"Five more days," he yawned. "Ho hum."
The customary thing on placer claims in Alaska is to make a clean-up every week. There was a special reason why the boxes would be cleaned up on Easy Money bar at the end of that period: If the river continued to fall and no rain came, there would not be sufficient water to sluice with. One or two men can't raise a whole river.
In the afternoon of the sixth day after his ejection, Lucky Jim trekked up the river by way of the mountain ridge. When well beyond Easy Money bar he dropped down to the river, then crossed it on a log. He walked down the beach until within a half-mile of Easy Money bar, then disappeared into the flat—just plumb dropped out of sight.
This was made possible by reason of the fact that for years innumerable the flat had annually been inundated for miles back from the river during the high water in the spring, and the receding waters had honeycombed the black muck to a depth of eighteen inches to two feet. On top of the "niggerheads," or pillars of muck thus formed, grew wild bunch grass. Through this maze Lucky Jim started to crawl downstream, secure in the fact that no one could see him.
He arrived at a point in line with Easy Money bar at nine o'clock, mud from his nose to the toes of his moccasins. In places he had been obliged to crawl through several inches of exceedingly dirty water. But he got there.
Between his place of concealment and Easy Money bar lay two other bars, one of which was covered with willows. For almost another day he lay and watched both men at work in the cut. And what a cut!
"They've put through the boxes just about double the dirt that I could have done alone!" he whispered to himself.
At length Chenoa Pete left the cut and strolled up to the cabin. Mike Haggart continued to work alone.
It was still almost as clear as at noon, and the hills were rosy in the westering sun when Lucky Jim dropped down the bank and made for the first bar. Such was the racket made by the rocks going over the riffles in the sluice-race that there was slight chance of his being heard.
Keeping to one side so that even should Mike Haggart turn around he would still be none the wiser regarding his presence, Lucky Jim dashed across the second channel and into the willows of bar number two. A clump of birch on the lower end of Easy Money bar protected him against discovery from the cabin.