PAT CASEY HELPS OUT
He hastened back to the cabin with his eyes popping.
"Our water's gone!"
"What!"
"It is. There's not enough to fill a tin cup!"
"Great Scotland!" And setting aside the skillet and dropping his fork, Harry rushed out to see for himself.
"Wonder if the blamed thing's drying up," he hazarded. "Well, we've got a pailful for drinking and cooking, anyway. And after breakfast we'll try to find out what's happened."
They had not yet explored the little draw down which the water drained; it was shallow and uninteresting; but they did not need to go far to find out "what had happened." Around the shoulder of the first bend they arrived at a branch draw on the other side of their low hill, and were in the midst of some more claims.
Water from a spring had been feeding the little draw and the branch draw both; but now a sluice had been set up, taking away so much that there was none left for the little draw.
Several men were at work with the sluice. They paid no attention to their visitors until Harry interrupted the nearest.
"Look here. You men have taken our water."
The man turned around short. He was the giant who had commented on Terry's big pan and on the condition in general of the Golden Prize prospect.
"What you talkin' about?" he growled. "Who are you an' where you come from? Oh, it's you, is it?" he added, to Terry—and Terry had the notion that he had known perfectly well who they were and where they were from, before speaking.
"Yes," answered Terry. "And this is my partner. You aren't leaving us any water for our own sluice."
"You have all that comes, haven't you?"
"We haven't all that ought to come, though," answered Harry, a bit sharply because the giant's tone was decidedly rough. "You've dug the ditch to your sluice higher up than necessary, and it lowers the level of the spring so much that no water enters our gulch at all. The stream used to split, didn't it?"
"Split nothin'. Trouble is, your gulch is runnin' dry. You ought to've figgered on that, now that the snow's all melted off and sunk in. Most of those little gulches dry up, come toward summer."
"The stream used to split, and feed through this gulch, just the same," insisted Harry. "You can see the channel. I hold that we're entitled to a share of this spring. And if you'd move your ditch a foot or two we'd get enough, and you'd have plenty yourselves."
"You're entitled to just what drains into your gulch, an' we're entitled to what drains into ours," growled the giant. "This water's in our gulch, ain't it—spring and all?"
"I don't know that it is, by rights," retorted Harry. "The spring's pretty close to being at the dividing point. And anyway, we're not asking you for your water; we're asking for ours."
"Now look-ee here," and the giant tapped his revolver butt: "By miners' law we're entitled to a share o' what water comes down our gulch, an' by miners' law you're entitled to a share o' what water comes down your gulch, alluz considerin' there's any to share. If your claim was wuth a picayune I'd advise you to hold on till next spring, when mebbe you'd get a leetle water again from natteral drainage; but as it ain't wuth a picayune I'd advise you to get off an' look elsewhar. Anyhow, you get off this ground mighty quick; for if you're huntin' trouble you'll find it in a bigger dose than you can handle."
"It looks to me like a deliberate scheme to run us off," began Harry, hotly. But he checked himself. "Come on, Terry," he bade.
"Did you see Pine Knot Ike?" exclaimed Terry, as they returned, with heads up, to their own ground. "I did—he was down below, with another man."
"Yes, I saw him." Back at their sluice again they stood undecided. Harry scratched his long nose and surveyed about. "Confound 'em! It's a dirty mean trick. If they'd change the head of their sluice ever so little we'd have enough water and so would they. But they've fixed it so that when they shut off to clean up the water all flows the other way. Let's see. We can get water for the cabin from that creek down below. Might pan with it, too—only we'd spend most of our time carrying the dirt down or the water up."
But when they went down to the creek, to investigate, they were curtly told by a camper there that his claim and others extended all along on both sides, and that they were entitled to the water themselves.
"You can help yourselves to drinking water, and that's all," he granted. "I'm sorry, strangers, but if you're on a dry prospect I reckon you'd better get out."
"Not yet!" retorted Harry. "Not," he added to Terry, "as long as we can make pie! Come on. We'll find Pat."
They had not seen Pat Casey for several days. As they descended the gulch, it seemed busier and more crowded than ever. Five thousand people were here now, according to report, and all the surrounding gulches were thronged, also. Sluices were running, others were being set up—and the thought of their own dry, useless sluice, and the gold that must be waiting, and the way they had worked to prepare for getting it, made Terry half sick. His father would laugh, and George would be a pest. Yes, George would poke all manner of fun at them.
Pat wasn't where they had expected to find him.
"Pat Casey? The red-headed Irishman, you mean? He's across yonder, and he's struck it rich. You'll find him over there, strangers, washing out $50 and more a day."
So Pat had moved. He was waist deep in a trench that showed signs of soon being a tunnel; and when from the brink they hailed him, he clambered out. All mud and perspiration was Pat.
"B' gorry, Oi'm glad to see yez," said Pat. "Oi've been thinkin' o' yez, but what with gettin' rich Oi've no time for calls. Oi bought out the men who were gopherin' here, an' now the deeper Oi go the richer Oi am. Sure, yez are lookin' at a millionaire, 'most. An' how are things with you boys?"
They told him. Pat scratched his head.
"Too bad, too bad. An' a dirty trick. But, faith, there ain't water enough to go 'round, an' that's a fact; not sayin', though, that they're actin' square, at all. For they ain't. Are yez in need?" He winked. "Jist come into me house a minute."
He led them into his bough hut, and from underneath his bunk fished out an oyster can.
"Heft it, wance," he invited.
It was heavy.
"Help yourselves, lads," he insisted.
But Harry laughed.
"Not yet, thanks, Pat. We've got a little to tide us along. What I want to know is, how's your appetite for pie?"
"Two dollars apiece for pie, an' two pies a day: wan for breakfast an' wan for supper; an' on Sunday wan for dinner besides," promptly answered Pat.
"It's a go," pronounced Harry.
"Will it take the both o' yez to make pie?" queried Pat. "Sure, ye look like a husky boy," he said, to Terry. "Let your partner make the pies, an' ye turn your hand to helpin' me at the sluice. Oi need another good worker. Oi fired the wan Oi had only this very mornin' because he sat down too frequent. Oi'll give ye a dollar an' a half a day, an' ye can fetch down me pies."
"That's a bargain," accepted Terry. "Wait till I get my spade."
When he and Harry arrived again at their own property they found the giant there. He was standing in their hole, and inquisitively poking about.
"Here! What are you doing?" challenged Harry.
"No harm meant," apologized the giant. "But you're down to bed-rock an' that's a fact. Still, a man might wash out a little dust, from spots, I reckon, if he had the water. Now, the truth is we're sorry for you boys. You've put consider'ble time an' labor in on this prospect, an' we're willin' to do the right thing. How'll you sell?"
"For how much?" demanded Harry.
"The property's no good to you; never would amount to anything great anyhow; it's too rocky. But I'll tell you what we'll do: We'll give you $100 for your claim, to save hard feelin's, an' we'll take the chance o' pannin' out enough when there's water, to pay us back. I expec' we'll lose, but we'd rather lose than have the hard feelin's. You get the hundred dollars an' the experience."
"We'll keep the experience and the claim, too; eh, Terry?" Harry answered. "And there's something you men can keep: you can keep off. What's that in your hand? A piece of our rock? Drop it!"
