At the Sign of the Silver Flagon

After a time men began to look for gold in the hills. It was settled years ago by the miners that all the gold that was found in the gullies was washed down from the ranges. Before many days had passed, quartz reefs were found with great lumps of gold in the stone; and one Saturday the principal gold-broker in Silver Creek displayed in his window a mass of quartz which could not have weighed less than two hundred pounds, and which was literally studded and veined with gold. It was labelled "From Pegleg Reef," so named because it was discovered by a man with a wooden leg. Then commenced a craze, and everybody went mad on quartz. This brings us to a day when Mr. Hart, who, with his company, had now been in Silver Creek for three weeks, winning money and laurels, was walking over the ranges, at some distance from the township, with a short-handled pick over his shoulder, a hammer in his hand, and a "fossicking" knife in his belt. The craze for discovering a quartz reef had infected him, and he was looking for a trail.

If you can love this man as you proceed with the story, I shall be glad; for he was a large-souled man, who had never been guilty of a meanness. That he was always poor came from the generosity of his nature, which frequent disappointments had not been able to sour; he could never stoop to trickery for money. In his younger days he had frequently been heard to despise money; but I think, now that he was old, his views were beginning to experience change. Else why should he be toiling over the hills on this hot sultry day, with his eyes eagerly bent to the earth, in search of gold?

He came to the ridge of a range, and he paused for a few moments to look back on the township. The air was still; the heavens were full of beautiful colour; the white tents of the diggers shone in the sun. A world in miniature was before him. Gold had lately been discovered in a large plain which with its busy life was stretched beneath him. Although he was at a great distance from it, he could see it clearly from the height on which he stood. At the farthermost edge of this plain were a dozen puddling machines at work, and two or three dams filled with clear water which had not been polluted. The water gleamed and glittered like sheets of burnished silver; the tiny horses walked round and round, yoked to their wheels; the tiny men flitted here and there across the plain, and bent over heaps of auriferous soil, and worked at toy windlasses, with ropes no thicker than thread; thin wreaths of smoke curled from the rear of the tents, where the smallest women in the world were washing and cooking; lilliputians were cutting down trees for firewood with bright sharp axes which were indicated by thin keen flashing edges of light as they were flourished in the air.

Mr. Hart turned his back upon these signs of busy life, and descended the range on the other side. On and on he walked, without discovering any indications of gold, although he paused to crack many a score pieces of the quartz which studded the hills. He smiled curiously at his ill-success. "Well," he mused, as if arguing with himself, "but I should like to find a golden reef! Let me see. A golden reef, yielding say twenty, thirty ounces to the ton. Ah, Gerald, Gerald! don't be greedy. Say fifteen ounces and be satisfied. A hundred tons-fifteen hundred ounces; six thousand pounds. And then, Home! Home! Home! Ah, my darling, how my heart yearns to you! But you are happy, thank God, and if I never look upon your sweet face, if I never hold you in my arms! – " He paused suddenly, with an aching feeling in his breast. "I must see her-I must see her!" he murmured; and stretching forth his arms, cried half seriously, "Come, Fortune, and take me to her!"

He was alone, and no one heard him. For an hour he had seen no evidences of human life about him; Silver Creek township was entirely shut out from view. On he walked, not stopping to chip now, for he thought that he might have a better chance of finding a golden reef if he went farther afield. He must have walked fully two miles farther, when he saw before him at a distance of a few hundred yards a thick clump of trees arranged by nature almost in a straight line, and entirely obscuring the view that lay beyond it. He plunged into the thicket-for it was no less-and through it, and found himself before another thicket of trees similarly arranged. Between the two thickets there were not more than two hundred feet of clear ground. The intervening space was level and bare, and the trees between which he stood were of a great height. The light came through the uppermost branches in slanting devious lines, which, as he moved, darted hither and thither, as though imbued with life. The ground was all in shadow, and so solemn was the stillness and so dim the light in this place, that it seemed like a page out of another existence.

Lost in admiration, Mr. Hart paused for awhile, and then plunged into the second thicket, and found it denser than the first. In a quarter of an hour he emerged into the open unobscured sunlight again.

