The Trail of a Sourdough Part 2

"In the meanwhile I was not wasting my time. I was using the pick upon a cl.u.s.ter of bunch gra.s.s hummocks, wis.h.i.+ng to fill the gold pan with dirt from underneath that I might wash it out and see if it contained 'colors'.

"Somehow I felt more subdued like, perhaps because I was growing tired; but Pa seemed to be affected differently. I could hear him grumbling to himself, and that was a bad sign. By and by his shovel struck something hard. He uttered an oath.

"'Pa Morrison!' I exclaimed, 'Ain't you ashamed of yourself? To think of your swearing like that. It's awful! Give me that shovel instantly.'

"'I won't!'

"'Give me that shovel, I say,' for we were both church members and had been for many years, and I was inexpressibly shocked at his profanity, and wished to remove the cause.

"'Shut your head, Mary Morrison! Whose doing this mining, will you tell me?'

"'O, of course you are, but then I wanted to help you if I could,'

trying to speak quietly and coming close enough to take the instrument of dispute from his hand if he would let me.

"No reply.

"'What did you strike, Pa, that made the shovel ring just now?'

"'Shovel!--ring!--It was ice! bloomin', blasted, infernal ice, I tell you,' he shouted in a rage, standing in black muck almost to his knees, with the same material bespattered over him from head to foot. Indeed his red and perspiring face showed a couple of great, black smirches with which he had unknowingly beautified himself.

"He was fairly sizzling with wrath. 'Git down here yourself, and go to work, and see how you like it,' he shouted excitedly, forgetting his English and everything but that we had encountered an astonis.h.i.+ngly hard proposition, and it had gotten the best of us. Like an old clock he was wound up and could not stop.

"'No gold, no nuggets, no gra.s.s roots even; nothing but muck and ice!'

and another mouthful of big, strong words gurgled from that man's lips like water from an uncorked jug.

"'Don't, Mr. Morrison, don't do that,' said I, in a voice cold as the ice in that four foot hole, 'you may be heard by some one who will report you to the church trustees, and then you will be expelled. At your age it would be a positive disgrace.'

"'Shut your mouth, I tell you,' he yelled, 'I ain't no baby! I know what I'm doing, and I know what I want to do, but it ain't mining on this confounded tundra!'

"At this I clapped my hands over my ears to shut out such language, but he kept on just the same.

"'Did we lease our farm for a whole year with all the machinery and stock, pack up our household furniture and come three thousand miles over this water like the blooming old idiots we are, to dig in a muckhole full of ice? Did we tell our banker that he should have the very first gold we took out of the ground to pay the two hundred dollar mortgage on our town lots? Does this look much like lifting mortgages from anything?'

"As I made no reply he insisted, 'Does it, I say?'

"'No, Pa Morrison, it doesn't,' I admitted, 'but wait a minute and let me talk.'

"'Well, ain't you talking now?' he rejoined irritably.

"Without noticing his exasperating words or tone I said calmly:

"'I remember hearing Leroy say when we first arrived that the tundra is a hard and peculiar proposition. Many have failed at mining it, but to those who go to work at it in the right way, at the proper time it will prove a bonanza. Now, probably you and I have not gone at it properly.'

"A surly silence ensued, during which Pa worked slowly, with anything but a good grace. Leroy was right. The tundra was a hard and peculiar proposition. Nothing like it had we ever seen before. For miles on three sides of us it spread itself like a carpet of green, dotted often with tiny pools of clear water, s.h.i.+ning like gla.s.s in the June suns.h.i.+ne.

Miles away to the northward rolled the smooth-topped hills, only one of them bearing a small, rocky crest; while further away, and forming a background to these, lay the snow-tipped Sawtooth."

To the south of us and close at hand spread the wonderful waters upon whose broad and beautiful bosom we had so lately sailed, and whose gently sweeping surf was today making sweet music among the sands and pebbles on the beach.

"Many s.h.i.+ps lay at anchor beyond. However, it was neither the scenery, nor the water, nor the s.h.i.+ps that we were now called upon to consider; but a layer of ice, the depth of which we did not know, lying between us and the much desired golden nuggets. The ground lay level and open to the sun, with nothing to prevent its thawing except this peculiar blanket of tundra mosses, vines, and plants, which formed an insulator as perfect as if made to order. It was now the middle of June. There was no doubt but that the ice would remain as it was all summer.

