye!”His large firm long fingers closed tightly on mine, and held my hand prisoned so hardly that he gave me a good deal of pain.“One minute, my lad,” he said. “Your father and mother were both English, were they not?”The mention of them made me wince.“Both dead, I think my sister said?”“Yes,” I said huskily, and I tried to drag my hand away, but he held it fast.“So you are true English?” he said; “and a pretty opinion you have of your fellow-countryman.”“I—I don’t understand you, sir.”“To think after you have struggled up here so pluckily, and in so manly a way, he would be such an inhuman brute as to let you go.”“Mr Raydon!” I cried, huskily.“And your friend, my lad, I hope, for my sister’s sake and your own too, if you justify the impression you have made. There, you came to me quite a stranger, and I wanted to see whether you had the manliness and courage to refuse to stay, and I know that you have both, and would have gone back. Come,” he said, pressing my hand warmly, “let what has passed during the past few minutes go. Sit here for a bit, both of you. To-morrow we’ll have a chat over what is to be done.”He smiled at me, gave Esau a nod, and went out.We neither of us spoke, but looked across at each other in the softening light, till suddenly Esau turned sharply round, and went and stood looking out of the window, while I sank down on a stool, turned my back to my companion, folded my arms on a desk, and laid my head thereon.
After the first fit of startling I don’t think I was much surprised, for something seemed to have suggested that this might be Mrs John’s brother.
He smiled at us, as if amused, and led the way to one of the wooden buildings, where wood was burning in a stone fire-place.
“This is our travellers’ hotel,” he said, as we entered the bare-looking room, which was beautifully clean. “Don’t trouble about cooking or preparing anything, for you are my guests. There is a sleeping-place here.”
He walked across to a door at one corner, and showed me another fair-sized place, bare as the first, but beautifully white and clean, and with some of the boards looking quite ornamental from the fine grain. There was a row of sleeping-bunks and plenty of water ready, and plain and rough as everything was, it seemed princely to the style of sleeping accommodation we had been accustomed to for so long.
He nodded and left us, and we had to explain to Quong that he was not to cook and prepare our evening meal, an explanation which for the first time made the little yellow-faced fellow look discontented.
“You all velly angly? What Quong been do?”
“Nothing at all. Mr Raydon’s people are going to send us our supper.”
“Don’t like—don’t like,” he said, shaking his head. “All angly. Quong no make good blead?”
“Yes; everything has been capital,” I said. “Don’t you understand?”
“No; can’t undlestan. Quong velly solly. Go now?”
“No, no. Stop.”
He shook his head and went and sat doleful-looking and unhappy in one corner; out of which he had to be almost dragged at last to partake of the evening meal Mr Raydon sent in for us, absolutely refusing to join us, and waiting patiently till we had done.
There was capital bread, plenty of tea with milk and sugar, cold ham, and hot slices of the deer-meat we had brought with us, and when we had finished and set Quong to his supper, Gunson went to the door to smoke his pipe, while Esau came to me smiling.
“Rather lonely sort of place,” he said, “but it will do, eh?”
“Oh yes, if Mr Raydon is willing for us to stay.”
“Eh? Why, of course he will be, won’t he? I say, though, what lovely ham!”
“What’s the matter with Quong?” I said, for the little fellow was muttering and grumbling as he sat on the wooden bench at the well-scrubbed table.
I went to him, and asked what was wrong.
“Allee dleadful,” he said. “No cookee meat plopelly. No makee tea plopelly. Blead bad.”
“Why, I’m sure it isn’t,” I said, crumbling off a piece to taste.
“Yes; allee bad. No bake blead to-day. Blead high.”
“High?” I said; “you mean stale?”
“Yes; stale high. Keep blead too long. Not good to eat.”
“Why, Quong,” I cried; “you’re grumbling because somebody else cooked and baked,” and I burst out laughing.
The little fellow jumped up with his yellow forehead all wrinkles and his eyes flashing and twinkling comically with resentment. But as I still laughed at him, the creases began to disappear from his face, and the angry look to depart, till he too smiled up at me.
“You velly funny,” he said. “Laugh at me.”
“Well, you made me by grumbling for nothing.”
“Quong cook well—better allee this? Cookee ploply.”
“Yes; everything you have done has been delicious. Here, go on with your supper.”
“Quong cook bleakfast?”
“Yes; I’ll ask Mr Raydon to let you. Here, go on.”
This pacified the little fellow, and he finished his meal quickly. He was busy clearing up when Mr Raydon came in, and I saw him glance sharply at the busy little fellow, whose tail was whisking about in all directions as he bobbed here and there, just as if he not been walking all day.
“Had a good supper?” said Mr Raydon. “That’s right. Now then come to my office, and let us have a talk.”
I followed him with some trepidation, Esau coming on nervously behind; and as we went outside, and then along to another building, catching sight of men and women at different places about the enclosure, our host went on to where I now saw that Gunson was waiting for us by a wooden house that had some show of comfort.
“Come in,” said our host, and he pointed to roughly-made, strong chairs, while he seated himself behind a deal desk.
The walls were covered with weapons, and heads and horns of the various animals that I presumed had fallen to his rifle were nailed up here and there, the white deal floor being nearly covered with skin rugs. These various objects of interest kept my eyes busy for a few moments, and then I was called back to my position by Mr Raydon’s voice, as he addressed Gunson.
“You are quite welcome,” he was saying, “and I dare say I could give you a little shooting if you were disposed to stay.”
“No,” said Gunson, “I thank you; but I have finished one part of my task here. I am not going of course to make any secret of my mission. I am a prospector.”
“Yes.”
“It was my fortune to come out with these lads, and when I heard that they were journeying up the river, I determined to get up to the higher waters by the same route as they did for the sake of helping them.”
“Then you would not have come this way, Mr Gunson?” I said.
“No, my lad,” he replied, smiling. “I should have struck up one of the side rivers sooner.”
“Oh!” I ejaculated.
“For it seemed to me that it was utter madness for two boys like these to attempt the journey alone in perfect ignorance of what they had undertaken.”
“And you made up your mind to see them through?”
“I did, for they would never have done it alone.”
“Indeed we should,” I said, quickly.
Gunson laughed, leaned forward, and patted me on the shoulder.
“No, no, Mayne, my lad,” he said kindly. “There’s all the pluck—the English spirit in you; but there was more than you could have done by yourselves. You would have struggled on, but Master Dean here would have broken down long enough ago, and wanted to go back home to his mother.”
“How could I have wanted to go back home to mother when she ain’t at home?” cried Esau, angrily.
“Well, to have gone back,” said Gunson. “There, I am in real earnest, my lads. It was more than you could have done.”
“But we should have persevered,” I said, warmly.
“And failed, as better men have done. Besides, there were the Indians, my lad. They always seemed very peaceable towards us, but you had a well-armed man with you; and it may have made some difference. There, I don’t want to rob you of any credit you deserve, and I tell Mr Raydon here before you that I have derived no little assistance from you both, and enjoyed my journey all the better for your company. What do you say, Mr Raydon—would they have found their way up here alone?”
“In time, perhaps,” he replied; “if they had met with other people making the trip they might have got here. Certainly not alone, and it would have been madness to have attempted it. It has been a mad project altogether.”
Gunson looked at me and smiled.
“But there, you have reached your goal safe and sound, and to-morrow morning we’ll shake hands and say good-bye.”
“Please understand, Mr Gunson,” said our host, quietly, “that you have no occasion to hurry.”
“I beg your pardon,” replied Gunson; “you are wrong. Time is gliding on, sir. I have spent years already in my quest and have no time to spare.”
“The quest of wealth?” said Mr Raydon, rather sarcastically.
“Yes, sir; the quest of wealth to redeem the past. You do not know my early life, and I’m not going to tell of it.”
“I only know enough to prove to me that Mr Gunson was educated as an English gentleman.”
“And is now the rough prospector you see,” replied Gunson. “There, sir, one lives for the future, not the past. To-morrow morning, thanking you warmly for your hospitality, I start; and I ask you to give my young friends here what you have offered so generously to me.”
“Your Chinese servant going with you, of course. You said ‘I start.’”
“My Chinese servant!” said Gunson, laughing. “I keep no servants. The poor fellow attached himself to us, and has worked for us patiently ever since. He is one of the poor patient Celestials, hunting for gold, and if ever he scrapes together fifty pounds’ worth he will account himself rich.”
“And you?”
“Ah, my desires are far higher,” said Gunson, laughing. “Now, if you will excuse me, I’ll go outside and enjoy a pipe in this delicious evening air.”
“Let me offer you a cigar, Mr Gunson,” said our host. “I have a few good ones for my visitors.”
“Thanks, no. I’ll keep to my pipe till better times come. Now, my lads, it is your turn to have your chat with our host.”
He rose.
“One moment, Mr Gunson,” said Mr Raydon. “There is a powder magazine in the enclosure.”
“Yes; I caught sight of it,” was the reply. “I shall not drop any matches near.”
I saw our host watch him very thoughtfully as he went out of the office. Then turning to us sharply he looked from one to the other, his clear eyes seeming to search us in a way that was far from encouraging.
“Now, young fellows,” he said, “I need not ask your names: Mayne Gordon and Esau Dean. I have been expecting you.”
“Expecting us, sir?” I said.
“Of course. Because you have been six months coming; a letter would not be all this while. I have known of your proposed visit for some time, though I tell you frankly that when I read my thoughtless, inconsistent brother-in-law’s letter, I never expected to see you here. You have been very lucky, that’s all.”
“If you mean Mr John Dempster is thoughtless and inconsistent, sir,” I said warmly, “I must speak. He is all that is kind, thoughtful, and gentlemanly, and he is the best—almost the only—friend I have in the world.”
“What, sir? Isn’t it thoughtless and inconsistent of a man to send two raw boys nearly all round the world on such a mad journey as this? A thoughtful man would say the person who planned it was a fool.”
“No thoughtful man who knew Mr John Dempster would speak of him like that, sir,” I said, angrily.
“Why you might just as well say so of some one who set him and poor Mrs John to travel thousands of miles the other way here,” cried Esau, coming to my help.
“Means that I am a fool!” said our host, sharply, as he turned on Esau. “Here, you hold your tongue, sir, till your turn comes.”
I saw Esau shrink, and Mr Raydon went on—
“I sent for my sister to come, because I believed the journey would be her salvation, as to her health, and because I wanted to end her sad life of penury. Your best friend, Mr Gordon, has not behaved well to her.”
“Why they are as happy and affectionate as can be,” I said. “You don’t know.”
