THE MINER’S PARTNER.
IN FOUR CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER I.
There was a good deal of excitement in the mining camps at and near Flume City, which, as every mining reader knows, was prominent among the gold-diggings, and gold-washings also, of Colorado twenty years ago. A meeting of miners was being held at the largest building in the city—a wooden shed, which called itself a restaurant, at which there were assembled some forty or fifty men, rough-looking, roughly clad, and armed with revolver and knife, although no intention existed of using such weapons at this gathering. The assembly, indeed, had been called together with an object calculated to promote union and comradeship—to assist in maintaining individual rights and to support the law generally.
There was a president, of course, and his discourse, if not polished, was much to the point. ‘I reckon,’ he said, after the meeting had lasted perhaps an hour, and several speeches had been made, with a good deal of shouting in the way of approval—‘I reckon that the citizens who have spoken are about right. We have got some traitors among us, and that’s where the worst comes in. It wasn’t by chance that any outside loafer knew just when to steal the washings at the Long Placer last night, or that Scotch Ned was sent away when the stamp-mill was broken. We know who broke the mill—it was Bill Dobell. But who told him to come in then? And who could have known that the Kentucky boys at the Long Placer had got the best washings they had seen this year? Who could have known that but one among us?’
The president said much more to this effect; but the remainder of his speech, with the various orations which followed, need not be given, as we have shown what was the nature of the excitement which had called the miners into solemn conclave.
The language used was odd and quaint enough; to many it would have sounded absurd in its phraseology; but no fault could have been found with the matter. That was direct and shrewd, and evinced a strong determination to put down the mischief which was making itself felt.
At the conclusion of a pithy harangue, in which the speaker urged vigorous and brief proceedings against any one detected in such unpardonable conduct, or reasonably suspected of complicity in the crime—for robbing the troughs in a mining country is looked upon as worse than murder, and is considered to be quite as bad as horse-stealing—a voice exclaimed: ‘You air right, colonel!’
Every one started at the sound, and looked in the direction of the speaker, who, having recently joined the meeting, with several others, stood near the door. A dozen men whispered to their next neighbours: ‘Why, it is Rube Steele!’ And significant glances were exchanged.
‘I thought the other day there was Injuns lying around to thieve,’ continued the man; ‘so, when’——
‘You told us so, Rube,’ interrupted the president; ‘and the Kentucky boys from the Long Placer came into committee on the subject; and their troughs were robbed while they were gone. You know that, I estimate?’
A murmur as of approval of the president’s language ran through the meeting. Rube noted this, but it did not disturb him. A peculiarly sinister glance which he threw around him was perhaps natural to his not greatly attractive features.
‘Yes; I expect I know that; and I expect that I know the tale about the Injuns was a fraud,’ returned Rube. Something like a sarcastically approving laugh ran through the meeting at these words; but the speaker continued, without appearing to notice it: ‘That stranger from San Francisco was the man who brought the news. You believed him; so did I.’
‘We believed you, Rube; you said the man was reliable,’ again interrupted the president.
‘That is so,’ replied Rube. ‘He brought messages from leading Frisco citizens, men known to me, and so I believed him. But I tell you he is no good; and he has gone off with nigh upon three thousand dollars in gold-dust which I trusted to him. He brought me an order from Ben, my pardner, to say he was to have the dust; and though I did not like the idea, I parted with it. And on coming into camp and asking Ben about it, I find he never gave any order at all. And it is my belief that this is the man who robbed the washings at the Kentucky boys’ placer.’
‘And where is Ben?’ began the president, who would probably have said more, but that a man burst hastily into the saloon as the question was asked, and shouted in answer: ‘Here! Here is Reuben Steele’s pardner. Who wants him?’
‘We want you to hear what has been said,’ returned the president, ‘and to give us your opinion about Californy Jones—the stranger who was introduced by your pardner, but who, Rube now says, is the man who robbed the placer, and has robbed him of three thousand dollars.’
‘I can’t say anything about the placer; maybe Rube knows more about that than I do,’ replied the new-comer. ‘But the man has gone off with three thousand dollars; that’s a sure fact; and as Rube gave him the dust, it’s a sure fact too, he knows more about that than I do.’
‘I know no more than yourself,’ retorted Rube. ‘The man produced an order from you. I could not tell that it was a forgery, and you have always considered yourself as the boss of our outfit.’
‘Wal, gentlemen, and Mr President,’ continued Ben, ‘I can tell you we have got murderers among us. Yes, gentlemen, that is so—real cold-blooded murderers, that will lie in wait for honest, law-abiding citizens and shoot them from behind rocks.’
A louder murmur ran through the assembly here; and the president asked Ben his meaning.
