"How did dead fishes ever get into this mud-puddle?" queried Edith.
"Well, they used to live in it before it dried up," replied Nate. "Fact is, this is a lake!"
Everybody exclaimed in surprise; and Kyzie said:—
"It doesn't seem possible; but then things are so queer up here that you can believe almost anything."
"Really it is a lake. It's all right in the winter, and swells tremendously then; but this is a dry year, you know, and it's all dried up." Kyzie forgave the lake for drying up, but pitied the fishes. Edith thought Castle Cliff was "a funny place anyway."
"What little bits of houses! Did they dry up too?"
"Oh, those are just the cabins and bunk-houses that were built for the miners, ever so long ago when the mine was going. Fixed up into cottages now for summer boarders. Do you want to see the mine?"
They went around behind the shaft-house and beyond the old saw-mill.
"O my senses!" cried Edith, "is that the old gold mine, that monstrous great thing? Isn't it horrid?"
They all agreed that it was "perfectly awful and dreadful," and that it made you shudder to look into it; and that they were glad baby Eddo was safely out of the way. The mine was a deep, irregular chasm, full of dirty water and rocks. It had a hungry, cruel look; you could almost fancy it was waiting in wicked glee to swallow up thoughtless little children.