“I knew that for twenty years he has been a dreamer, growing poorer, and wearing out her life with anxiety, my lad, and I wanted to get them here, where I can start them in a new life. He is a good fellow in his way, but weak and helpless as to getting on in the world. If I lead him, I believe it will be different. But enough of that. Here is my complaint. As soon as, after long and careful thought, I decided to bring them here, and send them the funds for the purpose, my thoughtful brother-in-law writes me word that they are coming, and that he has sent me two lads, friends of his, to take under my charge, and do the best I can for them. Why, sir, it came upon me like a thunderclap.”
All the high spirits and hopefulness at our journey being successfully ended, oozed away, and a despairing sensation came over me that was horrible. Then my pride came to my help, and I spoke out.
“I am very sorry, sir,” I cried, “and I will not impose on your kindness. To-morrow morning Esau Dean and I will make a fresh start.”
“What start?” he said, harshly.
“Perhaps go with Mr Gunson, prospecting.”
“Out of the question, sir. More madness.”
“Then we’ll go to work.”
“What at?”
“For some settler. We are both young, and willing.”
“I should just think we are,” cried Esau, sharply.
“Silence! Hold your tongue, please.”
Esau subsided.
“Where are you going to find your settler? Those here have only enough work for themselves.”
“But other people have got on.”
“Where you two could not, sir. You two boys think it all easy enough, but you are not beasts of the field, to be able to pick up a living in this wild solitary land. Do you think you can join some tribe, and become young Indian chiefs? Rubbish. Find gold? What’s the use of it hundreds of miles away from places where it can be sold. Play Robinson Crusoe in the woods? Bah! Where is your ship to go to for stores? Why, you pair of silly ignorant young donkeys, do you know what your projects would end in?”
“Success, sir; fighting our own way in life,” I cried, proudly.
“For the carrion birds,” he said, grimly; “good meals for them, and later on some hunter finding a couple of whitened skeletons, lying beneath a great sheltering pine.”
“Oh, I say!” cried Esau; “don’t, don’t talk like that.”
“I am compelled to, my lads, so as to get some common manly sense in your heads.”
“Here, I say, Mayne Gordon,” cried Esau, rising; “let’s go back at once.”
I rose too, slowly and thoughtfully, waiting to speak, but unable to find suitable words. I was cruelly hurt and surprised at the rough reception I had met with, for I had at least expected to be made welcome for Mrs John’s sake. At the same time though, much as it pained me to hear Mr John spoken of so harshly, I began to see dimly that what Mr Raydon said was right, and that it had been a wild idea for us two lads to make such a journey in so speculative a manner. But before I had made up my mind what to say, and while I was standing there hesitating, Mr Raydon began again, in a sharp authoritative tone.
“What have you lads been?” he said.
“Writers—clerks in an office,” said Esau, glumly.
“Hah! yes: about the most unsuitable avocation for any one coming out here. You did not expect to find a post at a desk, I suppose?”
“No,” said Esau, gloomily, “I meant to build myself a house, and start a farm.”
“How?” said Mr Raydon, with a contemptuous laugh.
“Dunno,” said Esau.
“Do you understand farming?”
“No, sir, but I’m going to learn.”
“Where? at what farm? What do you know about crops? Why, I don’t suppose you could grow a potato. Did you ever do any gardening?”
“Only grown mustard and cress, sir, in a box.”
Mr Raydon laughed aloud.
“And you, Mayne Gordon,” he said; “do you understand stock-raising and sheep?”
I shook my head sally.
“Can you ride?”
“Oh yes,” I cried, as I recalled the days when I had about as wild a little Welsh pony as ever boy sat.
“Come, that’s something; but you can’t ride without a horse.”
“No, sir.”
“And have you any capital to buy land, and stock it?”
“Only a few pounds left, sir.”
“Oh, you have a few pounds. Well, yours seems a lively position, and I suppose you both see that you have very little chance of getting on.”
“Oh, I don’t know, sir,” said Esau. “We’ve seen lots of places where we could build a hut to begin with, and get on by degrees.”
“Your eyes want opening a little wider, my lad. Suppose you took up one of the beautiful patches of land you saw near the river.”
“Yes, sir, quite close, where we could catch salmon same as the Indians do, and dry them. I don’t see if the Indians can live why we couldn’t.”
“For the simple reason that you are not Indians—savages, my lad. Do you know that if you did as you propose, some night you would have to climb for your life, and cling in the branches of a huge pine, while the flooded river swept away your hut.”
“Don’t sweep away your huts,” said Esau, sulkily.
“Because they are two hundred feet above the river. Well, what are you going to do?”
“Start back again, sir, at once,” I replied.
“And then?”
“Try to get work somewhere.”
“And what am I to say to my sister and her husband when they come?”
“That we found out we had made a mistake, sir, and had set to work at once to try and remedy it.”
“You will sleep here to-night though, of course?”
I looked at Esau, and his eyes flashed back my opinion.
“No sir,” I said. “We thank you for what you have done, but we shall start back directly, and sleep where we made our camp in the middle of the day.”
“Don’t be hasty, my lad,” said our host. “It’s wise sometimes to sleep on a determination.”
“It can’t be here, sir,” I said bitterly, “so goodbye, and thank you. Come, Esau, we can get on for a couple of hours before it is quite dark.”
“All right,” said Esau, sturdily; “and we can find our way back if we didn’t know it coming.”
“Well, perhaps you are right,” said Mr Raydon; “but of course you understand that you are going back alone. Mr Gunson will be on his way into the mountains, and I dare say that China boy will follow him.”
“I suppose he will, sir,” I said. “Better sleep on it, my lad.”
“No, sir,” I said, firmly. “I would rather not.”
“Too proud to accept the hospitality of the man who has told you such home-truths?”
“Yes, sir; but more so to stay where I feel that we are not welcome.”
“But you are welcome, my lads, as visitors. Is not your friend and leader very unreasonable, young man?” he continued, turning suddenly to Esau; and I listened eagerly in dread, lest he should be won over to ask for shelter for the night.
“Not a bit,” said Esau, with a scowl. “He’s all right, and knows what’s best, and always did. If it hadn’t been for him I should have been stupid enough to have gone for a soldier.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, indeed!” cried Esau; “and I tried all I could to get him to go too, only he knew better. Now then, Mr Gordon, I’m ’bout tired of talking. When you’re ready, I am.”
He moved toward the door and I followed him, having no words to say for the moment; but as I reached the door they came, and I faced around to see Mr Raydon’s clear eyes fixed upon me.
“Good-bye, sir,” I said, “and thank you. When Mr John and dear Mrs John come, don’t scold them and talk to them as you have to me. It would only upset her, and she is sure to be still very delicate. Tell them I have gone to make a start for myself, and as soon as I am doing well I shall try and write to her. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye,” said Esau, defiantly; and he put his hands in his pockets, began to whistle, and turned to me, to point to the head of a mountain sheep with enormous curled horns.
“Pretty good load for a thing to carry,” he said, as we reached the door.
“Stop!”
That word seemed to cut its way into our brains, it sounded so fierce and sharp, and its effect was to make us both face round wonderingly, and look inquiringly at the speaker.
“I should have thought, sir, that it would have been more decent if you had offered to shake hands with your host before you went.”
“I beg your pardon, sir,” I said, holding out my hand. “Good-night—good-bye!”
His large firm long fingers closed tightly on mine, and held my hand prisoned so hardly that he gave me a good deal of pain.
“One minute, my lad,” he said. “Your father and mother were both English, were they not?”
The mention of them made me wince.
“Both dead, I think my sister said?”
“Yes,” I said huskily, and I tried to drag my hand away, but he held it fast.
“So you are true English?” he said; “and a pretty opinion you have of your fellow-countryman.”
“I—I don’t understand you, sir.”
“To think after you have struggled up here so pluckily, and in so manly a way, he would be such an inhuman brute as to let you go.”
“Mr Raydon!” I cried, huskily.
“And your friend, my lad, I hope, for my sister’s sake and your own too, if you justify the impression you have made. There, you came to me quite a stranger, and I wanted to see whether you had the manliness and courage to refuse to stay, and I know that you have both, and would have gone back. Come,” he said, pressing my hand warmly, “let what has passed during the past few minutes go. Sit here for a bit, both of you. To-morrow we’ll have a chat over what is to be done.”
He smiled at me, gave Esau a nod, and went out.
We neither of us spoke, but looked across at each other in the softening light, till suddenly Esau turned sharply round, and went and stood looking out of the window, while I sank down on a stool, turned my back to my companion, folded my arms on a desk, and laid my head thereon.
