Chapter 18

"The Golden West," answered Mr. Adams. "It was given to us by a man whom we befriended in St. Louis. We had the documents to prove it, but they were stolen by the very gang who drove the boys away. Even that doesn't matter, though, for they found it, stake and all, and----"

"What did you say the name is?" demanded half a score of voices.

"The Golden West."

"Fetch the woman," cried the voices, now; and the demand rose to a clamor: "Fetch the woman."

The crowd laughed and jostled expectantly; and presently they parted, to give passage to a young woman, ceremoniously conducted by two of the miners, their hats off. And who should follow her, but Mr. Motte--the young man who had been left behind at Panama!

"Strangers," announced the red-shirted spokesman for the camp, to Mr. Adams, "if you've found the Golden West, here's the owner of it, an' I reckon she'll thank you for your trouble. The hull camp's' back of her, so you'd better talk peaceable. Ain't that so, boys?"

"You bet!" came the resounding cheer.

"Well, if that's the case, of course----" said Mr. Adams, uncertainly, removing his hat, while the young woman, in sunbonnet and neat calico dress, appeared much embarrassed. Charley and Billy stood with mouth open at the unexpected turn of events. But Mr. Motte pressed forward, extending glad hand.

"Hello," spoke Mr. Adams. "How'd you get here?" He shook hands with Mr. Motte, and so did Charley, and so did Billy, although he didn't know exactly why.

"Yes, sir, here I am, thanks to your ticket. And here's my wife, too. This is the gentleman who gave me the ticket from Panama, Mary."

"Hooray!" cheered the ready miners.

"How long have you been here?" asked Mr. Adams.

"Two or three days. I've been laid up (and indeed he looked thin), but I'm all right now. The camp's been mighty kind to us. They tell me you've found the Golden West quartz claim. Is that so?"

"Yes, sir. These boys found it; three rascals who have dogged us from New Orleans (one of them clear from St. Louis), have jumped it. Now I understand you or your wife have prior rights to it. How about that, sir?"

"To tell the truth, I think that probably we have," answered Mr. Motte; "but you shan't lose out, anyway. Not after you helped me along the way you did, with that ticket. No, sir. Shall he, Mary?" And the young woman shook her head. Mr. Motte continued, while the camp listened intently. "As I've explained to these men my uncle--or my wife's uncle, rather, whose name was Tom Jones--wrote us a letter last year telling us to come out and giving us the Golden West quartz claim that he had just located in this region, somewhere. He said it was a bonanza, with plenty for all. The letter didn't get to us for six months, and that's the last we heard from him, though we wrote him we were coming as soon as we could. I've the letter, as this camp knows."

"You're talkin'," approved the crowd, emphatically.

"So, thanks to you, sir, we got this far, and then we ran up against the fact that nobody seemed to know anything about a Golden West quartz claim. My uncle was in the diggings early, and he prospected alone, evidently, and nobody knew him, except a few people remembered his name--and one man did recollect something about a quartz claim from which there were samples. My uncle was a queer, quiet sort of a man--never talked much."

"Let the stranger tell his story, now," bade the red-shirt.

So Mr. Adams did, from the beginning in St. Louis, to the apparent end here; and he concluded:

"Your right to the mine evidently is prior to ours, sir, and we wouldn't think of contesting it--especially not with a woman," and he bowed to Mrs. Motte, who flushed, ill at ease among all these men.

"You're O. K.!" approved the crowd. "Especially not with a woman, you say; an' with the only woman in Rough an' Ready. Hooray!"

"But you've made a long trip," protested young Mr. Motte, also flushing. "You've found the claim for us, and if it hadn't have been for you I might have been in Panama yet, either alive or dead. So I don't agree----"

"Let's act fust an' talk afterward," interrupted the red-shirt. "Fust thing is to oust those thar claim-jumpers yonder, for the good of the camp, an' to put the little lady in possession. Get yore tools an' weapons, boys, an' come on."

With a great shout the crowd rushed hither-thither; and away they all went, streaming through the valley, laden with picks and spades and crow-bars and guns, hustling Mr. and Mrs. Motte and Mr. Adams and Charley and Billy along in their midst. They acted like a lot of school-boys on a frolic, but there was an undercurrent of earnestness.

