All at once the town was thrown into a state of extraordinary excitement. In mining parlance4 the Wide West had “struck it rich!” Everybody went to see the new developments, and for some days there was such a crowd of people about the Wide West shaft that a stranger would have supposed there was a mass meeting in session there. No other topic was discussed but the rich strike, and nobody thought or dreamed about anything else. Every man brought away a specimen5, ground it up in a hand mortar6, washed it out in his horn spoon, and glared speechless upon the marvelous result. It was not hard rock, but black, decomposed7 stuff which could be crumbled8 in the hand like a baked potato, and when spread out on a paper exhibited a thick sprinkling of gold and particles of “native” silver. Higbie brought a handful to the cabin, and when he had washed it out his amazement9 was beyond description. Wide West stock soared skywards. It was said that repeated offers had been made for it at a thousand dollars a foot, and promptly10 refused. We have all had the “blues”—the mere11 sky- blues—but mine were indigo12, now—because I did not own in the Wide West. The world seemed hollow to me, and existence a grief. I lost my appetite, and ceased to take an interest in anything. Still I had to stay, and listen to other people’s rejoicings, because I had no money to get out of the camp with.
The Wide West company put a stop to the carrying away of “specimens,” and well they might, for every handful of the ore was worth a sum of some consequence. To show the exceeding value of the ore, I will remark that a sixteen-hundred-pounds parcel of it was sold, just as it lay, at the mouth of the shaft, at one dollar a pound; and the man who bought it “packed” it on mules13 a hundred and fifty or two hundred miles, over the mountains, to San Francisco, satisfied that it would yield at a rate that would richly compensate14 him for his trouble. The Wide West people also commanded their foreman to refuse any but their own operatives permission to enter the mine at any time or for any purpose. I kept up my “blue” meditations15 and Higbie kept up a deal of thinking, too, but of a different sort. He puzzled over the “rock,” examined it with a glass, inspected it in different lights and from different points of view, and after each experiment delivered himself, in soliloquy, of one and the same unvarying opinion in the same unvarying formula:
“It is not Wide West rock!”
He said once or twice that he meant to have a look into the Wide West shaft if he got shot for it. I was wretched, and did not care whether he got a look into it or not. He failed that day, and tried again at night; failed again; got up at dawn and tried, and failed again. Then he lay in ambush16 in the sage17 brush hour after hour, waiting for the two or three hands to adjourn18 to the shade of a boulder19 for dinner; made a start once, but was premature—one of the men came back for something; tried it again, but when almost at the mouth of the shaft, another of the men rose up from behind the boulder as if to reconnoitre, and he dropped on the ground and lay quiet; presently he crawled on his hands and knees to the mouth of the shaft, gave a quick glance around, then seized the rope and slid down the shaft.
He disappeared in the gloom of a “side drift” just as a head appeared in the mouth of the shaft and somebody shouted “Hello!”—which he did not answer. He was not disturbed any more. An hour later he entered the cabin, hot, red, and ready to burst with smothered20 excitement, and exclaimed in a stage whisper:
“I knew it! We are rich! IT’S A BLIND LEAD!”
I thought the very earth reeled under me. Doubt—conviction—doubt again—exultation—hope, amazement, belief, unbelief—every emotion imaginable swept in wild procession through my heart and brain, and I could not speak a word. After a moment or two of this mental fury, I shook myself to rights, and said:
“Say it again!”
“It’s blind lead!”
“Cal, let’s—let’s burn the house—or kill somebody! Let’s get out where there’s room to hurrah21! But what is the use? It is a hundred times too good to be true.”
“It’s a blind lead, for a million!—hanging wall—foot wall—clay casings—everything complete!” He swung his hat and gave three cheers, and I cast doubt to the winds and chimed in with a will. For I was worth a million dollars, and did not care “whether school kept or not!”
