CHAPTER VIII.
JIM SANDERS.
On the afternoon of the following day a party of four stood facing the opening into the deserted copper mine.
The most prominent of the group was the bronzed and bearded Gideon Prawle, who had fully recovered from the effects of the drug administered to him by Otis Clymer.
The other three, it is almost needless to say, were Jack Howard, Charlie Fox and Meyer Dinkelspeil.
No difficulty had been experienced by Charlie in obtaining his father’s permission to accompany Jack Howard and Mr. Prawle to Montana after Gideon had explained the situation to the doctor and shown him the magnificent specimens of pure copper he carried in his grip.
As soon as Prawle missed his pocketbook a new light broke in on those in the secret.
They agreed that the thief was Otis Clymer; that Meyer had been right when he said he had seen Clymer’s face at the partly open window that night, and that the villain set fire to the surgery not only for the purpose of revenging himself on Dr. Fox, but to effectually get rid of Gideon Prawle as a bar to his newly-hatched plan of getting possession of the copper mine for himself.
Dr. Fox had strongly objected to losing the services of his German boy, who was a handy factor in his establishment.
But Meyer had made up his mind to go to Montana with the others, and it was useless to oppose him, for he declared he would surely run away of his own accord.
As Prawle and the two boys took his part, and interceded in his favor, the doctor was prevailed upon to give a reluctant consent to his going with the party.
“Well, boys, here we are on the ground at last,” said Prawle, enthusiastically. “Here’s the creek I spoke to you about which runs into the North Branch of the Cheyenne River, five miles or so away, and yonder you see the hole in the rock which affords entrance to one of the richest copper deposits in the great Northwest. Unfortunately, it isn’t really ours as yet till we find Jim Sanders, who sold me the option on the property.”
“And it may never be ours as the case stands,” said Jack, gloomily. “Otis Clymer, who robbed you of your pocketbook, and thereby came into possession of the option, has probably destroyed that document, and it’s pretty certain he lost no time coming here to get the inner track of you. His object, of course, if he has been able to raise the money necessary for his purpose, is to meet Sanders and persuade that very unreliable person to sell him the ground, knowing that this course will be perfectly safe, since you will never be able to present the option yourself. If, after he has accomplished this, you interfere with your claim he will demand that you produce the option, which, of course, you cannot do. Our only hope in this matter is to run across Jim Sanders before Clymer can get his work in. All you will then have to do is to pay down the balance of the purchase money, and get a bill of sale of the ground.”
“That’s all right,” spoke up Charlie Fox; “but even if he does succeed in getting the bulge on us, what is to prevent us having him arrested on a telegraphic order from Sackville, for the double crime of attempted murder and arson?”
“We could try that, of course, but I fear we should meet with many difficulties out here, especially if he is smart enough to make friends with an eye to that particular contingency, and the fellow is not such a fool but to understand and provide against the risk of arrest and subsequent extradition to Nebraska.”
“Vell, off ve lets dot rooster got der best off us, den I votes ve go py der wilderness oud und kick ourselufs for a bardy of shackasses,” interjected Meyer Dinkelspeil, with solemn earnestness.
“Good for you, Dutchman,” said Prawle, slapping the round-faced youth on the shoulder. “And now, boys, follow me into the mine and I will show you a sight which will make your mouth water. You will see more copper in five minutes than you ever looked at in all your lives before.”
A couple of hours later Gideon Prawle and the boys returned to Rocky Gulch.
They ate supper at the hotel, and having arranged to bunk there for the night, Prawle set about making inquiries relative to Jim Sanders.
“I never know’d Jim Sanders to be of sich importance as he seems to be jest now, stranger,” said the landlord of the Rocky Gulch Hotel, when Prawle button-holed him in search of the information he wanted. “You air ther second one in two days wot wants to know ther wharabouts of Lazy Jim, as we call him, for we’ve never known him to work a day sence he came to ther Gulch nigh on to a year ago. ’Pears to me your face is kinder familiar, pard. Warn’t you ’round these diggin’s a fortnight or three weeks ago?”
“I was,” said Prawle. “I bunked here a couple of nights and had my meals in your dining-room.”
“Wal, now, I thought I warn’t mistook in your phiz. We hev strangers comin’ and goin’ all ther time, but I generally remembers a face, once I takes notice of it. What might be your object in wantin’ to see Jim?”
“I want to see him about a bit of ground down by Beaver Creek I bought of him when I was here last. I paid him $100 down, and owe him a small balance which I am now ready to settle.”
