Nelly would not give any reason, but put the stone carefully back in her pocket. She was determined not to tell Rob any thing about it, unless she found the stones; and the more she racked her brains the more confused she became as to where it was she had seen them. All the way home she was in a brown study, trying to think where it could have been. She was in such a brown study that she was walking straight past Lucinda's door without seeing her, when Lucinda called her name aloud.
"Why, Nelly," she said, "ain't you going to stop long enough to speak?"
"She hasn't spoken a word all the way," said Rob, discontentedly. "I can't get any thing out of her. She's real cross."
"Oh, Rob! Rob! how can you!" cried Nelly: "I wasn't cross a bit."
"Then you're sulky," retorted Rob; "and mamma says that's worse."
"Tut, tut," said Lucinda: "Nelly doesn't look either sulky or cross. I guess you're mistaken, Rob."
Nelly felt a little conscience-stricken. She knew she had been thinking hard, all the last hour, about the black stones.
"Never mind, Rob!" she said: "I'll talk now." And she began to tell Lucinda all about the pictures they had seen at Mr. Kleesman's.
"Oh, yes!" said Lucinda: "I know all about those. My little sister's got one of them: Mr. Kleesman gave it to her. He's real fond of little girls. It's a picture he made of the black nurse he had for his little boy. She's got the baby in her arms."
"Why, has Mr. Kleesman got any children?" exclaimed Nelly, very much surprised.
"Oh, yes!" said Lucinda: "he's got a wife and two children over in Germany. That's what makes him so blue sometimes. His wife hates America, and won't come here."
"Then I should think he'd stay there," said Nelly.
"So should I," said Lucinda; "but they say it's awful hard to make a living over there; and he's a layin' up money here. He'll go back one of these days."
"Oh! I wish he'd take me with him," said Rob.
"Rob March! would you go away and leave papa and mamma and me?" said Nelly.
Rob hung his head. The longing of a born traveller was in his eyes.
"I should come back, Nell," he said. "I shouldn't stay: only just to see the places."
"Well," said Nelly, slowly, "I wouldn't go away from all of you, not to see the most beautiful things in all the world; not even to see the city of Constantinople."
Rob did not answer. He was afraid that there must be something wrong about him, to be so willing to do what seemed to Nelly such a dreadful thing. To see Constantinople, and hear the muezzins call out the hours for prayers from the mosques, Rob would have set off that very minute and walked all the way.
After Nelly went to bed that night, she lay awake a long time, still thinking about the black stones. She had put the little piece of stone on the bureau, and while she was undressing she hardly took her eyes off it. She recollected just how the place looked where she saw them. It was in a ravine: there were piles of stones in the bottom of the ravine, and a good many scattered all along the sides. There were pine trees and bushes too: it was quite a shady place.
"I should know it in a minute, if I saw it again," said Nelly to herself; "but where, oh! where was it!"
At last, all in one second, it flashed into her mind. It was one day when she had started for Rosita later than usual, and had thought she would take a short cut across the hills; but she had found it any thing but a short cut. As soon as she had climbed one hill she found another rising directly before her, and, between the two, a great ravine, down to the very bottom of which she must go before she could climb the other hill. She had crossed several of these ravines,—she did not remember how many,—and had come out at last on the top of the highest of all the hills above the town: a hill so steep that she had always wondered how the cows could keep on their feet when they were grazing high up on it. It was in one of these ravines that she had seen the black stones; but in which one she could not be sure. Neither could she recollect exactly where she had left the road and struck out to cross the hills.
"I might walk and walk all day," thought Nelly, "and never find it. How shall I ever manage?"
Fortune favored Nelly. The very next day, Billy came to the house to ask if Mrs. March could spare Nelly to go and stay two days with Lucinda, while he was away. He had an excellent chance to make some money by taking a party of gentlemen across the valley and up into one of the passes in the range, where they were going to fish. He would be at home the second night: Nelly need stay only over one night. Lucinda was not well, and Billy did not like to leave her alone.
Mrs. March said, "Certainly: Nelly could go."
As soon as she told Nelly of the plan, Nelly's heart seemed to leap in her bosom with the thought:—
"Now that's just the chance for me to look for the stones."
She set off very early, and reached Lucinda's house before eight o'clock. After she had unpacked her bag, and arranged all her things in the little room where she was to sleep, she asked Lucinda if there were any thing she could do to help her.
Lucinda was quilting a big bedquilt, which was stretched out on chairs and long wooden bars, and took up so much of the room in the kitchen it was hard to get about.
"Mercy, no, child!" said Lucinda. "I hain't got nothin' to do but this quilt, an' I expect you ain't much of a hand at quiltin'. 'Twan't my notion to have ye come,—not but what I'm always glad to see ye; ye know that,—but I wan't afraid to be alone. But Billy he's took it into his head 'tain't safe for me to be alone here nights. Now if there's any thing ye want to do, ye jest go 'n' do it."
"Would it make any difference to you if I were gone all day, so I am here to sleep?" said Nelly.
"Why, no," replied Lucinda; "not a bit. Did ye want to go into the town?"
"No," said Nelly; "but I wanted to find a place I saw once, on the way there. It was a real deep place, almost sunk down in the ground, full of pines and bushes: a real pretty place. But it wasn't on the road. I don't know 's I can find it; but I'd like to."
"All right," said Lucinda: "you go off. I'll give ye some lunch in case ye get hungry. Ye won't be lonesome, will ye, without Rob?"
"Oh, no!" said Nelly: "I like to be all alone out doors."
Then she bade Lucinda good-by, and set off. For a half mile or so, she walked in the road toward Rosita. She recollected that she had passed Lucinda's before she turned off from the road. But the more she tried to remember the precise spot where she had turned off the more confused she became. At last she sprang out of the road, on the left hand side, and began running as fast as she could.
"I may as well strike off in one place as another," she thought, "since I can't remember. It cannot be very far from here."
She climbed one steep hill, and ran down into the ravine beyond it; then another hill, and another ravine,—no black stones. The sun was by this time high, and very hot. Nelly had done some severe climbing.