Chapter Thirty Two.Was I Dreaming?Quite an hour must have passed, and it had grown dark in that room, where the heads of moose, elk, bear, and mountain sheep looked down upon us from the walls, and the old clock had it all its own way,tick-tack. For neither of us spoke; I confess that I dared not. Perhaps it was childish to feel so upset; perhaps it was natural, for I had been over-wrought, and the pain I had suffered was more than I could bear.Esau, too, was overcome, I was sure; but it always after remained a point of honour with us never to allude to the proceedings of that night when we remained there back to back without uttering a word, and, till we heard steps, without moving. Then we both started round as if guilty of something of which we were ashamed. But the steps passed the door, and they did not sound like those of Mr Raydon; and once more we waited for his return.It grew darker and darker, and as I slowly let my eyes wander about the walls, there on one side was the long, melancholy-looking head of a moose, with its broad, far-spreading horns, seeming to gaze at me dolefully, and on the other I could see the open jaws and grinning white fangs of a grizzly bear, apparently coming out of the gloom to attack me, while the deer’s heads about were looking on to see what would be the result. The place was all very strange, and the silence began to be painful, for only at intervals was there some distant step.At last, though, there came a loud, fierce barking, and it was quite inspiriting to hear so familiar a sound. This made Esau take a long breath as if he felt relieved, and it unlocked his tongue at once.“Hah!” he said; “seems quite natural-like to hear a dog bark. Wonder what he is? Bet sixpence he’s a collie. Yes, hark at him. That’s a collie’s bark, I know.”We sat listening to the barking till it ceased, and then Esau said—“Did seem too hard, didn’t it? But somehow I couldn’t help feeling all the time that he wouldn’t serve us so bad as that. So different like to Mrs John, eh?”“Hush! Here he comes back.” For there was a firm heavy step that was like a march, and the door was thrown open.“Ah, my lads, all in the dark? I had forgotten the light.”He struck a match, and lit a large oil-lamp, and sent a bright pleasant glow through the place, which, from looking weird and strange, now had a warm and home-like aspect.“You’ll like to get to bed soon. Pretty tired, I expect. I am too. We are early people here. Early to bed and early to rise; you know the rest of the proverb. You’ll sleep in the strangers’ place tonight; to-morrow we’ll see what we can do. Mine is a bachelor home, but we have women here. Some of my men have wives, but they are Indian. Rather a wild place to bring my sister to—eh, Mayne?”Then without giving me time to speak—“Come along,” he said. “I told Mr Gunson that I would fetch you.”We followed him out, and I wanted to thank him; but I could not then, and he seemed to know it, for he kept on chatting to us as we went along one side of the enclosed square, pointing out how clear the sky was, and how full of promise for the next day. Then, as we reached the long low building where we had had our meal, he threw open the door, and stood back for us to enter.“Good-night, Mayne,” he said.“Good-night, sir,” I replied, rather huskily, and I clung to his hand a little as he held it out.“Good-night, Dean,” he continued, and turning sharply off he sauntered away back towards his quarters.“Might ha’ shook hands with me too,” said Esau, sullenly. “Didn’t offend him too much, did I?”“No, no, don’t say any more about it,” I whispered.Then we entered, to find Gunson seated on a rough stool by the fire smoking his pipe, or pretending to, for I saw no smoke, and the red glow from the embers lit up his face strangely.“Ah, boys,” he said, starting up from his musings; “there you are. Well, you have dropped into snug quarters. Bed-time, isn’t it?”“I suppose so,” I said sadly. “Hallo! Not cheery that!”“Are you still thinking of going, Mr Gunson?” I said.“Yes; at sunrise to-morrow morning, so if you want to see me off, you must take down your shutters early.”“I am sorry.”“I am glad,” he cried—“that you are sorry. Been a pleasant trip up, my lad, and I dare say we shall meet again some day. We will, if I can manage it.”“I say, where’s old Quong?” said Esau, suddenly. “Asleep this hour, in the corner there.”“You want Quong—flesh tea—make blead—now?”“No, no; go to sleep,” said Gunson, laughing. “Allee light. I get up and makee fi’ keep bun; no let fi’ go out.”He coiled up again under his blanket, and we sat some little time in silence before Gunson rose.“Good-night, boys,” he said; and he went to the rough sleeping-place he had chosen.“S’pose we had better go too,” said Esau, after we had sat looking at the fire a few minutes in silence.“I’m ready,” I said quickly, and we went to our places, where I lay listening to the hard breathing of my companions, for sleep would not come. All was so new and strange. The fire had sunk down into a faint glow which brightened now and then as a light breeze swept by the house, and then sank down again, making the fireplace look ruddy, while all the rest of the place was intensely dark. Then all grew blacker still, and I was listening to Mr John Dempster’s hopeful words about meeting me at his brother-in-law’s home, and—I was staring hard at the fire again, awake and fully aware that I had been fast asleep, and that something was wrong. The door was wide open. I was sure of it, for I could see the square opening lit up with brilliant stars, and to add to my certainty, the embers of the wood fire, which had sunk lower and lower, were glowing again, as the soft air from the door swept over them, in a curious phosphorescent way.I listened, and heard that the others were sleeping heavily, and as I gazed at the door I saw some of the stars blotted out by something moving, while almost at the same instant a faint sound made me glance toward the fire, where for a moment I saw against the faint glow the shape of some animal. A panting sound; it was a wolf I was sure, and I lay there paralysed with dread, as I heard the soft pit-pat of the animal’s feet, and directly after a movement that did not seem to be that of an animal.I was right in that; for the fire glowed up, and I could see that it was a man standing close by now, whose dress indicated that he must be an Indian, for I just made out the edge of a hunting shirt, and I saw that he wore leggings.What ought I to do? I thought if I shouted to spread the alarm it might mean a sudden quick attack, perhaps death at once for me, while the others would be unable to defend themselves in the dark. The cold perspiration oozed from my face, and I felt a sensation as if something was moving the roots of my hair.At last when the agony grew so intense that I felt I must shout for help, the soft pit-pat of the animal’s feet passed by me again, and was followed by the sound of the man moving his moccasined feet, hardly heard upon the boarded floor, and the stars were completely blotted out by the closing door.I started again, for there was a quick rustling sound now from my left, and something passed me and made for the fire. Then came relief, for there was no doubt this time—it was Quong softly laying fresh pieces of wood on the embers to keep the fire going till morning.I lay back thankfully, determined to speak to him as he came back, and ask him if he had heard a noise. But I did not; he was so long in coming; and when I did speak it was to Gunson, who was getting up, and the grey light of morning was now filling the room, battling with the glowing fire. For I had been asleep after all, and I began to ask myself whether I had dreamed about the Indian and the wolf.
Quite an hour must have passed, and it had grown dark in that room, where the heads of moose, elk, bear, and mountain sheep looked down upon us from the walls, and the old clock had it all its own way,tick-tack. For neither of us spoke; I confess that I dared not. Perhaps it was childish to feel so upset; perhaps it was natural, for I had been over-wrought, and the pain I had suffered was more than I could bear.
Esau, too, was overcome, I was sure; but it always after remained a point of honour with us never to allude to the proceedings of that night when we remained there back to back without uttering a word, and, till we heard steps, without moving. Then we both started round as if guilty of something of which we were ashamed. But the steps passed the door, and they did not sound like those of Mr Raydon; and once more we waited for his return.
It grew darker and darker, and as I slowly let my eyes wander about the walls, there on one side was the long, melancholy-looking head of a moose, with its broad, far-spreading horns, seeming to gaze at me dolefully, and on the other I could see the open jaws and grinning white fangs of a grizzly bear, apparently coming out of the gloom to attack me, while the deer’s heads about were looking on to see what would be the result. The place was all very strange, and the silence began to be painful, for only at intervals was there some distant step.
At last, though, there came a loud, fierce barking, and it was quite inspiriting to hear so familiar a sound. This made Esau take a long breath as if he felt relieved, and it unlocked his tongue at once.
“Hah!” he said; “seems quite natural-like to hear a dog bark. Wonder what he is? Bet sixpence he’s a collie. Yes, hark at him. That’s a collie’s bark, I know.”
We sat listening to the barking till it ceased, and then Esau said—
“Did seem too hard, didn’t it? But somehow I couldn’t help feeling all the time that he wouldn’t serve us so bad as that. So different like to Mrs John, eh?”
“Hush! Here he comes back.” For there was a firm heavy step that was like a march, and the door was thrown open.
“Ah, my lads, all in the dark? I had forgotten the light.”
He struck a match, and lit a large oil-lamp, and sent a bright pleasant glow through the place, which, from looking weird and strange, now had a warm and home-like aspect.
“You’ll like to get to bed soon. Pretty tired, I expect. I am too. We are early people here. Early to bed and early to rise; you know the rest of the proverb. You’ll sleep in the strangers’ place tonight; to-morrow we’ll see what we can do. Mine is a bachelor home, but we have women here. Some of my men have wives, but they are Indian. Rather a wild place to bring my sister to—eh, Mayne?”
Then without giving me time to speak—
“Come along,” he said. “I told Mr Gunson that I would fetch you.”
We followed him out, and I wanted to thank him; but I could not then, and he seemed to know it, for he kept on chatting to us as we went along one side of the enclosed square, pointing out how clear the sky was, and how full of promise for the next day. Then, as we reached the long low building where we had had our meal, he threw open the door, and stood back for us to enter.
“Good-night, Mayne,” he said.
“Good-night, sir,” I replied, rather huskily, and I clung to his hand a little as he held it out.
“Good-night, Dean,” he continued, and turning sharply off he sauntered away back towards his quarters.
“Might ha’ shook hands with me too,” said Esau, sullenly. “Didn’t offend him too much, did I?”
“No, no, don’t say any more about it,” I whispered.
Then we entered, to find Gunson seated on a rough stool by the fire smoking his pipe, or pretending to, for I saw no smoke, and the red glow from the embers lit up his face strangely.
“Ah, boys,” he said, starting up from his musings; “there you are. Well, you have dropped into snug quarters. Bed-time, isn’t it?”
“I suppose so,” I said sadly. “Hallo! Not cheery that!”
“Are you still thinking of going, Mr Gunson?” I said.
“Yes; at sunrise to-morrow morning, so if you want to see me off, you must take down your shutters early.”
“I am sorry.”
“I am glad,” he cried—“that you are sorry. Been a pleasant trip up, my lad, and I dare say we shall meet again some day. We will, if I can manage it.”
“I say, where’s old Quong?” said Esau, suddenly. “Asleep this hour, in the corner there.”
“You want Quong—flesh tea—make blead—now?”
“No, no; go to sleep,” said Gunson, laughing. “Allee light. I get up and makee fi’ keep bun; no let fi’ go out.”
He coiled up again under his blanket, and we sat some little time in silence before Gunson rose.
“Good-night, boys,” he said; and he went to the rough sleeping-place he had chosen.
“S’pose we had better go too,” said Esau, after we had sat looking at the fire a few minutes in silence.
“I’m ready,” I said quickly, and we went to our places, where I lay listening to the hard breathing of my companions, for sleep would not come. All was so new and strange. The fire had sunk down into a faint glow which brightened now and then as a light breeze swept by the house, and then sank down again, making the fireplace look ruddy, while all the rest of the place was intensely dark. Then all grew blacker still, and I was listening to Mr John Dempster’s hopeful words about meeting me at his brother-in-law’s home, and—
I was staring hard at the fire again, awake and fully aware that I had been fast asleep, and that something was wrong. The door was wide open. I was sure of it, for I could see the square opening lit up with brilliant stars, and to add to my certainty, the embers of the wood fire, which had sunk lower and lower, were glowing again, as the soft air from the door swept over them, in a curious phosphorescent way.
I listened, and heard that the others were sleeping heavily, and as I gazed at the door I saw some of the stars blotted out by something moving, while almost at the same instant a faint sound made me glance toward the fire, where for a moment I saw against the faint glow the shape of some animal. A panting sound; it was a wolf I was sure, and I lay there paralysed with dread, as I heard the soft pit-pat of the animal’s feet, and directly after a movement that did not seem to be that of an animal.
I was right in that; for the fire glowed up, and I could see that it was a man standing close by now, whose dress indicated that he must be an Indian, for I just made out the edge of a hunting shirt, and I saw that he wore leggings.