To the three men on the ridge it must have looked as though an army was advancing; and Charley could see Mr. Walker and the Frémonter staring from their posts whence they were keeping watch on the claim. Well, this was pretty tough: to have traveled clear from St. Louis, and spent a lot of money, and acted honestly all the way through; and then only to have put somebody else in possession of the mine.

"Thar's the place--straight ahead on top the ridge," directed the miner Eph, who was leading with the red-shirt. And following these two, up the slope trooped the company.

The heads of the three men in the hollow poked up over the rim, as their owners surveyed, probably in amazement, the onslaught. The muzzles of the guns protruded, also, but the big red-shirt made no account of them.

"Come out o' thar!" he roared, in a voice that might have been heard a mile. "Drop those weapons; they'll do you no good. So come out o' thar, an' come quick. Don't you know enough to make room for a lady?"

Up slowly rose the long-nosed man, and emerged, glowering but weaponless, his hands in the air; and emerged likewise his two partners. The long-nosed man tried to bluff his way.

"What's the meaning of this attack?" he demanded. "Where's your warrant for it? Would you drive three honest men off ground to which they've got rights according to evidence? Won't you consider our documents in this matter?"

"Shot-gun rights don't go any longer in Grass Valley, mister," roared the red-shirt. "If you'd had the right sort o' rights you'd have proved 'em peaceable. Besides, with yore docyments--which you stole--you're barkin' up the wrong tree. Here's the true an' ondisputed owner of this claim--the heiress of the Golden West, not to speak of bein' the only woman in this district an' entitled to the best that goes. See? Get down in thar, lady; Eph, you do yoreself the honor of escortin' her, an' read what it says on that thar stake. If it says Golden West an' is signed Tom Jones, that settles the matter, pronto."

"But the claim was abandoned. It hasn't been worked for a year," spoke up one of the long-nosed man's companions.

"Then you lose out thar, too, stranger," retorted the red-shirt. "'Cause in that case, barrin' better rights, it belongs to these two boys by right o' rediscivvery. So don't argue with me; I'm a reg'lar lawyer in argufyin'."

The miner Eph had very politely helped the little woman to the stake, and stooping had traced with his gnarled finger the words on the notice.

"This is the claim," he announced. "Shore as shootin'."

"Hooray!" cheered the Rough and Ready crowd. Said the red-shirt, to the Jacobs trio: "You git! An' I app'int the camp o' Rough an' Ready, here assembled, as a committee of the whole to see that you do git. Don't you stop till you're so far you'll never come back. But fust shell out those dockyments, and be quick."

"Look here. I----" attempted the long-nosed man; but he was interrupted.

"Shell 'em out!" roared red-shirt, advancing a step.

Without a word Mr. Jacobs looked at his companions; and as if in answer to his unspoken appeal one of them (Charley tried hard to compare him with the stranger aboard the _California_) extracted from a pocketbook the well-remembered slips, and tossed them aside, to the ground.

Charley daringly darted forward and picked them up. Billy followed and rescued his rifle.

"Are those the same?" queried red-shirt, of Charley.

"Yes, sir."

"All right. Now," repeated red-shirt, to the Jacobs trio, "you git, as aforesaid."

That the long-nosed man and his two cronies had guilty consciences was very plain, for replying by naught (and rather white in the face at the threatening advance of several Rough and Ready-ites) they backed away, down the other side of the ridge; at a little distance they shook their fists and yelped something, but they kept on going, so long as Charley looked. They had left not only Billy's gun, but their own guns also.

Young Mrs. Motte now was speaking, and so was her husband.

"It isn't fair," she declared bravely. "This gentleman and his two boys found the claim, again, and have given it up without a word, after all their trouble; and they took care of my uncle, and it looks as though he intended them to have the claim, as much as us."

"He certainly intended them to have some of it----" added her husband.

"More likely he thought that you hadn't got his letter, and for that reason gave us a chance," put in Mr. Adams, quickly.

"But I owe you the mine, anyway," insisted Mr. Motte. "Your ticket from Panama was what brought me to San Francisco."

"The whole thing's soon settled," boomed the big red-shirt. "I app'int myself chairman of this here town meetin' of the new camp of Gold Hill (the same which is the name of this ridge)----"

"Hooray for Gold Hill!" cheered the miners.

