SIX THOUSAND TONS OF GOLD.

6,000
Tons of Gold

BY
H. R. CHAMBERLAIN
London Correspondent of “The Sun,” New York.

Copyright, 1894
By Flood & Vincent
Entered at Stationer’s Hall, London
By H. R. Chamberlain
The Chautauqua-Century Press, Meadville, Pa., U. S. A.
Electrotyped, Printed, and Bound by Flood & Vincent.

CONTENTS.

SIX THOUSAND TONS OF GOLD.

CHAPTER I.
THE SECRET OF THE CORDILLERAS.

The steamship Elbe had crossed the equator on her long passage from Southampton to Buenos Ayres in September, 1893. All but the final phases of a well-regulated, fair-weather voyage on a big passenger ship had duly presented themselves. The first irksomeness of the long monotony had worn off; the invalids had begun to enjoy the slow, lazy rolling which at first had been their hopeless undoing; companions of a fortnight were exchanging confidences which the friendship of years on land would not have induced. The frankness, the unrestraint, the offguard good fellowship of life at sea held full sway.

We are concerned with only two of the numerous ship’s company. Strangers to each other and to all on board at the outset of the voyage, they had by this time formed rather an odd intimacy. Men of widely different types, it would be difficult to discover any natural bond of sympathy between Robert Brent and Duncan Fraser. The one an American, whose quiet, self-possessed bearing had in it that indescribable ease of manner which is the unfailing mark of thorough acquaintance with men and affairs in the best phases of fin de siècle existence. The other a Scotchman, of rougher mold, more advanced in years, and whose natural keenness had been sharpened into an intuitive suspicion by much grinding against the unpolished side of human nature.

Physically the two men were in marked contrast. It would have puzzled you to say whether or no the American had reached his thirtieth birthday. He was rather above the medium height, neither light nor dark, and of well-built, athletic frame. Few would have called him handsome, but his face combined strength, intelligence, and refinement, with a touch of something which at first you might have described as cynicism or melancholy. The Scotchman had evidently been a typical representative of his race. The large-boned, sturdy, close-knit body was well-preserved after fifty years spent, many of them, under suns less kind than those of his native moors and mountains. But the sandy complexion and almost flaxen hair had given place to a grizzled head and that peculiar deep-tanned, almost leathery skin which is always a record of whole chapters of adventure. The left cheek and tip of the left ear bore an index to some special record of violence. A furrow in the skin just over the high cheek-bone and a bit missing from the top of the ear immediately back of it seemed to mark the course of a bullet that had failed by the smallest margin in the accomplishment of a deadly mission.

The vicissitudes of life ashore would seldom throw two such men into companionship, much less into close friendship. The sea fortunately is sometimes responsible for delightful bits of social phenomena. Perhaps after all it was the lottery of seats at table that brought it about. One must be at least conventionally sociable with one’s vis-à-vis and nearest neighbors, in a steamship saloon. Fraser and Brent were assigned adjoining seats and after a day or two the acquaintance begun at table was continued on deck and in the smoking-room. They became interested each in the opposite tastes, antecedents, and manner of life of the other. Brent speedily gained a high respect for the Scotchman’s deep, though rather uncouth philosophy and downright hard sense. Fraser admired the American’s alert, broad-minded mastery of all the absorbing topics of the day. Both were men naturally reserved and each respected this quality in the other. Their talks did not become personal for some days, save for an occasional anecdote from the Scotchman’s varied experience. It came out that Fraser was well acquainted with Argentina and other parts of the continent to which the ship was bound, while it was Brent’s first trip below the equator.

The young man’s close inquiries about Buenos Ayres led at length to some explanation of his mission there and the causes of it. He had suddenly found himself a month before face to face with the necessity for earning his living. The silver panic in America in the summer had swept away all but a few thousands of a comfortable fortune, which had enabled him to indulge a too enervating love of ease. His indulgences had not been vicious, they were intellectual rather than physical, and he had strength of character enough after the first disappointment of loss to welcome the coming struggle. He had been in London when the blow fell. His first determination was to return to New York and undertake the practice of law. He had prepared himself for admission to the bar after leaving college, but the sudden death of his father deprived him of his last family tie and led him to postpone active work at his profession. He went abroad to be gone a few months and his absence had lengthened into three years, when the disaster to his property compelled him to rouse his dormant talents to action.

When the necessity was upon him his energy was unbounded. He dreaded the dull days that would probably come before he could secure any opportunity for an active display of his powers. Besides he was not particularly in love with his profession. His sudden afflux of energy tempted him to challenge fortune in some more desperate struggle. The trip to Argentina, however, was not an unreasoning whim. Two or three of his London friends had suffered severely by the financial misfortunes of the Argentine Republic in 1892-93. They had been informed by agents in Buenos Ayres that the prevailing depression offered tempting opportunities for the investment of fresh enterprise and capital in several directions, notably in mines, real estate, and manufacturing. Brent had decided to make a trip for investigation, partly on his own account and partly on the assurance of his friends that they would join him financially in any promising enterprise.

These plain facts about his recent life and prospects Brent made known to his companion while they sat sheltered from the already tropical sun under the deck-awning one hot afternoon. The Scotchman was a sympathetic listener. It was, indeed, his genuine and apparent interest which induced the narration of most of the points in the simple biography. He did not refuse confidence in return, but what little he said about himself was in such general terms that Brent felt that it was modesty as well as natural reticence which withheld the details of a most adventurous career. He had evidently taken a strong fancy to the younger man and he discussed with greatest interest the chances of success in his search for fortune amid the many difficulties then existing in the struggling republic. He was silent, however, about his own immediate plans and about the nature of the interests which were occupying him. His offers of assistance to his new friend in the strange city to which he was going were coupled with the announcement that he should remain only a few days in Buenos Ayres, because business called him further south immediately.

The heat of the tropics was unrelieved even by one of the sudden storms which often break the monotony of the long southern voyage. Those who hoped for something out of the ordinary to make the trip memorable had begun to content themselves with anticipations of early arrival in port, when they were informed that the steamer had already entered the waters of the Rio de la Plata. No land was in sight. The sea was apparently as boundless as it had been for three weeks past. Most of the passengers thought it was a joke of the steward. There was only one river in the world, the Amazon, into whose mouth one could sail without sighting land—so, at least, they had read in their geographies. They were wrong, though, as they found when they applied to the first officer for information and had looked the matter up on the large map in the saloon. Buenos Ayres was still more than one hundred miles distant and they would see no land during the remaining two hours of daylight.

But an experience much more exciting than the first sight of land was vouchsafed them. A white line upon the sea appeared suddenly on the port bow away off to the southwest. It was seen from the bridge first and two or three quick orders set sailors and stewards flying in their hasty execution. Awnings were taken down in a trice, passengers were driven from their comfortable lounging chairs on deck, everything movable was taken away or made fast. To most of the passengers the sudden excitement was inexplicable and alarming.

“The pampero” was the only explanation anybody would stop to give. It was not many moments before ample explanation arrived. The pampero was soon upon them and it explained itself. The wind-storm, or dry hurricane, which comes off the land from the southwest and without warning lashes the Rio de la Plata and the sea beyond with a fury sometimes worse than the heaviest ocean storms, is a phenomenon peculiar to these latitudes. It never lasts long but its violence is often terrible. The Elbe faced the furious blast at first with dignified steadiness. Then as the sea became white, tempestuous, cyclonic, the ship forgot her dignity and struggled with trembling, straining frame against her merciless enemies. It was a test of her sternest resources. It was not a new peril. She had faced it before, not always unscathed, and this time again she survived the struggle. With only a few hurts, she emerged from the hour’s battle, shaken but safe.

It had been a trying hour below. Neptune’s transformation was full of terror for the passengers. His anger under the sudden assault of the winds seemed directed against those who had complained of his monotonous tranquillity. The wise ones among the ship’s company acted on the advice of the stewards and sought their berths at the beginning of the outbreak. Those whose curiosity to witness the fury of the sea kept them upon their feet were glad to seek a safer anchorage before the storm reached its height. Fraser and Brent were among these latter. Both were fairly good sailors and nature’s outburst of passion was a sublime spectacle which they were loth to leave. But they had no choice. The pitching of the ship became wilder and more erratic every moment. It was impossible to stand upright at a port-hole to watch the chaos of wind and water without. They did not abandon the attempt until two or three sudden lurches had thrown them into violent contact with tables, chairs, and other fixed objects.

They started at last to go to their staterooms below, but locomotion by this time was a dangerous experiment. They steered a zigzag course to the staircase, which they did not reach without several collisions, and Brent began to descend. He clung to the reeling railing and had gone down half the steps, when there was a cry and a blow from behind. He was wrenched from his hold and in a moment both men were pitched headlong to the deck below. A great lurch of the ship added violence to the fall, and they lay for a moment almost senseless upon the rubber mat at the bottom of the staircase.

“Are ye hurt, lad?” said the Scotchman, finding voice presently and trying to rise. He sank back again with an exclamation of pain, saying, “A broken leg, I’m afraid.”

Brent sat up rather dazed. “I don’t know,” he began, trying to raise his voice above the roar of the storm and the creaking of the ship’s timbers. “My arm is hurt, I think. Let me help you.” But the movement to aid his friend gave him a twinge that made him desist. They called for aid, but when a steward managed with some difficulty to reach them he could do little.

“Lie flat on your backs till the worst of this is over. It won’t last much longer,” was his advice. It was the only thing to do, though every motion of the ship was full of suffering, especially for Fraser.

The wind subsided almost as suddenly as it had risen. The doctor was summoned as soon as the ship became steadier. He found, as the Scotchman had feared, a broken leg and in Brent’s case a broken fore-arm, besides a few trifling bruises. The painful experience of transfer to his stateroom in the still restless ship and the setting of the fractured limb did not seem a very dreadful matter to the hardy Scotchman. But he was much worried over the consequences of his accident.

“I can’t abide this bad luck,” he said anxiously to Brent, who made light of his own hurts and visited his friend after the doctor had finished his work. “This means six weeks on my back and I can’t stand it. I’ve engagements that must be kept. It means all the difference between riches and poverty,” and the grizzled head shook in such exasperation of helpless revolt against fate that Brent did his best to relieve his bitterness of spirit.

“Oh, not so bad as that, I hope,” he responded cheerfully. “What you cannot do yourself, I can do under your direction. We are going to the same place. I have nothing pressing to require my attention and shall be delighted to see you out of this mishap. You just make a business of mending that broken leg and the other business will be taken care of all right. You shall tell me about it to-morrow and then we’ll see. Get a good night’s rest now.”

“You’re the right sort, lad, and I’ll trust you,” said the other gratefully, gripping Brent’s uninjured hand. “Perhaps you can help me, and you won’t suffer for it if you do. I’ll think it over and we’ll have a good talk to-morrow.”

That night the Elbe reached Buenos Ayres. Brent sought the services of the best surgeon in the city, who came aboard and put Fraser’s damaged leg in a plaster cast. He assured the impatient Scotchman that with good care he might hope to be on foot again in about five weeks, but he must not attempt to get about even with crutches under a month.

Fraser did not attempt to bring up the subject of his business disappointments with his friend until he had been safely transferred to pleasant quarters in a hotel on the afternoon of the 6th of October. He had been preoccupied and silent most of the time and Brent had found it hard work to rally him into even passing interest in his surroundings. The young man superintended the landing and storage of a dozen or more large cases belonging to Fraser from the cargo of the Elbe. When the invalid had been made comfortable upon an adjustable cot procured from a nearby hospital, he invited Brent to return after he had got a glimpse of the city. They would dine together and then have a long consultation.

Brent readily assented and they enjoyed a very good but very awkward meal by the Scotchman’s bedside. They became quite merry over their respective infirmities. Brent with one arm in a sling was even more helpless than Fraser upon his back but with both hands free. They had a jovial hour over the repast before approaching serious subjects. When the waiter had been finally dismissed, the Scotchman dropped his gay mood.

“I like you, lad,” he remarked suddenly, after looking rather quizzically from under his heavy brows at his companion for some moments. “And because I like you and because I’m certain you’ll stick to a friend through thick and thin, I’m going to ask you to join me in an adventure that may make us both richer than anybody in all this country—or in any other maybe.”

“Have you found a new El Dorado?” asked Brent half banteringly, but a good deal impressed nevertheless by the other’s manner and words.

“Not that exactly, but I know a man who has or who has known about it for years and has never used his knowledge till now. I have some of the products of his secret in that box over there,” answered the Scotchman pointing to the smaller of his trunks on the other side of the room. “I took something like a hundredweight of clean virgin gold to the Bank of England bullion-room a couple of months ago and it was so pure they allowed me weight for weight in new sovereigns for it.”

“And is there much more where that came from?” asked the now thoroughly interested American.

“I solemnly believe, lad, that there are millions more waiting to be carried away,” said the grizzled old man with grim emphasis, half raising himself in his earnestness and watching the effect of his words upon his companion.

Brent stared at the crippled figure before him in half stupefied amazement. There was such a convincing sincerity in the bearing of the old Scotchman that the young man could not receive his astonishing statement with any incredulity. So it was with a full conviction of the other’s truthfulness that he finally found words to say:

“My friend, if you have such wealth within your reach, you should not intrust the secret to a stranger such as I. I am proud of the confidence you show in me, but you must not make me the object of such generosity as you suggest.”

“Well said, my lad, and I know you mean it,” replied the old man warmly, “but I don’t intend to make you a present of this gold. I haven’t it to give you. I don’t even know where it is, and there’s many a difficulty and probably danger before we shall see it. What I propose is that you join me in the enterprise of securing it. I grant I should not have made the offer but for that confounded tumble,” pointing to his plaster leg, “but now I am compelled to seek assistance or to forfeit all chance of ever getting any of the treasure. So I invite you to share with me a rough experience of several weeks, perhaps months, and the much or little that may come of it.”

“That is what I came here hoping for,” responded Brent heartily, “and I would have undertaken it under much smaller temptation than you offer. Your proposition is most generous and flattering in spite of your modest way of putting it.”

“Wait till you hear the particulars before you commit yourself,” interrupted Fraser settling back among his pillows. “I’ll spin you a little yarn. It’s not long and I don’t think you’ll find it dull.”

“Go on; and don’t cut it short,” assented Brent keenly interested.

“You know that I’ve knocked about the world a good deal and among all sorts of people,” began the old man deliberately. “Somehow I have spent nearly all of my life in new countries. Thirty years ago I went to California. I was for a long time in Australia, and for the last eight years I have been in the southern countries of South America. I have tried mining, ranching, fruit farming, cattle raising, made and lost small fortunes at each, and on the whole have enjoyed life. About eighteen months ago, I visited the small colonies along the Argentine coast well down into Patagonian latitudes. I stopped finally at a little settlement near the mouth of the Rio Negro or Black River. There were strong indications there of mineral wealth. Then, too, the climate was agreeable, game was abundant, and I thought I might do a little profitable trading with the Indians. I had taken with me from Buenos Ayres quite a collection of small things in order to make the trip profitable if possible.

