"Well, Tom, you certainly have done something to be proud of," said Ezra. "Let"s go in and take a smoke. We"ll finish our examination by daylight."
CHAPTER XVI.
A NEW EXPEDITION.
There wasn"t much sleeping done in the cabin that night, there was so much to talk about. To say that the hunters were very much pleased over the success of Tom"s lucky shots would be putting it very mildly. Elam was much elated to know it was a camel, an animal he had never seen before, and not a genuine ghost, who had stood between him and the finding of the nugget. He was not satisfied until he had burned up three or four brands in going out to see the object to make sure it was there yet. To tell the truth, this Red Ghost had often stood between Elam and the accomplishment of his hopes; and as much as he desired to possess the nugget he did not dare face it alone.
"It is there yet," said Elam, coming in once more and throwing a half-burned chunk upon the fire. "Tom, you have made me your everlasting debtor. Now I hope the finding of the nugget will go the same way."
"I hope I can have the same effect upon your other work," said Tom modestly. "If I do, you will call me a lucky omen."
"What is an "omen"?" asked Elam, who had never heard the word before.
"Why, it is an occurrence supposed to show the character of some future event. That is about as near as I can come to it. If I am with you, you will find the nugget without the least trouble: if I am not, you won"t."
"Well, I"ll see that you don"t get very far from me till I find out what this map means. There is something hidden there, and I know it."
It was while we were talking in this way that daylight came, and I began getting breakfast while Elam and Uncle Ezra smoked, and Ben and Tom were packing up the skins which had fallen to Ben"s rifle during the hunt. I could see that Ben was sadly disappointed in not being permitted to accompany Elam on his search for the nugget, but like the soldier he was, he gave right up. He knew that his father did not believe in such things anyway, and very likely his refusal would have been more pointed than Uncle Ezra"s. When the breakfast was over all hands turned to and washed the dishes and put them away. We calculated to visit the camp again during the winter, and, if we did, we wanted to know what we had to go on. Then we went out to saddle our horses and take a last look at the Red Ghost.
"Are we going to leave this thing here?" asked Ben.
"Sure!" replied Uncle Ezra. "We can"t carry it with us."
"I"ll bet I don"t leave it all here," said Elam, going into the cabin and returning with an axe in his hand. "The folks down there won"t believe that we killed anything, and I am going to have one of the feet."
The thing was hideous when we came to look at it by daylight, and especially the great hoofs with which it had tramped so far. They were lacerated in every direction, and one cut had hardly had time to heal before it got another. Elam plied the axe vigorously, and in a few moments each boy had a foot which he was to take along to show to the people "down there." Finally Uncle Ezra said he would take the head. It was scarred and seamed all over, but he thought that anyone who had seen a camel would be sure to recognize it. Then we brought up the horses, but I tell you it took two men to saddle them. They couldn"t bear the scent of the camel; I had to take my nag out of sight of it, and it was a long time before he quit snorting. With a good deal of merriment we got them all saddled at last, and with Tom and Ben riding my horse and Elam"s, we bid good-by to our camp in the mountains. We had twenty miles to go and then we were among friends again.
"Say," said Elam, when he had allowed the others to get so far ahead that there was no danger of their overhearing our conversation, "I don"t think I am crazy; do you?"
"I never thought so," said I, although I knew there had been some talk of it in the settlement. "I was sure if that nugget was there you would find it. I shouldn"t have offered to go with you if I had thought you were crazy."
"You have seen the map and know just what there is onto it?" continued Elam.
"I certainly have."
"And you know the place where it starts is over there by those springs?"
"I do certainly."
"And do you think that those men would carry around a map of that kind unless there was something on it?" said Elam, going over the argument he had used the night before with Uncle Ezra.
"No, I don"t think they would. And it"s your ditty-bag that they took from you when you were shot."
"I know it; and many"s the time I have thought of it, too, and never expected to see it again. Thank goodness, I have two men with me who don"t think I am crazy! I have told Uncle Ezra that I never would give it up again until I have that nugget in my hands. I know that gully up there, and it is a pretty big place. Now, that is all I have to say. If you want to know anything more, now is the time to ask me."
