The Windy Hill

  CHAPTER IX

  THE FIDDLER OF APPLE TREE LANE (_Continued_)

  Felix tended the little horse as best he could, bringing her grass,which she would not eat and water, which she drank gratefully. Atlast, unbelievably tired, he built up the fire and lay down to sleep.His heavy eyes were just closing when he saw a black shadow movesilently across the basin of the little watercourse and heard thecrunch of a pebble dislodged by a softly padding foot. As he sat up, abig gray wolf, as unafraid as a dog, from long following at the heelsof the emigrant trains, came out into the circle of light. With itshead lowered and its eyes shining in the dark, it sat down--to wait.

  The fire dwindled, for there was little to burn save the dried twigsfrom the bushes that lined the stream, nor did Felix dare to leave thehorse long enough to gather a fresh supply. More gray figures camethrough the dark to gather in a wide, waiting circle all about thefire. Within the limits of their brutish minds lay the knowledge thatfires would die down, that strength of man and beast would fail, andthat, once a straggler could not go on, patient waiting always madehim their prey at last. Felix cocked his gun, took long aim at a pairof green eyes glittering in the dark, but in the end lowered themuzzle without firing. The flash of a rifle and its report carried farover the level prairie, and there were other eyes that might bewatching for human stragglers, fiercer and hungrier eyes even thanwere the wolves'. As the foremost animal drew a little closer, he tookup his violin and began to play.

  He had a strange audience, the greedy white-fanged beasts that slunkaway at the first strains of the unwonted sound, stole back, yet moveduneasily away again, the little fat, inquisitive prairie dogs thatpopped out of their burrows and sat up to listen, the circlingnighthawks that wheeled and called overhead. Hour after hour heplayed, but whenever he paused the hungry circle drew in about him andhe was forced to raise his aching arm and ply his bow again. The firsthint of dawn was brightening the sky when the creatures of the nightbegan to slip away, and Felix, laying down his violin, suddenlylaughed aloud.

  "I wish that Granny Fullerton, who thought that it wasn't quite safefor us to live on the Windy Hill," he said, "I wish that she could seeme now!"

  Then he lay down, pillowed his head upon his arm, and fell so fastasleep that, as he said afterward, "a whole tribe of Indians couldhave ridden over him and he would never have moved."

  It was, indeed, horse's feet that aroused him, but not, by goodfortune, the unshod hoofs of Indian ponies. A band of men was ridingtoward him from the westward, hard, grizzled men, weather-beaten andtoil-worn beyond anything Felix had ever seen.

  "We met your party back yonder," said their leader. "They asked us tolook out for you as we went by. Glad to see the Indians haven't gotyou yet."

  "Oh!" exclaimed Felix, sitting up and rubbing his eyes, "Haveyou--have you been in California?"

  The man nodded. He drew out of his pocket a greasy little buckskinbag, opened the strings, and poured a stream of something yellow intothe boy's hand.

  "Ever see gold dust before?" he asked.

  It was Felix's first sight of the odd, flattened flakes of metal thatshine dully in your hand, that are no two alike, so that you can turnthem over and over, always seeing different shapes and sizes,different gleams and lights upon their changing surfaces.

  "There's a lot of it back there where we've been," the man said,grinning slowly as he saw Felix's excited face. "We left it there foryou and those like you."

  "And did you find all you wanted? Are you going home now to be richand comfortable all your days?" the boy inquired.

  The man's grin grew broader still.

  "You don't know gold miners, sonny," he said. "We've been at work onthe American River diggings, where your folks ahead there are going,and we found it good enough, but we've heard of something better. Overto the southward of that valley there's another one deeper, wilder,hard to get into but with the richest pay dirt you ever dreamed of. Westaked out our claims and left one man to hold it, while we go back tothe States for supplies and better equipment. The gold's harder to getout, but it's there all right. It makes American River look likenothing at all."

