Carson and Buchan were sanguine over our prospects, too much so, I thought, for men who had no experience in mining.

I located the claim so as to include the cliff and spring and when I made out the registration papers, I said: "Gentlemen, what shall we call the mine?"

"Name it the Maldonado," said Carson.

"What!" exclaimed Buchan, turning an ashen paleness.

"The Major Domo," replied Carson, looking somewhat abashed.

"Name it the Aberdeen," said Buchan. "I like to hear that name spoken, it was my old home in Scotland."



XXIII.

THE TWO OLD BLACK CROWS.

Amos sat in the little back room of Rayder's office in Denver. His beady black eyes glistened beneath his beetle brows. A pleased expression shone on his thin face, drawn in wrinkles like stained parchment. Rayder was out, but had left instructions for him to wait. As he sat there his eye caught sight of something interesting on Rayder's desk. The door was closed and he was alone. He leaned forward and took up some slips of paper for closer inspection. They were certificates of assay from Pendleton. The pleased look vanished as he noted Amos No. 1, Amos No. 2, Amos No. 3, and so on for a dozen or more slips. Rayder did not trust him, and had had the sample of ore assayed by Pendleton for corroboration.

"He does not even believe in honesty among thieves," he mused, as he carefully replaced the papers. Then the pleased look came back to his face.

"All the better," he thought. "He will deal now and it is my time to strike before the iron cools."

He drew his chair further back from the desk, and pretended to be reading a newspaper when he heard Rayder coming.

"Just the man I have been wanting to see," said Rayder, extending his hand, "how is everything in Saguache and how is Annie?"

"Annie is handsome as ever, but there is a new assayer coming to town next month and I understand he is on the dead square, and what we do we have got to do all-fired quick. How is this for an eye-opener?" He took from his pocket several lumps of shining ore.

"Sylvanite," exclaimed Rayder. "What does it run?"

"Eighty ounces to the ton. There is a quarter of a million dollars on the dump and the fellows think it is copper and pyrites of iron."

"How would it do to contest the claim?"

"Dangerous business, they have taken to killing claim jumpers. One was shot last week, and this outfit will shoot, no mistake. It is better to buy them out for a song. They are about broke anyway. They believe everything I tell them, have a child-like confidence in me, same as everybody has. I tell you, Rayder, I stand at the top in the estimation of everybody, and all we have got to do is to have the buyer on the ground, and when they come in with their next samples I will prove to them their values have run out, show them some rich stuff from down the valley and like all others of their class, they will stampede."

"That sounds good, but tell me more of Annie, did she appreciate the cloak I sent her for a Christmas present?"

"Appreciate it! I should say she did. She just worships it because it came from you, and say, she has your photograph on the wall where she can see it all the time. She just dotes on that picture. I tell her there is the chance of her life, a fine house, fine clothes, a chance to go abroad and cultivate her musical talent, become a great singer and meet dukes and lords and crowned heads. Why, the girl is just crazy over you, and I believe she would marry you even if you did not have a cent. It is like marrying December to May, you sixty and she nineteen, pretty and vivacious—warm up your old bones, eh?"

Rayder's eyes shone and he stroked his beard with delight. "Charley," he called to his office boy, "bring up a quart of whisky, some lemons and sugar."

"Sweet creature, I love thee," said Amos a few minutes later, holding up a half goblet of whisky. "You do the proper thing in setting out these kind of glasses; puts me in mind of my old home down in Texas, where we never drink out of anything smaller than a tin cup or a gourd."

"Here is to Annie and Rayder—may your posterity become presidents and wives of presidents."

"Drink hearty," said Rayder, emptying his glass, which he had filled to the fullness of Amos' out of compliment.

"Charley, bring up a box of perfectos," he shouted. "You may then lock up and go home."

The glasses were again drained and the two black crows chattered until the streets were growing quiet for the night. Supper was forgotten in the love feast of Amos and Rayder.

"Do you know, Amos, I always did love you just like a brother?"

"Here, too, Rayder, you know the first time we saw each other, I sez to myself—I sez—there is a man that would stick to a friend through thick and thin."

"You are that kind of a man yourself, Amos, is the reason you have a good opinion of me. I never had a friend in distress yet that I didn't help him out."

"That's right, Rayder, that's right. Them's the qualities that go to make up nature's noblemen. Lord, if I had a known you years ago we'd a bin millionaires—my knowledge of mines and your sagacity. That's what counts, and you never fail in your estimate of men, either. Lord, you was born under lucky stars.

"Take another drink, Rayder, take a cistern full. 'Taint often we meet on auspicious occasions like this, and we won't go home 'till mornin,' and we won't go home 'till morning, hic—hurrah for Annie, Rayder, and a million outer the mine."

"An' she shame short of share of prosperity to my brother Amos," and Rayder took another drink.

"Shay, Rayder, you come and go home with me and hang around a day or two until you buy the mine and play sweet with Annie, an' the night of the weddin' we'll hev a dance and send you away on your bridal tour in a blaze of glory."