‘My meaning is this,’ continued Ben. ‘You know I am clearing out, and shall leave the camp in a day or two, so that we are realising all our property, and this gold-dust was a part of what I am going East with. So, I kinder felt like riled at losing it; and when my pardner told me, as cool as maybe, that he concluded this stranger had vamoosed with my dust’——
‘And mine!’ interjected Rube.
‘Wal, let every man speak of his own business,’ returned Ben, who was evidently in anything but a good temper. ‘I say he had cleared out with mine, anyhow; and I was riled, I tell you. But at that minute, I saw, crossing the Mule Back Ridge, two men on horseback. The Ridge is distant a good piece; but I could swear one was that stranger. “Send some of the boys on,” said I to Rube. “I shall go through the cañon, so shall meet them. They must cross there, if they don’t mean to go into the mountains.” And I was sure they did not want the mountain road. So I sot off. But I was waited for. There are as bad men left in the camp as have gone out of it; and at the very entrance of the cañon, when them horsemen must have been a good two miles away, some desperadoes fired at me from behind a rock. There was more than one shot fired at the same time, I know; and—see here, Mr President!—they took good aim.’ As he said this, he threw off his long outer coat, and handed it to the president, who, after a momentary examination, held it up, and exhibited an unmistakable bullet-hole in the skirt.
‘That was near—that is a fact!’ exclaimed the president. ‘And what did you do then?’
‘I turned back,’ said Ben. ‘It was of no use my pushing on alone, with the rocks lined with murderers, with men who expected me, and were in league with Californy Jones.’
‘And where was Rube?’ asked the president.
‘I was at the head of a bunch of boys of the right sort, seven or eight of them, that I had looked up in the camp. They are here now: Long Sim, Missouri Rob, Major Dimey and friend, with some others, all first-class citizens.’
An assenting exclamation from each of those he named confirmed the speaker.
‘I could not do more than that,’ continued Rube. ‘And when I found my pardner on the return-track, it was no use my proceeding. I came back to the city, and then right away to this here convention.’
‘I could have raised twice the force in a quarter of the time he took!’ cried Ben, intercepting some remark which it was evident the president was about to make. ‘And why I did not come straight here was because there was something in my tent I thought I had best look after. I had left my tent in the care of a friend; but you don’t know what may happen, with such loafers and scoundrels hanging around.’
‘Wal, fellow-citizens,’ said the president, ‘this convention didn’t assemble, I reckon, to hear the rights of any difference between two pardners; and it ain’t our business nohow. We are here to discuss the existence of thieves and scallawags amongst us, and to decide upon the beet means of clearing them out—that is all.’
Thus recalled to business, the assembly resumed its former discussion, and the quarrel between the partners was not again openly referred to; but it coloured all that was said, and many remarks upon it were made in the body of the meeting. It was clear that public feeling was much against Rube Steele, although a few of those present were his partisans; but these latter appeared to consist only of the ‘bunch’ of citizens he had referred to, and were not altogether free from suspicion themselves.
The gathering separated without having come to any formal resolve, beyond appointing a few of their members to act in committee and to decide what steps should be taken; but as it was notorious that each of the chosen ones was a leader among the Regulators, as they were once called—or the Vigilantes, to use their now familiar Spanish name—there was probably more significance in their appointment than at first appeared.
For that night at anyrate no fresh outrages were apprehended; the thieves, whoever they were, possessed information too prompt and too certain to allow them to venture on a renewal of their attempts during the excitement and watchfulness which would prevail for a time in the vicinity of Flume City.
In its neighbourhood, few persons were abroad after nightfall; it was dangerous, indeed, for any one to approach a tent without making his presence loudly known; a shot would probably be the first intimation that he was trespassing on dangerous ground; while a few of the miners possessed large and savage dogs, which would be loosed on hearing a footstep near the tent. So those who had business which led them abroad, were careful to confine themselves to the main street of Flume City, if such a title could fitly be applied to the straggling avenue which ran from end to end of the place. But spite of these drawbacks, a few persons were moving in the environs of the city, and even at a good distance beyond its boundaries, dark though the night was, and only relieved from utter gloom by the starlight, for moon there was none.
One man who was going towards the town, stopped suddenly, as his quick ear caught the sound of an approaching footstep, and with the caution of one accustomed to frontier-life, drew himself up by the side of one of the very few trees which remained in the vicinity of Flume City, so that in the obscurity it was almost impossible for any passing eye to detect him. The next instant a single man hurried by, passing between the first comer and the starry sky, so that his figure was visible with tolerable distinctness to the concealed watcher. This second man did not look to the right or left—it would have been almost impossible for him to detect the spy, had he done so—but went quickly on in a direction which seemed to surprise the hidden observer.
