The Cross Cut

C >> Courtney Ryley Cooper >> The Cross Cut

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"'What's the quotation on silver?' I asked him."

"'Hell,' says Old Man Saxby, 'there ain't any quotation! Close 'er
up--close up everything. They 've passed the demonetization bill, the
president 's going to sign it, and you ain't got a job.'

"And young feller--" Old Undertaker Chastine looked over his glasses
again, "that was some real disappointment. And it's a lot worse than
you 're liable to get in a minute."

He turned to the furnace and took out the pottery dish in which the
sample had been smelting, white-hot now. He cooled it and tinkered
with his chemicals. He fussed with his scales, he adjusted his
glasses, he coughed once or twice in an embarrassed manner; finally to
turn to Fairchild.

"Young man," he queried, "it ain't any of my business, but where 'd you
get this ore?"

"Out of my mine, the Blue Poppy!"

"Sure you ain't been visiting?"

"What do you mean?" Fairchild was staring at him in wonderment.

Old Undertaker Chastine rubbed his hands on his big apron and continued
to look over his glasses.

"What 'll you take for the Blue Poppy mine, Son?"

"Why--it's not for sale."

"Sure it ain't going to be--soon?"

"Absolutely not." Then Fairchild caught the queer look in the man's
eyes. "What do you mean by all these questions? Is that good ore--or
is n't it?"

"Son, just one more question--and I hope you won't get mad at me. I 'm
a funny old fellow, and I do a lot of things that don't seem right at
the beginning. But I 've saved a few young bloods like you from
trouble more than once. You ain't been high-grading?"

"You mean--"

"Just exactly what I said--wandering around somebody else's property
and picking up a few samples, as it were, to mix in with your own
product? Or planting them where they can be found easily by a
prospective buyer?"

Fairchild's chin set, and his arms moved slowly. Then he
laughed--laughed at the small, white-haired, eccentric old man who
through his very weakness had the strength to ask insulting questions.

"No--I 'll give you my word I have n't been high-grading," he said at
last. "My partner and I drilled a hole in the foot wall of the stope
where we were working, hoping to find the rest of a vein that was
pinching out on us. And we got this stuff. Is it any good?"

"Is it good?" Again Old Undertaker Chastine looked over his glasses.
"That's just the trouble. It's too good--it's so good that it seems
there's something funny about it. Son, that stuff assays within a
gram, almost, of the ore they 're taking out of the Silver Queen!"

"What's that?" Fairchild had leaped forward and grasped the other man
by the shoulders, his eyes agleam, his whole being trembling with
excitement. "You're not kidding me about it? You're sure--you 're
sure?"

"Absolutely! That's why I was so careful for a minute. I thought
maybe you had been doing a little high-grading or had been up there and
sneaked away some of the ore for a salting proposition. Boy, you 've
got a bonanza, if this holds out."

"And it really--"

"It's almost identical. I never saw two samples of ore that were more
alike. Let's see, the Blue Poppy's right up Kentucky Gulch, not so
very far away from the Silver Queen, is n't it? Then there must be a
tremendous big vein concealed around there somewhere that splits, one
half of it running through the mountain in one direction and the other
cutting through on the opposite side. It looks like peaches and cream
for you, Son. How thick is it?"

"I don't know. We just happened to put a drill in there and this is
some of the scrapings."

"You have n't cut into it at all, then?"

"Not unless Harry, my partner, has put in a shot since I 've been gone.
As soon as we saw that we were into ore, I hurried away to come down
here to get an assay."

"Well, Son, now you can hurry back and begin cutting into a fortune.
If that vein's only four inches wide, you 've got plenty to keep you
for the rest of your life."

"It must be more than that--the drill must have been into it several
inches before I ever noticed it. I 'd been scraping the muck out of
there without paying much attention. It looked so hopeless."

Undertaker Chastine turned to his work.

"Then hurry along, Son. I suppose," he asked, as he looked over his
glasses for the last time, "that you don't want me to say anything
about it?"

"Not until--"

"You 're sure. I know. Well, good news is awful hard to keep--but I
'll do my best. Run along."