"I'll do it, I'll do it, Amos, an' then we'll be almost brothers 'cordin' ter law, anyway."

"Shay, Rayder, did I tell ye I had a little mix up with a woman, an' I'm scared to death 'fear old woman 'ill find it out. I got 'ter square the deal or I'm a goner and stuff's all off, want yer to let me take ten thousand fer few days, got ter blow a lot o' money on weddin', too, yer see."

"All right, Amos, youse's square a man's ever met. I'll let ye hev it."

"Good, thet's relief; sooner I get it easier mind'll be. Nuthin' like 'mediate action to relieve man's mind, you know. Let's take nuther drink and ye can write th' check with steadier hand."

Rayder swallowed another drink while Amos fumbled about the desk until he found Rayder's check book.

"Bet ye can't spell ten without making a crook. There now, if you can write thousand as well you're a peachareno. Bully, now write Silas Rayder at the bottom. You're a brother in fact, Rayder, an' I love ye better as any brother. Shay, let's hev nuther bottle."

And Amos pocketed the check and quietly slipped down stairs, to the saloon and was back with another quart before Rayder had roused from his drunken stupor. He poured out another half goblet of whisky.

"Shay, Rayder, de ye know about story of Guvner of North Carolina sed to Guvner of South Carolina, to effet an' words, it was long time between drinks?"

"An' that was a damn shame Guvner hed to wait, ought to had you along an' famous epigram ed never been born."

Half an hour later Rayder was stretched upon the lounge in the little back office, dead to the world. Amos sat by the window sobering up until the grey of the morning. The sleeping man roused, and Amos gave him another half goblet of whisky followed by a sip of water. He had drawn the blinds and left the coal-oil lamp burning when it grew light, lest the sleeping man should arouse and discover it was daylight.

When the office boy came, he cautioned him not to awaken Rayder. He then crossed over to the bank, called for the face payment of the check in gold coin. He took the money to the Wells Fargo Express company's office and expressed it to his wife in Saguache.



Rayder was sleeping when he returned. He placed the check book in its accustomed place in the desk, destroyed all evidence of the night's debauch and left a note on the desk saying: "My dear Rayder, I have been suddenly called home by the illness of my wife. Come to Saguache as soon as you can make it convenient. Amos."

When Rayder awoke it was four o'clock in the afternoon. His head was in a whirl and every muscle was twitching. He called Charley and sent for a doctor. The doctor saw the trouble at a glance. He called a hack and accompanied Rayder to his home.

"This will never do, Mr. Rayder. You have drank much whisky in your time and it has become a poison to your system. Do not look for me to get you out of this in less time than four weeks."



XXIV.

THE RECKLESS HAND OF FATE.

The day was fair when Carson left Saguache with pretty Annie Amos seated beside him in the sleigh. Although he had spent the night in fearful anxiety, walking the streets, he now felt such a relief over getting out of town, undiscovered by Mary Greenwater, that he was bubbling over with high spirits. In the presence of Annie his better nature stood outward and he even surprised himself with his quick sallies of wit and repartee. Annie was charmed with his presence, and as the two chatted gaily, they did not notice the lowering clouds about the Spanish Peaks, until a strong wind began to raise and soon one of those sudden storms so common to the region was coming in all its fury. In a short while it became a raging blizzard. The snow drifted in blinding swirls, so dense that the horse's head could not be seen.

Carson had experienced the blizzard on the range and knew the only safe course was to let the horse have the reins, and trust to its animal instinct to find a shelter. He drew the robes securely about Annie and endeavored to allay her fears, although conscious of the peril they were in. The horse was plodding its way through the snow-drifts and it was evident that the animal would soon become exhausted. The blizzard might last all night, or it might continue for three days. On those trackless wastes in such a storm death by freezing was almost certain, unless they reached a place of shelter. The hours dragged by. He kept up an incessant talking with Annie, lest she should fall into the fatal sleep. The girl was quick to perceive his tender care, and in full apprehension of their danger, felt a growing confidence in the man beside her. She knew that he fully realized their peril and admired him for his efforts to conceal his fears from her.

It was growing darker and the horse was moving with feeble steps. Carson was at the point of giving vent to his fears, when the animal stopped. He left the sleigh, and upon going to the horse's head, found they were beside a cabin. His heart gave a great leap of joy and he called exultantly to Annie.

The cabin was deserted, but, praise Providence, it was shelter. The door swung open on its hinges. There was a fireplace with some half-burned logs in a heap of ashes. When Annie was securely inside, he brought in the robes from the sleigh and next unhitched the horse and brought the animal inside the cabin. This made Annie's heart leap with joy; she had not considered how they would protect the horse, and this humane act on the part of Carson gave her the most implicit confidence in the man. There is nothing to fear from a man who is so kind to animals, was her mental comment.

Soon there was a blazing fire on the hearth. Some poles were found by the door. These Carson dug from the snow and brought inside. He had no axe with which to cut them, and in the emergency, he laid the ends together in the fire slantwise from the chimney, and as they burned away, he shoved the logs forward. The wind screamed in wildest fury, while the snow drifted in through the rough clapboard roof.

