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Page 59
He had stopped, gazing with an odd, superstitious wonderment at the
colonel, as if overcome by this not very remarkable coincidence.
The colonel, overlooking or totally oblivious to its somewhat
uncomplimentary significance, simply said, "Go on. What about
him?"
"Well, ez I was sayin', he warn't in it nohow, but kept on his
reg'lar way when the boom was the biggest. Some of the boys
allowed it was mighty oncivil for him to stand off like that, and
others--when he refused a big pile for his hacienda and the garden,
that ran right into the gold-bearing ledge--war for lynching him
and driving him outer the settlement. But as he had a pretty
darter or niece livin' with him, and, except for his partickler
cussedness towards mining, was kinder peaceable and perlite, they
thought better of it. Things went along like this, until one day
the boys noticed--particklerly the boys that had slipped up on
their luck--that old man Sobriente was gettin' rich,--had stocked a
ranch over on the Divide, and had given some gold candlesticks to
the mission church. That would have been only human nature and
business, ef he'd had any during them flush times; but he hadn't.
This kinder puzzled them. They tackled the peons,--his niggers,--
but it was all 'No sabe.' They tackled another man,--a kind of
half-breed Kanaka, who, except the priest, was the only man who
came to see him, and was supposed to be mighty sweet on the darter
or niece,--but they didn't even get the color outer HIM. Then the
first thing we knowed was that old Sobriente was found dead in the
well!"
"In the well, sah!" said the colonel, starting up. "The well on my
propahty?"
"No," said his companion. "The old well that was afterwards shut
up. Yours was dug by the last tenant, Jack Raintree, who allowed
that he didn't want to 'take any Sobriente in his reg'lar whiskey
and water.' Well, the half-breed Kanaka cleared out after the old
man's death, and so did that darter or niece; and the church, to
whom old Sobriente had left this house, let it to Raintree for next
to nothin'."
"I don't see what all that has got to do with that wandering
tramp," said the colonel, who was by no means pleased with this
history of his property.
"I'll tell ye. A few days after Raintree took it over, he was
lookin' round the garden, which old Sobriente had always kept shut
up agin strangers, and he finds a lot of dried-up 'slumgullion'*
scattered all about the borders and beds, just as if the old man
had been using it for fertilizing. Well, Raintree ain't no fool;
he allowed the old man wasn't one, either; and he knew that
slumgullion wasn't worth no more than mud for any good it would do
the garden. So he put this yer together with Sobriente's good
luck, and allowed to himself that the old coyote had been secretly
gold-washin' all the while he seemed to be standin' off agin it!
But where was the mine? Whar did he get the gold? That's what got
Raintree. He hunted all over the garden, prospected every part of
it,--ye kin see the holes yet,--but he never even got the color!"
* That is, a viscid cement-like refuse of gold-washing.
He paused, and then, as the colonel made an impatient gesture, he
went on.
"Well, one night just afore you took the place, and when Raintree
was gettin' just sick of it, he happened to be walkin' in the
garden. He was puzzlin' his brain agin to know how old Sobriente
made his pile, when all of a suddenst he saw suthin' a-movin' in
the brush beside the house. He calls out, thinkin' it was one of
the boys, but got no answer. Then he goes to the bushes, and a
tall figger, all in black, starts out afore him. He couldn't see
any face, for its head was covered with a hood, but he saw that it
held suthin' like a big cross clasped agin its breast. This made
him think it was one them priests, until he looks agin and sees
that it wasn't no cross it was carryin,' but a PICKAXE! He makes a
jump towards it, but it vanished! He traipsed over the hull
garden,--went though ev'ry bush,--but it was clean gone. Then the
hull thing flashed upon him with a cold shiver. The old man bein'
found dead in the well! the goin' away of the half-breed and the
girl! the findin' o' that slumgullion! The old man HAD made a
strike in that garden, the half-breed had discovered his secret and
murdered him, throwin' him down the well! It war no LIVIN' man
that he had seen, but the ghost of old Sobriente!"
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