“I suppose you have heard the usual stories about the native Patagonians—that they are all giants and terribly ferocious and that they kill all foreigners who try to intrude into their country for fear they will discover the fabulous treasures that the Indians have been guarding for centuries. Well, those yarns are all bosh. I have traded with the Indians, picked up some of their lingo, hunted with them, and visited some of their villages. They are much like other primitive races, more intelligent in some respects, better made physically but not giants, and there are no buried cities or ancient temples filled with gold for them to guard. They have some admirable qualities not ruined yet by civilization, but they will not survive long after they become better acquainted with the trader and the whisky barrel.

“It’s a wonderful country, lad, that the Tehuelches live in. That’s the name of the general tribe of natives in all the region south of the Rio Negro. There isn’t a rougher, more inhospitable coast-line on all the footstool than the thousand miles or so from Rio Negro to Santa Cruz. The Indians themselves say it would take one of them at least two years to follow the coast by land from one point to the other. But there’s a fine country inland, back of nature’s barricade. Never mind about that now; you’ll see it for yourself. I spent more than six months previous to last May in and around the little settlement at the mouth of the Rio Negro. I cultivated the natives from the first and managed to get on good terms with some of them. I made them small presents, traded with them, and taught them some new points in hunting and fishing. I prospected a good deal and became convinced that there was valuable mineral wealth in the rocky districts near the coast. I could do very little, however, toward testing this point with my primitive appliances, though I did manage to collect a few ounces of free gold in the course of several weeks’ search. I found that the Indians were familiar with the metal, but they were absolutely close-mouthed on the subject. All my attempts to gain information about gold deposits served only to make them suspicious and silent.

“Most of the Indians I met belonged to a division or sub-tribe known as the Caillitchets, or non-speakers. For many years they have been morose and almost dumb. The story is that three or four of their chiefs, or caciques, whom they believed to be immortal and invulnerable were killed in battle three or four generations ago. Ever since the entire tribe has been gloomy, indifferent, and given up to a sort of savage cynicism. They used to bring gold-dust to the occasional traders who touched at points along the coast, but the yellow metal excited such evidences of cupidity in the white men that the Indians apparently became afraid it would tempt an invasion of their domicile. At all events they stopped all barter, having nothing else of value to offer in exchange for traders’ goods. There are some interesting stories among the settlers at Rio Negro about those days. The same thing is said about these Indians that is told about the natives of Ecuador, that they brought quantities of gold-dust to the traders, made their bargains, and then threw into the river all they had remaining of the precious metal. Two or three small expeditions at one time or another about thirty years ago attempted to follow the Indians back into the country, but none of the adventurers were ever heard of again.

“They are a tamer people now. A white man who takes care to treat them well is comparatively safe among them. They are not treacherous like their North American brethren and I have spent weeks with them without meeting any suggestion of hostility.

“I made especial effort to gain the confidence of their principal cacique, a fine old warrior whom they call Casimiro. He is a wonderful old man, more than ninety years old he says, and I believe him. Centenarians are by no means rare among these people and I met one old fellow who claims more than one hundred and twenty birthdays. Casimiro is remarkably intelligent, remarkably broad in his ideas, for a savage. I became quite attached to him, hunted and fished with him, and we had many long talks together. He has picked up a good deal of Spanish, and he taught me enough of his language to enable me to get along very well with the others of the tribe. He took very deeply to heart the decadence of his people. In all Patagonia now there are not above twenty-five thousand of the native tribesmen remaining, while a century ago their numbers were probably almost ten times as great. Casimiro lamented the growth of the white colonies, denounced indiscriminately the traders and the missionaries who had come among his people, and predicted gloomily the speedy extinction of his race. I sympathized with him and tried to convince him that there was good as well as bad in the civilization which he denounced.

“Finally a bit of adventure gave me a stronger hold upon the old chief’s regard. We had been wandering one afternoon last April through a very rough, half-wooded valley some miles inland. Making our way along the side of a steep declivity, we came to a spot where there had been a recent landslide. I stopped to examine what I thought were traces of gold in the fresh surface. Casimiro, picking his way some yards in advance of me, started somehow another movement of the loose earth and stones. He was swept off his feet in a moment, and before I realized what had happened I saw him whirled over and over in a great mass of débris toward the bottom of the defile more than a hundred yards below. I gave him up for lost, but about a third of the distance from the bottom, before the descent became almost perpendicular, was a large jutting rock, which divided the small avalanche, and the old man managed to catch and cling to it.

“Of course I went to his assistance. It was a matter of great difficulty to reach him. There was danger of starting fresh slides which would sweep us both away and it was not easy to get a footing in the insecure earth. Two or three times I slipped a few feet, but by digging toes and fingers into the hillside I checked myself with no worse damage than a few scratches. The old Indian was badly shaken and bruised but he seemed to have no bones broken. I got him into a more comfortable position on the rock and in a few minutes his strength came back, so that with a little help from me he was finally able to scramble up the steep slope to an easier angle where we could stand on our feet again and make our way to sound earth.

“Well, the old man persisted in making a hero of me for my part in the incident and declared I had saved his life. Two or three days later, he came to the settlement and invited me to go with him to one of the principal native villages where he declared he wished to ‘make a big talk’ with me and intrust to me a great secret. I made up my mind, principally on account of his solemn manner, that he really had something more important on hand than a native celebration of his deliverance from the landslide and so I decided to go with him. It was nearly a week’s journey on foot and horseback to the west. When I arrived, I was invited to attend a council of four caciques, Waki, Orkeke, Cuastro, and Casimiro. They had met, the old chief explained to me, to consider a great difficulty and peril which threatened the tribe. They needed a white man’s advice and assistance. He had in his intercourse with me for several weeks been testing my knowledge, my judgment, and my good faith. The adventure of the avalanche had completed my establishment in his confidence. I did not feel particularly complimented by this expression of their esteem until they had described their problem. Then you will readily believe, I was dumfounded.

“Casimiro as spokesman told the story. There existed, he said, at a secret spot in a spur of the Cordilleras within the tribe’s domain a vast store of native gold. ‘How much?’ I inquired in astonishment. ‘More, much more, than a thousand mules could carry,’ the chief declared solemnly. ‘But you mean ore, rock or sand with specks of gold in it,’ I said to him in Spanish, thinking I had misunderstood. ‘No,’ he replied, and going to a corner of the hut in which we were sitting, he produced presently a small bag of skin. He opened it and poured upon the floor in front of me a heap of yellow dust and nuggets—the purest virgin gold I had ever seen. ‘All like that,’ the old man remarked laconically. I was too amazed to speak. I put out my hand and took up a handful from the shining pile. There was no doubt about it. It was perfectly genuine—worth really four sovereigns an ounce, every speck of it. Then I looked from one to another of the four chiefs. They were watching me stoically.

“‘What do you want me to do?’ I asked finally.

“‘Take the gold away from our country,’ was Casimiro’s answer; whereat my surprise was so great that I must have shown signs of approaching idiocy. The four chiefs talked rapidly for a few moments in their own tongue, but I was too dazed to try to understand what they said. Involuntarily I was calculating roughly the amount of the treasure they had described. A mule-load I knew was about two hundredweight. Could there be two hundred thousand pounds, equivalent to twelve hundred thousand pounds sterling, or sixty millions of your American dollars, in this Patagonian treasure-bed? Presently Casimiro explained himself more clearly. What he said amounted to this:

“‘My people have long known of this gold which you white men love, fight for, suffer for, and die for. It is of no use to my people. It neither feeds them nor clothes them. The traders tell us they will give us food and clothing and much whisky for it. We know better. If they discover we have it, they will come with many soldiers and seize our country and drive us out and kill us. The white man knows no mercy in seeking gold. We have tried to cover it up and keep it secret. We fear we have been betrayed. Two or three times in recent moons white men have penetrated near to its hiding-place. The first seeker met his death, the second likewise. But more are coming. Our people are in peril. We must save them. We love our country, we love our simple life. We want none of your civilization, none of its cruelties, its vices, its death. With this gold tempting the white multitude, we shall become as chaff before the wind in front of you. So we say, Take the gold. We have nothing else to excite your cupidity, take it and let us live in peace.’

“I was fairly humiliated, lad, before that grand old savage. His words were simple; they were not spoken in anger. Yet he stood there melancholy, powerless before a relentless fate, looking fearlessly into a future full of peril for his people. There was something sublime in the dignity of the old Patagonian that I had never seen in any other man and for a moment I felt almost like going down in the dust before him. He came back presently to his usual mood and noticing, I suppose, my shamefacedness he assured me I was by no means included in the denunciation into which the contemplation of his people’s wrongs had led him. A renegade member of the tribe, it appeared, was held responsible for the betrayal of the secret. They asked me if I thought they had determined upon the right course to pursue. I told them they would be foolish to let such a vast treasure go without providing for certain lasting benefits to themselves in return. They might easily make themselves free of the traders, and secure all necessary annual supplies including harmless luxuries, besides providing for the practical exclusion of the white man’s liquor, which was already becoming a grave evil among them.

“They all seemed to think the suggestion a good one. When they had discussed it for a little while among themselves, Casimiro finally made me this proposition: His brother chiefs, he said, wished to make a test of my good faith. They would deliver into my hands at the Rio Negro settlement a small mule-load of gold. This I was to take to my own country and spend on behalf of the tribe in the purchase of arms, ammunition, supplies of various kinds, and necessary tools, receptacles, etc., for the gathering and transportation of the treasure. I should bring these things in a ship to Rio Negro and meet Casimiro at a point near the settlement fourteen days previous to the longest day of the coming summer, which will be the sixth of December, two months hence. Casimiro would then accompany me on the ship to a point on the coast farther south and nearer to the location of the treasure. If I failed to appear on the day appointed our treaty would be at an end. Of course I agreed. I received about one hundred and fifty pounds of gold-dust ten days later and immediately sailed for Buenos Ayres. I did not dare dispose of any considerable quantity of native gold here, for I am pretty well known and the location of my wanderings in the South was also known. Besides I wished to make a large portion of my purchases elsewhere in order to avoid exciting suspicion. So I sailed to England where I arrived early in August, turned my gold into money, bought all my supplies except food-stuffs, and now here I am laid up with a broken leg with none too great margin of time to keep my appointment with Casimiro in December.

“So you see, my lad, I am compelled to seek assistance. If I were well it would probably be impossible to charter a suitable sailing craft, do all that must be done here in buying, fitting, and other preparations, and sail before the end of the month. The five weeks remaining would be none too much for the uncertainties of such a voyage in a small ship. Now you know practically as much about this strange venture as I do. I have money enough left for the trip to Rio Negro and back besides all necessary purchases of supplies, etc. We may come back here penniless, we may bring the most valuable cargo that ship ever carried. Will you take the chances?”

Brent had listened to the Scotchman’s extraordinary narrative with ever increasing interest. The Patagonian chief’s description of buried millions in nature’s richest treasure-house bewildered him with its prodigality of wealth, its prodigious massing of riches. The story was almost incredible yet plausible. He knew not what to think. He was unable at first to think at all with calmness. But he had only one answer to Fraser’s fascinating proposition. If the prospect of success had been but one in a thousand it would have been enough.

“Of course I will take the chances and gladly,” he exclaimed warmly. “But do you not suspect,” he added presently, “that the Indians have concocted this story in order to secure through you the purchase of a large quantity of goods at much lower rates than they could obtain them from the traders?”

“A very natural suspicion, my lad,” responded Fraser, “and it does credit to your bump of caution. But I have absolute faith in them. My reasons are not easy to define, perhaps. I have heard some wonderful yarns in my time and I have grown even more suspicious than is reasonable, I imagine, but I believe these Patagonians told me the simple truth. That is far from saying we shall ever get possession of this treasure. Now, as for terms of partnership, I will pay all the expenses of the expedition and give you a third of whatever proceeds it yields. You agree to see the thing through to the end, coöperating with me of course in every way that circumstances may make necessary. Is that satisfactory?”

“Perfectly, and generously liberal terms they are, too,” said Brent, and the two men clasped hands to seal the compact.

CHAPTER II.
INVADING NATURE’S TREASURE-CHAMBER.

Brent never had worked so hard in his life as during the days that followed his strange engagement for the pursuit of fabulous treasure. The disabled Fraser, none too patient in his irksome imprisonment, directed most of the young man’s movements. His first efforts were in search of a suitable ship for a coasting and trading trip of indefinite length. He succeeded after a few days in finding a trim schooner of about two hundred and fifty tons which seemed to be just what was needed. Her owners were unwilling at first to charter her for an indefinite voyage that might last three months or possibly six. On Brent’s description of her, the Scotchman was willing to buy the craft outright if necessary, but a liberal offer finally secured possession of her for six months.

Fraser hoped they might succeed in returning to Buenos Ayres by the middle of February at latest. Casimiro had told him the gold was about one hundred miles from the coast, so that the task of transportation of the immense quantity he had described would be slow and difficult. But he had explained that it was near a river, easily navigable for canoes or rafts down stream but almost impossible of ascent by either means, so rapid was the current at many places. He had promised to make such preparations as he could with the primitive means at his command during the Scotchman’s absence. Fraser hoped, therefore, that with the assistance of the Patagonians the treasure might be brought to tide-water within a month of his arrival at the nearest point on the coast.

One point in their problem troubled both Fraser and Brent for some little time. How were they to load the gold (provided they got it) upon the schooner, bring it to Buenos Ayres, and transship it to England or New York without the crew’s or other handlers’ discovering the nature of the cargo? Both men agreed that every precaution must be taken to prevent the disclosure of such a secret. They finally decided that before being put upon the schooner the metal must be packed in strong boxes securely made and practically unbreakable. When they came to figure a little they found that on the basis of the chief’s calculation of the quantity of gold, it would require a good many boxes to contain it. Even if five hundred pounds should be packed in each case, which would be as great a weight as could be conveniently handled, there would be no less than four hundred boxes necessary to contain the two hundred thousand pounds which Casimiro had roughly indicated to be the amount of the treasure. The boxes would still be very small. The specific gravity of gold is so high that it occupies about one fourth the space of iron, weight for weight.

They determined that the boxes should be made of heavy two-inch timber, and that they should be lined with sheet iron and fastened with long stout screws. It was not an easy thing to procure the manufacture of such boxes, four hundred of them, at short notice. Brent divided the work among half a dozen carpenter shops and required that the work should be completed according to specification within ten days. He bought a large yawl which was put aboard the schooner. He hoped to use it for carrying the gold-packed cases, six at a time, from the shore to the ship as she lay at anchor. He procured also a windlass with necessary tackle for hoisting aboard the heavy cases from the small boat.

