The Silver Canyon

by Fenn, George Manville

  “Find it? Ah! of course he will, and before you know where you are.”

  They trudged on in silence now, for both were growing tired, but just about the time appointed they came within sight of their starting-place, the Doctor meeting them a few minutes later.

  “What luck?” he asked.

  “Nothing but a glorious spring of water, and a stream with some specks of gold in the washing.”

  “I have done little better, Bart, but there is a valley yonder that leads up into the mountains, and with care I think we can get the waggon along without much difficulty.”

  * * *

  Chapter Ten.

  A sure-footed Beast.

  An early start was made next morning, and following the course mapped out by the Doctor, they soon reached an opening in the hills, up which they turned, to find in the hollow a thread-like stream and that, as they proceeded, the mountains began to open out before them higher and higher, till they seemed to close in the horizon like clouds of delicate amethystine blue.

  Every now and then the travelling was so bad that it seemed as if they must return, but somehow the waggon and horses were got over the obstacles, and a short level cheered them on to fresh exertions, while, as they slowly climbed higher and higher, there was the satisfaction of knowing that there was less likelihood of molestation from Indians, the dangerous tribes of the plains, Comanches and Apachés, rarely taking their horses up amongst the rugged portions of the hills.

  Maude, in her girlish freshness of heart, was delighted with the variety of scenery, while to Bart all was excitement. Even the labour to extricate the waggon from some rift, or to help to drag it up some tremendous slope, was enjoyable.

  Then there were little excursions to make down moist ravines, where an antelope might be bagged for the larder; or up to some dry-looking flat, shut in by the hills, where grouse might be put up amongst the sage-brush and other thin growth, for six hard-working men out in these brisk latitudes consume a great deal of food, and the stores in the waggon had to be saved as much a possible.

  One way and the other the larder was kept well supplied, and while Dr Lascelles on the one hand talked eagerly of the precious metal he hoped to discover, Joses was always ready with promises of endless sport.

  “Why, by an’ by, Master Bart,” he said one day as they journeyed slowly on, “we shall come to rivers so full of salmon that all you’ve got to do is to pull ’em out.”

  “If you can catch them,” said Bart, laughing.

  “Catch ’em, my boy? Why, they don’t want no catching. I’ve known ’em come up some rivers so quick and fast that when they got up to the shallows they shoved one another out on to the sides high and dry, and all you’d got to do was to catch ’em and eat ’em.”

  “Let’s see, that’s what the Doctor calls a traveller’s tale, Joses.”

  “Yes; this traveller’s tale,” said Bart’s companion gruffly. “You needn’t believe it without you like, but it’s true all the same.”

  “Well, I’ll try and believe it,” said Bart, laughing, “but I didn’t know salmon were so stupid as that.”

  “Stupid! they aren’t stupid, my lad,” replied Joses sharply. “Suppose you and millions of people behind you were walking along a narrow bit o’ land with a river on each side of you, and everybody was pushing on from behind to get up to the end of the bit of land, where there wasn’t room for you all, and suppose you and hundreds more got pushed into the water on one side or on the other, that wouldn’t be because you were so very stupid, would it?”

  “No,” said Bart, “that would be because I couldn’t help it.”

  “Well, it’s just the same with the salmon, my lad. Millions of ’em come up from out of the sea at spawning time, and they swim up and up till the rivers get narrower and shallower, and all those behind keep pushing the first ones on till thousands die on the banks, and get eaten by the wolves and coyótes that come down then to the banks along with eagles and hawks and birds like them.”

  “I beg your pardon, Joses, for not believing you,” said Bart, earnestly. “I see now.”

  “Oh, it’s all right enough,” said the rough fellow bluntly. “I shouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it, and of course it’s only up the little shallow streams that shoot off from the others.”

  This conversation took place some days after they had been in the mountains, gradually climbing higher, and getting glorious views at times, of hill and distant plain. Bart and Joses were out “after the pot,” as the latter called it, and on this occasion they had been very unfortunate.

