"I've known he was after us for the last half hour," Jim replied curtly. "Carlos, come here."
Carlos had been creeping along through the grass in Indian fashion, but now he straightened up his lithe body and came straight toward Jim. Jack knew he was horribly frightened and so she couldn't help but admire the boy's sudden grip on himself. He looked straight into the "Big White Chief's" eyes; only once his eyelids twitched.
"Why did you come with us when I said stay behind?" Jim demanded quietly with his own peculiar sternness.
The boy hesitated; but an Indian does not lie to his friends. "I heard you speak of the cave of the never-found gold," Carlos answered simply. "The Indians of the plains now know the value of the white man's gold. Often have I followed them into the desert to search for it in vain. For nothing else would I leave the women whom you gave me to tend, but I too must see the place of which you speak."
Jim groaned, and Jack laughed lightly. "Come on, Carlos," she said kindly. "Partner," she turned to Jim, "no matter what happens from this day's outing, remember you are responsible for planting the gold microbe in Carlos and me." For the rest of their tramp Jack could not but amuse herself, whenever her companions were silent, with wild dreams of what joy it would be for them to come across a gold mine and get suddenly very rich. She kept guessing and planning what she and the other girls would do. More than anything, she wished to play fairy godmother to the overseer of their ranch. During the week of their caravan trip, Jim had showed so plainly that only Ruth and Frieda were still unconscious of it, how much he cared for the ranch girl's chaperon. And Jack knew how little, except the strength of his love, he had to offer her. Jim had been running the Rainbow Ranch, receiving a salary so small for the value of his services that it made Jack blush to think of it.
Time after time had she begged him to manage the ranch on shares, but he had always refused, saying he had no need of money, and the place made only enough to pay expenses, take care of the girls, and put a little by for their futures. And Jim knew they would need more money some day if they were ever to see anything of the great world which lay outside their ranch lands.
Jim paid no heed to Jack's unnatural silence, for his mind was fixed on a discovery that absorbed his entire interest. Other travelers had lately crossed the trail which he and his companions were following. Footprints were fresh upon it, and in an out-of-the-way spot a tin can showed a bright new label. The footprints not only followed the path along the side of the ravine, but marked the same track through the more open country. Without these signs, Jim knew he could never have traced the old trail so easily, yet he felt the gold prospector's hot glow of resentment—another man had located his claim. Then he smiled, remembering he had turned his back on it as no good, nearly fourteen years before. Without a word to his companions, however, he kept his eyes fastened steadfastly on the ground and his ears alert for every sound each step of the way, but no other human being appeared in the vast solitude. Once Jim and Jack sighted a covey of quail and killed half a dozen. Ruth and the other girls were willing to eat quail so long as they did not have to see them killed.
About three o'clock in the afternoon the travelers had their first vision of Jim's three pine cone hills with the stream of brackish water running down the side of one of them, and in the background a dense thicket of evergreens. Forgetting their tired feet, Jack and Carlos made a sudden rush, but Jim caught hold of them, making them keep close to his side until he saw the place was deserted. At last he brought them in breathless silence to a yawning cave in the middle hill. It was only a great, black hole, dull and uninteresting. Jack peered well into it for a sign of anything that sparkled or shone like a precious metal. It showed only a mixture of earth and stones and sand, and the whole place was so gloomy it gave her a shiver of apprehension. The sun was not so bright as it had been a short time before. Suddenly she felt cold and weary, though she could not explain the cause.
"It's a pretty dismal place, isn't it, Jim?" Jack said quickly. "I am awfully glad to have seen it of course, but I don't wonder you ran away. I am sure no gold could be discovered here." And the girl heaved a sigh of fatigue and disappointment. She was sure she had made the trip simply from idle curiosity, yet the chance of their finding a gold mine had been lurking in the back of her mind.
Jim was stalking about the deserted mine like a hound that had been given a scent. He had seen, not far from one of the hills, a piled-up heap of ashes, which showed that a fire had been built there within the past few days, and the rank grass in the vicinity pressed down by human bodies. Jack had picked up a tool from the earth immediately in front of the mine, and the tool had been lately used.