"Who do you suppose that man was, anyway?" Tom remarked. "You have never heard of him since, have you?"
"Now, wait until I tell you. I don"t know. But let us go ahead, and I will tell you what I mean in a day or two."
"What do you look for anyway, when you go off by yourself?" asked Tom.
"If you would give us a pointer on that subject we might be able to help you."
"I don"t mind telling you that I am looking for a trail," said Elam.
"And it is so old that no one but myself would notice it. When I find that trail I"m a-going to follow it up. It isn"t over ten feet long, for a man as badly hurt as that one was, aint a-going to go a great ways to hide a nugget."
"Do you mean to tell me that we are on his trail now?" exclaimed Tom in amazement.
"Certainly I do. I have found two or three places where he slept."
"Why didn"t you speak about it?"
"Do you suppose I have come in here this far without following some trail? Of course not. Some of the marks he made are so badly obliterated by the wind and the rain, that you can"t make head nor tail of them, unless you know what had been there in the first place. Why, I have found blood on the rocks where he slept."
"You"re beaten, aint you, Tom?" I asked, when he gazed at me, lost in wonder.
"I should say I was. I wish you had showed me that spot."
"Well, I will the next time I come across one. Good gracious! if I didn"t know any more about trailing than you do, I would never find that nugget."
"How do you suppose your father came by it in the first place? He must have got it in some honest way or he wouldn"t have had it in his wagon."
"That is one thing that I don"t know," answered Elam solemnly. "He got it, and how it ever came noised abroad that it belonged to me beats my time. I wish the man that started that story had it crammed down his throat."
Elam was getting excited again, and we thought it best to leave him alone until he got over thinking about the nugget. We didn"t raise any objections when he spurred up his horse and got out of sight of us in the bushes. When we were certain that he had pa.s.sed out of hearing, Tom said:
"Why, it is two years since that man, whoever he was, made that trail through here, and to think he can find some traces of it now! It bangs me completely."
"There are two things which must be taken into consideration," said I.
"In the first place that man didn"t know what he left of a trail; he hoped n.o.body would ever find it. A twig may have been broken down and he left it so, certain it would lead him back to the place where he had buried his find. In the next place there is some little sign for which Elam is looking that will lead him directly to the place he wants to find; some branch of a tree that has been broken down and looks as though somebody had been browsing there, and it will tell Elam that he is hot on the trail. Do you see?"
"Yes, I see; but I don"t see how a man can follow a trail two years old.
I wish you would show me his next camping ground. If I am a lucky omen, I may be able to find the nugget."
I laughed and promised Tom that I would show him the next place I found; but it was a long time before I found any. You could not have told that a man had pa.s.sed through there in one year or ten, the weather had so completely done away with all his work. But it did not make any difference to Elam. Sometimes he would be gone before we were up, but he always came back to supper, which we took pains to have good and hot for him. We never made any enquiries, for he knew just how impatient we were, and he would not keep us waiting a moment longer than was necessary. We had been in the canyon six weeks, and, to tell you the truth, Tom and I were getting pretty tired of the search. It was the same thing over and over every day, and I was glad that n.o.body had connected my name with a lost nugget. Elam would go along on foot, leaving his horse to follow or not as he pleased; and if he found a little pile of stones on the bank that didn"t look as though it had been thrown up by nature, he would go into the bushes and perhaps be gone for an hour. We had long ago pa.s.sed the pocket, and were continuing on our way slowly and laboriously up the canyon, and one day Elam startled Tom by calling out:
"I reckon you will think I am all right now. Here is the place where that fellow camped."
In less than two seconds Tom and I were by Elam"s side. Cautioning us not to go too far so as to disturb things, he plainly pointed out to us the marks of a person"s figure on the leaves. Some of the bushes had been broken down, and the leaves had blown over where he lay, but by carefully brushing these aside the impress of a person"s form could be seen. There was no doubt about it, and I told Elam so in a way that made him all right again.
"Where do you suppose that fellow is now?" said Tom.
"I don"t know," said Elam. "My impression is that he died."
"But he wouldn"t have given this map to a man when he knew it to be wrong, would he?"
"I tell you that there"s a heap of things connected with this nugget that we shall never find out. We are on the right trail yet. I tell you I feel encouraged."
We all did for that matter, and every day we searched both sides of the stream to find that man"s camping place, and when we found it we would call the others up; but one day Tom came into camp, and his face was full of news.
