The Ranch Girls' Pot of Gold

by Margaret Vandercook

  CHAPTER IX

  "MINER'S FOLLY"

  Jack sat up with a start. She had dozed only a few minutes, and feltindignant with Carlos when she found he also had deserted her. It wastime they were starting back for camp. "Jim! Jim! Carlos!" she halloed,in half-hearted fashion; then she hugged her sweater closer about her,glad that Ruth had insisted on her wearing it, for as evening approachedit was growing strangely cooler.

  There seemed nothing to do that was interesting before her companionsreturned. Jack wandered idly to the edge of the pine woods behind thehills, but saw and heard nothing of Carlos; then she examined the smallstream along one of the hillsides, knelt and scooped up a handful ofwater, putting it to her lips. It was salt as the Dead Sea, and musthave made life doubly hard for the men who worked in "Miner's Folly,"for they could hear its soft trickle by day and night and yet neverquench their thirst in its waters.

  All this time Jack was thinking, not of what she was doing, but of thequeer big hole in the side of the hill, that was like a wound.Irresistibly she was drawn toward it by an impulse of curiosity anddread. Jim had told her of no tragedies except disappointed hopes thatwere buried in the deserted mine, yet she felt that if the cavern couldsuddenly change into an open mouth it would have many strange stories totell of lives and fortunes lost by its false lure.

  Jack stared so hard into the entrance of the tunnel that it no longerseemed dark to her. She went into it a few feet and peered about her.Curiosity was one of the strongest traits of Jacqueline Ralston'scharacter, not a girl's idle desire so much as a boy's firmdetermination to find out what things are like, and how they areaccomplished. Jack had never seen a gold mine before, and she did notwish to tell the girls nothing except that it was a big hole in theearth. The mouth of the cave was uninteresting, so Jack lit a match andwalked a few feet further in. On the ground were bits of broken stonewhich she stuffed in her pocket for Frieda, thinking she spied an oddglimmer in them. Although the main entrance to the mine was through asingle opening, by the aid of her flickering light Jack saw that minershad pursued many dead lodes in the sides of the hill. This means theyhad dug tunnels wherever they hoped to follow a vein of gold, until thewhole inside of the hill looked like a network of black passages.

  It now occurred to Jack that Jim and Carlos must have returned andsurely they would think the earth had opened and swallowed her, so outshe crept into the daylight again. The place was still solitary andgloomy. "Jim! Jim! Carlos!" Jack cried aloud. There was no answer. Ifonly she had waited five or ten minutes more before she started backinto that gruesome cave. And yet, perhaps, the spirits of otheradventurous natures were summoning her to follow them.

  One passage was larger than the others. Jack certainly thought she sawstones that shone like gold lying near its mouth. It was separated fromthe main tunnel by a gully, across which some planks had been laid. Witha lighted match in her hand and gazing upward, Jack stepped on theforward end of a plank. In a flash her light went out and she fell backwith a heavy thud. Her weight on the loose plank had caused it to riseup, striking her in the forehead with terrific force. Fortunately, shehad fallen clear of the gully, but her body lay in the shadow out of thereach of any light that might come from the mouth of the cave. Shesuffered no pain; the blow had been too swift and sure, stunning herinto silence and complete unconsciousness.

  "Oo! Ooo! Oooo!" Jim whistled through his fingers nearly a quarter of amile away. "Cheer up, Jack, I'm coming at last," he shouted, a few yardsfarther on. His conscience had begun to trouble him, and he was quiteprepared to find Jack cross at having been forced to wait for him morethan half an hour. Jim had not consulted his watch at the moment of hisdeparture, but he was fairly certain that he had been gone some time,and that they must hurry off at once if they were to be with Ruth andthe girls by an early bedtime.

  Jim whistled and called all the way to the three pine cone hills. Hepresumed he would have to make his peace with his companion by tellingher that he had discovered other visitors to the old mine within a veryshort time. There were evidences of their presence everywhere in thevicinity, and they had not been idle curiosity seekers, but men with amission. Whether they had given up the hunt for gold and gone away fromthe neighborhood of the mine for good, Jim could not tell. This was oneof the reasons why he had prowled around so long. He had gone to all thelikely spots near by, where a party of miners might be camping, thinkinghe might run across them, but not one of them had turned up.

  Pretty soon, Jim discovered that Jack and Carlos were not in the spotwhere he left them, but he did not yet feel uneasiness. He circledaround the three hills; he went a short distance into the thicket ofpine trees, making as much racket as possible; he gave the long cowboycall of the Rainbow Ranch. And then Jim's blue eyes turned black withanger and his sun-tanned skin grew red. He was exceedingly angry withJack and Carlos, he was frightened, and an inner voice reminded him thatif anything had happened to them he was to blame for leaving them solong alone.