What ought I to do? I thought if I shouted to spread the alarm it might mean a sudden quick attack, perhaps death at once for me, while the others would be unable to defend themselves in the dark. The cold perspiration oozed from my face, and I felt a sensation as if something was moving the roots of my hair.
At last when the agony grew so intense that I felt I must shout for help, the soft pit-pat of the animal’s feet passed by me again, and was followed by the sound of the man moving his moccasined feet, hardly heard upon the boarded floor, and the stars were completely blotted out by the closing door.
I started again, for there was a quick rustling sound now from my left, and something passed me and made for the fire. Then came relief, for there was no doubt this time—it was Quong softly laying fresh pieces of wood on the embers to keep the fire going till morning.
I lay back thankfully, determined to speak to him as he came back, and ask him if he had heard a noise. But I did not; he was so long in coming; and when I did speak it was to Gunson, who was getting up, and the grey light of morning was now filling the room, battling with the glowing fire. For I had been asleep after all, and I began to ask myself whether I had dreamed about the Indian and the wolf.
Chapter Thirty Three.Leave-taking.A few minutes after I saw how darkness and fancy can combine to startle one who wakes suddenly from sleep, for the man who had been Mr Raydon’s companion on the previous day suddenly made his appearance silently at the door and walked in, his deerskin moccasins making no sound as he came towards us. He was followed by a great fierce-looking dog, about whose neck was a formidable ruff of loose hair, and as he trotted towards me I saw in them the Indian and the wolf of my scare.“Morning,” said the man, quietly; “needn’t ask you how you slept. I came in late to see if the fire was all right, and you were all fast. Here, Rough—quiet! Better make friends with him at once,” he continued, turning to me.For, after sniffing at Gunson, and Esau, who got out of his way as soon as possible, the dog turned his attentions to me, smelling me all round, as if to try whether I was good to eat, and then uttering a low deep growl, to indicate, I suppose, that he was satisfied that I was a stranger.“Well,” I said, laying my hand upon his head, feeling nervous though not showing it, “are we to be friends?”There was a deeper growl, and two fierce eyes glared up at me, while I fully expected that my hand would be seized. Then there was a slight agitation of the great fluffy tail, which began to swing slowly from side to side, and before I knew what was about to happen the great beast rose up, planted its paws upon my shoulders, threw up its muzzle, and uttered a deep-toned bay.“That’s all right,” said the man; “you and he will be good friends now. Can I do anything for you? Start this morning, don’t you?”“Yes,” said Gunson, “I’m off directly.”“Right; my wife will bring you some breakfast.—Come along.”He went to the door, and the great dog followed him with his muzzle down; but as soon as he was outside he ran back to me, thrust his great head against my side, uttered a loud bark, and then trotted off.A few minutes after an Indian woman, dressed partly in English fashion, came in with a kettle of tea and some cake and bacon, which she smilingly placed ready for us, while Quong stood over by the fire looking very serious and troubled.Gunson smiled and gave me a cheery look, and we sat down to the early meal; but I did not feel hungry, and was playing with my breakfast when Mr Raydon came in, looking quiet and firm as he wished us good morning.“Quite ready for your start then?” he said; “quite decided to go to-day?”“Quite,” replied Gunson, shortly. “If you come back this way I shall be glad to see you,” continued our host.“Thank you. I hope to come back safely some day, and,” he said, turning to me, “to see how you are getting on.”“I shall be very glad to see you again,” I said warmly; for though I did not feel that I exactly liked the prospector, there was something beside gratitude which attracted me to him.“The Chinaman goes with you, I suppose?” said Mr Raydon, glancing to where Quong stood, looking troubled and uneasy at being superseded.“I don’t know. He is free, and not tied to me in any way.”“What are you going to do?” said Mr Raydon, turning sharply on the little fellow.“Light n’—make blead—plenty tea hot—stlong. Cookee, velly much cookee. Speak ploper English, allee same Melican man.”“Yes; but are you going on with Mr Gunson here?”Quong looked at the prospector and then at me and at Esau, his little black eyes twinkling, and his face as full of lines as a walnut-shell; but Gunson made no sign, only went on with his breakfast.“No wantee me,” said Quong, shaking his head. “Go washee washee gole, no wantee Quong.”“Then if I offered you work, would you like to stay here for a while?”“Make blead, flesh blead? Yes, Quong going stop.”He looked at us and laughed.Then Gunson spoke.“Yes,” he said, “he had better stay. I can carry my own pack and cook all I require. There,” he said, rising, “I’m ready for my start now. Will you lads walk a little way with me?”“Yes,” I cried; and two minutes later we were outside, with Esau shouldering the pack, while its owner stood for a few minutes talking earnestly to Mr Raydon. I could not hear his words, but from his glancing two or three times in my direction, I guessed the subject of their conversation.Gunson would not let us go far, but stopped short at the rise of a steep slope, at the foot of which the river ran.“Good-bye, Mayne,” he said. “I shall come and look you up by and by if the Indians do not kill me, or I am starved to death somewhere up yonder. No, no: my nonsense,” he continued, as he saw my horrified look. “No fear; I shall come back safely. Good-bye.”He shook hands with us both hurriedly, shouldered his pack, and we stood there watching him till he disappeared round a curve in the valley.“He don’t like me,” said Esau, in a grumbling tone, as we began to walk back.“And you never liked him,” I said.“No. Perhaps it’s because he had only got one eye. Never mind, he’s gone now, and we’re going to stay. Will the old man set us to work?”There seemed to be no sign of it at first, for when we returned to the Fort Mr Raydon was away, and when he returned we spent our time in what Esau called sight-seeing, for Mr Raydon took us round the place, and showed us the armoury with its array of loaded rifles; took us into the two corner block-houses, with their carefully-kept cannon, and showed us how thoroughly he was prepared for danger if the Indians should ever take it into their heads to attack him.Then there were the stores, with the gay-coloured blankets and other goods which were dear to the Indian and his squaw, and for which a portion of a tribe came from time to time to barter the skins they had collected by trapping and shooting.There they were, bales of them—seal, sea-otter, beaver, skunk, marten, and a few bear, the sight of all raising up in our hearts endless ideas of sport and adventure possibly never to be fulfilled.“There,” said Mr Raydon, when we had seen all the stores, including that where an ample supply of provisions was laid up, and we had visited the homes of his men, all of whom had married Indian wives, “I have not settled anything about you two lads yet. I may set you to work perhaps, but at all events not for a few days, so you can wander about the place. Don’t go away from the streams. Why?” he added, as he saw my inquiring look; “because if you wander into the forest there is nothing to guide you back. One tree is so like another that you might never find your way out again. Easy enough to talk about, but very terrible if you think of the consequences. If you ascend one of the streams, you have only to follow it back to the river. It is always there as a guide.”Nothing could have gratified us more, and for some days we spent our time exploring, always finding enough to attract, watching the inhabitants of the woods, fishing, bathing, climbing the trees, and going some distance up into the solitudes of one of the mountains.It was a pleasant time, and neither of us was in a hurry to commence work, the attractions were so many.“It’s so different to being in streets in London,” Esau was always saying. “There it’s all people, and you can hardly cross the roads for the ’busses and cabs. Here it’s all so still, and I suppose you might go on wandering in the woods for ever and never see a soul.”It almost seemed as if that might be the case, and a curious feeling of awe used to come over me when we wandered up one of the little valleys, and were seated in the bright sunshine upon some moss-cushioned rock, listening to the murmur of the wind high up in the tall pines—a sound that was like the gentle rushing of the sea upon the shore.Mr Raydon generally asked us where we had been, and laughed at our appetites.“There, don’t be ashamed, Mayne,” he said, as he saw me look abashed; “it is quite natural at your age. Eat away, my lad, and grow muscular and strong. I shall want your help some day, for we are not always so quiet and sleepy as you see us now.”I had good reason to remember his words, though I little thought then what a strange adventure was waiting to fall to my lot.
A few minutes after I saw how darkness and fancy can combine to startle one who wakes suddenly from sleep, for the man who had been Mr Raydon’s companion on the previous day suddenly made his appearance silently at the door and walked in, his deerskin moccasins making no sound as he came towards us. He was followed by a great fierce-looking dog, about whose neck was a formidable ruff of loose hair, and as he trotted towards me I saw in them the Indian and the wolf of my scare.
“Morning,” said the man, quietly; “needn’t ask you how you slept. I came in late to see if the fire was all right, and you were all fast. Here, Rough—quiet! Better make friends with him at once,” he continued, turning to me.
For, after sniffing at Gunson, and Esau, who got out of his way as soon as possible, the dog turned his attentions to me, smelling me all round, as if to try whether I was good to eat, and then uttering a low deep growl, to indicate, I suppose, that he was satisfied that I was a stranger.
“Well,” I said, laying my hand upon his head, feeling nervous though not showing it, “are we to be friends?”
There was a deeper growl, and two fierce eyes glared up at me, while I fully expected that my hand would be seized. Then there was a slight agitation of the great fluffy tail, which began to swing slowly from side to side, and before I knew what was about to happen the great beast rose up, planted its paws upon my shoulders, threw up its muzzle, and uttered a deep-toned bay.
“That’s all right,” said the man; “you and he will be good friends now. Can I do anything for you? Start this morning, don’t you?”
“Yes,” said Gunson, “I’m off directly.”
“Right; my wife will bring you some breakfast.—Come along.”
He went to the door, and the great dog followed him with his muzzle down; but as soon as he was outside he ran back to me, thrust his great head against my side, uttered a loud bark, and then trotted off.
A few minutes after an Indian woman, dressed partly in English fashion, came in with a kettle of tea and some cake and bacon, which she smilingly placed ready for us, while Quong stood over by the fire looking very serious and troubled.
Gunson smiled and gave me a cheery look, and we sat down to the early meal; but I did not feel hungry, and was playing with my breakfast when Mr Raydon came in, looking quiet and firm as he wished us good morning.
“Quite ready for your start then?” he said; “quite decided to go to-day?”
“Quite,” replied Gunson, shortly. “If you come back this way I shall be glad to see you,” continued our host.
“Thank you. I hope to come back safely some day, and,” he said, turning to me, “to see how you are getting on.”
“I shall be very glad to see you again,” I said warmly; for though I did not feel that I exactly liked the prospector, there was something beside gratitude which attracted me to him.
“The Chinaman goes with you, I suppose?” said Mr Raydon, glancing to where Quong stood, looking troubled and uneasy at being superseded.
“I don’t know. He is free, and not tied to me in any way.”
“What are you going to do?” said Mr Raydon, turning sharply on the little fellow.