But perhaps I ought to explain. A “blind lead” is a lead or ledge that does not “crop out” above the surface. A miner does not know where to look for such leads, but they are often stumbled upon by accident in the course of driving a tunnel or sinking a shaft. Higbie knew the Wide West rock perfectly22 well, and the more he had examined the new developments the more he was satisfied that the ore could not have come from the Wide West vein23. And so had it occurred to him alone, of all the camp, that there was a blind lead down in the shaft, and that even the Wide West people themselves did not suspect it. He was right. When he went down the shaft, he found that the blind lead held its independent way through the Wide West vein, cutting it diagonally, and that it was enclosed in its own well-defined casing-rocks and clay. Hence it was public property. Both leads being perfectly well defined, it was easy for any miner to see which one belonged to the Wide West and which did not.
We thought it well to have a strong friend, and therefore we brought the foreman of the Wide West to our cabin that night and revealed the great surprise to him. Higbie said:
“We are going to take possession of this blind lead, record it and establish ownership, and then forbid the Wide West company to take out any more of the rock. You cannot help your company in this matter—nobody can help them. I will go into the shaft with you and prove to your entire satisfaction that it is a blind lead. Now we propose to take you in with us, and claim the blind lead in our three names. What do you say?”
What could a man say who had an opportunity to simply stretch forth24 his hand and take possession of a fortune without risk of any kind and without wronging any one or attaching the least taint25 of dishonor to his name? He could only say, “Agreed.”
The notice was put up that night, and duly spread upon the recorder’s books before ten o’clock. We claimed two hundred feet each—six hundred feet in all—the smallest and compactest organization in the district, and the easiest to manage.
No one can be so thoughtless as to suppose that we slept, that night. Higbie and I went to bed at midnight, but it was only to lie broad awake and think, dream, scheme. The floorless, tumble-down cabin was a palace, the ragged26 gray blankets silk, the furniture rosewood and mahogany. Each new splendor27 that burst out of my visions of the future whirled me bodily over in bed or jerked me to a sitting posture28 just as if an electric battery had been applied29 to me. We shot fragments of conversation back and forth at each other. Once Higbie said:
“When are you going home—to the States?”
“To-morrow!”—with an evolution or two, ending with a sitting position. “Well—no—but next month, at furthest.”
“We’ll go in the same steamer.”
“Agreed.”
A pause.
“Steamer of the 10th?”
“Yes. No, the 1st.”
“All right.”
Another pause.
“Where are you going to live?” said Higbie.
“San Francisco.”
“That’s me!”
Pause.
“Too high—too much climbing”—from Higbie.
“What is?”
“I was thinking of Russian Hill—building a house up there.”
“Too much climbing? Shan’t you keep a carriage?”
“Of course. I forgot that.”
Pause.
“Cal., what kind of a house are you going to build?”
“But what kind?”
“Well, I don’t hardly know. Brick, I suppose.”
“Brick—bosh.”
“Why? What is your idea?”
“Brown stone front—French plate glass—billiard-room off the dining- room—statuary and paintings—shrubbery and two-acre grass plat—greenhouse—iron dog on the front stoop—gray horses—landau, and a coachman with a bug31 on his hat!”
“By George!”
A long pause.
“Cal., when are you going to Europe?”
“Well—I hadn’t thought of that. When are you?”
“In the Spring.”
“Going to be gone all summer?”
“All summer! I shall remain there three years.”
“No—but are you in earnest?”
“Indeed I am.”
“I will go along too.”
“Why of course you will.”
“What part of Europe shall you go to?”
“All parts. France, England, Germany—Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Syria, Greece, Palestine, Arabia, Persia, Egypt—all over—everywhere.”
“I’m agreed.”
“All right.”
“We’ll spend forty or fifty thousand dollars trying to make it one, anyway.”
Another long pause.
“Higbie, we owe the butcher six dollars, and he has been threatening to stop our—”
“Hang the butcher!”
“Amen.”