"I don"t want to raise any false hopes," said he, "but if I have not found something I will give it up. It"s on the left-hand side of the creek. In the first place there were four stones laid up the bank, and the bush at whose foot they lay had been broken down and leaned away from the bank. And further than that, it was held in position by two of the branches, which were firmly tied about it."
"Tom, I believe you have found it," said I.
"It is too far away to find it before dark, but I will go there the first thing in the morning," continued Tom, who was so excited that he could scarcely speak plainly. "We want to take along our picks and shovels, too."
We both glanced at Elam, but he didn"t say anything. He was lying back on his blanket, with his pipe between his teeth and his hands under his head. He smiled all over, but said nothing.
"Go on," said he to Tom. "What else did you find?"
"And right there is where the fun comes in," said Tom. "The pa.s.sage was about twenty feet long--he was too badly hurt to go further--and with every step of the way he had broken down a piece of the bushes, first on one side and then on the other, to enable him to keep a straight course.
Right under the head of a rock that the pa.s.sage brings up against, you will find something buried. It may not be the nugget, but there is something there."
"Why didn"t you dig down and see what it was?" said I.
"It was pretty near night when I found it, and besides I wanted Elam to see it. I will go with you now, if you say so."
"No," said Elam, filling up his pipe for a fresh smoke. "I"ll be happy for once in my life for twelve hours, and if at the end of that time I find that there is nothing there----"
"But I tell you there is something there," e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Tom.
"I will go back and go to herding cattle," added Elam, paying no attention to Tom"s interruption. "I will give it up as a bad job."
There wasn"t much sleeping done in that camp that night, and although we stayed awake till toward morning, we had little to say to each other. We all wanted to see what was hidden up there. I had seen Elam become wonderfully excited whenever anyone spoke of the nugget and hinted that it wasn"t there, but I had never seen him come so near finding it before. When daylight came Tom declared he couldn"t wait any longer, so we got up and saddled our horses and followed along after him. We did not stop to cook breakfast, for in case we did not find the nugget n.o.body would want any. After going about a quarter of a mile, Tom stopped and dismounted from his horse.
"There are the stones," said Elam.
"You go along a little further and you will find everything just as I described it to you," said Tom. "Elam is about half wild," he added in a low tone to me, "so you and I had better take a pick along. Mind, I don"t say it is the nugget, but there is something hidden in there."
Talk about Elam"s being half wild! Tom and I were in that fix also. We saw Elam examine the broken bush, the one that was held in place by two limbs that were tied about it, and his face grew as white as a sheet. He worked his way into the bushes, making his way all too slowly to suit us who were following close at his heels, and finally stopped under the hanging rock, where there was a clear s.p.a.ce about two feet in diameter.
The bushes grew as thick here as they did anywhere else, but they had been cut with a knife to give the digger a chance to work. Not one of us said a word, because we were too highly excited. Elam reached his hand behind him, and I, knowing what he wanted, placed a spade within it; but you might as well have set a child to sc.r.a.ping it out with a teaspoon.
His hand trembled so that it was scarcely any use to him.
"Here, Elam, give me that spade," I cried. "You will never get it up in the world. Now, stand back beside Tom, out of the way."
I did not think Elam would agree to this, but he did, and in two minutes I had the leaves and brush all out of the way, faster than it was put in, I"ll bet. But what was this I struck against before I had gone down three inches? It was not as hard as a rock, because, when I placed my shovel against it and tried to pry it up, the instrument slipped from it and showed me the color of the pure gold.
"Elam, Elam, there"s something here!" I shouted, so nearly beside myself that I did not know what I was saying. "Stand out of the way and let me handle it myself. When I get it out where the horses are, you can examine it till your head is as white as Uncle Ezra"s."
I have since learned that the nugget weighed 130 pounds, but it did not seem half that weight as I pulled it out of the hole and started through the bushes with it. I paid no attention to the others, who followed along after me, lost in wonder. I carried it out to where the bushes ended, and then laid it down, hunted up a rock, and sat down and examined it.
"Elam, there"s your nugget!" I said.
"By gum, I believe it is!" said Elam.
One would have thought by the way Elam went about it that he did not know whether it was or not. For fifteen minutes we sat there and watched him as he pa.s.sed his hands carefully over it, brushing away a little particle of dirt here and pecking with his knife there to see if it was really gold, until he was satisfied; then he put up his knife and thrust out his hand to Tom.