by Jesse Reiss
André
Los Angeles: 8 February 1857
After traveling for two days from Santa Clarita, André Baguette and his two hired Mexican hands rode their horses down through the mountains and into sight of the Spanish Mission of San Fernando. Three burdened mules tethered to André’s horse plodded along with them.
The weather in the valley was perfect. Early snow melting in the mountains had filled the streams and rivers with fresh water that flowed out to the Pacific, and winter rains had turned the valley from its usual drab brown to a lush green with the wonderful smells of nature. This was more like how France was, he reminded himself. They bypassed the mission and pushed on to try to make the Cahuenga Pass before sundown.
For the first time André knew success. He had come to California with his father in 1849 with the gold rush. His father, who had raised him in New England, had passed away from some unknown illness in the first year panning for gold. André had continued alone, determined to fulfill his father’s dream of riches.
He knew he was fortunate and had really been very lucky. Most miners had gone further north to the Sacramento and San Francisco area, but with a tip that the first gold strike in California had occurred just north of Los Angeles in the Placerita Canyon, André decided to try his luck in the San Gabriel Mountains. For over six years he had been panning his way across the mountain range, heading west as far as the Spanish Mission of San Buenaventura. He had learned to live off the land, picking up native Indians as helpers here and there and renting shelter with ranchers during the colder winter months.
Now, after prospecting for years, he’d had his fill and decided to return to his family’s original hometown in France, where he dreamt of buying a large villa overlooking a valley and living in luxury. He had the money now; he just had to make it back home.
The Mexicans beside him, Miguel and Javier, were rough men raised on the California ranches and knew only the law that they imposed upon each other. Each rode a horse with a rifle across the saddle and two pistols at their waist. André had picked them up at Rancho San Francisco approximately thirty miles north and offered them a generous sum for safe passage to San Pedro, where he intended to board a vessel heading around the Cape to Cuba and across the Atlantic to France. If all went well, he could be in his native country by 1858.
They rode hard through the day and arrived at Campo de Cahuenga, an adobe farmhouse situated in the middle of the Cahuenga Pass where, for a small fee, they were allowed to stay the night. The Cahuenga Pass was a two-mile long gap between two mountain ranges, connecting the San Fernando Valley to the Los Angeles Basin. A well-worn trail laid out the best path on which wagons and horses could travel with some ease.
André joined several ranchers, traders and prospectors with their families around the fireplace where steak and wine was served with tin plates and cups. An American fur trader, who introduced himself as Charles Eastern, befriended André and they started talking.
“Where you headed?” Charles asked, chewing his steak.
“South to San Pedro where I intend to get on a boat and go back east,” André said with a trusting smile.
“So you found some success here in California?”
“Oh yes! California has been good to me.” André was enjoying California wine for the last time, in anticipation of the day he arrived back in France and could have real wine.
“You’re not from America are you?”
“No, France. Came here with my father. Buried him up on a mountain some years back. Going home now.”
“Got to watch yourself going through Los Angeles. Bandits there are stirring up trouble. Whole town is unsettled. Mexican named Juan Flores has started a gang and now has up to fifty men terrorizing the ranchers, raiding the locals, stealing from stores. Even murder and rape I hear.” André’s eyes widened. “Yep! Flores has been active for a couple years since busting out of prison. Insurgent he is, threatening a full-scale revolt against the US to take back California.”
“America won that war with Mexico ten years ago.”
“Yeah and in 1847 the treaty that supposedly ended the war was signed with a Colonel John Fremont of the US Army right here in this adobe building you are in now at Cahuenga,” he said with a proud smile, waving an arm around the farmhouse’s sparse furnishings. “Even the Mexicans who fought against the Americans were allowed to return to their ranches and stay on the land—that is so long as they accepted United States rule and agreed to do what the new California government says. It seems some Mexicans are still fighting the war and want to cause enough trouble that the American’s will get fed up and leave.”
