Silver and Gold Page 8

  Yet now that his sale had been consummated and he had the money he needed, Bunker Hill suddenly lost all interest in Denver and retired into his shell. He had invited Denver once to come down to his house and share the hospitality of his home; but, after Denver’s brusque, almost brutal refusal, Old Bunk had never been the same. He had shown Denver his claim and stated the price and told a few stories on the side, but he had shown in many ways that his pride had been hurt and that he did not fully approve. This was made the more evident by the careful way in which he avoided introducing his wife; and it became apparent beyond a doubt in that tense ecstatic minute when Drusilla had come in from the garden.

  Then, if ever, was the moment when Denver should have been introduced; but Bunker had pointedly neglected the opportunity and left him still a stranger. And all as a reward for his foolish words and his refusal of well-meaning hospitality. Denver realized it now, but his pride was touched and he refrained from all further advances. If he was not good enough to know Old Bunker’s family he was not good enough to associate with him; and so for three days he lived without society, for the Professor, too, was estranged. He passed Denver now with eyes fixed straight ahead, refusing even to recognize his presence; and, cut off for the time from all human intercourse, Denver turned at last to his phonograph.

  The stars had come out in the velvety black sky, the hot stillness of evening had come, and from the valley below no sound came up but the eerie, eh, eh, eh, of tree toads. They were sitting by the stream and in cracks among the rocks, puffing out their pouched throats like toy balloons and raising, a shrill, haunting chorus. Their thin voices intermingled in an insistent, unearthly refrain as if the spirits of the dead had come again to gibber by the pool. Even the scales and trills of Drusilla had ceased, so hot and close was the night.

  Denver set up his phonograph with its scrollwork front and patent filing cases and looked over the records which he had bought at great expense while the other boys were buying jazz. He was proud of them all but the one he valued most he reserved for another time. It was the “Barcarolle” from “Les Contes D’ Hoffmann,” sung by Farrar and Scotti, and he put on instead a tenor solo that had cost him three dollars in Globe. Then a violin solo, “Tambourin Chinois,” by some man with a foreign name; and at last the record that he liked the best, the “Cradle Song,” by Schumann-Heink. And as he played it again he saw Drusilla come out and stand in the doorway, listening.

  It was a beautiful song, very sweet, very tender, and sung with the feeling of an artist; yet something about it seemed to displease Drusilla, for she turned and went into the house. Perhaps, hearing the song, she was reminded of the singers, stepping forward in a blare of trumpets to meet the applause of vast audiences; or perhaps again she felt the difference between her efforts and theirs; but all the next day, when she should have been practicing, Drusilla was strangely silent. Denver paused in his work from time to time as he listened for the familiar roulades, then he swung his heavy sledge as if it were a feather-weight and beat out the measured song of steel on steel. He picked and shoveled, tearing down from above and building up the trail below; and as he worked he whistled the “Cradle Song,” which was running through his brain. But as he swung the sledge again he was conscious of a presence, of someone watching from the sycamores; and, glancing down quickly he surprised Drusilla, looking up from among the trees. She met his eyes frankly but he turned away, for he remembered what the seeress had told him. So he went about his work and when he looked again his lady of the sycamores had fled.

  * * *

  CHAPTER XII

  STEEL ON STEEL

  The stifling summer heat fetched up wind from the south and thundercaps crowned the high peaks; then the rain came slashing and struck up the dust before it lifted and went scurrying away. The lizards gasped for breath, Drusilla ceased to sing, all Pinal seemed to palpitate with heat; but through heat and rain one song kept on–Denver’s song of steel on steel. In the cool of his tunnel he drove up-holes and down, slugging manfully away until his round of holes was done and then shooting away the face. As the sun sank low he sat on the dump, sorting and sacking the best of his ore; and one evening as he worked Drusilla came by, walking slowly as if in deep thought.