Until now no thought had been given to the lunch which Annie had prepared for the trip. She brought it out from among the wraps and when Carson gave the horse a buttered biscuit as his share of the meal, she watched the act with a thrill of gladness. The blazing logs gave warmth and light, and the man and woman sat and talked throughout the long watches of the night, while the snow drifted and the wind screamed and roared, making the loose clapboards of the roof creak and groan.

There these two, thrown together by the reckless hand of fate, told incidents of their lives and won the love and sympathy of each other. A new song was born in Carson's breast. For a moment he seemed to remember a former life; somewhere out in the wide, white waste and hush of infinite space, where they had known each other and now their souls imprisoned in forms of clay, they had met by chance and renewed an old affinity.

As she told him the simple story of her life, he listened with ever-increasing interest. An orphan at an early age, she had since lived in the home of her Uncle Amos. Everything had gone well until the last year, when her uncle brought Rayder to their home and insisted that she should regard him as a suitor for her hand. Rayder, old and grey, had dyed his whiskers and tried to appear boyish. His intentions were well enough—he would give her all she would ask that money could purchase—but she could not love the man and could never think of becoming his wife. Amos, her uncle, was a man of avarice and greed. He insisted that it was a duty she owed him for his fatherly care in bringing her up. He dwelt on the advantages it would be to him in his old age and that it would be only right for her to help him in this way. He had appealed to her generous nature and sought to make her believe this sacrifice on her part would be just and right. Amos' wife had taken the same view of the matter and urged that the wedding should be at an early date. Annie, alone in the world, had no one to whom she could go for counsel. Some of the coarse women of the mining camp who came to their home thought her the most fortunate of girls to have a suitor as rich as Rayder, and ridiculed the idea of her refusing to accept the greatest opportunity of her life. Some of their husbands were rough, uncouth men, who cared nothing for the luxuries of a home, spent most of their money and time drinking and gambling at the Lone Tree, and they gauged conditions as they were with themselves. They were honest-hearted women of the frontier who believed they were doing the girl a kindness. It was not through bravery that she was cool and collected, yesterday, in the presence of death from the lions, she told him, but because she had almost made up her mind that she did not care. Death had lost its terrors in the contemplation of impending fate.

He did not tell her of the burden of his heart. He did not feel that he dared to ask for sympathy. At that hour he would have given ten years of his life to undo his marriage with Mary Greenwater by the ancient custom of the Swiftest Horse. He knew the Indian woman and knew that she intended to kill him and yet he felt helpless, powerless. He did tell the girl beside him that he, too, was alone in the world and hoped to merit the love of a good woman and that his every act in life should go to prove his sincerity. And so, amid the wild scenes of the night, they talked.

At noon the following day, the storm abated and when the flurries of snow had ceased they saw the town of Del Norte well down on the plain.

Annie was received at the home of her friends with delight and when she told them of her recent adventures, they gave expression to heartfelt joy for Annie's safety, and called Carson a hero.

Carson did not leave Del Norte for six weeks. Meanwhile, Annie visited her friends. When the two were not together in the cozy parlor at Annie's host's, Carson kept close in his room at the hotel. He wanted to delay the meeting with Mary Greenwater as long as possible. If she was only a man,—ah, that would be different! It would then be knife to knife, or bullet to bullet—he would not shrink. But she was a woman, an educated Indian woman upon whom society had some claim, and she had some claim upon it.

Annie promised to become his wife and it was arranged that she should return to her uncle's home, and as soon as he could arrange his affairs at the mine they would go to an eastern state. He first intended, however, to make a clean breast of the Mary Greenwater affair, and trust his fate to her love for him.

When he reached the foot of the Sangre de Christo range, through the great depths of snow, he saw the fearful havoc of the snow slide and noted the slanting position of the edgewise cliff. Thinking it was of but recent occurrence, he hurried to Saguache and gave the alarm that two of his companions were buried beneath the mountain of snow.

In no place in the world does an appeal for help meet with a quicker response than among the pioneers of the west. The news flew over the town like wildfire that two miners were imprisoned in a snow slide. A relief party was organized at once and Carson led them to the base of the range.

Mary Greenwater saw Carson organizing the relief, she stood within a few feet of him unobserved, and could have shot him, but she knew better than shoot a man in the act of aiding the distressed. The crowd would hang her, woman or no woman, and she knew it. Some other time than this—she would wait.



XXV.

CORDS OF LOVE ARE STRONG.

Hattie Judson sat by the window overlooking the green wheat fields of the Los Ossis valley. The bells in the old mission were calling the humble worshippers of the valley, just as they had done for more than one hundred and forty years. She watched the blue haze of the valley growing denser in the shadows of the evening. She heard the low boom of a signal gun roll up from the sea. It was from the coast steamer in the open roadstead, the signal she was listening for in the hope that it would bring her a letter—the letter for which she had been waiting for six weeks.