“Can’t they find a way to settle it?” André asked. “This place is huge. There is enough land for everyone.”
“You’d think. ‘Manifest Destiny’, the bigwigs in government call it. The supposed God-given right of Americans to claim and take whatever land westward they want. Now that they’ve reached the Pacific, before you know it America will head north and over the Bering Sea and take over Russia. You watch.”
The man refilled André’s drink and poured one for himself, and continued on. “You see, after the war, the Mexicans returned to their ranches, laying claim to most the good land that they’d owned before the war started. So a few years ago the state legislature passed a law requiring Mexican landowners to prove that they really owned the land. Years have gone by and most have been unable to establish a clear title and without one they can’t sell their land or profit from it, but are still being required to pay taxes and accumulated debts on them — really tricky.
“So now the Mexicans have had enough and are forming gangs to harass and provoke the white settlers, continuing the war. The whites in turn are forming vigilante committees to go after and hang these bandits. In Los Angeles, a town of a few thousand, someone is getting killed every day.” He strung out the last words for emphasis.
“Americans going to give the land back?”
“Not a chance in Hell. America is a unique animal. What they call a ‘democracy’. Democracies don’t give up on wars easily, even the ones that are costing countless lives. They fight them to the end. Besides, too many Mexicans are loyal to their ranch more than to their country. If Americans eventually let them have their ranch, it doesn’t mean a thing to them whether they are governed by Mexico or America. California is so far out from anywhere and so irrelevant in the big scheme of things — what does it really matter to them?”
André seemed to not understand all this. “Mexicans far outnumber Americans. They could cause trouble if they all banded together,” he asked.
Charles seemed to be ignoring his steak and was more interested in talking to this stranger. “Not going to happen. Too lazy and some like being part of the United States. Take for example, Andres Pico, who owns a cattle ranch in Los Angeles. He was the governor of Alta California, which is what Mexico called this place when they gained independence from Spain back in 1821. Andres led the Mexican forces in California against the US in the war ten years ago and lost. He had three hundred men, mostly untrained and unemployed vagrants, to the United States’ six hundred trained soldiers. And yet he still fought and he lost. Now you would think he would have lost his pride and gone down to Mexico, right?” André nodded. “No, he has now become a United States citizen and sits on the state legislature.”
André nodded in surprise, impressed by this stranger’s intelligence. Charles leaned in closer so the women nearby wouldn’t hear him. “Just a few weeks ago the first and lone sheriff of Los Angeles — fella I knew named James Barton — he went after that main gang leader, Flores, with six other men, intending to arrest him for murder of a German shopkeeper. Flores ambushed and killed Barton and now the whole town is in a rage. I heard Pico is right now forming a posse of one hundred and twenty men to go after Flores to put an end to the insurrection.”
“I hope he gets him before I pass through,” André said cheerfully. He finished his drink and poured another.
&nbs
p; “Yep. Plans are to hang him on Fort Hill. Bet the whole town’s gonna come out to see that one.”
“How many people you say living in Los Angeles now?” André asked.
“Near five thousand.”
“That is big for a desert town. Man could get lost among so many people.”
“Well, you watch out for yourself and I wouldn’t trust those men you have with you. They look like they would as likely take your money and run. You’re a prospector going home, aren’t you?”
“Yes. Going home — home to France that is. Grew up in New England, but will return to my family home in France.”
“I would have guessed you were French. Been out here alone eh?
“Yes, but so long as I am among Nature, loneliness is a fine companion.”
The man chatted on about the threat of civil war in America, further confirming for André it was a good time to move on. As the evening wore down André cheerily thanked the man for the company and went to his bunk. The man’s words had made him nervous and he worried that he had said too much. He had been lazy in recent days, not hiding the fact that he was a prospector and clearly had found success. The three mules he had carrying saddlebags smelled of gold and he was sure word was spreading about a French prospector traveling through. He had already banked large quantities of the gold and traded many nuggets in for coins, but a good sum was with him now. He started doubting his decision to not bank it all and have the bank transfer the money across the country.
