“What do you mean?” asked Hunt. “They haven’t gone back to the desert?”
“Not on your life. They’ve been prospecting where they prospected twenty years ago. Or that’s what I figger. Just at dawn, after we let off those shots that started the dam-busting, I spied ’em prowling around up there on the side of the canyon. Reckless as kids, those old tykes are. Might another slip come ’most any time.”
“Oh!” said Betty, “I hope you did not leave them in danger, Joe.”
“If they were, I couldn’t help ’em,” Hurley replied. “You can’t influence those old desert rats any more than you could lead an iron horse to drink. No, sir! Steve and Andy were up there on a shelf that was uncovered by the last slip, a-holding hands and ghost-dancing like a couple of Piute Injuns. Acted plumb crazy.
“They must have swum the West Fork to get there. And I bet they didn’t go together. But when they got up there and saw the way open——”
“To what?” interrupted Nell. “You haven’t told us what they found.”
“That’s so,” chuckled Joe. “They’ve found something all right. I reckon Steve and Andy can’t be fooled when it comes to ‘color.’ They certainly have made a ten-strike. Steve shouted down to me that the slip had uncovered the mother lode. Of course, they are claiming everything in sight. Got their claims staked out, and if it’s really a sure-enough find I expect there will be a small stampede to that side of the canyon. There’s gold all through those cliffs. This is a gold country. Some day they’ll find out how to work the Topaz Desert as a paying proposition. The wash from these headlands and the canyon sides has been carried out into the desert by the Runaway for a couple of million years—more or less.”
“Anyway,” said Nell, her eyes sparkling, “the old-timers are going to be rich at last? How fine!”
“It may only be a pocket—or a broken lead. But I wish ’em both millionaires. Me, I’ll stick to the Great Hope a while longer.” He looked at Betty. “I am a great feller for sticking to a thing.”
Betty blushed and looked away. Hunt said thoughtfully: