by Jack L Knapp
“I had it shipped in. You can do that, you know.”
“The Post Office ships booze, T?”
“I don’t know, but UPS does. You have to sign for it, but otherwise it’s the same as any other package.”
“I’ll have to try that. I’ve been swapping messages with an Irish fellow regarding horses. He likes Ardbeg; it’s supposed to be very peaty. Still, the Balvenie twenty-one year old is also matured in port barrels, so I might try that one.”
“Expensive tastes, Ray.”
“Yeah, well...I don’t drink often, but I prefer quality when I do.”
“I understand. But about this morning, I think I might have figured out what happened when you two vanished. I’m reasonably sure you teleported, and as for why your thoughts sounded weird, I wonder if somehow teleportation is involved with time travel. Could you have skipped out of our timeline?”
“I don’t know, T. If I did, it was only for a fraction of a second. Still, it’s not all that accurate, whatever I did. I didn’t land where I intended, I was about thirty yards off. That’s probably not a problem, because I was in my bubble, but I don’t think I’d want to try it without protection. Suppose I’d teleported into a tree or a boulder?”
“Let’s think about it. Don’t try it unless one of us knows what you’re up to. You might get into something you can’t handle. I think we all need to take it slow and learn all we can about this one, until we know what we’re getting into.”
“Yeah. I haven’t forgotten about Denny and Mike. The Talents are useful, but they can kill you if you don’t know what you’re doing.
Chapter Three
Bobby headed back to the location he’d been scouting after breakfast. A small shipment of steel pipes had been delivered while they were having dinner, but they still had to be transported to the mine. From there, Bobby would need to lift the heavy pipes to his new discovery.
Was his intuition, what T called a ‘hunch’, accurate? There was really only one way to find out. T had solid evidence that his peculiar ability worked; he’d used it to find the caches Doc Noss had buried in the New Mexico desert. With Ray’s help, he’d recovered a bag of gold coins and several boxes of poorly-refined gold bars that the paranoid old man had buried. Had the buried treasures really originated with the Emperor Maximilian? Some believed so; reportedly, Doc Noss had recovered a crown as well as the bars and coins he’d hidden.
Ray had sold the coins through dealers. The effort had attracted unwanted attention from federal agencies that believed it must be tied to drug dealing. He had kept part of his share of the sale proceeds in a bank account, which federal officials had seized. The US Attorney’s office had eventually released the money under threat of a lawsuit when no evidence of wrongdoing could be found.
T sold most of the bars through contacts in Arizona, who then smuggled them into Mexico. The millions of dollars they’d gotten from the sales had purchased the ranch and established Doctor Schmidt’s, Shezzie’s, clinic.
T’s ability appeared to be an enhanced version of the ability that dowsers used. Most used their ability to find water, while others were reportedly able to locate precious metals, even gemstones, using the same techniques. Traditional dowsers used twigs or metal, though a few used nothing more than their senses. As for Bobby’s own intuitive feeling, only time would tell whether it was as accurate as T’s. Miners throughout history had held similar feelings and most had died broke. Still, there were the few who’d been considered “lucky”, just as some gamblers seemed able to sense what cards other players held.
Bobby had the pipes and the necessary blasting supplies. It was only necessary to blow off the overburden, then remove the shattered rock below.
Ray drove the two of them to the site, using T’s truck; the pipes and the sand-spikes Bobby had ordered as part of the shipment rested in the back, along with two plastic canisters of diesel fuel and a case of bottled water.
“I can carry the diesel and the sand spikes, or you can carry the extras and I’ll bring the pipes. Got any preferences, Ray?”
“You carry the pipes, Bobby. Take off when you’re ready, I’ll be right behind you. You’re not going to blow the charges today, are you?”
“Maybe. T wants to be here. I’ll let him sniff around the deposit before I set the charges, see what he thinks of it.”
“Sounds good. Lead off, I’ll follow. I’ll call T now; by the time he gets here, we should have your supplies at the site.”
