by B. M. Bower
CHAPTER TWENTY. LOVIN CHILD STRIKES IT RICH
It was only the next day that Bud was the means of helping Lovin Childfind a fortune for himself; which eased Bud's mind considerably, andbalanced better his half of the responsibility. Cutting out the dramaticfrills, then, this is what happened to Lovin Child and Bud:
They were romping around the cabin, like two puppies that had a surplusof energy to work off. Part of the time Lovin Child was a bear, chasingBud up and down the dead line, which was getting pretty well worn outin places. After that, Bud was a bear and chased Lovin. And when LovinChild got so tickled he was perfectly helpless in the corner where hehad sought refuge, Bud caught him and swung him up to his shoulder andlet him grab handfuls of dirt out of the roof.
Lovin Child liked that better than being a bear, and sifted Bud's hairfull of dried mud, and threw the rest on the floor, and frequently cried"Tell a worl'!" which he had learned from Bud and could say with theuncanny pertinency of a parrot.
He had signified a desire to have Bud carry him along the wall, wheresome lovely lumps of dirt protruded temptingly over a bulging log. Thenhe leaned and grabbed with his two fat hands at a particularly big, hardlump. It came away in his hands and fell plump on the blankets of thebunk, half blinding Bud with the dust that came with it.
"Hey! You'll have all the chinkin' out of the dang shack, if you lethim keep that lick up, Bud," Cash grumbled, lifting his eyebrows at themess.
"Tell a worl'!" Lovin Child retorted over his shoulder, and made anothergrab.
This time the thing he held resisted his baby strength. He pulled and hegrunted, he kicked Bud in the chest and grabbed again. Bud was patient,and let him fuss--though in self-defense he kept his head down and hiseyes away from the expected dust bath.
"Stay with it, Boy; pull the darn roof down, if yuh want. Cash'll getout and chink 'er up again."
"Yeah. Cash will not," the disapproving one amended the statementgruffly. "He's trying to get the log outa the wall, Bud."
"Well, let him try, doggone it. Shows he's a stayer. I wouldn't have anyuse for him if he didn't have gumption enough to tackle things too bigfor him, and you wouldn't either. Stay with 'er, Lovins! Doggone it,can't yuh git that log outa there nohow? Uh-h! A big old grunt and a bigold heave--uh-h! I'll tell the world in words uh one syllable, he's somestayer."
"Tell a worl'!" chuckled Lovin Child, and pulled harder at the thing hewanted.
"Hey! The kid's got hold of a piece of gunny sack or something. Youlook out, Bud, or he'll have all that chinkin' out. There's no sense inlettin' him tear the whole blame shack to pieces, is there?"
"Can if he wants to. It's his shack as much as it's anybody's." Budshifted Lovin Child more comfortably on his shoulder and looked up,squinting his eyes half shut for fear of dirt in them.
"For the love of Mike, kid, what's that you've got? Looks to me like apiece of buckskin, Cash. Here, you set down a minute, and let Bud take apeek up there."
"Bud--pik-k?" chirped Lovin Child from the blankets, where Bud haddeposited him unceremoniously.
"Yes, Bud pik-k." Bud stepped up on the bunk, which brought his headabove the low eaves. He leaned and looked, and scraped away the cakedmud. "Good glory! The kid's found a cache of some kind, sure as youlive!" And he began to claw out what had been hidden behind the mud.
First a buckskin bag, heavy and grimed and knobby. Gold inside it, heknew without looking. He dropped it down on the bunk, carefully soas not to smash a toe off the baby. After that he pulled out fourbaking-powder cans, all heavy as lead. He laid his cheek against the logand peered down the length of it, and jumped down beside the bunk.
"Kid's found a gold mine of his own, and I'll bet on it," he criedexcitedly. "Looky, Cash!"
Cash was already looking, his eyebrows arched high to match hisastonishment. "Yeah. It's gold, all right. Old man Nelson's hoard, Iwouldn't wonder. I've always thought it was funny he never found anygold in this flat, long as he lived here. And traces of washing here andthere, too. Well!"
