Weber had breakfast ready. After Jimmy had taken a cup of coffee, the old man sat down by his side and showed him a handful of rock.
“Son, did you ever see any gold-bearin’ ore?” he demanded.
Jimmy suddenly saw that the old man’s hands were trembling and that he could hardly control his voice.
“Where did you find them?”
“We flew right down on a rainbow and landed smack-dab on a bag of gold,” the old man declared exultantly. “I’ve come up and down this crick a dozen times, but I never found anything but a few pieces of float. But, this Calico Peacock of yours dug its nose smack-dab into the richest gold ledge that’s been uncovered in this country for years. We’re rich, son. We’re so rich I don’t dare figger out how much we’re worth for fear I’ll wake up. I’ve got our claims all staked out. Last night after you’d gone to sleep I went over there to see if I couldn’t find my pipe. I struck some matches and scratched around on the ground and picked up a piece of this rock that had been busted off the ledge when we hit. There it was, out before my eyes.”
“Do you think it’s better than Keno would have been?”
“Keno!” the old man said contemptuously. “Why, son, inside of three days there’ll be twenty thousand men stakin’ claims around here. We don’t have to work our claims. We can sell them inside of twenty-four hours for a fortune apiece. Didn’t I tell you that there was no calculatin’ how or when a strike was goin’ to be made?”
Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in the April 10, 1929 issue of Short Stories magazine.