Digging for Gold

“On that point I have other evidence.”

“What is it? If Grant says he saw me take anything he lies.”

“I have not said it, Mr. Benton.”

“Then I should like to know what evidence you can bring against me.”

“Do you remember these two bills?” asked Vincent, taking out his wallet and producing two five-dollar notes.

“Well, what about them?” asked Benton doggedly.

“I gave you two gold pieces for them last evening.”

“Yes; I believe you did.”

“You took them from the money drawer before you left the restaurant.”

“That is false!”

“Do you see the cross, in red ink, on the reverse side of the bills?”

“Well, what of it?”

“I marked the bills in that way, so as to be able to trace them.”

“Well,” said Benton faintly.

“They were put into the drawer at three o’clock yesterday afternoon. They must have been taken out some time between that hour and the time when you produced them in the gambling-house.”

“I am the victim of a conspiracy,” said Benton, turning pale.

“If it is a conspiracy to put my friend here on your track,” said Smithson, “then you have some color for your statement. Mr. Vincent is an old detective.”

Albert Benton was silenced. Ingenious as he was, there was nothing left for him to say.

“Now, Benton,” said Mr. Smithson, “how much have you taken from me during the time you have been in my employment?”

“Perhaps a hundred dollars,” answered Benton sullenly.

“I am very much mistaken if the amount is not four or five times as great. Are you prepared to make restitution?”

“I have no money.”

“Then I shall feel justified in ordering your arrest. Your guilt is aggravated by your seeking to throw the blame on Grant.”

“I have a valuable diamond at home. I will turn that over to you,” said Benton, with a sudden thought.

“How much is it worth?”

“I paid three hundred dollars for it.”

“You can go and get it.”

Benton took off his apron, put on his hat, and left the restaurant.

Half an hour – an hour – passed, and he did not return.

“Mr. Smithson,” said Vincent, “the fellow has given us the slip. He won’t come back, nor will you ever see anything of his diamond. I don’t believe, for my part, that he had any.”

The detective was right. Benton managed to borrow fifteen dollars of a friend, and within an hour he had left Sacramento for good.

CHAPTER XXII

PULLING UP STAKES

Mr. Smithson supplied the place vacated by Benton without delay. He engaged a man of middle age who had come back from the mines with a fair sum of money. Before the first week was up, he made his employer an offer for the restaurant, and after some negotiation the transfer was made.

“I should like to have you continue Grant Colburn in your employment,” said Smithson, with a kindly consideration for his young waiter.

“I am sorry to say that I cannot do it,” answered his successor. “I have a young townsman at the mines who has not been very successful. I have promised to send for him in case I went into business.”

“It is of no consequence,” said Grant. “I have always wanted to go to the mines, and now I have money enough to make the venture.”

The same day, by a lucky coincidence, Grant received the following letter from Tom Cooper:

    Howe’s Gulch, October 5.

Dear Grant:

I have been meaning to write you for some time, but waited till I could tell whether I was likely to succeed or not. For the first month I was here I only got out enough gold-dust to pay my expenses, and envied father and you, who have a sure thing. The fact is, nothing is more uncertain than mining. You may strike it rich, or may fail entirely. Till last week it looked as if it would be the last in my case. But all at once I struck a pocket, and have thus far got two hundred and seventy-five dollars out of it, with more in prospect. That will make up for lost time. I tell you, Grant, it is a very exciting life. You are likely any day to make a strike. Further down the creek there is a long, lank Vermonter, who in a single week realized a thousand dollars from his claim. He took it pretty coolly, but was pleased all the same. “If this sort of thing continues a little longer,” he told me, “I’ll become a bloated bondholder, and go home and marry Sal Stebbins. She’s waitin’ for me, but the old man, her father, told her she’d have to wait till I could show him two thousand dollars, all my own. Well I don’t think I’ll have to wait long before that time comes,” and I guess he’s right.

But I haven’t said what I set out to say. That is I wish you would pull up stakes and come out here. I feel awful lonely, and would like your company. There’s a claim about a hundred feet from mine that I have bought for twenty-five dollars, and I will give it to you. The man that’s been workin’ it is a lazy, shiftless creeter, and although he’s got discouraged, I think it’s his fault that it hasn’t paid better. Half the time he’s been sittin’ down by his claim, readin’ a novel. If a man wants to succeed here, he’s got to have a good share of “get there” about him. I think you’ll fill the bill. Now, just pack up your things, and come right out. Go and see father and mother, but don’t show ’em this letter. I don’t want them to know how I am getting along. I mean some day to surprise ’em. Just tell them that I’m gettin’ fair pay, and hope to do better.

There’s a stage that leaves Sacramento Hotel for “these diggin’s.” You won’t have any trouble in findin’ it. Hopin’ soon to see you, I am,

    Your friend,
    Tom Cooper.

This letter quite cheered up Grant. He was anxious to find out how it seemed to be digging for gold. He counted over his savings and found he had a little over a hundred dollars. But lack of money need not have interfered with his plans. On the same day he received a letter from Giles Crosmont, from which we extract a paragraph:

Remember, Grant, that when you get ready to go to the mines, you can draw upon me for any sum of money you want. Or, should you lose your place, or get short of money, let me know, and I will see that you are not inconvenienced for lack of funds. I am thinking of making a little investment in your name, which I think will be of advantage to you.

“That’s a friend worth having,” said Grant to himself. “If I had a father, I should like to have him like Mr. Crosmont. He certainly could not be any kinder.”

He wrote back that he was intending to start on the following day for Howe’s Gulch, and would write again from there. He concluded thus: “I thank you very much for your kind offer of a loan, but I have enough to start me at the mines, and will wait till I stand in need. When I do need money, I won’t hesitate to call upon you, for I know that you are a true friend.”

He went round to see the blacksmith the next forenoon.