The shadows from the coast hills crept up the valley, and the stars shone, when the whistle of the little narrow-gauge engine announced its arrival from the port. She put on her wraps and went to the postoffice and waited a good long hour before the mail was distributed. There was nothing in her box except the San Francisco paper. And yet she felt intuitively there must be some news. She returned to her home with a vague feeling of dread and lit the parlor lamp. Mechanically she scanned the headlines of the paper when her eye caught the line:

"Imprisoned Miners in Snow-slide; Relief Party Working Night and Day."

"Saguache, Colo.—Word reached here last night that John Buchan and James Winslow, miners working a claim on the Sangre de Christo range, were buried in their cabin beneath a snow slide. It is believed the men are alive although there seems to be small hope of rescuing them on account of an overhanging cliff which may topple at any moment, with the melting snows and crush them out of existence. Rescue parties are at work night and day."

The room seemed to whirl and grow dark as she finished reading. Tears came to her eyes and she cried aloud. The members of the family came to find the cause of her outcry and found her in a flood of tears. They read the dispatch and knew the cause. The paper was two days old from San Francisco. What could she do? She must know at once. She went to the telegraph office and sent a message of inquiry to the mayor of Saguache. It was twelve o'clock when the message came: "Lines all down in San Luis valley." There was a telegraph line to San Louis Obispo, but no coast line railroad nearer than Paso Robles Hot Springs, sixty miles inland. It would be three days before there was another steamer for San Francisco. She felt that if she waited the suspense would kill her. She must go to Saguache.

In the grey of the morning she was seated beside a driver in a light running rig behind the swiftest pair of horses in the town. The northern express was due at noon and the distance of sixty miles must be made. The fleet animals climbed the mountain slopes and crossed the divide of the Santa Lucia range, and went speeding through the beautiful Santa Marguerite valley with its carpet of green, enlivened with splashes of yellow from the wild mustard blossoms. Across the swift flowing ford of the Salinis river, through deep ravines and mountain gorges, and over miles and miles of sun-baked sand and dreary waste of stunted cactus and sagebrush, the horses sped.

The scorched winds of the desert caught up the sands and hurled them hot into their faces and stung them like tiny sparks.

Dripping with foam the horses were reined up at the depot platform in just five hours and fifty minutes from the time of starting—a record that stands in San Louis Obispo today as the best ever made, and that too by a big-hearted western man who did it only to aid a woman in distress.

The train sped over miles of brown and parched desert, studded with a growth of palms that rattled in the sultry wind like dried sunflower stalks. The scenes were scarcely noticed by Hattie as she sat in the coach busied with her own thoughts. The train was an express but it seemed to her to creep along. The rumble of the wheels clanking on the iron rails seemed to say: "You'll be too late, you'll be too late."

At Sacramento there was a wait of four hours for the east bound express, and Hattie sat in the depot where she could watch the clock, tick, tock, tick, tock—swinging the pendulum in these moments of suspense and waiting. Those monotonous sounds persistently repeated the single theme, seconds were born and ushered into eternity with the slow swing of the pendulum; every tick brought the time of starting nearer, but the pendulum swung so slow.

Those four hours watching the clock were the most tedious of her life. When the time was drawing nigh and the waiting passengers were stirring about, the man in the ticket office came out and wrote upon the blackboard, "East bound Express two hours late."

Again the slow swinging pendulum sent a torrent of woe to the unhappy girl, and when the train rolled into the yards she felt as though she had lived within sound of that clock for a year.

The green valley changed to the red earth of the foothills, still showing signs of the gold hunters of 1849. The puffing and wheezing of the engine told they were climbing steep grades, and soon they were in the snows of the Sierra Nevada mountains. The train entered the forty-two mile snow shed and when half way through struck a hand car, derailing the engine.

It was day without, but dark within the sheds. A kindly woman with her daughter occupied the berth opposite Hattie. She noticed the troubled look on the girl's face and from that time on until they separated at Cheyenne, did everything she could to make the journey pleasant. But there was the ever present suspense and doubt.

It was ten hours before the train was again under way, but they had lost the right of way on the road and were compelled to make frequent stops on the sidings to allow other trains to pass.

As the train skirted the Great Salt Lake with its bleak and desolate islands of rock rising in silhouette against the cold grey skies, Hattie compared the scene to the feeling of utter desolation within her soul.

A storm was raging on the Laramie plains and when the snow plow, driven by the tremendous force of an extra engine in front, stuck fast in the snow, she began to have some conception of the mighty force of an avalanche, and the difficulty of reaching imprisoned men beneath its weight.

The railroad ended at a little station in the San Luis valley and then followed many miles of staging in a crowded coach. Everywhere the girl met with the most profound respect and attention from fellow passengers. She was always given the best seat in the coach, and otherwise made as comfortable as circumstances would permit. Such was the gallantry of these men of the frontier to the girl who was traveling alone.

At the last stage station before reaching Saguache, she heard men talking of the imprisoned miners in the Sangre de Christo mountains, but she was unable to learn any of the particulars other than that the relief party was still working. When, at last, she alighted at the hotel in Saguache her first question was concerning the imprisoned men. They will have them out in a few days if nothing happens was the assurance given by the landlady. "They are alive, we know, for we can see the smoke coming out from under the rock."