"On the top of the next hill I'll eat my lunch," she thought.
The next hill was the steepest one yet. How Nelly did puff and pant before she reached the top; and when she reached it, there was not a single tree big enough to shade her!
"Oh, dear!" said Nelly; and looked up and down the ravine, to see if she could spy any shade anywhere. A long way off to the north, she saw a little clump of pines and oaks. She walked slowly in that direction, keeping her foothold with difficulty in the rolling gravel on the steep side of the hill. Just as she reached the first oak-bush, her foot slipped, and she clutched hard at the bush to save herself: the bush gave way, and she rolled down, bush and all, to the very bottom of the ravine. Luckily, it was soft, sandy gravel all the way, and she was not in the least hurt: only very dirty and a good deal frightened.
"I'll walk along now at the bottom, where it is level," said Nelly, "and not climb up till I come to where the trees are."
There had been at some time or other a little stream in this ravine, and it was in the stony bed of it that Nelly was walking. She looked very carefully at the stones. They were all light gray or reddish colored: not a black one among them. She had in her pocket the little piece Mr. Kleesman had given her: she took it out, and looked at it again. It was totally unlike all the stones she saw about her.
"Oh, dear!" sighed Nelly: "I expect I won't find it to-day. I'll come again to-morrow. At any rate, I'll go to that nice, shady place to eat my lunch."
It was further than she thought. In Colorado, every thing looks a great deal nearer to you than it really is: the air is so thin and light that mountains twenty miles away look as if they were not more than three or four; and there are a great many funny stories of the mistakes into which travellers are led by this peculiarity of the air. They set off before breakfast, perhaps, to walk to a hill which looks only a little way off; and, after they have walked an hour or two, there stands the hill, still seeming just as far off as ever. One of the funniest stories is of a man who had been cheated in this way so often that at last he didn't believe his eyes any longer as to whether a distance were long or short; and one day he was found taking off his shoes and stockings to wade through a little ditch that anybody could easily step over.
"Why, man alive!" said the people who stood by, "what are you about? You don't need to wade a little ditch like that! Step across it."
"Ha!" said he, "you needn't try to fool me any more. I expect that ditch is ten feet wide."
Nelly walked on and on in the narrow stony bed of the dried-up stream. The stones hurt her feet, but it was easier walking than on the rolling gravel of the steep sides above. She stopped thinking about the black stones. She was so hot and tired and hungry, all she thought of was getting to the trees to sit down. At last she reached the place just below them. They were much higher up on the hillside than she had supposed. She stood looking up at them.
"I expect I'll tumble before I get up there," she thought. It looked about as steep as the side of the roof to a house. But the shade was so cool and inviting that Nelly thought it worth trying for. Half-way up her feet slipped, and down she came on her knees. She scrambled up; and, as she looked down, what should she see, in the place where her knees pressed into the gravel, but a bit of the black stone! At first she thought it was the very piece she had had in her pocket; but she felt in her pocket, and there was her own piece all safe. She took it out, held the two together, looked at them, turned them over and over: yes! the stones were really, exactly the same color! Now she was so excited that she forgot all about the heat, and all about her hunger.
"This must be the very ravine!" she said, and began to look eagerly about her for more of the stones. Not another bit could she find! In her eager search, she did not observe that she was slowly working down the hill, till suddenly she found herself again at the bottom of the ravine, in the dried bed of the brook. Then she stood still, and looked around her, considering what to do. At last she decided to walk on up the ravine.
"The big pile of them was right in such a deep place as this," thought Nelly: "I guess it's farther up."
It was very hard walking, and Nelly was beginning to grow tired and discouraged again, when lo! right at her feet, in among the gray stones and the red ones, lay a small black one. She picked it up: it was of the same kind. A few steps farther on, another, and another: she began to stoop fast, picking them up, one by one. She had one hand full: then she looked ahead, and, only a little farther on, there she saw the very place she recollected so well,—the ravine full of bushes, and low pine trees, and piles of stones among them. She had found it! Can you imagine how Nelly felt? You see she believed that it was just the same thing as if she had found a great sum of money. How would you feel if you should suddenly find at your feet thousands and thousands of dollars, if your father and mother were very poor, and needed money very much? I think you would feel just as Nelly did. She sat straight down on the ground, and looked at the stones, and felt as if she should cry,—she was so glad! Then the thought came into her mind:—
"Perhaps this land belongs to somebody who won't sell it. Perhaps he knows there is a mine here!" She looked all about, but she could not see any stakes set up to show that it was owned by any one: so she hoped it was not.
Now that the excitement of the search was over, she began to feel very hungry again, and ate her lunch with a great relish. The thoughtful Lucinda had put in the basket a small bottle of milk. Nelly thought she had never tasted any thing so good in her life as that milk. When you are very thirsty, milk tastes much better than water. After Nelly had eaten her lunch, she filled her basket with the black stones, and set off for home. Presently she began to wonder if she could find her way back again to the spot.
"That would be too dreadful," thought she: "to lose it, now I've just found it." Then she recollected how, in the story of Hop o' My Thumb, it said that when he was carried off into the forest he slyly dropped beans all along the way, to mark the path, and thus found his way back, very easily by means of them. So she resolved to walk along in the bed of the stream, till it was time to climb up and strike off toward Lucinda's, and then to drop red stones all along the way she went, till she reached the beaten road. She took up the skirt of her gown in front, and filled it full with little red stones. Then she trudged along with as light a heart as ever any little girl had, scattering the stones along the way, like a farmer planting corn.
When she reached the road, she was surprised to see that she had come out the other side of Lucinda's house, full quarter of a mile nearer home.
"Now this isn't anywhere near where I left the road before," she said. "How'll I ever tell the place?"
At first she thought she would put a bush up in the crotch of a little pine-tree that stood just there.
"No, that won't do," she said: "the wind might blow it out."
Then she thought she would stick the bush in the sand; but she feared some horse or cow might munch it and pull it up. At last she decided to break down a small bough of the pine-tree, and leave it hanging.
"We can't make a mistake, then, possibly," she thought.
