The Travelers 1

by Lee Hunnicutt

  The end of the bulge was about a hundred and fifty feet from the cliff facing and angled away from the kids towards the cliff.

  Jack rode slowly along the bulge toward the cliff.

  When he was almost at the cliff, he turned his horse into the bulge and disappeared.

  A few minutes passed before his horse’s head appeared out of the bulge and then the rest of the horse and Jack followed.

  He waved his arm beckoning them to come.

  The entrance was narrow. The wagon just had a few feet on either side to spare. The walls were perpendicular to the canyon floor.

  Sonny said, “No wonder nobody found this opening. You have to be right on top of it to see it.

  Let’s go.”

  He was excited. All of them were.

  For the first mile they traveled through the claustrophobic canyon, the walls towering above them. They were constantly in a shadow. It wasn’t as dark as night but it was dark.

  Beth said with a nervous laugh, “This is almost as eerie as when we went to the cave.”

  “Yeah,” said Jack.

  With a slight incline, the canyon was taking them higher. It wasn’t too difficult on the horses.

  The canyon was an old river bottom. The walls were carved and swirled by thousands of years of running water.

  There were turns and bends, making it difficult for the wagon. All of a sudden they came around one of the turns and the canyon opened up and became wider.

  After about a mile, they cleared the canyon and entered the valley.

  They were about a hundred and fifty feet above the valley floor. They were on the other side of the cliffs. Below them and to their right they could see the river that they had followed for the past few days. They could hear its roar as it rushed through the mountains where it would exit in the tall cataract that they had seen the day before.

  They could see the full length of the valley. It was at least five miles long and maybe two and half to three miles wide.

  Some parts were heavily wooded and other places looked like pasture land. It was beautiful.

  “It takes your breath away,” said Anne.

  “Yes it does,” said Jack with a grin.

  “What are we waiting for?” said Sonny. “Let’s look for a place to build our home.”

  The ground dropped away gradually to the valley floor. They rode down to where they were once again paralleling the river.

  They looked down stream and could see where the river was cutting its own narrow canyon through the mountains. Unlike where they had entered, the river’s canyon was impassable. It funneled what had until now had been a rather gentle stream into a raging torrent.

  They stopped about a mile into the valley.

  Beth said, “We should build next to where we are going to mine. In order to do that we need to find out where the gold is. Let’s find some high ground, make a temporary camp and break out our gold pans.”

  They found a partially wooded hillock next to the river, pulled out a specially sewn canvass tarp that made into a tent. They had had the tarp sewn in Fort Laramie.

  The tent was on a slight incline. Jack and Sonny started digging a trench around three sides of the tent. The open ends of the trench faced downhill.

  Sonny explained to Anne that if it rained, the trench was to run off water so that it would not enter the floor of the tent.

  Beth hobbled the draft horses and set them out to pasture. She then began setting up a fire.

  Anne felt useless. She attempted to help but all of them insisted that she stay put.

  Sonny explained with a smile, “It’s to our advantage that you conserve your strength and get up to full speed as soon as possible. If you try and do any work now, it might make you worse and we won’t be able to work you like a dog later.”

  “Don’t pay any attention to him Anne,” said Beth. “He is right though. You’re in no condition to do anything. Later on, when you’re better there will be enough to go around.”

  Sonny replied, “Hey, isn’t that what I just said?”

  In the few days that Anne had been with Beth, Sonny and Jack she had grown to like them very much. When she wasn’t preoccupied by her grief, she was put at ease by their banter, easy manner and good natured interaction. It was obvious to her that they loved each other very much.

  She felt safe with them.

  They sat down and had coffee and some of Jack’s fried bread for lunch.

  When they had finished lunch, Sonny said, “Let’s go look for color.”

  “Color?” said Anne.