The two men under the snow slide had been the talk of the town for days. Every day a new party went to the scene to relieve those who had worked the day and night before, tunneling up the steep mountain side through snow of an unknown depth.

When Hattie reached the tunnel she begged to be allowed to go to the end of it where the men were working. She was assisted up the mountain side by willing hands and when she reached the workers one of them said: "The boys are all right for we can hear their voices."

It was then she gave an exclamation of joy, and when Buchan said to me in the cabin, "It seems that I hear her voice," he was right.



XXVI.

WHEN THE DEATH GLOOM GATHERS.

Amos staggered out of the fog of powder smoke and groped his way to the door. He took the center of the street reeling as he went, and made his way to his home. The scenes at the Bucket of Blood were magnified in his whisky-crazed brain. He raved in wild delirium, fighting the demons that gathered around his bedside. The doctor came and shook his head. "He has been drinking so long that my medicine will not act," he said. Amos glared wildly from his bloodshot eyes when a monkey seemed to leap on the footboard. He held a glass in his hand. "Have a cocktail, Amos," said the monkey, as he tossed the liquid into the air and caught it in another glass. Amos' throat was parched and he wanted the cocktail, but the monkey did not give it to him. A rhinoceros came creeping through the wall and looked at him with its leaden eyes. The monkey tossed the cocktail into the wide open mouth of the rhinoceros, who smacked his lips and said to the monkey, "Let's play ante over."

"All right," replied the monkey, "what with?"

"Get his eye, get his eye," exclaimed the rhinoceros.

The monkey crept forward and plucked out one of Amos' eyes, as he groaned and yelled. For awhile the rhinoceros was on one side of the dresser and the monkey on the other, tossing his eye to and fro between them. The scene changed. He was on a white horse, plunging down a steep rocky road lined with trees on either side; pythons and rattlesnakes reached out from among the branches striking their fangs at his head. There was the form of a dead woman behind him on the horse. Her cold arms clung about his neck as little devils came out from behind the trees and shouted: "You did it; you did it." The horse was now plunging over a snow-covered country. He felt the icy winds chill his heart. He was trying to shake off the dead arms that clung to his neck, when the horse stopped in a wild spot among the rocks. A grave digger, with the flesh of face and arms dried to the bone, appeared. "We will bury her here," he said as he sunk his spade into the earth. As the grave digger threw up the clods they turned to little devils, the size of frogs and yelped, "We are the sins of Amos come out of the grave." The vision passed and another appeared. Three Sisters of Charity stood at the footboard of his bed. They were looking down on him with sorrowful eyes. One of them lifted her hand and all was a livid flame. Amos raised his head and gave one prolonged shriek. A shriek of death.

When Amos returned to Saguache after his spree with Rayder his first act was to purchase a ranch in the San Luis valley and deed it to his wife. He then went to his assay office and drew down the blinds and sat in the shadows like a cunning old spider in hiding waiting for the unwary fly for which he had wove his web. His life had been that of the iconoclast who creates nothing to adorn the world's great gallery of gods. But he was not philosophical enough to evolve an idea that would disrupt existing beliefs.

It was some weeks after his arrival home, when he espied Rayder one morning coming down the street towards his office. He cautiously turned the key in his office and slipped over to the Bucket of Blood and returned with some beer and two quart bottles of whisky. When Rayder returned an hour later he was maudlin drunk.

Rayder was still pale from the effects of his recent debauch and when he found Amos in an intoxicated condition he went away, not caring to stay and talk with him on important business matters lest he should get drawn into another spree. Meanwhile, Carson had arrived and spread the news of the imprisoned miners under the snow slide. Rayder learned that this was the mine he had come to purchase through the connivance of Amos and concluded to wait and see what time would develop.

Day after day he sought Amos, but the latter was too drunk to talk with any sense. He then sought Carson and offered financial assistance in the rescue work, but the men spurned the offer. They felt they were doing a God-given duty and to receive money for an act of that kind would be debasing their manhood. Such was it then and such is now the spirit of the West. He called at the Amos home, and while he was received by the matron and failed to see Annie, he thought he detected an air of distress in the surroundings, and attributed it to Amos' condition. Feeling that he was at their home at an inopportune time, he went away and started out to find Amos and if possible persuade him to quit drinking. Not finding him at his office he took a nearer route and entered the Bucket of Blood by the back door. He passed two or three hoboes sitting on beer kegs on the outside. "Say, old timer, can't I dig into ye for two bits?" asked one. The man was trembly and his lips quivered as he spoke. Remembering his own recent condition Rayder handed the fellow a dollar and motioning to the others, said: "Divide up." The men jumped to their feet with alacrity and followed the first man to the bar.