When she reached the house, Lucinda had cleared the bedquilt all away, and had the table set for supper, though it was only half-past four o'clock. Nelly was not hungry. It seemed to her only a few minutes since she ate her lunch.
"Did you find the place, Nelly?" said Lucinda.
"Yes," said Nelly.
"Was it as pretty as it was before?" Lucinda asked.
"Oh, yes!" said Nelly; "but it was awful steep getting down to it. I kept tumbling down."
"Well, you're the curiousest child ever was!" exclaimed Lucinda. "Anybody'd think you got walkin' enough in a week without trampin' off this way."
Nelly did not reply. She felt a little guilty at letting Lucinda think it was only to find a pretty place she had gone; but she was sure it would not be best to tell anybody about the black stones till she had told her father. She had hid them all in a pile near the pine-tree whose branch she had broken down; and she meant to pick them up on her way home the next night. In the morning it looked to Nelly as if it never would be night, she was in such a hurry to see her father.
"Oh, Lucinda," she said, "do give me something to do! I don't want to go off to-day. I want to stay with you." So Lucinda gave her some brown towels to hem, and also let her snap the chalked cord with which she marked off the pattern on her quilt; and, by help of these two occupations, Nelly contrived to get through the day, till four o'clock, when she set out for home. As good luck would have it, when she was within quarter of a mile from home she saw her father at work in a field. She jumped over the fence and ran to him.
"Papa! papa!" she said, breathless: "look here!" And she held up her basket of black stones. "This is the kind of stone that comes where the silver is. There is a mine underneath it always: Mr. Kleesman said so. And I've found a mine: I'll show you where it is."
Mr. March laughed very heartily.
"Why, my dear little girl!" he said, "what ever put such an idea into your head? I don't believe those stones are good for any thing."
Nelly set down her basket, and pulled her pocket-handkerchief out of her pocket: the little piece of black stone she had got from Mr. Kleesman was tied firmly in one corner.
"Look at that, papa," she said, "and see if the stones in the basket are not just like it." Then she told her father all about the man's coming into the assayer's office with a bag of stones like that one, and what Mr. Kleesman said to him.
"Don't you see, papa," she said, vehemently, "that it must be a mine? Why, there are piles of it: it has all slipped down into the bottom of this steep place; there used to be a brook down there. I know it's a mine, papa! And if I found it, it's ours: isn't it?"
Nelly's cheeks were red, and her words came so fast they almost choked her.
"Nelly, dear," said her father, "don't you recollect that once before you thought you had found silver ore, you and Rob, up in the Ute Pass?"
Nelly looked ashamed.
"Oh, papa," she said, "that was quite different. That was when we were little things. Papa, I know this is a mine. If you'd heard what Mr. Kleesman said, you'd think so too. He said in his country they had a proverb, that no mine was good for any thing unless it had a black hat on its head; and that meant that there were always black stones on top like this."
Mr. March turned the little bit of black stone over and over, and examined it carefully.
"I do not know much about minerals," he said. "I think I never saw a stone like this."
"Nor I either, papa," exclaimed Nelly: "except in this one place. I know it's a mine, and I'll give it to you all for your own. It's mine, isn't it, if I found it?"
"Yes, dear, it's yours, unless somebody else had found it before you."
"I don't believe anybody had," said Nelly; "for there weren't any stakes stuck down anywhere near; and all the claims have stakes stuck down round them. Oh, papa! isn't it splendid! now we can have all the money we want."
Mr. March smiled half sadly.
"My dear little daughter," he said, "there are a great many more people who have lost all the money they had in the world trying to get money out of a mine, than there are who have made fortunes in that way. You must not get so excited. Even if there is a mine in the place where you found these stones, I don't think I have money enough to open it and take out the ore. But I will show these stones to Mr. Scholfield. He knows a great deal about mines."
"Oh, do! do! papa," exclaimed Nelly. "I know it's a mine."
"I am going down there to-night," said Mr. March. "I will carry your stones, and see what he says. In the mean time, we will not say any thing about it to anybody. You and papa will just have a little secret."
When Nelly kissed her father for good-night, she nodded at him with a meaning glance, and he returned the nod with an equally meaning one.
"What are you two plotting?" cried Mrs. March. "I see mischief in both your eyes."
"Oh, it's a little secret we have, Nelly and I," said Mr. March. "It won't last long: we'll tell you to-morrow."
It turned out that Mrs. March did not have to wait till the next day before learning the secret. Mr. March got home about midnight from Mr. Scholfield's. Mrs. March had been sound asleep for two hours: the sound of Mr. March's steps wakened her.
"Is that you, Robert?" she called.
"Yes," he said. There was something in the tone of his voice which was so strange that it roused her instantly. She sat up straight in bed and exclaimed:—
"What is the matter?"
"Nothing," said Mr. March.
"Nonsense!" said Mrs. March: "you can't deceive me. Something has happened. Come in here this minute and tell me what it is."
Then Mr. March told her the whole story. He had taken Nelly's stones to Mr. Scholfield, who had said immediately that there was without doubt a mine in the place where that mineral was found; and, when Mr. March had told him as nearly as he could from Nelly's description where the spot was, he had said that no mines had yet been discovered very near that place, and no claims were staked out.
"Scholfield says we must go immediately and stake out our claim. He'll go shares with me in digging; and at any rate will see what's there," said Mr. March.
"Do you believe in it yourself, Robert?" asked Mrs. March. She was much afraid of new schemes for making money.
"Why, I can't say I'm very enthusiastic about it," replied Mr. March; "but then I don't know any thing about mines, you see. Scholfield was near wild over it. He says we've got silver there sure."
"Will you have to find money to begin with?" asked Mrs. March, anxiously.
"Well, Sarah, considering that we haven't got any money, I don't see how I can: do you?" laughed Mr. March. "But Scholfield says that if I will give him a third of the mine, he'll take another man in, and they two'll pay for the working it at first. That seems very fair: doesn't it?"
"I don't know," said Mrs. March. "If the mine really does turn out to be very valuable, it is giving him a good deal."
