Chapter 9. Gid Holt Goes Prospecting

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_ CHAPTER IX. GID HOLT GOES PROSPECTING

As soon as Selfridge reached Kamatlah he began arranging the stage against the arrival of the Government agent. His preparations were elaborate and thorough. A young engineer named Howland had been in charge of the development work, but Wally rearranged his forces so as to let each dummy entryman handle the claim entered in his name. One or two men about whom he was doubtful he discharged and hurried out of the camp.

Selfridge had been given a free hand as to expenses and he oiled his way by liberal treatment of the men and by a judicious expenditure. He let them know pretty plainly that if the agent on his way to Kamatlah suspected corporate ownership of the claims, the Government would close down all work and there would be no jobs for them.

The company boarding-house became a restaurant, above which was suspended a newly painted sign with the legend, "San Francisco Grill, J. Glynn, Proprietor." The store also passed temporarily into the hands of its manager. Miners moved from the barracks that had been built by Macdonald into hastily constructed cabins on the individual claims. Wally had always fancied himself as a stage manager for amateur theatricals. Now he justified his faith by transforming Kamatlah outwardly from a company camp to a mushroom one settled by wandering prospectors.

Gideon Holt alone was outside of all these activities and watched them with suspicion. He was an old-timer, sly but fearless, who hated Colby Macdonald with a bitter jealousy that could not be placated and he took no pains to hide the fact. He had happened to be in the vicinity prospecting when Macdonald had rushed his entries. Partly out of mere perversity and partly by reason of native shrewdness, old Holt had slipped in and located one of the best claims in the heart of the group. Nor had he been moved to a reasonable compromise by any amount of persuasion, threats, or tentative offers to buy a relinquishment. He was obstinate. He knew a good thing when he had it, and he meant to sit tight.

The adherents of the company might charge that Holt was cracked in the upper story, but none of them denied he was sharp as a street Arab. He guessed that all this preparation was not for nothing. Kamatlah was being dressed up to impress somebody who would shortly arrive. The first thought of Holt was that a group of big capitalists might be coming to look over their investment. But he rejected this surmise. There would be no need to try any deception upon them.

Mail from Seattle reached camp once a month. Holt sat down before his stove to read one of the newspapers he had brought from the office. It was the "P.-I." On the fifth page was a little boxed story that gave him his clue.

ELLIOT TO INVESTIGATE MACDONALD COAL CLAIMS

The reopening of the controversy as to the Macdonald claims, which had been clear-listed for patent by Harold B. Winton, the Commissioner of the General Land Office, takes on another phase with the appointment of Gordon Elliot as special field agent to examine the validity of the holdings. The new field agent won a reputation by his work in unearthing the Oklahoma "Gold Brick" land frauds.

Elliot leaves Seattle in the Queen City Thursday for the North, where he will make a thorough investigation of the whole situation with a view to clearing up the matter definitely. If his report is favorable to the claimants, the patents will be granted without further delay.

This was too good to keep. Holt pulled on his boots and went out to twit such of the enemy as he might meet. It chanced that the first of them was Selfridge, whom he had not seen since his arrival, though he knew the little man was in camp.

"How goes it, Holt? Fine and dandy, eh?" inquired Wally with the professional geniality he affected.

The old miner shook his head dolefully. "I done bust my laig, Mr. Selfish," he groaned. It was one of his pleasant ways to affect a difficulty of hearing and a dullness of understanding, so that he could legitimately call people by distorted versions of their names. "The old man don't amount to much nowadays. Onct a man or a horse gits stove up I don't reckon either one pans out much pay dust any more."

"Nothing to that, Gid. You're younger than you ever were, judging by your looks."

"Then my looks lie to beat hell, Mr. Selfish."

"My name is Selfridge," explained Wally, a trifle irritated.