Before him rose a vast range with masses of outcropping quartz. He considered within himself whether it was worth his while to climb this range; the quartz looked tempting. There were traces of iron pyrites in it, and he had heard that the richest reefs were sometimes found on such heights. Moreover, it seemed to him as though the hill had never been prospected. He decided that he would mount the range.

It was a difficult task that he had set himself; the range was higher, steeper, than he had imagined, and the day was very hot. He was compelled to stop and rest. "Shall I go to the top or turn back?" he asked of himself. He was inclined to retrace his steps, until he thought of his darling at home; he took her picture from his pocket, and kissed it many times. "I will go up," he said "to the very top. I might hear one day that a golden reef had been found on the summit of this hill, and then I should never forgive myself."

Little did he suspect how much hung upon that moment of hesitation. Little did he suspect that simply by mounting this hill, the means of bringing into his daughter's life its greatest joy and happiness were to be put into his hands. But even had he suspected it, his wildest dream would not have afforded a clue to the manner of its accomplishment.

He mounted the hill; he reached its summit. Then he found that others had been before him.

A shaft had been sunk; a windlass was erected. Mr. Hart judged, from the great hillock of earth by the side of the claim, that the pit could not be less than a hundred feet deep. A tree, split in two, was on the ground close by, with its inner surfaces exposed.

Mr. Hart went to the windlass, thinking at first that the shaft was a deserted one, for he saw no person on the hill. But the sound of metal upon stone which came to his ears from the bottom of the pit was sufficient to convince him that his idea was wrong, and that a miner was working in the shaft.

A little heap of quartz lay within a yard or two of him. He examined it, and found gold in it. He took up piece after piece, and in every other piece there were traces of gold. He cast greedy glances, not at the quartz he was examining, but along the brow of the hill, beyond the boundary pegs which marked the area of the prospectors' claim. Then turning, he jumped back with a loud cry, for a man whom he had not before observed was lying on the ground at his feet, and he had almost trodden on his upturned face. But another thing that he saw held him for a moment motionless from fear.

The man was asleep, and in his hair was moving a long brown reptile, with, as it seemed, numberless legs, which were all in motion, stealthily and venomously. Two slender horns protruded from its head, and behind its horns its eyes gleamed with spiteful fire. Mr. Hart knew immediately that it was a centipede-a very large one of its species-and that its sting might bring death to the sleeper. It had crawled out of the centre of the split tree which lay near, and was now crawling from the hair on to the face of the sleeping man. Taking his handkerchief in his hand for protection, Mr. Hart, with a swift and sudden movement, plucked the crawling reptile from the sleeper's hair, and threw it and his handkerchief a dozen yards away.

"Holloa, mate!" cried the man, aroused by the action, and jumping to his feet, "what are you up to?"

He was a young and handsome man, with a noble beard hanging on his breast, and with his hair hanging almost to his shoulders. His eyes were blue, his hair was brown. His skin was fair, as might be seen, not on his face, nor on his neck where it was bared to the sun, but just below the collar of his light-blue serge shirt, the top button of which was unfastened. In age probably twenty-five or six. In height, five feet ten inches, or thereabouts; a model of strength, beauty, and symmetry. Such a form and figure as one of the old painters would have loved to paint, and as might win the heart of any woman not in love and that way inclined-as most women are, naturally.

Impetuous, fiery, aggressive, his first thought was that the stranger had attacked him in his sleep. He did not wait for a second thought, but pulled a revolver from his belt, where it was slung, covered by a leathern sheath, and levelled it at Mr. Hart. In new goldfields these weapons were necessary for self-defence; like vultures after carrion (although the simile does not entirely hold good), the most desperate characters flew to the new goldfields on the first scent of gold, resolved to get it by hook or by crook.

Mr. Hart held up his hand and smiled deprecatingly.

"I think I have done you a service, young sir," he said. "I saw a centipede crawling in your hair on to your face as you were lying asleep, and I plucked it away. That is all. I was once stung in the arm by such a reptile, and was disabled for three months. I fancied you might not relish a like experience; your face is far too handsome to be spoiled in that way. If you will lift my handkerchief gently and carefully-I did not care to seize the beast with naked fingers-you will see for yourself."

