Chapter 24

They woke next morning into light, clear air. The sun rose over the eastern line of mountains filling the valley with golden light. As it climbed higher the landscape shone an emerald green. No doubt the moisture would boost vegetation. The creek had turned into a real lake, muddy and full of floating debris. It was strange to see just the crown of trees above the surface.

In spite of his congestion, Jeremiah lit up his pipe, but had to give up after two puffs as it robbed him of all breath. “Damnation, if a man can’t even enjoy a good pipeful.”

“You stay by the fire and rest today.”

“Not a chance. It’ll take more than a couple of sneezes to get the best of me.” He stood up, but a fit of coughing doubled him over to the point that he nearly fell to the ground. He sat back down. “I guess I know when I’m licked.”

Chance had to go a long way to find water that wasn’t full of mud. He cooked breakfast, washed up, and got some more firewood. The sun was shining bright overhead and did the soul good to be in its warmth.

Jeremiah was sucking on an empty pipe. “You know if we ever strike it rich, you can get your Emily and I’ll buy the best dance hall girl money can afford and we’ll go dancing, parading our women folk around like we’ve done it all our lives...”

Somewhere along the line Chance had stopped listening. Strike it rich? Unlikely. His eyes stared unfocused past Jeremiah’s head, past the rock slide, boring into the sweep of the hillside. In the bright sunlight everything sparkled. The air danced as the heat rose up and the wings of birds flashed by. A dragonfly caught his eye and he followed it as it meandered over the field among the sparkles of rocks and turned up soil. It seemed that in one fell swoop, nature was giving back in this magic moment all it had put them through...

His mouth dropped open and hung there.

“What??! What’s the matter with you?” Jeremiah demanded in alarm, looking for his rifle.

Paralyzed, all Chance could do was to point.

“What is it? You’re scaring me!” He looked around, rifle ready in hand, searching for some threat that had frozen his partner. At first he saw nothing but the wide slash of the slide. He didn’t see the glitter among the rocks, the sparkles like scatterings of golden pieces...!

Then in one motion Jeremiah vaulted to his feet, Chance was a little slower getting up. As in a dream, they approached the spewed up soil. Everywhere, the glint of gold greeted them.

“My God... My God... My God...” Chance repeated until spittle nearly choked him.

“I can’t believe it...” Jeremiah was so overcome with the sight that he lost control and wet himself, not even feeling it.

Up and down the slide, a sparkle of yellow highlighted the flow of rocks and mud. Jeremiah reached into the disruption, but Chance grabbed him and held him back. “Careful, the whole thing is unstable...”

Jeremiah went to the fire and came back with his long rifle. With the butt end, he reached in and snared a gleaming piece and fished it out. Triumphantly his hands closed over it. “For a moment I thought it could be fool’s gold, but not according to the shape and weight. Do you realize...? Do you know what this means?” His hands swept over the slide. “There’s tens of thousands dollar’s worth just on the surface. Just like picking strawberries. Partner, go make yourself rich.”

Chance wasn’t in a hurry. “We’d better wait until it dries out, settles a bit and is safe.”

“Bullshit! We’ll get long poles and fashion scoops to the ends and pick what we can see.” Sounded feasible and they set to work. They soon had what was required and went fishing in the mud. In no time they had a second canister filled and then the third. Soon they had to pile the gold into a blanket. By nightfall they’d harvested the near edge all the way up the slope.

One thing for sure, the surge of triumph had completely cured Jeremiah of his cold and he didn’t sneeze once after that.

Around the supper fire they sat limply, exhausted by the emotional turmoil of the discovery. Even Jeremiah sat silently, sunk into himself. Chance thought that he should be happy but all he felt was stunned. His mind saw the gold, he’d felt the weight of it, and knew it translated into thousands of dollars, but so what? At the moment it made no dent in him.

“There’s too much of this. We can never handle it alone,” Chance said.

“What, you want to give our secret away?”

“No, but I don’t want us getting killed over it either. No gold is worth it.” He struggled to make his mind work. “What we ought to do is collect what’s on the surface, but then get a crew for the rest.”

“Who, for instance?” Jeremiah asked warily.

“Ormond and his boys.”

“I knew it! You have some secret deal with this guy.”

“No, I don’t. But think of how much gold there must be here. And on the bottom, now holding back the new lake.” They both looked at the lake. “Do you think that just the two of us can handle all that?”

There was a long silence as each followed his own train of thought. Jeremiah’s conflict was obvious as it played out on his face. Chance was overwhelmed by the extent of their success. He’d prepared for failure but not for a windfall of this magnitude.

“I still don’t feel right about giving this away. Believe me, soon as it becomes known, the entire country will be here digging.”

