The Heritage of the Hills

"How do you do, Mr. Sloan!" cried Jessamy almost at the top of her voice.

A veined hand shook its way to form a cup behind the ancient's ear.

"Hey?" he squealed.

Jessamy filled her sturdy lungs with air and tried again.

"I say – How do you do!" The effort left her neck red but for a blue outstanding artery.

"Oh!" exclaimed Dad Sloan, with a look of relief. "Why, howdy?"

Jessamy ascended a step to the door, took him by both shoulders, and placed her satin lips close to the ear that he inclined her way.

"We've come to make you a call," she announced. "I want you to meet a friend of mine; and we want to ask you some questions."

The grey head nodded slowly up and down, more to indicate that its owner heard and understood than to signify acquiescence. But he tottered back and held the door wide open; and Jessamy and Oliver went into the cabin.

Dad Sloan managed to live all alone in this sequestered little nook by reason of the county's generosity. He was old and feeble, and at times irritatingly childish and petulant. Jessamy Selden often brought him cakes, fried chicken, and the like; and, provided he was in the right mood, he would be more likely to be confidential with her than with anybody else in the country.

But the girl's task was difficult. The old man shook hands listlessly with Oliver at her bidding, but seemed entirely to have forgotten their previous meeting. They sat in the uncomfortable straight-backed, thong-bottom chairs while Jessamy shrieked the conversation into the desired channel. The old eyes gathered a more intelligent look as she spoke of the lost mine of Bolivio.

Pieced together, the fragments that fell from the bearded lips of Old Dad Sloan made some such narrative as follows:

Bolivio had been a Portuguese or a Spaniard, or some "black furriner," who had been in the country in the memorable days of '49 and afterward. His knowledge of some tongue based on the Latin had made it easy for him to communicate with the Pauba Indians that inhabited the country, as some of them had learned Spanish from the Franciscan Fathers down at the coast. Bolivio mingled with the tribe, and finally became a squawman.

One day he appeared at the Clinker Creek bar and exhibited a beautiful stone. A gold miner who was present had once followed mining in South Africa, and knew something of diamonds. He examined Bolivio's stone, and gave it such simple tests as were at his command, then advised the owner to send it to New York to find out if it was possessed of value.

It required months in those days to communicate with the Atlantic seaboard. Bolivio's stone was started on its long journey around the Horn. He hinted that there were more of the stones where he had found this one, and created the impression that his Indian brethren had showed them to him.

More they could not get out of him. Nor did anybody try very hard to learn his secret, for no one imagined the find of much intrinsic value.

Bolivio was a saddler, and was skilled in the art of the silversmith. Gold dust was plentiful in the country in that day, and the foreigner found ready buyers for his masterpieces in leather and precious metals. The finest equestrian outfit that he made was finally acquired from the Indians by Dan Smeed, a miner who afterward turned highwayman, married an Indian girl, became an outlaw, and finally disappeared altogether. In the conchas with which the plaited bridle was adorned Bolivio had set two large stones from his secret store, which he himself had crudely polished.

One day, a month or more before word came from New York regarding the stone, Bolivio was found dead in the forest. A knife had been plunged into his heart. The secret of the brilliant stones had died with him.

Then came the answer. The stone was said to be spodumene, of a very high class, and had a a lilac tint theretofore unknown. It was the finest of its kind ever to have been reported as found in the United States. The finder was offered a thousand dollars for the sample sent; one hundred dollars a pound was offered for all stones that would grade up to the sample.

But Bolivio was dead, and no one knew from whence the stone had come.

Efforts were made, of course, to find the source of this wealth. The Indians were tried time and again, but not one word would they speak regarding the matter. The new quest was finally dropped; for those were the days of gold, gold, gold, and so frenzied were men and women to find it that other precious minerals were cast aside as worthless. None had time to seek for stones worth a hundred dollars a pound, with gold worth more than twice as much. So the lost mine of Bolivio became only a memory.

Years later this same stone was discovered six hundred miles farther south. It is now on the market as kunzite, and a cut stone of one karat in weight sells for fifty dollars and more. The San Diego County discovery was supposed to mark the introduction of the stone in the United States, for the lost mine of Bolivio was all but forgotten.

Old Dad Sloan thumped out at Jessamy's request and once again critically examined Oliver's saddle and bridle and the brilliants in the conchas.

"It's the same fine outfit Bolivio made, and that afterwards belonged to Dan Smeed, outlaw, highwayman, and squawman," he pronounced. "They never was another outfit like it in this country."