The schooner was thoroughly overhauled and refitted. Brent was fortunate in finding an English captain, who picked up a crew of Englishmen and Americans, four men only besides the mate and cook. They were good seamen, the captain assured Brent, and glad to ship for such a trip under promise of a bonus if the voyage was successful. The purchase of supplies in great variety occupied several days, and it was not until the very last week in the month that preparations for departure were practically completed. They were still delayed two or three days by the non-delivery of a few of the peculiar boxes that puzzled the sailors so much as they stowed them away in the hold.

Fraser, meantime, had been mending rapidly. On the day before going aboard the schooner, his damaged leg was taken out of its plaster cast, and the surgeon promised him that at the end of another month it would be as good as the other if he treated it properly. He was delighted with the schooner when he went aboard on the morning of sailing. He insisted on hobbling about the deck a little upon his new crutches and inspecting all the equipment of the trim little craft.

It was a beautiful spring day, the 31st of October, when the schooner picked her way gracefully among the shipping and out of Buenos Ayres harbor before a light wind. There was speed as well as seaworthiness in the craft, as the owners had promised, and the two fortune-hunters, who were her only passengers, were enthusiastic over the happy auspices under which they started on their extraordinary quest. The voyage was not eventful. Storms and calms, head winds and currents, made it a trip that taxed the patience of men with minds full of tremendous possibilities. Still it was no use grumbling, as Fraser explained to his companion. Nothing could be done until the 6th of December and they might as well spend the time at sea as at Rio Negro.

There were still ten days to spare when they dropped anchor off the Rio Negro settlement. They went ashore, and the Scotchman was heartily welcomed by his friends in the little colony. He made inquiries about the Indians, and learned that Casimiro had not been seen by any of the colonists since Fraser’s departure six months before. None of the natives had appeared often at the settlement within the same period, and trade with them had almost ceased. Fraser did not regard this as a bad sign.

Brent found the ten days’ waiting far from dull amid the picturesque scenery of the wild coast and the primitive colonial life which was all a charming novelty in his eyes. His partner was not yet able to make very active use of his convalescent limb, and an Englishman in the colony accompanied the young man on several long tramps through what was to him a delightful country.

On the morning of the 6th of December, Fraser and Brent set off together on foot at about ten o’clock. The Scotchman had almost discarded his crutches, but he carried them with him on this occasion. They would help to explain Brent’s presence to the chief, he intimated. The rendezvous was at a small spring in the hills, about four miles from the settlement, where Fraser and the Patagonian had often refreshed themselves on their tramps. High noon was to be the hour of meeting. They were fully an hour in advance of the time, and when they sat down by the pool of bubbling water in a charming little hollow among the rugged hills, there was no sign of any living creature hear them. They talked together for half an hour or more about the possible results of their venture, and then the younger man began to be anxious. He was feverishly impatient to see the strange man upon whose simple, unsecured promise they had based weeks of time and effort. As the minutes passed and they saw and heard nothing save nature’s face and voice about them, Brent was unable to conceal his fears of disappointment.

“Do you think he will come?” he asked impatiently looking again at his watch and noting that the hands were close to the meridian.

“I wish I was as sure of getting the gold as I am that Casimiro will keep his appointment,” said Fraser smiling. “Don’t judge him by your watch. The sun will govern his movements.”

Scarcely had he spoken when the Scotchman sprang suddenly to his feet and started rapidly upon his crutches toward a group of trees about two hundred yards away on the opposite side of the little valley. Brent looked and saw a man standing there motionless. Uncertain of his welcome, the young man waited until his friend should explain his unexpected appearance at the tryst. He saw the two men meet, greet each other, and engage in conversation. Then they came slowly toward the spring, talking earnestly together.

As they drew near, Brent watched the splendid figure of the Patagonian with growing surprise and admiration. He could not believe it was a man of ninety, this proud, unbent form with the bearing of an athlete, the reserved vigor of a retired gladiator. His face alone and the white hair upon his great bare breast gave token of age. His features were Caucasian in type, almost Grecian in mold. The eyes were dark, still brilliant and searching, but they had in them even greater depths of melancholy than Fraser had described. Brent felt before a word had been spoken an involuntary springing up within him of the same implicit confidence in this man which he had been unable to understand in his friend. He felt himself in the presence of one who commanded something deeper than respect—a savage perhaps, but a personified force and power and wisdom such as the young man had never encountered before. He approached the newcomer with a deference which was not assumed and greeted him with some words in the native tongue which Fraser had taught him.

Casimiro received him gravely but kindly. He accepted the outstretched hand and said a word or two of welcome which Brent was delighted to find he could understand.

“I have told Cacique Casimiro,” said Fraser, “that it is to your assistance that I owe my ability to keep my promise here to-day, that I owe you much in many ways, that I have made you my friend and partner, that in all things you will be to him and his people as I am, and that you are more worthy than I to be intrusted with the mission he has offered me.”

Brent endeavored in a mixture of Spanish and the native language of the Patagonian to express his thanks for the welcome and his desire to render to him and to his people every service in his power. Casimiro watched the young man keenly for some moments. Presently he said gravely:

“Your words are good, young man, which is nothing. Your face is true, which is much. I trust your friend, who is my friend, therefore I trust you. It shall be as he says.” And the old chief offered his hand, which the young man took with genuine pride at the honor which he felt had been conferred upon him.

Casimiro said no more upon the subject but forthwith asked the Scotchman for an account of his adventures and stewardship, which the latter gave at some length. The chief listened attentively but made no comments until the story was finished. He expressed himself as perfectly satisfied with what had been done. Then he sat very silent and very grave for some time. Both Brent and Fraser grew a little apprehensive of what might be coming and they were startled at Casimiro’s first words when he finally spoke.

“I bring bad news for my people,” he began sadly. “We cannot, I fear, expel from our country the gold which will surely crush us and blot us out.” He noticed the involuntary dismay upon the faces of both the white men. He went on with a touch of bitterness in his voice: “Do not fear. You shall have all I promised and more. The gold is more, much more, than I told you. We have been digging it up and storing it, that you might take it away easily. We cannot move it all, not with many horses, in many weeks. Many rafts cannot float it. The white men’s biggest ship cannot carry it away. I fear we are lost.”

The two listeners were haggard with astonishment at the chief’s words. They looked at him confused, half comprehending. When the significance of the stern old Patagonian’s utterance came home to them its inherent improbability did not arouse doubts of his truthfulness. There was an intrinsic honesty about the man that disarmed suspicion and compelled confidence. So it was that the minds of both his companions did not stop to question his almost incredible declarations, but turned at once to the problem which his statement presented. The Scotchman was the first to find his tongue, and speaking in Spanish, which all three understood fairly well, he said:

“Your words amaze us beyond expression, Casimiro. It is difficult for us to conceive of so great a quantity of gold as you describe. It is impossible for us to believe the amount is greater than can be moved. The white man’s skill in such tasks is beyond anything that can be known to you. He makes rivers where before was dry land, he digs a path through the heart of vast mountains, he forces back the sea from the shore, he builds ships larger by fifty or a hundred fold than those which come to your coast. The task you set for us will not be impossible. Neither shall we find it necessary to bring other white men for its execution, which would be an offense to you and your people. We will accomplish it with the help of your own strong men. We have brought tools, which you will easily learn to use. We will build rafts so large that they will carry more than five hundred horses can draw. Many of these rafts will float your gold to the sea. We will bring a ship so great that her length will stretch from this spot as far as yonder trees where you appeared to us. You and your people shall yourselves put the gold upon this ship, and no white man on board her shall put foot upon your shores or ever again return to disturb you. Believe me, the undertaking is not beyond our powers.”

“You speak of riddles and wonders, of works of God and not of men,” responded Casimiro in incredulous awe, but deeply impressed nevertheless by the Scotchman’s earnest confidence. Turning suddenly to a steep cliff towering nearly one hundred feet above them, the chief raised his arm toward it and asked, “Could you cut down yonder rock and carry it away?”

“Aye, ’tis often done and greater works than that in building the iron path for the locomotive, which you know runs with faster speed than horses between the white men’s settlements not very far now to the north,” the Scotchman answered.

“Yes, my young men have seen it and told me of it,” said the chief. “Your words give me hope. We will go to the spot where my people are still at work separating the gold from the earth. You shall judge for yourselves whether the task is too great for you.”

They decided to go immediately to the harbor and sail at once to the mouth of the river which Casimiro had described as flowing from the hiding-place of his treasure. Fraser judged from the chief’s words that the point was two hundred miles or more down the coast. They reached the settlement in an hour’s time and went on board the schooner. Instructions had been given in advance for everything to be in readiness for immediate departure, and before three o’clock the anchor was up and they were under way.

Under baffling breezes and with the necessity for keeping within sight of the coast that Casimiro might not lose the bearings, the voyage was a slow one. On the fifth day, the chief sighted a landmark which he said was close to their destination. The schooner soon ran into a large, well-protected, natural harbor. The coast was still rugged and forbidding and not a sign of human handiwork or habitation was visible. It was not until they were well within the little bay that they discovered that it concealed the mouth of a river of considerable size, which found its way somehow through what appeared to be an impenetrable wall of rocky hills. A quiet anchorage was found about two hundred yards from the shore, but as it was nearly dusk no attempt was made to land that night.

At daybreak the next morning Casimiro was on deck eagerly scanning the shore near the mouth of the large stream, whose current swept into the bay several hundred yards from where the ship lay. At length the old chief sprang upon the railing and waved his arms as though signaling. A few minutes later a boat or native canoe put out from the shore and came rapidly toward the ship. Three Patagonians soon came on board. They stood talking for a long time with Casimiro in the bow of the schooner, while all others on board were still below and asleep. Their consultation seemed to result in an agreement of some sort and, when it was finished, Casimiro went below and aroused Fraser and Brent. It was not yet six o’clock although the sun was almost two hours high. The two men soon made their appearance, surprised to find guests already on board. The Scotchman quickly recognized the three Indians as the chiefs who had joined in their council eight months before and he greeted them warmly. Brent was presented to them and they received him not unkindly. They were all younger men than Casimiro, but past middle life and in the prime of physical vigor. Each was more than six feet tall, well built, muscular, and splendidly developed. In color they were neither as coppery as the North American aborigines, nor as brown as the mulatto.

Their features were of the same general type as Casimiro’s, neither sharply aquiline nor round like a Teuton’s.

Casimiro said to the two white men that he had explained the situation to his brother caciques, including what Fraser had said about the removal of the gold, and that they joined in his own opinions. The younger chiefs expressed immediate interest in the cargo which the ship contained, and while breakfast was being prepared Fraser and Brent displayed to them many of the articles that they had brought. The Indians said that a large number of horses and several of their tribesmen were on shore near by ready to transport the supplies into the interior. The Scotchman assured them that the work should begin that very day.

They ate upon deck, the visitors preferring to squat cross-legged upon the white floor and take their food in native fashion. The captain of the schooner in a spirit of hospitality brought out a bottle of Scotch whisky, with which he was about to regale his savage guests when Fraser caught sight of it. He astonished the skipper with a sharp request to put the liquor quickly out of sight. He explained in English that the chiefs were much prejudiced against white men’s liquors, which had worked great havoc with many of their followers, and that the chances of profitable trading would be much diminished if whisky should be offered to any Indians who might come on board.

In answer to Fraser’s questions, Casimiro said that there were about one hundred members of his tribe in the hills near by and that they had with them some two hundred horses which could be used to carry inland much of the schooner’s cargo. Nearly all the other male Caillitchets were in the vicinity of the Bed of Gold, where they had been engaged for weeks in gathering up and putting the bright metal into caches. The spot lay two days’ journey to the southwest. The chief proposed that a portion of the ship’s cargo should be landed at once, its transportation arranged for, and then the four caciques with Fraser and Brent should ride on ahead to the goal the two white men were so anxious to reach. The plan was adopted.

The Scotchman decided to land first the tools and materials for mining and raft-building. He had brought for the latter purpose nearly one hundred axes, some saws, a large supply of heavy spikes, and a liberal quantity of small wire rope. The Indians were much interested as these articles were brought out and their uses explained. They began evidently to credit more fully Fraser’s confident assertion that the difficulties which had been described were not insurmountable. A yawl-load of miscellaneous articles was made ready at once and with Fraser and Brent on board they followed the canoe of the four chiefs to a landing place about six hundred yards from the ship. They found it in a tiny rock-bound cove with a narrow beach so steep that as the heavy boat ran upon it, the occupants were able to step dry-shod from the bows.

It was a novel experience for Brent, a New Yorker blasé to all the fin de siècle features of civilization, but ignorant a few days before of all but the existence of these savages and their wild, almost untrodden country. Prudence suggested treachery and danger in placing himself thus at the mercy of untried barbarians. He felt no alarm. The streets of New York or Paris or London did not seem to him safer than this virgin wilderness under the protection of its dark-skinned sons. There appeared presently along a faint trail winding up among the rocks others of the Patagonians. They greeted their caciques with a gutteral sound or two and at once assisted in unloading the boat, whose contents they examined with great curiosity.

Casimiro suggested that while the boat returned to the ship for another load, they should visit the native camp not far away. Fraser and Brent followed the old chief for nearly a mile up the steep trail until they came suddenly upon a little plateau still surrounded by hills. The American was astonished to find grazing upon the luxuriant grass a large herd of the finest horses he had ever seen assembled together. His exclamations of admiration pleased the Patagonian. The old man proudly made known to him that his people were the best horsemen and possessed the best horses in all the world. Brent was a lover of horses and a good judge of their qualities. He had not been among the Patagonians twenty-four hours before he was willing to admit without reservation both points of Casimiro’s somewhat sweeping boast. Horsemanship that was a marvel of skill, strength, bravery, recklessness, and endurance was matched only by the speed, training, intelligence, and beauty of the splendid animals that made the wonderful exploits possible.

The American’s attention was divided between the horses and their masters. Three or four score Indians were in the camp, and they watched the white visitors curiously. Nearly all these natives were men of superior physical qualities. Brent thought they would average somewhat greater in height and general proportions than a similar number of Americans or Englishmen, but they were by no means giants. He went about among them without hesitation, and tried to profit by a month’s instruction from Fraser in their native language by expressing his admiration of the horses. Their stoical silence soon gave way to evident surprise and pleasure, both at hearing their own tongue spoken by a white man and by his tribute to their one great pride. The Indians caught several of the finest horses and led them up to the young man for his inspection. He was delighted and his pleasure was so manifest that it soon won the confidence and friendship of the Patagonians. Several of them mounted and performed feats in riding that he had never seen attempted even in the circus-ring. He was so absorbed in the exciting scenes that he was quite loth to accompany his friend back to the boat and would not believe it when he was told he had been for three hours admiring Patagonian horses and horsemanship.

