For once, by a cruel irony, the adverse reports regarding the stability of the Conroy mine were true. A few stockholders still clung to the belief that it was a fabrication to depress the stock, but the fact as stated in Mr. Dumphy's despatch to Donna Maria was in possession of the public. The stock, fell to $35, to $30, to $10—to nothing! An hour after the earthquake it was known in One Horse Gulch that the "lead" had "dropped" suddenly, and that a veil of granite of incalculable thickness had been upheaved between the seekers and the treasure, now lost in the mysterious depths below. The vein was gone! Where?—no one could tell. There were various theories, more or less learned: there was one party who believed in the "subsidence" of the vein, another who believed in the "interposition" of the granite, but all tending to the same conclusion—the inaccessibility of the treasure. Science pointed with stony finger to the evidence of previous phenomena of the same character visible throughout the Gulch. But the grim "I told you so" of Nature was, I fear, no more satisfactory to the dwellers of One Horse Gulch than the ordinary prophetic distrust of common humanity.
The news spread quickly and far. It overtook several wandering Californians in Europe, and sent them to their bankers with anxious faces; it paled the cheeks of one or two guardians of orphan children, frightened several widows, drove a confidential clerk into shameful exile, and struck Mr. Raynor in Boston with such consternation, that people for the first time suspected that he had backed his opinion of the resources of California with capital. Throughout the length and breadth of the Pacific slope it produced a movement of aggression which the earthquake had hitherto failed to cover. The probabilities of danger to life and limb by a recurrence of the shock had been dismissed from the public consideration, but this actual loss of characteristic property awakened the gravest anxiety. If Nature claimed the privilege of at any time withdrawing from that implied contract under which so many of California's best citizens had occupied and improved the country, it was high time that something should be done. Thus spake an intelligent and unfettered press. A few old residents talked of returning to the East.
During this excitement Mr. Dumphy bore himself toward the world generally with perfect self-confidence, and, if anything, an increased aggressiveness. His customers dared not talk of their losses before him, or exhibit a stoicism unequal to his own.
"It's a bad business," he would say; "what do you propose?" And as the one latent proposition in each human breast was the return of the money invested, and as no one dared to make that proposition, Mr. Dumphy was, as usual, triumphant. In this frame of mind Mr. Poinsett found him on his return from the Mission of San Antonio, the next morning.
"Bad news, I suppose, down there," said Mr. Dumphy, briskly; "and I reckon the widow, though she has been luckier than her neighbours, don't feel particularly lively, eh? I'm devilish sorry for you, Poinsett, though, as a man, you can see that the investment was a good one. But you can't make a woman understand business. Eh? Well, the Rancho's worth double the mortgage, I reckon. Eh? Ugly, ain't she—of course! Said she'd been swindled? That's like a woman! You and me know 'em! eh, Poinsett?" Mr. Dumphy emitted his characteristic bark, and winked at his visitor.
Arthur looked up in unaffected surprise. "If you mean Mrs. Sepulvida," he said, coldly, "I haven't seen her. I was on my way there when your telegram recalled me. I had some business with Padre Felipe."
"You don't know then that the Conroy mine has gone up with the earthquake, eh? Lead dropped out—eh? and the widow's fifty-six thousand?"—here Mr. Dumphy snapped his finger and thumb, to illustrate the lame and impotent conclusion of Donna Maria's investment—"don't you know that?"
"No," said Arthur, with perfect indifference and a languid abstraction that awed Mr. Dumphy more than anxiety; "no, I don't. But I imagine that isn't the reason you telegraphed me."
"No," returned Dumphy, still eyeing Poinsett keenly for a possible clue to this singular and unheard-of apathy to the condition of the fortune of the woman his visitor was about to marry. "No—of course!"
"Well!" said Arthur, with that dangerous quiet which was the only outward sign of interest and determination in his nature. "I'm going up to One Horse Gulch to offer my services as counsel to Gabriel Conroy. Now for the details of this murder, which, by the way, I don't believe Gabriel committed, unless he's another man than the one I knew! After that you can tell me your business with me, for I don't suppose you telegraphed to me on his account solely. Of course, at first you felt it was to your interest to get him and his wife out of the way, now that Ramirez is gone. But now, if you please, let me know what you know about this murder."