“I’ll leave you there while I go back to the mine, Ray. I’ve still got to bring up the ammonium nitrate and the dynamite and caps. Tell you what, for safety you should come with me. You carry the dynamite, I’ll carry the ammonium nitrate and the caps.”
“Caps won’t set off ammonium nitrate, will they?”
“Probably not, ANFO needs a pretty sharp jolt to set it off, that’s why we use dynamite. Still, there’s no reason to take chances. T can stop at the bunker and bring the caps.”
“Sounds good. I’ll comm him now.”
#
T arrived an hour later, bringing the caps, the small blasting machine, and a roll of two-conductor wire.
“I figured you’d need this stuff too, Bobby.”
“It’s probably best. I considered setting off the charge by slamming a piece of rebar down on the capped dynamite. I might do that next time, or if for some reason I get a misfire I’ll try it here. But why don’t you see if you can sense the deposit, T? Maybe two of us can do a better job of precisely locating it.”
“Sure. Give me a few seconds.”
T drifted over the section already marked with three rebar rods Bobby had driven into the ground. He paused, then moved beyond the rods, eventually circling the location and coming back to land next to Bobby and Ray.
“I’m getting something, but I can’t tell what it is. You think it’s triangular, or did you just put the rods in to define the center of the deposit?”
“I think it’s more or less triangular. I used a couple of coins while I surveyed the site, a silver peso I got in Mexico and a half-ounce gold eagle I bought the last time I was in Las Vegas. I carried them for luck, so maybe they are; I also figured if I was ever broke, I could sell them and get enough to live on for a while, maybe get a ticket back to the states. Some of the places I worked, having an insurance policy like that was a necessity. Anyway, I tried to visualize the ore body while I held onto the peso and nothing happened. With the gold eagle, though, I got a much stronger impression.”
“I never tried that. Can I borrow your eagle for a minute?”
“Sure, T. Don’t go running off with it, though.”
“I’ll keep it safe, Bobby.”
T levitated, then hovered over the approximate center of the marked area. Descending, he moved around from rebar marker to marker, then moved outside and circled the area.
“You’ve got something, all right. The deposit extends about ten feet on each side beyond the triangle you marked. Was that deliberate?”
“Right, I planned to drive the iron pipes into the ground just inside the poles. That’s close enough for the ANFO to shatter the rock on top and it will also break up the upper part of the deposit. Whether the shock wave will propagate deep enough to bust the rest of the deposit, I don’t know. I figure using a full stick of dynamite per charge and a twelve-foot section of pipe, I’ll get down about fifteen feet with this blast.”
“You using a tamper, Bobby?”
“Right, notice that the pipes are capped at one end and there’s a half-inch hole drilled through the cap. I’ll unscrew the cap, then pass the leads from the blasting cap through the predrilled hole. The wire leads are twisted together so that stray voltage won’t set off the squibs that fire the caps. I’ll test for continuity after I run the leads through the pipe caps, that eliminates the possibility that the insulation would be scraped off the wire leads during installation. I’ll do all that, then store the blasting caps behind rocks for safety while I load the charg
es. Why don’t the two of you move back, maybe to that ridge. That’s far enough that you should be safe, and if any chunks of rock come your way just use your bubbles. That’s what I’m going to do, form my bubble as soon as I’ve fired the charges.”
“Sounds like a plan, Bobby. Want us to help plant the pipes?”
“Sure, just screw the sand spikes into the end opposite to the threaded caps. The pipes came with the threads pre-cut. Finger-tight is probably good enough. For that matter, we might have been able to drive the pipes in without using the spikes, but no use taking a chance. It’s pretty rocky up here.”
“Can do, Bobby.”
The three men attached the spikes. These were intended for use in driven water wells and consisted of conical metal points screwed into perforated stainless steel extensions. This would allow water to flow in after the pipe was driven deep enough. There was no water up here, but the spikes would help to prevent rock particles or dirt from entering and possibly plugging the pipes.