And Fairchild "ran." Whistling and happy, he turned out of the office
of the Sampler and into the street, his coat open, his big cap high on
his head, regardless of the sweep of the cold wind and the fine snow
that it carried on its icy breath. Through town he went, bumping into
pedestrians now and then, and apologizing in a vacant, absent manner.
The waiting of months was over, and Fairchild at last was beginning to
see his dreams come true. Like a boy, he turned up Kentucky Gulch,
bucking the big drifts and kicking the snow before him in flying,
splattering spray, stopping his whistling now and then to
sing,--foolish songs without words or rhyme or rhythm, the songs of a
heart too much engrossed with the joy of living to take cognizance of
mere rules of melody!

So this was the reason that Rodaine had acknowledged the value of the
mine that day in court! This was the reason for the mysterious offer
of fifty thousand dollars and for the later one of nearly a quarter of
a million! Rodaine had known; Rodaine had information, and Rodaine had
been willing to pay to gain possession of what now appeared to be a
bonanza. But Rodaine had failed. And Fairchild had won!

Won! But suddenly he realized that there was a blankness about it all.
He had won money, it is true. But all the money in the world could not
free him from the taint that had been left upon him by a coroner's
investigation, from the hint that still remained in the recommendation
of the grand jury that the murder of Sissie Larsen be looked into
further. Nor could it remove the stigma of the four charges against
Harry, which soon were to come to trial, and without a bit of evidence
to combat them. Riches could do much--but they could not aid in that
particular, and somewhat sobered by the knowledge, Fairchild turned
from the main road and on up through the high-piled snow to the mouth
of the Blue Poppy mine.

A faint acrid odor struck his nostrils as he started to descend the
shaft, the "perfume" of exploded dynamite, and it sent anew into
Fairchild's heart the excitement and intensity of the strike.
Evidently Harry had shot the deep hole, and now, there in the chamber,
was examining the result, which must, by this time, give some idea of
the extent of the ore and the width of the vein. Fairchild pulled on
the rope with enthusiastic strength, while the bucket bumped and
swirled about the shaft in descent. A moment more and he had reached
the bottom, to leap from the carrier, light his carbide lamp which hung
where he had left it on the timbers, and start forward.

The odor grew heavier. Fairchild held his light before him and looked
far ahead, wondering why he could not see the gleam from Harry's lamp.
He shouted. There was no answer, and he went on.

Fifty feet! Seventy-five! Then he stopped short with a gasp. Twisted
and torn before him were the timbers of the tunnel, while muck and
refuse lay everywhere. A cave-in--another cave-in--at almost the exact
spot where the one had occurred years before, shutting off the chamber
from communication with the shaft, tearing and rending the new timbers
which had been placed there and imprisoning Harry behind them!

Fairchild shouted again and again, only gaining for his answer the
ghostlike echoes of his own voice as they traveled to the shaft and
were thrown back again. He tore off his coat and cap, and attacked the
timbers like the fear-maddened man he was, dragging them by superhuman
force out of the way and clearing a path to the refuse. Then, running
along the little track, he searched first on one side, then the other,
until, nearly at the shaft, he came upon a miner's pick and a shovel.
With these, he returned to the task before him.

Hours passed, while the sweat poured from his forehead and while his
muscles seemed to tear themselves loose from their fastenings with the
exertion that was placed upon them. Foot after foot, the muck was torn
away, as Fairchild, with pick and shovel, forced a tunnel through the
great mass of rocky debris which choked the drift. Onward--onward--at
last to make a small opening in the barricade, and to lean close to it
that he might shout again. But still there was no answer.

Feverish now, Fairchild worked with all the reserve strength that was
in him. He seized great chunks of rock that he could not even have
budged at an ordinary time and threw them far behind him. His pick
struck again and again with a vicious, clanging reverberation; the hole
widened. Once more Fairchild leaned toward it.

"Harry!" he called. "Harry!"

But there was no answer. Again he shouted, then he returned to his
work, his heart aching in unison with his muscles. Behind that broken
mass, Fairchild felt sure, was his partner, torn, bleeding through the
effects of some accident, he did not know what, past answering his
calls, perhaps dead. Greater became the hole in the cave-in; soon it
was large enough to admit his body. Seizing his carbide lamp,
Fairchild made for the opening and crawled through, hurrying onward
toward the chamber where the stope began, calling Harry's name at every
step, in vain. The shadows before him lengthened, as the chamber gave
greater play to the range of light. Fairchild rushed within, held high
his carbide and looked about him. But no crumpled form of a man lay
there, no bruised, torn human being. The place was empty, except for
the pile of stone and refuse which had been torn away by dynamite
explosions in the hanging wall, where Harry evidently had shot away the
remaining refuse in a last effort to see what lay in that
direction,--stones and muck which told nothing. On the other side--

Fairchild stared blankly. The hole that he had made into the foot wall
had been filled with dynamite and tamped, as though ready for shooting.
But the charge had not been exploded. Instead--on the ground lay the
remainder of the tamping paper and a short foot and a half of fuse,
with its fulminate of mercury cap attached, where it had been pulled
from its berth by some great force and hastily stamped out. And Harry--

Harry was gone!