‘What can he want there?’ exclaimed the latter, stepping from his hiding-place, when the other had fairly gone past. ‘There ain’t no shanties nor no living soul in that direction. It was surely Rube Steele; and without he has gone crazy, I can’t fix anyhow why he should be going towards the cañon after nightfall. I will see where he is going; and if he has turned crazy, I may help him; and if not, I shall find out what he wants in the mountain pass.
He was moving carefully but quickly in the direction the other had taken, while he was muttering these disinterested sentiments; and although he could only see the figure he followed, at intervals, when the man climbed a ledge and stood for an instant in relief against the sky, yet there was no difficulty in the pursuit. He could hear his steps as they disturbed the loose stones which strewed the way, and knew besides, that in the wild spot which they had reached, there was no means of turning to the right or left, so that he could not easily miss the chase. Presently the tread of the foremost man became slower, and the pursuer, as a matter of course, moved at a slower rate also—slower and slower still, until the former stopped, or only moved about the same spot of ground.
‘What on airth is he going to do?’ muttered the other man. ‘It’s so dark—for he is right under the shadow of Big Loaf Rock—that he can’t see to dig, nor hunt after any buried—— Wal! that means something!’ This exclamation was caused by a low whistle which Rube Steele—if indeed it were that person—suddenly gave. This was repeated, and then answered from a distance. ‘I feel like seeing the end of this,’ continued the spy; ‘and I mean to.’
Acting upon this determination, he crawled carefully forward, for he was too near to venture upon standing upright; and moreover, as the answering whistle had proved that others were in the neighbourhood, he was compelled to be on his guard against discovery from other quarters. His quick ear soon caught the sound of an approaching tread, and directly after, he heard words spoken. The spy’s curiosity was now raised tenfold, especially as one of the two men who were now, as he well knew, close to him, struck a match to light his pipe, and the momentary flash showed him both figures in a brief glimpse. They were unluckily placed with their backs towards him, so that he could not see their features. He now felt confident that the first one was Rube Steele, and that the second was not entirely unknown to him, but more than this he could not tell.
This was terribly tantalising; and after the brief illumination of the match, a more impenetrable darkness seemed to have settled upon the pass and the rocks around; so, at all hazards, he resolved to get still nearer. He was perhaps a little unguarded in his eagerness, and made some slight noise, and it is certain that he had not calculated all the hazards which might environ him, for a low fierce growl showed that a dog was with the men, and the spy shuddered with horror as he heard the sound.
‘Did you hear anything?’ said a harsh voice. ‘The dog would not have growled like that, unless some one was hanging around.’
‘Nonsense!’ returned the other; and the voice was certainly the voice of Rube Steele. ‘He heard a jack-rabbit, perhaps, or scented a polecat. I reckon there ain’t a soul within a league of this cañon to-night. The miners are all at Flume City, and the Indians have left the district for more than a week past.’
‘You may be right,’ returned the first speaker. ‘But the dog is uneasy, and I never knew him give them signs for game or venison; no, nor for Injun neither. I should have said there was a white man near. But we air a little too much in the line of the main pass to show a light, which we must do. Come behind this rock.—Good dog!—mind ’em!’ These last words were of course addressed to the dog, which had continued to growl at intervals while his master was speaking, although the unseen watcher had lain as still as death. The animal was apparently soothed by being thus noticed, and probably followed the men, whose footsteps could be heard as they removed to the proposed cover behind the Big Loaf Rock.
The spy had no inclination to follow them to learn more, but crawled carefully and noiselessly over the ground until he was at a safe distance from the pass; so far, indeed, that he judged that even the acute ears and scent of the dog could not detect him when he rose, and hurried in the direction of the city as fast as his legs could carry him.
On the outskirts, he knocked at the door of a shanty, a log-built hut with earthen floor, such as the Mexican peasantry, and even their betters, often reside in; and in answer to a gruff challenge from within—for the inmates were in bed, or stretched on such pallets as served for beds—he returned an answer which seemed to satisfy the questioner, for after a little more gruff grumbling, the door was opened, and he was admitted.
In answer to his inquiry, the gruff voice said: ‘No; nary drop of anything but water; ye kin have that. Your voice sounds all of a tremble, Absalom; and if ye don’t get shot over the cards or drown yourself, I guess ye won’t last long as a miner, anyhow.’
Absalom, as he was called, hesitated for a moment, as though about to say something in his defence, but eventually decided on making no reply to this rather unpleasant speech, and threw himself down on a buffalo skin which the other man pushed towards him. No further conversation took place, and the shanty was as dark and silent as were the remainder of the scattered dwellings on the outskirts of Flume City.