“Light n’—make blead—plenty tea hot—stlong. Cookee, velly much cookee. Speak ploper English, allee same Melican man.”
“Yes; but are you going on with Mr Gunson here?”
Quong looked at the prospector and then at me and at Esau, his little black eyes twinkling, and his face as full of lines as a walnut-shell; but Gunson made no sign, only went on with his breakfast.
“No wantee me,” said Quong, shaking his head. “Go washee washee gole, no wantee Quong.”
“Then if I offered you work, would you like to stay here for a while?”
“Make blead, flesh blead? Yes, Quong going stop.”
He looked at us and laughed.
Then Gunson spoke.
“Yes,” he said, “he had better stay. I can carry my own pack and cook all I require. There,” he said, rising, “I’m ready for my start now. Will you lads walk a little way with me?”
“Yes,” I cried; and two minutes later we were outside, with Esau shouldering the pack, while its owner stood for a few minutes talking earnestly to Mr Raydon. I could not hear his words, but from his glancing two or three times in my direction, I guessed the subject of their conversation.
Gunson would not let us go far, but stopped short at the rise of a steep slope, at the foot of which the river ran.
“Good-bye, Mayne,” he said. “I shall come and look you up by and by if the Indians do not kill me, or I am starved to death somewhere up yonder. No, no: my nonsense,” he continued, as he saw my horrified look. “No fear; I shall come back safely. Good-bye.”
He shook hands with us both hurriedly, shouldered his pack, and we stood there watching him till he disappeared round a curve in the valley.
“He don’t like me,” said Esau, in a grumbling tone, as we began to walk back.
“And you never liked him,” I said.
“No. Perhaps it’s because he had only got one eye. Never mind, he’s gone now, and we’re going to stay. Will the old man set us to work?”
There seemed to be no sign of it at first, for when we returned to the Fort Mr Raydon was away, and when he returned we spent our time in what Esau called sight-seeing, for Mr Raydon took us round the place, and showed us the armoury with its array of loaded rifles; took us into the two corner block-houses, with their carefully-kept cannon, and showed us how thoroughly he was prepared for danger if the Indians should ever take it into their heads to attack him.
Then there were the stores, with the gay-coloured blankets and other goods which were dear to the Indian and his squaw, and for which a portion of a tribe came from time to time to barter the skins they had collected by trapping and shooting.
There they were, bales of them—seal, sea-otter, beaver, skunk, marten, and a few bear, the sight of all raising up in our hearts endless ideas of sport and adventure possibly never to be fulfilled.
“There,” said Mr Raydon, when we had seen all the stores, including that where an ample supply of provisions was laid up, and we had visited the homes of his men, all of whom had married Indian wives, “I have not settled anything about you two lads yet. I may set you to work perhaps, but at all events not for a few days, so you can wander about the place. Don’t go away from the streams. Why?” he added, as he saw my inquiring look; “because if you wander into the forest there is nothing to guide you back. One tree is so like another that you might never find your way out again. Easy enough to talk about, but very terrible if you think of the consequences. If you ascend one of the streams, you have only to follow it back to the river. It is always there as a guide.”
Nothing could have gratified us more, and for some days we spent our time exploring, always finding enough to attract, watching the inhabitants of the woods, fishing, bathing, climbing the trees, and going some distance up into the solitudes of one of the mountains.
It was a pleasant time, and neither of us was in a hurry to commence work, the attractions were so many.
“It’s so different to being in streets in London,” Esau was always saying. “There it’s all people, and you can hardly cross the roads for the ’busses and cabs. Here it’s all so still, and I suppose you might go on wandering in the woods for ever and never see a soul.”
It almost seemed as if that might be the case, and a curious feeling of awe used to come over me when we wandered up one of the little valleys, and were seated in the bright sunshine upon some moss-cushioned rock, listening to the murmur of the wind high up in the tall pines—a sound that was like the gentle rushing of the sea upon the shore.
Mr Raydon generally asked us where we had been, and laughed at our appetites.
“There, don’t be ashamed, Mayne,” he said, as he saw me look abashed; “it is quite natural at your age. Eat away, my lad, and grow muscular and strong. I shall want your help some day, for we are not always so quiet and sleepy as you see us now.”
I had good reason to remember his words, though I little thought then what a strange adventure was waiting to fall to my lot.
Chapter Thirty Four.We make a Discovery.We two lads wandered away one day along a valley down which a stream came gliding here, roaring in a torrent there, or tumbling over a mass of rock in a beautiful fall, whose spray formed quite a dew on the leaves of the ferns which clustered amongst the stones and masses of rock. To left and right the latter rose up higher and higher crowned with fir-trees, some of which were rooted wherever there was sufficient earth, while others seemed to have started as seeds in a crevice at the top of a block of rock, and not finding enough food had sent down their roots over the sides lower and lower to where they could plunge into the earth, where they had grown and strengthened till the mass of rock was shut in tightly in what looked like a huge basket, whose bars held the stone fast, while the great fir-tree ran straight up from the top.These wild places had a constant attraction for us, the greater that we were always in expectation of hearing a deer rush away, or catching sight of some fresh bird, while there was always a shivering anticipation of our coming face to face with a bear.The sun came down glowing and hot into the ravine, where the strong aromatic scent of the pines floated to us laden with health as we toiled on higher and higher, leaping from rock to rock, wading or climbing, and often making use of a great pine-trunk for a bridge.“It’s so different to the city,” Esau used to say. “The roaring of the water puts you a bit in mind of Cheapside sometimes; but you can’t lie down there, and listen and think as you can here.”“What do you generally think about, Esau?” I said.“Dunno; mostly about getting higher up. Let’s get higher up now. I say, look at the trout. Shall we try and get a few for dinner; the old man likes them?”“As we come back,” I said. “Let’s go up higher now.”“How far would it be up to where this stream begins?”“Not very far,” I said. “It cannot come from the ice up yonder.”“Why not?” he said sharply. “I think it must.”“It cannot, because it is so clear. We couldn’t see the trout if it was a glacier stream.”“Humph, no, I s’pose not. Where does it come from then?”“Oh, from scores of rills away perhaps in the mountains. How beautifully clear the water is!—you can see every stone at the bottom—and, look, it’s like a network of gold on the sand.”“What makes that?” said Esau.“The ripple of the water as it runs. How beautiful it all is!”“Yes; I should like to build mother a cottage up there when she comes.”“That’s what you always say. Why don’t you set to work and build one ready when she does come?”“If you talk like that I will,” said Esau, irritably. “Of course I always say so—shame if I didn’t.”“Well then, select your place and let’s begin.”“Shan’t! not for you to make fun of me,” cried Esau, throwing himself down. “Now then, if you want to quarrel again, go it. I shan’t grumble.”We went on by the side of the little stream for quite half-an-hour almost in silence, not from Esau being out of temper, but from the intense satisfaction we felt in being in so beautiful a place, and at last sat down close by a gravelly-looking shallow, where the beautiful clear water tempted us to lie flat down, lean over till we could touch it, and drink.“That’s good water,” said Esau, as he wiped his mouth. “I wish plenty of fruit grew here too. What are you doing? Why, you’re not going to hunt for gold, are you?”I did not answer, but went on with what I was doing; scooping up the gravel and sand, and agitating my hand till the light sand was washed away and only the stones remained. It was in imitation of what I had seen Gunson and Quong do scores of times, and in the idlest of moods that I did this, partly, I think, because the water felt cool and pleasant to my hands, and the sensation of the sand trickling between my fingers was agreeable.“I wonder whether Gunson has found a good place for gold yet?”“Dunno,” replied Esau, with a yawn. “I wish those people would come here, so that we could set to work in real earnest, and be making a house. Shall you come and live with us, or with Mr and Mrs John?”“Can’t say at present. All that sort of thing must be left till they come, and—oh!”“What’s the matter?”“Nearly slipped in; that’s all,” I said, selecting a fresh stone for my seat, the one I had been using at the edge of the stream having turned slowly over and pitched me forward.“Only got wet; you would soon get dry again in the sunshine.”“Yes,” I said, taking a fresh handful of gravel and beginning to shake it to and fro in the stream, pausing every now and then to pick out the big stones and throw them away, and the gravel after them, before taking another handful.“Makes your hands nice and clean, doesn’t it?” said Esau. “Nothing like sand for that. Found any gold yet?”“Not yet,” I said.“No, nor you won’t. There’s no gold here, only a few little specks like Quong got.”“Oh, there might be,” I said carelessly, as I thrust in my hand a little deeper, and brought out a good handful of sand from lower down. “Gunson said he was sure there was plenty if you could—”“Well, could what?” said Esau, as he lay back with his hands beneath his head, his cap over his eyes, and his voice sounding hollow and strange from having to run round inside his hat.I did not answer, for I was washing the contents of my hand with a sudden feeling of eagerness.“Well?” he said again, “could what?”“Esau, come and look down here,” I whispered very huskily.“Can’t,” he said, lazily. “Too comfortable to move.”“Come here!” I cried again.“Shan’t. I’m tired. I don’t want to be roused up to look at a fly, or some stupid bird in a tree. You can look at it all to yourself.”“Come here, will you?” I said so fiercely that he sprang up.“What’s the matter?”“Come and look here!”He rose and came to me, looking wonderingly at my hands, which I held closely clasped together.“What’s the matter?” he said; “cut yourself? Wait till I tear up my hank’chief.”“No, no,” I panted, and the excitement I felt made me giddy.“Well, I thought you hadn’t,” he cried. “Don’t bleed. Here, what is it? What’s the matter with you? You look as silly as a goose.”I stared at him wildly, and no answer came.“He’s going to be ill,” I heard Esau mutter, as he shook me angrily. “I say, don’t, don’t have no fevers nor nothink out here in this wild place where there’s no doctors nor chemists’ shops, toget so much as an ounce o’ salts. Oh, don’t, don’t!”“I’m not ill,” I said at last. “There’s nothing the matter.”“Then what do you mean by frightening a fellow like that? I say, I like a game sometimes, but that’s too bad.”“I—I didn’t want to startle you, Esau,” I said, hurriedly, as the giddy sensation passed away. “Look—look here.”I held my hands open before him, raising one from the other slowly, as I felt half afraid that it was partly fancy, and that when my hand was quite open, that which I believed I held would be gone.“Well?” said Esau, “what of it? Wet stones? Think you’d caught a little trout?”“No, no,” I cried impatiently. “Look—look!”I raised one finger of my right hand, and began to separate the little water-worn stones with my palm raised in the sunshine, and for a few moments neither spoke. Then as Esau suddenly caught sight of some half-dozen smoothly-ground scales, and a tiny flattened bead with quite a tail to it, he uttered a shout.“Hooray!” he cried. “Gold! That beats old Quong; he never got as much as that in his tin plate. Yah! ’tain’t gold. Don’t believe it! it’s what old Gunson called Pyrrymids.”“Pyrites? No,” I said. “It’s gold; I’m sure of it. Look what a beautiful yellow colour it is.”“So’s lots of things a beautiful yellow colour,” said Esau, sneeringly, as he curled up his lip and looked contemptuously at the contents of my hand. “Tell you what it is—it’s brass.”“How can it be brass?” I said, examining the scales, which looked dead and frosted, but of a beautiful yellow.