CHAPTER XX

It was as though the shades of the past had come to life again, to
repeat in the twentieth century a happening of the nineteenth. There
was only one difference--no form of a dead man now lay against the foot
wall, to rest there more than a score of years until it should come to
light, a pile of bones in time-shredded clothing. And as he thought of
it, Fairchild remembered that the earthly remains of "Sissie" Larsen
had lain within almost a few feet of the spot where he had drilled the
prospect hole into the foot wall, there to discover the ore that
promised bonanza.

But this time there was nothing and no clue to the mystery of Harry's
disappearance. Fairchild suddenly strengthened with an idea. Perhaps,
after all, he had been on the other side of the cave-in and had hurried
on out of the mine. But in that event, would he not have waited for
his return, to tell him of the accident? Or would he not have
proceeded down to the Sampler to bring the news if he had not cared to
remain at the tunnel opening? However, it was a chance, and Fairchild
took it. Once more he crawled through the hole that he had made in the
cave-in and sought the outward world. Then he hurried down Kentucky
Gulch and to the Sampler. But Harry had not been there. He went
through town, asking questions, striving his best to shield his
anxiety, cloaking his queries under the cover of cursory remarks.
Harry had not been seen. At last, with the coming of night, he turned
toward the boarding house, and on his arrival. Mother Howard, sighting
his white face, hurried to him.

"Have you seen Harry?" he asked.

"No--he has n't been here."

It was the last chance. Clutching fear at his heart, he told Mother
Howard of the happenings at the mine, quickly, as plainly as possible.
Then once more he went forth, to retrace his steps to the Blue Poppy,
to buck the wind and the fine snow and the high, piled drifts, and to
go below. But the surroundings were the same: still the cave-in, with
its small hole where he had torn through it, still the ragged hanging
wall where Harry had fired the last shots of dynamite in his
investigations, still the trampled bit of fuse with its cap attached.
Nothing more. Gingerly Fairchild picked up the cap and placed it where
a chance kick could not explode it. Then he returned to the shaft.

Back into the black night, with the winds whistling through the pines.
Back to wandering about through the hills, hurrying forward at the
sight of every faint, dark object against the snow, in the hope that
Harry, crippled by the cave-in, might have some way gotten out of the
shaft. But they were only boulders or logs or stumps of trees. At
midnight, Fairchild turned once more toward town and to the boarding
house. But Harry had not appeared. There was only one thing left to
do.

This time, when Fairchild left Mother Howard's, his steps did not lead
him toward Kentucky Gulch. Instead he kept straight on up the street,
past the little line of store buildings and to the courthouse, where he
sought out the sole remaining light in the bleak, black
building,--Sheriff Bardwell's office. That personage was nodding in
his chair, but removed his feet from the desk and turned drowsily as
Fairchild entered.

"Well?" he questioned, "what's up?"

"My partner has disappeared. I want to report to you--and see if I can
get some help."

"Disappeared? Who?"

"Harry Harkins. He 's a big Cornishman, with a large mustache, very
red face, about sixty years old, I should judge--"

"Wait a minute," Bardwell's eyes narrowed. "Ain't he the fellow I
arrested in the Blue Poppy mine the night of the Old Times dance?"

"Yes."

"And you say he 's disappeared?"

"I think you heard me!" Fairchild spoke with some asperity. "I said
that he had disappeared, and I want some help in hunting for him. He
may be injured, for all I know, and if he 's out here in the mountains
anywhere, it's almost sure death for him unless he can get some aid
soon. I--"

But the sheriff's eyes still remained suspiciously narrow.

"When does his trial come up?"

"A week from to-morrow."

"And he 's disappeared." A slow smile came over the other man's lips.
"I don't think it will help much to start any relief expedition for
him. The thing to do is to get a picture and a general description and
send it around to the police in the various parts of the country! That
'll be the best way to find him!"