Feeling jumpy and nervous for the first time, André left his bunk and went to the barn where he slept the night on the saddlebags, in the hay.
He was awoken the next morning by a nudging of his foot. It was his hired Mexican hand, Miguel. “Senor, we got to move. Strangers come to camp last night and ask about you. You being followed. Two more days before San Pedro and could be trouble.”
André thanked the man and brushed himself off. Eating some salted meat, biscuits and a drink of water, they saddled up and headed out of the camp, hoping they weren’t seen. The sky was clear after a light rain during the night and a cold breeze was blowing in from the coast and up the canyon pass.
André knew that until they were through the pass and in the basin and in sight of San Pedro, there were plenty of trees, outcroppings, boulders and gullies in which an ambush could hide behind and he didn’t like it. His map showed him there was another way around the mountains to the east that followed the Los Angeles River that would mean going back the way they came and would add several hours to the journey and possibly a third day. It was also possible to go over the mountains directly through the middle as they were approximately fourteen hundred feet high, but that was a steep climb and might take an entire day to get the mules over with their burden.
He decided he was being too jumpy and that they would face whatever was to come, if there were anything, and head on through. He had been working these lands for many years and had had little trouble, so no reason for it to come now. The two Mexicans appeared wary, sitting high in their saddles and one hand on their rifles, eyes constantly peeled ahead and around.
The trail took them around many bends as it wove uphill, cutting around various rock outcroppings, boulders and ridges. Around a turn André was able to see far out into the Los Angeles basin and all the way to the ocean, a faint thin blue line where the sky and the land met. It brought joy to his heart and a big smile on his face. He was going home.
As they headed downwards and the pace was picking up, Miguel, who had been ridding approximately twenty meters ahead, raised his hand for them to halt. He stood up in the saddle and squinted his eyes around the terrain. Something bothered him. He mumbled something quietly in Spanish to his comrade and they lifted their rifles to their chest. André didn’t see what they saw or hear what they were hearing. He looked at them for a sign of what was happening. Neither spoke. Birds and the soft rustle of evergreens was all he heard.
Miguel raised his rifle to his shoulder and shouted out, “Hola!” His voice echoed off the hillsides and things went silent again.
Javier motioned his horse to the side and he rode up the edge, onto a ridge where he had higher ground.
The horses were getting anxious, not understanding why they weren’t moving. The mare under André snorted and stamped her hooves. The mules were shifting from side to side, their hooves scraping the hard ground.
Miguel remained motionless, his rife on his shoulder, pointed at the trail ahead. A minute seemed to go by with nothing happening. André moved his horse slowly over to the left near a levee.
A hat appeared approximately fifty meters ahead behind a rock outcropping and a man came walking slowly into view. It was Charles Eastern. He held a rifle at his side. The sly smile on his face told André that this wasn’t a coincidental meeting.
André decided to play the naive and unassuming, calling out to him: “Charles, I thought for a moment you were going to be Juan Flores! Fancy meeting you here on the pass so early in the morning.”
The answer from Charles wasn’t so jovial: “No, Mr. Baguette, this isn’t a coincidence. Turn over your horses and saddlebags and you and your amigos can leave on foot.”
André saw two more men come into view on either side and another on the other side of the pass from where Charles was.
“So you made up that stuff about Flores or is that your real name?”
“No, that’s all true. You see, every man who can shoot a gun is out hunting south of Los Angeles for Flores, you’ve got no one to turn to when I take the gold you’ve got.”
The cold and calculated manner in which the man spoke irked André and the initial fear he felt at being robbed turned to anger. He wasn’t so willing to give up eight years of work to a criminal. His father had taught him how to use a gun and he had successfully hunted for his own meat all these years. Shooting someone with no morals like this man wasn’t going to be as hard as he thought.