"An' I further app'int Eph Saunders clerk, to record the minutes when he gets whar thar's somethin' to record with. I'll make the motions, too, if thar's no objection. I move that it be the sense of this camp that the little woman, here, an' her husband, by name o' Motte, be declared legal owners of the Golden West quartz claim, extendin' 100 feet, both sides of the claim stake, followin' the main lode an' includin' all dips an' angles an' spurs whatsoever; the same bein' really two claims, one by 'heritance an' one for luck."

"I second the motion," yelled everybody.

"Moved an' seconded. All in favor can say 'aye.'"

"Aye."

"Next I move it be the sense of this here camp," continued the chairman, "that in consideration of this gentleman an' party havin' sartin rights o' rediscivvery in the Golden West claim, an' havin' sort o' defeated themselves 'cause they were kind to a young feller down at Panama, an' havin' acted mighty white since they've been in these diggin's, they be allowed next ch'ice o' claims, to the extent o' one hundred an' fifty feet along the main lode, on both side o' the Golden West, bein' 300 feet o' claims in all."

"Second the motion."

"Motion bein' seconded, all in favor say 'aye.' An' I hope no citizen of this camp'll be so dogged mean as to say anything else."

"Aye," pealed the lusty chorus.

Mr. Adams tried to speak; Charley and Billy looked at one another and grinned. And Billy waved at his father and Mr. Grigsby, who had pressed up the hill to learn what was going on.

"The motion bein' carried unanimous, the chair app'ints the indivijools known as Pike and Dutch to pace off the aforesaid distances, as close as they can, an' mark the ends."

While everybody gravely watched, the two miners designated paced off the 100 feet, on either side of the stake, along the ridge, and again the 150 feet, further. They hastily marked the distances and returned.

"There bein' no other bus'ness before the meetin'," shouted red-shirt, "I declare it hereby dissolved--an' every man for himself. Stake yore claims, boys, while thar are any!"

Away he jumped, and away broke all. With shouts and cheers and laughter the whole hill was covered, in an incredibly short time, with men picking and digging and peering and driving their stakes or piling up stones.

XXII

THE BEST OF ALL

Mr. Grigsby and Billy's father had arrived in time to hear as well as to see the outcome of the adventure on the newly-named Gold Hill. Watching the retreat of the Jacobs party, Mr. Grigsby, leaning on his rifle, laughed shortly.

"They got off easy," he said, in grim manner. "Let me see the map, boy."

"That smudgy place does look like a 'G. W.'," asserted Charley, passing the paper over. "Anyway, it looks as much like 'G. W.' as it does like 'G. H.'"

And so it did. However, that mattered little now, and the feebly scrawled assignment of the Golden West claim also was of small importance; for the Golden West had been found at last, and everything had turned out all right. Here on Gold Hill, as at the Shirt-tail Diggin's, "the goose hung high."

Now, with everybody busy, it remained to develop the Golden West lode, which under the hurried operations of the bevy of workers could be traced for a mile.

"I suppose," remarked Charley's father, "that the next thing for us to do is to form a company and to lay plans for development, and to name our property."

"If your party have no objections," spoke young Mr. Motte, hesitantly, coming forward, "my wife and I would be very willing to combine our claim with yours, under the name Golden West, and work all together. We are able to do our part, of course."

Certainly there were no objections. Thus the agreement was drawn up, and the Golden West Mining Company was formed from the two parties.

At the base of the ridge there almost immediately sprang into being the town of Gold Hill, for which Mr. Adams himself was elected _alcalde_, or mayor, and Mrs. Motte clerk. But the development of the Golden West mine went ahead much more slowly. Paying mines, especially lode mines, do not grow up in a day, or a week, or a month. The surface rock could be loosened with pick and crow-bar, and pulverized and washed, to get some gold, but the hard rock below the surface required special machinery, for treatment.

So pending the arrival of the machinery the work was all development work: picking here and there, digging a few tunnels, and much exploring and planning. Hard work it was, too. However, the weather continued to hold fine and sunny and crisp, in the early fall a light snow fell but soon disappeared, and an Indian summer set in. There was hunting for deer and elk, and fun, evenings, in the camp--but something seemed lacking. What that was, Charley found out, when one morning Billy hailed him excitedly.