Fairchild's teeth gritted, but he could not escape the force of the
argument, from the sheriff's standpoint. For a moment there was
silence, then the miner came closer to the desk.

"Sheriff," he said as calmly as possible, "you have a perfect right to
give that sort of view. That's your business--to suspect people.
However, I happen to feel sure that my partner would stand trial, no
matter what the charge, and that he would not seek to evade it in any
way. Some sort of an accident happened at the mine this afternoon--a
cave-in or an explosion that tore out the roof of the tunnel--and I am
sure that my partner is injured, has made his way out of the mine, and
is wandering among the hills. Will you help me to find him?"

The sheriff wheeled about in his chair and studied a moment. Then he
rose.

"Guess I will," he announced. "It can't do any harm to look for him,
anyway."

Half an hour later, aided by two deputies who had been summoned from
their homes, Fairchild and the sheriff left for the hills to begin the
search for the missing Harry. Late the next afternoon, they returned
to town, tired, their horses almost crawling in their dragging pace
after sixteen hours of travel through the drifts of the hills and
gullies. Harry had not been found, and so Fairchild reported when,
with drooping shoulders, he returned to the boarding house and to the
waiting Mother Howard. And both knew that this time Harry's
disappearance was no joke, as it had been before. They realized that
back of it all was some sinister reason, some mystery which they could
not solve,--for the present at least. That night, Fairchild faced the
future and made his resolve.

There was only a week now until Harry's case should come to trial.
Only a week until the failure of the defendant to appear should throw
the deeds of the Blue Poppy mine into the hands of the court, to be
sold for the amount of the bail. And in spite of the fact that
Fairchild now felt his mine to be a bonanza, unless some sort of a
miracle could happen before that time, the mine was the same as lost.
True, it would go to the highest bidder at a public sale and any money
brought in above the amount of bail would be returned to him. But who
would be that bidder? Who would get the mine--perhaps for twenty or
twenty-five thousand dollars, when it now was worth millions?
Certainly not he. Already he and Harry had borrowed from Mother Howard
all that she could lend them. True she had friends; but none could
produce from twenty to two hundred thousand dollars for a mine, simply
on his word. And unless something should happen to intervene, unless
Harry should return, or in some way Fairchild could raise the necessary
five thousand dollars to furnish a cash bond and again recover the
deeds of the Blue Poppy, he was no better off than before the strike
was made. Long he thought, finally to come to his conclusion, and
then, with the air of a gambler who has placed his last bet to win or
lose, he went to bed.

But morning found him awake long before the rest of the house was
stirring. Downtown he hurried, to eat a hasty breakfast in the
all-night restaurant, then to start on a search for men. The first
workers on the street that morning found Fairchild offering them six
dollars a day. And by eight o'clock, ten of them were at work in the
drift of the Blue Poppy mine, working against time that they might
repair the damage which had been caused by the cave-in.

It was not an easy task. That day and the next and the next after
that, they labored. Then Fairchild glanced at the progress that was
being made and sought out the pseudo-foreman.

"Will it be finished by night?" he asked.

"Easily."

"Very well. I may need these men to work on a day and night shift, I
'm not sure. I 'll be back in an hour."

Away he went and up the shaft, to travel as swiftly as possible through
the drift-piled road down Kentucky Gulch and to the Sampler. There he
sought out old Undertaker Chastine, and with him went to the proprietor.

"My name is Fairchild, and I 'm in trouble," he said candidly. "I 've
brought Mr. Chastine in with me because he assayed some of my ore a few
days ago and believes he knows what it's worth. I 'm working against
time to get five thousand dollars. If I can produce ore that runs two
hundred dollars to the ton, and if I 'll sell it to you for one hundred
seventy-five dollars a ton until I can get the money I need, provided I
can get the permission of the court,--will you put it through for me?"

The Sampler owner smiled.

"If you 'll let me see where you 're getting the ore." Then he figured
a moment. "That 'd be thirty or forty ton," came at last. "We could
handle that as fast as you could bring it in here."

But a new thought had struck Fairchild,--a new necessity for money.

"I 'll give it to you for one hundred fifty dollars a ton, providing
you do the hauling and lend me enough after the first day or so to pay
my men."

"But why all the excitement--and the rush?"