“I don’t think I’m ready to give you my earnings yet, Mr. Eastern.”
“Very well…we’ll have to take them from you the hard way,” and with that his rifle flew up to his shoulder and he snapped off a shot as he scrambled back behind the rock outcropping. Miguel’s horse buckled and went down as Miguel fired his rifle and reached for a pistol, sparks flying from the rocks near Charles’ head.
The pass erupted with gunfire.
André leapt from his horse and hit the ground, doing a half somersault as he scampered behind some bushes on top of a small levee, feeling the sharp sting as rock fragments from a rifle shot hit the ground beneath him. The levee gave him some cover, but he was still exposed. He looked up to see Javier fire his rifle across the pass at the assailant who had just fired and saw the man drop his rifle and clutch his thigh, falling back behind the rise he had come from.
Behind Javier a man stepped out from behind a tree and took aim. André brought his rifle up and in one motion aimed and fired. The man jolted back against the trunk and slumped forward, lifeless. It was the first man André had killed and there was a short instance of sorrow.
He looked over the levee at the pass and saw Miguel’s horse on its side, writhing and whining with its legs kicking. Miguel’s leg was still in the saddle, trapped underneath it with his rifle lying out of reach. Miguel was struggling to free his leg while the horse was fighting the pain of the bullet it had taken in the neck. Blood ran down its front and André knew it was lost. He reloaded his rifle and took careful aim, firing a shot that instantly made the horse flop to the ground.
André’s own horse and the three mules were trotting away, back down the pass, scared by the gunfire. They would be in a full retreat were it not for the fact they were tethered together and unable to move as one.
From where he lay, the outcropping that Charles hid behind was out of André’s view
Javier tied his horse to a tree and crept down from his position to where Miguel was, concealing himself behind the dead horse. He worked with Miguel to free his l
eg and pulled him back to safety behind some rocks.
André watched as the two men covered each other as they scrambled back to Javier’s horse. To his dismay, they got on the horse and rode off as fast as the horse would go, back down the trail without even looking in André’s direction. They passed his wandering horse and mules without stopping.
He watched them go and realized it was hopeless now. He left his concealed spot and raced back to where the horse and mules had wandered. A random shot fired over his head. He reached the animals and grabbed his horse’s reins. He looked back to see Charles running up the pass with his gun at his shoulder. Though he wanted to, he couldn’t ride off in flight like the two Mexicans — his horse was tied to the mules! They would stubbornly be dragged on their sides before they made an effort to run. He fired a shot from a pistol to slow Eastern down and led his horse and the mules off the trail, climbing the side of the hill. He would be exposed, but it was the only option he had.
He climbed higher, hearing the occasional bullet pass overhead. He kept concealed behind the animals so a lucky bullet wouldn’t reach him. He was nearing the top of a hill when a mule brayed in pain and went down. Then another. The horse was yanking on the line, trying to free itself so it could get away from the noise. André pulled out his knife and cut the rope that tied them all together, still trying to hang onto the reins. Only one mule had the gold and that one was kicking in the dirt with blood coming from its side. Pulling the horse along with him, he reached the animal and cut the straps that attached the pack, dragging it off.
A bullet hit a rock near his horse, sending sparks and fragments flying up into its face. The animal reared and André did all he could to hold on. He was yanked off the ground and slammed back down to the earth, loosening his grip on the reins. The horse took off, galloping aimlessly back down the hillside.
André thought to surrender, but they wouldn’t let him walk now. Not now that two of their men were shot and he had two witnesses that had left the scene alive, wherever they were. He was in it to the finish.
He scrambled on his stomach over to the dying mule and got his arms around the pack that contained the gold. He started backing up along the ground, dragging it towards the last standing mule. The gunfire had stopped and he surveyed the pass below him to try to see what the two men down there were doing. He got the pack over to the last standing mule and hauled it onto the mule’s back, doubling its load. The animal brayed and shook its head in protest. André grabbed the line and pulled on it to get the animal walking. He tried to use the animal to conceal himself as much as he could, as they headed further up the hillside to the ridge where he would be safe.
