Then, one evening, when the country grew more broken, they fell in with three returning prospectors.
"If you'll trade your horses, we might make a deal," said one when they camped together. "You can't take them much farther—the country's too rough—and we could sell them to one of the farmers near the settlements."
Blake was glad to come to terms.
"We've been out two months on a general prospecting trip," the man informed them. "It's the toughest country to get through I ever struck."
His worn and ragged appearance bore this out; and Benson looked somewhat dismayed.
"Are there minerals up yonder?" Harding asked. "We're not in that line; it's a forest product we're looking for."
"We found indications of gold, copper, and one or two other metals, besides petroleum, but we didn't see anything that looked worth taking up. Considering the cost of transport, you want to strike it pretty rich before what you find will pay as a business proposition."
"So I should imagine. Petroleum's a cheap product to handle when you're a long way from a market, isn't it?"
"Give us plenty of it and we'll make a market. It's an idea of mine that there's no part of this country that hasn't something worth working in it if you can get cheap fuel. Where the land's too poor for farming, you often find minerals, and ore that won't pay for transport can be reduced on the spot, so long as you have natural resources that can be turned into power. With an oil well in good flow, we'd soon start some profitable industry and put up a city that would bring a railroad in. Show our business men a good opening, and you'll get the money. And there are men across the frontier who have a mighty keen scent for oil."
"Have you done much prospecting?" Harding asked.