  “I tell you what it is,” said Joses at last, “we shall have to go lower down. The master won’t never find no gold and silver up here, and food’ll get scarcer and scarcer, unless we can come upon a flock of sheep.”

  “A flock of sheep up here!” said Bart incredulously.

  “I didn’t say salmon, I said sheep,” grunted Joses. “Now, say you don’t believe there is sheep up here.”

  “You tell me there are sheep up here,” said Bart, “and I will believe you.”

  “I don’t say there are; I only hope there are,” said Joses; “for if we could get one or two o’ them in good condition, they’re the best eating of anything as goes on four legs.”

  “But not our sort of sheep?”

  “No, of course not. Mountain sheep, my lad, with great horns twisted round so long and thick you get wondering how the sheep can carry ’em, and—there, look!”

  He caught Bart by the shoulder, and pointed to a tremendous slope, a quarter of a mile away, where, in the clear pure air, the lad could see a flock of about twenty sheep evidently watching them.

  “They’re the shyest, artfullest things as ever was,” whispered Joses. “Down softly, and let’s back away; we must circumvent them, and get behind ’em for a shot.”

  “Too late,” said Bart; and he was right, for suddenly the whole herd went off at a tremendous pace along a slope that seemed to be quite a precipice, and the next moment they were gone.

  “That’s up for to-day,” said Joses, shouldering his rifle. “We may go back and try and pick up a bird or two. To-morrow we’ll come strong, and p’r’aps get a shot at the sheep, as we know they are here.”

  They were fortunate enough to shoot a few grouse on their way back, and next morning at daybreak, Bart and the four men started after the sheep, the Doctor preferring to stay by the waggon and examine some of the rocks.

  As the party climbed upwards towards the slope where the sheep had been seen on the previous day, Joses was full of stories about the shy nature of these animals.

  “They’ll lead you right away into the wildest places,” he said, “and then, when you think you’ve got them, they go over some steep cut, and you never see ’em again. Some people say they jump head first down on to the rocks, and lets themselves fall on their horns, which is made big on purpose, and then bounces up again, but I don’t believe it, for if they did, they’d break their necks. All the same, though, they do jump down some wonderful steep places and run up others that look like walls. Here, what’s Sam making signals for! Go softly.”

  They crept up to their companion, and found that he had sighted a flock of eleven sheep on a slope quite a couple of miles away, and but for the assurance of Joses that it was all right, and that they were sheep, Bart would have said it was a patch of a light colour on the mountain.

  As they approached cautiously, however, trying to stalk the timid creatures, Bart found that his men were right, and they spent the next two hours in cautious approach, till they saw that the sheep took alarm and rushed up to the top of the slope, disappeared for a moment, and then came back, to stand staring down at their advancing enemies.

  “It’s all right,” exclaimed Joses, “we can get the lot if we like, for they can’t get away. Yonder’s a regular dip down where they can’t jump. Keep your rifles ready, my boys, and we’ll shoot two. That’ll be enough.”

  As they spread out and slowly ad
vanced, the sheep ran back out of sight, but came back again, proving Joses’ words, that there was a precipice beyond them and their enemies in front.

  Four times over, as the hunting party advanced, did the sheep perform this evolution, but the last time they did not come back into sight.

  “They’re away hiding down among the bushes,” said Joses. “Be ready. Now then close in. You keep in the middle here, Master Bart, and have the first shot. Pick a good fat one.”

  “Yes,” panted Bart, who was out of breath with the climbing, and to rest him Joses called a halt, keeping a sharp look-out the while to left and right, so that the sheep might not elude them.

  At the end of a few minutes they toiled up the slope once more, Joses uttering a few words of warning to his young companion.

  “Don’t rush when you get to the top, for it slopes down there with a big wall going right down beyond, and you mightn’t be able to stop yourself. Keep cool, we shall see them together directly.”