“Sooner or later it will become known. There’s no way of preventing that. So what can we do to maximize our profit? Turn professional as you’ve been saying...” The word profit calmed Jeremiah down, but it still took half the night to come up with a plan both could agree to. They’d collect the surface stuff, perhaps as much as 60 pounds, stash it somewhere safe, then call in Ormond’s boys. Maybe by the time the news got out they would have harvested most of it.

By the morning Jeremiah reverted to his former stance of saying nothing and giving nothing away. As they worked, it took Chance the rest of the day to bring him to reason. The next day was the same, but each day Jeremiah came closer to giving in.

Chance tried again. “Partner, we already have enough to set up each of us comfortably for life. I’d be satisfied with that. You’re rich, I’m rich with what we already have. And if we make a deal with Ormond’s company we’ll get even richer. We’ll no longer have to work our hands to the bone or stand in cold water, panning.” In the end even Jeremiah had to admit that the task was too large for just the two of them so reluctantly he surrendered.

Over the next five days, they finished harvesting the surface of the slope, transported what they’d collected to a cave about an hour away, and buried it deep in a back corner. It took both of them two trips to complete the transfer.

In the morning, they went over every detail again. Jeremiah was to stay, gather as much as he could and hide it somewhere. Chance was to go to Rainbow Falls and work out a contract. The rest was up to God. No doubt the news would get out but by then they would have the place well staked out, and if the boys from the other two operations at Highland Trail and Wolverine Pass also came, they’d have this place nearly picked clean before the real crowds arrived.

The only point of contention remaining was how much of the pie to yield. Jeremiah was insisting on a 60-40 split, 60 for Jeremiah and Chance and 40 for the rest of the outfit; on that he wouldn’t yield.

Chance set off, and still Jeremiah yelled after him, “60-40. Don’t sell us out.” Chance waved one more time before he disappeared under the trees.

It took him until noon of the second day to reach the Rainbow Falls fort. Along the way he came to terms with yielding 40 percent to the Carmody family. Who better? he thought. Everybody gets to profit.

Joshua, on lookout, hurried to open up for Chance. He led him direct to Brooks, who appeared surprised but pleased to see him.

“I got a letter from the Carmodys just the other day, mentioning you.”

“Really?” For some reason that fact pleased Chance. “What did they say?”

“Just that if you’re ever in Toronto you must visit them. They stressed the must part.”

After they were alone, Chance laid out his news and offer. Disbelieving at first, Brooks just shook his head. But with more detail, he started getting excited.

“Are you telling me that the stuff just lies on top of the ground? How come nobody ever stumbled across it?” Brooks demanded.

“The mud slide tore the hill wide open, exposing we’re not quite sure what. We don’t know how deep it goes or how much there is in total. We just know we can’t handle it by ourselves. So we’re willing to split. Are you in or out?”

“Split? How?”

“We were thinking 60 for us, 40 for your crew.”

“Not a chance. We want 75 for our end.” The deal was still hypothetical, contingent upon the confirmation that there was real gold to be mined, but the percentages were already rock solid.

“I can go to Bear Claw and come back with a hundred miners for much less.”

“True, and they’d rob you blind.”

“All right, we can live with 55 for us 45 for you.”

“You’re asking me to buy the horse unseen. I wasn’t born yesterday. We could talk about 70 percent for us.”

It took more than three hours to settle on 50 percent for the Morning Wish Company and 50 for Last Chance Company, which Chance now called his partnership with Jeremiah. They wrote it down in a contract.

“And we keep whatever we’ve already collected, right up to the date your crew starts.”

“That seems reasonable.”

“Then write it in,” Chance directed. Afterwards he carefully read the document and signed it, while Brooks signed on behalf of the Morning Wish Company. Chance knew of course that the contract was only as good as the men honoring it. Still they shook hands on it after Brooks spit on his hands to properly seal the bargain.

Brooks pulled out a bottle and shoved it over to Chance. “Real HBC scotch, not some rot-gut whiskey.” He poured them a drink. “Well, here’s to a profitable partnership. I think you’re exaggerating, but if your claim is only half as good as you say, I’ll be satisfied.” He lifted his glass and tossed the drink down. So did Chance.

“We really don’t know what lies underneath, just what was on the surface.”

“Just how much have you collected already?” Brooks asked, looking at the new partner speculatively.

“I’m not telling.”

“Fine way to start a partnership,” snapped Brooks, irked by the refusal.

“You would have had it, had you allowed us the 60 percent I asked for.”

“Well and good then.” And Brooks tossed down another drink.

They decided further that Brooks would go back with Chance, check out the site and then bring in Ormond’s crew right away and after, whatever manpower they needed. Sounded good to Chance. It was near morning before the two went to bed, only to rise at daybreak to set off.