“Wal, now thet accounts for ther wad Jim had at the time. Folks ’round here thought he mought hev robbed somebody, but as thar warn’t no proof agin him, of course he warn’t troubled. But he didn’t stay ’round here more’n a day before he lighted out, and he hain’t been heard from sence.”
“You say there was somebody else looking for him yesterday?”
“Sure. A big cityfied-lookin’ chap named Plunkett.”
That name conveyed no information to Prawle, who had not heard of the landlord of Sackville’s eyesore, and the prospector wondered if he was an emissary of Otis Clymer.
“Mought I ask what you wanted with thet there land down by ther krik?” inquired the proprietor of the Rocky Gulch Hotel, curiously. “It don’t seem a likely sort of place thet I hev heard of. You hain’t diskivered payin’ dirt, hev you?”
This was asked with undisguised eagerness.
“No,” replied Prawle, with assumed carelessness. “No such luck.”
“Wal, now, I wuz in hopes you had,” said the man, in a tone of disappointment. “’Cause why, these here diggin’s aren’t just what they wuz a year ago. Things look like as if they wuz goin’ ter peter out. Wal, you hain’t sed what you bought Jim’s claim for. You aren’t expectin’ ter build a palis an’ live thar jest for ther fun of ther thing, are you?”
“Well, hardly,” replied Prawle, falling in with the man’s rude humor. “I’ve discovered there’s a peculiar kind of stone near the creek that might be used to advantage in railroad building, and——”
“Oh, I see,” said the landlord of the hotel, thrown off the scent as Prawle intended. “Wal, I wish you luck with it.”
Prawle asked several other inhabitants of Rocky Gulch about Sanders, but each one had the same answer—Jim had not been seen in the Gulch for over two weeks, and they did not know where he was.
“Kind of hard luck, isn’t it?” said Prawle, when he rejoined his companions, after more than an hour’s ineffectual search for a clew to Sanders’ present whereabouts.
“I should say it is,” replied Jack Howard. “What are we going to do?”
“We’ll have to go back to Trinity in the morning and see what we can learn in that place. By the way, I heard there was another person trying to locate Sanders.”
“Otis Clymer!” exclaimed Jack and Charlie in a breath.
“No,” replied Prawle, shaking his head. “It was a big man, named Plunkett.”
“Plunkett!” shouted Charlie Fox, in a tone of astonishment. “Not Dave Plunkett?”
“I didn’t hear what his first name was. Do you know somebody by that name?”
“The cheap hotel where Otis Clymer lodged of late in Sackville is kept by a man named Dave Plunkett. I’ll bet Clymer has taken him into his confidence as a moneyed partner in this enterprise, and so that he himself can keep under cover as much as possible. He’s a cute rascal.”
“If that’s the case,” said Gideon Prawle, reflectively, “we’ve got our work cut out for us to beat the pair of them. Tell me what you know about this Plunkett.”
Charlie gave the prospector the history of Dave Plunkett’s operations in Sackville, so far as he knew, as well as his opinion of the man’s character.
“Well,” said Prawle, “I judge if he rounds up Jim Sanders before we do, it’ll be all day with us. Without that option I haven’t got the ghost of a claim on the ground. It’s a thousand pities things have turned out as they have. Who would have suspected we had a listener that night in your pop’s surgery?” looking at Charlie Fox.
“I never heard of such confounded hard luck,” returned Charlie, kicking the wooden front of the hotel spitefully in his silent wrath. “Just when we have sighted a big fortune for the crowd of us—not to speak of a million or two which, by right of discovery, is coming to you, Mr. Prawle—in steps a pair of unmitigated rascals, with every chance of scooping the trick at our expense.”
“By shinger!” chipped in Meyer: “do we stood dot? I feels so mad dot I vould like to do somedings already yet.”
At another time Jack and Charlie would have given the German boy the laugh, but they were not in laughing humor at that moment.
The outlook was altogether too serious.
Next morning the rig which had brought them from Trinity to Rocky Gulch was hitched up, and Gideon Prawle and the three boys started back along the trail.
They had perhaps accomplished half the distance to the river town, when a solitary horseman, astride of a wretched nag, was seen coming toward them in the distance.
“By shinger!” exclaimed Meyer. “Off dot don’d peen a scarecrow I’m a liar!”
“He certainly looks like a hard case,” said Jack, watching the stranger’s approach with not a little curiosity.
When the distance between them had lessened about one half Prawle, who had been examining the newcomer with great attention, suddenly gave a shout that fairly electrified his young companions.
“Jim Sanders, by all that’s wonderful!”