  He turned in the saddle and looked up the little stream bed where thewater lay in shallow pools below the overhanging bushes. The blackmare had at last struggled to her feet and was now grazing on thesparse grass that bordered the river.

  "It is none too safe for you to be here alone, young fellow," the manobserved. "There's a band of Indians have been doing considerablemischief around this neighborhood just lately. We've been hearing ofthem from every party as we came along."

  "I'm not afraid," returned Felix stoutly. "One boy and one horse wouldbe hard to find in this great wide prairie. Aren't you afraid you willmeet the Indians yourselves?"

  "Afraid!" The other laughed aloud. "Why, we're looking for them and itwill be a sorry day for them when we find them." He sobered and wenton earnestly: "The woman in that party you left called out a messagefor you as we came by. 'Tell him,' she said to us, 'that the horse ishis and that he is to go back with you to the States. Tell him, Godbless him,' she said. We'll be glad enough to have you if you care tocome with us," he concluded.

  Felix looked at the long, empty trail before him; he looked up at theprospector's hard brown face, and then at the little heap of gold dustin his hand.

  "I'll not go back--just yet," he said. "There are things I must seefirst."

  They rode jingling away, the sun glinting on their gun barrels andpistol butts until they disappeared in the shimmering hot distance ofthe dusty trail. Felix, as the heat of the day increased, led the mareup the watercourse to where the bushes were tall enough to afford alittle shade. He, himself, crawled under a rock beside one of thepools and lay there very quietly, waiting for the long, sleepy day topass. It was noontime, with the world so still that he could actuallyhear the water of the stream filtering through the sand as it ransluggishly from pool to pool, when a new sound caught his attention.There was a shuffling of muffled feet, a stone dislodged from the bankabove, the click of metal against metal, but every noise so stealthyand quiet that he could hardly believe he heard.

  He did not dare to move, but peered through the branches of the bushbeside him and saw a strange cavalcade passing on the high bank above,little brown and buckskin and piebald Indian ponies, their unshodhoofs stepping lightly and quietly over the dry grass, each with apainted, red-skinned rider, armed and decorated with all of anIndian's trappings of war. The feathered war bonnets that crownedtheir heads and reached to their heels were of every gay color, theirfierce faces were daubed with red and ocher, they carried, some ofthem, guns, more of them rude lances and bows and arrows. Felix was sonear that he could make out the strings of beads and claws of wildanimals about their necks, could see their red skins glisten, andcould watch the muscles of their slim thighs move and ripple as theyguided their wise little horses more by pressure of the knee than byuse of the rude Indian bridles. Not one of them spoke, once a ponysnorted in the dust, but that was the only sound as they moved pasthim and turned into the trail with their faces eastward. The wholeprocession might have been a vision--a mirage of the high, hotnoontide and of the boy's tired brain. But after the men were gone andhe had crawled out from his hiding place he could see the horses'footprints in the dust and could assure himself that they were real.

  After a long time he heard shots, very faint and far away, lasting foran hour or more before the hush of the prairie fell again. The coolnight came at last, and the little mare, visibly strengthened by therest and grazing, came trotting to him, splashing happily through thewater of the pool. Those gray enemies of the night before did not comenear, nor, though he waited two days, watchful and alert, did any ofthe Indians return. He thought of that band of men he had talked with,hard, seasoned, and well armed for the struggle. From the very firsthe had felt little doubt as to what the issue of such a battle wouldbe.

  It seems too long to tell of how Felix mounted the mare at last andcantered away along the t
rail, rejoicing in swift motion again afterthe long wait and the crawling pace of the ox team. Nor can it befully told how he and his friends toiled forward across the plain,over that dreaded stretch of desert that came at the far edge of it,up the tempest-swept, snow-covered mountains, until that wondrousminute when the endless bleak slopes suddenly fell away before themand they looked down into the wide green wonder of a new land. In lessthan a week from that day, Felix's long dream had come true; he wasstanding knee-deep in a rushing stream with a miner's pan in hisexcited hands, he saw the gravel wash away, the muddy earth dissolve,the black sand settle to the bottom to be dried and blown away,leaving--it did not even then seem believable--the sparkling grains ofyellow gold.

