Читать книгу Gold Seekers of '49 - Edwin L. Sabin - Страница 19

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The Robert Burns steadily churned her way down the Mississippi, yellow and swollen with the spring freshets. She stopped at towns and other landings—some of these being plantation landings—to discharge or take on passengers and freight. These stops would have been the more interesting, to Charley, were he not in a hurry. He wanted to be sure and catch the Georgia, for the Isthmus. Supposing the Robert Burns were late into New Orleans; then they might miss the Georgia. Of course, there were other boats—the Falcon and the Isthmus and the Quaker City; but with such crowds setting out for the gold fields, it behooved a fellow to get there as soon as he possibly could.

More "Forty-niners" boarded the Robert Burns. One in particular took Charley's eye. He came out in a skiff, from a small wood landing, where some steamers, but not the Robert Burns, stopped to load up with fuel. When the Robert Burns whistled and paused, floating idly, and he had clambered in, he proved to be a very tall, gaunt, black-whiskered individual, with a long, muzzle-loading squirrel rifle on his arm. A darky tossed a blanket roll up after him, and rowed away for the shore.

The man looked like a backwoodsman—and again he looked like a Californian, too, for his clothes were an old blue flannel shirt (with a rolling collar having white stars in the corners), patched buckskin trousers and heavy boots of the regulation style. Charley chanced to be crossing the salon or main cabin when the man was paying for his passage, and there witnessed something exciting that made him dart out and find his father.

"Dad!" hoarsely whispered Charley. "That was a gold miner who came aboard in a skiff! He was paying his fare with gold dust."

"Was he? How do you know?"

"I saw him at the desk, but the clerk wouldn't take any dust, so he had to pay with money. He has a buckskin sack, just like ours. Wish I could talk with him."

"Maybe he'll talk with you, if you give him the chance. You can try and see. But don't ask him any foolish questions, or seem inquisitive."

Presently the tall man (he was taller even than Mr. Adams) emerged from the cabin, to stand by the rail, leaning on his rifle and gazing at the shore line. A picturesque figure he made, with his starred shirt-collar rolled back, and his leathery trousers wrinkled down over his boot-tops.

Charley sidled around him, expectantly; and the man noticed him.

"You look as if you were going out, too," addressed the man, a twinkle under his bushy brows.

"Yes, sir," answered Charley. "To California."

"Anybody with you?"

"My father." And Charley proudly nodded toward another tall form. "Were you ever there?" he added, hesitantly.

"I should rather think so. Five years ago, and four years ago; and now I'm making another trip by a new route. The other times I crossed by the land trail."

"Oh, you must have been with Frémont!" exclaimed Charley.

The whiskered man nodded.

"I was. I was with Carson and Frémont in Forty-three—Forty-four, and again in Forty-five—Forty-six."

"I know about those travels," cried Charley. "I'm reading Colonel Frémont's reports now. I'm just finishing his last one. I guess they're about the best description of California there is. Did you fight in the war?"

The man smiled.

"See my shirt?" he queried. "All we Frémont men wore these navy shirts—some of us clear through the campaign. The sloop of war Portsmouth sent us a lot of ship's supplies, when we marched down from the mountains to Sutter's Fort, just before the uprising of the Bear War in June, Forty-six. I saved my shirt, and now I only wear it occasionally. I'm sorter proud of this shirt."

"I should think you would be," agreed Charley. "Did you mine in California?"

"Yes, sir. I started in to settle there, after the war, till the gold craze broke out. Ever see any dust?"

"Some," admitted Charley.

"There's not much in this sack now," continued the Frémont man, showing it. "But I've filled it many a time."

"I've got a sack, too," said Charley, exhibiting it.

"You've been out there?"

"No, sir. I got this in St. Louis."

"Let's see." And the man fingered it. "It's old-timer—been used plenty. Some dust sticking to it, too. Huh."

"Is there lots of gold out there?" asked Charley.

"Gold?" repeated the man; and laughed. "I found fifteen hundred dollars in two days, first thing; then I didn't find any for a month. But I cleaned up $10,000, and I'm going back after more. It's all luck, now; but after the surface has been scraped off, then it will be skill. Does your father know anything about mining?"

"No, sir. He's a soldier. He was with General Scott."

"That won't cut much figure," said the man, quickly. "Soldiers and sailors and lawyers and doctors and farmers and trappers and even Indians are all grubbing together—and none of us knows a blamed thing except that gold is soft and yellow and will pass for currency—sixteen dollars an ounce. But good luck to you. Going across the Isthmus, I reckon?"

"Yes, sir."

"That's the easier way. Well, if I see you out there and can help you along any way, you can count on me. But it's a country where every tub stands on its own bottom, and no man's any better than any other man."

So saying, he threw his rifle into the hollow of his arm and paced away, into the cabin. Charley gazed after him, and reflected that although they might have an enemy with them, they also had made a friend.

"If he was with Carson and Frémont, he's all right," declared Mr. Adams, when Charley related the conversation. "But we'll be beholden to nobody, as long as we can help ourselves. We two bunkies can paddle our own canoe, can't we?"

The Robert Burns continued on, down to New Orleans. The long-nosed man kept to the cabin, mainly, where a number of rough passengers spent their time drinking and gambling. The Frémont man was about the quietest of all the passengers, mingling little, talking little. He exchanged a few civil words with Mr. Adams, and kindly greeted Charley, when they were near one another. That was all.

Charley thought rather the more of him, that he was not the blustering, boasting kind, even though he had blazed the long trail across to California, with Frémont and Carson. He evidently was a man of deeds, not words.

New Orleans was reached in the afternoon—and a fine big city it looked to be, as the Robert Burns whistled hoarsely and swung for the levee. However, the Forty-niners aboard her had not much thought for the looks of the city; their minds were more upon whether the Georgia had arrived, and how soon they could get aboard her, for the Isthmus and California gold fields.

In the excitement of bustling ashore Charley forgot all about the long-nosed man, who disappeared with the other scattering passengers.

"Where's the dock of the Isthmus steamers?" queried Mr. Adams, of a lounger, as he and Charley landed, the roll of bedding on Mr. Adams's shoulder.

"Eet is still down the river, m'sieur," answered the man—who was a young French creole. "M'sieur would better ride than walk."

"All right. Thank you," and Mr. Adams hailed an odd carriage, drawn by one horse between a of long curved shafts. They piled in.

"To the Isthmus dock," ordered Mr. Adams.

"You want to catch the Georgia?" asked the driver,

"We do."

"She's about coming in. They're looking for her."

"Will I have time to get our tickets?"

"Plenty. She'll lie over till morning."

"All right. Go ahead."