""Commander of an Expedition, reached this place, 1750."
"All this, so that the subjects of Spain might know this country belonged to His Majesty.
"We journeyed back to Santa Fe after many days of hardships and we found a new Viceroy had been appointed and he demanded our gold. This we were loath to give up, and after selling it to a trader for the coin of the realm, we started across the country for New Orleans, knowing well not to go south for the new Viceroy would pursue us and take the gold.
"We journeyed along the banks of a considerable river by night and hid ourselves by day. We saw many thousands of ferocious bulls grazing, and when they ran the noise was like thunder and it made us afraid. We crossed many rivers and finally came to a country of wooded hills where the Barbarians were thick and ferocious.
"The Barbarians pursued us and we hid our gold and records in a cave and rolled a stone over the hole and fled. They killed nearly all of our expedition and our mules. Baptiste was sorely wounded in the breast with an arrow and notwithstanding we bled him copiously, he died.
"The treatment given us by the Barbarians irritated us exceedingly and we fell upon them with swords when they were not in great numbers.
"We came to a river whose waters were red, like unto the color of the tiles on the houses of Seville, and after journeying along its banks for many nights, we came unto the River of the Holy Ghost, which DeSoto discovered and here we found safety.
"While all these things were new in my mind I made another map in order that I might take another expedition to the mine when the Viceroy grew rich from the spoils of office and would trouble us no more. But he did write unto the people of Spain that I would be hanged upon my return to Santa Fe, therefore I desisted in returning. Being extremely irritated at his conduct I sought my fortune in Peru, until such time when he should be called to heaven, which call even now, in my old age, has not yet been made, over which misfortune I have sorely grieved."
Accompanying this doc.u.ment was a map with the Sangre de Christo range, the Spanish Peaks, the River, Valley and flat cliff on edge, plainly marked. The distance from Santa Fe and the mountain pa.s.ses was clearly indicated.
A month later Buchan was transferred on a run out of Santa Fe where the hand of Fate and Chance again took part. He received a letter from Mr. Robinson who had joined a surveying party and had fallen ill at Saguache. The letter implored him to come, if he ever expected to see him alive. True to his old time friendship, he lost no time in reaching his bedside. Mr. Robinson lingered a few weeks and died. This was more sad news for Hattie in her far-away home, amid the Santa Lucia mountains. She alone remained of the happy family who had gone to Arequipa with fond hopes for the future beneath those sunny skies.
I, the writer, had been with Carson a few days before prospecting in the Sangre de Christo mountains, when by chance we rested at the spring beside the peculiar shaped cliff. I noticed that Carson was interested in the surroundings, but I thought nothing of it at the time. The formation of the cliff appealed to my fancy, and I chanced to mention it to Buchan one day when he became excited and asked to be shown its whereabouts.
Together with Carson we visited the spot. Being an old prospector, I soon discovered formations that looked like pay ore. My years of experience in these mountains had taught me that a man might work a lifetime and gain nothing, and again from the outcroppings of a stone at gra.s.s roots he might develop a mine worth a million dollars.
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 a.s.say 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 a.s.sayed 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 a.s.sayer 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 cla.s.s, 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 gla.s.ses; 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 gla.s.s, 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 gla.s.ses 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 n.o.blemen. 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"