The young man had no need to lift the handkerchief. The long ugly thing was wriggling out of it; half its body was exposed.

"By Jove!" exclaimed the young man, seizing a spade and cutting the creature in a dozen pieces, all of which immediately began to crawl away in different directions, north, south, east, and west, with the intention of commencing independent existences.

CHAPTER V

PHILIP'S RIDE FOR FLOWERS FOR MARGARET

"Thank you," said the young man to Mr. Hart, replacing his revolver in his belt.

"Thank you," returned Mr. Hart drily, "for cutting up my pocket-handkerchief."

The young man laughed.

"Take mine," he said, offering a red-silk handkerchief to Mr. Hart.

Red was a favourite colour in the diggings in the matter of personal adornment. Red handkerchiefs, red serge shirts, red scarves and sashes, red tassels and bindings, were much coveted.

Mr. Hart shook his head.

"No; I will keep my own as a remembrance."

He gazed admiringly at the young man, and with curiosity, for he saw that the young fellow was superior to the general run of gold-diggers.

"What are you looking at?" asked the young man merrily.

"At what seems to me an anomaly."

"That's me."

"That is you. What made a gold-digger of you?"

The young man shrugged his shoulders.

"A thirst for freedom and adventure. That answer will do as well as another, I suppose. I was cramped up in the old country, so I thought I would come where there was room to move and breathe."

"You find it here."

"Rather!"

He inflated his lungs, and expelled the air with vigorous enjoyment.

"What part of the old country do you hail from?" There was an unconscious tenderness in their tones as they spoke of their native land.

"Devon-dear old Devon. Oh, for a tankard of real Devonshire cider!"

Mr. Hart sighed. "You have home ties, then?"

"Yes, I have an old father at home, who is old only in years. Let us drink to him." He took a tin saucepan half filled with cold tea, and handed it to Mr. Hart, who drank from it, and returned it. "He is about your age, I should say. Have you been long in the colony?"

"Seven years."

"Ah! I haven't served my apprenticeship yet. Now, what brought you over these hills to-day?"

Mr. Hart stammered and hesitated; no man on the goldfields liked to confess that he had been wasting hours and days in the wild hope of discovering a golden reef, simply by wandering about and chipping up stones, although every man did it at some time or other, in secret. However, Mr. Hart blurted out the truth.

"Well," said the young man, "that's the way I and my mate discovered this reef. We found a vein of quartz with gold in it, cropping out on the surface, and we followed it down until we came to another vein about two feet thick, and this we are working now. We're down a hundred and two feet. You see we have about twenty tons of quartz up now; it will go about twelve ounces to the ton, I should say. But we're stuck for a machine to crush it."

"There's one being put up in Iron Bark Gulley."

"Yes; that's nine miles off," said the young man fretfully; "how are we to get the stone to the machine over the ranges, unless we carry it on our backs? A nice job that would be, and would cost as much as the stone's worth!"

"When Mahomet found that the mountain wouldn't' come to him-" Mr. Hart said, and paused.

"By Jove!" exclaimed the young quartz miner, "you're a gentleman. It does one good to talk to a man who can talk. Well, then Mahomet went to the mountain. That is to say, as we can't take the stone to a machine, we must bring a machine to the stone. But that would cost money, and we're on our beam ends."

Many a gold-miner has been in the same strait-with wealth at his feet, staring him in the face, and no money in his pocket-a rich beggar.

Mr. Hart considered. Should he offer his savings for a share in the claim? He had a hundred and twenty pounds in the corner of his trunk. The chance was a good one. He made the offer. The young man laughed at him.

"We should want twenty times as much," he said.

"I shall mark out a claim for myself, then," said Mr. Hart.

"All right, mate; but you'll have to go a mile away for it. The reef is pegged, north and south, for quite that distance."

This was true; Mr. Hart, with regret, gave up the idea. He looked at the sun, and saw that if he wished to get back to the theatre in time for the performance he must start at once. He bade the young man good-day.

"What's your hurry?"

Mr. Hart explained.

"By Jove!" cried the young man, his face flushing scarlet. "I thought! recognised you. How I should like to go behind the scenes."