With the help of the Indians and four or five canoes, besides the big yawl, rapid progress was made in discharging the schooner’s cargo. The boxes intended for packing with gold, it was decided to leave on board until after the trip to the interior. On the third day, Brent, Fraser, and the four chiefs started on their journey toward the Cordilleras. Mounted on six of the best horses in the herd they set off at a sharp lope soon after daybreak. Brent had a blanket for a saddle, and the others rode bareback. The two white men and one of the Indians carried rifles; the others were contented with the bolas with which all the Indians were armed. It is a peculiar weapon, if weapon it be called. It consists of two heavy balls of metal or stone connected with a strong thong or cord. The Indians are wonderfully expert in using it against all manner of game or human enemies. They bring down a wild horse at an almost incredible distance. The bola goes flying through the air and twists itself about the fore or hind legs of the running animal throwing it violently to the ground. It is sometimes used also with deadly effect as a single or double slung-shot, the wielder holding the cord in the middle.

The route for many miles over a faint trail was rough and difficult. The country through which they passed was picturesque almost to grandeur. It was far from being the “bleak and uninhabitable region” which the geographies only a few years ago would have us believe was a truthful description of Patagonia. Late in the day the path became smoother and the landscape more even. They were upon a high table-land, fertile and delightful. But nature’s charms had few attractions for Brent during the last three or four hours of the drive. Riding without a saddle for ten or eleven hours with only a brief halt at midday was no joke to a man who had not been on horseback for six months and who was physically quite out of training. For the others in the party, even Fraser, there seemed to be little fatigue in the trip, and Brent did his best to conceal his feelings. There was something very like a twinkle in the eye of old Casimiro, when they finally halted for the night and the American limped very unsteadily from his horse to the spot chosen for a camp-fire. The chief made no comment at the time.

It was a hungry group that did full justice to the supper Cuastro prepared. Some few delicacies from the schooner’s stores had been brought along for the benefit of the two strangers, but the viand which Brent enjoyed most of all was a liberal piece of a tender fillet or steak which was roasted over hot embers. The young man remarked enthusiastically that it was the most appetizing morsel he had tasted for many a day.

“Do you know what it was?” asked Fraser with a peculiar smile.

“No, why?” replied Brent noticing the odd expression on the face of his friend.

“It was one of the best cuts from a well-fatted mare,” said the Scotchman. “Nearly all the meat the Patagonians eat is horseflesh and they think it the best in the world. I’m glad you like it.”

Brent turned pale, but he rallied bravely before his feelings could overcome him. “Great Scott,” he exclaimed, “have I been eating horseflesh? I’m glad you didn’t tell me before. Perhaps it was hunger that made it seem so good. It thinks bad, but it didn’t taste bad.”

Fraser laughed heartily. “I was afraid you wouldn’t eat it if I told you, and I didn’t want you to offend the chiefs,” he said. “Really there is nothing unwholesome about it. It isn’t as though it were an old, worn-out animal that had spent its life in city streets. They prepare horses for food with more care than we do beef and mutton. Animals that do not come up to their high standards of speed and strength furnish the most esteemed delicacies of their bill of fare.”

Soon after eating, Brent was fain to wrap himself in his blanket and rest his aching limbs. Casimiro called him away from the fire and suggested that they should walk for a time. The young man pleaded fatigue and he felt indeed scarcely able to keep his feet. The chief explained partly by signs that if he would walk briskly until the cramped muscles were limbered up, he would be much better able to continue the journey in comfort on the morrow; otherwise he would have a painful experience. Brent acted on the advice, though at the expense of an uncomfortable half-hour. He felt better for the exercise even before he slept.

The next day’s journey was easier and more rapid. Their destination lay, the chiefs said, in a group of high mountains which were in sight all day. They were a spur or offshoot of the Cordilleras of the Andes, the main range lying still two or three hundred miles to the west. In the afternoon the landscape again became broken. At length Casimiro led the party into a narrow defile which grew wilder and grander with every furlong. The trail, which no stranger could have discovered, crept along the side of a mountain, craggy and bare. For a time they were just above the verdure of a narrow valley, which below was bright and fresh along the banks of a twisting river, while over them hung black and threatening masses, flung into grotesque and insecure shapes by some not remote cataclysm of nature.

The path became narrow and shelf-like. The verdure below them disappeared. The valley grew narrower and more wild. The river was condensed almost out of sight between steep black precipices. Their horses walked in single file and the riders made no attempt to guide them. The strange scene awoke a conflict of emotion in the minds of the two white men. The sense of danger could not overcome the mingled admiration and awe which some of nature’s weird manifestations aroused in them. The marks of a terrific convulsion of gigantic forces were all about them. There were no signs of volcanic action, but the disturbance seemed to have been even more violent than that which accompanies the eruption of a volcano.

Turning after a time a bend in the trail, the leader of the file suddenly stopped, waited till the white men had approached, and then pointed silently with his long arm to the opposite side of the gorge. Brent gave an exclamation of amazement. His companion was too astonished to speak. They saw the opposite mountain, which had seemed more massive and regular than the one they were circling, apparently cleft in two by a narrow line from peak to deepest base. It was as though the stroke of a mighty knife or the blow of a colossal ax had split the vast mass in twain. The heart of the great mountain had become transparent and they looked through it to bright sunshine and green fields in the plain beyond. It was a narrow glimpse, a single, thin column of light that pierced the black cone from summit to foundation. If they moved a few steps forward or back the phenomenon was not visible, the mountain became as dense and impenetrable as the rock upon which they were standing.

The two white men gazed in silent wonder at this evidence before them of a fit of mighty fury to which some natural or supernatural power had given vent. Nature’s wildest, maddest chaos was all about them. Even the Indians, to whom the scene was not new, were awed by the grim grandeur, the anarchy of matter that reigned supreme in this domain of Titanic wrath. The six horsemen grouped themselves in a small niche, where the pathway widened into the side of the mountain. The horses seemed to partake of the mute solemnity of the spot. They stood silent and statue-like as though the intrusion of life was a desecration amid these monuments of a vanished rage. Minutes passed without a word being spoken. At length, when the first spell of a dead but mighty power had relaxed its hold upon them, Casimiro raised his hand, pointed with long, bony finger into the heart of the valley below them, and said:

“White men, there lies the curse from which you must rescue my people.”

They looked and amid the gathering shadows in the depths they saw a single gleam of white. And presently they hurried on.

CHAPTER III.
WHERE GOLD WAS AS DROSS.

It was dusk when the six horsemen, descending the still tortuous path, reached the bottom of the mountain-guarded valley. They had been challenged by a small band of Indians when they first entered the narrow pass between the mountains two hours before. Now again three dark-skinned sentinels suddenly barred their way with a gruff command which the white men did not understand. Casimiro responded, giving what was probably a countersign. The shadows were so dark that the three guardsmen of the pass did not recognize their chief until he spoke. When they heard his voice they made obeisance to him, and he conversed with them for a few moments.

The party moved on presently and came at once upon a scene quite different from the wild and barren chaos of the mountain-side. It was a bit of nature’s most peaceful loveliness thrown down in the midst of her most majestic confusion; it was an emerald in a setting of jet, an oasis of beauty in a desert of shapeless grandeur. There were nodding flowers, waving grass, and a grove of stately trees. The twilight softened the grim shapes of the surrounding heights. Nature’s face had changed suddenly from frowns to smiles and the transformation was bewildering. The visitors were puzzled and delighted. They had seen no sign of verdure from the pass above, when Casimiro pointed out what seemed to be but a tiny patch of white sand. It was not a wide expanse, this spot of fertility in a sterile wilderness, but it afforded pasturage for quite a large herd of horses and among the trees beyond was a village of huts.

A number of natives caught sight of the party and came to meet them. They received the chiefs, Casimiro especially, with many signs of respect and pleasure. The white men they regarded with curious interest. Dismounting at the edge of a small forest, the newcomers were conducted to the center of the village, where a fire burned in front of a group of larger huts. Food was prepared and they were soon satisfying an appetite so vigorous that even in Brent’s case it was not disturbed by any suspicion of the viands provided. After the meal, Casimiro explained that the golden sands lay just beyond the forest, a few minutes’ walk from the village. Little could be gained by a visit that night, for the darkness in the valley was by that time intense. Great as was the eagerness of Brent and Fraser to see the treasure which had tempted them into this far-away wilderness, they wisely restrained their impatience. They were well content, after the excitement of the afternoon’s wonders had worn off, to indulge the heavy fatigue which followed by early retirement to the large hut and beds of skins and leaves which were assigned to them.

Very early in the morning they were ready to accompany Casimiro. Somewhat to their surprise, he led them first in a different direction from that in which he had indicated the deposit of gold lay. They came in a few minutes to the sandy, shelving bank of the river, whose course they had watched for many miles on their journey. Casimiro quickly disrobed and plunged into the sparkling water, inviting his companions to follow. Brent imagined the baptism might be some religious or purifying rite which he must perform before being allowed to touch the Patagonian treasure. Inasmuch as the bath was most tempting in itself, the young man was nothing loth, and all three were soon swimming about in the very cool stream. Brent enjoyed himself immensely until he discovered that they were not alone. Other Indians appeared above and below them on the bank of the river and in a few moments the whole tribe, men, women, and children, were in the river enjoying their morning bath.

Brent did not notice what was going on till it was impossible to escape from the situation. As soon as he realized the dilemma he shouted in such horror-stricken accents to his friend that the Scotchman thought a cramp or a wandering crocodile had seized the young man. He swam rapidly to his assistance. Brent explained his alarm.

“I’m afraid we’ll have to take rather a long bath, lad,” responded the Scotchman ruefully, “and the water’s getting cold already. I ought to have thought of this. The Patagonians always take a plunge, every mother’s son and daughter of them, every morning.”

“Good gracious, how long will they be about it?”

“Not long, I hope. We might swim over to the opposite bank and stay in shallow water till they clear out.”

They paddled across stream and found a place where they could sit upon a sunken rock with the water up to their necks. Presently Casimiro caught sight of them, swam across, and suggested that they should return with him, dress, and have breakfast. The two men were at a loss to explain their embarrassment to the chief. They feared he would not understand and might misconstrue their motives for not desiring to join the promiscuous bathing party.

“We want to stay in the water a little longer,” said Brent in rather shaky accents, while his teeth belied his tongue by beginning to rattle violently.

“No, no, bad, very bad, too cold stay long,” said Casimiro paddling about uneasily and plainly puzzled by the behavior of the two white men. There was an anxious expression upon the two faces, perched side by side on the rock, while cold little wavelets rippled against their chins. They were attracting attention from the opposite bank where most of the natives were already donning their scanty clothing. Some of the bathers began to leave the bank, and Fraser and Brent were pleased to note that most of the women were among those going away.

“I think we’d better risk it, lad, and swim back, or they’ll all be coming over here to see what’s the matter,” said the shivering Fraser presently. “Besides, we’ll get a cramp if we stay here any longer.”

Casimiro was immensely relieved when his odd guests left their perch and struck out vigorously for the opposite bank. He followed them with strong strokes. The two were thankful to see only men about when they reached shoal water. They didn’t wait to investigate further but made a dash for their clothes, into which they scrambled and then began running violently up and down in the early sunshine in order to restore warmth to their chilled blood. Casimiro shook his head in still greater mystification.

The exercise and a hearty meal quite neutralized the bad effects of the morning episode, and before the sun was two hours high, Brent, Fraser, and a party of natives sought the spot which nature had made her richest treasure-house. Five or ten minutes’ walk through the trees brought them to a bare, barren spot, scarcely more than four hundred yards in extent, apparently a mere waste of sand which had been much thrown and tossed about.

“The gold lies there,” said Casimiro, indicating the center of the white field where the surface had been much disturbed.

Brent was surprised and disappointed. He saw nothing but worthless heaps of sand in a spot whose only interest was the mighty works of nature which surrounded and shut it in. Fraser’s trained eye sparkled with anticipation.

“I see it all,” exclaimed the Scotchman looking rapidly about him at the general topography of the situation. “This used to be the bed of the river. There were falls over that straight line of rock there at the boundary of the sand, and all this is the gathered accumulation of ages in a great hollow or cup just before the water poured over the barrier. Does the river flow through the gap in the mountain we saw yesterday?” he asked turning to the Patagonian.

“Yes. We believe in the early days of our fathers it flowed here,” answered the chief.

“Exactly,” went on the Scotchman. “That convulsion, whenever it took place, changed the whole course of the river and left this basin full of gold, brought down bit by bit for centuries from the hills behind us and many miles away. But what an ideal placer mine! Nothing to do but to sift the gold from the sand!” And they went toward the primitive workings.

They found much more extensive excavations than they expected. The natives had, in fact, very completely tested the extent and value of the deposit. Casimiro explained that on the borders of the sandy expanse the depth of earth was only a few inches and practically no gold was mixed with it. Beneath the sand was a solid, sloping bed of rock, almost saucer-shaped, as Fraser discovered. The gold lay mostly at the bottom and in greatest richness within a space of only about one hundred yards square. The depth of sand to the gold and bed-rock was scarcely ten feet. None of these facts were at first apparent to the visitors. They saw no gold. Fraser and Brent picked up handfuls of the coarse sand here and there, but they found no trace of the precious metal. They went down into some of the older trenches, but discovered nothing. At length Casimiro led them to what was evidently a newer working. Some poor, wooden tools had been dropped by the users just where they had stopped work.

Fraser sprang into the trench suddenly and got down upon his hands and knees. He scraped about among the earth with his bare fingers. In a few moments he rose to his feet, called his friend to the edge of the ditch, and put into his hand a yellow nugget, so heavy that Brent almost dropped it. It was the size of a small hen’s egg.

“It’s thicker than plums in a Christmas pudding down here,” the old miner exclaimed in great excitement. “Come and see.”

Brent, nothing loth and as much excited as his companion, leaped down and began scratching in the earth at the bottom of the ditch as madly as the Scotchman had done. Fraser clawed at the loose sand a few feet away. The lust of gold seized both men like a fever. They tore out the shining nuggets from their envelope of earth in frenzied haste, cramming them one after another into their pockets. They shouted to each other in exclamations of glee and disjointed words over each yellow lump, bigger than the last. They toiled on almost frantically, still on hands and knees and with only fingers for tools. They became breathless with their exertions, but panting they worked on.

At last Brent looked up. He saw Casimiro a few feet above him. The old chief was standing silent as a statue, with folded arms, watching the mad outburst of the passion for gold in the two men at his feet. Upon his face was a melancholy but proud superiority, mingled with something of pity and of contempt. Brent rose to his feet. His hands fell at his side and he hung his head. His face, already dripping with sweat, flushed a deeper crimson under a sudden sense of shame. He stood abashed and humiliated before this savage, who became in his eyes the personification of a higher virtue than his own. Then as the revulsion of feeling grew upon him, the young man plunged his hand into his pockets and flung back into the trench the yellow treasure he had gathered. Casimiro stopped him.

“The white man loves gold; let him keep it,” said the old man quietly.

