the golden prize property appeared to be a very snug proposition. it was located about a mile up gregory gulch, and right in the midst of things. there was a good enough dug-out, set partly into the slope at the bottom of one of the rocky hills in the gulch, with log walls surrounding the single room and a sod roof. it contained a rusty stove (better than a fireplace) and a bunk and a slab table and a slab stool, all on a dirt floor. the cooking utensils were hung on the wall. the door, of split logs, like puncheons, swung by leather hinges and fastened with a wooden pin and latch-string.
but the mine of course was the most important. that was really the first thing to be inspected. archie showed it rather proudly, although it did not look very imposing, being only a deep trench into the hillside just beyond the cabin.
down the shallow side draw that helped to form the hill ran a small stream of muddy water, which finally joined the main drainage stream, below.
"you see," said archie, "i have to carry all my dirt to that stream so as to wash for the gold, and, gee! but it's hard work. about breaks my back. the digging and the climbing up and down are too much for me. a fellow ought to lead the water nearer, some way."
"why didn't you?" asked terry.
"i did think of digging a ditch, but that's an awful job, and i'd have to squat with a gold-pan just the same. i suppose if i'd stayed here i'd have built a sluice or hired one built. i couldn't build it myself, because the boards are too heavy to handle. and anyway, i want to go out. i can't breathe up here. i don't feel as good as when i came in, and mostly i just sit and puff. i felt lots better down on the plains. if i can't work the mine, what's the use in having it? but i'd a heap rather give it to you fellows than sell it to strangers."
"we won't take it, but we'll work it for you, on shares," again asserted harry.
archie stubbornly shook his head—and his thin cheeks were crimson.
"nope. you can share together but you can't share with me. you work it and keep all you find; i owe it to you. i'm so tickled i can hardly see."
"where do we begin?" cried terry, excited. "which is the best spot, archie?"
"i'll show you in the morning. i'll show you everything," panted archie, "before i go. we'll wash out some color, anyway."
"we'd better get our stuff unpacked before dark, terry," reminded harry. "the mine will keep. we know it's there. whew, but this is a big stroke of luck. doesn't seem as though we'd earned it."
dusk settled early in the gulch, and by the time they had stowed their stuff away, and jenny had been turned out to browse among the rocks and pines on the hillside, most of the camps in the gulch had ceased their work of the day and had changed to the work of the evening. smoke was welling from chimneys and from open fires, far and near; wood was being chopped and men and women were cooking. the gulch suddenly seemed cheerful and homelike: a miraculous contrast with the dark timber rising above on all sides, where the wild animals, bear and bobcats and elk and wolves, probably sniffed in astonishment.
harry made a big batch of flap-jacks and a pot of coffee; shep curled in a corner and snuggled for comfortable sleep; the air outside was chill, but within was warm, and a candle that archie produced gave light enough to eat by.
archie was awarded the bunk, for a good rest. harry and terry spread their beds on the floor. they were used to sleeping on the ground, but terry found it hard to go to sleep. he wanted to talk—he fairly itched to be out with spade and pan, digging gold from "their" mine. think of it! a mine, a genuine gold mine, at last! now they could pay his father back easy, and also show him and george how to get rich.
"i know how you feel," said archie, from the bunk. "they say that when gregory discovered his lode after tracing it for miles, and found four dollars in his first pan, he kept his partner awake till three o'clock in the morning, talking, and he was still talking at breakfast time."
"wonder how he discovered it," hazarded terry.
"he just started in on lower clear creek, at the platte, and kept panning, and panning, on up, until above this gulch the gold quit. then he turned into this gulch, because it seemed to yield the most color, and the gold was the coarsest, and he kept panning and panning until the color quit again. then he knew he'd come to the place where the gold below was washed from. so he went back to the platte and got a partner; and they sized up the natural lay of the gulch, at the highest spot where the color had quit—and they struck rich diggin's with the very first spadeful. that was the sixth of may. after they'd located a lot of ground for themselves and their friends the news got out, and now look at the mob!"
"well, i'll bet we've got something just as good," declared terry, confidently.
immediately after a hurried breakfast they started in to pan their own claim, under the direction of archie.
"i've always found the most gold in that spot there," he instructed. "there was another spot, where i panned first, but it's quit on me. expect, though, you'll find a lot of 'em. let's dig and try out some of the dirt in our pans."
into the spot terry plunged the spade. the dirt was gravelly and soft—two strokes of the blade were more than enough to loosen sufficient for the three pans. the pans were sheet-iron and about the size and shape of a large milk-pan. in a moment they three were trailing down to the little creek, each with some two inches of the dirt in the bottom of his pan. they squatted to fill the pans with water, and carefully twirled to slop it out again along with the dirt that ought to float off.
this was an anxious process. archie finished first, because he was in practice.
"i didn't get anything this time," he announced, gaily. "but i don't care. i'm going out."
terry's dirt had practically all flowed off. he picked out the bits of gravel—they were only pebbles and flakes of rock. he peered for yellow—yes, there it was! a glint mingled with a seam of coarse sand.
"i've got some!" he yelled. "see here? i've got some!"
archie looked in.
"that's right. let me finish it for you. i'll flirt that sand out."
so he did, with a dexterous twirl that sent part of the sand out and the rest against the sides, and left the heavier yellow in the middle.
"reckon i've landed a little, myself," remarked harry.
he had! perhaps a trifle more than terry, and the two pans together weren't enough to cover the point of the knife-blade with which they scraped the yellow up and carefully deposited it in father richards' old buckskin bag, brought for the purpose.
"gold's worth $21 an ounce and that's about a pennyweight, i guess," encouraged archie. "ninety cents—but it's a beginning. of course, where you dug i'd been digging before. you'll find a better place. you see, i've already taken out $80. so go ahead and keep panning, and i'll travel."
archie had arranged to leave with a wagon outfit who were disgusted because they'd discovered nothing. the two new proprietors of the golden prize stopped operations long enough to bid him good-bye, and watch him trudge away, his pack on his back.
"when you want some of your gold, come back or let us know," called harry, after.
"it's all yours," he retorted. "that's why i bought the mine."
"jiminy!" exclaimed terry. "that's big pay for what little we did—just giving him a drink of water and toting him in a cart."
the next few pans didn't yield anything at all; then harry made a "strike," as he called it, and scraped out as much yellow as would cover a finger-nail. he'd got the dirt from a new spot, "for luck," and from the same spot terry managed to extract about as much.
"we'll have to try about," counseled harry, "until we find spots like those of archie's. we've got a lot of space yet."
as archie had said, this digging and panning was hard work. at every stroke the spades clinked against rock—a boulder or a ledge—and to chip away with a pick was about as bad. and then, to trudge back and forth with the pans! but harry hit upon the idea of dumping the dirt upon a piece of gunny sacking and thus carrying several spadesful at a time, to be panned.
they scarcely stopped for dinner, and by evening had greatly widened the trench. when they knocked off for supper and sleep the buckskin sack was apparently as flat and as light as in the early morning, and they were mud from soles to waist. but nevertheless, the sack contained gold! peeking in, one might see it!
"we'll have to get a pair of scales," proclaimed harry. "and we'll have to go about this more scientifically. panning's too slow."
"how much did we find, do you think?" invited terry.
"five dollars' worth, maybe—and we're hungry enough to eat five dollars' worth of grub. but that's all right. we're just starting in, and we own all the ground from the cabin to that little creek, and from half-way up the hill down to the bottom. hooray!" he grabbed terry and they war-danced, while shep barked gladly.
"i'd rather dig gold than potatoes, wouldn't you, now?" demanded terry. "we're liable to make a hundred dollars 'most any day. we haven't done much more than scratch."
"what do you want for supper?" asked harry. "let's celebrate with antelope steak and apple pie."
"sure!" cheered terry. "we don't have to save on grub."
they were sitting down, on the stool and the edge of the bunk, to a sumptuous supper, when a step and a grunting sounded outside, shep growled, and into the half-open doorway was thrust an inquiring face. it was the red face of pat casey.
"good evenin' to yez," he proffered, blinking.
"come in, come in. glad to see you. sit and have a bite." and harry changed from the stool to the bunk-edge beside terry.
pat, muddy like everybody else, clumped in, agrin.
"sure, oi've had my supper, but oi'll set a bit," he answered. "oi've been a-lookin' for yez. an' are yez at home already?"
"yes, sir-ee," pronounced harry, triumphantly. "here we are."
"an' have yez located? 'tis the sick boy's property, ain't it? oi saw him goin' out this mornin'."
"all ours now, till he comes back again; cabin, claim, everything."
"and we're to have all we find," added terry. "we've panned over five dollars already and we're only learning. he took out $80, but there's the whole claim left yet: tons of it! we're going to put in a sluice and do a lot other improving and fix things up right."
"b' gorry, mebbe yez have a bonanzy," congratulated pat. "gold is where yez find it. oi've washed out a matter o' wan dollar an' sixty-siven cints meself, but didn't oi tell yez we'd all be rich together, some o' these days?" he sniffed and gazed over the table. "faith, is that a pie? a genuyine pie?"
"that's what. have a piece, pat?"
"'tis wan thing oi can't refuse," admitted pat, modestly. "'specially apple pie."
harry cut him a generous piece, and having dissected it with his knife into large mouthfuls, he accepted the invitation to finish the half; harry and terry ate the other half.
"ye made it?" he inquired, of harry. "glory be! sure, now, oi wish ye were in the business. couldn't ye make me a pie, occasional? oi'll pay ye two dollars apiece annytime."
"can't promise that yet, pat," laughed harry. "but whenever we have a pie you're welcome to help us eat it."
"not me," protested pat. "a rale apple pie is worth two dollars of anny man's money; an' if that ain't enough oi'll pay ye more."
but of course pie was a small item in comparison with a gold mine that might yield $100 a day, under proper management. however, pat lighted his short black pipe and spent the evening, and they all talked gold, gold, gold.
"i think," said harry, after pat had left, with much good-will and another reference to pie, and the two partners prepared for bed, "that tomorrow we'll make a tour around the camp, to see what other folks are doing, and then we'll know how to go about it the quickest way. panning is too slow for us."
