CHAPTER IX
PROGRESS AND SALT
Goldite, by the light of day, presented a wonderful spectacle. It wasa mining camp positively crystallizing into being before the very eyesof all beholders. It was nearly all tents and canvas structures--aheterogeneous mixture of incompleteness and modernity to which thetelegraph wires had already been strung from the outside world. It hadno fair supply of water, but it did have a newspaper, issued once aweek.
A dozen new buildings, flimsy, cheap affairs, were growing liketoadstools, day and night. Several brick buildings, and shacks of mud,were rising side by side. Everywhere the scene was one of crowds,activity, and hurry. Thousands of men were in the one straight street,a roughly dressed, excited throng, gold-bitten, eager, and open-handed.Hundreds of mules and horses, a few bewildered cows, herds of greatwagons, buggies, heaps of household goods, and trunks, withfortifications of baled hay and grain, were crowded into two greatcorrals, where dusty teamsters hastened hotly about, amidst heaps ofdusty harness, sacks of precious ore and the feed troughs for thebeasts.
Beth had slept profoundly, despite the all-night plague of noises,penetrating vividly through the shell-like walls of the house. She wasout with Elsa at an early hour, amazingly refreshed and absorbinglyinterested in all she heard and saw. The sky was clear, but a chillwind blew down from the mountains, flapping canvas walls in alldirections.
The building wherein the women had rested was a wooden lodging house,set barely back from the one business street of the camp. Next doorwas a small, squat domicile constructed of bottles and mud. Thebottles were laid in the "mortar" with their ends protruding. Near by,at the rear of a prosperous saloon, was a pyramid of empty bottles,fully ten feet high--enough to build a little church.
Drawn onward by the novelty of all the scene, Beth crossed the mainstreet--already teeming with horses, wagons, and men--and proceededover towards a barren hill, followed demurely by her maid. The hillwas like a torn-up battlefield, trenched, and piled with earthworks ofdefense, for man the impetuous had already flung up great gray dumps ofrock, broken and wrenched from the bulk of the slope, where he questedfor gleaming yellow metal. He had ripped out the adamant--the matrixof the gold--for as far as Beth could see. Like ant-heaps oftremendous dimensions stood these monuments of toil--rock-writings,telling of the heat and desire, the madness of man to be rich.
The world about was one of rocks and treeless ridges, spewed from somevast volcanic forge of ages past. It was all a hard, gray, adamantineworld, unlovely and severe--a huge old gold furnace, minus heat orfire, lying neglected in a universe of mountains that might have been aworkshop in the ancient days when Titans wrought their arts upon theearth.
Beth gazed upon it all in wonder not unmingled with awe. What a placeit was for man to live and wage his puny battles! Yet the fever of allof it, rising in her veins, made her eager already to partake of thedream, the excitement that made mere gold-slaves of the men who hadcome here compelling this forbidding place to yield up some measure ofcomfort and become in a manner their home.
Van, in the meanwhile, having spent the time till midnight on his feet,and the small hours asleep on a bale of hay, was early abroad, engagedin various directions. He first proceeded to the largest general storein the camp and ordered a generous bill of supplies to be sent to hisnewest claim. Next he arranged with a friendly teamster for the promptreturn of the two borrowed horses on which Beth and her maid had cometo camp. Then, on his way to an assayer's office, where samples ofrock from the claim in question had been left for the test of fire, heencountered a homely, little, dried-up woman who was scooting aboutfrom store to store with astonishing celerity of motion.
"Tottering angels!" said he. "Mrs. Dick!"
"Hello--just a minute," said the lively little woman, and she divedinside the newest building and was out almost immediately with a greatsack of plunder that she jerked about with most diverting energy.
"Here, fetch this down to the house," she demanded imperiously."What's the good of my finding you here in Goldite if you don't donothing for your country?"
Van shouldered the sack.
"What are you doing here anyhow?" said he, "--up before breakfast andbusy as a hen scratching for one chicken."
"Come on," she answered, starting briskly towards a new white building,off the main thoroughfare, eastward. "I live here--start myboarding-house today. I'm going to get rich. Every room's furnishedand every bed wanted as fast as I can make 'em up. Have you had yourbreakfast?"
"Say, you're my Indian," answered Van. "I've got you two customersalready. You've got to take them in and give them your best if youturn someone else inside out to do it."
Mrs. Dick paused suddenly.
"Bronson Van Buren! You're stuck on some woman at last!"
"At last?" said Van. "Haven't I always been stuck after you?"
Mrs. Dick resumed her brisk locomotion.
"Snakes alive!" she concluded explosively. "She's respectable, ofcourse? But you said two. Now see here, Van, no Mormon games with me!"
"Her _maid_--it's her maid that's with her," Van explained. "Don'tjump down my throat till I grease it."
"Her maid!" Mrs. Dick said no more as to that. The way she said itwas enough. They had come to the door of her newly finished house, aclean, home-like place from which a fragrance of preparing breakfastflowed like a ravishing nectar. "Where are they now?" she demandedimpatiently. "Wherever they are it ain't fit for a horse! Why don'tyou go and fetch 'em?"
