Silver Dreams (31 page)

Max's gaze swept the rough interior of the spinster's bonnet. "Are you really sure about that, Ross?"

Dooley dropped his arms to his sides and picked up on the challenge in Max's question. "Yeah, you whining little thumb sucker,” he said to Ross. “How do you know there ain't no mine?  The least you could do is have a look-see."

"I'll bet the mine's over here."

Everyone looked at Ramona, who had wandered over to a patch of thick vegetation. She tugged at stubborn limbs clinging to the mountain and held up a bunch of twigs. "See this stuff? I know what it is. It's mostly dead now because of the cold, but I recognize the dried bunchberry leaves and columbine. It grows wild in the mountains, but I'd think it'd be kind of rare up this high...unless someone dragged it to this spot and planted it."

"Someone like the Faraday brothers perhaps?" Max said.

"That's it!" Dooley shouted gleefully. "The Faradays hid the entrance with those plants. Any fool can see that."

"Then how come you didn't?" Ross asked. "You're the biggest fool here."

Either Dooley didn't hear him or chose to ignore the barb, because he was at Ramona's side in a split second. His hands working with the speed of buzz saws, he soon had brittle limbs and dry leaves flying through the air.

The others approached slowly, standing clear of the debris until Dooley stopped and wiped dust from a spot he'd cleared in the brush. Like magic, an old wooden sign appeared, the burnt words barely readable in the worm-eaten surface.
Fair Day Mine,
it said,
Prop. of Ian and Clyde Faraday, Holyhead, Wales.

"Now let's hear you say there ain't no Fair Day Mine, Mr. City Boy," Dooley crowed, "or is your mouth too full of your big foot to spit the words out?"

Ross stepped up to the sign and ran the tip of his finger over the letters. "We did it!" he shouted, turning to the others. "We found the mine. We're rich!”

Everyone tugged and pulled four year's worth of nature's curtain from the entrance. When the vegetation had been removed and set aside as kindling for the evening fire, the miners stared at a hole in the mountain, five feet tall and four feet wide. Planks of lumber crisscrossed the entrance, the last barrier to the potential riches inside.

Each member of the party stuck his head between the boards to peer into the dark interior. Since the setting sun was just a golden glow on a nearby mountain top, it was nearly impossible to tell what the mine was like inside. Even when Ross lit a lantern and held it through the planks, there was nothing but utter blackness beyond the ring of the flame.

"I can't see a damn thing," Ross said. "Let's tear the boards down and go in for a look."

As eager as she was to see what was inside, Elizabeth realized the foolishness of going in the mine at night. "I don't think that's a good idea."  An hour before, she'd fetched a woolen blanket from her bedroll, and she wrapped it more tightly around her shoulders. "It's freezing out here, and I'll bet it's worse in there. I read that mines are usually a few degrees colder than the air." She stuck her hand inside the mine to demonstrate. "We'd better wait till morning."

"I hear these mines never get above forty degrees, even in the daytime," Max stated. "I agree with Betsy. We should wait."

"She's right as rain," Dooley said. "We don't know how many shafts the brothers blasted in there, or how deep they run. Some of them might drop twenty or thirty feet straight down. And they might end in water. This ain't no walk in the park, sonny, and I, for one, won't put one foot in there tonight."

"Sissies, all of you," Ross grumbled, "But alright. We'll go in first thing in the morning."

They pitched tents in the shelter of the bonnet, about one hundred yards from a ledge that dropped almost one thousand feet to a canyon floor. After their evening meal, they huddled around the campfire talking about the next day's events. The mine opening, just a few feet away, beckoned like a pharaoh's tomb filled with unknown treasure.

Shadows from the fire danced along the mountain wall. They licked at the boards covering the mine opening and leapt into the black chasm Elizabeth could only dream about until morning. The shadows reminded her of bent, gaunt men, like two Welsh brothers who'd died on this mountain before they had a chance to enjoy its spoils.

They'd died violently, victims of greed and evil. Thinking of the Faraday brothers now, Elizabeth experienced two equally strong emotions...excitement and fear. Did the Fair Day pull her to its deep, dark core with a promise of treasure, or repel her with its tragic secrets and threats of spirits who'd been cheated out of a peaceful death?

She was once again thankful for Max's comforting presence. They sat side by side, sharing a blanket. Their thighs, covered by the thick denim of britches, touched beneath the woolen covers. Max's hand found hers and his fingers, warm and reassuring, wrapped around her palm. "Sleepy?" he asked.

Had it only been twenty-four hours since those fingers had played upon her skin bringing life and fire to her body like a musician brings music and soul to his instrument?  "A little," she admitted, wishing she could stay with him tonight.

"I think we should turn in," he said. "Who knows what tomorrow will bring."

"I know," Dooley said, stirring to awareness. "Silver. Tons of good rich ore."