  They did well, he and Abner Blythe. Though their backs ached at theend of the day and they came home to sleep, worn out, wet, and dirty,their buckskin bags filled slowly with gold dust as the autumnpassed. Yet Felix could not put from his mind the talk of the man hehad met on the prairie, the tale of higher mountains, deeper valleys,and richer diggings over to the southward. When the rains came andthere was little work to do, he thought of those words more and more,and when the open weather came once more he gathered supplies, saidgood-by one day to Abner and Anna, and set forth to seek a further,greater fortune for them all.

  It was a toilsome journey over the mountains, for very few had as yetpassed that way. The deep, shadowy canyons, the rushing streams, thesmooth faces of granite walls seemed impassable barriers, but Felix atlast passed them all and came into the wild, rugged valley of BearCreek. He staked his claim, put up his little tent, and went down tothe river to wash his first pan of gold. Yes, the prospector had beenright; here in this bleak, far region the toil was much heavier, butthe reward was unbelievably great.

  There were not yet many miners who had come so far, but the one whoseclaim was next to Felix's and whose rough shanty stood almost side byside with his tent had been there among the first. He was a friend ofthose men from whom the boy had first heard of the place, and hewillingly showed the newcomer the best slope for his claim and theeasiest way to wash the gold.

  "There's room for all, so far," he said. "The others below there onAmerican River haven't had time to get discontented yet, but therewill be a rush up here soon. When the place begins to be crowded therewill be jumping of claims, and robbery and fights, with knives out andblood shed, just as you have seen it down there. But we will bepeaceable and friendly here as long as we can."

  The old miner seemed to take a great fancy to Felix and helped himwith advice and kindness in unnumbered ways. He had built himself alittle hut of pine logs roofed with bark as a better protection than atent against the mountain storms. Felix sat there with him one nightbefore the rude stone hearth, while the rain fell in deluges outsideand the wind went calling and blustering down the valley. The minerpiled the fuel high upon the fire and, as the hours passed, told storyafter story of wild adventure, of desperate escape, of bold crime, andof the quick, merciless justice of the frontier. At last his fund ofnarrative seemed to come to an end and he was silent for a little.

  "Yes, these are rich diggings," he said finally, going back to thesubject of which they had first been talking, "but--there is more goldeven than this somewhere beyond. A man I knew once, a prospector, toldme a strange story. He was captured by the Indians and carried off tothe south, over beyond the mountains to the edge of the desert. Heescaped from them, but he got lost, trying to go back, and wanderedfor days, nearly dying with thirst, torn and cut by the cactusthorns, blind and nearly crazed by the terrible heat. He came to thefoot of a hill that he was too weak to climb and he lay down there todie. But a rain fell and he lay soaking in it all night, drinking whatgathered in a rock pool beside him, with rattlesnakes and lizards, hesaid, crawling up to drink with him and he never cared. In the morninghis head was clear and he looked up the hill to see the outcropping ofsuch a gold mine as you never dreamed of. Lying there on the openslope was the gold-bearing quartz in plain sight, to be picked up withyour bare hands. He took some with him, but not much, for gold isheavy when you are staggering weak, and he went on and on, lost againand nearly dead, but at last he came to a settlement. He lay in aMexican's house, raving with fever for weeks, but in the end he gotwell. But when he tried to go back to his mine he could never find theway."

  Felix was listening eagerly, but he did not interrupt or even ask aquestion when the man paused. The deep voice rasped huskily, forevidently the miner was telling his tale with an intent purpose.

  "I have always meant, some day, to go and look for that mine myself,when I found a comrade I could trust, one who would not be afraid ofthe hardship and the danger. The way there is a terrible journey, butI believe I know almost to a certainty where the place must be. Willyou come, boy--will you come?"