Rayder walked to the faro table where Amos sat with his back to him putting down twenty dollar gold pieces on the money. "I never squeal," Amos was saying to another man who was drawing out the cards from the box. "Bet yer life, man wins my money I never squeal," Amos was saying to the dealer. "Got skads of it anyhow, and when that's gone I know where to get a mine worth more an' a million." Rayder stood watching the player tossing twenty after twenty in gold and tapping a tiny bell now and then when a waiter came and took the orders from those seated around the table watching the game. They all called for whisky except the dealer, he took a cigar. It requires a clear head to deal faro.

Rayder grew tired of watching and sat down. He was thinking where did Amos get so much money? He had not attended to the business of his office since his recovery and had had no occasion to look into his check book. After a certain period of the night with Amos in his back office, everything was a blank. He remembered the conversation about Annie and the mine but had no recollection about signing the check. To see Amos sitting at that table losing money like a prince at Monte Carlo, almost took his breath. He began to feel certain now as to the fabulous riches of the mine, for he could conceive of no other way by which Amos could get possession of so much money. He had learned of Mrs. Amos purchasing the ranch and paying for it in gold, and wondered at the time. Then he thought that perhaps Amos was trying to throw him off the purchase of the mine in order to secure the property himself. There was a mystery somewhere he could not fathom.

The board partition against which he sat was thin, and while he was not playing eavesdropper, he could not help hearing: "The secret of that mine has been known to me since I was a child," a woman was saying, "but I never supposed Carson would locate it when I gave him the papers." And then she recounted the story of the hidden Spanish treasure in the Grand river hills and continued: "The two men they are trying to rescue from under the snow slide are dead long ago and the only one left that is interested is Carson. I will get him out of the way, and you must file on the claim, I cannot, for I am an Indian, but you can. Besides, I could never sing my death song in peace if he lives."

"Tonight, then," her companion said. "You had better act before matters go any farther."

Here was another revelation to Rayder, he saw coming through one archway an Indian woman, and through the other, Coyote Jim who slowly walked toward the faro table. Rayder's first and best impulse was to see Carson and warn him of impending danger. His second thought was that such a course would be bad financial policy. No, he would let the woman kill him if she could and he would jump the claim himself. He was certain now of its fabulous value and determined to have it at any price.

And so the old black crow sat and waited and plotted, while the other old black crow gambled away his money, and when the shooting was over, and the coal oil lamps flickered their sickly flame through the curling powder smoke, Rayder was raised from the floor where he had flattened himself against the baseboard, trembling like a frightened sheep about to be led to the slaughter.



XXVII.

A NIGHT OF TRAGEDIES.

The Lone Tree saloon and dance hall was ablaze with lights. Two bar-keepers in white jackets were setting out the bottles over the long, polished counter. There was the clink of glasses, as men stood in rows drinking the amber-colored liquid. "Have another on me," was frequently heard along the counter, as someone felt it was his turn to set up the drinks to the crowd.

A brawny miner stepped up to the side of a sheep herder who had been edging in all evening to get free drinks—and squirted a mouthful of tobacco juice in his ear.

"If anybody else had done that but you, Bill, I'd be tempted to strike him."

"Don't let your friendship for me spoil your notions," the miner said with a contemptuous look.

The sheep herder made no reply, as he wiped his ear. The fire that burned in his stomach demanded whiskey, and he would brook any insult to get it. He had reached the level of the sodden, and others passed him by. It was yet early in the night, and crowds were gathering in the rear of the large room, about the roulette wheel, the crap tables and faro layout, back of which the lookout was seated on a raised platform. Stacks of coin in gold and silver were on the tables to tempt the players. At other tables men were seated playing cards and smoking. In an adjoining room, cut with archways, was the dance hall. An orchestra on a platform played rag-time music, while painted women in short dresses to give them a youthful appearance, sat on benches against the wall, or danced with swaggering men to the calls of a brawny bullet-headed floor manager. His bleared eyes and heavy swollen jaw showed the effects of a recent debauch ending in a fist fight.

The women urged their partners to drink at the end of every dance. While the men drank whiskey, they gave the bar-keepers a knowing look, and a bottle like the others was set out containing ginger ale which the women drank as whiskey, and were given a check, which they afterwards cashed as their percentage.

While the sign on the windows read The Lone Tree Saloon and Dance Hall, the place had earned the sobriquet of the Bucket of Blood, from the many tragedies enacted therein. And this place was run by a woman, Calamity Jane, famous in several mining camps. One fellow analyzed her when he said: "She is a powerful good woman, except she hain't got no moral character."

Coyote Jim, faro dealer, sauntered in and took his place at the table. His eyes were a steel blue, the kind that men inured to the mining camps of the early west had learned were dangerous. His face was thin and white, hair of a black blue, like a raven's wing, hung half way to his shoulders. His thin hands handled the pasteboards in the box with a dexterity that marked him an expert. Supple in form, with quick, cat-like motions, he made one think of a tiger.

A dark faced woman wearing a Spanish mantilla was winning at the roulette wheel. The onlookers crowded about. She was winning almost every bet. The interest grew intense, men crowded forward to catch a glimpse of her whose marvelous luck surpassed anything in the history of the Lone Tree. Her stack of chips of white, red and blue, grew taller at every turn of the wheel. The face of the gambler at the wheel grew vexed and then flushed with anger. The devil appeared to have been turned loose and he was losing his stakes. The chips vanished from his box in twenties, fifties and hundreds, and the group of onlookers stared in astonishment. As he counted out his last hundred he said: "If you win this you have broke the game."