The Scotchman’s attention was attracted by the incident, and he, too, shamefacedly recovered his self-control. He endeavored to apologize for his own and Brent’s greedy excitement. Casimiro indicated that no apology was necessary. The effect of gold upon them, in whose integrity and virtue he had high confidence, was but another proof of the danger of allowing such a temptation to remain and attract white men to his country. Both men felt thoroughly uncomfortable as they clambered out of the ditch and proceeded in saner fashion to inspect the marvelous deposit of treasure.

They gathered from Casimiro’s explanation that fully two thirds of the sand-filled basin had been carefully gone over within the last few months and all the gold removed down to bed-rock. They found upon examination that the natives had not merely dug trenches through the sand. They had begun the work systematically at one side of the deposit by separating the gold from the sand along a long line. They advanced regularly and slowly in this line, throwing behind them the sand as fast as it had been treated. In this way they had shifted and cleaned two thirds of all the earth in the whole basin. About five hundred men had been engaged in this task, Casimiro said, and he believed they would be able to complete it in three or four months more.

They walked all over the deposit, and Fraser examined carefully some samples of the sand that had been worked.

“They have done it very thoroughly,” he remarked in considerable surprise. “I don’t discover a trace of free gold in what is left.”

Then in calmer frame of mind he entered again the trench which separated the barren from the gold-bearing earth and studied the nature of the deposit more critically. The gold lay almost entirely in the very lowest stratum, resting upon or within five or six inches of the bed-rock which had been the bottom of the river. Casimiro said that in several quite large areas they had found nearly two inches of pure gold, unmixed with sand, lying upon the smooth rock at the bottom of the basin. In five minutes a digger had often scooped up all that a bearer could carry away. So easy and rapid had been the work of taking the gold from its bed and separating it from the gravel, that no less than thirty men on the average had been employed daily merely in carrying the metal from the trenches to the caches, or pits, which had been dug for its reception near by.

Casimiro led the way finally to these sunken depositories, only a few hundred feet away upon the bank of the river. Only one mound of earth, beside what seemed to be a large open grave, was visible. The chief said that sixteen other pits had been filled and covered over with earth and débris very carefully so as to leave no trace of their existence. They walked to the side of the excavation still open and looked in.

It would have shaken the sanity of some men to have gazed into that pit. Naked treasure was heaped up there enough to ransom a state. Both men were fascinated. The sun shone upon the virgin gold and dazzled their eyes with the yellow glare. Brent turned his face away after a moment and drew his hand across his forehead as though in a maze. Fraser gazed on in apparent indifference. Presently he seemed to be measuring the pit and the pile of earth beside it with his eye and remarked musingly:

“About twelve feet by six—I wonder how deep it is?”

The gold filled the pit to within two feet of the surface of the ground. The Scotchman had no means of judging the quantity or value of the metal. Its great weight occupies such small space that he was quite confident that several hundred tons of the precious stuff lay before him. And worth one hundred and twenty thousand pounds a ton! It wasn’t worth while estimating such a treasure in pounds sterling or avoirdupois. Fraser shook his head and looked round at his companions. They too were silent and distrait.

Just then an Indian bending under a very small but evidently very heavy load came up to them. He stopped at the edge of the pit, lifted down a bag from his shoulder, opened it, and poured carelessly upon the accumulation beneath a shower of fresh gold. Then he shook the bag and walked slowly away. Both Fraser and Brent drew long breaths as they watched him. When the man had gone, Casimiro turned to his silent companions, waved his hand toward the treasure before them, and remarked with a grim smile:

“It is yours. When will you take it away?”

“We must think, Casimiro,” said Fraser presently. “We are overcome by the sight of such treasure. It is beyond anything we have dreamed of.”

It was some time before the effect of the demonstration of the truth of Casimiro’s promises enabled the two white men to think calmly on the situation and on the problem before them. They told each other that they would be perfectly content if they might take away with them a small fraction of that last great pitful of gold and leave all the rest. But this they could not do. They were under pledge to despoil these Patagonians of all their riches or go away empty-handed. If they succeeded in the apparently feasible task of carrying away this fabulous treasure, they were to be made rich far above any of their fellows for practically nothing in return. It seemed like robbery. They had not looked at it in that light before, but the sight of the gold itself aroused their scruples. They went over together two or three times Casimiro’s statement of the case from the standpoint of his people and they were unable to find serious moral or economic flaws in it.

After they had discussed the matter, they invited Casimiro to consult with them. They pressed him to suggest additional services which they might render in exchange for the stupendous gift he was about to bestow upon them. The wise old man shook his head.

“The white man’s luxuries would but corrupt and destroy us,” he said. “It were better that we died by his sword than by his vices. I fear the effect of even a too liberal supply of food and clothing and arms which you will send us. It will encourage sloth and soften too much the wholesome rigor of our simple life. No, no, you shall not kill us with kindness.”

Brent, who knew something of the crime his own countrymen had committed in sapping the life and spirit of the North American Indians by a mistaken liberality in supplying their physical appetites, admired and indorsed the wisdom of the old chief’s words. Casimiro exacted a pledge from both men that the danger which he feared should be carefully guarded against by them in the selection of the annual shipload of goods which they agreed to send to his people.

For several days Fraser and Brent devoted themselves assiduously to the problem—how to convey safely and with reasonable speed to the coast the great mass of treasure which had been spread before them. It was no trifling task, and the American was inclined to be almost hopeless of its accomplishment. He felt himself unable to contribute anything to the solution of it, and he chafed under the ignorance which made him helpless against a practical difficulty, while his partner was full of resources.

First, they set about ascertaining as closely as possible the quantity or weight of the metal which was to be moved. In this matter, Brent, who was expert at figures, was able to be of assistance. They made calculations in two or three ways. They estimated by various rude tests that the load carried by each bearer from the trench in the sand to the hoarding-pits was about one hundred pounds in weight. Casimiro was able to inform them that each pit contained about five thousand such loads. This meant about two hundred and fifty tons of virgin gold in each pit, or a total of about four thousand tons!

Fraser managed to contrive a serviceable pair of balances, with the aid of his pocket knife, string, bits of wood, and other material at command. They tested them by balancing weights in the improvised scale-pans and then shifting them from one arm to the other. The exact weight of their rifle cartridges was printed upon the cartridge boxes. Using several of these in place of standard weights they balanced them with gold-dust. The Scotchman after some difficulty managed to construct a cubical receptacle which his pocket rule assured him measured exactly twelve inches in each of its dimensions. Its capacity therefore was just one cubic foot. Into this he poured gold from his scale-pan after balancing it with cartridges and keeping account of the number of weighings. It was a slow process and it took a long time to fill his cubic-foot box. He was surprised to find that the weight of a cubic foot of closely-packed, loose gold, according to his rough test, was about one thousand pounds avoirdupois. Then they measured the last pit which had been dug and which Casimiro assured them was the same as the others in size. They found that the space designed to be occupied by the gold was about four hundred and thirty-six cubic feet. That quantity of gold would weigh then about two hundred and forty tons—practically a confirmation of their first estimate.

After all this work had been done, Brent suddenly called to mind the school-book information that the weight of a cubic foot of water is sixty-two and one half pounds and that the specific gravity of gold is nineteen—simple facts, which, if he had recollected them sooner, would have saved them more than a day’s labor.

The truth was before them, at all events, that the prodigious treasure already awaiting removal amounted to about four thousand tons, while if Casimiro’s estimate of what remained proved correct the final total would be no less than six thousand tons. The figures were almost meaningless to their comprehension at first. Brent figured out on a bit of paper what it meant in money. Gold he knew was worth about three hundred dollars a pound when pure. Six thousand tons, or twelve million pounds avoirdupois, at that rate amounted to three billion six hundred million dollars! He showed the figures to Fraser.

“More than seven hundred million pounds sterling!” the Scotchman exclaimed. He was silent for some moments, and then he said: “Well, lad, I wish it was only six tons instead of six thousand. It would be far more tempting. One means comfort and no worry for each of us. The other—I’m afraid to think what it may mean for us.”

“It will mean a life of the most galling publicity and notoriety, unless we can conceal the existence of the bulk of the treasure from the world’s knowledge,” said Brent earnestly, as the apprehension of the penalties of great wealth suddenly dawned upon him.

“You are right,” answered Fraser. “We cannot guard the secret too carefully, and all our plans must bend to that end.” From that hour, Brent never lost sight of this danger. It furnished the dominant motive in all his dealings with the gold of the Cordilleras.

After the fourth day following their arrival in the golden valley, the two strangers and the native chiefs took careful account of the facilities at their command for transporting the immense weight of treasure which nature had surrendered to them. Fraser was much pleased to discover that the material for raft-building was very abundant. The change in the bed of the river had left a great level area below and in front of the rocky barrier over which the water had formerly poured. The new course of the stream after passing through the riven mountain returned to the old bed at a sharp angle just below this point. At times of high water this former river-bottom was flooded, and it had become the depository of great quantities of débris which the receding waters in their annual or semi-annual freshets had left behind. Fraser noted that an immense number of well-seasoned logs or tree-trunks were included in the accumulation.

The supplies from the schooner, including all the tools and other appliances, arrived by the time the Scotchman was ready to make use of them. He tried the experiment of raft-building at once. The Indians proved ready pupils, and the novelty of the work attracted them. The horses easily dragged the heavy timber by means of log-chains to the water, and in a single day Fraser constructed a large raft, capable of floating safely seventy-five tons in any but a most violent stream. He was astonished to find the wood so buoyant. It was of light grain, but not porous, and it easily sustained more than twice its own weight in the water. The Scotchman estimated that the building of a series of rafts that would carry one hundred tons each might easily be accomplished.

The problem of transportation appeared, therefore, to find its solution provided by nature, who in her lavish generosity had supplied even the means for making the rifling of her treasure-house a pastime. Fraser explained his plans to Casimiro, loaded his trial raft with stones to show its carrying capacity, and made it clear that the means were at hand for conveying safely away even the immense load of wealth that had appalled him. The chief expressed his admiration and satisfaction in strong terms. He was fully convinced that his plans regarding the gold which menaced his people would be successfully executed.

The new year had arrived before all the elements of the situation had been thoroughly examined and the two white men were able to make comprehensive plans for the future. Fraser estimated that the work of taking out the remainder of the gold, building rafts, floating the treasure to the coast, and there unloading and re-burying it before putting it on shipboard, would occupy fully six and perhaps eight months. To carry it away to London or New York would require a vessel of the largest capacity. In view of their wish to conceal the existence of the treasure from the world, elaborate precautions must be taken. Not an ounce of the gold must be allowed to leave the country except under secure cover, where it could masquerade as ore. Fortunately, the very vastness of the treasure was the best security against suspicion. Six tons of gold packed in mysterious boxes might lead its handlers to guess its identity; but six thousand tons, never. Nothing approaching such a quantity of the precious metal ever existed under one control and everybody would scout such an idea as preposterous.

After many long talks they decided upon a general plan of operation. Fraser would remain and direct the work of transporting the gold to the coast. Brent would take with him to New York about two million dollars’ worth of the metal. There he would buy or build a suitable private vault for the storage of the rest of the treasure. In the following summer he would charter a steamship of the largest size, and provide a partial cargo of stores for the Indians and a sufficient number of suitable cases for containing the gold. He would sail south on this vessel, timing his arrival in the harbor where the schooner now lay as nearly as possible on the first of September. The work of transshipping the gold and carrying it to New York would then be carried out as speedily as possible. This plan was explained to Casimiro and he approved it without hesitation.

They proceeded at once to act upon it. It was decided to send Brent’s preliminary fund and as much more as possible down the river upon the experimental raft that had been constructed. Brent determined to make the trip himself in the same way. Twenty Indians were assigned the task of loading the raft with gold. Fraser limited the quantity to about sixty tons. Three days of hard work were required before the score of natives had deposited this heavy weight of metal upon the structure. It occupied very little space, but a good deal of difficulty was experienced in stopping up the chinks between the logs and providing a resting-place sufficiently secure so that the gold would not sift through.

At length the primitive craft was ready for its first and last voyage, as the bearer of a cargo far more precious than any pretentious treasure-ship ever carried. Brent finally made ready to depart, with a great deal of regret. He had found genuine pleasure, as well as many wonders, in this strange valley. The simple life of the inhabitants, their contempt for civilized wealth, the character of some of their leaders, all had a strong charm for him. His own thirst for gold had slackened. Its prodigal accumulation no longer aroused any emotion in him. The ambition for great riches had never been as strong in him as it is in many men, but he was himself surprised at his growing indifference to wealth. He assured himself that he would become again as other men, as soon as he should again be among his fellows.

On the eve of the sailing of the raft, Fraser and Brent had a last talk. The friendship between the two men had grown into a deep and strong affection on both sides. The parting was a sincere sorrow to each. The hard-shelled old Scotchman was even a little superstitious about it. The eight months’ separation did not seem to threaten serious danger to either of them, but he was vaguely apprehensive.

“Take good care of yourself, lad,” he said earnestly, “and remember, if anything happens to me, you are to see this thing through alone. I have Casimiro’ s promise to deliver the gold to you, if I should knock under.”

Brent reassured the stanch old man with a promise to greet him safe and sound on the deck of their treasure-ship eight months later. They bade each other an affectionate farewell just as the raft shoved off into the current at daybreak next morning, and the last thing Brent saw as the raft swept around a turn in the stream was the sturdy figure of Fraser waving him good-by.

Casimiro and three other Indians manned the treasure-raft. The chief assured Brent that the navigation would not be difficult, for although the current in places was very swift there were no rocks to encounter. The young man expected nothing more than a pleasure trip, and he gave himself up to admiration of the scenery of the marvelous valley as it disclosed itself from new points of view. There was much that was wonderful, but the outlook was not as imposing as from the mountain trail by which they had entered the strange wilderness. A part of the way high precipices shut out all but a narrow strip of sky above and deep shadows and solemn echoes made their swift passage along the black stream uncanny and fearsome.

The Indians seemed a little anxious as the raft approached the entrance of the valley. The stream was rather high and the current swifter than they had expected. Armed with paddles, they prepared to guide the fast-moving raft from either bank toward which it might approach too near. Brent saw the danger and sprang to assist. The momentum which their heavy cargo gave them carried the unwieldy craft perilously near the right bank, where the stream turned slightly in the opposite direction. Their speed was so great that a touch against the steep rocks meant destruction. The four Indians plied their paddles with all their strength to swing the head of the raft toward midstream. It was useless to attempt to use poles against the unyielding rocks which they were passing so rapidly.

Brent did not know this danger. He picked up a pole, sprang to the side, and tried to fend off the raft by pushing the pole against the bank. The pole was quickly dashed out of his hands, and, before he could recover himself, over he plunged into the rushing stream.

