CHAPTER II
JIM MAKES DISCOVERIES
It was dark and there were five miles of boot-tracks and seven miles of pup-tracks left in the sand of the road when Jim, Tintoretto, and Aborigineezer came at length to a point above the small constellation of lights that marked the spot where threescore of men had builded a town.
From the top of the ridge they had climbed, the man and the pup alone looked down on the camp, for the weary little "Injun" had fallen asleep. Had he been awake, the all to be seen would have been of little promise. Great, sombre mountains towered darkly up on every side, roofed over by an arch of sky amazingly brilliant with stars. Below, the darkness was the denser for the depth of the hollow in the hills. Vaguely the one straight street of Borealis was indicated by the lamps, like a thin Milky Way in a meagre universe of lesser lights, dimly glowing and sparsely scattered on the rock-strewn acclivities.
From down there came the sounds of life. Half-muffled music, raucous singing, blows of a hammer, yelpings of a dog, hissing of steam escaping somewhere from a boiler—all these and many other disturbances of the night furnished a microcosmic medley of the toiling, playing, hoping, and fearing, where men abide, creating that frailest and yet most enduring of frailties—a human community.
The sight of his town could furnish no novelties to the miner on top of the final rise, and feeling somewhat tired by the weight of his small companion, as well as hungry from his walking, old Jim skirted the rocky slope as best he might, and so came at length to an isolated cabin.
This dark little house was built in the brush, quite up on the hill above the town, and not far away from a shallow ravine where a trickle of water from a spring had encouraged a straggling growth of willows, alders, and scrub. Some four or five acres of hill-side about the place constituted the "Babylonian Glory" mining-claim, which Jim accounted his, and which had seen about as much of his labor as might be developed by digging for gold in a barrel.
"Nobody home," said the owner to his dog, as he came to the door and shouldered it open. "Wal, all the more for us."
That any one might have been at home in the place was accounted for simply by the fact that certain worthies, playing in and out of luck, as the wheel of fate might turn them down or up, sometimes lived with Jim for a month at a time, and sometimes left him in solitude for weeks. One such transient partner he had left at the cabin when he started off to get the pup now tagging at his heels. This house-partner, having departed, might and might not return, either now, a week from now, or ever.
The miner felt his way across the one big room which the shack afforded, and came to a series of bunks, built like a pantry against the wall. Into one of these he rolled his tiny foundling, after which he lighted a candle that stood in a bottle, and revealed the smoky interior of the place.
Three more of the bunks were built in the eastern end of the room; a fireplace occupied a portion of the wall against the hill; a table stood in the centre of the floor, and a number of mining tools littered a corner. Cooking utensils were strewn on the table liberally, while others hung against the wall or depended from hooks in the chimney. This was practically all there was, but the place was home.
Tintoretto, beholding his master preparing a fire to heat up some food, delved at once into everything and every place where a wet little nose could be thrust. Having snorted in the dusty corners, he trotted to the bench whereon the water-bucket stood, and, standing on his hind legs, gratefully lapped up a drink from the pail. His thirst appeased, he clambered ambitiously into one of the bunks, discovered a nice pair of boots, and, dragging one out on the floor, proceeded to carry it under the table and to chew it as heartily as possible.
There was presently savory smoke, sufficient for an army, in the place, while sounds of things sizzling made music for the hungry. The miner laid bare a section of the table, which he set with cups, plates, and iron tools for eating. He then dished up two huge supplies of steaming beans and bacon, two monster cups of coffee, black as tar, and cut a giant pile of dun-colored bread.
"Aborigineezer," he said, "the banquet waits."
Thereupon he fetched his weary little guest to the board and attempted to seat him on a stool. The tiny man tried to open his eyes, but the effort failed. Had he been awake and sitting erect on the seat provided for his use, his head could hardly have come to the level of the supper.
"Can't you come to, long enough to eat?" inquired the much-concerned miner. "No? Wal, that's too bad. Couldn't drink the coffee or go the beans? H'm, I guess I can't take you down to show you off to the boys to-night. You'll have to git to your downy couch." He returned the slumbering child to the bunk, where he tucked him into the blankets.
Tintoretto did ample justice to the meal, however, and filled in so thoroughly that his round little pod of a stomach was a burden to carry. He therefore dropped himself down on the floor, breathed out a sigh of contentment, and shut his two bright eyes.
Old Jim concluded a feast that made those steaming heaps of food diminish to the point of vanishing. He sat there afterwards, leaning his grizzled head upon his hand and looking towards the bunk where the tiny little chap he had found was peacefully sleeping. The fire burned low in the chimney; the candle sank down in its socket. On the floor the pup was twitching in his dreams. Outside the peace, too vast to be ruffled by puny man, had settled on all that tremendous expanse of mountains.
When his candle was about to expire the miner deliberately prepared himself for bed, and crawled in the bunk with his tiny guest, where he slept like the pup and the child, so soundly that nothing could suffice to disturb his dreams.
The arrows of the sun itself, flung from the ridge of the opposite hills, alone dispelled the slumbers in the cabin.
The hardy old Jim arose from his blankets, and presently flung the door wide open.
"Come in," he said to the day. "Come in."
The pup awoke, and, running out, barked in a crazy way of gladness. His master washed his face and hands at a basin just outside the door, and soon had breakfast piping hot. By then it was time to look to Aborigineezer. To Jim's delight the little man was wide awake and looking at him gravely from the blankets, his funny old cap still in place on his head, pulled down over his ears.
"Time to wash for breakfast," announced the miner. "But I don't guarantee the washin' will be the kind that mother used to give," and taking his tiny foundling in his arms he carried him out to the basin by the door.
For a moment he looked in doubt at the only apology for a wash-rag the shanty afforded.
"Wal, it's an awful dirty cloth that you can't put a little more blackness on, I reckon," he drawled, and dipping it into the water he rubbed it vigorously across the gasping little fellow's face.
Then, indeed, the man was astounded. A wide streak, white as milk, had appeared on the baby countenance.
"Pierce my pearls!" exclaimed the miner, "if ever I saw a rag in my shack before that would leave a white mark on anything! Say!" And he took off the youngster's old fur cap.
He was speechless for a moment, for the little fellow's hair was as brown as a nut.
"I snum!" said Jim, wiping the wondering little face in a sort of fever of discovery and taking off color at every daub with the rag. "White kid—painted! Ain't an Injun by a thousand miles!"
And this was the truth. A timid little paleface, fair as dawn itself, but smeared with color that was coming away in blotches, emerged from the process of washing and gazed with his big, brown eyes at his foster-parent, in a way that made the miner weak with surprise. Such a pretty and wistful little armful of a boy he was certain had never been seen before in all the world.
"I snum! I certainly snum!" he said again. "I'll have to take you right straight down to the boys!"
At this the little fellow looked at him appealingly. His lip began to tremble.
"No-body—wants—me," he said, in baby accents, "no-body—wants—me—anywhere."