"That is true," replied Mr. March. "But, on the other hand, perhaps it is not worth any thing; and, in that case, Scholfield has the worst of the bargain. He says, though, he can tell very soon. He has been in mining a good deal; and he can make his own assays with the blow-pipe. We're to start very early in the morning, and take Nelly along to show us the way. The dear child was nearly beside herself last night."
"So that was your secret: was it?" said Mrs. March.
"Yes, and a very hard one it was for the child to keep too," said Mr. March. "She was half crazy to tell Rob."
"You'll take him along too: won't you?" asked Mrs. March.
"Oh, yes," said Mr. March: "no more secrets now; that is, not in this house. We won't have it talked round, if we can help it. Scholfield says that the minute it is known we've found silver there, those ravines will just swarm with men prospecting for more claims."
The next day, Mr. March and Mr. Scholfield and Rob and Nelly set out immediately after breakfast for the ravine. They stopped at Billy's house and took him with them. Mr. Scholfield had said to Mr. March, as they walked along:—
"If Long Billy'll go in with us, I'd rather have him than any man I know about here. He's as honest 's daylight; I don't think he's doing much this summer; I think he'll go to work digging right away."
Wasn't Nelly a proud little girl as she walked ahead of the party? She kept hold of Rob's hand, and every now and then they would run so fast that the older people had to run, too, to keep up with them.
"How do you know the way so well, Nelly?" said Mr. Scholfield.
Nelly laughed.
"If you watch closely, you can see what I tell by," she said. "It's in plain sight."
"Yes, plain sight! plain sight!" shouted Rob, to whom Nelly had pointed out the little red stones. "It's out of a story."
Mr. Scholfield and Mr. March and Billy all looked around, perplexed; but they could see nothing.
"Oh, tell us the secret, Guide," said Mr. March. "We are stupid: we can't find it out."
Then Nelly told them; and as soon as she pointed to the red stones they wondered very much that they had not noticed them before.
It seemed a very short way to the ravine, this time: Nelly had reached it before she thought of its being near.
"Why, here it is," she said; "I didn't think we were half way there."
Then she and Rob sat on the ground and watched the others. Rob was very quiet. He was a good deal overawed at the idea of a real silver mine all for their own.
"Do you suppose it's right here, right under our feet, Nell?" said he, stamping his foot on the ground.
"I dare say," said Nelly. "Perhaps it is all over round here: some of them are as big as a mile."
"I wonder if they'll let us go down as often as we want to," said Rob. "They'll have to, won't they, if it's our own mine?"
"That'll be for papa to say," answered Nelly, decidedly. "I've given it to him. It's his mine."
While the children was thus building their innocent air-castles in a small way, the brains of the older people were building no less actively, and on a larger scale. Both Billy and Mr. Scholfield were much excited. Billy ran from spot to spot, now hammering a stone in two with his hammer, now digging fiercely into the ground with his pick-axe. Mr. Scholfield went about picking up the black stones, and piling them together, till he had quite a monument of them.
"I declare," he said at last, "it beats me that this place hasn't ever been found before, much 's this country's been prospected over and over. I don't know what to make of it. But there isn't a sign of a claim here for miles: I know that."
"Well, I'll tell yer what I'm a thinkin'," said Billy. "I'm a thinkin' that 's fur back 's them fust prospectin' days there was a creek in here; 'n' thet's the reason there didn't nobody look here. I've heern it said hundreds o' times in town thet there wan't no use lookin' along these ridges; they'd all been looked over thorough, 'n' there wan't nothin' in 'em. But we've struck a silver mine, sure: I hain't any doubt of it. Let's name her 'The Little Nelly.'"
Mr. March's face grew red. He did not like the idea of having a mine called after Nelly; but he did not want to hurt Billy's feelings. Before he could speak, Mr. Scholfield cried out:—
"Good for you, Billy! That's what we'll call it! That's a name to bring good luck. 'The Little Nelly!' and may she turn out not so 'little,' after all; and the first bucketful of ore we draw up, Nelly, we'll drink your health, and christen the mine."
Nelly did not quite understand what all this meant.
"Did you mean that I am to name the mine, sir?" she said.
"No," said Mr. Scholfield: "we meant that we were going to name it for you, by your name. But you can name it, if you like. That would be luckier still. Don't you like to have it called by your name?"
Nelly hesitated.
"I think I would rather not have it named after me," she said: "some of the mines have such dreadful names. But I know a name I think would be a real pretty name."
"What's that?" said her father.
"The Good Luck," said Nelly.
Billy clapped his knee hard with his hand.
"By jingo!" said he, "that's the best name ever was given to a mine yet. 'The Good Luck' it shall be; and good luck it was to you, Nelly, the day you struck it. Old Pine he said, one day last spring, mebbe you'd find a mine, when I was a tellin' him how you 'n' Rob was allers lookin' for one."
"But I wasn't looking for this, Billy," said Nelly. "I gave up looking for one a long time ago, when we began to sell the eggs. It was just an accident that I happened to remember the black stones in here."
"That's the way some of the best mines have been found," said Mr. Scholfield: "just by sheer accident. There was a man I knew, in California, had his mule run away from him one day: it was somewhere in that Tuolomne region; and if that mule didn't run straight down into a gulch that was just washed full of free gold,—and the fellow had been walking in it some time before he noticed it! There's a heap o' luck in this world."
"Yes," said Mr. March, "there's a great deal of luck; but there is a great deal which is set down to luck which isn't luck. Now, if my little girl here hadn't had the good-will and the energy to try to earn some money for her mother and me, she wouldn't have been searching for a short cut to Rosita over these hills, and would never have found this mine."
"That's so," said Mr. Scholfield, looking admiringly at Nelly. "She's a most uncommon girl, that Nelly of yours. I think we ought to call the mine after her; it's hers."
"No," said Mr. March: "I like her name for it best. Let us call it 'The Good Luck.'"