The woman lost and the gambler began to have hope, when she won again, and so the pendulum of chance swung to and fro over those last hundred chips for an hour, when the gambler slammed the lid of his box with the exclamation: "You have busted the game!"

The woman cashed in her checks. Over five thousand dollars was paid to her. She walked up to the bar and threw down five hundred dollars on the counter and said to a bar-tender:

"I pay for everybody's drinks here tonight. Take no money from any of them and when this runs short, call on me."

The word was passed, "Free drinks at the bar," and the crowd surged forward. A half-tipsy fellow raised his glass above the heads of others. "Here's to Mary Greenwater, Queen of the Cherokee Indians!"

"Rah fer Mary Greenwater," chattered old Amos, holding his reeling form up by the bar rail.

The invitation was even too much for Rayder, strong as had been his resolution to let the stuff alone. The temptation of free drinks was too great, he imagined he needed something and called for gin.

Just then, some one came in and announced that the two men had been rescued from under the snow-slide. The games stopped and the men at the tables ordered their drinks from the waiters. The dance in the adjoining room stopped in the middle of a set, while men and women crowded about the bar.

Only three in that room did not rejoice at the news—Mary Greenwater, Coyote Jim and Rayder. Amos was too drunk to know whether he ought to be sad or rejoice. He did neither, but gave another loud "Rah for Mary Greenwater!" when a waiter led him to a seat. When the hubbub of voices which the announcement of the rescue had created, had subsided somewhat, the players resumed their games and amid the clink of chips and glasses, could now and then be heard from some gamester, "Hold on there, that's mine!"

Mary Greenwater went to the faro table. "Get up, Coyote," she said, "I'm going to bust this bank, and you and I have been together so much that they will think you have throwed the game. Let some one else deal." Another dealer was called and Mary laid down a hundred on the ace. Men crowded about as before, when she was at the roulette wheel. There was a hush for a moment, when the clear tones of a man at the door rang out.

"Hands up, everybody. Don't try to escape, the doors are guarded!"

All was confusion in an instant. Calamity Jane, eyes ablaze, strode from behind the curtain in the dance hall. Quick of action, she fired at the nearest hold-up in mask. The uproar was furious. The lamps were shot out by confederates of the hold-ups. The ball room women screamed with fright, while jets of fire spit from revolvers in different parts of the room. Men were afraid to make an outcry, lest a bullet would follow at the sound of their voice. Coyote Jim was crouching like a tiger, beside the stacks of coin on the table. In his hand was a long, keen blade. He felt a stealthy hand near his own and he lunged the knife. A heavy groan and a few words in a language which only he understood, and the body sank to the floor. The tiger's blood was now afire and he leaped upon the faro table, revolver in hand. His form was outlined in silhouette by a light across the street, when a spark flashed in the darkness and he fell headlong to the floor. There was a heavy roar of voices, as the men stampeded to the door.

When lights were brought from the outside, the masked men were gone except one. He lay dead near the door, with a bullet from Calamity Jane's revolver in his brain. Coyote Jim lay dead, and by his side, Mary Greenwater, with her life's blood still ebbing from the knife stab.

From this scene of tragedy, Amos made his escape to end with the horrors of delirium at home. The Bucket of Blood had maintained its reputation.

The excitement of the affair spread over the town, and among the spectators who crowded in was a haggard man. His eyes were hollow and deep-set, showing that he had undergone a severe mental strain for weeks. He saw them lift the affrighted Rayder from his place of safety at the baseboard, then his eyes rested on the dead woman at the faro table. He threw a cloth over her face, and sat staring into vacancy until the undertaker and assistants came. Then he took the undertaker aside and said: "See to it that she has a Christian burial. I will be responsible." When she was buried the next day, there was one attendant beside the undertaker and his assistants, at the grave.

The tragedies of the night marked a new era in Saguache. The better element arose in their might and demanded that the Bucket of Blood be forever closed.



XXVIII.

FROM OUT THE SHADOWY PAST.

When Buchan arose in the cabin and said "I thought I heard a voice, her voice," I was amazed. It did not occur to me that anyone would attempt our rescue, else why had they not done it long ere this?

He opened the door and shouted, then turning to me, exclaimed: "They are digging us out."

Our hearts leaped for joy. We shook hands in expression of delight and Buchan danced a highland fling around the room. Two men, snow-covered, entered and hailed us joyously. Then came a woman, followed by Carson. She ran to Buchan and he caught her in his arms. I was deaf and could not hear what they said or I would write it word for word, but he kissed her and she cried, and he wiped away some tears, and I turned my back and pretended to be talking to Carson.