Holt put a cupped hand to his ear anxiously. "Shellfish, did you say? Tha' 's right. Howcome I to forget? The old man's going pretty fast, Mr. Shellfish. No more memory than a jackrabbit. Say, Mr. Shellfish, what's the idee of all this here back-to-the-people movement, as the old sayin' is?"

"I don't know what you mean. And my name is Selfridge, I tell you," snapped the owner of that name.

"'Course I ain't got no more sense than the law allows. I'm a buzzard haid, but me I kinder got to millin' it over and in respect to these here local improvements, as you might say, I'm doggoned if I _sabe_ the whyfor." There was an imp of malicious deviltry in the black, beady eyes sparkling at Selfridge from between narrowed lids.

"Just some business changes we're making."

Holt showed his tobacco-stained teeth in a grin splenetic. "Oh. That's all. I didn't know but what you might be expecting a visitor."

Selfridge flashed a sharp sidelong glance at him. "What do you mean--a visitor?"

"I just got a notion mebbe you might be looking for one, Mr. Pelfrich. But I don't know sic' 'em. Like as not you ain't fixing up for this Gordon Elliot a-tall."

Wally had no come-back, unless it was one to retort in ironic admiration. "You're a wonder, Holt. Pity you don't start a detective bureau."

The old man went away cackling dryly.

If Selfridge had held any doubts before, he discarded them now. Holt would wreck the whole enterprise, were he given a chance. It would never do to let Elliot meet and talk with him. He knew too much, and he was eager to tell all he knew.

Macdonald's lieutenant got busy at once with plans to abduct Holt. That it was very much against the law did not disturb him much so long as his chief stood back of him. The unsupported word of the old man would not stand in court, and if he became obstreperous they could always have him locked up as a lunatic. The very pose of the old miner--the make-believe pretension that he was half a fool--would lend itself to such a charge.

"We'll send the old man off on a prospecting trip with some of the boys," explained Selfridge to Rowland. "That way we'll kill two birds. He's back on his assessment work. The time limit will be up before he returns and we'll start a contest for the claim."

Howland made no comment. He was an engineer and not a politician. In his position it was impossible for him not to know that a good deal about the legal status of the Macdonald claims was irregular. But he was a firm believer in a wide-open Alaska, in the use of the Territory by those who had settled it. The men back of the big Scotchman were going to spend millions in development work, in building railroads. It would help labor and business. The whole North would feel a healthful reaction from the Kamatlah activities. So, on the theory that the end sometimes justifies doubtful means, he shut his eyes to many acts that in his own private affairs he would not have countenanced.

"Better arrange it with Big Bill, then, but don't tell me anything about it. I don't want to know the details," he told Selfridge.

Big Bill Macy accepted the job with a grin. There was double pay in it both for him and the men he chose as his assistants. He had never liked old Holt anyhow. Besides, they were not going to do him any harm.

Holt was baking a batch of sour-dough bread that evening when there came a knock at the cabin door. At sight of Big Bill and his two companions the prospector closed the oven and straightened with alert suspicion. He was not on visiting terms with any of these men. Why had they come to see him? He asked point-blank the question in his mind.

"We're going prospecting up Wild-Goose Creek, and we want you to go along, Gid," explained Macy. "You're an old sour-dough miner, and we-all agree we'd like to have you throw-in with us. What say?"

The old miner's answer was direct but not flattering. "What do I want to go on a wild-goose mush with a bunch of bums for?" he shrilled.

Bill Macy scratched his hook nose and looked reproachfully at his host. At least Holt thought he was looking at him. One could not be sure, for Bill's eyes did not exactly track.

"That ain't no kind o' way to talk to a fellow when he comes at you with a fair proposition, Gid."

"You tell Selfridge I ain't going to leave Kamatlah--not right now. I'm going to stay here on the job till that Land Office inspector comes--and then I'm going to have a nice, long, confidential chat with him. See?"

"What's the use of snapping at me like a turtle? Durden says Wild-Goose looks fine. There's gold up there--heaps of it."

"Let it stay there, then. I ain't going. That's flat." Holt turned to adjust the damper of his stove.