  But they did not see the sheep cowering together as they expected, for though the top of the mountain was just as Joses had described, sloping down after they had passed the summit and then going down abruptly in an awful precipice, no sheep were to be seen, and after making sure that none were hidden, the men passed on cautiously to the edge, Bart being a little way behind, forcing his way through some thick bushes.

  Just then a cry from Joses made him hurry to the edge, but he was too late to see what three of them witnessed, and that was the leap of a magnificent ram, which had been standing upon a ledge ten feet below them, and which, as soon as it heard the bushes above its head parted, made a tremendous spring as if into space, but landed on another ledge, fifty feet below, to take off once more for another leap right out of sight.

  “We must go back and round into the valley,” said Juan. “We shall find them all with their necks broken.”

  “You’ll be clever if you do,” said Joses, in a savage growl. “They’ve gone on jumping down like that right to the bottom, Master Bart, and—”

  “Is that the flock?” said Bart, pointing to where a similar wall of rock rose up from what seemed to be part of a great canyon.

  “That’s them,” said Joses, counting, “eight, nine, ten, eleven, and all as fresh as if they’d never made a jump. There, I’ll believe anything of ’em after that.”

  “Why, it makes one shudder to look down,” said Bart, shrinking back.

  “Shudder!” said Joses, “why, I’d have starved a hundred times before I’d have made a jump like that. No mutton for dinner to-day, boys. Let’s get some birds.”

  And very disconsolately and birdless, they made their way back to the camp.

  * * *

  Chapter Eleven.

  Bears and for Bears.

  Bart was sufficiently observing to notice, even amidst the many calls he had upon his attention, that Dr Lascelles grew more and more absorbed and dreamy every day. When they first started he was always on the alert about the management of the expedition, the proportioning of the supplies and matters of that kind; but as he found in a short time that Bart devoted himself eagerly to everything connected with the successful carrying out of their progress, that Joses was sternly exacting over the other men, and that Maude took ample care of the stores, he very soon ceased troubling himself about anything but the main object which he had in view.

  Hence it was then that he used to sling a sort of game-bag over his shoulder directly after the early morning meal, place a sharp, wedge-like hammer in his belt, shoulder his double rifle, and go off “rock-chipping,” as Joses called it.

  “I don’t see what’s the good of his loading one barrel with shot, Master Bart, for he never brings in no game; and as for the stones—well, I haven’t seen a single likely bit yet.”

  “Do you think he ever will hit upon a good mine of gold or silver, Joses?” said Bart, as they were out hunting one day.

  “Well, Master Bart, you know what sort of a fellow I am. If I’d got five hundred cows, I should never reckon as they’d have five hundred calves next year, but just calculate as they wouldn’t have one. Then all that come would be so many to the good. Looking at it fairly, I don’t want to dishearten you, my lad, but speaking from sperience, I should say he wouldn’t.”

  “And this will all be labour in vain, Joses?”

  “Nay, I don’t say that, Master Bart. He might find a big vein of gold or silver; but I never knew a man yet who went out in the mountains looking for one as did.”

  “But up northward there, men have discovered mines and made themselves enormously rich.”

  “To be sure they have, my lad, but not by going and looking for the gold or silver. It was always found by accident like, and you and me is much more like to come upon a big lead where we’re trying after sheep or deer than he is with all his regular trying.”

  “You think there are mineral riches up in the mountains then?”

  “Think, Master Bart! Oh, I’m sure of it. But where is it to be found? P’r’aps we’re walking over it now, but there’s no means of telling.”

  “No,” said Bart thoughtfully, “for everything about is so vast.”

  “That’s about it, my lad, and all the harm I wish master is that he may find as much as he wants.”

  “I wish he may, Joses,” said Bart, “or that I could find a mine for him and Miss Maude.”