The Indians heard his cry as he fell. Casimiro sprang toward him. The young man had gone down in the still closing gap between the raft and the precipitous bank. The chief shouted to the others to stick to their paddles and pull still harder. Keenly he searched the dark water. In a moment he caught sight of the body as it rose. Standing ready with a pole, the Indian prepared to assist the young man aboard, but he perceived when the body reached the surface that it was motionless. It floated for a moment, only two yards from the raft and almost touching the rocky bank past which it swept. Instantly the old man threw himself into the water, seized the already sinking man, and with a couple of strong strokes succeeded in getting hold of the raft. The chief called to one of the Indians and a moment later both men were back upon the raft.

The danger of collision was over by this time, and two minutes later they were out under smiling skies, floating peacefully between the green banks of the plains. Brent did not regain his senses for some time and the Indians feared for a little that he was not merely stunned. They found a small gash in the scalp which might mean a fractured skull, and Casimiro was mightily relieved when the young man finally opened his eyes. Soon he was able to make light of an adventure which had almost put an end to his interest in Patagonian treasure-beds and all other terrestrial affairs.

The remainder of the raft’s trip was without important incident. It was a novel journey, not too monotonous to be boresome, and it came to a successful end the second day in the little cove where the schooner’s cargo had been landed nearly a month before. They grounded the raft without attracting the attention of any one on the schooner, which still lay anchored in the same spot in the harbor. Brent and Casimiro boarded the ship the next morning. Her captain and crew had grown heartily tired of their long idleness, and they welcomed the two men heartily. The work of landing the boxes intended for containing the gold was begun at once. Meantime, Brent instructed the mate and one of the sailors of the schooner to take a small boat and make careful soundings of the entrance and anchorage in the harbor. They were to prepare a rough chart of the small bay, which would serve for navigating the steamship in which the young man expected to return later in the year. He did not explain, however, the purpose for which he desired the survey.

He landed all the boxes which had been made in Buenos Ayres. Twenty, which he intended to use at once, he put upon the raft, the others he stored upon shore where they could be filled during his absence. He did not fill his twenty boxes quite full of gold. He spread a covering of earth and gravel over the surface of the metal before screwing down the cover. Within three days his cargo was aboard ship, the harbor soundings were finished, and he was ready to sail. The task of landing the rest of the gold from the raft was left to the Indians.

The voyage north was begun on the 12th of January. Buenos Ayres was reached after an uneventful trip three weeks later. The twenty enormously heavy boxes were transshipped to a steamer which was to sail in three days for Rio Janeiro. In the three days, Brent purchased a large supply of wire rope, spikes, saws, anchors, and other raft-building material which Fraser believed he would need, and sent the schooner back with them to the Patagonian coast. Then he took passage north. He lost a week at Rio Janeiro, waiting for a boat bound to New York, and it was finally the 15th of March when he found himself one morning alongside the wharf at Roberts’ Stores in Brooklyn.

The custom-house inspector who came aboard did not seem particularly interested in Brent’s twenty cases of “mineral ores.” The owner removed the cover of one of them and the inspector poked his fingers into the harmless looking contents and promptly passed the lot. This ordeal passed, Brent hurried to the ferry and a few minutes later stepped ashore in his native city.

CHAPTER IV.
THE VOYAGE OF THE RICHMOND.

New York seemed strange to Brent for several days after his arrival. Life itself impressed him as unnatural and unreal. More than once he became suspicious that memory was playing him a trick, and he half felt that he ought not himself to believe the story of the last half-year, a story he was sure nobody else would credit on the security of his mere assertion.

Resolved as he was not to share his secret, he was a little puzzled at first as to the best practical course for turning his present resources into available cash. After making some general inquiries, he decided that the most direct method would be best. He would take his boxes of gold to the Mint, have the metal coined under the terms of the Free Coinage of Gold Act, and make no explanations to anybody. He presumed that so large a deposit of virgin gold might cause some comment at the Mint, but the sum was not great enough to be of general business importance and there seemed to be no reason for fearing any widespread curiosity or inquiry.

He hired for a month a small room in the basement of an office building in one of the less busy down-town streets. His twenty small, amazingly heavy boxes were safely stored there within a week of his arrival in the city. He then undertook the tedious and by no means easy task of separating the gold from the covering of sand with which he had disguised it. He did this in order that he might meet the requirements of the Mint and offer only the clean and pure metal. He grew heartily tired of the job before he had finished it, for it occupied him several hours daily for a full fortnight. At last it was completed and the cases were shipped to Philadelphia.

Brent went with them. He had them transferred from the express car to a truck, got into the wagon himself and with two or three truckmen drove to the Mint. He was directed to the proper department for the reception of gold bullion, and he asked the clerk in charge where he should deliver a quantity of gold for coinage.

“I will take it here,” responded the functionary.

“It is outside in a wagon; shall I have it brought in here?” asked Brent.

The reply was in the affirmative, and in a few moments two brawny men staggered in with a small box between them. The clerk seemed much surprised by the great weight of the burden, and remarked with interest that it was evidently a very valuable ingot.

“Have we got to bring ’em all in this way?” inquired one of the truckmen, wiping his forehead.

“Are there any more?” asked the clerk in surprise.

“Yes, twenty of them, and they weigh four hundred pounds apiece, if an ounce.”

The Mint official dropped his routine, red-tape manner and became a very much astonished man.

“Do these boxes contain pure gold?” he exclaimed, turning to Brent.

“Yes, I believe so,” was that individual’s matter-of-fact reply. “There are about four tons of it.”

The first box was taken behind the counter. The clerk, still agitated, produced a screw-driver at Brent’s request, and the cover was taken off.

“Nuggets and dust, not bullion,” said the government employee, taking up a little in his hand and examining it critically. “Yes, and wonderfully pure. Four tons! Almost two and a half millions.”

When he had mastered his astonishment, the clerk told the truckmen that they might take the team to the entrance of the bullion reception department and deliver their load direct, without bringing it into the office. Then he excused himself for a moment and returning presently he invited Brent to visit the director of the Mint, who was in the building.

The owner of millions in virgin gold was greeted with much respect by the head of Uncle Sam’s money-coining establishments. He asked several questions about the remarkable deposit, all of which Brent answered except one as to the source of the newborn wealth. This he respectfully explained he was unable to disclose. He requested the director to use his good offices to prevent as far as possible any unnecessary publicity in connection with the reception of so unusual a quantity of gold from private hands. The director promised to take such precautions as could be taken, and after waiting some time for his weighing receipt, Brent withdrew.

A few days later, the young man had on deposit to his credit in the Chemical National Bank of New York, the substantial sum of $2,445,152 in cash. Then he set about the detailed work called for by his agreement with Fraser. He found it necessary to have such a vault as was needed for the safe storage of the treasure specially constructed. He bought a suitable site on a quiet street south of Fourteenth Street and west of Broadway, and a large force of men was speedily at work in the construction.

A little figuring made it plain that storage capacity equivalent to at least 36,000 cubic feet would be required for the reception of six thousand tons of gold packed in such boxes as he intended using. The vault or vaults, as he designed and finally ordered them, measured in their internal dimensions eighty feet long, forty feet wide, and twelve feet high. It was an expensive undertaking. The contract price for the construction of granite, steel, and cement, to be completed within five months, was $250,000.

Early in April, Brent contracted for the manufacture of twenty-four thousand boxes similar in most respects to those he had had made in Buenos Ayres. They were to be twenty inches long, thirteen inches wide, and ten inches deep, external measurement, and they were designed to contain five hundred pounds each of gold. Lined with iron and held together by screws, it was hardly possible that any ordinary rough handling would injure such a receptacle sufficiently to disclose its contents.

These matters disposed of, Brent found himself with two or three months of almost idle time on his hands. He would have preferred to spend it among the strange people and scenes he expected soon to revisit, but New York was not unattractive even during the suspense under which he labored. When was the metropolis of the New World ever unattractive to a young man with money and with tastes not yet jaded by indulgence?

As the time approached for making preparations for his long journey south, he made inquiries in vain for a steamship suitable for the trip. He required a boat of at least nine thousand tons, and aside from the well-known Atlantic greyhounds and a few men-of-war, few ships of that size existed. It began to appear that only by chartering some famous liner at an enormous expenditure would he be able to keep his appointment in the Patagonian harbor. He was averse to taking so bold a step, chiefly because of the danger of publicity which it involved. It would be impossible to withdraw a well-known crack flyer from her regular Atlantic service at the height of the passenger season and to send her off on a mysterious voyage without attracting much public attention and curiosity.

There seemed to be no other course open, and Brent was about to make to the American line an offer of three quarters of a million for three months’ use of their steamer New York, when he learned of the arrival from Bremen of a giant cargo steamship, the Richmond, on her first voyage. She was a crack boat of her kind, 9,580 tons, twin screws, enormous cargo capacity, and built very much on the lines of the ill-fated Naronic. Brent lost no time in putting himself in communication with the representatives of her owners. His negotiations were easily successful, and an offer of four hundred thousand dollars secured possession of the great boat from August till mid-November.

In addition to the twenty-four thousand queer little boxes which puzzled the crew very much, Brent put on board a considerable miscellaneous cargo for the benefit of his Patagonian friends. He kept in mind, however, Casimiro’s wise warning and included little or nothing of the luxuries of civilization.

On the morning of August 4, the Richmond cleared for Rio Janeiro, with Brent as the only passenger. The run to Rio was easily made in eighteen days. The steamer was re-coaled and again sailed under papers providing for a cruising trip, touching at coast points. Brent had endeavored as far as possible to prevent any idea of mystery getting possession of the officers or crew of the ship. He had said that he was going to trade with some of the natives farther south and that he had arranged to take back to New York a cargo of ore or gold-bearing placer gravel. After leaving Rio, he pointed out the destination on the general chart to the captain and produced his private chart of the natural harbor in which they would find shelter.

Approaching the coast on the morning of August 30, Brent soon recognized the rugged topography about the entrance to his unnamed harbor. The ship proceeded with the greatest caution. She felt her way with constant soundings. Brent had warned the captain that the chart which he supplied had been made with some haste and not the greatest thoroughness. After creeping along almost inch by inch for fully three hours, the Richmond reached what seemed to be a safe anchorage at a little greater distance from the shore, as Brent remembered it, than the schooner had stopped on his previous visit.

While the ship was slowly seeking her moorings, Brent examined the shore searchingly with a powerful glass. He could discover no sign of life, not a trace of the presence of a human being. A nervous apprehension began to rise within him when the anchor had been dropped and only the wild and desolate coast appeared to welcome him. He dreaded to discover the fate of his Patagonian friends, his partner in the treasure-quest, and the vast prize itself which he had come to bear away. As soon as the steamer was at rest, he asked for a small boat and a couple of sailors to row him ashore. Soon he entered the little cove where he had first landed and where he had left the raft and its precious load eight months before. His forebodings increased as he grounded upon the narrow beach and stepped ashore without discovering anything to suggest the previous presence of man. There were not even logs or driftwood from abandoned rafts. The empty boxes which he had landed from the schooner had disappeared. There was simply a silent, desolate, narrow beach, with almost a precipice rising back of it.

Concealing his agitation, Brent directed the boatmen to wait for him and sought the natural trail leading to the higher land above. This he found and hastily followed up the steep ascent. A few minutes’ hard climbing brought him to the beautiful bit of pasture-land where he had first met the native Indians, and made acquaintance with the remarkable qualities of Patagonian horses and horsemanship. The little plain was deserted. Its verdure in the cool spring air was not as luxuriant as it had been under the warm summer sun of the previous December.

The young man looked about in dismay. The solitude appalled him. Not even a bird-note made the silence less oppressive. He began to fancy himself the victim of a delusion. The uncanny impression that the record in his mind of the past year had no material existence returned to torment him. His common sense came to his rescue after a little, and he tried to consider reasonably the cause of this desolation, where he had expected to find life and activity. That something had gone wrong was almost certain, but he could only conjecture what it might be. He sat down upon a rock to think the matter over, but his meditations brought him little satisfaction.

It occurred to him presently that the time fixed for his coming with the steamer was the 1st of September, which was still two days off. It had, however, been no absolute appointment for a set day and hour, and he felt sure that Fraser and many of the natives, according to the plans at the time of his departure, would be in the vicinity for days if not weeks before the time. There seemed nothing for him to do but to wait. He would at least take no step, he decided, until the 1st of September had passed. Perhaps then he would undertake to visit overland the wonderful valley in order to seek the solution of the mystery. He dreaded such a journey. He had no horses or means of getting them, and he doubted very much if he could make his way on foot, unguided, to the spot where the gold had lain. It would be a difficult and perilous undertaking under any circumstances.

He banished from his manner as far as possible all symptoms of perturbation and made his way back to the steamer. He told the captain that they were likely to make a long stay in the harbor, and that no one from on board must be allowed at any time to land near the mouth of the river which he had just visited. The natives, he explained, would resent the intrusion of white men at that point, and any violation of their wishes would interfere with trading and might lead to trouble. Then Brent composed himself with as much patience as he could command to wait for some indication from the shore. The next day passed without a sign, and nobody left the ship. Anxious use of strong field-glasses directed toward all parts of the land-locked bay discovered nothing.

Late that night, Brent decided that if the next day should pass without any solution of the mystery, he would attempt the ascent of the river upon which he had made one almost fatal trip. He had on board the Richmond a powerful naphtha launch, which he had expected to use for towing rafts or small lighters from the shore alongside the steamer. He believed this craft might succeed in forcing a passage through even the swiftest part of the river, up to the original treasure-bed in the mountain-locked valley. At all events, it was worth trying, and the young man succeeded in sleeping upon his resolution.

The next morning brought no communication from the shore, and Brent ordered the launch made ready for a cruise. He was watching the men at work upon it, just before noon, when the second officer called to him suddenly that a boat was approaching the steamship from the shore. Brent hurried to the side. He saw a canoe containing three men rapidly nearing the ship. The two at the paddles were native Patagonians, the third Brent recognized instantly as Casimiro. He motioned to the chief to bring the canoe to the foot of the ladder at the side of the steamship, and in a few moments the old man was on deck, receiving Brent’s greetings with the grave native dignity peculiar to himself. The great ship upon which he stood evidently impressed the Patagonian deeply. He looked about him, forward, aft, aloft, at the immense smoke-tunnel, at the height above the water where he stood, and then shook his head in dumb marvel.

Brent waited a moment for his surprise to pass off and then pressed with some anxiety his inquiries for Fraser. The old man’s face changed instantly. His awe became sadness, and again his head shook silently, this time with the dejection of grief.

“Tell me,” exclaimed Brent in much alarm, speaking in Spanish, “is my friend dead?”

Slowly the old man replied in broken Spanish phrases: “I bring you saddest grief. It is true. The good white cacique is dead. He fell fighting for my people, fighting for the accursed gold.”

The news overwhelmed the young man. The blow was so unexpected, in spite of his vague forebodings, that it unmanned him. He leaned against a stanchion, silent and pale. He was unable to ask for the particulars of the tragedy. Casimiro looked on in manifest sympathy with the other’s genuine grief. Presently he invited the young man to go with him to the shore, promising to give him there the whole history of events during his absence.

