"No trouble at all. I'll just send a wire to Whitehead, the superintendent. I met Ed in a queer way. It was at Cripple Creek. I'd been there almost a year. After my mother died there wasn't anything to keep me at home in Virginia, and there wasn't much money. So I hiked out to Colorado, thinking about all I'd have to do was to cinch up my belt and start to pick up gold nuggets in the streets. The best I could find was work with a shovel in one of the mines over Victor way. Then I got work in another mine handling explosives. I got in front of a missed hole one fine day and was blown down a slope with about a hundred tons of rock on top of me. As luck had it, however, the big ones wedged over me and I wasn't hurt much, just scratched up a bit."
"But that was wonderful!" breathed Eve.
"Yes, it was sort of funny. I was covered up from one in the afternoon until five, quite conscious all the time and pretty well scared. You see, I couldn't help wondering just what would happen if the rocks should settle. My eyes got the worst of it and I had to stay in the hospital about a month. But I'm afraid I'm boring you. I was just leading up to my meeting with Ed."
"Boring me! Don't be absurd! Then what happened?"
"Well, after I got out of the hospital I bought a burro and a tent and hiked out for the Sangre—for the southern part of the State. I still had some money coming to me for work when the trouble happened, and after I got out I cashed an accident policy I'd luckily taken out a month before. I stayed in the mountains pretty much all summer prospecting. I found the biggest bunch of rock I'd ever seen, but no yellow iron—I mean gold. Came sort of near starving before I got out. I sold my outfit and went back to Cripple and struck another job with the shovel and pick, digging prospect ditches. It was pretty tiresome work and pretty cold, too. So when I'd got a month's wages I told the boss he'd either have to put me underground or I'd quit. I said I was a miner and not a Dago. You see, I felt independently rich with a month's wages in my jeans—pockets, that is. The boss said I could quit. I've been wondering ever since," laughed Wade, "whether I quit or was fired."
"That was lovely," said Eve. "Oh, dear, I've often wished I'd been a man!"
"H'm; well, every one to his taste. But look here, Miss Walton, you're certain I'm not boring you to death?"
"Quite. What did you do with all that money? And how much did a month's wages amount to?"
"About ninety dollars. You get three a day and work seven days a week. But, of course, I owed a good deal of that ninety by the time I got it. Well, I paid my bills and then did a fool thing. I got my laundry out of the Chinaman's, put on a stiff shirt and went over to Colorado Springs. It just seemed that I had to have a glimpse of—well, you know; respectability—dress clothes—music—flowers. I remember how stiff and uncomfortable that shirt felt and how my collar scratched my neck. When I got over to the Springs I ran across some folks I'd known back home in Virginia. Richmond folks, they were. I dined with them and had a fine time. I forgot to tell them I'd been pushing a shovel with the Pinheads—that is, Swedes. They asked me to be sure and visit them when I went back to Virginia for Christmas, for of course I would go! I told 'em I'd do that very thing. Rather a joke, wasn't it? If railroads had been selling at forty dollars a pair I couldn't have bought a headlight! I went back to Cripple the next day, having spent most of my money, feeling sort of grouchy and down on my luck. That night I thought I'd have a go at the wheel—roulette, you know. I'd steered pretty clear of that sort of thing up to then, but I didn't much care that night what happened. I only had about fifteen dollars and I played it dollar by dollar and couldn't win once. Finally I was down to my last. I remember I took that out of my pocket and looked at it quite awhile. Then I put it back and started to go. But before I'd reached the door I concluded that a dollar wasn't much better than none in Cripple, and so I went back to the table. It was pretty crowded and I had to work my way in until I could reach it. Just when I got my dollar out again and was going to toss it on, blind, some one took hold of my arm and pulled me around. I'd never seen the fellow before and I started to get peeved. But he—may I use his words? They weren't polite, but they were persuasive. Said he: 'Put that back in your pocket, you damned fool, and come out of here."
Wade looked anxiously at his audience to see if she was shocked. She didn't look so; only eager and sympathetic. He went on.