  “Yes,” said Jack, “we take pans,” He reached behind him and picked up a gold pan, “like this one and fill it with dirt from the river bank. You then go to the river and submerge the pan in water. You throw out any rocks and break up the clots with your hand and then swirl the pan using centrifugal force to throw out the light stuff. Gold is heavy and will stay in the pan.

  If there is any gold in the pan, it will show up as a dull yellow dust or small yellow nuggets. When you see that yellow, it is called color.

  So we’re going to look for color.”

  “If we find color, we’ll try and find where the highest concentration of gold is and that is where we will set up our mine,” said Beth.

  “You mean you will dig a tunnel?” said Anne.

  “No,” said Beth, “we are going to do what is called placer mining. We extract the mineral from the surface. We aren’t equipped to chase the gold into the earth. Besides, we don’t know anything about explosives and if you’re serious about tunneling you need explosives.

  Most of the planks in the wagon are for setting up a sluice box. We’ll use it to separate the gold from the gravel and dirt.

  It may sound complicated but it’s pretty simple. When we construct the box, we’ll explain everything to you. You’ll be a gold miner in no time.”

  Anne had her doubts about that but the thing that impressed her most was how much Beth knew about the process. Anne would have expected the boys or males in general to know about things like gold mining but for a girl to know this much, this was beyond Anne’s experience.

  When it came to work, Beth did everything that a male would do. Once when Jack was driving the wagon, the wheel stuck in the mud. Beth jumped off her horse and with Sonny, grabbed the spokes of the wagon and helped push the wagon out of the mud.

  Not once did she look helpless or stand around in a funk waiting for the boys to do something or resolve a problem. Instead, she took action. She solved problems.

  And the guns that Beth wore, they weren’t there for decoration. Anne had decided that Beth knew all too well how to handle those pistols. There was no doubt in Anne’s mind that if the time came Beth would use them.

  Anne had never met a female in her life that was like Beth. The boys treated Beth as their equal. When they talked to her it was as an equal and they valued her advice. What was even more amazing, Beth was only two months older than Anne. She was fourteen years old.

  Anne had never met an adult woman, much less a teenager, like Beth.

  If Anne didn’t know better, she would have said that Beth was the leader of the three but that couldn’t be. Beth was a girl.

  Anne decided then and there that she wanted to have the confidence and independence that Beth had. Never again did she want to be terrified by an evil little man with a wicked smile. She didn’t know what Beth had but whatever it was Anne wanted it.

  It wasn’t just Beth that she admired. All three of them had a confidence and sense of purpose that far exceeded their years.

  Sonny broke in on her thoughts.

  “Let’s get cracking. I can hardly wait to get started.”

  They all stood up and prepared to leave. Anne could feel the panic well up at the thought of being left alone. That she felt fear of being left alone embarrassed and angered her. She thought “How could she be like Beth if she was going to be like a baby.”

  As if she could sense Anne’s anxiety, Beth
said to Anne, “Don’t worry, we’re going to try the river right here. You’ll be in sight of us.

  Until you get back on your feet and are strong enough to take care of yourself, we won’t leave you alone.”

  Anne said with a bravado she didn’t feel, “I’m not a child. I can take care of myself.”

  “We know that” said Beth “but you’re not out of the woods yet and you have just gone through a terrible ordeal. Let’s take this one step at a time.”

  Beth went over to her, knelt down and hugged her and said, “OK?”

  Anne gave her a grateful look and said, “OK. And you’re right, I don’t want to be left alone but at the same time I don’t want to be a hindrance.”

  Beth scoffed and said, “Believe me, you’re no hindrance. I’m glad for the company. Do you know how hard it’s been being a girl alone with these two clowns?”

  Jack groaned, looked at Sonny and said, “She already had us outnumbered and now there’s another one. We’re doomed.”

  Sonny grinned, put his arm around Jack’s shoulders and said, “Yeah, you’re right Jack. We’re SOL.” He picked up a shovel and they both started walking toward the river.

  “SOL? What does that mean.”

