The Wedge of Gold Part 4

The old man surveyed him wildly for a moment, then broke completely down, and, wringing the young man's hands, could only sob:

"Thank G.o.d, my son, whom I thought was lost, is back again. Thank G.o.d!"

Then the brothers and their wives and children came in, and there was such a scene that Browning slipped out, seated himself on the piazza, and mopping his brow with his kerchief, said, "Bless my soul; I believe I will never go home. There is more real enjoyment at a miner's funeral in Virginia City; there is, by Jove."

But they found him after a little, and Sedgwick presented him to his kinfolk as his close companion, and he was welcomed in a way which touched him deeply, and made him conclude that the world was filled with good people.

Soon the news spread, and the neighbors began to pour in, and what a day it was! What old memories were awakened and rehea.r.s.ed; what every one had done; who had died; who had married; all the history of the little place for all the years.

Going home after a long absence is a little like what one might imagine of a resurrection from the dead. There is exceeding joy, but mingled with it is much of the damp and chill of the tomb. Indeed, going home after a long absence "causes all the burial places of memory to give up their dead," and through all the joy there is an undertone of sorrow, for all the reminders are of the fact that the calmest lives are speedily sweeping on; that there is no halting in the swift transit between birth and death.

Three days pa.s.sed, and notwithstanding the enjoyment, Sedgwick found that there was a good deal of trouble worrying the family. The old mortgage of $5,000 was not paid; rather, it had been doubled to make a first payment on a 200-acre farm adjoining, and with fitting up and stocking the old place, and with bad crops, the debts amounted altogether to more than $20,000. He did not tell any one of his good fortune. He was dressed in a plain business suit, without a single ornament. The watch he carried for convenience was merely a cheap silver watch.

On the fourth day, Browning said to his friend: "Jim, old pard, I must be off to-morrow. You have had a good visit. Come over to England with me for a month, and help me through with--Rose and the old man."

"Agreed, Jack," said Sedgwick. "I want to fix up some little things here, and I do not want to be around when the fixing shall be understood. It will be a good excuse to get away."

Then going to a desk, he wrote a few words, took a bill of exchange for $100,000 from his pocketbook, endorsed it, making it payable to his father, folded the bill inside the letter, sealed it and directed it to his father; then putting the letter in his pocket, said, "That will make it all right."

At supper that evening he informed the family that he was going on the early train with his friend and might be gone a month or six weeks, after which he believed he would return, settle down and become steady. All tried to dissuade him, but Browning helped him, telling the family he needed his friend's help on serious business; and so that night the kindling was put in the kitchen stove, the dough for biscuits for breakfast was set, the tea-kettle filled, the chickens fixed for frying, and the coffee ground.

It was but a little after daylight next morning when, the breakfast over, they were ready to start. They shook hands all round, and when it came to saying good-bye to his father, Sedgwick drew out the letter, and giving it to the old man, said: "Father, when you hear the train pull out of the village, open that letter. It contains a little keepsake for you which I picked up by a scratch in Nevada." And they were off.

When that letter was opened, and the astounding figures on the bill were read and comprehended, what a time there was at that house, and how the neighbors came again to see the wonderful paper, and how it was figured how many farms it would buy, what houses it would build and furnish, and how the boy who had been expelled from school for fighting had done it all! What a smashing of old theories it made, and how every wild boy in the neighborhood to whom the evil example of the bad Sedgwick boy had been held up as an ill.u.s.tration of total depravity and as proof that nothing of good ever came to a youth that would fight and get expelled from school, rejoiced! To these, what a day of exultation that bill of exchange brought!

But it was only a day, before there began to circulate rumors that the whole thing was but a joke; that the bill would be repudiated when presented for payment, or at most that it was only for $1,000.

Sedgwick, _pere_, with his sons, lost no time in testing the matter.

Sedgwick had written in the letter that though the bill was drawn on New York, any bank in Cincinnati would cash it. So they repaired to the city, and calling on their lawyer, asked him to go with them and identify them at some bank, as they desired to get a little check cashed. He complied.

The cashier looked at the bill and asked in what kind of money the payment was wanted.

The old man thought he would give his neighbors an object lesson, and replied that he would take it in gold.

The cashier smiled and asked him how he would take it away.

The old man said, "I do not understand you."

"It will, in gold, weigh about 400 pounds," said the cashier.

At this the lawyer became interested in a moment and said: "Four hundred pounds of gold! What kind of a check have you?"

"It is a bill of exchange on New York for $100,000," said the cashier.

"One hundred thousand dollars!" said the lawyer; "Great heavens! have you found an oil well on your farm, robbed a bank, or what?"

"No," said the elder Sedgwick, "but my wild boy has come from Nevada, and I guess this is a part of the great bonanza."

Finally $25,000 was drawn in paper, enough to clear up all the home indebtedness, and the rest left on deposit until the son and brother should return; for, as they talked it all over, they concluded that he had left with them all his fortune, except traveling expenses.

CHAPTER V.

THE VOYAGE.

Browning and Sedgwick reached New York and took pa.s.sage on the first outgoing Cunarder. When the ship steamed out of the harbor, it entered at once into a lively sea, and the great craft grew strangely unsteady.

Browning was a good sailor, but Sedgwick found it was all he could do to maintain his equanimity. "Jack," he said at last, "this is worse exercise then riding a Texas steer." "Did you ever ride a Texas steer?" asked Browning. "Indeed I have," said Sedgwick. "The cowboys have a game of that kind. When a lot of steers are corraled, they climb up on the cross-bar over the gate; the gate is opened, the steers are turned out with a rush, and the science is to drop from the cross-bar upon a steer and ride him. If you miss, you are liable to be trodden to death. If you strike fairly, then the trick is to see how long you can hold on. It is rough exercise, but I believe it is preferable to this perpetual rising, falling and rolling. The infernal thing seems to work like an Ingersoll drill. It turns a quarter of a circle on one's stomach with every blow it strikes."