T finished first, then moved his section of pipe to the location Bobby indicated, just inside one of the rebar markers.
“Heads up; I’m going to plant this thing.”
Ray and Bobby stopped, watching T as he carefully lifted the pipe, not stopping until the pipe floated high above them. Judging the position of the pipe, T nodded, satisfied.
“Ray, one final check. I’m just going to drop the pipe straight down. I figure it’s about a hundred feet in altitude and if doesn’t go deep enough, I’ll try slamming it in deeper. Feel like giving me a hand?”
“Wait one, T. I’ll lift a pebble up until it touches the point, then drop it. Where the pebble hits, that’s where the pipe will land.”
“Good thinking, Ray. Yeah, I could be off by a little.”
Ray’s pebble landed just slightly more than two feet inside the marker. T carefully moved the pipe, adjusting the location while ensuring it was as vertical as possible.
“Dropping it...now!”
The section of pipe smashed into the dirt. It finally stopped with some four feet still projecting above the surface.
“Want to try driving it deeper, Bobby?”
“I don’t know if we can, T.”
“Why don’t I see what I can do, Bobby. I’ll need one of those threaded pipe caps, though.”
“Wait one, T.”
Bobby removed the wires that had been threaded through the drilled hole in the cap, then handed it to T, who handed it to Ray.
“Screw this onto the end, just finger tight. I’ll bring in my hammer.”
Ray fitted the cap over the pipe end, then watched as a large boulder slowly drifted down the slope. T positioned the multi-ton rock over the embedded pipe. When it was centered, T dropped it atop the capped pipe.
“That ought to do it, don’t you think?”
T lifted the boulder and moved it away, stacking it fifty yards downhill. He repeated the process for each of the remaining pipes.
Half an hour later the three pipes had been driven flush. The threaded pipe caps had been removed and returned to Bobby, who had prepared the blasting caps by threading the wire leads through the hole. He had then mixed the ammonium nitrate and fuel oil, using the plastic-lined bags that had held the chemical. As he finished each bag, he packed the thick slurry into the pipes, stopping when the mix was six inches from the end. The excess fuel oil was stored behind the boulder T had used as a hammer.
“I’ll do the final prep now. Why don’t the two of you wait behind T’s pebble while I do that, okay? From this point on, don’t use your abilities until I fire the charge. I don‘t want to take a chance that something electrical will ruin my day.”
Using a wooden stick, Bobby pressed a hole into the ANFO large enough to take the dynamite. Easing the explosive into the hollow, he pressed gently, making sure the dynamite was fully embedded and that none of the explosive material reached above the top of the pipe. The blasting cap went into the plastic-covered hollow in the top of the dynamite. Feeding the wires through, he lowered the threaded pipe cap into place and turned it gently, feeling the threads grip.
Repeating the process for the other charges, he gathered in the three shunted ends of the electrical blasting cap leads. This was the fun part...
Bobby twisted three wires, one of each wire pair, together, then repeated the process using the other wires. Satisfied, he attached one of the joined blasting cap wires to each of the leads of the blasting wire, already laid out in readiness. The far end of the wires were shorted together for safety. Bobby followed the wire back to the initiation point, looking for any faults as he went.
“All right, I’ll connect the wires to the blasting machine now. Stay behind your rock, okay?”
“Got it, Bobby.”
Bobby untwisted the two wires, then scraped the metal conductors with the back of a knife blade. Finally ready, he attached a wire to each of the posts on the hand-held blasting machine, then tightened the knurled knob to hold the wire in position. The firing circuit was now complete.
“Fire in the hole...fire in the hole...fire in the hole!”
As soon as he’d finished the call, Bobby sharply twisted the handle of the machine. The action spun a small generator inside the device, sending a jolt of electricity down the wires.