  He was down on his knees, a single-jack in his right hand a pile of quartzite at his left, and as she came to the forks he went on cracking rocks without so much as a stare. She glanced at him furtively, looked back towards the town, then turned off and came up his trail.

  “Good evening,” she began and as he nodded silently she seemed at a loss for words. “–I just wanted to ask you,” she burst out hurriedly, “if you’d be willing to sell back the mine? I brought up the money with me.”

  She drew out the sweaty roll of bills which he had paid to her father and as Denver looked up she held it out to him, then clutched it convulsively back.

  “I don’t mean,” she explained, “that you have to take it. But I thought perhaps–oh, is it very rich? I’m sorry I let him sell it.”

  “Why, no,” answered Denver with his slow, honest smile, while his heart beat like a trip-hammer in his breast, “it isn’t so awful rich. But I bought it, you know–well, I was sent here!”

  “What, by Murray?” she cried aghast, “did he send you in to buy it?”

  “Don’t you think it!” returned Denver. “I’m working for myself and–well, I don’t want to sell.”

  “No, but listen,” she pleaded, her eyes beginning to fill, “I–I made a great mistake. This was father’s best claim, he shouldn’t have sold it; and so–won’t you sell it back?”

  She smiled, and Denver reached out blindly to accept the money, but at a thought he drew back his hand.

  “No!” he said, “I was sent, you know–a fortune-teller told me to dig here.”

  “Oh, did he?” she exclaimed in great disappointment. “Won’t some other claim do just as well? No, I don’t mean that; but–tell me how it all came about.”

  “Well,” began Denver, avoiding her eyes; and then he rose up abruptly and brushed off the top of a powder-box. “Sit down,” he said, “I’d sure like to accommodate you, but here’s how I come to buy it. There’s a woman over in Globe–Mother Trigedgo is her name–and she saved the lives of a lot of us boys by predicting a cave in a mine. Well, she told my fortune and here’s what she said:

  “You will soon make a journey to the west and there, within the shadow of a place of death, you will find two treasures, one of silver and the other of gold. Choose well between them and both shall be yours, but–well, I don’t need to tell you the rest. But this is my choice, see? And so, of course─”

  “Oh, do you believe in those people?” she inquired incredulously, “I thought─”

  “But not this one!” spoke up Denver stoutly, “I know that the most of them are fakes. But this Mother Trigedgo, she’s a regular seeress–and it’s all come true, every word! Apache Leap up there is the place of death. I came west after that fellow that robbed me; and this mine here and that gold prospect of the Professor’s are both in the shadow of the peaks!”

  “But maybe you guessed wrong,” she cried, snatching at a straw. “Maybe this isn’t the one, after all. And if it isn’t, oh, won’t you let me buy it back for father? Because I’m not going to New York, after all.”

  “Well, what good would it do him?” burst out Denver vehemently. “He’s had it for fifteen years! If he thought so much of it why didn’t he work it a little and ship out a few sacks of ore?”

  “He’s not a miner,” protested Drusilla weakly and Denver grunted contemptuously.

  “No,” he said, “you told the truth that time–and that’s what the matter with the whole district. The ground is all held by lead-pencil work and nobody’s doing any digging. And now, when I come in and begin to find some ore, your old man wants his mining claim back.”

  “He does not!” retorted Drusilla, “he doesn’t know I’m up here. But he hasn’t been the same since he sold his claim, and
I want to buy it back. He sold it to get the money to send me to New York, and it was all an awful mistake. I can never become a great singer.”

  “No?” inquired Denver, glad to change the subject, “I thought you were doing fine. That evening when you─”

  “Well, so did I!” she broke in, “until you played all those records; and then it came over me I couldn’t sing like that if I tried a thousand years. I just haven’t got the temperament. Those continental people have something that we lack–they’re so Frenchy, so emotional, so full of fire! I’ve tried and I’ve tried and I just can’t do it–I just can’t interpret those parts!”