"Come then; I shall be glad to see you. This will admit you." And he took a card from his pocket, and wrote some words in pencil upon it. "What name shall I say?"

"Rowe."

"Here is the open sesame. Admit Mr. Rowe by the stage-door. Hart's Star Dramatic Company. – Signed, John Hart.'"

"You're a brick!" said the young fellow, looking at the card with a flushed face. If it had been an enchanted wand, it could not have made his heart beat more quickly. "I'll be there to-night."

He was as good as his word. What made him so eager was that he had been to the theatre three times, and had fallen dead in love with the singing and dancing Chambermaid. Such an opportunity to make her acquaintance was not to be thrown away. At eight o'clock he stood by the wings, as handsome as Apollo, as strong as Hercules. When he was introduced to the singing and dancing Chambermaid, he was as shy as a sensitive plant, and would have looked foolish but that his beard prevented him. Many a man has to thank his beard for similar grace. The Chambermaid, as good a girl as she was beautiful, saw the state of affairs at once, and knew, by feminine instinct, that she could twist him round her little finger. Nevertheless, she fell in love with him. Nature will not be denied, and he was a man to be fallen in love with. Her name was Margaret. His was Philip.

After the performance, John Hart and Philip Rowe had a glass together. They spoke of the old country.

"I'll give you a toast," said Philip Rowe. "Here's to the Silver Flagon."

"To the Silver Flagon," responded John Hart. Philip Rowe drank another toast, but did not utter it: To Margaret.

He went to the back of the stage on the following night, and many nights after that, and made friends with the company. All the men liked him; he was free-hearted and free-handed. But the Leading Lady, after a night or two, looked upon him with displeasure, for he paid her less court than her state demanded. Her displeasure was the greater because she had shown that she was inclined to be gracious to him. It was incredible that a lady who enacted Pauline, and Juliet, and Lady Macbeth, should be overlooked for a chitling who played simple chambermaids, and could dance a little. But then Philip Rowe was blind-which was not a valid excuse for him. The Leading Lady-being a woman as well as a Leading Lady-would have been well pleased to receive the attentions of so handsome a young man, who was evidently a gentleman, and she snubbed Margaret one night, and was spiteful to her, because of her good fortune. Philip Rowe, going behind the scenes, found his Margaret in tears, in a convenient corner. She had a spare half-hour, and he coaxed her to tell him the cause of her distress.

"Never mind, Margaret," he said tenderly. "Don't cry!"

She looked up shyly at this. It was the first time he had called her by her Christian name. If brevity be the soul of wit, it is also frequently the soul of love. Margaret was comforted.

When Philip Rowe came face to face with the Leading Lady, he glared at her. She glared at him in return. He felt awkward and hung down his head. Her glare was more potent than his; she had to glare often on the stage, and was an adept at it. Besides, her face was smooth; his was hairy.

Margaret coaxed him to do something that night; she knew where and how to plant a dagger in her rival's bosom. She whispered to Philip and he ran out of the theatre in a glow of ecstatic delirium, for her lovely lips had almost touched his ear. Her warm breath on his neck made him tremble.

She had asked him to get a bouquet of flowers, to throw on the stage to her in the last piece, in which both she and the Leading Lady appeared. Flowers have before now been used for purposes as sharp.

But where to get the flowers? A bouquet of flowers was unheard of in Silver Creek township. Where to get them? Where?

Could not love grow them?

Where to get them? Ah, he knew! Six miles away on the main road to the metropolis, there was a-yes, call it so-a garden; a little plot of ground tended by a woman with country memories. In less than two minutes he was in the saddle, galloping in that direction, and right in front of him, all the way, shone Margaret's face and Margaret's eyes and hair. No will-o'-the-wisp was ever more alluring. Margaret lurked in the bushes, glided among the trees, shone in the open spaces, and Philip's heart beat fast and joyously. The six miles of bush road, so soft and pleasant to the horse's feet, were soon traversed, and there was the garden with a few-not many-flowers in it. Philip Rowe leaped off his horse, with joyous exclamations. A woman came to the door.

"Here, Jim!" she cried, to her husband, running into the house, thinking that a bushranger (Anglicè, highwayman) was paying them a visit.