Mrs. March was watching for her husband and children when they came down the lane. She had been much more excited about the silver mine than she had confessed to Mr. March. All day long she had been unable to keep it out of her mind. The prospect was too tempting. "Why should it not have happened to us, as well as to so many people," she thought. "Oh! if we only could have just money enough to give Rob and Nelly a good education, I would not ask for any thing more. And, even if this is not very much of a mine, it might give us money enough for that." With such hopes and imaginations as these Mrs. March's mind had been full all day long; and, when she saw Mr. March and Rob and Nelly coming toward the house, she felt almost afraid to see them, lest she should see disappointment written on their faces.
Not at all. Rob and Nelly came bounding on ahead, and, as they drew near the door, they shouted out:—
"The Good Luck! The Good Luck! It is named 'The Good Luck.'"
"They wanted to call it 'The Little Nelly,' but Nelly wouldn't," said Rob. "I don't see why. If I'd found it, I'd have called it 'The Rob,' I know. They didn't ask me to let them call it for me. If they had, they might and welcome."
"It is really a mine, then?" said Mrs. March, looking at her husband.
"Yes, Sarah, I think it is," he replied. "If Scholfield and Billy know,—and they seem to be very sure,—there is good promise of silver there; and Nelly herself has named it 'The Good Luck.'"
"Oh, Nelly! did you, really?" exclaimed Mrs. March. "You dear child!" And she threw both arms around Nelly, and gave her a great hug. "That's a lovely name. I do believe it will bring luck."
"I didn't want it named after me," said Nelly. "It isn't as if it was a live thing—"
"Subjunctive mood, dear! 'as if it were,'" interrupted Mrs. March.
"As if it were," repeated Nelly, looking confused. "I wish they'd left the subjunctive mood out of the grammar. I sha'n't ever learn it! It isn't as if it were a live thing like a baby or a kitten. I wouldn't mind having such things called after me, but some of the mines have the awfullest names, mamma: real wicked names, that I shouldn't dare to say."
"Well, they'll call it after you, anyhow, Nell," cried Rob. "Billy said so, coming home."
"They won't either," said Nelly, "when it was my own mine, only I gave it to papa, and I asked them not to; I think it would be real mean."
"Oh, I don't mean Mr. Scholfield and Billy," said Rob: "they called it 'The Good Luck' as soon as you said so; but the men around town. They'll hear it was you found it; and they'll call it 'The Nelly,' always: you see if they don't."
"Rob, don't tease your sister so," said Mrs. March.
"Why, does that tease you, Nell?" asked Rob, pretending to be very innocent. "I was only telling you what Billy said."
"I don't believe it," said Nelly: "do you, papa?"
"No," replied Mr. March. "I do not see why they should give it any other name than the one the owners give it."
"Well, you'll see," said Rob. "There are ever so many mines that go by two or three different names. There's one way off in the north somewhere, where Billy used to haul ore, is called 'Bobtail,' some of the time, and 'Miss Lucy,' some of the time. They tried to change 'Bobtail' into 'Miss Lucy,' and they couldn't."
"Couldn't!" exclaimed Nelly: "what do you mean by that?"
"Why, the people wouldn't," said Rob, saucily: "that's all."
"'That's all' about a great many things in this world, Rob," laughed his mother. "'Couldn't' is very apt to be only another word for 'wouldn't' with a little boy I know."
Rob laughed, and left off teasing Nelly about the name of her mine.
Billy went to work the very next day at "The Good Luck." First, he put up a little hut, which looked more like an Indian wigwam than any thing else. This was for him and Mr. Scholfield to sleep in.
"We can't take time to go home nights till we get this thing started," said Billy. "If we've got ore here, the sooner we get some on't out the better; an' if we hain't got ore here, the sooner we find that out the better."
All day long, day after day, Billy and Mr. Scholfield dug, till they had a big hole, as deep as a well, dug in the ground. Then they put a windlass at the top, with a long rope fastened to it, and a bucket on the end of the rope. This bucket they lowered down into the hole, just as you lower a water-bucket down into a well; then they filled it full of the stones which they thought had silver in them, and then turned the windlass and drew it up.
Mr. Scholfield pounded some of these stones very fine, and melted them with his blow-pipe, and got quite big buttons of silver out of them. He gave some of these to Mr. March. When he showed these to Nelly, she exclaimed:—-
"Oh! these are a great deal bigger than any I saw in Mr. Kleesman's office. Our mine must be a good one."
Mr. Scholfield was in great glee. He made the most extravagant statements, and talked very foolishly about the mine: said he would not take half a million of dollars for his third of it; and so on, till old, experienced miners shook their heads and said he was crazy. But, when they saw the round buttons of shining silver which he had extracted from the stones, they stopped shaking their heads, and thought perhaps he was right. The fame of "The Good Luck" spread all over town; and, as Billy had said there would be, there were many who persisted in calling the mine "The Nelly." Almost everybody in Rosita knew Nelly by sight by this time; and it gave the mine much greater interest in their eyes that it had been found by this good, industrious little girl, whom everybody liked. Whenever Nelly went to town now, people asked her about her mine. She always answered:—
"It isn't my mine: it is my papa's."
"But you found it," they would say.
"I found the black hat it wore on its head," was Nelly's usual reply: "that is all. Mr. Scholfield and Billy found the silver."
It happened that it was nearly three weeks before Rob and Nelly went to Mr. Kleesman's house again. They had now a new interest, which made them hurry through with all they had to do in Rosita, so as to have time on their way home to stop at "The Good Luck," and watch Billy and Mr. Scholfield at work. It was an endless delight to them to see the windlass wind, wind, wind, and watch the heavy bucket of stone slowly coming up to the mouth of the hole. Then Billy would let Rob take the bucket and empty it on the pile of shining gray ore which grew higher and higher every day. Sometimes the children stayed here so late that it was after dark when they reached home; and at last Mrs. March told them that they must not go to the mine every time they went to Rosita: it made their walk too long. She said they might go only every other time.
"Let's go Tuesdays," said Rob.
"It never seems half so long from Tuesday till Friday as it does from Friday to Tuesday," said Rob.
"Why, why not?" asked Nelly.
"Oh, I don't know," said Rob. "Sunday's twice as long as any other day: I guess that's it."