Van put the bag inside the door, then his hands on Mrs. Dick'sshoulders.
"I'll bet your mother was a little red firecracker and your father abottle of seltzer," he said. Then off he went for Beth.
She was not, of course, at "home" when he arrived at the place he hadfound the previous evening. Disturbed for a moment by her absence, hepresently discerned her, off there westward on the hill from which shewas making a survey of the camp.
Three minutes after he was climbing up the slope and she turned andlooked downward upon him.
"By heavens!" he said beneath his breath, "--what beauty!"
The breeze was molding her dress upon her rounded form till she seemedlike the statue of a goddess--a goddess of freedom, loveliness, andjoy, sculptured in the living flesh--a figure vibrant with glowinghealth and youth, startlingly set in the desert's gray austerity. Withthe sunlight flinging its gold and riches upon her, what a marvel ofcolor she presented!--such creamy white and changing rose-tints in hercheeks--such a wonderful brown in her hair and eyes--such crimson oflips that parted in a smile over even little jewels of teeth! And shesmiled on the horseman, tall, and active, coming to find her on thehill.
"Good morning!" she cried. "Oh, isn't it wonderful--so big, and bare,and _clean_!"
Van smiled.
"It's a hungry-looking country to me--looks as if it has eaten all thetrees. If it makes you think of breakfast, or just plain coffee androlls, I've found a place I hope you'll like, with a friend I didn'tknow was here."
"You are very kind, I'm sure," she said. "I'm afraid we're a greatdeal of trouble."
"That's what women were made for," he answered her frankly, a bright,dancing light in his eyes. "They couldn't help it if they would, and Iguess they wouldn't if they could."
"Oh, indeed?" She shot him a quick glance, half a challenge. "I_guess_ if you don't mind we won't go to the place you've found, forbreakfast, this morning."
"You'd better guess again," he answered, and taking her arm, in amasterful way that bereft her of the power of speech or resistance, hemarched her briskly down the slope and straight towards Mrs. Dick's.
"Thank your stars you've struck a place like this," he said. "If youdon't I'll have to thank them for you."
"Perhaps I ought to thank you first," she ventured smilingly. It wouldhave seemed absurd to resent his boyish ways.
"You may," he said, "when I get to be one of your stars."
"Oh, really? Why defer mere th
anks _indefinitely_?"
"It won't be indefinitely, and besides, thanks will keep--and breakfastwon't."
He entered the house, with Beth and her maid humbly trailing at hisheels. Mrs. Dick came bustling from the kitchen like a busy littleant. Van introduced his charges briefly. Mrs. Dick shook hands withthem both.
"Well!" she said, "I like you after all! And it's lucky I do, for if Ididn't I don't know's I should take you or not, even if Van did say Ihad to."
Van took her by the shoulders and shook her boyishly.
"You'd take a stick of dynamite and a house afire, both in one hand, ifI said so," he announced. "Now don't get hostile."
"Well--I s'pose I would," agreed Mrs. Dick. She added to Beth: "Ain'the the dickens and all? Just regular brute strength. Come rightupstairs till I show you where you're put. I've turned off two men tolet you have the best room in the house."
Beth had to smile. She had never felt so helpless in her life--or soamused. She followed Mrs. Dick obediently, finding the two-bed roomabove to be a bright, new-smelling apartment of acceptable size andsituation. In answer to a score of rapid-fire questions on the part ofMrs. Dick, she imparted as much as Van already knew concerning herselfand her quest.
Mrs. Dick became her friend forthwith, then hastened downstairs to thekitchen. Van and Beth presently took breakfast together, while Elsa,with a borrowed needle and thread, was busied with some minor repairingof garments roughly used the day before. Other boarders and lodgers ofthe house had already eaten and gone, to resume their swirl in themaelstrom of the camp.
For a time the two thus left alone in the dining-room appeased theirappetites in silence. Van watched the face of the girl for a time andfinally spoke.
"I'll let you know whatever I hear about your brother, if there is anymore to hear. Meantime you'll have to remain here and wait."
She was silent for a moment, reflecting on, the situation.
"You took my suitcase away from Mr. Bostwick, you'll remember," shesaid, "and left it where we got the horses."
"It will be here to-day," he answered. "I arranged for that with Dave."
"Oh. But of course you cannot tell when Mr. Bostwick may appear."
"His movements couldn't be arranged so conveniently, otherwise hewouldn't appear at all."
She glanced at him, startled.
"Not come at all? But I need him! Besides, he's my---- I expect himto go and find my brother. And the trunk checks are all in hispocket--wait!--no they're not, they're in my suitcase after all."
"You're in luck," he assured her blandly, "for Searle has doubtlesslost all his pockets."
"Lost his pockets?" she echoed. "Perhaps you mean the convicts tookthem--took his clothing--everything he had."
"Everything except his pleasant manner," Van agreed. "They have plentyof that of their own."
She was lost for a moment in reflection.
"Poor Searle! Poor Mr. Bostwick!"
Van drank the last of his coffee.
"Was Searle the only man you knew in all New York?"
She colored. "Certainly not. Of course not. Why do you ask such aquestion?"