"My partner 's Harry Harkins. He 's due for trial Friday, and he 's
disappeared. The mine is up as security. You can see what will happen
unless I can substitute a cash bond for the amount due before that
time. Is n't that sufficient?"

"It ought to be. But as I said, I want to see where the ore comes
from."

"You 'll see in the morning--if I 've got it," answered Fairchild with
a new hope thrilling in his voice. "All that I have so far is an assay
of some drill scrapings. I don't know how thick the vein is or whether
it's going to pinch out in ten minutes after we strike it. But I 'll
know mighty soon."

Every cent that Robert Fairchild possessed in the world was in his
pockets,--two hundred dollars. After he had paid his men for their
three days of labor, there would be exactly twenty dollars left. But
Fairchild did not hesitate. To Farrell's office he went and with him
to an interview, in chambers, with the judge. Then, the necessary
permission having been granted, he hurried back to the mine and into
the drift, there to find the last of the muck being scraped away from
beneath the site of the cave-in. Fairchild paid off. Then he turned
to the foreman.

"How many of these men are game to take a chance?"

"Pretty near all of 'em--if there 's any kind of a gamble to it."

"There 's a lot of gamble. I 've got just twenty dollars in my
pocket--enough to pay each man one dollar apiece for a night's work if
my hunch doesn't pan out. If it does pan, the wages are twenty dollars
a day for three days, with everybody, including myself, working like
hell! Who's game?"

The answer came in unison. Fairchild led the way to the chamber,
seized a hammer and took his place.

"There 's two-hundred-dollar ore back of this foot wall if we can break
in and start a new stope," he announced. "It takes a six-foot hole to
reach it, and we can have the whole story by morning. Let's go!"

Along the great length of the foot wall, extending all the distance of
the big chamber, the men began their work, five men to the drills and
as many to the sledges, as they started their double-jacking. Hour
after hour the clanging of steel against steel sounded in the big
underground room, as the drills bit deeper and deeper into the hard
formation of the foot wall, driving steadily forward until their
contact should have a different sound, and the muggy scrapings bear a
darker hue than that of mere wall-rock. Hour after hour passed, while
the drill-turners took their places with the sledges, and the sledgers
went to the drills--the turnabout system of "double-jacking"--with
Fairchild, the eleventh man, filling in along the line as an extra
sledger, that the miners might be the more relieved in their strenuous,
frenzied work. Midnight came. The first of the six-foot drills sank
to its ultimate depth. Then the second and third and fourth: finally
the fifth. They moved on. Hours more of work, and the operation had
been repeated. The workmen hurried for the powder house, far down the
drift, by the shaft, lugging back in their pockets the yellow,
candle-like sticks of dynamite, with their waxy wrappers and their
gelatinous contents together with fuses and caps. Crimping
nippers--the inevitable accompaniment of a miner--came forth from the
pockets of the men. Careful tamping, then the men took their places at
the fuses.

"Give the word!" one of them announced crisply as he turned to
Fairchild. "Each of us 'll light one of these things, and then I say
we 'll run! Because this is going to be some explosion!"

Fairchild smiled the smile of a man whose heart is thumping at its
maximum speed. Before him in the long line of the foot wall were ten
holes, "up-holes", "downs" and "swimmers", attacking the hidden ore in
every direction. Ten holes drilled six feet into the rock and tamped
with double charges of dynamite. He straightened.

"All right, men! Ready?"

"Ready!"

"Touch 'em off!"

The carbide lamps were held close to the fuses for a second. Soon they
were all going, spitting like so many venomous, angry serpents--but
neither Fairchild nor the miners had stopped to watch. They were
running as hard as possible for the shaft and for the protection that
distance might give. A wait that seemed ages. Then:

"One!"

"And two--and three!"

"There goes four and five--they went together!"

"Six--seven--eight--nine--"

Again a wait, while they looked at one another with vacuous eyes. A
long interval until the tenth.

"Two went together then! I thought we 'd counted nine?" The foreman
stared, and Fairchild studied. Then his face lighted.

"Eleven 's right. One of them must have set off the charge that Harry
left in there. All the better--it gives us just that much more of a
chance."

Back they went along the drift tunnel now, coughing slightly as the
sharp smoke of the dynamite cut their lungs. A long journey that
seemed as many miles instead of feet. Then with a shout, Fairchild
sprang forward, and went to his hands and knees.

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