"But you've got the Sunday each week," exclaimed Nelly: "it isn't any shorter from Tuesday to Tuesday than from Friday to Friday: what a silly boy! The Sunday comes in all the same. Don't you see?"
Rob looked puzzled.
"I don't care," he said "it seems ever so much shorter."
The first day that they were not to go to the mine, Rob said:—
"See here, Nell: if we can't go to the mine, let's go and see old Mr. Kleesman. His furnace must be done by this time. Perhaps he'll be making an assay to-day."
"Oh, good!" said Nelly. "I declare I'd almost forgotten all about him: hadn't you?"
"No, indeed!" said Rob: "I liked the mine better; but let's go there to-day."
"And we'll go and eat our lunch at Ulrica's too," said Nelly. "We haven't taken it there for ever so long: she said so Tuesday. We'll go to-day."
"So we will," said Rob. "Perhaps she'll have stewed chicken."
"Oh, for shame, Rob!" said Nelly.
"What for?" said Rob: "I don't see any shame. Where's the shame?"
"Shame to think about something to eat when you go to see people," replied Nelly.
"Now, Nell March, didn't you think of it, honest Indian?" said Rob.
"Well, it's worse to say it," stammered Nelly. "Perhaps I did think of it, just a little, little bit; but I always try not to."
"Ha! ha! Miss Nell! I've caught you this time; and I don't think it's a bit worse to say it: so, there! Stewed chicken! stewed chicken!" And Rob danced along in front of Nelly, shouting the words in her very face. Nelly could not help laughing, though she was angry.
"Rob," she said, "you can be the worst torment I ever saw."
"That's only because you haven't had any other torment but me," cried Rob, still dancing along backwards in front of Nelly.
"Hullo! hullo!" said a loud, gruff voice just behind him: "don't run me down, young man! Which side of the way will you have, or will you have both?"
Very much confused, Rob turned and found himself nearly in the arms of an old man with rough clothes on, but with such a nice, benevolent face that Rob knew he was not going to be angry with him.
"I beg your pardon, sir," he said. "I didn't see you."
"Naturally you didn't, since you have no eyes in the back of your head," said the old man. "Do you always walk backwards, or is it only when you are teasing your sister?"
Nelly hastened to defend Rob.
"Oh, sir," she said, "he was not really teasing me: he was only in fun."
The old man smiled and nodded.
"That's right! that's right!" he said.
They had just now reached Mr. Kleesman's steps. Rob sprang up, two steps at a time.
"What!" said the old man, "are you going in here? So am I." And they all went in together.
Mr. Kleesman was very glad to see Nelly.
"I haf miss you for many days," he said. "Vy is it you not come more to see assay?"
"We have been very busy," said Nelly: "and have not stayed in town any longer than we needed to sell our things."
"I know! I know!" said Mr. Kleesman: "you haf been at the Goot Luck mine!"
"Why, who told you about it?" exclaimed Rob.
"Ach!" said Mr. Kleesman, "you tink dat mines be to be hid in dis town? Not von but knows of 'Goot Luck,' dat the little maid-child haf found;" and he looked at Nelly and smiled affectionately. "And not von but iss glad," he added, patting her on the head.
Then he turned to the old man who had come in with the children, and said, politely:—
"Vat can I do for you, sir?"
The man took off his hat and sat down, and pulled out of his pocket a little bag of stones, and threw it on the table.
"Tell me if that's worth any thing," he said.
Mr. Kleesman took a small stone out of the bag, and called:—
"Franz! Franz!"
Franz was Mr. Kleesman's servant. He tended the fires, and pounded up the stones fine in an iron mortar, and did all Mr. Kleesman's errands.
Franz came running; and Mr. Kleesman gave him the stone, and said something to him in German. Franz took the stone, and disappeared in the back room.
"After he haf make it fine," said Mr. Kleesman, "I shall assay it for you." Then, turning to Nelly and Rob, he said:—
"Can you stay? I make three assay now in three cups."
"Yes, indeed, we can!" said Nelly: "thank you! That is what we came for. We thought the furnace must be mended by this time."
While Franz was pounding the stone, the old man told Mr. Kleesman about his mine. Nelly listened with attentive ears to all he said: but Rob was busy studying the pretty little brass scales in the glass box. The man said that he and two other men had been at work for some months at this mine. The other two men were sure the ore was good; one of them had tried it with the blow-pipe, he said, and got plenty of silver.
"But I just made up my mind," said the man, "that, before I put any more money in there, I'd come to somebody that knew. I ain't such a sodhead as to think I can tell so well about things as a man that's studied 'em all his life; and I asked all about, and they all said, 'Kleesman's the man: he'd give you an honest assay of his own mind if he could get at it and weigh it.'"
Mr. Kleesman laughed heartily. He was much pleased at this compliment to his honesty.
"Yes, I tell you all true," he said. "If it be bad, or if it be good, I tell true."
"That's what I want," said the man.
Then Franz came in with the fine-powdered stone in a paper. Mr. Kleesman took some of it and weighed it in the little brass scales. Then he took some fine-powdered lead and weighed that. Then he mixed the fine lead and the powdered stone together with a knife.
"I take twelve times as much lead as there iss of the stone," he said.
"What is the lead for?" asked Nelly.
"The lead he will draw out of the stone all that are bad: you will see."
Then he put the powdered stone and the lead he had mixed together into a little clay cup, and covered it over with more of the fine-powdered lead. Then he put in a little borax.
"He helps it to melt," he said.
Then he went through into the back room, carrying this cup and two others which were standing on the table already filled with powder ready to be baked.
Rob and Nelly and the old man followed him. He opened the door of the little oven and looked in: it was glowing red hot. Then he took up each cup in tongs, and set it in the oven. When all three were in, he took some burning coals from the fire above, and put them in the mouth of the oven, in front of the cups.
"Dat iss dat cold air from door do not touch dem," he said. Then he shut the door tight, and said:—
"Now ve go back. Ve vait fifteen minute."