It was mid morning now and the day was heating up. Sweating profusely, a burning sensation began to run through his lungs, he worked them so hard. He had lost his water canteens and food on one of the mules and knew by afternoon he would be thirsty. He realized it was foolish to have gone for the mule with the gold so that he might keep his riches as opposed to the mule with the food and water so that he might live another day.
He pulled the mule over a ridge and viewed the foothills before him. They rose and fell steadily, getting higher and higher as they approached the mountain, like exposed roots spreading out from an old tree.
From where he stood he thought he could see an adobe hut in the distance, farther down in the basin, but wasn’t sure. Other than the worn wagon trail markings through the Cahuenga Pass, now far below, there were no other signs of human life. Eastern must be on his trail and would possibly come over that ridge with guns raised, so he had to keep moving.
He pulled the mule as he scampered down the other side of the ridge and faced the next hill, starting up it, looking for the best route upon which to go. The mule was becoming more stubborn; detecting the anxiety in André and seeing there was no usual path being taken. It twice stood there and locked its legs, responding to nothing. Only when André poked its rear with his knife did it move forward.
After an hour of scrambling over hills and through dry gullies, dragging the mule most of the way, his legs felt like rubber he stopped to rest, flopping to the ground. After ten minutes he sat back up and looked around. He was lying under a California Holly bush, abundant in these parts. The red berries looked inviting, but he knew they would taste awful. They were edible, but were best mashed up and cooked to remove the acidic taste or mixed in a tea or drink with sugar. He pulled some off and put them in his mouth to try to get some energy. They tasted awful and try as he might to chew and swallow, he could hardly get any down. He spat out the rest and got to his feet.
He stepped over to the mule, but it stepped away from him. He moved towards it quicker, and it moved back quicker as well. It wasn’t going for this anymore and had had enough. He started to panic. He needed that mule if he was going to get out of here alive. He took two quick steps and dove for the reins, but the mule swung its head away and they slipped through his fingers.
The mule was off, back down the path towards the gully between the two hillsides. It had hooves built for climbing in rocky terrain like this and was sure of its footing, able to move fast. André was able to keep up, despite his lack of energy. Something rose up within him and he was determined to not let the mule get away.
As they approached the hillside bottom, he reached the animal’s side and grabbed a hold of the pack, putting all his weight on top of the beast. His feet dragged in the dirt as the animal slowed to a walk. The animal wanted water and knew that there was none to be found on top of the hillside. It knew water was to be found in these gullies or out in the basin from mountain run-off. This was its natural instinct kicking in and André knew he would eventually lose the fight.
As the mule plodded along, resigned in its duties and oblivious to André’s presence, André untied the gold packs from its rear and pulled them off the animal, letting them flop to the ground. The mule, now lightened of the load, picked up its pace in search of water.
He collected himself for a minute and thought about his predicament. He really had only one way to go and that was over the mountainside edge in hopes of reaching the river on the east side by noon tomorrow. If he went back down into the basin he would be a sitting duck, out in plain sight. They might be waiting for him there.
He heaved all fifty pounds of the pack up to his shoulders and under the burden, retraced his ascent up the mountainside. It was slow going to keep his balance. He plodded one foot before the other, continuing up the hillside. There were more trees in this area, mostly evergreen, and he did his best to follow paths that would keep him concealed behind them as he went.
It was late afternoon and he was unthinking, avoiding ideas of tiredness, thirst and pain. All three were tearing through his body, but his mind was numb. He wasn’t allowing it to register and so concentrated his thoughts to moving forward and keeping the dead weight on top of his shoulders. He ached in places he had never ached before and his feet pained him with every step, but each shooting pain was pushed away and the next foot was placed forward.