  “Well, my lad, we’ll keep our eyes open while we are out, only we have so many other things to push, and want to push on farther so as to get among better pasture for the horses. They don’t look in such good condition as they did.”

  There was good reason for this remark, their halting-places during the past few days having been in very sterile spots, where the tall forbidding rocks were relieved by very little that was green, and patches of grass were few.

  But these were the regions most affected by the Doctor, who believed that they were the most likely ones for discovering treasure belonging to nature’s great storehouse, untouched as yet by man. In these barren wilds he would tramp about, now climbing to the top of some chine, now letting himself down into some gloomy forbidding ravine, but always without success, there being nothing to tempt him to say, “Here is the beginning of a very wealthy mine.”

  Every time they journeyed on the toil became greater, for they were in most inaccessible parts of the mountain range, and they knew by the coolness of the air that they must now be far above the plains.

  Bart and Joses worked hard to supply the larder, the principal food they obtained being the sage grouse and dusky grouse, which birds they found to be pretty plentiful high up in the mountains wherever there was a flat or a slope with plenty of cover; but just as they were getting terribly tired of the sameness of this diet, Bart made one morning a lucky find.

  They had reached a fresh halting-place after sundown on the previous night—one that was extremely attractive from the variety of the high ground, the depths of the chasms around, and the beauty of the cedars that spread their flat, frond-like branches over the mountain-sides, which were diversified by the presence of endless dense thickets.

  “It looks like a deer country,” Joses had said as they were tethering the horses amongst some magnificent grass.

  These words had haunted Bart the night through, and hence, at the first sight of morning on the peaks up far above where they were, he had taken his rifle and gone off to see what he could find.

  Three hours’ tramp produced nothing but a glimpse of some mountain sheep far away and at a very great height.

  He was too weary and hungry to think of following them, and was reluctantly making for the camp, when all at once a magnificent deer sprang up from amongst a thicket of young pines, and bounded off at an astounding rate.

  It seemed madness to fire, but, aiming well in front, Bart drew trigger, and then leaped aside to get free of the smoke. As he did so, he just caught a glimpse of the deer as it bounded up a steep slope and the next moment it was gone.

  Bar
t felt that he had not hit it, but curiosity prompted him to follow in the animal’s track, in the hope of getting a second shot, and as he proceeded, he could not help wishing for the muscular strength of these deer, for the ground, full of rifts and chasms, over which he toiled painfully in a regular climb, the deer had bounded over at full speed.

  It took him some time to get to the spot where he had last seen the deer, when, to his intense surprise and delight, he found traces of blood upon the stones, and upon climbing higher, he found his way blocked by a chasm.

  Feeling sure that the animal would have cleared this at a bound, he lowered himself down by holding on by a young pine which bent beneath his weight. Then he slipped for a few feet, made a leap, and came down amongst some bushes, where, lying perfectly dead, was the most beautiful deer he had ever seen.

  Unfortunately hunger and the knowledge that others are hungry interfere with romantic admiration, and after feasting his eyes, Bart began to feast his imagination on the delight of those in the camp with the prospect of venison steaks. So, in regular hunter’s fashion, he proceeded to partially skin and dress the deer, cutting off sufficient for their meal, and leaving the other parts to be fetched by the men.

  There were rejoicings in camp that morning, and soon after breakfast Bart started off once more, taking with him Joses, Juan, and Sam, all of whom were exceedingly willing to become the bearers of the meat in which they stood in such great need.

  The Doctor had gone off in another direction, taking with him Maude as his companion, and after the little party had returned to the camp, Bart was standing thoughtfully gazing at a magnificent eminence, clothed almost to the top with cedars, while in its rifts and ravines were dark-foliaged pines.

  “I wonder whether we should find anything up there, Joses,” said Bart.

  “Not much,” said the frontier man. “There’d be deer, I daresay, if the sound of your rifle and the coming of the sheep hadn’t sent them away.”