The old prospector insisted upon filling in each hole as they went along and putting back the tufts of bunch grass in order to make the place look as it ordinarily did. Tiny numbered stakes driven down into the loose and gravelly soil was all that marked the places from which the specimens were taken. Of course, the specimens themselves were properly marked, too.
The gold seemed to be right at the grass-roots, as Flapjack had said. He told them the ledge was all of twenty yards wide, with the width increasing as the value of the ore increased. The full length of the ledge was still unexplored, but the depth of the vein of gold-bearing quartz was really the “unknown dimension.”
“But we’re going to be rich, girls!” whispered Jennie Stone, almost dancing, as they went back to the camp at dusk. “Rich! why, I’ve always been rich—or, my father has. I never thought much about it. But to own a real gold mine oneself!”
The thought was too great for utterance. Besides, they had agreed not to whisper about the find at the camp. Not even Miss Cullam knew that the report had come from the assayer regarding the first specimen of ore the girls had found.
It was not hard to hide their excitement, for there was so much going on at Freezeout Camp. Mr. Grimes was trying to rush the work as much as possible, for the picture actors were complaining constantly regarding their trials and the manifold privations of the situation.
The college girls and Ann Hicks, however, were having the time of their lives. They dressed up in astonishing apparel furnished by the film company and posed as the female populace of Freezeout Camp in some of the episodes. Min, in the part Ruth had especially written for her, was a pronounced success. Miss Gray, of course, as she always did, filled the character of the heroine “to the queen’s taste”—and to Mr. Grimes’ satisfaction as well, which was of much more importance.
The weather was just the kind the “sun worshippers” delighted in. The camera man could grind his machine for six hours a day or more. The film of “The Forty-Niners” grew steadily.
Ruth had practically finished her part of the work; but Rebecca Frayne was kept busy at her typewriter during part of the day. Therefore, Ruth easily got away from the sanctum sanctorum the next forenoon and went up to the ridge again with Flapjack and Min.
It had been settled that Helen and Jennie should remain with the other girls and keep them from wandering about on the easterly side of the stream.
Flapjack had been on the ridge since early light. He was taking samples every few rods, and Min was wrapping them up and marking the ore and the stakes. Beyond a small grove of scrubby trees they came in sight of what Flapjack declared was probably the end of the gold-bearing rock. There was a dip into another arroyo and beyond that a mesquite jungle as far as they could see.