Part 38 (1/2)

They set about it, and in another hour had laid to rest the man who had brought them there. Then Devine put down his shovel and turned to Weston.

”This thing has had its effect on me, and I guess you feel it too. He was your partner quite a while,” he said. ”We want to get a move on and work this depression out of us. Well, you can make camp--a little farther back--while I crawl along between the willows and the range. I want to see what's back of them. There's an idea in my mind.”

Weston, who did not ask him what it was, fell in with the suggestion, and, when his comrade floundered away through the willows, proceeded to pitch the camp and build a fire ready for lighting among a few straggling firs a little back from the water. Then he went to sleep, and when the horse awakened him as it strove to pull out its picket to get another drink, he was a little astonished to see that the sun now hung low down above one range, and that Devine had not come back. He lay still, however, in the blissful content that only the worn-out know when, for a few hours, they can cease from toil. Presently he heard the willows rustle, and, though it cost him an effort, he stood up when Devine strode into camp. The latter glanced toward the hole they had dug to reach the water.

”You've let the horse break the sides down and stand in it,” he said.

”We'll clean it down to the gravel and pitch the soil out.”

”Is it worth while?” Weston asked.

”Yes,” said Devine, dryly, ”as we'll probably be here a day or two, I guess it is. I'll tell you about it when we get supper.”

Weston might have noticed that there was something curious in his manner, but he was very weary, and his mind was a little hazy then. He took the shovel, and toiled for some few minutes before a strip of stone he was endeavoring to wrench out broke beneath the blade. He flung the fragments out of the hole, and one of them caught Devine's eye.

”Pitch me up that big round stone,” he said sharply.

Weston did as he was bidden, and his comrade, falling upon his knee, smashed the fragments into little lumps, and then, clutching some of them tight in one hand, stood up with a hoa.r.s.e, exultant laugh.

”We've struck the lode!” he exclaimed.

Weston was beside him in a moment, and Devine poured the crushed fragments into his hand.

”Look!” he said.

Weston did so, and while his heart thumped painfully the blood crept to his face. The little lumps he gazed at were milky white, and through them ran what seemed to be very fine yellow threads.

”That is wire gold?”

”It is,” said Devine. ”A sure thing.”

Then the surveyor swept off his battered hat and swung round toward the willows, a grotesque ragged figure with his hands spread out.

”You weren't crazy, partner. You brought us up out of the swamps and sloos of poverty, and planked us down right on to the lode,” he said.

Weston said nothing. After all, he was English, and to some extent reticent, but he felt that his comrade's dramatic utterance was more or less warranted, for the irony and pathos of the situation was clear to him. Grenfell had found the mine at last, but the gold he had sought so persistently was not for him. Men great in the mining world had smiled compa.s.sionately at his story, others with money to invest had coldly turned their backs on him, and it had been given to a railroad hand and a surveyor, who had longed for an opportunity for splitting roofing s.h.i.+ngles in return for enough to eat, to prove that, after all, the skill he had once been proud of had not deserted him.

He had patiently borne defeat, and now the thrill of the long-deferred triumph had crushed him out of existence.

In a moment or two Devine spoke again in a different tone.

”Well, we'll get supper. You want to cool off and quiet down.”

Weston felt that this was true, and it was a relief to start the fire and prepare the meal, for he had found the rush of emotion which had swept over him almost overwhelming. It was, however, not until the meal was ready that he was quite master of himself, and they ate it before they said anything further about the matter. Then Devine took out his pipe, and lying with his back against a fir, turned to his comrade as the soft dusk settled.

”Whether Grenfell knew where he was going when he started out last night, or was led by some blind impulse or subconscious memory, is more than I can tell, and, anyway, it's not a point that greatly matters now,” he said. ”The cold fact is that you struck the water on the creek where, as he told you, he once got a drink.”

”But things don't fit in,” objected Weston.

”Oh,” said his companion, ”you let me talk. You've been in this country a few years. I was raised in it. He said that a creek ran from the range, and, though there's mighty little water in it, I guess it does that now. There's rock, milling rock shot with gold, under it, and a small flow of water will filter a long way through gravel.”

”But he described it as an ordinary open creek,” persisted Weston.