"Thank the Lord, we've all got somethin'," Old Tom muttered devoutly, as he rose to his feet. Then we went our several ways.
| Happy Jack and Dead-Broke Sam. |
[THE "SACRED" NUGGET]
At this time much interest was aroused by the report that an extraordinarily large nugget had been found within a few miles of Kanowna, an outlying township, but as the days passed and no confirmation of the rumour was forthcoming, the miners throughout the whole district decided to hold a court of inquiry and elicit the facts, or at least the foundations on which the panic-creating statement had been based. As may be imagined, where gold is in question no rumour, however wild, is allowed to die a natural death. The miners will sift and probe into the matter to the bitter end—and usually the end is bitter indeed to those who have been too eager to join the inevitable rush, and sink the almost equally inevitable duffer shafts.
In the present case, however, the sifting process was speedily fruitful of results. Tangible evidence was obtained that two men had been seen early one morning carrying what seemed to be an enormous nugget in a blanket, some little distance from the settlement. Where the men came from with their find no one knew, and it was not likely that they would have given the information had it been asked; but where they had gone afterwards promised to be an equally mysterious question; they had vanished, leaving no trace or clue.
The warden of the district professed complete ignorance of the entire affair, and suggested that a practical joke had been played on the people; but this only served to make the miners unite in an outburst of genuine indignation. Already many shafts had been sunk in the most unlikely places by men who could ill afford to labour in vain. The mad enthusiasm created had had dire effect. Hundreds of men were flooding into the camp daily from every quarter; work on all the leads had ceased in anticipation of a rush. The joke, if joke it was, was indeed a cruel one, and its perpetrators deserved the wild denunciations that were heaped upon them. "We'll lynch them!" roared the miners, and they meant it; but despite the utmost searching, the nugget-carriers—whose names were known—could not be found.