The men gathered up our few belongings and we hurriedly left the cabin. Sleds were waiting at the foot of the mountain, and we were soon speeding toward Saguache. The air was crisp and the stars shone like eyes of tender sympathy over the white plain. We were brought to a stop at the hotel. Men and women whom we had never seen came and joyfully shook us by the hands, and had much to say in congratulation. The news of Hattie's arrival and her interest in Buchan had spread over the camp, and many were the motherly old women who came to say sympathetic things and invite her to their homes, so great was their admiration for her loyalty and sacrifice for the man she loved.

The next day a mass meeting was called by the citizens. The Lone Tree saloon and dance hall had to go. A railroad survey had been completed through the town, and public works had been projected by the newly-elected city council. A new era was dawning for Saguache. The hall was crowded, as one citizen after another spoke of the future possibilities of the town, and a good government that would no longer tolerate a lawless element. When resolutions were passed and the assembly was ready to adjourn, one speaker arose and said he heartily endorsed everything that was said and done there that evening, but there was another matter which should have attention: One of the men rescued from under the snow-drift had just married the girl who had arrived a few days before from California, and his partner who led the rescue party had married an estimable young woman of the town. The double wedding had occurred at the hotel an hour before, and he thought it would be fitting to celebrate the event and the new era of Saguache with a dance that night, in which everybody should be asked to participate. A roar of approval greeted the speaker. There was no resolution or motion. None was needed. Men instantly set to work clearing the hall of chairs, while a committee was sent to the hotel to announce to Buchan and Carson that a dance had been arranged that night in their honor.

Men came with their wives and their sweethearts, dressed just as they were from their work, and the women as they were in their homes. Evening clothes would have been as much out of place in that ballroom, as the garb of a workman would be out of place in the ballroom of the Waldorf-Astoria. The orchestra struck up, and Buchan and Hattie were given the place of honor in the dance. Carson and Annie, being better known, felt that they should largely play the part of host and yielded every honor to Buchan and Hattie. The music was good. Everybody joined in the spirit of goodfellowship, and the dance continued until the small hours of the morning.

It was toward the close that Rayder came upon the floor with a fat widow milliner. He had taken a few drinks of gin and was trying to act kittenish when, in the midst of a cotillion, the widow fell to the floor in an epileptic fit. They bore the woman to an adjoining room, where she soon recovered, but it was such a shock to Rayder's nerves that he went out and braced up on a little more gin.

* * * * *

I was at the governor's reception in the state capitol of Colorado. The rooms and corridors were brilliantly lighted. Men and women in rich attire were there to do honor to the occasion. I was seated behind a decoration of palms, when a prominent attorney and a companion took seats near me.

A heavy set man with a woman leaning on his arm entered the corridor. They were well, but modestly dressed. There were grey streaks in their hair, but their steps were firm and, both were the picture of good health, evidence of good and wholesome lives.

"Here comes Senator Buchan and lady," said the attorney to his companion. "I knew those people twenty-five years ago. I was one of a party to rescue Buchan and a companion from under a snow slide in the Sangre de Christo mountains. The girl had come all the way from California to help in the rescue. I don't believe she would have lived two days longer if we had not got him out. Shows what the right sort of love will do. It stands the test of time. There is no divorce business in that. Buchan had an iron will, too. Somehow he and his partners had discovered a lost Spanish mine and did not know its value on account of some trickery of an assayer. But Silas Rayder did, so Rayder hounded the boys to sell and finally when he offered a hundred and fifty thousand dollars, they closed the deal. Carson had just married, too. He took his money and invested it in a flouring mill. I do not know what became of the other fellow, but Buchan put his money in a bank and it failed in less than three months and he went to running an engine on the Rocky Mountain railroads. It was a pretty hard knock, but right there is where that girl came to the front like a guardian angel. She told him that perhaps it was all for the best. Riches do not always bring happiness. It is adversity that brings to the surface our better natures and fires our ambitions to the nobler and grander things of life.

"Buchan must have had this in mind, for while he was running his engine he was always trying to help some poor fellow. He accepted his lot in life and worked for years content with the love of that woman and when people saw he was made of the right sort of stuff they elected him to the legislature and his very first act was to put through a bill making eight hours a legal day's work. That very act took the yoke of bondage off more than half a million workers.

"It turned out just as the girl said. He has served the people three terms and if he had not worked for their interests they would never have sent him back the third time.

"Adversity, sir, is oftimes the making of us. I never thought so when Bob Lee surrendered and our dreams of imperialism vanished and left most of us without a dollar. But I can see now it is all for the best. As a nation united we welcome all men regardless of their nationality, and, in return, they give us the best thoughts the world can produce."

"Rayder, what became of him?" asked his companion.

"When Rayder bought the mine he thought he had millions but he only took out of it about enough to get even when the vein gave out between two big slabs of granite that came together like the thin end of a wedge. A widow who had fits sued him about this time for a breach of promise, and either to get out of that or get square with some old enemy, he married the widow Amos."

I arose and stood before the attorney and his companion. "I want to shake hands with you, sir," I said. He arose, and in extending his hand, said: "Your name, please?"

"I am the other fellow you rescued from the cabin," I replied.