  But what could have happened?--for no one else had come near the place.

  Jim saw Jack's footprints leading to the entrance of the cave, but hisown and the Indian boy's were alongside them, and as they had rushed tolook in the mine the first moment of their arrival he did not think tosearch for fresh tracks. And yet, for an instant, Jim had an oddpremonition urging him toward the deserted mine.

  The wind was now blowing hard across the plains; and the sun wasslipping down to the line of the far horizon, not in a crimson glow, butin a piled-up mass of smoke--gray clouds lit with flame-colored sparks.Jim watched it uneasily. A summer storm was coming up after their weekof perfect weather, and Jack, who knew the signs of the weather as wellas any backwoodsman, had probably set off with Carlos for their camp,expecting him to overtake them. There was no other explanation for theirdisappearance. Once Jim walked irresolutely toward the mouth of themine; then he turned, quickly moving off along the trail, wondering howfar his companions would be able to travel before he reached them.Within twenty yards he halted, swung himself about and, in spite of hisworry and haste, strode back to the open mine, where he had once vainlytried to find his fortune. Jim did not know exactly why he returned; henever dreamed that either Jack or Carlos could be inside, but he had toobey the impulse that first prompted him.

  The great hole in the hillside was blacker than ever, and Jim felt ashudder of repulsion as he gazed into it. He had always hated his oldsubterranean existence of digging into the earth for her treasures, wheneverywhere on her broad plains the fruit and flowers and grasses offeredan equal opportunity and a fuller and higher meaning to life.

  "Jack! Jack!" Jim called weakly, down on his knees at the gaping mouthof the tunnel, trying to grow more accustomed to the darkness and cryingJack's name, not because he thought her near, but because he was filledwith a vague foreboding.

  There was no answer out of the grim darkness. Jack could give no sign ofher presence, and the black shadow into which she had fallen hid theoutline of her prostrate body.

  Suddenly a boom of distant thunder sounded from the far side of theworld, and Jim Colter sprang quickly to his feet, for he knew howswiftly storms travel across the western plains, and he feared Jack andCarlos might wait for him in the dangerous shelter of the trees. Fasterthan he had run in many a long day he left the neighborhood of theunlucky mine.

  A little later Carlos appeared at the opening of the pine woods, hisbrown face scratched, his breath coming unevenly, with his gun on hissquare, lean shoulder, and a little bunch of a feathery or furrysomething tucked under his arm. He did not linger as Jim had; hebelieved at once that his companions had given him up, and sped on asfast as his weary brown legs could carry him along the path which hadbrought them to the place of the pine cone hills. Carlos had wanderedtoo far into the woods and had lost his way, but now he hoped toovertake the other adventurers and in some way to make his peace.

  When Jack opened her eyes it was nearly dark outside the mine as well asin. She lay quite still, feeling a dull pa
in in her head and an achingnumbness in her body. "Olive! Jean! Ruth!" she called fretfully. "I'mill. Why don't somebody come to me?" She thought she had wakened in themiddle of the night in her bed at Rainbow Lodge. Poor Jack put out herhand to touch Jean, who usually slept with her, and her fingers closedon some loose mud and gravel. She held it for a moment and struggled tosit up, but her head ached harder than ever, and she reached back tofind her lost pillow. There was only the earth to touch again, andslowly her consciousness returned. Jack stumbled to her feet and madefor the faint light at the tunnel entrance. She took a few uncertainsteps and sank down in a little heap on the outside at the foot of oneof the hills. Drops of rain were falling, and the wind whistled throughthe tops of the tallest pine trees and swirled around the crests of thelonely hills. "Jim! Jim! surely you haven't left me!" Jack cried aloud.She was not usually timid or nervous, but the deserted place had alarmedher when she came to it early in the afternoon. Now she was alone in it,and about to face a fierce summer storm. Dulled by the pain in her headand by hunger and thirst, for Jim had carried the food and water bottleaway in his pockets, she was uncertain as to how she had come to themine and whether she would ever be able to keep to the return trail.

  Jack's face was white and her expression unusual, while just over hertemple there was an ugly bruise, and she did not feel able to thinkclearly. Once she put her hand to her head and was surprised to find herhair damp with wisps of wet curls streaking her forehead. Then shewondered what had become of her hat. An instant later she knew she haddropped it off her head when she fell inside the mine, but nothing wouldhave induced her to go in again to find it. If Jim came back, perhaps heor Carlos would get it for her. Sometimes she was not certain of whetherJim and Carlos had just gone away for a few minutes or whether she hadbeen waiting for them a great many hours. Then she pictured them back attheir tent in the green place by the quiet stream, and wondered whatthey would do when she did not come.