"Oh, I don't know. I wouldn't say that," drawled Bill insolently.

The man at the stove caught the change in tone and turned quickly. He was too late. Macy had thrown himself forward and the weight of his body flung Holt against the wall. Before the miner could recover, the other two men were upon him. They bore him to the floor and in spite of his struggles tied him hand and foot.

Big Bill rose and looked down derisively at his prisoner. "Better change your mind and go with us, Holt. We'll spend a quiet month up at the headquarters of Wild-Goose. Say you'll come along."

"You'll go to prison for this, Bill Macy."

"Guess again, Gid, and mebbe you'll get it right this time." Macy turned to his companions. "George, you bring up the horses. Dud, see if that bread is cooked. Might as well take it along with us--save us from baking to-morrow."

"What are you going to do with me?" demanded Holt.

"I reckon you need a church to fall on you before you can take a hint. Didn't I mention Wild-Goose Creek three or four times?" jeered his captor.

"Every step you take will be one toward the penitentiary. Get that into your cocoanut," the old miner retorted sharply.

"Nothing to that idee, Gid."

"I'll scream when you take me out."

"Go to it. Then we'll gag you."

Holt made no further protest. He was furious, but at present quite helpless. However it went against the grain, he might as well give in until rebellion would do some good.

Ten minutes later the party was moving silently along the trail that led to the hills. The pack-horses went first, in charge of George Holway. The prisoner walked next, his hands tied behind him. Big Bill followed, and the man he had called Dud brought up the rear.

They wound up a rising valley, entering from it a canon with precipitous walls that shut out the late sun. It was by this time past eleven o'clock and dusk was gathering closer. The winding trail ran parallel with the creek, sometimes through thickets of young fir and sometimes across boulder beds that made traveling difficult and slow. They went in single file, each of them with a swarm of mosquitoes about his head.

Macy had released the hands of his prisoner so that he might have a chance to fight the singing pests, but he kept a wary eye upon him and never let him move more than a few feet from him. The trail grew steeper as it neared the head of the canon till at last it climbed the left wall and emerged from the gulch to an uneven mesa.

The leader of the party looked at his watch. "Past midnight. We'll camp here, George, and see if we can't get rid of the 'skeeters."

They built smudge fires of green wood and on the lee side of these another one of dry sticks. Dud made coffee upon this and cooked bacon to eat with the fresh bread they had taken from the oven of Holt. While George chopped wood for the fires and boughs of small firs for bedding, Big Bill sat with a rifle across his knees just back of the prisoner.

"Gid's a shifty old cuss, and I ain't taking any chances," he explained aloud to Dud.

Holt was beginning to take the outrage philosophically. He sat close to a smudge and smoked his pipe.

"I wouldn't either if I were you. Sometime when you ain't watching, I'm liable to grab that gun and shoot a hole in the place where your brains would be if you had any," countered the old man.

He slept peacefully while they took turns watching him. Just now there would be no chance to escape, but in a few days they would become careless. The habit of feeling that they had him securely would grow upon them. Then, reasoned Holt, his opportunity would come. One of the guards would take a chance. Perhaps he might even fall asleep on duty. It was not reasonable to suppose that in the next week or two he would not catch them napping once for a short ten seconds.

There was, of course, just the possibility that they intended to murder him, but Holt could not associate Selfridge with anything so lawless. The man was too soft of fiber to carry through such a programme, and as yet there was need of nothing so drastic. No, this little kidnapping expedition would not run to murder. He would be set free in a few weeks, and if he told the true story of where he had been his foes would spread the report that he was insane in his hatred of Macdonald and imagined all sorts of persecutions.

They followed Wild-Goose Creek all next day, getting always closer to its headwaters near the divide. On the third day they crossed to the other side of the ridge and descended into a little mountain park. They were in a country where prospectors never came, one deserted even by trappers at this season of the year.