"I was trying to understand the situation, but I give it up." Helooked in her eyes with mock gravity, and she colored.
She understood precisely what he meant--the situation between herselfand Bostwick, to whom, she feared, she had half confessed herselfengaged. She started three times to make a reply, but halted eachanswer for a better.
"You don't like Mr. Bostwick," she finally observed.
Van told her gravely: "I like him like the old woman kept tavern."
She could not entirely repress a smile.
"And how did she keep it--the tavern?"
"Like hell," said Van. He rose to go, adding; "You like him about thatway yourself--since yesterday."
Her eyes had been sparkling, but now they snapped.
"Why--how can you speak so rudely? You know that isn't true! You knowI like--admire Mr. Bost---- You haven't any right to say a thing likethat--no matter what you may have done for me!"
She too had risen. She faced him glowingly.
He suddenly took both her hands and held them in a firm, warm claspfrom which there could be no escape.
"Beth," he said audaciously, "you are never going to marry that man."
She was struggling vainly to be free. Her face was crimson.
"Let me go!" she demanded. "Mr. Van--you let me go! I don't see howyou dare to say a thing like that. I don't know why----"
"You can't marry Searle," he interrupted, "because you are going tomarry me."
He raised her hands to his lips and kissed them both.
"Be back by and by," he added, and off he went, through the kitchen,leaving Beth by the table speechless, burning and confused, with ahundred wild emotions in her heart.
He continued out at the rear of the place, where little Mrs. Dick wasvaliantly tugging at two large buckets of water. He relieved her ofthe burden.
"Say, Priscilla," he drawled, "if a smoke-faced Easterner comes aroundhere while I'm gone, looking for--you know--Miss Kent, remember hecan't have a room in your house if he offers a million and walks on hishands and prays in thirteen languages."
Little Mrs. Dick glanced up at him shrewdly.
"Have you got it as bad as that? Snakes alive! All right, I guessI'll remember."
"Be good," said Van, and off he went to the assayer's shop for which hehad started before.
The assayer glanced up briefly. He was busy at a bucking-board, where,with energetic application of a very heavy weight, on the end of ahandle, he was grinding up a lot of dusty ore.
"Greeting, Van," said he. "Come in."
Van shook his outstretched hand.
"I thought I'd like to see those results," he said, "--that rock Ifetched you last, remember? You thought you could finish the batchlast week. Gold rock from the 'See Saw' claim that I bought threeweeks ago."
"Yes, oh yes. Now what did I do with---- Finished 'em up and put 'emaway somewhere," said the assayer, dusting his hands and moving towardshis desk. "Such a lot of stuff's been coming in--here they are, Ireckon." He drew a half dozen small printed forms from a cavity in thedesk, glanced them over briefly and handed the lot to Van. "Nothingdoing. Pretty good rock for building purposes."
"Nothing doing?" echoed Van incredulously, staring at the assay recordswhich showed in merciless bluntness that six different samples ofreputed ore had proved to be absolutely worthless. "The samples youassayed first showed from ten to one hundred and fifty dollars to theton, in gold."
"What's that got to do with this?" inquired the master of acids andfire. "You don't mean to say----"
"Do with it, man? It all came out of the same identical prospect," Vaninterrupted. "These were later samples than the others, that's all."
The assayer glanced over his shoulder at the hope-destroying slips.
"The 'See Saw' claim," he said perfunctorily. "You bought it, Van, whofrom?"
"From Selwyn Briggs."
"Sorry," said the assayer briefly. "H'm! That Briggs!"
"You don't mean---- It couldn't have been salted on me!" Van declared."I took my own samples, broke down a new face purposely, sacked it allmyself--and sealed the sacks. No one touched those sacks till youbroke the seals in this office. He couldn't have salted me, Frank.What possible chance----"
The assayer went to a shelf, took down a small canvas bag, glanced at amark that identified it as one in which samples of "See Saw" rock hadarrived for the former assay, and turned it inside out.
"Once in a while I've heard of a cute one squirting a sharp syringefull of chloride of gold on worthless rock, through the meshes of thecanvas, even after the samples were sealed," he imparted quietly."This sack looks to me like some I've encountered before that werepretty rich in gold. I'll assay the cloth if you like."
Van took the sack in his hand, examined it silently, then glanced asbefore at his papers
.
"Salted--by that lump of a Briggs!" His lip was curved in a mirthlesssmile. "I guess I've got it in the neck all right. These last samplestell the real story." He slapped the papers across his hand, then torethem up in tiny bits and threw them on the floor."
"Sorry, old man," said the assayer, as before. "Hope you didn't payhim much for the claim."
"Not much," said Van. "All I had--and some of it borrowed money."
The assayer puckered up his mouth.
"Briggs has skipped--gone East."
"I know. Well--all in a lifetime, I suppose. Pay you, Frank, when Ican."
"That's all right," his friend assured him. "Forget it if you like."
Van started off, but returned.
"Say, Frank," he said, "don't hawk this around. It's bad enough for meto laugh at myself. I don't want the chorus joining in."
"I'm your clam," said Frank. "So long, and better luck!"