Jim promptly appeared, with a gun in his hand. "Now then?" he demanded, nothing daunted.

"Oh! it's all right, mate," said Philip; and in a few moments he explained the motive of his visit.

"About a dozen flowers done up in a bunch are all I want. This for them."

He held up two pieces of rich quartz, in which there were probably two ounces of gold.

Jim was agreeable, coveting the specimen; his wife was not, loving her flowers. But when Philip pleaded, and told his story, she relented.

"Oh, if it's for that!" she said with a sly smile, and took a good look at Philip, and thought that the woman was to be envied who had won so fine a young fellow.

While she cut the flowers the two men had a nip of brandy each, which Philip paid for. The place really was a sly grog-shop.

Soon Philip was galloping back to Silver Creek township in a glow of triumph. He arrived in time, and paid for admission into the body of the theatre, hiding the flowers in the breast of his dandy serge shirt. He was a bit of a dandy in his way, and especially so when he expected to see Margaret. He followed her instructions to the letter; she had told him at what point to throw the flowers, and plump at her feet they fell, at the precise moment she desired. The audience stared at first at the unusual compliment, and then applauded loudly. Margaret curtseyed, at which they applauded still more vociferously; the beautiful girl was a pet of theirs, and they approved of the tribute. The Leading Lady turned pale, and clutched at her bosom tragically. The dagger had been deftly planted, and she felt the smart-as only a woman would feel it. Margaret placed the flowers in the bosom of her dress, and sent a look straight into the eyes of Philip, which made every nerve in his body tingle.

CHAPTER VI

ROMEO AND JULIET

The Leading Lady was fond of money, and the theatre was doing so well that her dividend every week was a very handsome one, three times as much as she could expect to get elsewhere; but what woman is prudent when her vanity is hurt? A man with a large bump of caution occasionally hangs back, and calculates consequences. A woman never does. The Leading Lady in a towering passion confronted Mr. Hart, the manager, at the end of the performance.

"Here comes a tragedy," thought he, as he looked into her wrathful eyes. There was a smile on his face, nevertheless.

"I leave the company!" she said abruptly, with heaving bosom.

"My dear lady!" remonstrated the manager.

"To-morrow. I shall take a place in the coach that starts at eight o'clock."

She knew well enough what the result would be if she left; the company would collapse. A man might be spared, and his place filled, or his parts doubled, but the loss of a woman would inflict irreparable injury upon the prospects of the theatre. Mr. Hart knew this also.

"You don't forget," he said gravely, "that we have your signature, and that if you leave without consent we can make you pay heavy damages!"

"That for my signature! that for your heavy damages!" Each time she snapped a disdainful finger.

"My dear lady," he said, in a soothing tone, "you are excited, you are overstrained. We have taxed you a little hardly. We'll play light pieces for a night or two, and give you a rest."

Inconsiderate man He could not more successfully have fanned the flame in her breast.

"You'll play no light pieces to give me a rest! Play light pieces, and give her the opportunity of taking leading characters! The shameless hussy! Not if I know it!"

Mr. Hart began to understand. This colloquy was taking place on the stage; the theatre was clear, the curtain was up. Down the stairs which led to the ladies' dressing-room tripped Margaret, fresh, and bright, and happy, with her bunch of flowers in her hand.

"Good night, Mr. Hart," she cried gaily.

In the shadow of the door which led on to the stage a man was waiting for her-Philip. They met, clasped hands-her supple fingers lay in Philip's great palm as in a nest, and he imprisoned them, be sure! – and walked out, side by side, chatting confidentially, with their heads close together. The Leading Lady saw this, and her anger rose higher; but still it was bitter gall to her to reflect that if she went away, the field would be clear for her rival.

Mr. Hart felt that he was on the horns of a difficulty; he could spare neither one nor the other of the ladies.

"You're the manager of this company," said the Leading Lady, "and you ought long ago to have put down such shameless goings on. Did you see the way they went out together, and do you think people are blind? We shall be the talk of the town; but I'll not be implicated in it. My name musn't be used lightly." The manager smiled grimly. "I leave to-morrow. Understand that."