“Very easy.”“Don’t be absurd,” I cried, bringing my school knowledge to bear; “brass is an artificial product.”“That it ain’t,” cried Esau, triumphantly; “why, it’s strong as strong, and they use it for all sorts of things.”“I mean, it’s made by melting copper and tin or zinc together. It’s an alloy, not a natural metal.”“Don’t tell me,” said Esau, excitedly; “think I don’t know? It’s brass, and it’s got melted up together somehow.”“Nonsense,” I cried; “it’s gold; I’m sure of it.”“’Tain’t. Yah! that isn’t gold.”“It is; I’m sure.”“It’s brass, I tell you.”“Impossible.”“Then it’s copper.”“Copper isn’t this colour at all, Esau. It’s gold.”“Not it; may be gold outside perhaps. It’s gilt, that’s what it is.”“You stupid, obstinate donkey!” I cried in a pet.“Oh, I am, am I? Look here, mister, donkeys kick, so look out.”“You kick me if you dare!” I cried.“Don’t want to kick you, but don’t you be so handy calling people donkeys.”“Then don’t you be so absurd. How can a piece of metal out here be gilt?”“By rubbing up against other pieces, of course, just the same as your boots get brazed by rubbing ’em on the fender.”“I believe you think it’s gold all the time, only you will not own to it,” I cried.“’Fraid to believe it, lad; too good to be true. Why, if you can find bits like that by just wiggling your hand about in the sand, there must be lots more.”“Yes; enough to make us both rich.”“I say, think it really is gold?” whispered Esau, hoarsely.“Yes, I feel sure of it.”“Look! there’s another bit,” he cried, dashing his hand down and sending the water flying, as he caught sight of a scrap, about as big as a flattened turnip-seed, in the sand, into which it sank, or was driven down by Esau’s energetic action.“Gone!” he said, dismally.“Never mind; we’ll come on here with a shovel, and wash for more.”“But, I say, how do you know it’s gold? How can you tell?”“One way is because it’s so soft, you can cut it almost like lead.”“Who says so?”“Gunson told me.”“Then we’ll soon see about that,” cried Esau, pulling out and opening his knife. “Sit down here on this stone and give me that round bit.”“What are you going to do?” I said.“Try if it’ll cut. Split it like you do a shot when you go a-fishing.”He picked the little pear-shaped piece from the sand, laid it on the stone beside us, and placing the edge of the knife upon it, pressed down hard, with the result that he cut a nick in the metal, which held on fast to the blade of the big knife.“There!” I cried, triumphantly.“I don’t believe it yet,” said Esau, hoarsely. “Are you sure it ain’t that pyrry stuff?”“Certain!—that all splinters into dust if you try and cut it. I am sure that’s gold.”“Ain’t much of it,” said Esau. “Take four times as much as that to make a half-sovereign.”“Well, if we only got four times as much as that a day, it would mean three pounds a week. It is gold, and we’ve made a discovery that Gunson would have given anything to see.”“And he’s gone nobody knows where, and it’s all our own,” said Esau, looking cautiously round. “I say, think anybody has seen us?”“What, up here?” I said, laughing.“Ah, you don’t know. I say, slip it into your pocket.”“Let’s pick out the stones first.”“Never mind the stones,” cried Esau; “slip it in. We may be watched all the time, and our finding it may turn out no good. I’ll look round.”He looked up and ran back a little way, peering in amongst the tree-trunks and clumps of berries and fern. Then returning he went higher up the stream and searched about there before coming back.“Don’t see no one,” he said, looking quite pale and excited at me. “I say, you’re not playing any games are you?” he whispered, looking up.“Games?”“Yes; you didn’t bring that and put it down there, and then pretend to find it?”“Esau! As if I should!”“No, of course you wouldn’t. It is all real, ain’t it?”“Yes; all real.”“Then we shall have made our fortune just before they come out to us. Oh, I say! but—”“What is it?”“Shall we find this place again?”“Yes; we only have to follow up the stream here, and it doesn’t matter about this one place: there must be gold all the way up this little river right away into the mountains.”“But it will be ours, won’t it?”“I don’t know,” I said.“But we found it—leastwise you did. All this land ought to be yours, or ours. I say, how is it going to be?”“I don’t understand you,” I said.“I mean about that. I s’pose you consider you found it?”“Well, there isn’t much doubt about that,” I said.“Oh, I don’t see nothing to laugh at in it. All right, then. I don’t grumble, only you can’t say as all the country up here is to be yours.”“Of course not. What do you mean?”“Oh, only that I don’t see no fun in your making a fortune and me being left nowhere. I want a fortune too. I’m going to hunt now for myself.”“Nonsense!” I cried; “what is the use of your going away? Isn’t there enough here for both of us?”“Dunno,” said Esau, scratching his head. “That is what I want to know; you ain’t got much yet.”“Why, Esau,” I said, struck by his surly way, “we were the best of friends when we came out.”“Yes; but we hadn’t found gold then—leastwise you hadn’t.”“But what difference does that make?”“Ever so much. You’re going to be rich, and I ain’t. Every one ain’t so lucky as you.”“But, Esau,” I cried, “of course you will share with me. We found it together.”“Say that again.”“I say that we will share together.”“What, go halves?”“Of course.”“You mean it?”“Why, of course I mean it. You’ve as good a right to the gold we find as I have.”“Here, shake hands on it.”I laughingly held out my hand, which he seized and pumped up and down.“I always thought your father was a gentleman,” he cried. “Now I feel sure as sure of it. Halves it is, and we won’t tell a soul.”“But we must,” I cried.“What, and let some one come and get it all?”“I should only tell some one who has a right to know: Mr Raydon.”“What right’s he got to know?” cried Esau. “I say, don’t go and throw it all away.”“I consider that Mr Raydon, who has welcomed us here and treated us as friends, has a perfect right to know.”“But it’s like giving him a share in it.”“Well, why not?”“But, don’t you see, it will be thirds instead of halves, and he’ll want to bring some one else in, and it ’ll make it fourths.”“Well, and if he did? Sometimes a fourth is better than a half. I mean with the help of a clever man we should get more for our fourth than we should if we had half apiece.”“Oh, all right. I s’pose you know,” he cried; “but I wouldn’t tell any one else.”“Of course I’m right,” I said, sharply.“And we couldn’t go on getting the gold here without his knowing it. So you’d better tell him.”“That’s a nice selfish way of looking at it, Master Esau,” I said.“Dessay it is,” he replied; “but gold makes you feel selfish. I dunno that I feel so glad now that we’ve found it.”And I don’t think I felt quite so excited and pleased as I had a short time before.“It ain’t my fault,” said Dean; “it’s your thinking I didn’t want to play fair.”“Don’t talk like that,” I cried, angrily. “Who thinks you don’t want to play fair? No, no; don’t say any more about it. Now then: can we recollect this spot exactly?”“Why, you said that there must be gold all along.”“Yes, I know,” I cried; “but Mr Raydon may want to see the place, and we must bring him where we can find some and show him directly.”“Well,” said Esau, “there’s a clump of fir-trees on this side, and a clump of fir-trees on that side.”“Oh, you old stupid,” I cried, “when there are clumps of fir-trees everywhere. That won’t do.”“Well then, let’s make a cross with our knives on those twisting ones.”“What, to tell people this is the very place? That wouldn’t do.”“Well then,” he cried, peevishly, “you find out a better way.”I stood thinking a few minutes, but no better way came. Then I thought I had hit out the plan.“Look here,” I said, “we’ll make the two crosses on the other side of the trees. No one would notice them then.”Esau burst into a hoarse laugh.“Of course they will not,” he said, “nor us neither. Why, you keep on coming to trees like these over and over all day long. We shan’t find ’em again.”I felt that he was right, and thought of plan after plan—putting stones in a heap, cutting off a branch, sticking up a post, and the like, but they all seemed as if they would attract people to the spot, and then induce them to search about and at last try the sand as Quong did, and I said so.“Yes,” said Esau, “that’s right enough. There ain’t many people likely to see ’em but Indians, and I s’pose they won’t go gold-washing, nor any other washing, for fear of taking off their paint.”“Well, what shall we do?” I cried. “We mustn’t lose the place again now we have found it, and we shall be sure to if we don’t mark it. I’ve seen hundreds of places just like this.”“Well then, why not make a mark?” said Esau. “Because whoever sees it will be sure that it means something particular, for some one to stop and search.”“Make a mark then on that big tree which will tell ’em to go on,” said Esau, grinning.“But how?”“I’ll show you,” he said; and he took out his big knife from its sheath. “Let’s look round again first.”We looked round, but the silence was almost awful, not even a bird’s note fell upon our ears. Once a faint, whistling sound came from the far distance, that was all; and Esau went up to the biggest fir-tree whose trunk was clear of boughs, and he was about to use his knife, when we both jumped away from the tree. For from close at hand came a sharp, clear tap, as if somebody had touched the ground with a light cane.“What’s that?” whispered Esau, with his eyes staring, and his mouth partly opened.I shook my head.“Some one a-watching us,” he whispered. “Here, let’s dive right in among the trees and see.”But I held his arm, and we stood in that beautiful wild ravine, listening to the rippling of the water, and peering in among the tall pines, expecting to see the man who had made the sound.“I say,” whispered Esau, “I can’t see or hear anything. Ain’t it rather rum?”He said “rum,” but he looked at me as if he thought it very terrible, with the consequence that his fear was contagious, and I began to feel uncomfortable as we kept looking at each other.“Shall we run?” whispered Esau.At another time such an idea would not have occurred to him. The forest and the streams that run up the valleys were always solitary, but we felt no particular dread when going about, unless we saw the footmarks of bears. But now that we were in possession of the secret of the gold, the same idea of our being watched impressed us both, and we turned cold with fear, and all because we had heard that faint blow on the ground.I don’t know whether I looked pale as I stood by Esau, when he asked me if we should run, but I do know that the next moment I felt utterly ashamed of myself, and in the reaction—I suppose to conceal my shame for my cowardice—I struck Esau heavily on the shoulder and made a false start.“Run—run—the Fort!” I cried. Esau bounded off, and I hung back watching him till he turned to see me standing there laughing, when he stopped short, looking at me curiously, and then came slowly to where I was.“What did you say run for?” he cried, angrily.“You asked me if you should,” I replied.“Then there ain’t no one coming?”“No.”“What a shame!” he cried. “It’s too bad.”“Yes, for us to be frightened at nothing. Do you know what that noise was?”“No, I don’t know.”“It was a squirrel dropped a nut or a fir-cone. Why, it’s just the same noise as you hear in the country at home when they drop an acorn.”“Then why didn’t you say so? I’ve never been in no countries where squirrels shies nuts and acorns at people. I’ve always seen ’em in cages spinning round and round.”“That’s what it was, Esau. There’s nobody watching. Now then, how are you going to mark the tree?”He looked at me rather sulkily, but began to smile directly, as he drew his keen-edged knife across the trunk of the great tree upon which he was going to operate before. Then, making a parallel incision close to the first, he produced a white streak where he removed the bark.“Well,” I said, “that’s as bad as anything.”“No, it ain’t: wait a bit,” he said; and carving away at the thick bark, he made four deep incisions at one end so as to form an arrow-head, and eight at the other end for the feathering of the arrow, so that when he had ended there was a rough white arrow on the red bark pointing down the river, and of course in the direction of the Fort.“There!” he said, triumphantly. “No brave will think that means gold in the stream, will he?”I confessed that it was most unlikely, and we started off home.“Wouldn’t old Quong like to know of that?” I said.“Yes; he’d give something—half of what he found I dare say,” cried Esau; “but he isn’t going to know, nor anybody else, from me.”
