“Let’s get Dave Wilbur to run us out to Coleson’s in his flivver,” suggested Ned. “I’ll go in and phone him.”
“Where’s Coleson’s—and what is it?” asked Dick, when Ned had returned with the information that Wilbur would be over in a few minutes.
“It’s an old copper mine on the shore of the lake about ten miles out from town,” explained Ned. “It used to be just a third-rate farm where Eli Coleson lived and grubbed a scanty living out of his few acres. The story is that one day he started to dig a well in his back-yard and down about ten feet he came upon a vein of almost pure copper ore. They say he quit farming that very minute and went to mining copper. For awhile he made money hand over fist, but, like lots of people who strike it rich, Eli Coleson couldn’t stand prosperity.”
“Here comes Dave,” interrupted Tommy Beals, as a battered car came into sight around the corner. “He’s brought Charlie Rogers with him. Hey there, Red!” he shouted to a boy on the front seat, who by reason of his fiery locks had been given that expressive nickname. “Who asked you to the party?”
“Nobody asked me, Fatty. I just horned in,” grinned Rogers. “I figured that if four of us sat on the front seat there’d be room for you in back.”
“Tell me some more about this Eli Coleson,” urged Dick, when the seating arrangements had been settled and the car was again in motion.
“Well,” resumed Ned, “the old man just naturally lost his head when he saw the dollars rolling in so fast. The first thing he did was to rip down his old farmhouse, which job he accomplished with a couple of sticks of dynamite, and right on the old foundation he began a great house of brick and stone.”
“Yes, and if he’d ever finished it, he’d have had one of the swell places of the state,” declared Rogers.
“There’s no doubt of that,” agreed Ned. “Every dollar old Eli got for his copper he spent on the house. The vein of ore was only about ten feet wide and extended toward the lake. They followed it out under the lake bottom as far as they dared; then they started digging in the other direction and tunneled back under the cellar of the house, but soon afterward the vein petered out and so did Eli’s fortune. The workmen had just got the roof on the new house when they had to stop. Eli was broke.”
“What became of him?” asked Dick.