Ross sprinkled some precious water on the fire, and it sizzled to a smoky death. "And hopefully a mountain stream these Rockies are supposed to be famous for. I don't look forward to marching a half mile down the mountain to the last little brook we passed just to get a bucket of water."

Dooley turned impatient eyes on him. "It's just like you to start fussing about a little bit of work. I hope you ain't opposed to getting your fingernails dirty once we get in the mine."

Ross met his gaze head on and shook his finger at the mine. "Don't worry about me, old man. I'll work circles around you to get to that ore."

"There's no way a dandy like you is gonna..."

Max grinned at Elizabeth. "It's going to be a restful night, I can see that."  Folding his blanket over his arm, he rose and went to the two men. Taking each by an elbow, he marched them to the tent they were all sharing. "Say goodnight to the ladies, gents. I'm sleeping in the middle tonight, so if you two come to blows, make darn sure your reach is long enough to pummel the right man!"

Elizabeth watched until their tent flap was secure and the lantern inside was turned low. Then she followed Ramona into the other tent and wrapped herself in a cocoon of blankets.

The morning dawned crisp and bright. The miners immediately turned their attention to the rotting cross boards separating them from success. Ross and Dooley quickly removed the lumber and exposed the mine entrance. Sunlight streamed around the spinster's bonnet and into the opening, creating an almost shrine-like effect which Elizabeth was certain prophesied good things ahead.

"Who's going first?" she asked as they all hesitated on the brink of wealth. "I can't wait to go inside."

She jumped when Dooley grabbed her elbow. "What are you talking about, girlie? You’re not going in the mine. Neither is the other girlie."

She wrenched her arm free and spun around to face him. "Why not for heaven's sake?"

"Everybody knows women are bad luck in a mine."

"I've never heard of such a stupid thing,” she said, determined that Dooley’s superstitions wouldn’t keep her from exploring. “Nobody here ever heard of it either, right?"

Max and Ross nodded, but Ramona only curled her lip sheepishly. "Well, to tell the truth, honey, I've lived in these parts long enough to have heard most everything, including this superstition. But personally, I think it's rubbish."

"It's not rubbish!" Dooley shouted. "When a woman goes in a mine, her soul never leaves. Her body may come out, but her spirit stays there to haunt the hard-working men who come after her. Many a miner has seen the apparitions in the tunnels, white as gypsum on the mine walls, their hair and skirts blowing like sails behind them. Tormenting sights they are, the ghostly souls of womenfolk."

"That's ridiculous," Elizabeth said. "You don’t really believe in ghosts? Souls left behind...that's absurd."

"Well, I ain't about to take the chance!" Dooley thundered. "You’re not going in. The knockers don't like it."

She was losing her patience. The old man wasn't making any sense, but she'd indulge him with one more question. "Who are the knockers?"

"I think he's talking about tommyknockers, Betsy," Max said.

Dooley nodded. "That's right. Listen to him. He's heard of the knockers. He knows what those little devils can do."

"Anyone from the British Isles has heard of them, Dooley. It doesn't mean I believe in any of the tales."

"Will somebody please tell me what's going on?" Ross demanded.

"There's an old superstition that started in Cornish mines,” Max began. “Whenever a miner was killed in a tunnel his spirit lived on in the mine in the form of a tommyknocker. Supposedly they're ornery men, like mischievous leprechauns, and they make noises to warn off other miners."

"They ain't mischievous, they're downright mean!" Dooley said. "And they swing their picks against the rocks. You can hear them all through the shafts. Tink, tink, tink, it's the tap of a knocker. And whoever is unlucky enough to hear it, he's the next to die."

Taking note of the animation in the old man's face, Elizabeth decided two things. One was that she didn't believe a word of this silly folktale and the other was that Dooley adamantly did.

"It's as clear as the nose on your face,” Dooley continued. “Hear a knocker and you wind up dead. If you rile the knockers, they don’t let you go. And bringing a female in the mine makes a knocker mad as hell!"

Elizabeth was going in the mine. She hadn't come all this way to remain on the outside looking in. She wasn't about to write her last chapter on the Fair Day Mine describing what it was like to stare at the entrance and never set foot over the threshold! While she was thinking of how to convince Dooley of her determination, Ross came up with his own rationale for why the women should enter.

"Look, you addle-brained buzzard," he said. "How do you suppose the three of us are going to find the silver, blast it out of the mountain, break it into chunks of good ore and carry it out to the campsite by ourselves? And even if we could do all that, we'd still have to break up the ore and pack it on the burros before all our food runs out. Criminy, we need these women to work!"

Everyone gave his undivided attention to Ross. No one spoke until Max said, "I think we've just heard the chivalrous side of the debate.”

Ross' ears turned red with either embarrassment or indignation, Elizabeth wasn't sure which. "Well, it's true, isn't it?" he offered feebly. "We need everybody to work. That's why we're here after all."