We two lads wandered away one day along a valley down which a stream came gliding here, roaring in a torrent there, or tumbling over a mass of rock in a beautiful fall, whose spray formed quite a dew on the leaves of the ferns which clustered amongst the stones and masses of rock. To left and right the latter rose up higher and higher crowned with fir-trees, some of which were rooted wherever there was sufficient earth, while others seemed to have started as seeds in a crevice at the top of a block of rock, and not finding enough food had sent down their roots over the sides lower and lower to where they could plunge into the earth, where they had grown and strengthened till the mass of rock was shut in tightly in what looked like a huge basket, whose bars held the stone fast, while the great fir-tree ran straight up from the top.
These wild places had a constant attraction for us, the greater that we were always in expectation of hearing a deer rush away, or catching sight of some fresh bird, while there was always a shivering anticipation of our coming face to face with a bear.
The sun came down glowing and hot into the ravine, where the strong aromatic scent of the pines floated to us laden with health as we toiled on higher and higher, leaping from rock to rock, wading or climbing, and often making use of a great pine-trunk for a bridge.
“It’s so different to the city,” Esau used to say. “The roaring of the water puts you a bit in mind of Cheapside sometimes; but you can’t lie down there, and listen and think as you can here.”
“What do you generally think about, Esau?” I said.
“Dunno; mostly about getting higher up. Let’s get higher up now. I say, look at the trout. Shall we try and get a few for dinner; the old man likes them?”
“As we come back,” I said. “Let’s go up higher now.”
“How far would it be up to where this stream begins?”
“Not very far,” I said. “It cannot come from the ice up yonder.”
“Why not?” he said sharply. “I think it must.”
“It cannot, because it is so clear. We couldn’t see the trout if it was a glacier stream.”
“Humph, no, I s’pose not. Where does it come from then?”
“Oh, from scores of rills away perhaps in the mountains. How beautifully clear the water is!—you can see every stone at the bottom—and, look, it’s like a network of gold on the sand.”
“What makes that?” said Esau.
“The ripple of the water as it runs. How beautiful it all is!”
“Yes; I should like to build mother a cottage up there when she comes.”
“That’s what you always say. Why don’t you set to work and build one ready when she does come?”
“If you talk like that I will,” said Esau, irritably. “Of course I always say so—shame if I didn’t.”
“Well then, select your place and let’s begin.”
“Shan’t! not for you to make fun of me,” cried Esau, throwing himself down. “Now then, if you want to quarrel again, go it. I shan’t grumble.”
We went on by the side of the little stream for quite half-an-hour almost in silence, not from Esau being out of temper, but from the intense satisfaction we felt in being in so beautiful a place, and at last sat down close by a gravelly-looking shallow, where the beautiful clear water tempted us to lie flat down, lean over till we could touch it, and drink.
“That’s good water,” said Esau, as he wiped his mouth. “I wish plenty of fruit grew here too. What are you doing? Why, you’re not going to hunt for gold, are you?”
I did not answer, but went on with what I was doing; scooping up the gravel and sand, and agitating my hand till the light sand was washed away and only the stones remained. It was in imitation of what I had seen Gunson and Quong do scores of times, and in the idlest of moods that I did this, partly, I think, because the water felt cool and pleasant to my hands, and the sensation of the sand trickling between my fingers was agreeable.
“I wonder whether Gunson has found a good place for gold yet?”
“Dunno,” replied Esau, with a yawn. “I wish those people would come here, so that we could set to work in real earnest, and be making a house. Shall you come and live with us, or with Mr and Mrs John?”
“Can’t say at present. All that sort of thing must be left till they come, and—oh!”
“What’s the matter?”
“Nearly slipped in; that’s all,” I said, selecting a fresh stone for my seat, the one I had been using at the edge of the stream having turned slowly over and pitched me forward.
“Only got wet; you would soon get dry again in the sunshine.”
“Yes,” I said, taking a fresh handful of gravel and beginning to shake it to and fro in the stream, pausing every now and then to pick out the big stones and throw them away, and the gravel after them, before taking another handful.
“Makes your hands nice and clean, doesn’t it?” said Esau. “Nothing like sand for that. Found any gold yet?”
“Not yet,” I said.
“No, nor you won’t. There’s no gold here, only a few little specks like Quong got.”
“Oh, there might be,” I said carelessly, as I thrust in my hand a little deeper, and brought out a good handful of sand from lower down. “Gunson said he was sure there was plenty if you could—”
“Well, could what?” said Esau, as he lay back with his hands beneath his head, his cap over his eyes, and his voice sounding hollow and strange from having to run round inside his hat.
I did not answer, for I was washing the contents of my hand with a sudden feeling of eagerness.
“Well?” he said again, “could what?”
“Esau, come and look down here,” I whispered very huskily.
“Can’t,” he said, lazily. “Too comfortable to move.”
“Come here!” I cried again.
“Shan’t. I’m tired. I don’t want to be roused up to look at a fly, or some stupid bird in a tree. You can look at it all to yourself.”
“Come here, will you?” I said so fiercely that he sprang up.
“What’s the matter?”
“Come and look here!”
He rose and came to me, looking wonderingly at my hands, which I held closely clasped together.
“What’s the matter?” he said; “cut yourself? Wait till I tear up my hank’chief.”
“No, no,” I panted, and the excitement I felt made me giddy.
“Well, I thought you hadn’t,” he cried. “Don’t bleed. Here, what is it? What’s the matter with you? You look as silly as a goose.”
I stared at him wildly, and no answer came.
“He’s going to be ill,” I heard Esau mutter, as he shook me angrily. “I say, don’t, don’t have no fevers nor nothink out here in this wild place where there’s no doctors nor chemists’ shops, toget so much as an ounce o’ salts. Oh, don’t, don’t!”
“I’m not ill,” I said at last. “There’s nothing the matter.”
“Then what do you mean by frightening a fellow like that? I say, I like a game sometimes, but that’s too bad.”
“I—I didn’t want to startle you, Esau,” I said, hurriedly, as the giddy sensation passed away. “Look—look here.”
I held my hands open before him, raising one from the other slowly, as I felt half afraid that it was partly fancy, and that when my hand was quite open, that which I believed I held would be gone.
“Well?” said Esau, “what of it? Wet stones? Think you’d caught a little trout?”
“No, no,” I cried impatiently. “Look—look!”
I raised one finger of my right hand, and began to separate the little water-worn stones with my palm raised in the sunshine, and for a few moments neither spoke. Then as Esau suddenly caught sight of some half-dozen smoothly-ground scales, and a tiny flattened bead with quite a tail to it, he uttered a shout.
“Hooray!” he cried. “Gold! That beats old Quong; he never got as much as that in his tin plate. Yah! ’tain’t gold. Don’t believe it! it’s what old Gunson called Pyrrymids.”
“Pyrites? No,” I said. “It’s gold; I’m sure of it. Look what a beautiful yellow colour it is.”
“So’s lots of things a beautiful yellow colour,” said Esau, sneeringly, as he curled up his lip and looked contemptuously at the contents of my hand. “Tell you what it is—it’s brass.”
“How can it be brass?” I said, examining the scales, which looked dead and frosted, but of a beautiful yellow.
“Very easy.”
“Don’t be absurd,” I cried, bringing my school knowledge to bear; “brass is an artificial product.”
“That it ain’t,” cried Esau, triumphantly; “why, it’s strong as strong, and they use it for all sorts of things.”
“I mean, it’s made by melting copper and tin or zinc together. It’s an alloy, not a natural metal.”
“Don’t tell me,” said Esau, excitedly; “think I don’t know? It’s brass, and it’s got melted up together somehow.”
“Nonsense,” I cried; “it’s gold; I’m sure of it.”
“’Tain’t. Yah! that isn’t gold.”
“It is; I’m sure.”
“It’s brass, I tell you.”
“Impossible.”
“Then it’s copper.”
“Copper isn’t this colour at all, Esau. It’s gold.”
“Not it; may be gold outside perhaps. It’s gilt, that’s what it is.”
“You stupid, obstinate donkey!” I cried in a pet.
“Oh, I am, am I? Look here, mister, donkeys kick, so look out.”
“You kick me if you dare!” I cried.
“Don’t want to kick you, but don’t you be so handy calling people donkeys.”
“Then don’t you be so absurd. How can a piece of metal out here be gilt?”
“By rubbing up against other pieces, of course, just the same as your boots get brazed by rubbing ’em on the fender.”
“I believe you think it’s gold all the time, only you will not own to it,” I cried.
“’Fraid to believe it, lad; too good to be true. Why, if you can find bits like that by just wiggling your hand about in the sand, there must be lots more.”