  Felix got up and went to the tiny square window to look out. His voicewas thick with excitement, but he did not answer directly.

  "The storm has passed," he said, "and I must go back to my tent. I--Iwill think about what you say and tell you in the morning."

  He went out into the dark, wet night, closing the door with a handthat shook and fumbled against the wooden latch.

  The old miner must have slept little, for it was scarcely dawn beforehe had crossed the muddy slope to Felix's tent. Early as he was, theboy was before him, gathering up his possessions and thrusting theminto his pack.

  "You're going?" cried the man joyfully, but Felix shook his head.

  "I'm going back," he said and beyond that he would tell him nothing.

  He could not explain how, in the watches of the night, there had cometo him the realization that the fever for finding gold is moreconsuming than the fever for getting it, that there is always thethirst to go on, to leave what one has and seek some new, dazzlingdiscovery that seems just out of reach. To follow adventure is onething; but, as the years pass, to surrender a whole life to a singleand selfish desire is quite another. Some indwelling wisdom had toldFelix that it was time to turn back, but he had no words by which tomake the other understand. The old miner had given up to the dreamlong ago; he would always be seeking something richer and better,always leaving it for some golden vision that would lure him forwarduntil at last he would disappear in the mountains or the desert andnever return.

  "I am going to turn over my claim here to Abner Blythe," declaredFelix. "It will make him rich and his wife happy, and you had betterstay to work it with him, for I am going home."

  "I can't stay." The miner seemed to understand also, but he was asbrief and inarticulate as was the boy. "I'm one of those that has togo on--and on."

  He turned away and walked back to his cabin through the rain-drenchedflowers and the dripping green bushes. Who may know what pictureseither of dark regret or of golden hope were passing before his eyesas vividly as were Felix's memories of the low cottage on the hill, ofthe apple trees that would be in bloom now all up and down MedfordValley, of the wind talking in the oak tree outside his window. Aquarrel with one's only brother looks suddenly very small when so manythousand miles are stretched out between.

  * * * * *

  Ralph had often said that the hollyhocks were growing too many andshould be uprooted, but Barbara's begging for their lives somehowalways saved them in the end. They had spread out from the door andadvanced down the hill in marching regiments, a glowing mass ofcolor. The singing, yellow-banded bees were busy all day in the cupsof scarlet fading to pink and white, and white shading into yellow.The afternoon sun was behind them, lighting them to unwonted glory,when Felix came plodding along the lane on each side of which theapple trees were beginning to grow tall. Barbara was in the gardencutting sweet peas into her apron and Ralph, beside her, was standingin silence, watching the bees. A dozen times the girl had read thatsame thought in his mind, that he would give ten years of life tounsay the words that had driven his brother away and that had taughthimself such a bitter lesson. Then suddenly Barbara uttered such a cryof joy that even the bees hum
med and hovered lower, and slow old Chloecame hurrying to the door. The old woman smiled, with tears runningdown her wrinkled face, as she saw who it was that came trudging upthe hill.

  "There's good luck come back to this house at last," she said aloud anhour later when Felix, as the twilight was falling, sat down upon thedoorstep and began to play his violin.

  He never grew tired of telling the tale of his adventurous journey,nor did his sister and brother ever grow tired of listening. RalphBrighton had lost, in that one dreadful hour, his love for dollarsigns, and he nodded in wise agreement over Felix's decision to giveup the quest for gold. Barbara would hearken in awed fascination tothat story of the man lost in the desert, whose eyes looked once uponfabulous wealth but who could never find it again.

  Wherever gold mines are, there is to be found such a legend, a tale ofgreater riches just beyond men's knowledge. No matter how dazzling isthe wealth at hand there is always that tantalizing story of the lostmine, sometimes reputed to be far and inaccessible, sometimes onlyjust over the next hill, yet always as difficult to discover as theend of the rainbow. But, as Abner Blythe said, it is so a countrygrows, and when men cease from following rainbows, then will the worldstand still.