And so it went on. By three o’clock we found it was no use, and so we got up and played cribbage and smoked pipes till sunrise. It was my week to cook. I always hated cooking—now, I abhorred33 it.
The news was all over town. The former excitement was great—this one was greater still. I walked the streets serene34 and happy. Higbie said the foreman had been offered two hundred thousand dollars for his third of the mine. I said I would like to see myself selling for any such price. My ideas were lofty. My figure was a million. Still, I honestly believe that if I had been offered it, it would have had no other effect than to make me hold off for more.
I found abundant enjoyment35 in being rich. A man offered me a three- hundred-dollar horse, and wanted to take my simple, unendorsed note for it. That brought the most realizing sense I had yet had that I was actually rich, beyond shadow of doubt. It was followed by numerous other evidences of a similar nature—among which I may mention the fact of the butcher leaving us a double supply of meat and saying nothing about money.
By the laws of the district, the “locators” or claimants of a ledge were obliged to do a fair and reasonable amount of work on their new property within ten days after the date of the location, or the property was forfeited36, and anybody could go and seize it that chose. So we determined37 to go to work the next day. About the middle of the afternoon, as I was coming out of the post office, I met a Mr. Gardiner, who told me that Capt. John Nye was lying dangerously ill at his place (the “Nine-Mile Ranch”), and that he and his wife were not able to give him nearly as much care and attention as his case demanded. I said if he would wait for me a moment, I would go down and help in the sick room. I ran to the cabin to tell Higbie. He was not there, but I left a note on the table for him, and a few minutes later I left town in Gardiner’s wagon38.
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1
quartz
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| n.石英 | |
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ledge
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| n.壁架，架状突出物；岩架，岩礁 | |
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shaft
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| n.(工具的)柄，杆状物 | |
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parlance
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| n.说法；语调 | |
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specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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mortar
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| n.灰浆，灰泥；迫击炮；v.把…用灰浆涂接合 | |
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7
decomposed
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| 已分解的，已腐烂的 | |
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8
crumbled
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| （把…）弄碎， （使）碎成细屑( crumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 衰落； 坍塌； 损坏 | |
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9
amazement
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| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
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promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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indigo
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| n.靛青，靛蓝 | |
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13
mules
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| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
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14
compensate
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| vt.补偿，赔偿；酬报 vi.弥补；补偿；抵消 | |
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15
meditations
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| 默想( meditation的名词复数 )； 默念； 沉思； 冥想 | |
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ambush
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| n.埋伏(地点)；伏兵；v.埋伏；伏击 | |
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17
sage
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| n.圣人，哲人；adj.贤明的，明智的 | |
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18
adjourn
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| v.（使）休会，（使）休庭 | |
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19
boulder
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| n.巨砾；卵石，圆石 | |
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20
smothered
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| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
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21
hurrah
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| int.好哇，万岁，乌拉 | |
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22
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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vein
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| n.血管，静脉；叶脉，纹理；情绪；vt.使成脉络 | |
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24
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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taint
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| n.污点；感染；腐坏；v.使感染；污染 | |
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ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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splendor
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| n.光彩；壮丽，华丽；显赫，辉煌 | |
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posture
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| n.姿势，姿态，心态，态度；v.作出某种姿势 | |
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applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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attic
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| n.顶楼，屋顶室 | |
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31
bug
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| n.虫子；故障；窃听器；vt.纠缠；装窃听器 | |
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32
swell
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| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
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33
abhorred
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| v.憎恶( abhor的过去式和过去分词 )；（厌恶地）回避；拒绝；淘汰 | |
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34
serene
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| adj. 安详的，宁静的，平静的 | |
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35
enjoyment
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| n.乐趣；享有；享用 | |
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36
forfeited
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| （因违反协议、犯规、受罚等）丧失，失去( forfeit的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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37
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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wagon
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| n.四轮马车，手推车，面包车；无盖运货列车 | |
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