  It began to rain harder and faster in big pelting drops; lumps of hailbeat down on Jack's shoulders and unprotected head. She ran to the woodsto hide, but the place was so sodden and wet and ghostly in the twilightthat she would not enter it. There was nothing to do but to try to findher way back to camp alone. Jack thought her head ached less and herdecision a wise one. She did not realize that her friends could returnto the old mine for her, but once missing the trail back to them shewould be utterly lost in the wilderness. Jack recalled that severalmiles ahead there was a deep gorge with high walls on either side ofit, and that she and Jim and Carlos had followed a path at the side ofthis ravine for a part of their journey. She would strike out across theopen country, feeling sure that its high walls could soon be seen risinglike a wall of mist beyond the rain.

  Flying along on feet unconscious of fatigue, fighting through the stormand darkness and calling aloud when she had the strength, in about anhour Jack reached the ravine. No actual sight of the trail had guidedher, but an instinctive feeling for the right direction. Now she satdown for a few minutes in the shelter of an overhanging rock, hoping thestorm would blow over or that Jim would find her. But the thundercrashed on, and the wind in the jagged rocks of the ravine moaned andsighed like lost souls wandering in the walled chambers of the canyons,crying for release. Had she ever been rash enough to say she loved thesplendid western storms? Jack asked herself. Yes, even in her terror andloneliness she realized there was something magnificent andawe-inspiring in their sudden fury and abandon, as though nature,yielding to a burst of elemental passion, poured forth her anger on theearth in the sweeping rain and furious charges of electricity.

  When half an hour passed, the young girl crept out of her hiding place.Perhaps the storm was less severe; anyhow, she would rather face anyfate than remain in the gorge all night. It was now too dark to seeanything except the vague outlines of rocks and bunches of low shrubs.For a moment Jack stood still, trying to remember whether she shouldturn to the right or left, and straining her eyes to catch sight of afamiliar object that might help her to decide. Then she moved off inexactly the wrong direction, with each step getting farther and fartheraway from her friends and shelter.

  Trained to a knowledge of animal life in the plains of the great West,Jacqueline knew the call of almost every wild beast that is still nativeto the uncivilized portions of the western states. After walking foranother hour, a sound filled her with horror. It was the low cry of acougar! A thicket of trees and underbrush bordered one side of her path;on the other, lay the deep hollow of the ravine. And it had just begunto dawn on Jack that she was going in the wrong direction; she hadpassed by no such dense shrubbery in her morning journey. But this wasnot the time to turn back, nor must she show hesitation or fear, wellknowing that the wild creature behind her would dog the footsteps of asolitary traveler, keeping only a short distance away, like a hungrywolf, and though a coward at heart, spring upon her if she showedweakness or defeat.

  Digging her nails in the palms of her hands, Jacqueline crashed on,shouting when she could. A little while before, she had felt ill anddeadly tired; now, forgetting both, her old courage revived. In thetragedies of the afternoon, her rifle had been forgotten and leftoutside the mine, but the big cat back of her would never dare attackher if she kept steadily on, frightening it by loud shouting andtrampling.

  How far Jack walked that night she never knew. There were times when thecougar kept back of her, then he seemed to be walking along by her sidein the shelter of the thicket. Now and then Jack believed he slipped infront of her, crouching in a clump of underbrush, but she never oncecaught sight of the big furtive cat, though she was always conscious ofthe presence slinking near her. If it is necessary to prove that themodern American girl still has the nerve and fortitude of her pioneergrandmother, Jacqueline Ralston proved it that night. Not for a momentdid she falter in her long march in the darkness.

  A few hours before daylight the rain suddenly ceased and the stars cameout as though the storm had not interrupted the usual hour of theirappearance. Now Jack could rest at last! Having come through the woodedplace, her enemy no longer pursued her. There were no more rocks ahead.She had reached the end of the gorge; the country beyond was a well-nighunbroken plain.

  A few yards farther on the young girl spied, like a dim sentinel, theoutline of a solitary tree with its close, low branches sweeping theground. Even in the darkness of night she knew a comfortable sheltercould be found in it, for its beautiful boughs extended in a solid massof foliage from its crown to its base, so the rain could scarcely havesoaked through them. Jack crawled into the cradle-shaped branches andlay down to wait for the dawn and whatever the new day might bringforth, wondering if she were too tired to care what happened to her orif she had earned any shadow of right to the title Carlos had oncegiven her: "The Girl Who Was Never Afraid."

  It never dawned on her that sleep could come; but before the lamps inthe sky went out she had journeyed to that dim country where we findstrength for the next day's need.