He held his watch in his hand, so as not to make a mistake. When the fifteen minutes were over he opened the oven-door to let a current of cool air blow above the little cups. Nelly stood on a box, as she had before, and looked in through the queer board with holes in it for the eyes. The metal in the little cups was bubbling and as red as fire. Rob tried to look, but the heat hurt his eyes so he could not bear it.
"Ven de cold air strike the cups," said Mr. Kleesman, "then the slag are formed."
"Oh, what is slag?" cried Rob.
"All that are bad go into the slag," said Mr. Kleesman.
Then he put on a pair of thick gloves, and a hat on his head, and went close up to the fiery oven door, and took out the cups, and emptied them into little hollow places in a sheet of zinc. The instant the hot metal touched the cool zinc, it spread out into a fiery red rose.
"Oh, how lovely!" cried Nelly.
"By jingo!" said Rob.
Even while they were speaking, the bright red rose turned dark,—hardened,—and there lay three shining buttons, flat and round. Their rims looked like dark glass; and in their centres was a bright, silvery spot.
Mr. Kleesman took a hammer and pounded off all this dark, shining rim. Then he pounded the little silvery buttons which were left into the right shape to fit into some tiny little clay cups he had there. They were shaped like a flower-pot, but only about an inch high.
"Now these must bake one-half hour again," he said; and put them into the oven. Pretty soon he opened the oven-door to let the cold air in again, as he had done before. That would make all the lead go off, he said: it would melt into the little cups, and leave nothing but the pure silver behind.
"Now vatch! vatch!" he said to Nelly. "In von minute you shall see a flash in de cups, like lightning, just one second: it are de last of de lead driven avay; den all is done."
Nelly watched with all her might. Sure enough, flash! flash! flash! in all three of the cups it went; the cups were fiery red; as Mr. Kleesman took them out, they turned yellow; they looked like the yolk of a hard-boiled egg hollowed out,—and there, in the bottom of each, lay a tiny, tiny silver button! Mr. Kleesman carried them into the front room and weighed them. Two of them were heavy enough to more than weigh down the little button which was always kept in the left-hand scale. That showed that the ore had silver enough in it to make it worth while to work it. The third one was so small you could hardly see it. That was the one which belonged to the old man.
"You ore are not worth not'ing," said Mr. Kleesman to him. Nelly looked sorrowfully at the old man's face; but he only smiled, and said:—
"Well, that's just what I've suspicioned all along. I didn't believe much in all that blow-pipe work. I'm out about a hundred dollars,—that's all,—not counting my time any thing. It's the time I grudge more'n the money. Much obliged to ye, sir." And the philosophical old fellow handed out his three dollars to pay for the assay, and walked off as composedly as if he had had good news instead of bad.
Nelly looked very grave. She was thinking of what her father had said about Mr. Scholfield's blow-pipe.
"Perhaps Mr. Scholfield was all wrong too, just like this other man. Perhaps our mine isn't good for any thing."
Nelly's face was so long that kind-hearted Mr. Kleesman noticed it, and said:—
"You haf tired: it are too long that you look at too many t'ings. You shall sit here and be quiet."
"Oh, no, thank you," said Nelly: "I am not tired. I was only thinking."
Mr. Kleesman really loved Nelly, and it distressed him to see her look troubled. He wanted to know what troubled her; but he did not like to ask. He looked at her very sympathizingly, and did not say any thing.
"Is not a blow-pipe good for any thing to tell about silver?" said Nelly, presently.
"Oh, ho!" thought Mr. Kleesman to himself: "now I know what the little wise maiden is thinking: it is her father's mine. It did not escape her one word which this man said."
But he replied to her question as if he had not thought any thing farther.
"Not very much: the blow-pipe cannot tell true. It tell part true; not all true."
Nelly sighed, and said:—
"Come, Rob: it is time for us to go. We are very much obliged to you for letting us see the assay. It is the most wonderful thing I ever saw. It is just like a fairy story. Come, Rob."
Rob also thanked Mr. Kleesman; and they went slowly down the steps.
"Stay! stay!" said Mr. Kleesman. "Little one, vill you not ask your father that he send me some of the ore from the Goot Luck mine? I shall assay it for you, and I vill tell you true how much silver there should come from each ton, that you are not cheated at the mill vere dey take your ore to make in de silver brick."
Nelly ran back to Mr. Kleesman, and took his hand in hers.
"Oh, thank you! thank you!" she said: "that was what I was thinking about. I was thinking what if our mine should turn out like that man's that was here this morning."
"Oh, no: I t'ink not. Every von say it iss goot, very goot," said Mr. Kleesman. "But I like to make assay. You tell your father I make it for nothing: I make it for you."
"I will tell him," said Nelly; "and I am sure he will be very glad to have you do it. I will bring some of the ore next time. Good-by!" And she and Rob ran off very fast, for it was past Ulrica's dinner-time.
When they reached the house it was shut up: the curtains down, and the door locked. Ulrica had gone away for the day, to do washing at somebody's house; and Jan had taken his dinner to the mill. The children sat on the doorstep and ate their lunch, much disappointed. Then they tried to think of some way to let Ulrica know they had been there.
"If we only had a card such as ladies used to leave for mamma when she was away," said Rob, "that would be nice."
"I'll tell you," said Nelly: "we'll prick our names on two of the cottonwood leaves in the top of your hat: they'll do for cards."
Rob always put a few green leaves in the top of his hat, to make his head cool. It keeps out the heat of the sun wonderfully. One variety of the cottonwood leaf is a smooth, shining leaf, about as large as a lilac leaf, and much like it in shape. This was the kind Rob had in his hat. Nelly picked out the two biggest ones, and then with a pin she slowly pricked "Nelly" on one and "Rob" on the other.
"There!" she said, when they were done: "aren't those nice cards? Now I'll pin them on the door, close above the handle, so that Ulrica can't open the door without seeing them."
"What fun!" said Rob. "I say, Nell, you're a capital hand to think of things."
Nelly laughed.
"Why, Rob," she said, "sometimes you find fault with me just because I do 'think of things,' as you call it."
"Oh, those are different things," said Rob. "You know what I mean: bothers. Such things as these cards are fun."