He stopped to look back at how far he had come and was pleased with himself. He had passed one mountain and was covering the foothills of the, able to look out far into the basin below. He rested for a few minutes and then struggled to get the pack back onto his shoulders. He wasn’t climbing anymore, mostly going sideways. He seemed to hit a second wind, the pain in his legs and feet subsiding to a dull throb.
Another hour later and he turned to see the sun starting to fall below the horizon. Night would be upon him in about an hour. He rounded a bend, keeping his eyes out ahead for some level ground to camp on, not that he had anything to camp with. Now he would give anything, even gold, for water. He held onto it and kept pushing on, so those murderers wouldn’t get their hands on it.
A bullet zinged passed his ear. As he was about to turn, he felt the impact of a second bullet in his lower back and he went sprawling forward, the pack softening his fall. There was little pain at first —
he was already too exhausted and numb to feel much. He looked back and saw the outline of two men against the sunset, on the ridge he had passed not more than half an hour ago. He estimated they were firing from a thousand feet and having to tilt their rifles upwards, unable to take proper aim. He reached over and grabbed the pack’s straps and dragging himself and it, finishing the turn around the ridge and out of sight.
Once concealed by the mountainside, he grimaced as he slowly got back onto his feet, staggering and shaking.
He was bleeding now. He could feel it running down his lower back and down his leg. He felt back there where the bullet had gone in. Blood continued to come from the small hole and each twist of the body now sent dull pain to his head.
This was near the end, he thought. The idea of the two thieves picking up the pack from his motionless body with a smile on their faces brought renewed determination and he dragged the pack onwards, crossing over the mountainside, determined to take this all the way to the end. He still had his rifle and could possibly take one or both to the grave with him.
Darkness was setting in now, making it hard to see the path ahead. He could make out that he was approaching a small mesa with a large oak tree and he thought it would work as place he could build a fire and rest. He might be too weak in the morning to move or maybe he wouldn’t wake if he slept. Dying in one’s sleep is sure the way to go, he thought. Peaceful.
By the time André reached the tree and got under its canopy the last vestiges of light had left. Clouds overhead blocked any star or moonlight, leaving him in darkness. This was better he thought as it would make it impossible for his pursuers to follow him if they had the notion to do so during the night.
Small branches and kindling were ample about and he got a bunch together and started a fire to get some warmth into him. He had lost much fluid. He had looked back at the blood trail he had left and knew it was going to take nothing to track him. His pursuers were probably camping somewhere in a ravine and would pick up his blood trail in the morning, more looking for his dead body that anything else.
He leaned back against the tree and within seconds his weary body fell asleep.
When he awoke the fire was half its strength. He loaded more stick onto it and looked out. Several pairs of silvery eyes glistening beyond the tree’s canopy. Coyotes. They no doubt followed his trail too and could smell the blood from his wound. They must know he didn’t have long to live and patiently waited for their meal to be served. This was unlike coyotes he thought. His experience was they were afraid of humans and fire, but these must be able to sense here was an easy meal. Maybe they had tasted human meat before.
He threw some more branches on the fire and watched as embers floated upwards and into the oak above him. The fire cast a show of light and shadows across the boughs. He could sense something about this tree, as it was like only a few other large oaks he had seen on this mountainside. This one had boughs that stretched far out and to the ground and had them coming off the main trunk in various directions, like an open invitation of natural steps for anyone to climb.
A coyote that had crept too close under the canopy caught his attention. He pulled out a glowing red stick and tossed it at the animal. It missed, but the scavenger got the point and backed up to a safe distance with his other companions. He’s a hungry one, André thought.
He was disappointed in himself. He had failed his father, his family and himself. And when success was staring him right in the face and he was a few days away from realizing his dream, he was careless and got into a heap of trouble. Now he was going to die. He accepted this fact rather glumly. There was no getting around it. He had left a trail half a mile long from where he had been shot to the campsite under the oak and didn’t have the energy to go further. The nearest town, Los Angeles, was miles away and here he was, stuck under a tree, halfway up a small mountain.