"Don"t you think that there are other parties up there, hunting for it?"
I asked, knowing that his story had been noised abroad. "Just think; you have been looking for it fourteen years."
"Longer than that; and I ought to get it, for they say that perseverance conquers all things. As for other parties looking for it, why, they can get it if they want it. But where"s the map?"
"That"s so. I think you have got the only one there is in existence."
"I only hope there are other fellows looking for the nugget," said Elam, shifting his rifle from one shoulder to the other, "because we won"t have to work where they have been. It will make matters so much easier for us."
After that Elam kept still about the nugget, and during the whole of the twenty miles I never heard him speak of it again. We accomplished the journey just about dark, Elam and I walking all the way, and Tom I know was glad to get back among civilized people once more. My headquarters were right there with Uncle Ezra, for I had only four men to take care of my small herd, and didn"t think it best to get too far away from him.
We rode up to the shanty and began to dismount, when the door flew open and the foreman of the ranch appeared on the threshold.
"Well, I declare, if there aint Uncle Ezra!" he exclaimed in a stentorian voice. "What you got? Enough furs to load one horse with?"
While the foreman was speaking he untied the bundle of skins and laid it upon the porch, when he happened to discover Tom Mason. He did not say anything, but nodded to Tom, and then turned his attention to his employer"s horse, whom he had unsaddled while one was thinking about it.
"Are you here all alone?" asked Uncle Ezra.
"All alone!" replied the foreman. "You see, there has been a blizzard lately, and we thought we had better look up the sheep. I have just got in. What have you got in that bag?"
"Something that will make your eyes bulge out," replied Uncle Ezra.
"Wait till we get in, and we will show it to you."
The horses, being unsaddled, were turned loose to go where they chose; the foreman carried Ben"s bundle of skins into the cabin, and Uncle Ezra brought up the rear with the bag containing what was left of the prize.
There was a fire burning brightly at one end of the room, and Tom and Ben drew camp-stools up in front of it to get some heat, while Elam and I took our overcoats off and waited for Uncle Ezra to turn out the contents of the bag. We waited until the old frontiersman had hung up his coat and hat where they belonged and seated himself on a camp-stool before the fire, and then the head and four feet of the camel were tumbled out on the floor.
"What in the name of common sense are those?" cried the foreman in astonishment.
"They are part of the Red Ghost," said Uncle Ezra; and then he went on to tell the story much as I have told it, although he put in some additions of his own. The foreman was profoundly amazed. Not daring to use his hands, he used a poker to move the things about, so that he could see on all sides of them. The antics he went through were enough to make the hunters laugh.
"What do you think now about my being crazy?" demanded Elam. "I"ve shot at that thing, and I don"t see why I didn"t get him; but I can see now why it was. He was so big that a bullet had to be put in the right place to get him."
"That"s about the case with everything I have shot, Elam," said the foreman. "I had to put the ball in the right place, or I didn"t get him.
But you have removed a heap from my mind. Who shot him?"
"Here"s the man, right here."
Seeing that the foreman began to take a deeper interest in Tom after that, Uncle Ezra introduced him, and he failed to say that Tom had got into a "little trouble" down in Mississippi where he used to live, and had come out West to get clear of it. Uncle Ezra didn"t think that was any of his business. He said that Tom wanted to see new sights, and he reckoned he had already had his fill of them, having been lost in the mountains and shot the Red Ghost besides. Now, he was going into partnership with Elam after the nugget, and Uncle Ezra thought he had a boy who could be depended upon. The foreman shook hands with Tom, and said he was glad to see him. Then he wanted to know whether they had eaten supper yet.
"Well, no," replied Uncle Ezra. "You see, we started from our camp up there sooner than we expected. Elam has got a map telling him where to look to find his nugget."
"Ah, get out!" said the foreman. He had heard so many things about a "map" that he did not believe a word of it.
"Well, he has, sure enough. It came from the man who tried to rob him.
And you haven"t heard anything about the Indians, have you?"
"Indians!" exclaimed the foreman. "Have they broken out?"
"Just give your knife to Elam and sit down," said Uncle Ezra. "It appears to me that we have heard of a heap of things that you don"t know anything about."