The loud crack of the explosions was followed by a shock wave. The boulder T and Ray waited behind absorbed the air shock, but they felt the vibration through the ground. Down the slope, a huge cloud of dust puffed into the air, hanging for a moment before dissipating in the light breeze. Thumping sounds told where chunks of rock had landed.
“Think that’s enough of a hole, Bobby?”
“I’ll know when I clear the loose rubble out. Want to help me with that? Then we can see what we’ve got and head back to your place, T. I don’t know about you, but I think I deserve a glass of your whiskey!”
Chapter Four
“I’ve never seen anything like this, T.”
“I’ve heard of it, Bobby, but you’re right, it’s unusual; the old-time miners called it ‘jewelry rock’; I read up on mining when we were considering whether to exploit that deposit I found, and that’s where I found the reference. Anyway, this is the first time I’ve heard of this kind of gold in Nevada. Most of what’s mined here is like what I found before, small amounts of gold and other metals dispersed through the rock.
“This pocket might be part of the Carlin Unconformity that’s east of here. Maybe it’s an offshoot.”
“I’ve heard of that one, but it’s more north of here. I’d have to look at a geologic map to be sure, but since unconformities are regions where the geologic record isn’t complete, I might not be able to tell if the formation extends this far. Part of the geology is missing, most often caused by erosion, but geologic processes can happen wherever the conditions are right. So you might be right about this being part of that formation. Remember the old adage, gold is where you find it.”
“I’ve heard that one. The Battle Mountain-Eureka trend is northeast of us too, but there are half a dozen known mine locations scattered around the ranch’s borders, some to the north, several others to the south.”
“The hills around here show igneous outcrops too, and they’re mostly quartz-rich. This rock is mostly quartz with gold wires running through it, so whatever caused that Carlin-Battle Mountain complex may also have formed the pockets we’ve found here. I figure the gold and quartz were dissolved in hot circulating groundwater along with other minerals. The solution would not only be very hot, it would also be under high pressure, so maybe it was an earthquake that caused the pockets to form. A sudden drop in pressure would flash the water to steam, leaving the gold and quartz behind.”
“Maybe so, Bobby. If we market this here, we’ll be neck-deep in prospectors. I can think of a couple of ways to sell the gold, but they’re not necessarily legal.”
“What do you have in mind, T?”
“First, Ray
and I own the land, but you found this deposit. The other one you located might also be a high-grade lode deposit. The deposit I found is lower-grade, but probably more extensive. What would you say to splitting the profits for your two deposits three ways?”
“Even split? I’d go along with that. So how would you market it?”
“By selling the best samples to collectors. We’d have to do that in California or Alaska though. Otherwise, the weekend miners would be flooding in and next thing you know we’d find OSHA and all the other snoopies here. We can’t explain how we found this, we can’t explain how we’re extracting the ore, we don’t even want people roaming around the hills who might hear the next blast. Maybe, after we’ve got most of the gold out, we can let the story leak. There are people around here who could use the money if they have similar deposits on their land. Even so, if government starts looking too deep they’ll start wondering about us. We could wind up moving on again.”
“What about the other stuff? You said sell the best samples to collectors, so what would you do with the samples that are not so rich?”
“Easiest thing to do is crush the rock and pan out the gold. That should be easy, most of it’s likely to be larger than the flakes that panning usually turns up. We can sell the panned gold through the same Mexican dealers I used before. You need a hot furnace but it’s easy to melt down the gold, and we might even be able to do it using the pyro ability.”
“I hadn’t thought of that. I don’t know if it’s possible, but yeah, I’d like to try.”
“One thing, Bobby. Plan to hold on to some of it for yourself. Ray and I already have gold and money cached back in the hills. If the government finds out who and what we are, that’s our get-out-of-town money. We’ve each got about half a million stashed, some of it in bars, but Krugerrands too. Selling the bars takes some doing, but the Krugerrands are easy to convert. There are dealers everywhere who’ll buy those. We’ve got new identity documents stashed too. You should have at least one new identity that no one knows about but you.”