Big John regarded him keenly for some time. “You boys been quarrelin’, without yore old unkel to go settin’ in the game?” he asked, trenchantly.
“Yes. You see it’s this way,” broke out Sid impulsively. “Scotty’s all for staking out this mine and filing a government claim on it. I couldn’t get him to see it my way, so we—well, we had a row over it,” said Sid. His voice told Big John how it hurt him to have anything come up between himself and such an old chum as Scotty.
“What’s yore idee, son?” asked Big John curiously.
“Haven’t these Indians any rights?” burst out Sid impetuously. “Whose mine is it if not theirs? It’s common property with them, though, just as are the beans they raise and the game they shoot. Along comes Scotty and thinks because he’s a white man he has a right to stake a claim and take the whole thing for himself. And our government will give it to him, too—that’s the pity of it! Did he find it? I guess not! And it’s their home, too! Are we going to turn them out?”
The fire in Sid’s voice told Big John how hot had been that argument between the friends. All this was, no doubt, Sid’s side of it.
“If Honanta knew what Scotty was really set on doing not one of us would leave here alive,” went on Sid, bitterly. “I’ve a good mind to tell him! Anything, sooner than be a party to rank treachery like that!”
“Scotty’s mother’s pretty hard up, ain’t she, Sid?” asked Big John softly.
“Ye-es; a little discomfort, maybe, until he can land a good job. But for that he’s going to turn this whole tribe out, to wander at the mercy of our government—and you know what that is!”
“Sho! The mine’d pay enough to buy them a reservation big enough to support them all in the style in which they is accustomed to!” laughed Big John, weakly, “nawthin’ to it, son.”
“That’s what Scotty says,” replied Sid. “Some day it will pay enough, maybe—if the promoters don’t skin him out of all his rights in the mine first. But meanwhile, what about these Indians and those white miners who will surely come here? Whisky, debauchery of their women, degradation of their young men—isn’t it always the story when our two races come together? How can you prevent it?” he demanded.