The Boys of Crawford's Basin Part 30

Blaze away we did! Never before had Joe and I worked so hard for so long a stretch; not a minute did we lose, except on those four or five occasions when Tom, having put down a hole into one of the large pieces, called out to us to get to cover, when, running for shelter, we crouched behind some friendly rock until a sharp, cracking explosion told us that another of the big obstructions was out of the way.

So hard did we work, in fact, and so systematically, that by sunset we had cleared a path six feet wide. There remained only one more of the big rocks to break up, and into this Tom put a three-foot hole, which he charged and tamped, when, sending us ahead to hitch up the horse, he touched off the fuse, the explosion following just as we started homeward.

"A great day's work, boys!" cried Tom. "If it wasn't for the training you've had all winter handling rocks, you never could have done it.

There is a good chance now, I think, of getting the trench cut before Wednesday evening. I'll work with you all day to-morrow--I must get back to my camp then--and that will leave you two days and a half to finish up the job. You ought to do it if you keep hard at it."

By sunrise next morning we were at it again, working under Tom's direction, in the same systematic manner.

"Take the sledge, Joe," said he, "and crack up the fragments of that big rock we shot to pieces last night. Phil, you and I will put down our first hole, beginning here at the crevice and working upward. Now! Let's get to work!"

Tom and I, therefore, went to work with drill and hammer, Tom taking the larger share of the striking; for though the swinging of the seven-pound hammer is the harder part of the work, the turning of the drill is the more particular, and as our instructor justly remarked, it was as well I should have all the practice I could get while he was on hand to superintend.

The hole being deep enough, Tom made me load and tamp it with my own hands, using black powder, which, though perhaps less effective for this particular kind of work than giant powder would have been, he regarded as safer for novices like ourselves to handle.

Our first shot broke out the rock in very good style, and then, while I busied myself cracking up the big pieces and throwing them aside, Joe took my place.

The second hole was loaded and tamped by Joe, under Tom's supervision; after which my partner once more took the sledge, while I turned drill again.

In this order we worked all day, making, before quitting time, such encouraging progress that we felt very hopeful of getting the task completed before my father's return.

Tom having fairly started us, went back to his camp on Lincoln, leaving Joe and me to continue the work by ourselves; and sorely did we miss our expert miner when, on the Monday morning, we returned to the crater.

Though we kept steadily at it all day, our progress was noticeably slower than it had been the first day, for, besides the fact that there were only two of us, and those the least skilful, as we ascended towards the stream each hole was a little deeper than the last, each charge a little stronger, and each shot blew out a greater amount of rock to be broken up and cast aside.

Nevertheless, we made very satisfactory headway, and continuing our work the next two days with unabated energy and some increase of skill with every hole we put down, we made such progress that by two o'clock on the Wednesday afternoon there remained but three feet of rock to be shot out to make connection with the channel.

I was for blasting this out forthwith, but Joe on the other hand suggested that we trim up our trench a little before turning in the water; for, hitherto, we had merely thrown out the loose pieces, and there were in consequence many projections and jagged corners both in the sides and bottom of our proposed water-course. These we attacked with sledge and crowbar, and in two hours or so had them pretty well cleared out of the way, when we went to work putting down our last hole.

As we wanted to make a sure thing of it, we sank this hole rather deeper than any of the others, charging it with an extra allowance of powder. Then, the tools having been removed, I touched off the fuse and ran for shelter behind the big rock where Joe was already crouching, making himself as small as possible. Presently there was a tremendous bang! Rocks of every size and shape were flung broadcast all over the crater--some of them coming down uncomfortably close to our hiding-place--but as soon as the clatter ceased, up we both jumped and ran to see the result.

Nothing could have been better. Our last shot had torn a great hole, extending across almost the whole width of the old channel, and our trench being six inches or more below the original level, the whole stream at once rushed into it, leaving its former bed high and dry.

"Hooray, for us!" shouted Joe. "Come on, Phil! Let us run down and see it go into the canon."

Away we went; but as the crater-side was pretty steep we had to descend with some caution; whereas the water, having no neck to break, went down headlong. The consequence was that the stream beat us to the canon by a hundred yards, and by the time we arrived it was pouring over the edge in a sixty-foot cascade.

We were in time, however, to see a wall of foam flying down the canon; a sight which, while it delighted us, at the same time gave us something of a start.

"Joe!" I cried. "How about our bridge?"

"Pht!" Joe whistled. "I never thought of it. It will go out, I'm afraid.

Let us get down there at once."

Off we ran to where our horse was standing, eating hay out of the back of the buckboard, threw on the harness, hitched him up, and scrambling in, one on either side, away we went as fast as we dared over the uneven, rocky stretch of the mesa which lay between us and home.

The course of the stream being more circuitous than the one we took across country, we beat the water down to the ranch; but only by a few seconds. We had hardly reached the bridge when the swollen stream leaped into the pool in such volume that I felt convinced it would sweep it clear of all the sand in it whether black or yellow; rushed under the bridge, and went tearing down the valley--a sight to see! Luckily the creek-bed was fairly wide and straight, so that the banks did not suffer much.

As to the bridge, the stringers being very long and well set, and the floor being composed of stout poles roughly squared and firmly spiked down, it did not go out, though the water came squirting up between the poles in a way which made us fear it might tear them loose at any moment.

To prevent this, we ran quickly to the stable, harnessed up the mules to the wood-sled, loaded the sled with some of our big flat lava-rocks, and driving back to the bridge, we laid these rocks upon the ends of the poles, leaving a causeway between them wide enough for the pa.s.sage of a wagon.

We had just finished this piece of work, when we heard a rattle of wheels, and looking up the road we saw coming down the hill an express-wagon, driven by Sam Tobin, a San Remo liveryman, and in the wagon sat my father and mother.

"Why, what's all this?" cried the former, as the driver pulled up on the far side of the bridge. "Where does all this water come from?"

Then did the pent-up excitement of the past week burst forth. The flood of water going under the bridge was a trifle compared with the flood of words we poured out upon my bewildered parents; both of us talking at the same time, interrupting each other at every turn, explaining each other's explanations, and tumbling over each other, as it were, in our eagerness. All the details of the strenuous days since the snow-slide came down--the discovery of the Big Reuben, the recovery of the stolen ore, and above all the heading-off of the underground stream--were set forth with breathless volubility; so that if the hearers were a little dazed by the recital and a trifle confused as to the particulars, it was not to be wondered at. One thing, at least, was clear to them: we had found and turned the underground stream; and when he understood that, my father leaped from the wagon, and shaking hands with both of us at once, he cried:

"Boys, you certainly _have_ done a stroke of work! If it had taken you a year instead of a week it would have been more than worth the labor. As to its actual money value, it is hard to judge yet; but whether that shall turn out to be much or little, there is one thing sure:--we have our work cut out for us for years to come--a grand thing by itself for all of us. And now, let us go on up to the house: Sam Tobin wants to get back home as soon as possible."

This the driver was able to do at once, for the livery horses, frightened by the water which came spurting up through the floor of the bridge, declined to cross, so Joe and I, taking out the trunk, placed it on the wood-sled and thus drew it up to the house.

As we walked along, my mother said:

"So the hermit has been staying with you, has he? And what sort of a man _is_ your wild man now you've caught him?"

"He isn't a wild man at all," cried Joe, somewhat indignantly. "He's a fine fellow--isn't he, Phil? He has been of great help to us these last few days. We could never have finished our trench in time if he hadn't taken the ch.o.r.es off our hands. He is in the kitchen now, getting the supper ready. I'll run and bring him out."

So saying, Joe ran forward--we others walking on more leisurely--and as we approached the house the pair came out of the front door side by side.

In spite of Joe's a.s.surance to the contrary, my parents still had in their minds the idea that any one going by the name of "Peter, the Hermit" must be a rough, hirsute, unkempt specimen of humanity. Great was their surprise, therefore, when Peter, always clean and tidy, his hair and beard neatly trimmed in honor of their return, issued from the doorway, looking, with his clear gray eyes, his ruddy complexion and his spare, erect figure, remarkably young and alert.

There was an added heartiness in their welcome, therefore, when Joe proudly introduced him; and though Peter threw out hints about sleeping in the hay-loft that night and taking himself off the first thing in the morning, my mother scouted the idea, telling him how she had long desired to make his acquaintance, and intimating that she should take it as a very poor compliment to herself if he should run off the moment she got home.

