Their skates, already clogged with drift, were beginning to be useless.The bare wind-swept spaces were becoming rarer; they could only stumble on blindly towards the nearest shore.Nor when they reached it were they yet safe; they could scarcely stand against the still increasing storm that was fast obliterating the banks and stretch of meadow beyond.Their only hope of shelter was the range of woods that joined the hill.Holding hands in single file, the little party, consisting of Kitty, Marie, and Cousins Jane and Emma--stout-hearted Gabriel leading and Cousin John bringing up the rear--at last succeeded in reaching it, and were rejoiced to find themselves near old Lane's half-ruined cabin.To their added joy and astonishment, whiffs of whirling smoke were issuing from the crumbling chimney.They ran to the crazy door, pushed aside its weak fastening, and found--Uncle Sylvester calmly enjoying a pipe before a blazing fire.A small pickaxe and crowbar were lying upon a mound of freshly turned earth beside the chimney, where the rotten flooring had been torn up.
The tumultuous entrance of the skating party required no explanation;but when congratulations had been exchanged, the wet snow shaken off, and they had drawn round the fire, curious eyes were cast upon the solitary occupant and the pile of earth and debris before him.
"I believe," said Gabriel laughingly, "that you have been so bored here that you have actually played at gold-hunting for amusement."Uncle Sylvester took the pipe from his mouth and nodded.
"It's a common diversion of yours," said Marie audaciously.
Uncle Sylvester smiled sweetly.
"And have you been successful THIS TIME?" asked Marie.
"I got the color."
"Eh?"
Uncle Sylvester rose and placed himself with his back to the fire, gently surveying the assembled group.
"I was interrupted in a story of gold-digging last evening," he said blandly."How far had I got?""You were down on the San Joaquin River in the spring of '50, with a chap named Flint," chorused Cousins Jane and Emma promptly.
"Ah! yes," said Uncle Sylvester."Well, in those days there was a scarcity of money in the diggings.Gold dust there was in plenty, but no COIN.You can fancy it was a bother to weigh out a pinch of dust every time you wanted a drink of whiskey or a pound of flour;but there was no other legal tender.Pretty soon, however, a lot of gold and silver pieces found their way into circulation in our camp and the camps around us.They were foreign--old French and English coins.Here's one of them that I kept." He took from his pocket a gold coin and handed it to Gabriel.
Lane rose to his feet with an exclamation:
"Why, this is like the louis-d'or that grandfather saved through the war and gave to father."Uncle Sylvester took the coin back, placed it in his left eye, like a monocle, and winked gravely at the company.
"It is the SAME!" he went on quietly."I was interested, for I had a good memory, and I remembered that, as a boy, grandfather had shown me one of those coins and told me he was keeping them for old Jules du Page, who didn't believe in banks and bank-notes.Well, Itraced them to a trader called Flint, who was shipping gold dust from Stockton to Peter Gunn & Sons, in New York.""To whom?" asked Gabriel quickly.
"Old Gunn--the father of your friend!" said Uncle Sylvester blandly."We talked the matter over on our way to the station this morning.Well, to return.Flint only said that he had got them from a man called Thompson, who had got them from somebody else in exchange for goods.A year or two afterwards this same Thompson happened to be frozen up with me in Starvation Camp.When he thought he was dying he confessed that he had been bribed by Flint to say what he had said, but that he believed the coins were stolen.Meantime, Flint had disappeared.Other things claimed my attention.I had quite forgotten him, until one night, five years afterwards, I blundered into a deserted mining-camp, by falling asleep on my mule, who carried me across a broken flume, but--Ithink I told you that story already."