“Yes; enough to make us both rich.”
“I say, think it really is gold?” whispered Esau, hoarsely.
“Yes, I feel sure of it.”
“Look! there’s another bit,” he cried, dashing his hand down and sending the water flying, as he caught sight of a scrap, about as big as a flattened turnip-seed, in the sand, into which it sank, or was driven down by Esau’s energetic action.
“Gone!” he said, dismally.
“Never mind; we’ll come on here with a shovel, and wash for more.”
“But, I say, how do you know it’s gold? How can you tell?”
“One way is because it’s so soft, you can cut it almost like lead.”
“Who says so?”
“Gunson told me.”
“Then we’ll soon see about that,” cried Esau, pulling out and opening his knife. “Sit down here on this stone and give me that round bit.”
“What are you going to do?” I said.
“Try if it’ll cut. Split it like you do a shot when you go a-fishing.”
He picked the little pear-shaped piece from the sand, laid it on the stone beside us, and placing the edge of the knife upon it, pressed down hard, with the result that he cut a nick in the metal, which held on fast to the blade of the big knife.
“There!” I cried, triumphantly.
“I don’t believe it yet,” said Esau, hoarsely. “Are you sure it ain’t that pyrry stuff?”
“Certain!—that all splinters into dust if you try and cut it. I am sure that’s gold.”
“Ain’t much of it,” said Esau. “Take four times as much as that to make a half-sovereign.”
“Well, if we only got four times as much as that a day, it would mean three pounds a week. It is gold, and we’ve made a discovery that Gunson would have given anything to see.”
“And he’s gone nobody knows where, and it’s all our own,” said Esau, looking cautiously round. “I say, think anybody has seen us?”
“What, up here?” I said, laughing.
“Ah, you don’t know. I say, slip it into your pocket.”
“Let’s pick out the stones first.”
“Never mind the stones,” cried Esau; “slip it in. We may be watched all the time, and our finding it may turn out no good. I’ll look round.”
He looked up and ran back a little way, peering in amongst the tree-trunks and clumps of berries and fern. Then returning he went higher up the stream and searched about there before coming back.
“Don’t see no one,” he said, looking quite pale and excited at me. “I say, you’re not playing any games are you?” he whispered, looking up.
“Games?”
“Yes; you didn’t bring that and put it down there, and then pretend to find it?”
“Esau! As if I should!”
“No, of course you wouldn’t. It is all real, ain’t it?”
“Yes; all real.”
“Then we shall have made our fortune just before they come out to us. Oh, I say! but—”
“What is it?”
“Shall we find this place again?”
“Yes; we only have to follow up the stream here, and it doesn’t matter about this one place: there must be gold all the way up this little river right away into the mountains.”
“But it will be ours, won’t it?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“But we found it—leastwise you did. All this land ought to be yours, or ours. I say, how is it going to be?”
“I don’t understand you,” I said.
“I mean about that. I s’pose you consider you found it?”
“Well, there isn’t much doubt about that,” I said.
“Oh, I don’t see nothing to laugh at in it. All right, then. I don’t grumble, only you can’t say as all the country up here is to be yours.”
“Of course not. What do you mean?”
“Oh, only that I don’t see no fun in your making a fortune and me being left nowhere. I want a fortune too. I’m going to hunt now for myself.”
“Nonsense!” I cried; “what is the use of your going away? Isn’t there enough here for both of us?”
“Dunno,” said Esau, scratching his head. “That is what I want to know; you ain’t got much yet.”
“Why, Esau,” I said, struck by his surly way, “we were the best of friends when we came out.”
“Yes; but we hadn’t found gold then—leastwise you hadn’t.”
“But what difference does that make?”
“Ever so much. You’re going to be rich, and I ain’t. Every one ain’t so lucky as you.”
“But, Esau,” I cried, “of course you will share with me. We found it together.”
“Say that again.”
“I say that we will share together.”
“What, go halves?”
“Of course.”
“You mean it?”
“Why, of course I mean it. You’ve as good a right to the gold we find as I have.”
“Here, shake hands on it.”
I laughingly held out my hand, which he seized and pumped up and down.
“I always thought your father was a gentleman,” he cried. “Now I feel sure as sure of it. Halves it is, and we won’t tell a soul.”
“But we must,” I cried.
“What, and let some one come and get it all?”
“I should only tell some one who has a right to know: Mr Raydon.”
“What right’s he got to know?” cried Esau. “I say, don’t go and throw it all away.”
“I consider that Mr Raydon, who has welcomed us here and treated us as friends, has a perfect right to know.”
“But it’s like giving him a share in it.”
“Well, why not?”
“But, don’t you see, it will be thirds instead of halves, and he’ll want to bring some one else in, and it ’ll make it fourths.”
“Well, and if he did? Sometimes a fourth is better than a half. I mean with the help of a clever man we should get more for our fourth than we should if we had half apiece.”
“Oh, all right. I s’pose you know,” he cried; “but I wouldn’t tell any one else.”
“Of course I’m right,” I said, sharply.
“And we couldn’t go on getting the gold here without his knowing it. So you’d better tell him.”
“That’s a nice selfish way of looking at it, Master Esau,” I said.
“Dessay it is,” he replied; “but gold makes you feel selfish. I dunno that I feel so glad now that we’ve found it.”
And I don’t think I felt quite so excited and pleased as I had a short time before.
“It ain’t my fault,” said Dean; “it’s your thinking I didn’t want to play fair.”
“Don’t talk like that,” I cried, angrily. “Who thinks you don’t want to play fair? No, no; don’t say any more about it. Now then: can we recollect this spot exactly?”
“Why, you said that there must be gold all along.”
“Yes, I know,” I cried; “but Mr Raydon may want to see the place, and we must bring him where we can find some and show him directly.”
“Well,” said Esau, “there’s a clump of fir-trees on this side, and a clump of fir-trees on that side.”
“Oh, you old stupid,” I cried, “when there are clumps of fir-trees everywhere. That won’t do.”
“Well then, let’s make a cross with our knives on those twisting ones.”
“What, to tell people this is the very place? That wouldn’t do.”
“Well then,” he cried, peevishly, “you find out a better way.”
I stood thinking a few minutes, but no better way came. Then I thought I had hit out the plan.
“Look here,” I said, “we’ll make the two crosses on the other side of the trees. No one would notice them then.”
Esau burst into a hoarse laugh.
“Of course they will not,” he said, “nor us neither. Why, you keep on coming to trees like these over and over all day long. We shan’t find ’em again.”
I felt that he was right, and thought of plan after plan—putting stones in a heap, cutting off a branch, sticking up a post, and the like, but they all seemed as if they would attract people to the spot, and then induce them to search about and at last try the sand as Quong did, and I said so.
“Yes,” said Esau, “that’s right enough. There ain’t many people likely to see ’em but Indians, and I s’pose they won’t go gold-washing, nor any other washing, for fear of taking off their paint.”
“Well, what shall we do?” I cried. “We mustn’t lose the place again now we have found it, and we shall be sure to if we don’t mark it. I’ve seen hundreds of places just like this.”
“Well then, why not make a mark?” said Esau. “Because whoever sees it will be sure that it means something particular, for some one to stop and search.”
“Make a mark then on that big tree which will tell ’em to go on,” said Esau, grinning.
“But how?”
“I’ll show you,” he said; and he took out his big knife from its sheath. “Let’s look round again first.”
We looked round, but the silence was almost awful, not even a bird’s note fell upon our ears. Once a faint, whistling sound came from the far distance, that was all; and Esau went up to the biggest fir-tree whose trunk was clear of boughs, and he was about to use his knife, when we both jumped away from the tree. For from close at hand came a sharp, clear tap, as if somebody had touched the ground with a light cane.
“What’s that?” whispered Esau, with his eyes staring, and his mouth partly opened.
I shook my head.
“Some one a-watching us,” he whispered. “Here, let’s dive right in among the trees and see.”
But I held his arm, and we stood in that beautiful wild ravine, listening to the rippling of the water, and peering in among the tall pines, expecting to see the man who had made the sound.
“I say,” whispered Esau, “I can’t see or hear anything. Ain’t it rather rum?”
He said “rum,” but he looked at me as if he thought it very terrible, with the consequence that his fear was contagious, and I began to feel uncomfortable as we kept looking at each other.
“Shall we run?” whispered Esau.
At another time such an idea would not have occurred to him. The forest and the streams that run up the valleys were always solitary, but we felt no particular dread when going about, unless we saw the footmarks of bears. But now that we were in possession of the secret of the gold, the same idea of our being watched impressed us both, and we turned cold with fear, and all because we had heard that faint blow on the ground.
I don’t know whether I looked pale as I stood by Esau, when he asked me if we should run, but I do know that the next moment I felt utterly ashamed of myself, and in the reaction—I suppose to conceal my shame for my cowardice—I struck Esau heavily on the shoulder and made a false start.
“Run—run—the Fort!” I cried. Esau bounded off, and I hung back watching him till he turned to see me standing there laughing, when he stopped short, looking at me curiously, and then came slowly to where I was.
“What did you say run for?” he cried, angrily.
“You asked me if you should,” I replied.
“Then there ain’t no one coming?”
“No.”
“What a shame!” he cried. “It’s too bad.”
“Yes, for us to be frightened at nothing. Do you know what that noise was?”
“No, I don’t know.”
“It was a squirrel dropped a nut or a fir-cone. Why, it’s just the same noise as you hear in the country at home when they drop an acorn.”
“Then why didn’t you say so? I’ve never been in no countries where squirrels shies nuts and acorns at people. I’ve always seen ’em in cages spinning round and round.”
“That’s what it was, Esau. There’s nobody watching. Now then, how are you going to mark the tree?”
He looked at me rather sulkily, but began to smile directly, as he drew his keen-edged knife across the trunk of the great tree upon which he was going to operate before. Then, making a parallel incision close to the first, he produced a white streak where he removed the bark.
“Well,” I said, “that’s as bad as anything.”
“No, it ain’t: wait a bit,” he said; and carving away at the thick bark, he made four deep incisions at one end so as to form an arrow-head, and eight at the other end for the feathering of the arrow, so that when he had ended there was a rough white arrow on the red bark pointing down the river, and of course in the direction of the Fort.
“There!” he said, triumphantly. “No brave will think that means gold in the stream, will he?”
I confessed that it was most unlikely, and we started off home.
“Wouldn’t old Quong like to know of that?” I said.
“Yes; he’d give something—half of what he found I dare say,” cried Esau; “but he isn’t going to know, nor anybody else, from me.”