"It just occurred to me—maybe you could help me—find a school."
"Yes, a school to teach. You see, I have used nearly all my money. By the end of next month it will be gone, and I must get a job." The man noticed that the girl was doing her best to meet the situation bravely.
"Indeed I will help you!" he exclaimed. "In fact, I think I can right now promise that whenever you get ready to accept it, there will be a position waiting."
"Even if it is only a country school—just so I can make enough money this winter to come back next summer."
"I couldn't think of letting a country school get you. We need you right in town. You see, I happen to be president of the school board, and if I were to let a perfectly good teacher get away, I'd deserve to lose my job." Stepping to the door, he whistled shrilly, and a moment later the piebald cayuse trotted to his side. When the horse stood saddled and bridled, the man turned to Patty: "Oh, about the Samuelsons—do you know how to get to Big Porcupine?"
Patty shook her head. "No, but I guess I can find it."
"Give me a pencil and a piece of paper, and I'll show you in a minute." Leaning over the table, the man sketched rapidly upon the paper. "We'll say this is the Watts ranch, and mark it R. That's our starting point. Then you follow down the creek to the ford—here, at F. Then, instead of following the trail, you turn due east, and follow up a little creek about ten miles. This arrow pointing upward means up the creek. When you come to a sharp pinnacle that divides your valley—we'll mark that ⋀ so—you take the right hand branch, and follow it to the divide. That leads, let's see, southeast—we'll mark it S. E. 3 to D; it runs about three miles to the divide which you cross. Then you follow down another creek four or five miles until it empties into Big Porcupine, 4 E. to P., and from there it's easy. Just turn up Porcupine, pass Jack Pierce's ranch, and about five miles farther on you come to Samuelson's. Do you get it?"
Patty watched every move of the pencil, as she listened to the explanation. And when, a few moments later, the big "Bishop of All Outdoors" crossed the ford and rode out of sight up the coulee that led to the trampled notch in the hills, she threw herself down at the table and with eyes big with excitement, drew her father's map from its silk envelope and spread it out beside Christie's roughly sketched one. "What a fool I am not to have guessed that those letters must stand for the points of the compass!" she cried. "It ought to be plain as day, now." Carefully, she read the cabalistic line at the bottom of the map. "SC 1 S 1 1/2 E 1 S ↑ to ∩ 2 W to a. to b. Stake L. C. ∑ center." Her brow drew into a puzzled frown "SC," she repeated. "S stands for south, but what does SC mean? SW or SE would be southwest, or southeast, but SC—?" She glanced at the other map. "Let's see, Mr. Christie's first letter is R—that stands for Watts' Ranch. SC must represent daddy's starting point, of course! But, SC? Let's see, South Corner—south corner of what? I wish he'd put his letters right on the map like this one, instead of all in a row at the bottom, then I might figure out what he was driving at. SC, SC, SC, SC," she repeated over and over again, until the letters became a mere jumble of meaningless sounds. "S must stand for South," she insisted, "and C could stand for creek, or cave, only there are no caves around here that I've seen, or camp—South Camp—that don't do me any good, I don't know where any of his camps were. And he'd hardly say Creek, that would be too indefinite. Let's see, C—cottonwood—south cottonwood—short cottonwood, scarred cottonwood, well if I have to hunt these hills over for a short cottonwood or a scarred cottonwood, when there are millions of both, I might better keep on hunting for the crack in the rock wall."
For a long time she sat staring at the paper. "If I could only get the starting point figured out, the rest would be easy. It says one mile south, one and one half miles east, one mile south, then the arrowhead pointing up, must mean up a creek or a mountain to something that looks like an inverted horseshoe, then, two miles west to a. to b. whatever a. and b. are. There are no letters on the map, then it says to stake L. C.—L. C., is lode claim, at least, I know that much, and it can be 1500 feet long along the vein, and 300 feet each way from the center. But what does he mean by the wiggly looking mark before the word center? I guess it isn't going to be quite as easy as it looks," she concluded, "even when I know that the letters stand for the points of the compass. If I could only figure out where to start from I could find my way at least to the a. b. part—and that would be something.