  Beth laughed and said, “Shit outta luck.”

  Anne was shocked and her face showed it. For boys to say something like that in front of a girl was unheard of and for Beth to repeat it and to repeat it so easily, it just came right out of her mouth! Beth didn’t hesitate. She didn’t blush or look embarrassed. She just said it!

  Beth saw Anne’s discomfort and laughed. She kissed Anne on the cheek and said, “Get use to it. We are a whole new experience for you. We are like nothing you have ever known or seen before.”

  She stood up, picked up her gold pan and started to walk away. Over her shoulder she said, “If you need anything just holler.”

  Anne just sat there with her mouth open. When she realized what she was doing, she snapped her mouth shut, thought for a moment and through pursed lips expelled a lung full of air.

  Sonny had placed some of the blankets against a large rock to make a place for Anne to sit. It was facing so that she could watch them work at the river about sixty feet away.

  She could see Jack digging into the bank of the river and filling up Beth’s pan. He then moved to another place a little up river and did the same thing for Sonny. He moved a little further up river and filled his pan.

  It was a clear mountain Spring day. Even though snow was still on the ground and it was in the forties the sun was warm on Anne and as she watched them work, she would doze. She was awakened by a shout of excitement. She had no idea how long they had been working but the sun was still high in the sky.

  At first, Anne thought something was wrong. Jack and Sonny were running towards Beth. When the boys got to Beth, they both looked at something that Beth had in her pan. Both boys let out with a whoop.

  Sonny took Beth’s pan and set in on the ground. All three grabbed hold of each other in a group hug and still holding on to each other, started yelling and jumping up and down.

  Anne knew something momentous had taken place but had no idea what it was. After the three had stopped celebrating, the boys ran back for their pans. All three of them hurried up the hill to show Anne what all of the excitement was about.

  The boys were like two puppy dogs. Whooping and hollering, they couldn’t keep still. Beth was just as excited but, except for an awkward pirouette in front of Anne, she showed a little more calm than the boys.

  She stood in front of Anne and said, “When we use to go gold panning with Frank, Jack’s uncle,” she explained, “we would go to the bush for a week and work our butts off panning gold and maybe come away with one or two ounces of gold. When Frank showed us how to make a sluice and we sluiced for gold we still didn’t get a whole lot more, maybe four or five ounces. At 35 dollars an ounce, it wasn’t something that you wanted to make a career of.”

  Beth paused and with a big smile said, “Well, look at this.” and she proudly shoved her pan in front of Anne’s face.

  Anne took the pan from Beth and looked at it. At the bottom of the pan was what looked like black dirt and dull yellow rocks.

  Anne looked up from the pan.

  Beth said excitedly, “Well?”

  Anne’s face said it all. She didn’t have a clue as to what she was looking at.

  Beth sat down next to her and pointed to the dull yellow rocks and said, “Those, girl, are gold nuggets.”

  Beth reached in the pan and pulled out the largest of the nuggets, one about the size of a

  grape.

  She said with a soft reverence, “This is gold. It probably weighs about two ounces maybe more and with the smaller nuggets in the pan I have perhaps three to four ounces of gold.

  Jack and Sonny have about a half an ounce in each of their pans.

  Do you know what this means?”

  It was obvious that she didn’t, so Beth said, “Just as Frank’s father, Jack’s great grandfather, suspected, we may be sitting on one of the richest gold fields in the world.

  I’ve read about finds like this in the early days of the ’49 gold rush. Early prospectors were literally pulling nuggets out of rivers with their hands. In Virginia City in the Comstock mine they came across a blue sticky clay that was difficult to dig out and was considered a nuisance. They actually used the clay to pave the streets of Virginia City until they found out that the minerals in the clay were about seventy percent silver and thirty percent gold.

  In the late 1850s one group of men in Colorado took out ten ounces of gold a day using only one sluice box.

