“Well, why don’t yousell?” he suggested innocently, and she paused and bit her lip. Yes, why not? Why, because there were no buyers–except Wiley Holman and his father! The knowledge of her impotence almost drove her on to further madness, but another voice bade her beware. He had given her his advice, which was not to sell, and–oh, 88 that accursed assayer! If she had his report she could flaunt it in his face or–she caught her breath and smiled.
“No,” she said, “you told me not to!”
And Wiley smiled back and patted her hand.
89CHAPTER X
The Best Head in Town
What was Wiley Holman up to? Virginia paced the floor in a very unloverlike mood; and at last she sat down and wrote a scathing letter to the assayer, demanding her assay at once. She also enclosed one dollar in advance to test the sample for gold and silver and then, as an afterthought, she enclosed another bill and told him to test it for copper, lead, and zinc. There was something in that rock–she knew it just as well as she knew that Wiley was in love with her, and this was no time to pinch dollars. For ten years and more they had stuck there in Keno, waiting and waiting for something to happen, but now things had come to such a pass that it was better to know even the worst. For if the mine was barren and Wiley, after all, was only trying in his dumb way to help, then she must pocket her pride and sell him her stock and go away and hide her head. But if the white quartz was rich–well, that would be different; there would be several things to explain.
Yet, if the quartz was barren, why did Wiley offer to buy her stock, and if it was rich, why did 90he sell his tax deed? And if his father stood ready to pay ten cents a share for two hundred thousand shares of stock why did Wiley refuse to redeem her mother’s holdings for a petty eight hundred dollars? He must have the money, for his diamond ring alone was worth well over a thousand dollars; and he had tried repeatedly to get possession of this same stock which he now refused to accept as a gift. Virginia thought it over until her head was in a whirl and at last she stamped her foot. The assay would tell, and if he had been trying to cheat her–she drew her lips to a thin, hard line and looked more than ever like her mother.
The work at the Paymaster went on intermittently, but Blount’s early zest was lacking. For eight, yes, ten years he had waited patiently for the moment when he should get control of the mine; but now that he held it, without let or hindrance, somehow his enthusiasm flagged. Perhaps it was the fact that the timbering was expensive and that his gropings for the lost ore body came to nothing; but in the back of his mind Blount’s growing distrust dated from the day he had bought Wiley’s quit-claim. Wiley had come to the mine full of fury and aggressiveness, as his combat with Stiff Neck George clearly showed; but after he had gone down and inspected the workings he had sold out for one hundred dollars. And Wiley Holman was a mining engineer, with a name for Yankee shrewdness–he must have had a reason.
Blount recalled his men from the drifts where 91they had been working and set them to crosscutting for the vein. It was too expensive, restoring all the square-sets and clearing out the fallen rock; and he had learned to his sorrow that Colonel Huff had blown up every heading with dynamite. In that tangle of shattered timbers and caved-in walls the miners made practically no progress, for the ground was treacherous and ten years under water had left the wood soft and slippery. To be sure the hidden chute lay at the breast of some such drift; but to clear them all out, with his limited equipment and no regular engineer in charge, would run up a staggering account. So Blount began to crosscut, and to sink along the contact, but chiefly to cut down expenses.
With the railroad that had tapped the camp torn up and hauled away, every foot of timber, every stick of powder, cost twice as much as it ought. And then there was machinery, and gas and oil for the engine, and valves and spare parts for the pumps, and the board of the men, and overhead expenses–and not a single dollar coming in. Blount sat up late in his office, adding total to total, and at the end he leaned back aghast. At the very inside it was costing him two hundred dollars for every day that he operated the mine. And what was it turning back? Nothing. The mine had been gutted of every pound of ore that it would pay to sack and ship, and unless something was done to locate the lost ore body and give some guarantee of future values, well, the Paymaster 92would have to shut down. Blount considered it soberly, as a business man should, and then he sent for Wiley Holman.