The country was so much a primeval wilderness that a big bull moose stalked almost upon their camp before discovering the presence of a strange biped. Big Bill snatched up a rifle and took a shot which sent the intruder scampering.

From somewhere in the distance came a faint sound.

"What was that?" asked George.

"Sounded like a shot. Mebbe it was an echo," returned Dud.

"Came too late for an echo," Big Bill said.

Again faintly from some far corner of the basin the sound drifted. It was like the pop of a scarcely heard firecracker.

The men looked at one another and at their prisoner. Their eyes consulted once more.

"Think we better break camp and drift?" asked Dud.

"No. We're in a little draw here--as good a hiding-place as we'd be likely to find. Drive the horses into the brush, George. We'll sit tight."

"Got the criminals guessing," Holt contributed maliciously. "You lads want to take the hide offen Macy if he lands you in the pen through that fool shot of his. Wonder if I hadn't better yell."

"I'll stop your clock right then if you do," threatened Big Bill with a scowl.

Dud had been busy stamping out the camp-fire while Holway was driving the horses into the brush.

"Mebbe you had better get the camp things behind them big rocks," Macy conceded.

Even as he spoke there came the crack of a revolver almost at the entrance to the draw.

One of the men swore softly. The gimlet eyes of the old miner fastened on the spot where in another moment his hoped-for rescuers would appear.

A man staggered drunkenly into view. He reeled halfway across the mouth of the draw and stopped. His eyes, questing dully, fell upon the camp. He stared, as if doubtful whether they had played him false, then lurched toward the waiting group.

"Lost, and all in," Holway said in a whisper to Dud.

The other man nodded. Neither of them made a move toward the stranger, who stopped in front of their camp and looked with glazed eyes from one to another. His face was drawn and haggard and lined. Extreme exhaustion showed in every movement. He babbled incoherently.

"Seven--eighteen--ninety-nine. 'Atta-boy," he said thickly.

"Don't you see he's starving and out of his head?" snapped Holt brusquely. "Get him grub, _pronto_."

The old man rose and moved toward the suffering man. "Come, pard. Tha' 's all right. Sit down right here and go to it, as the old sayin' is." He led the man to a place beside Big Bill and made him sit down. "Better light a fire, boys, and get some coffee on. Don't give him too much solid grub at first."

The famished man ate what was given him and clamored for more.

"Coming up soon, pardner," Holt told him soothingly. "Now tell us howcome you to get lost."

The man nodded gravely. "Hit that line low, Gord. Hit 'er low. Only three yards to gain."

"Plumb bughouse," commented Dud, chewing tobacco stolidly.

"Out of his head--that's all. He'll be right enough after he's fed up and had a good sleep. But right now he's sure some Exhibit A. Look at the bones sticking through his cheeks," Big Bill commented.

"Come, Old-Timer. Get down in your collar to it. Once more now. Don't lie down on the job. All together now." The stranger clucked to an imaginary horse and made a motion of lifting with his hands.

"Looks like his hawss bogged down in Fifty-Mile Swamp," suggested Holt.

"Looks like," agreed Dud.

The old miner said no more. But his eyes narrowed to shining slits. If this man had come through Fifty-Mile Swamp he must have started from the river. That probably meant that he had come from Kusiak. He was a young man, talking the jargon of a college football player. Without doubt he was, in the old phrasing of the North, a chechako. His clothing, though much soiled and torn, had been good. His voice held the inflections of the cultured world.

Gideon Holt's sly brain moved keenly to the possibility that he could put a name to this human derelict they had picked up. He began to see it as more than a possibility, as even a probability, at least as a fifty-fifty chance. A sardonic grin hovered about the corners of his grim mouth. It would be a strange freak of irony if Wally Selfridge, to prevent a meeting between him and the Government land agent, had sent him a hundred miles into the wilderness to save the life of Gordon Elliot and so had brought about the meeting that otherwise would never have taken place. _

Read next: Chapter 10. The Rah-Rah Boy Functions

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