Brent went with him at once, asking no questions. The canoe took them, not to the little cove where they had landed before, but to the opposite side of the river’s mouth, some rods farther away. The country here seemed as deserted as the opposite bank, and there was the same rugged, forbidding coast-line. Casimiro led the way, and a few minutes’ rough walk brought them to another concealed camp, situated somewhat similarly to that which Brent had first visited. But the young man felt neither surprise nor interest in what he saw. He went at once with the chief to the temporary hut which the latter occupied. Brent sat down upon a pile of skins and for the first time asked Casimiro to tell him his story.

The old Patagonian’s narrative was not long, as he told it. The limitations of a strange tongue prevented any elaboration of detail. The story as he gave it to Brent was less complete than even the brief version of it which follows:

After Brent’s departure in January, the work of emptying the old river-bed of its remaining store of gold and transporting it to the coast had been pushed vigorously and systematically. Fraser’s practical suggestions and superintendence had simplified the task wonderfully. He had sought to float as much of the gold as possible to the river-mouth before the advent of winter should make the operation difficult and dangerous. After he had thoroughly instructed the natives in raft-building, he made a trip with a large treasure-load, as Brent had done. He examined with Casimiro the facilities for concealing the gold on the shore, and decided as a precaution against possible discovery that half the treasure should be buried on the bank of the stream opposite the little cove. He had then returned to the treasure valley and had devoted himself with great energy to the severe task in hand.

Rapid progress was made and only one serious mishap occurred. This happened at almost the exact spot where Brent’s gold-seeking career had almost ended with his life. Some undiscoverable cause, perhaps a local deluge at the sources of the stream, had considerably swollen the current. The swift water carried one of the rafts too near the rocky bank. The end of a log touched the flinty wall. In an instant the ponderous mass was a scattered procession of drift-wood. The millions of treasure which it had borne sank into dark depths whence only another convulsion such as rent the divided mountain could resurrect it. One of the raftsmen was crushed to death, the others clung to the floating timber until they were borne to smoother water and could swim ashore.

In April, Fraser made another trip to the coast. Work at both ends of the line was making excellent progress. More than half the gold which had been recovered and stored when he and Brent arrived in Treasure Valley had been safely carried to the shore. Most of it had been buried in the new spot which had been selected, opposite their first landing-place. That which was yet to come down the river, it was intended to conceal in the sands of the little cove. The native camp was transferred for this purpose to the small plateau where the two white men had first seen it.

Soon after the camp was stirring one morning, Fraser and the Indians alike were startled by the sound of firearms coming from the direction of the beach below the plateau. The Scotchman seized a rifle, shouted to the natives to arm themselves and follow him, and then ran hastily down the narrow path toward the shore. The Indians, including Casimiro, who were soon on the heels of their leader, saw him stop just before reaching the bottom of the trail and motion them to approach cautiously. They did so and they saw a sight which filled them with alarm and rage. Five of their fellows, who had gone early to the shore, lay dead upon the sand. A raft had been moored upon the beach the day before and the work of unloading its treasure had been begun. Most of its burden of gold still lay naked upon the timbers. Around this were now gathered a dozen white men and another Indian, who, Casimiro explained in a savage whisper to Fraser, was the renegade member of the tribe whose treachery they had feared.

The white men seemed to be in wildest excitement over the heap of treasure before them. Disregarding all prudence, they had flung down their rifles, and now they knelt beside the gold and madly plunged their hands into the shining pile. Some of them began frantically to fill their pockets with the yellow nuggets. Presently, judging by their movements, one or two of them suggested bringing the two boats, in which they had come and which lay upon the beach near by, to the side of the raft and loading them with gold.

By this time the Indians concealed along the secret path were no longer to be held back from avenging their murdered comrades. Casimiro by a few signs to his followers and a word or two to Fraser ordered an attack while the white adventurers were still crazy with the fever of gold. They began creeping quietly nearer the beach, when the Indian on the raft caught sight of a movement among the rocks and shouted a warning to his white companions. At the same moment that the invading party picked up their guns, Fraser, Casimiro, and fifty Patagonians sprang toward them only fifty yards away. There was a double volley of rifle shots. Five of those on the raft fell and three of the attacking party. There was no more shooting. The eight men remaining on the raft tried to reach their boats. Access by land was cut off. They threw themselves into the water and tried to swim toward them. Instead of swimming they sank from sight. Two of them never rose again. The other three tore off their gold-loaded coats and rose to the surface. It was only a choice of deaths for them. Instantly they were seized by revengeful hands and the blue water was reddened with their blood.

The traitor died by Casimiro’s own hand. He had been wounded by the first discharge of firearms. He leaped to his feet when the avenging party reached the raft and faced them, knife in hand. The chief was in the van. He motioned to the others to stand back and, himself a picture of vengeance, rejuvenated and implacable, sprang upon the doomed man. The defiance of the wretch at bay seemed at the last moment to change to terror. He cringed. The yellow heap which was to have been the prize of his treachery was literally the pillow upon which he drew his last breath.

It was not a fight but a slaughter. In five minutes it was over. Not one of the invaders remained alive. Casimiro for the first time missed the Scotchman. He looked quickly from one to another of the prostrated forms upon the beach and raft, and then ran swiftly to a figure lying upon the sand, where the volley from the raft had met the charging Patagonians. The Scotchman lay upon his face. Casimiro turned him. A groan relieved the worst fears, and he sought to revive the wounded man. Fraser regained consciousness presently, but shook his head in answer to the look in the chief’s face. A ball had passed through his body just below the breast-bone, and the injured man knew his case was hopeless. He protested against being moved, and the Indians brought skins for a softer couch and tried to ease his sufferings where he lay.

The dying man gave little thought to himself. He asked eagerly about the result of the short battle. He suggested sending to reconnoiter at once in order to ascertain whence the invaders came and whether there were more of them. Casimiro told him a small ship lay anchored in the harbor, but she seemed to be deserted. Then the sufferer advised the removal of all the gold in the cove to the hiding-place on the opposite side of the river. He reminded Casimiro of his promise to carry out the agreement with Brent in case of his own misfortune, and urged the thorough execution of the original plan as the only safeguard against such tragedies as they had just witnessed.

Casimiro acquiesced sadly in all the dying man said, and when the end came rather suddenly at the last, he closed the eyes of his stanch ally and friend with a grief as deep as he would have felt for any of his own kindred.

“Tell the lad,” said Fraser just before the end, “that his responsibility will be greater than mine—greater than I could have borne—greater than any man bears to-day. I love the lad. He will be true.”

The struggle to exorcise the curse which the presence of gold meant to the Patagonians went on more earnestly than ever after this. Some feeling of rebellion against the heavy labor which the task imposed quite disappeared after the tragic demonstration of the dangers lurking in the useless treasure which encumbered their land. The ship in which the white men had come proved to be quite deserted. The Indians took it outside the harbor and sank it in the sea. The two or three loads of gold which had been landed in the little cove were taken to the opposite bank of the river. All the remaining gold had been brought from Treasure Valley, safely landed and concealed, and all trace of treasure or anything else unusual had been removed nearly a month before Brent’s arrival. Casimiro had simply waited for the hour when he understood Brent was to appear and then he had presented himself.

Brent gleaned the principal points in this history from Casimiro’s narration. His grief over his friend’s fate quite destroyed for the time all interest in the treasure which had been the primary cause of it. There arose, in fact, a revulsion in his mind against this gold which for him would always be blood-stained, a sinister and evil treasure. He talked long with the old man about his dead friend, and Casimiro strove to satisfy his thirst for knowledge of the man they both had loved with an affection not less strong than a brother’s.

When Casimiro turned at last to the work still at hand, Brent brought himself to the subject with the greatest aversion. He explained very briefly his facilities for shipping the gold, and it was agreed to begin work on the morrow. It was a comparatively simple task. The position of the steamship was changed a few rods to facilitate the work, and then the unloading of the cargo and boxes went on rapidly from day to day. All the work, except placing the goods upon the floats at the ship’s side and hoisting the loaded boxes of gold on board, was done by the Indians. No one from the ship except Brent was allowed to step foot ashore at the point where the cargo was landed and the mysterious boxes were reshipped. The crew of the Richmond marveled much at the extraordinary weight of the small cases when they came back from the shore. A rumor gained currency among them that the boxes contained quicksilver ore, and ignorant as the men were of such subjects this report quite satisfied their curiosity.

On the 3d of October, the Richmond’s cargo was all on board, and instead of appearing to be in ballast only she sank deep in the water under the small but heavy load. Brent had a last and affectionate interview with Casimiro, who seemed to consider that the service was on Brent’s part and not on his own in carrying away the gold. The young man arranged for the annual delivery of a cargo of supplies in December midsummer, and then just at noon, with steam up, the Richmond startled the echoes and sent terror to the hearts of the Patagonians with a tremendous blast of her whistle. A few moments later she was under way, creeping slowly out into the ocean and then turning her prow to the north.

The steamer’s cargo was so heavy that she was unable to carry a full supply of coal. She put in again at Rio Janeiro to partially refill her bunkers. Otherwise the voyage to New York was without stop or unusual incident. Sandy Hook was sighted on the 2d of November, and the steamer lay at quarantine that night while Brent went up to the city to arrange for docking.

The only point which gave the young man any anxiety was the customs inspection. His cargo was not dutiable, so that he would be guilty of no fraud upon the government in failing to declare its real nature. He was also confident that if the arrival of such a vast quantity of gold should transpire through a custom-house declaration, it would inflict a great and unnecessary calamity upon the business world. His conscience felt justified, therefore, in resorting to the same expedient which he had adopted on landing his small consignment of gold a few months before. Fortune seemed to favor him, for the same inspector came aboard who had examined his boxes before. He remembered the occasion, and his examination this time was almost as superficial as the first.

This ordeal passed and the ship docked near the foot of West Tenth Street. Brent felt that the worst of his difficulties were over. He found the vault completed to his satisfaction, and the work of storing his strange cargo therein was begun at once.

CHAPTER V.
A MOLE-HILL THAT BECAME A MOUNTAIN.

It was five o’clock in the afternoon of Tuesday, the 20th of November, when the last box of the Richmond’s mysterious cargo was raised to its place on top of one of the tiers of closely-packed cases in the steel and granite chamber. Robert Brent watched the rather awkward exertions of the brawny truckmen as they tugged and pushed the rough box over small rollers on a long skid which rested against the top of the row.

“We can’t get used to ’em, sir,” remarked one of the men, when they rested for a moment at the end of their task. “It isn’t the heavy weight; it’s the small size. If they were solid lead they wouldn’t be harder to handle.”

“There is a good deal of metal in them,” replied Brent sententiously.

The men went away. Brent followed them to the outer door, locked it on the inside, and went back to the great vault. He threw himself in sudden weariness into an old wooden chair the workmen had left, and sat listless, scarcely thinking. His energy was gone. Body and mind became suddenly inert. Nerves that for more than a year had been under the strain of an anxiety and excitement more intense than he himself had realized, finally relaxed. A sense of unreality in it all overwhelmed him. It had been a stupendous dream. There was no Valley of Gold down there at the world’s southernmost outpost. Fraser and his dreadful end were a horrible nightmare. The dark-skinned, lithe Patagonians were myths. So was this silent tomb of treasure in which he was sitting. He would awake presently and find that the last morsel of biscuit and cheese eaten in the smoking-room of the Victoria last night was responsible for it all. So strong did the impression grow within him that he roused himself in quite a panic of fear. He got upon his feet, walked over to the last high breastwork of gold-laden cases and struck it smartly. The blow bruised his knuckles, and he was himself again.

“The air must be bad here,” he said to himself, “to give me such a turn. I’ll have a sharp walk up to Del’s and dine.” And he put his hand into his pocket for the key to the inner door of the vault.

“Hullo!” he exclaimed suddenly, “I’ve no money.” And then as the situation dawned upon him he sat down again and laughed. The predicament amused him immensely. “Six thousand tons of gold and penniless. It’s just as well that I want to walk up town, for I couldn’t pay car-fare. Stupid of me to get caught in this fashion. I wonder if the cashier at Del’s would take a small handful of gold-dust for a dinner. Be apt to make a sensation, I imagine, if I should put a few pinches of yellow dust on the plate when the waiter brought the bill. I must hunt up Wharton and borrow a few dollars.” He put out the electric light, locked the inner door, closed one by one the other steel barriers, drew the bolts, turned the dials of the combination locks, and left the building.

For several days Brent gave himself up to aimless idleness. He admitted that he needed rest. He was tired from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet. The unrelenting pressure of his task—a pressure that he had scarcely felt, so stimulating had been the attending excitement—was gone, and he yielded to the demand for rest which the reaction made upon brain and body. He reveled in the freedom from care and responsibility. The instincts and tastes which he had cultivated in his European wanderings reasserted themselves. He was half inclined to seal up his treasure-house and spend the winter amid the luxurious delights of Nice or southern Italy. He need be in no haste to execute any of the ideas which had occurred to him for the employment of some of his wealth. As a matter of fact he had made no plans, and no comprehensive scheme for the utilization of any considerable portion of his treasure had suggested itself to his mind. He had allowed various fancies to run riot in his imagination occasionally since the gold had come into his possession, but he had given little serious thought to the subject. The task in hand had been quite enough to absorb any man’s energies.

Now, however, he sat himself down to consider the opportunities, the privileges, the responsibilities, the duties, which the situation thrust upon him. He faced the problem buoyantly, hopefully, and without anxiety. The facts with which he must deal were without precedent, to be sure, and of unparalleled importance to the people of his own country and to all Christendom. He was about to make the greatest contribution to the world’s wealth, as he regarded it, that humanity had ever received. Such a gift, if judiciously bestowed, could be naught but a blessing. There was no room for any sordid motive in deciding how to employ the bulk of his treasure. He could not conceive of any human ambition which money could gratify that would call for a tenth part of the treasure locked in his storehouse. His motives were honest and generous. He was willing, nay, desirous, to administer his wealth as a monster trust-fund for the benefit of all humanity.

He reached this determination very early in his deliberations. Then he began to be puzzled a little. He realized that he could not put any considerable portion of his treasure to work in the financial or commercial world without its adding to itself an increment. To invest it, in the ordinary sense, in enterprises which “didn’t pay” would be serious folly. It would encourage bad business methods and those who least deserved it would profit by such a policy. And yet he did not feel justified in adding to his immense store by accumulations in the shape of interest or dividends. He could compel the whole industrial and commercial world to pay tribute to him with his billions. He had no desire to use such a power.

How could he diminish his fortune year by year without doing violence to any sound business principle? That was the form in which the problem soon presented itself to Robert Brent, and he did not find it as easy of solution as he expected. It was a problem new to human experience. Brent was very sure that no other man ever was troubled by it. He did not doubt, however, that his humblest acquaintance would undertake to manage it for him without the least hesitation.