"Say! Hurrah! Do you know it?"

"No," admitted Charley.

"My father and yours are going to send for my mother and yours! They might be out here with us as well as not. See? They'll be company for Mrs. Motte. She's having a great time, and loves it. If she can stand it, they can--and besides, we want 'em."

Want 'em? Want his mother! Charley let out a wild whoop, and rushed for his father, who greeted him with a twinkle. Why, that was the very thing lacking--his mother! Of course it was. And now----!

"Do you think it will be Christmas present enough for you?" queried his father. "They'll have just about time to get here for Christmas, we figure."

Surely nothing, not even another Golden West mine, could be half so good for a Christmas present.

Time fairly dragged, despite the busy days. Development work proceeded, but better far and more interesting were the two cabins that were being put up, in readiness for the great day. And suddenly (for all things come to him who waits!) Charley and Billy found themselves actually delegated to go down to San Francisco--just they two--and meet two Somebodies at the steamer pier!

It seemed great to be sent on such an errand; and it gave one rather an important feeling to be alone and responsible in a city like San Francisco. By way of Sacramento and the river and bay they landed there--two real miners from the hills, clad in their miner costumes.

They had intended to put up at the Parker-house; but at Sacramento rumors of a great fire reached them, and sure enough, they found San Francisco still smouldering. For in the middle of December fire had swept through all the flimsy buildings of down town. The whole of Portsmouth Square lay in ashes. However, already new buildings were going up as fast as hands could work. Nobody seemed discouraged, but toiled with a cheer. The floor beams of another Parker-house had been placed--and this new Parker-house was to be of brick! Good for San Francisco!

That night Charley and Billy slept in a large tent that had been erected by the Parker-house to take care of what patrons it could. Charley had tried to show his partner the "sights," but in only those few months San Francisco had changed amazingly. It had doubled in population since that date when the steamer California had landed the Adams party in the bay, and its people had changed, too. Why, there were as well-dressed men and women on the streets as in St. Louis; and some of the stores which had not burned were like Eastern stores!

A new scheme had been invented. On top of a high hill called Telegraph Hill, overlooking the Golden Gate, a signal had been installed. It consisted of a tall post equipped with wooden paddles, like arms, that flourished in a system of wigwags. The positions of the arms signaled "brig," "bark," "side-wheel steamer," etc. And on "steamer day"--a day when one of the big mail and passenger steamers was expected in--every citizen was gazing at Telegraph Hill to see the arms extend horizontally right and left, wigwagging, at last, "side-wheel steamer."

"The _Panama_! When was the _Panama_ due?"

"On the nineteenth, bub."

But would she come? Supposing she were late. Then those mothers might be late, too, for Christmas! But she was not late; no, sir; for at sunset of the _eighteenth_, see, up went the two arms of the signal on Telegraph Hill, extended horizontally to announce: "Side-wheel steamer entering the Golden Gate." And presently there came the _Panama_, surging majestically through the channel, and rounding to before the city.

That was a long night, intervening before the passengers might land. Charley and Billy slept scarcely a wink. They were at the wharf bright and early--but no earlier than an army of other persons almost as excited as they. The _Panama_ began to unload her passengers; the usual fleet of skiffs and ship's boats put out, filled, from her side.

Charley and Billy peered expectantly. Supposing, after all, those mothers had missed the _Panama_ and had not come. But no! That was they, wasn't it, in the second boat? Yes! Hurrah and hurrah! Forward bolted Charley; forward bolted Billy; and delivered such a series of frantic hugs that their mothers simply _had_ to know them, in spite of tan and clothes.

"Why!" gasped Charley's mother, holding him off a moment, to gain breath and to make sure. "How well you look! Where's your father? Is he all right? When do we get to the mine? Are things going well? Oh, Charley, but I'm glad to see you!"

"Everything's splendid," panted Charley. "But this is the best of all."

And from the behavior of Billy and _his_ mother, Charley rather imagined that they agreed with him.

So it proved to be a merry Christmas at Gold Hill and the Golden West mine. And thus the famous year of Forty-nine passed into the busy prosperous year of Fifty, during which California and the Golden West mine grew and prospered together.