The giant’s laugh rumbled again.
“Not me—I ain’t that kind of a miner—ain’t wearing no brass collar for a corp’ration! Gone too long without it. But lookee here, you ain’t told me nothin’ about yerself. I didn’t allow you was aimin’ to turn into a mount’in man when I rid the cars with yuh last spring.”
“I wasn’t,” said Philip; and thereupon he gave a short account of the summer’s wanderings up to, but not including, the discovery of the “Little Jean,” and entirely omitting all mention of Bromley’s part in the wanderings. That his story did not explain his presence on the outward trail with two saddle horses, three jacks and no tools or camp equipment, he was well aware; but the canny traditions were warning him not to betray the carefully guarded secret of the “Little Jean” to a chance travelling companion.
“Tough luck, all round,” said the big man half absently; and Philip saw plainly enough that he was trying to fit the present moment’s inconsistencies into the story. Then: “Still and all, somebody’s had good luck over here in this hell’s back kitchen. I heard about it in the camp o’ them Leadville pardners last night.”
“What did you hear?” Philip asked, and his nerves were prickling.
“They said two young fellers, tenderfoots, both of ’em, hoofed it into Leadville two-three weeks ago with some stuff that run away up yonder in the assays—rotten quartz and free gold.”
“Well,” said Philip, still with nerves on edge, “that sort of thing is happening every day, isn’t it? What more did you hear?”
“They was talkin’ ’mongst theirselves—not to me. The news had leaked out, like it always does, and they’d trailed the young fellers, a ridin’ two broncs and herdin’ three loaded jacks, acrosst the range and over here. Then they’d lost the trail somehow. From what I picked up, I allowed they was aimin’ to stay till they found it ag’in, if it took all winter.”
Philip’s tongue was dry in his mouth when he said: “Whereabouts were these Leadville people camped?”
“About ten mile north, at the mouth of a li’l’ creek that runs into the Fork.”