"Giant powder might possibly be used, but it was dangerous and expensive. I would never allow Father to handle the stuff. Better let it all go forever. Probably Pa was right about our being foolish to come here. We could go home again as many people were doing. There lay the steamers making preparations to sail; but how our friends at home would laugh at us!

"On the other hand was it not too soon to p.r.o.nounce on this tundra, and really no fair trial of the ground or mining? Then, too, our son probably had his own plans for us which must be more intelligent ones, for had he not had some experience and a year's residence in this place?

"There were the creek claims, besides. They must surely be very different and easier to work.

"Reasoning thus I had wandered away a short distance by myself in order to let Pa's temper cool, and had forgotten the panning I had started out to do.

"I now returned. Taking up the gold pan I filled it with dirt and muck from the four foot hole taken directly above the objectionable ice, and though I found its weight almost more than I could carry, and Pa did not offer to help me in the least, I carried it to a small pool of water at no great distance and began to pan it.

"How heavy it was to be sure. There might be gold in it yet. I would see presently. I had watched men panning on the beach that morning and I believed I could do it as it appeared very easy.

"Immersing the pan in the water, after pinning my skirts carefully higher, I began the rotary motion so necessary to separate the gold from the sand and dirt. A moment of this employment and I was breathing heavily and felt very warm. I put the pan down and flung off my sun-bonnet, pulling my sleeves a notch higher before continuing. Again the rotary movement with various dips of the edge of the big pan to let the waste material pa.s.s away. Small pebbles showed themselves and had to be picked out, the heavier material sinking in the natural order of things, to the bottom.

"I was watching the outcome with great interest, though panting for breath and covered with perspiration. Suddenly the soft earth under my right foot gave way, and I found myself, gold pan and all, in the mud and water up to my knees.

"I thought of Pa and his recent profanity, but I shut my teeth resolutely together, wringing out the edges of my petticoats and pulling my rubber boot tops still higher.

"Fis.h.i.+ng for the gold pan I brought it to light. Of course its contents were lost, my hands and clothes were muddied and my efforts wasted; but I would not give it up yet.

"Another pan of the same material was brought and a second trial was made, with success this time as the pan was not filled so full.

"Finally, after shaking, twisting, dipping, picking out pebbles, was.h.i.+ng off sand, and resting a moment at intervals, it was finished.

"There was gold in the pan.

"A few small 'colors', bright and s.h.i.+ning as if made so by much scouring of beach sand, appeared in the bottom of the gold pan to gladden my longing eyes, and I hastened to show them to Pa Morrison, whose head and shoulders were still visible in that four foot hole.

"'Humph!' said he, in much disgust, as I exhibited the result of my labors. 'Is that all?'

"'Why, yes.'

"'And no nuggets?'

"'No nuggets.'

"At that he flung the pick he had been using in the ice upon the ground.

"'I'm going home', he said shortly.

"Now I hardly knew whether he intended to say he was going to the United States, or to the little cabin and tent on Front Street, but rather than run the risk of exploding another bomb of wrath like the last one by asking a question, I kept quiet and made preparations to go back to our tent.

"On the beach we washed our hands and smoothed our clothing as best we could; but the frown which had lodged on Pa's forehead remained.

"That evening when Leroy had returned from his work and we had eaten our eight o'clock supper with the sun still s.h.i.+ning very brightly upon the tent, the boy lighted his pipe and asked for the story of the day's doings.

"I then gave it from the beginning. When I reached Pa's discovery of the ice in the prospect hole on the tundra, Leroy laughed heartily. Then seeing the aggrieved look on his father's face, and, I suppose, a bothered one on my own, he became more serious, and drawing closer, took my hand in both of his.

"'I never intended you to begin mining in that way, Mother,' he said, simply, in a low voice. 'I want you here to help me keep house, to mend my clothes, to bake bread and fry griddle cakes, and do the many little things for Father and me that only you can do. In this way I can keep my health and give all my time to my mining.'