Desert Gold

  Flashing thoughts in Gale's mind were no swifter than the thrills that ran over him.  He would stake out a claim here and never be cheated out of it.  Ditches on the benches and troughs on the steep walls would carry water down to the valley.  Ben Chase had build a great dam which would be useless if Gale chose to turn Forlorn River from its natural course.  The fountain head of that mysterious desert river belonged to him.

  His eagerness, his mounting passion, was checked by Yaqui's unusual actins.  The Indian showed wonder, hesitation, even reluctance.  His strange eyes surveyed this boiling well as if they could not believe the sight they saw.  Gale divined instantly that Yaqui had never before seen the source of Forlorn River.  If he had ever ascended to this plateau, probably it had been to some other part, for the water was new to him.  He stood gazing aloft at peaks, at lower ramparts of the mountain, and at nearer landmarks of prominence.  Yaqui seemed at fault.  He was not sure of his location.

  Then he strode past the swirling pool of dark water and began to ascend a little slope that led up to a shelving cliff.  Another object halted the Indian.  It was a pile of stones, weathered, crumbled, fallen into ruin, but still retaining shape enough to prove it had been built there by the hands of men.  Round and round this the Yaqui stalked, and his curiosity attested a further uncertainty.  It was as if he had come upon something surprising. Gale wondered about the pile of stones.  Had it once been a prospector's claim?

  "Ugh!" grunted the Indian; and, though his exclamation expressed no satisfaction, it surely put an end to doubt.  He pointed up to the roof of the sloping yellow shelf of stone.  Faintly outlined there in red were the imprints of many human hands with fingers spread wide.  Gale had often seen such paintings on the walls of the desert caverns.  Manifestly these told Yaqui he had come to the spot for which he had aimed.

  Then his actions became swift–and Yaqui seldom moved swiftly. The fact impressed Gale.  The Indian searched the level floor under the shelf.  He gathered up handfuls of small black stones, and thrust them at Gale.  Their weight made Gale start, and then he trembled.  The Indian's next move was to pick up a piece of weathered rock and throw it against the wall.  It broke. He snatched up parts, and showed the broken edges to Gale. They contained yellow steaks, dull glints, faint tracings of green. It was gold.

  Gale found his legs shaking under him; and he sat down, trying to take all the bits of stone into his lap.  His fingers were all thumbs as with knife blade he dug into the black pieces of rock.  He found gold.  Then he stared down the slope, down into the valley with its river winding forlornly away into the desert.  But he did not see any of that.  Here was reality as sweet, as wonderful, as saving as a dream come true.  Yaqui had led him to a ledge of gold.  Gale had learned enough about mineral to know that this was a rich strike.  All in a second he was speechless with the joy of it.  But his mind whirled in thought about this strange and noble Indian, who seemed never to be able to pay a debt.  Belding and the poverty that had come to him!  Nell, who had wept over the loss of a spring!  Laddy, who never could ride again!  Jim Lash, who swore he would always look after his friend! Thorne and Mercedes!  All these people, who had been good to him and whom he loved, were poor.  But now they would be rich.  They would one and all be his partners.  He had discovered the source of Forlorn River, and was rich in water.  Yaqui had made him rich in gold.  Gale wanted to rush down the slope, down into the valley, and tell his wonderful news.

  Suddenly his eyes cleared and he saw the pile of stones.  His blood turned to ice, then to fire.  That was the mark of a prospector's claim.  But it was old, very old.  The ledge had never been worked. the slope was wild.  There was not another single indication that a prospector had ever been there.  Where, then, was he who had first staked this claim?  Gale wondered with growing hope, with the fire easing, with the cold passing.

  The Yaqui uttered the low, strange, involuntary cry so rare with him, a cry somehow always associated with death. Gale shuddered.

  The Indian was digging in the sand and dust under the shelving wall. He threw out an object that rang against the stone.  It was a belt buckle.  He threw out old shrunken, withered boots.  He came upon other things, and then he ceased to dig.

  The grave of desert prospectors!  Gale had seen more than one. Ladd had told him many a story of such gruesome finds.  It was grim, hard fact.

  Then the keen-eyed Yaqui reached up to a little projecting shelf of rock and took from it a small object.  He showed no curiosity and gave the thing to Gale.