So Peter, set quite at his ease, said no more about it, but went back into the kitchen, whence he presently issued again to announce that supper was ready.

A very hearty and a very merry supper it was, too, and long and animated was the talk which followed, as we sat before the open fire that evening.

"I feel almost bewildered," said my father, "when I think of the amount and the variety of the work we have before us; it is astonishing that the turning of that stream should carry with it so many consequences, as I foresee it will--that and Tom Connor's strike."

"There's no end to it!" cried Joe, jumping out of his chair, striding up and down the room, and, for the last time in this history, rumpling his hair in his excitement. "There's no end to it! There's the hay-corral to enlarge--rock hauling all winter for you and me, Phil! We shall need a new ice-pond; for this new water-supply won't freeze up in winter like the old one did! Then, when the 'forty rods' dries up, there will be the extension of our ditches down there; besides making a first-cla.s.s road to bring all the travel our way--plenty of work in that, too! Then, when we bring the old lake-benches under cultivation, there will be new headgates needed and two new ditches to lay out, besides breaking the ground! Then----Oh, what's the use? There's no end to it--just no end to it!"

Joe was quite right. There was, and there still seems to be, no end to it.

The effect of Tom Connor's strike on Mount Lincoln was just what my father had predicted: our whole district took a great stride forward; the mountains swarmed with prospectors; the town of Sulphide hummed with business; our new friend, Yetmore, doing a thriving trade, while our old friend, Mrs. Appleby, followed close behind, a good second.

As for Tom, himself, he is one of our local capitalists now, but he is the same old Tom for all that. Just as he used to do when he was poor, so he continues to do now he is rich: any tale of distress will empty his pocket on the spot. Though my father remonstrates with him sometimes, Tom only laughs and remarks that it is no use trying to teach old dogs new tricks; and moreover he does not see why he should not spend his money to suit himself. And so he goes his own way, more than satisfied with the knowledge that every man, woman and child in the district counts Tom Connor as a friend.

The fate of those two poor ore-thieves was so horrible that I hesitate to mention it. It was six months later that a prospector on one of the northern spurs of Lincoln came upon two dead bodies. One, a club-footed man, had been shot through the head; the other, unmistakably Long John, was lying on his back, an empty revolver beside him, and one foot caught in a bear-trap. Though the truth will never be known, the presumption is that, setting the stolen trap in a deer run in the hope of catching a deer, they had got into a quarrel; Clubfoot, striking at his companion, had caused him to step backward into the trap, when, in his pain and rage, Long John had whipped out his revolver and shot the other. What his own fate must have been is too dreadful to contemplate.

And the Crawford ranch? Well, the Crawford ranch is the busiest place in the county.

Peter, for whom my parents, like ourselves, took a great liking, quickly thawed out under my mother's influence, and related to us briefly the reason for his having taken to his solitary life. He had been a school-teacher in Denver, but losing his wife and two children in an accident, he had fled from the place and had hidden himself up in our mountains, where for several years he had spent a lonely existence with no company but old Socrates. Now, however, his house destroyed and his mountain overrun with prospectors, he needed little inducement to abandon his old hermit-life; and accepting gladly my father's suggestion that he stay and work on the ranch, he built for himself a good log cabin up near the waterfall, and there he and Socrates took up their residence.

There was plenty of work for him and for all of us--indeed, for the first two years there was almost more than we could do. It took that length of time for the "forty rods" to drain off thoroughly, but by the middle of the third summer we were cutting hay upon it; the ore wagons from Sulphide and from the Big Reuben were pa.s.sing through in a continuous stream; the stage-coach was coming our way; the old hill road was abandoned.

In fact, everybody is busy, and more than busy--with one single exception.

The only loafer on the place is old Sox--tolerated on account of his advanced age. That veteran, whose love of mischief and whose unfailing impudence would lead any stranger to suppose he had but just come out of the egg, spends most of his time strutting about the ranch, stealing the food of the dogs and chickens; awing them into submission by his supernatural gift of speech. And as though that were not enough, his crop distended with his pilferings to the point of bursting, he comes unabashed to the kitchen door and blandly requests my mother, of all people, to give him a chew of tobacco!