Gold! That’d been all Eastern had wanted and what he’d shot him for. And that’s what he had now giving up his life for. Seemed so pointless now. He reached his hand over to his saddlebag, which was filled with coins and nuggets and confirmed it was still there. Charles Eastern didn’t have the gold and this thought put a weak smile on his face.
At least he didn’t have it yet.
In the morning light they would leave their camp and follow his trail and pick up the pack from his corpse. There was no way he could hide it. Wherever he went, he left a clear trail. Even if he dug a hole and stuck the gold in it, they would surely see the markings and dig it back up. This dilemma of how to hide the gold frustrated him more than dying. He could accept dying. That was inevitable. Everyone would someday die and that he had lived this long prospecting these mountains was a miracle. But accept that in dying he would be giving up all his hard earnings to some dry-gulching thieves, this bothered him greatly.
He sat pondering this when something caught his attention from above. He looked up and tried to focus his vision in the night. Something was moving up on a bough high above. He strained to see it, but could make out only a faint outline that seemed to blend in with the branches and leaves. Then it moved.
Two large orbs reflecting the firelight were staring down at him. It was an owl. It had stepped into the light and he could see it clearly now. A Great Horned Owl — and a large one at that. He watched the bird as it cocked its head to the side. Its eyes seemed to say a thousand words in silence.
An idea came to him. The owl probably lived in the tree, which meant it had a hole or a nest or even somewhere that he could wedge the packs into so they weren’t seen. He would be far more comfortable leaving this life if he knew its success wasn’t handed down to some criminals.
He slowly lifted himself back up onto his feet. Every muscle in his body ached and his back throbbed with pain. He was shivering and sweating from fever. With much strain, he lifted the pack onto the lowest bough and got himself onto it too.
With one painstakingly slow movement after another, he began to climb the tree, using his fire as his light. He moved like a sloth, one hand slowly up to the next branch and then lifting the pack and his body after testing several positions to determine the best one. After approximately half an hour he was nearing the bough that the owl had been sitting on. The owl was gone. Maybe it was an apparition he thought, but regardless, this was the best place to hide the gold. His wound was bleeding again now with blood droplets dripping down and several times dropping into the fire, making a loud hissing sound.
After a few more branches and what seemed like an eternity, he found the hole. It was a good-sized one and the perfect place to hide his gold pack.
André thought about the fact that the first gold ever to be discovered in California was found amongst an oak tree’s roots right over the mountains from where he was now. It was this one accidental discovery ten years ago that had spurred on the gold rush, sending tens of thousands of prospectors and their families flocking to the state. And here he was, putting gold back into an oak tree. Oh the irony!
He shoved the pack deep into the hole and slowly stretched his aching body out as best he could on the limb. He propped himself between two branches so he wouldn’t fall. He was wasted. He didn’t have the energy to go back down. And why should he? So he could give the coyotes a meal? He rested his head back and fell asleep.
When he woke in the morning he felt refreshed. The sun was shining brightly through the tree leaves, warming his face and his thirst and hunger were gone. In fact, he had no attention at all on his body. No aches or pains. He stood up and stretched, feeling odd and his mind a blank on recent events. He sat back down and thought to where yesterday had gone and remembered with a sudden shock everything that had happened.
He looked at the ground beneath and realized it was the tree’s bark and that he had been sleeping on a tree limb as wide and as long as a train. Behind him he saw the massive tree trunk with a beautifully carved oval door on the side. He looked over the edge and saw his dead campfire site far below with no
one around.
Hearing laughter, he spun around to face a scantily dressed native Indian about his age approaching with tears of happiness in his eyes, looking like he was seeing the first human being in his life.
To André’s surprise, the man embraced him in a bear hug, lifting him off the ground.
