He got up and dragged the ladder out, and hid it under the leaves piled against the fence.
“I reckon I ought not to expect to find it right away,� he sighed. “I’ve got to keep on looking and looking and looking. And I say I will! But I need some real tools. A knife, specially a broken one, isn’t much force for mining.�
He went toward home, but he was in no hurry to complete the journey at the end of which were his unfinished task and his father. Instead of going down The Street, he took The Back Way behind the Court-house, and slipped around the corner of the blacksmith shop.
Mr. Mallett, the blacksmith, with only his corncob pipe for company, was sitting in a chair tilted against the door jamb of the grimy log cabin. He was a vivacious little man with blue eyes and dark hair, and a face that would have been sallow if it had been visible under the grime. All the Village boys liked to loaf at his shop, but Dick had now a special reason for visiting him.
“Mr. Mallett—� Dick began.
The smith started. “You young imp!� he exclaimed. “What do you mean by jumping at me, sudden as a jack-in-the-box? I wasn’t thinking ’bout you—and here you are, close enough to hear my very thoughts. I never see such a boy. Why, what’s the matter with your face?�
“I fell down. It got scratched,� Dick explained briefly. “Mr. Mallett, I was thinking about the Old Sterling Mine, near your great-grandfather’s shop. Do you reckon it was silver, real silver, he got there?�
“Do I reckon? No, I don’t! I know it, sure and certain as I’m setting here in this chair, smoking my corncob pipe. Aint I heard my father tell time and again what his granddad told him? Why, my father could remember him good. He was a little quick man with blue eyes and black hair—we all get our favor from him. He never did learn to talk like folks over here; he always mixed his words and gave ’em curious-sounding twists. He come from France, one of Lafayette’s soldiers he was.�
“Why didn’t he go back with Lafayette?� asked Dick. “I should think he’d have been lonesome here, away from his own home and folks.�
“Certainly he was lonesome,� said Mr. Mallett. “My father said, when he was old and child-like, he’d set in the corner, jabbering French by the hour, with tears dripping down his face.