  We have come across something as big or bigger than that. If this isn’t a fluke and the rest of this valley pans out as this place has, we are going to rich beyond our wildest dreams.”

  Anne reached over and took the nugget out of Beth’s hand. Her heart was racing.

  Jack said, “Let’s put the sluice together now.”

  “The sooner the better,” said Sonny.

  “No,” said Beth, “we build our house first. In case you haven’t noticed, it’s cold as Hell out here. The gold isn’t going anywhere.

  For the first time in three years, I want to sleep in a real house with a real roof over my head and I want to try and get use to sleeping in a bed again.

  House first, then gold.”

  Jack started to open his mouth but Beth cut him short.

  “I’m not going to argue with you. House! And that’s that!”

  The boys looked like someone had just broken their favorite toy.

  “Besides, we should look at the rest of the valley and try to find where the richest deposits are. Although, I can’t imagine anyplace being richer than this place.”

  Beth was using her best reasonable mother voice.

  “We know there is gold so we know we’re going to stay. Now let’s find a good place to build and live.”

  Sonny whined “Beth, it’s like keeping kids out of a free candy store. It’s cruel and unusual punishment. It’s not fair.”

  “I know, Sonny, I want to set the sluice up too but we have to get a roof over Anne’s head as soon as possible. If she gets a cold and her resistance drops, it could be bad for her.”

  Anne started to protest but Beth nudged her. Anne’s protest turned into a mock coughing fit.

  The boys weren’t fooled a minute but Jack said with false disgust, “All right, all right you win. But first let’s see if we can find a good deposit and then try and find a place near it to build a cabin. OK?”

  “OK, but no more than a week and then I want a roof over my head. You two start out now. We have about three hours of daylight left. As you travel up stream look for a good place to build a cabin.

  I’ll stay with Anne.”

  This was a real sacrifice for Beth. She was as anxious as the boys to explore the valley and hunt for gold but she didn’t want to cause Anne any distress.

  Anne started to protest b
ut Beth cut her short. “No, I’d just as soon stay here and keep you company. I’ll help you down to the river. You can watch me pan and we can talk.”

  The boys didn’t stick around to chitchat. Jack took Beth’s pan and the nugget from Anne. He went to the wagon and pulled out an empty coffee tin and scraped the contents of the three pans into the tin.

  “We’ll separate the gold from the iron dust later.” He was in a hurry to go.

  Sonny snatched up the shovel. They stuffed their pans in their saddlebags, swung into the saddle and were off.

  Beth smiled and said, “They’ll never change. They’ll be acting like two year olds when they are in their fifties.

  Come on, let’s get you down to the river. It’s about time that you were getting a little exercise anyway.”

  Beth helped Anne on to her feet and picked up Anne’s blankets. She put Anne’s arm over her shoulder and they both slowly walked to the riverbank.

  After Beth had made Anne comfortable she said, “I’m going back for another shovel and my pan. Be back in a minute.”

  When Beth returned, she began to shovel dirt and rock into her pan. She then took the pan down to the riverside, sat down on a rock and dipped the pan in the water. She turned so that she was facing Anne and set the pan down between her feet.

  She began to explain to Anne what she was doing. “I’m going to break up the clots of dirt so that the dirt can wash. I am also going to examine the rocks in the pan and then throw out any rocks that don’t have gold in them. Sometimes you will find a piece of quartz or a stone that will be shot through with gold and you keep those. The rest you throw away.”

  All the time that she talked, she was working the contents of the pan, breaking up the dirt and throwing out the stones.

  “Now that I have all of the clots broken up and the pan relatively free of large rocks, I am going to start washing the dirt.”

  Beth then turned so that she could dip the pan into the water. There was a little current flowing over the top of the pan. She said, “I’m now going to swirl the pan and let the dirt wash out of the pan. The gold, which is much heavier than anything else in the pan, will sink to the bottom of the pan. All else will wash out of the pan.”