  She stamped her foot and winked very fast and Denver forgot he was a stranger. He had heard her sing so often that he seemed to know her well, to have known her for years and years, and he ventured a comforting word.

  “Oh well, you’re young yet,” he suggested shame-facedly, “perhaps it will come to you later.”

  “No, it won’t!” she flared back, “I’ve got to give it up and go to teaching school!”

  She stomped her foot more impatiently than ever and Denver went to cracking rocks.

  “What do you think of that?” he inquired casually, handing over a chunk of ore; but she gazed at it uncomprehendingly.

  “Isn’t there anything I can do?” she began at last, “that will make you change your mind? I might give you this much money now and then pay you more later, when I go to teaching school.”

  “Well, what do you want it back for?” he demanded irritably, “it’s been lying here idle for years. I’d think you’d be glad to have somebody get hold of it that would do a little work.”

  “I just want to give it back–and have it over with!” she exclaimed with an embittered smile. “I’ve practiced and I’ve practiced but it doesn’t do any good, and now I’m going to quit.”

  “Oh, if that’s all,” jeered Denver, “I’ll locate another claim, and let you give that back. What good would it do him if you did give it back–he’d just sit in the shade and tell stories.”

  “Don’t you talk that way about my father!” she exclaimed, “he’s the nicest, kindest man that ever lived! He’s not strong enough to work in this awful hot weather but he intended to open this up in the fall.”

  “Well, it’s opened up already,” announced Denver grimly. “You just show him that piece of rock.”

  “Oh, have you found something?” she cried snatching up the chunk of ore. “Why, this doesn’t look like silver!”

  “No, it isn’t,” he said, and at the look in his eyes she leapt up and ran down the trail.

  She came back immediately with her father and mother and, after a moment of pop-eyed staring, the Professor came waddling along behind.

  “Where’d you get this?” called Bunker as he strode up the trail and Denver jerked his thumb towards the tunnel.

  “At the breast,” he said. “Looks pretty good, don’t it? I thought it would run into copper!”

  “Vot’s dat? Vot’s dat?” clamored the Professor from the fork of the trail and Bunker gave Denver the wink.

  “Aw, that ain’t copper,” he declared, “it’s just this green hornblende. We have it around here everywhere.”

  “All right”, answered Denver, “you can have it your own way–but I call it copper, myself.”

  “Vot–copper?” demanded the Professor making a clutch at the specimen and examining it with his myopic eyes, and then he broke into a roar. “Vot–dat copper?” he cried, “you think dat is copper? Oh, ho, ho! Oh, vell! Dis is pretty rich. It is nutting but manganese!”

  “That’s all right,” returned Denver, “you can think whatever you please; but I’ve worked underground in too many copper mines─”

  “Where’d you get this?” broke in Bunker, giving Denver a dig, and as they went into the tunnel he whispered in his ear: “Keep it dark, or he’ll blab to Murray!”

  “Well, let him blab,” answered Denver, “it’s nothing to me. But all the same, pardner,” he added sotto voce, “if I was in your place I wouldn’t bank too much on holding them claims with a lead-pencil.”

  “I’m holding ’em with a six-shooter,” corrected Bunker, “and Murray or nobody else don’t dare to jump a claim. I’m known around these parts.”

  “Suit yourself,” shrugged Denver as they came to the face, “I guess this ore won’t start no stampede. That seam in the hanging wall is where it comes in–I’m looking for the veins to come together.”

  “Judas priest!” exclaimed Bunker jabbing his candlestick into the copper streak, “say, this is showing up good. And your silver vein is widening out, too. Nothing to it, boy; you’ve got a mine!”

  “Not yet,” said Denver, “but wait till she dips. This is nothing but a blanket vein, so far; but if she dips and goes down then look out, old-timer, she’s liable to turn out a bonanza.”

  “Well, who’d a thought it,” murmured Old Bunk turning somberly away, “and I’ve been holding her for fifteen years!”