One escape from his dilemma was obvious and easy. He could leave his gold where he had buried it, as non-existent to the world as if it had remained in its native bed. A few millions a year, not enough to disturb the monetary and commercial conditions of society, might be distributed in benefactions, while the great mass remained untouched. Brent debated this policy a long time, and then he rejected it. He turned from it rather regretfully. He began to understand that any other course involved tremendous responsibility, grave anxieties, and unremitting labor. He would have been glad to escape all these. But it was a burden which he did not quite dare to shirk. He could not have said just why. He would not have acknowledged a trace of superstition in his instincts, but a strong conviction possessed him that it was his duty to the world to make the best use possible of the treasure which he controlled. The more clearly he realized how gigantic and how difficult was the task, the more he shrank from it and yet the more convinced he became that he could not honorably avoid it. To an American mind more than to any other, perhaps, it was repugnant to think of such a great force lying idle.

His six thousand tons of gold should become an active factor in shaping the destinies of men and especially of his own countrymen. Brent became very determined on that point as soon as he had given it thorough consideration. But that was as far as he could get for some time. He could give away many millions. He could advance the cause of education with a greater impetus than it had ever received. He could promote science on a larger scale than the world had known. He could endow charities with a liberality that would minimize suffering throughout the nation. Ah, but could he? Was it as simple as it seemed at first thought? Was it possible to accomplish these good things without doing greater harm? He tried to trace out in a single example the effect of such a policy.

Suppose he should endow a college with a fund of $20,000,000. According to all precedent and to every principle of sound finance, that money must be safely invested, so that it would yield a return of $800,000 or $1,000,000 a year to pay the expenses of the institution. There was one fact in connection with the management of his own financial affairs after he came of age that he remembered very clearly—good investments are scarce. Stocks, bonds, anything paying a fair return without too great an element of risk, are hard to find. It would not be difficult probably to place safely and without appreciable harm to others the sum of twenty millions. But that was a mere bagatelle compared with nearly four thousand millions. The investment of such a treasure meant the overturning of all the world’s standards of value. It would be doing indirectly what he had determined not to do. It would mean that he should put the industrial and commercial world under tribute to such objects, good in themselves perhaps, as he might choose to designate. Had he the right to assume such a power, and what would he be giving the world in exchange for such an arbitrary assumption of authority? He began to doubt if a man who discovered a gold mine, however good his intentions, was a public benefactor. Perhaps the man who drove a railroad spike or plowed a field was of greater value to society after all.

Brent’s meditations from being hopeful became gloomy. His golden burden threatened to become an incubus not only to himself but to humanity. He must not keep it, he must not invest it, he must not give it away.

One other consideration added to his difficulties. Above all things he was resolved to preserve the secret of his riches. Every plan must bend to that end. He would avoid at any cost the notoriety which public knowledge of the possession of such wealth would bring him. It would mean infinite annoyance and even danger. He was absolutely selfish on this point, and he felt that he had a right to be. This determination cut him off from counsel and advice which he would have been glad to seek and of which he knew he stood sadly in need. He knew it would be necessary to make several partial confidences. No man should know, if he could prevent it, the whole truth or any large part of it. He was willing to pose as a man of great wealth in the ordinary sense, but nobody must suspect him of being a billionaire or even compare his riches with those of the Astors, the Vanderbilts, or the Goulds.

It was hampered by these restrictions and harassed by the impotent result of his unaided struggles with his great problem, that Brent began to study the affairs of the day early in December. Fortunately he admitted without reserve his ignorance and his incompetence for the task which he had assumed. His present duty, he wisely decided, was to seek information. He could do this in books, in newspapers, and in his character as a wealthy gentleman of leisure among men of business. He was not hopeful, however, of finding any definite suggestions for the disposal of the most enormous treasure that had ever been suddenly added to the world’s banking account.

His first practical step was to provide for turning some small portion of his store into money. That would be necessary in any event, for gold-dust and nuggets are not legal tender, and the metal must be in the form of coin or duly stamped and certified bullion before it will pass current in the world’s markets. He saw that he must adopt careful and strict precautions. He must guard not only the secret of his own connection with this gold, but the fact of the metal’s existence must be kept from the world. If it became known that such an overwhelming flood of new-born treasure might at any moment be poured into the ebbing and flowing tide of human traffic, the consequences would be something quite beyond the power of the imagination to estimate. Brent did not undertake to say what would happen.

He remembered that the financial disaster which swallowed up his own fortune eighteen months before had been caused primarily by the production of too much silver. It had become impossible to preserve the proportion of value which the white metal had held to the yellow in previous history. America had persisted longer in the attempt than any other country. When she abandoned the task, she suffered the severest penalties for her efforts. All this was clear in Brent’s mind, and he feared that the plethora of gold which would be created by the unlocking of his treasure-house would prove even more disastrous. He meant to guard against the possible calamity.

He decided to send to the Philadelphia Mint thirty of the boxes from the steel vault, the equivalent of about $4,500,000, which could be coined promptly. One hundred boxes more, worth say $15,000,000, he would turn into bullion at the United States Assay Office in Wall Street. He would thus be provided with an available capital of nearly $20,000,000, which would be sufficient probably for his immediate purposes. The greatest safety against suspicion he decided lay in treating his boxes as ordinary merchandise. He shipped thirty cases to Philadelphia as second-class freight. When they arrived there he allowed them to remain unguarded for a day or two in the railroad freight depot. He employed a private truckman to deliver them at the Mint.

His request for a private audience with the director of the Mint was granted at once.

“Have you a few tons of gold about you, this time, Mr. Brent?” was the official’s greeting after a cordial hand-shake.

“Not in my pockets,” was the young man’s smiling reply, “but my errand is much the same as the one which brought me here last spring, and I have the same favor of secrecy to ask of you.”

The director leaned forward in astonishment.

“Do you mean that you are bringing me several more truck-loads of native gold to be coined?” he asked.

“Well, yes, that’s what it comes to. It isn’t a fabulous amount; rather more than last time; about fifteen thousand pounds, I should judge.”

The look of amazement settled upon the director’s face. “Fifteen thousand pounds,” he repeated, “and worth more than $300 a pound, for that was the purest metal that ever came to the Mint. Close to five million dollars. Is the new lot like the last?”

“Pretty much the same, I think you will find it.”

“Free gold has seldom been found in such quantities before, Mr. Brent. I suppose the location of your mine is still a secret?”

“It may as well remain so for it is practically exhausted. I may possibly bring you more of its products. I don’t know. You’ll be able once more, I hope, to prevent any annoying rumors about the matter getting into the newspapers?”

“Oh, I think so. It would not be proper for me to conceal the facts about so important a transaction from the Department, but I will mention your wish and I have no doubt the secretary of the treasury will respect it.”

The usual formalities of weighing and receipts were completed and arrangements were made for shipping the coin to New York a few days later. Brent returned home. The difficulties in the way of turning a larger quantity of native metal into commercial bullion without connecting his name with such wealth puzzled him for some time. He considered the feasibility of establishing a private assay office in which his gold might be cast into bars or ingots which would soon be recognized as of standard purity in the bullion market. The risks in such a plan would be too great, he concluded. It involved trusting a large portion of his secret to too many strangers.

The metal must therefore pass through the government Assay Office and receive the government stamp. He resolved not to appear in any way in these transactions. He was compelled to choose an agent. Naturally, he turned to his chum of college days. He had always found John Wharton trustworthy. He believed he could trust him now. Wharton was the junior member of the firm of Strong & Co., brokers in New Street. It was not a large house or very prominent in big operations in the market, but it was sound, conservative, and respected. During the few weeks Brent had spent in New York in the spring and summer, Wharton was one of the few old friends whom he had sought out, and their intimacy had been in some degree renewed. The jovial, generous qualities of the college lad had not disappeared in the keen, energetic man of business, but he was not in the fast set in the Exchange. He was thoroughly a man of affairs, genial and popular. Brent credited him with a sound judgment, conservatism, and reserve capacity which a new acquaintance might not at once have perceived. He was not deceived. His confidence in Wharton’s loyalty and ability was well placed.

The day after Brent returned to New York he hunted up his friend and easily secured his promise to join him that evening in a tête à tête dinner at his Waldorf rooms. It was a jolly meal. Brent was glad enough to throw off the rather depressing load which his situation was again putting upon him, and he enjoyed keenly the revival of college experiences and the budget of anecdotes about the fortunes of mutual friends which Wharton supplied. It was not until the waiter had cleared the table of all but the café noir and cigars had disappeared, that the rather grave air which was becoming habitual to him returned to Brent’s face. His guest noticed it and presently broke in on him with frank friendliness:

“Look here, old man, something’s on your mind. Let’s have it. You know you can command me—advice, sympathy, anything—and the indebtedness will still be on my side. Which is it, girl or money?” There was a warm cordiality beneath the playfulness of the young man’s tone which attested his sincerity.

“You are right, John. I am puzzled about some money, but not in the way you imagine. Tell me, by the way, what you think of the financial situation.”

“Business, eh? I’m disappointed. I hoped it was romance. Well, things are rather in a mess. We haven’t recovered from last year’s smash by any means. It isn’t a good time to speculate either way. Prospects are too uncertain. About investments, it’s a question of detail. If I had certain things I’d sell them. There are a few sound securities that I believe it would be safe to buy at present prices and lay by. How have you been hit, Bob?”

“I haven’t been hit. My difficulty is quite of the other sort. I am going to tell you something of the story, Jack, and then ask your assistance. I am concerned chiefly in keeping the facts secret, and I know I can trust you. I have here in New York the product of a very rich gold mine. This gold is solely my own property and it is for me to decide what to do with it. How much? Well, I don’t know exactly. There will be about $5,000,000 to my credit at the Chemical National Bank in a few days, and—“

“Five millions! And such a fortune makes you sad? I’d like to have a touch of that sort of melancholy. My congratulations, old man,” and Wharton seized his friend’s hand enthusiastically.

“But you haven’t heard the worst,” responded Brent, with a not very mirthful smile. “I have at least four or five times as much more in native metal which I want to turn into bullion.”

Wharton searched his friend’s face, amazed and then incredulous. “See here, Bob. Are you joking?” he exclaimed.

“Does this look like it? It is the director of the Mint’s receipt for fifteen thousand odd pounds of native gold for coining,” and Brent tossed the slip of paper across the table. Wharton read it and was silent for a few moments.

“I am clean knocked out, Robert,” he observed presently. “Twenty-five or thirty millions in gold! That is more cash than the richest man in America possesses to-day. Where is this mine? Is it still producing? Is this all or is it to keep on indefinitely? What are you going to do with this money? It will make you one of the most powerful operators in the market.”

“I am under obligation not to disclose the secret of the mine and I admit I have not told you the whole truth about its value, but its future product will not be worth considering. It is with present difficulties that I want you to help me. I am fully determined on two points. I am willing to be known as ordinarily rich, as a millionaire perhaps, but I mean to escape if it is possible the notoriety that goes with vast wealth. In gratifying this desire I hope to rely chiefly on your aid. My other resolve you may think eccentric and foolish, but I am firm in it also. I have decided not to increase my fortune by investment, speculation, or in any other way. You will look upon me as a philanthropic crank, perhaps, but we will discuss that point another time. My question now is whether you can devote yourself, old fellow, pretty largely to my interests, quite within the lines of your regular business and of course under liberal conditions.”

“You have no need to ask that question, Bob. You know very well, or ought to, that you are making me one of the most flattering offers that one man could make to another. I accept, and gratefully. You may trust my fidelity, if not my judgment, and there’s my hand on it,” and the two clasped hands in the earnest, manly fashion that is a surer pledge than a man’s bond.

They fell into a discussion of plans for sending a quantity of the gold through the Assay Office. It was arranged finally that Brent should send one hundred and twenty-five boxes of the metal to the office of Strong & Co. Thence it would be transferred in smaller consignments, as fast as it could be handled, to the Assay Office in Wall Street for smelting. The transaction was to be in the name of the firm, and secrecy about the real ownership of the metal was, of course, to be maintained by Strong & Co. The resulting bullion, they decided, should be sold or used in whatever financial operations might be undertaken, as rapidly as might be without creating any serious disturbance in the market.

It was long after midnight when the two men separated. This was only one of many and frequent consultations between them. Brent learned much in these talks, but the light which he gained upon the real nature of his problem was only partial and incidental. Wharton was completely in the dark as to the size of his friend’s fortune. He naturally supposed that it did not much exceed the millions which had already been disclosed to him. His suggestions were most of them, therefore, of little value to Brent in seeking a channel for the distribution of the golden contents of his reservoir.

“If your fortune was five or ten times greater,” Wharton remarked one day, after several millions of the crude gold had already been turned into bullion, “you might do the public, and yourself too, a great service by smashing the bear clique that is having things all its own way in the market.”

Brent seized the point with genuine interest. “Do you think it would be really a good thing if prices were put up by heavy buying?” he asked.

“Most assuredly I do,” was the reply. “The market has been growing worse for weeks. Public confidence is so shaken that it is locking up its money in secret hiding-places again, as it did eighteen months ago. Pretty soon we shall have another money famine and then the bottom will go out of the market again. The intrinsic values of securities are not falling. Earnings and dividends are good. The trouble is not commercial; it is financial purely. When our financial Moses appears he will set things right again, but he isn’t in sight yet. It is quite true that fear of what may be done at Washington, or fear that nothing will be done, is the chief cause of the distrust which is daily aggravating the situation. How could it be otherwise than a boon, then, if public confidence should be strengthened by the introduction of fresh capital and the consequent advance of prices in the stock market? Why, my dear fellow, the addition of $100,000,000 in gold to the circulation in this country would settle in five days the silver question that has been tormenting us for the last five years.”

Brent pondered a few moments. Then in sudden determination:

“John, I’ll try the experiment. I’m not sure that you are right, but it sounds reasonable. I will add $100,000,000 in gold to the circulation, and at the same time I’ll advance prices a few points in the stock market. You may begin buying for me to-morrow morning. I’ll give you carte blanche.”

Wharton’s amazement was speechless for some time, and Brent, who had heartily realized the startling nature of the revelation which his declaration involved, watched his friend in some amusement. There was a nearer approach to awe in John Wharton’s voice when he finally spoke than that rather unemotional young man ever manifested before.

“Do you mean to tell me, Robert, that you are able to speak of spending one hundred millions as easily as another rich man would talk of as many thousands? How much gold is there, for heaven’s sake, in that storehouse of yours?”

“I don’t know, John; but I can spare one hundred millions. Can you invest it for me? I told you, to be sure, that I did not wish my fortune to earn any increase, and that is still my determination. It seems necessary, however, to put this sum temporarily into investment securities, but I think I can devise means for turning the income back into its former channels without its going to augment my capital. Will you undertake the commission?”