At last he married a farmer's girl from the plains, who had come up there to teach the Frost Creek school. She failed as a teacher. She was born for the kitchen and farm. Andrew Malden saw it. She would make him as good a helpmate as any, better than the Chinese women and half-breeds with whom some of his neighbors consorted, so he married.
The mines were giving out. His keen eye saw there were mines above ground as well as below. He quietly left off placer mining, drew out some gold from a hidden purse, and, before the world of Gold City knew it, had nine hundred acres on Pine Tree Mountain, a big saw-mill going, a nice ranch home, and barns like folks back in the States.
At last a baby came—a baby boy; almost the first in Grizzly county. The neighbors would have cheered if they dared. Judge Lawson did dare to suggest a celebration, but the people were afraid of the stern man on Pine Tree Mountain.
Oh, how he loved that boy! His wife looked on with wonder, for she thought he knew not what stuff love was made of. It was not long. A few short years, and the lad, who seemed so strangely merry for a son of Andy Malden, grew pale and took the fever and died; and, where the pine trees stoop to shade the mountain flowers in hot midsummer, strange Yankee Sam and Andy, all alone, laid him to rest. There was no clergyman. The "Gospel Peddlers," as the miners called them, had not yet come to the hills to stay. Just as Sam was putting the soil over the rough box, Andy stopped him and muttered something about the boy's prayer. He must say it for him, and he whispered in a broken voice, "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep."
That was the last prayer Andrew Malden had uttered. Many years had come and gone; more and more he had lived within himself. He used to go to the boy's grave on holidays. Now he never went. For years his wife had lived with him and kept his house and prepared his food, and grown, like him, silent and apart from all around. She died at last and he gave her a high-toned funeral; had a coffin from the city and a preacher and all that. She had died of loneliness. He did not know it. She did not realize it. He went on as if it was a matter of course. The old house was kept up carefully; a Chinaman, as silent as himself, kept it for him, and a corps of men kept him busy at the mill.
He was rich, the people said; he was mean and grinding, the men muttered; and yet he prospered when others failed. Men envied, feared, hated him. Now he was growing old and men were wondering who would have his riches when he was gone. He had no kin this side the Ohio; and, for aught he knew, nowhere. His wife's nephews and cousins, pegging away in these hills, were beginning to build air-castles of days when the Pine Tree mill should be theirs.
Such was the old man who drove along in the moonlight, past Mormon Bar and over Chichilla Hill, holding a sleeping lad in his arms; and feeling, for the first time in years, the heart within him.
It was nearer dawn than midnight when the tired team, which had been slowly creeping up the mountain road for hours, turned into the lane above the mill and waited for their owner to swing open the gate which barred the way to the private road leading through the oak pasture to Pine Tree Ranch and home. It was one of those matchless nights that come only in the mountains, when the world is flooded with a soft, silvery light and the great trees stand out transfigured against the sky, amid a silence profound and awe-inspiring.
It had been a long ride; aye, a long one indeed to Andrew Malden. He had traveled across more than half a century of life since they left Gold City. His own childhood, Mary Moore, old Kentucky, had all come back to him. Then he had thought of that silent grave down beyond Gold City, and of the large part of his life buried there. He turned to the lad at his side, sleeping unconscious of life's ills and disappointments, of which, poor boy, he had already had his share. The sight of the innocent face thrilled the old man. In his slumbers the boy murmured, "Mamma, papa;" and, turning, the old man did a strange thing for him. He leaned over and kissed the lad, and whispered, "Mamma, papa! Boy, as long as Andy Malden lives, he shall be both to you."
When they reached the house, he hushed the dogs to silence, bade Hans, who stared astonished at his master's guest, to take the horses; and, lifting the sleeping form, carried it into his room, and, gently removing coat and shoes, laid the boy in the great bed, while he prepared to stretch himself on a couch near by.