  He led the way out, stooping down to avoid the roof; and outside the stoop still remained.

  “Where’s the Professor?” he asked, suddenly looking about, “has he gone to tell Murray, already? Well, by grab then, he knew it was.”

  “Oh, was it copper?” quavered Drusilla catching hold of his hand and looking up into his tired eyes, “and you sold it for five hundred dollars! But that’s all right,” she smiled, drawing his head down for a kiss. “I’ll just have to succeed now–and I’m going to!”

  * * *

  CHAPTER XIII

  SWEDE LUCK

  As the sun set that evening in a trailing blaze of glory Denver Russell came out and sat with bared arms, looking lazily down at the town. The news of his strike had roused them at last, these easy-going, do-nothing old-timers; and now, from an outcast, a crack-brained hobo miner, he was suddenly accepted as an equal. They spoke to him, they recognized him, they rushed up to his mine and stared at the ore he had dug; and even the Professor had purloined a specimen to take over and show to Murray. And all because, while the rest of them loafed, he had drifted in on his vein until he cut the stringer of copper. It was Swede luck again–the luck of that great people who invented the wheel-barrow, and taught the Irish to stand erect and run it.

  Denver could smile a little, grimly, as he recalled Old Bunker’s stories and his fleering statement that a mule could work; but, now that he had struck copper at the breast of his tunnel, the mule was suddenly a gentleman. He was good enough to speak to, and for Bunker’s daughter to speak to, and for his wife to invite to supper; and all on account of a vein of copper that was scarcely two inches thick. It was rich and it widened out, instead of pinching off as a typical gash-vein would; and while it would take a fortune to develop it, it was copper, and copper was king. Silver and gold mines were nothing now, for silver was down and gold was losing its purchasing power; but the mining journals were full of articles about copper, and it had risen to thirty cents a pound.

  Thirty cents, when a few years ago it had dropped as low as eleven! And it was still going up, for the munition factories were clamoring for it and the speculators were bidding up futures. Even Bible-Back Murray, who had a reputation as a pincher, had suddenly become prodigal with his money and was working day and night, trying to tap a hidden copper deposit. He had caught the contagion, the lure of tremendous profits, and he was risking his all on the venture. What would he have to say now if his diamond drill tapped nothing and a hobo struck it rich over at Queen Creek? Well, he could say what he pleased, for Denver was determined not to sell for a million dollars. He had come there with a purpose, in answer to a prophecy, and there yet remained to win the golden treasure and the beautiful woman who was an artist.

  Every little thing was coming as the seeress had predicted–good Old Mother Trigedgo with her cards and astrology–and all that was necessary was to follow her advice and the beautiful Drusilla would be his. He must treat her at first like any young country girl, as if she had no
beauty or charm; and then in some way, unrevealed as yet, he would win her love in return. He had schooled himself rigidly to resist her fascination, but when she had looked up at him with her beseeching blue eyes and asked him to sell back the mine, only a miracle of intercession had saved him from yielding and accepting back the five hundred dollars. He was like clay in her hands–her voice thrilled him, her eyes dazzled him, her smile made him forget everything else–yet just at the moment when he had reached out for the money the memory of the prophecy had come back to him. And so he had refused, turning a deaf ear to her entreaties, and scoffing at her easy-going father; and she had gone off down the trail without once looking back, promising Bunker she would become a great singer.

  Denver smiled again dreamily as he dwelt upon her beauty, her hair like fine-spun gold, her eyes that mirrored every thought; and with it all, a something he could not name that made his heart leap and choke him. He could not speak when she first addressed him, his brain had gone into a whirl; and so he had sat there, like a great oaf of a miner, and refused to give her anything. It was rough, yet the Cornish seeress had required it; and doubtless, being a woman herself, she understood the feminine heart. At the end of his long reverie Denver sighed again, for the ways of astrologers were beyond him.