"Looky, Boy!" Bud had the top off a can, and took out a couple ofnuggets the size of a cooked Lima bean. "Here's the real stuff for yuh.
"It's yours, too--unless--did old Nelson leave any folks, Cash, do yuhknow?"
"They say not. The county buried him, they say. And nobody ever turnedup to claim him or what little he left. No, I guess there's nobody gotany better right to it than the kid. We'll inquire around and see. Butseein' the gold is found on the claim, and we've got the claim accordingto law, looks to me like--"
"Well, here's your clean-up, old prospector. Don't swallow any, is all.let's weigh it out, Cash, and see how much it is, just for a josh."
Lovin Child had nuggets to play with there on the bed, and told theworld many unintelligible things about it. Cash and Bud dumped all thegold into a pan, and weighed it out on the little scales Cash had forhis tests. It was not a fortune, as fortunes go. It was probably all thegold Nelson had panned out in a couple of years, working alone and withcrude devices. A little over twenty-three hundred dollars it amountedto, not counting the nuggets which Lovin Child had on the bunk with him.
"Well, it's a start for the kid, anyway," Bud said, leaning back andregarding the heap with eyes shining. "I helped him find it, and I kindafeel as if I'm square with him now for not giving him my half the claim.Twenty-three hundred would be a good price for a half interest, as theclaims stand, don't yuh think, Cash?"
"Yeah--well, I dunno's I'd sell for that. But on the showing we've gotso far--yes, five thousand, say, for the claims would be good money."
"Pretty good haul for a kid, anyway. He's got a couple of hundreddollars in nuggets, right there on the bunk. Let's see, Lovins. Let Budhave 'em for a minute."
Then it was that Lovin Child revealed a primitive human trait. He wouldnot give up the gold. He held fast to one big nugget, spread his fatlegs over the remaining heap of them, and fought Bud's hand away withthe other fist.
"No, no, no! Tell a worl' no, no, no!" he remonstrated vehemently, untilBud whooped with laughter.
"All right--all right! Keep your gold, durn it. You're like all therest--minute you get your paws on to some of the real stuff, you gohog-wild over it."
Cash was pouring the fine gold back into the buck skin bag and thebaking-powder cans.
"Let the kid play with it," he said. "Getting used to gold when he'slittle will maybe save him from a lot of foolishness over it when hegets big. I dunno, but it looks reasonable to me. Let him have a fewnuggets if he wants. Familiarity breeds contempt, they say; maybe hewon't get to thinkin' too much of it if he's got it around under hisnose all the time. Same as everything else. It's the finding that hitsa feller hardest, Bud--the hunting for it and dreaming about it and notfinding it. What say we go up to the claim for an hour or so? Take thekid along. It won't hurt him if he's bundled up good. It ain't coldto-day, anyhow."
That night they discussed soberly the prospects of the claim and theirresponsibilities in the matter of Lovin Child's windfall. They wouldquietly investigate the history of old Nelson, who had died a pauper inthe eyes of the community, with all his gleanings of gold hidden away.They agreed that Lovin Child should not start off with one grain ofgold that rightfully belonged to some one else--but they agreed themore cheerfully because neither man believed they would find any closerelatives; a wife or children they decided upon as rightful heirs.Brothers, sisters, cousins, and aunts did not count. They werepresumably able to look after themselves just as old Nelson had done.Their ethics were simple enough, surely.
Barring, then, the discovery of rightful heirs, their plan was to takethe gold to Sacramento in the spring, and deposit it there in a savingsbank for one Lovins Markham Moore. They would let the interest "ride"with the principal, and they would--though neither openly confessed itto the other--from time to time add a little from their own earnings.Bud especially looked forward to that as a compromise with his duty tohis own child. He intended to save every cent he could, and to starta savings account i
n the same bank, for his own baby, Robert EdwardMoore--named for Bud. He could not start off with as large a sum asLovins would have, and for that Bud was honestly sorry. But RobertEdward Moore would have Bud's share in the claims, which would do alittle toward evening things up.
Having settled these things to the satisfaction of their desires andtheir consciences, they went to bed well pleased with the day.