"Tell us more about Dan Smeed!" screamed the girl.

The patriarch shook his head. "Bad egg; bad egg!" he said sonorously. "He married a squaw, and that's how come it he got the grandest saddle and bridle Bolivio ever made. Bolivio's squaw kep' it after Bolivio was knifed. And by and by along come this Dan Smeed and his partner to this country. And when Dan Smeed married into the tribe he got the saddle and bridle and martingales somehow. That was later – years later. Bolivio's been dead over seventy year."

"Have you ever heard the name Peter Drew?" Oliver asked him.

But the old eyes remained blank, and the grey head shook slowly from side to side. "I recollect clear as day what happened sixty to seventy year ago, but I can't recollect what I did last week or where I went," Dad Sloan said pathetically. "If I'd ever heard o' Peter Drew in the days o' forty-nine to seventy, I'd recollect it."

"You mentioned Dan Smeed's partner," prompted Jessamy. "Can you recall his name?"

"Yes, Dan Smeed had a partner," mused Dad Sloan. "Bad egg, Dan Smeed. Squawman, highwayman, outlaw. Disappeared with his fine saddle and bridle and martingales and the stones from the lost mine o' Bolivio."

"But his partner's name?" the girl persisted.

The old mind seemed to be wandering once more. "Bad eggs – both of 'em. Bad eggs," was the only answer she could get.

"Well, we're progressing slowly," Jessamy observed as they rode away. "Our next step must be to visit the Indians. I know a number of them. Filipe Maquaquish, for instance, and Chupurosa are as old or older than Old Dad Sloan. Chupurosa's face is a pattern in crinkled leather. When we go to see Aunt Nancy Fleet we'll visit the Indian village. And that will be – when?"

"Tomorrow, if you say so," Oliver replied. "I meant to irrigate my garden tomorrow, but it can wait a day."

"By the way," she asked, "have you written that letter to Mr. Selden, telling him what we found out down at the county seat?"

"I have it in my pocket," he told her.

"Give it to me," she ordered. "I'll hand it in at the post office, get them to stamp the postmark on it, and take it home with me when I go."

"Will you dare do that? Won't the post-master scent a conspiracy against Old Man Selden?"

"Let him scent!" said Jessamy. "I'm dying to see Selden's face when he reads that letter."

They parted at the headwaters of Clinker Creek, with the understanding that she would meet him in the county road next morning for the ride to her aunt's and the Indian reservation.

CHAPTER VIII

POISON OAK RANCH

The trail that meandered down Clinker Creek Cañon extended at right angles to the one that led to the Selden ranch. The latter climbed a baldpate hill; then, winding its narrow way through dense locked chaparral higher than horse and rider, dipped down precipitously into the deep cañon of the American River.

Jessamy waved good-bye to her new friend at the parting of the ways and lifted White Ann into her long lope to the summit of the denuded hill. For a little, as they crossed the topmost part of it, the deep, rugged scar that marked the course of the river was visible. Ragged and rocky and covered with trees and chaparral, the cañonside slanted down dizzily for over fifteen hundred feet. At the bottom the deep green river rushed pell-mell to the lower levels. A moment and the view was lost to the girl, as White Ann entered the thick chaparral and started the swift descent.

At last they reached the bottom, forded the swirling stream, and began clambering up a trail as steep as the first on the other side. Soon the river was lost to view again, for once more the trail had been cut through a seemingly impenetrable chaparral of buckthorn, manzanita and scrub oak. Around and about tributary cañons they wound their way, and at last reached the end of the steep climb. For a quarter of a mile now the trail followed the backbone of a ridge, then entered a cañon that eventually spread out into a pine-bordered plateau on the mountainside. Just ahead lay Poison Oak Ranch. Beyond, the deep, dark forest extended in miles numbered by hundreds to the snow-mantled peaks of the Sierra Nevada range.

While it was possible to reach Poison Oak Ranch from this side of the river, the journey on Shank's mare would have taken on something of the nature of an exploring expedition into unmapped lands. Occasionally hunters wandered to or past the ranch on this side; but for the most part any one who fancied that he had business at Poison Oak Ranch came over the narrow trail that connected the spot with outside civilization. Few entertained such a fancy, however, for Poison Oak Ranch, secluded, hidden from sight, tucked away in the Hills of Nowhere, and difficult of access, was owned and controlled by a clannish family that had little in common with the world.

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