They had sailed into an expiring storm that was fast losing its strength; the waves were breaking down, and by the time night came on the ship was running nearly on an even keel, only gently rolling as it swept magnificently on its voyage.

The two miners walked the deck, or sat by the rail, until far into the night, admiring the glorified structure on which they rode; watching the stars and the sea, and saw with other things the beautiful spectacle of another ship as grand as their own, that swept close by them on its way to New York. Its whole 500 feet of length was a blaze of light, and as the t.i.tans whistled hoa.r.s.ely to each other a greeting without abating their speed, it seemed to the two landsmen as though two stars had met in s.p.a.ce, saluted and pa.s.sed on, each in its own sublime orbit.

Sedgwick and Browning soon made the acquaintance of several pa.s.sengers.

A day or two later an animated conversation sprang up in the smoking room. An American was declaring that his country was the greatest on earth because it could feed the world from its mighty food area.

An Englishman disputed the claim, because the profits of the manufacturers of little England were more than all the profits from all the lands of the United States.

A Frenchman claimed the palm for France, because in France the people were artists; from a little basis, from material well-nigh worthless in itself, the Frenchman could, by infusing French brain into it, create a thing of beauty for which the world was glad to exchange gold and gems.

Then Browning said: "You are all right, looking from a present horizon; all wrong, when the years are taken into account. The great country of the world is to be the country that produces the metals in the greatest quant.i.ty and variety, and whose people acquire the art of turning them to the best account. This ship that we are on, a few months ago, was but unsightly ore in the ground. Look at it now! Tried by fire and fused with labor, it has grown into this marvelous structure. England's greatness and wealth are due, primarily, all to her mining. Her civilization can be measured by her progress in reducing metals. She will begin to fall behind soon, for America has, in addition to such mines as England possesses, endless mines of gold and silver, and, after all, the precious metals rule the nations and measure their civilization. It has always been so and always will be. Those mines in America will build up greater manufactures than England possesses; they will create artists more skilled than even beautiful France can boast of. A hundred years hence, all other nations will be second-cla.s.s by comparison."

The next day the conversation was resumed and carried on with much spirit, until Sedgwick, who had been reading through it all, laid down his book, and in a brief pause of the talk said:

"Neither fruitful fields, rich mines, nor skilled artisans, nor all combined, are enough to make great nations. A hundred nations existed when Rome was founded. They had as fair prospects as did Rome, but ninety of the hundred are forgotten; the other ten are remembered but as inferior nations. It was the stock of men and women that made Rome's grandeur and terror. For five hundred years an unfaithful wife was never known in Rome. The result was Rome had to be great and grand.

"I stood once on the crest of the Rocky Mountains in Montana. Near together were two springs, out of each of which the water flowed away in a creek. One follows the mountains down to the eastward, the other to the west. One finds its final home in the Gulf of Mexico, the other in the Pacific. The one takes on other streams, its volume steadily swells; before it flows far its channel is hewed through fertile fields; gaining in power, the argosies of commerce find a home upon its broad bosom, and it is a recognized power in the world, a mighty factor in the calculations of merchants and shippers.

"But in the meantime it becomes tainted, until at last when it finds its grave in the Gulf, so foul are its waters that they discolor for miles the deep blue of the sea.

"The other starts with a babble as joyous as the carols of childhood; when it reaches the valley it begins its struggle through a lava-blasted desert; when the desert is pa.s.sed, it has to grind its channel through rugged mountains that tear its waters into foam, and at last in mighty throes, on the stormy bar it finds its grave in the roaring ocean. Its existence is one long, mighty struggle; there are awful chasms in its path into which it is hurled; the thirsty desert encroaches upon its current; mountains block its way; at the very last furious seas seek to beat it back, but to the end it holds itself pure as when it starts on its way from the mountain spring.

"These rivers are typical of men and of nations. Some meet no obstruction; they glide on, gaining in wealth and power; at last, they become in one way a blessing, in another a terror; but in the meantime, they grow corrupt because of the world's contact; and so pa.s.s, gross and discolored, into eternity.

"Others have lives that are one long struggle unheard-of obstacles are ever rising in their paths, but they fight on and on, and when at last their course is run, those who trace them through their careers, with uncovered heads are bound to say that they kept their integrity to the last, and that all the world's discouragements could not disarm their power, break their courage, or dim the clear mirror of their purity."

Sedgwick ceased speaking, but after a moment, looking up, he added: "Not very far from the sources of these two streams, there is another fountain in the hills, out of which flows another stream as large and fair as either of the others. It, too, goes tumbling down the mountain gorge, increasing in volume, until it strikes the valley, then grows less and less in size, until a few miles below it disappears in the sands.

"This, too, is typical of men and nations. They begin life buoyant and brave; they rush on exultingly at first, but the quicksands of vice or crime or disease are before them, and they sink and leave no name.

"The man or nation that is to be great must be born great. Those who succeed are those who are guided into channels which make success possible.

"The strength of the modern world rests on the modern home. That did not come of rich mines or fields, but of the sovereign genius of the men of northern Europe; and the glory was worked out amid poverty, hardships and sorrows."

But the voyage was over at last, and the two miners hastened to take the train for the home of Browning in Devonshire. They arrived at the village at midnight and went to a hotel, or, as Sedgwick said: "This, Jack, is han Hinglish Hinn, is it?"