When Ulrica came home at night from her washing, she was very tired; and she put her hand on the handle of her door and turned it almost without looking, and did not at first see the green leaves. But, as the door swung in, she saw them.
"Ah, den! vat is dat?" she exclaimed. "Dem boys at deir mischiefs again!" And she was about to tear the leaves down angrily, when she caught sight of the fine-pricked letters. She looked closer, and made out the word "Nelly;" then on the other one "Rob."
"Ach! mine child! mine child!" she exclaimed. "She haf been here: she make that the green leaf say her name to me. Mine blessed child!" And Ulrica took the leaves and laid them away in a little yellow carved box, in the shape of a tub, which she had brought from Sweden. When Jan sat down at his supper, she took them out, and laid them by his plate, and told him where she found them. Jan was much pleased, and looked a long time curiously at the pricked letters. Then he laid the leaves back in the box, and said to Ulrica:—
"Why do you not make for the child a gown, such as the Swede child wears, of the blue and the red? Think you not it would please her?"
"Not to wear," said Ulrica. "She would not like that every one should gaze."
"Oh, no, not to wear for people to see," said Jan; "but to keep because it is strange and different from the dress of this country. The rich people that did come travelling to Sweden did all buy clothes like the Swede clothes, to take home to keep and to show."
"Yes! yes! I will!" exclaimed Ulrica, much delighted at the thought; "but it shall have no buttons: we cannot find buttons."
"Wilhelm Sachs will make them for me out of tin: that will do very well, just for a show," said Jan. "It is not for money; but only that they shine and be round."
So after supper Ulrica took the roll of blue cloth out of the chest, and began to measure off the breadths.
"How tell you that it is right?" said Jan.
"By my heart," said the loving Ulrica: "I know mine child her size by my heart. It vill be right."
But for all that it turned out that she cut the breadths too long, and had to hem a deep hem at the bottom; which wasted some of the cloth, and vexed Ulrica's economical soul. But we have not come to that yet. We must go home with Nelly and Rob.
Nelly had made up her mind not to tell her father any thing about Mr. Kleesman's proposal to make the assay until she could see him all alone; but she forgot to tell Rob not to speak of it; and they had hardly taken their seats at the tea-table when Rob exclaimed:—
"Papa! don't you think Mr. Kleesman says a blow-pipe isn't good for any thing to tell about silver with. And there was a man there to-day, with ore out of his mine, and it hadn't any silver at all in it,—not any to speak of,—and he thought it was splendid: he and two other men; they had tried it with a blow-pipe."
Mr. Scholfield was taking tea with the Marches this night. He listened with a smile to all Rob said. Then he said:—
"That's just like Kleesman. He thinks nobody but he can tell any thing. It's the money he's after. I see through him. Now I know I can make as good an assay with my blow-pipe as he can with all his little cups and saucers and gimcracks, any day."
Nelly grew very red. She did not like to hear Mr. Kleesman so spoken of. She opened her mouth to speak: then bit her lips, and remained quiet.
"What is it, Nelly?" said her father.
"Nothing, sir," replied Nelly: "only I don't think Mr. Kleesman is like that. He is very kind."
"Oh, yes, he's kind enough," said Mr. Scholfield: "he's a good-natured fellow. But it's all moonshine about his being the only one who can make assays. There's a plenty of mines working here to-day that haven't ever had any assay made except by the blow-pipe. There's no use in paying a fellow three or four or five dollars for doing what you can do yourself."
"But that man said—" began Rob.
"Be quiet now, Rob," said Mr. March. "We won't talk any more about it now."
After Mr. Scholfield had gone away, Mr. March called Nelly out of the room.
"Come walk up and down in the lane with me, Nell," he said, "and tell me all about what happened at Mr. Kleesman's."
Then Nelly told her father all about it, from beginning to end.
"Upon my word, Nell," he said, "you seem to have studied the thing carefully. I should think you could almost make an assay yourself."
"I guess I could if I had the cups and things," said Nelly: "I recollect every thing he did. But, papa, won't you let him take some ore from our mine, and let him see if it is good by his way? He won't ask us any thing: he said he was doing it every day, and he could put in one more cup as well as not. Oh, do, papa!"
"I'll think about it," said Mr. March.
That night he talked it over with Mrs. March, and she was as anxious as Nelly that he should let Mr. Kleesman make the assay. This decided Mr. March; and the next morning he said to Nelly:—
"Well, Nelly, you shall have your way,—you and mamma. I will take some of the ore to your old friend. I shall go up with you to-morrow myself, and carry it. I do not like to send it by you."
"Oh, good! good!" cried Nelly, and jumped up and down, and ran away to find Rob and tell him that their father would walk into town with them the next day.
When Nelly walked into Mr. Kleesman's room, holding her father by the hand, she felt very proud. She had always thought her father handsomer and nicer to look at than any other man in the world; and, when she said to Mr. Kleesman, "Here is my father, sir," this pride was so evident in her face that it made Mr. Kleesman laugh. It did not make him love Nelly any less, however. It only made him think sadly of the little girl way off in Germany, who would have just as much pride in his face as Nelly did in her father's. Mr. Kleesman's love for Nelly made him treat Mr. March like an old friend.
"I am glad to see you here," he said. "I haf for your little girl von great friendship: she iss so goot. I say often to myself, she haf goot father, goot mother. She iss not like American childs I haf seen."
Mr. March was glad to have Nelly liked; but he did not wish to have her praised in this open way. So he said, very quickly:—
"Yes, Nelly is a good girl. I have come to talk to you, Mr. Kleesman, about our mine: perhaps you have heard of it,—'The Good Luck.'"
"Yes: I hear it is goot mine, very goot," replied Mr. Kleesman. "I ask the child to bring me ore. I assay it for you. It vill be pleasure to me."
"That is what I was going to ask you to do," said Mr. March. "I would like to know the exact truth about it before I go any farther. Scholfield is pressing me to put in machinery; but I do not like to spend money on it till I am sure."
"Dat iss right," said Mr. Kleesman. "Vait! vait! It is always safe to vait. Haf you brought with you the ore?"
"Yes, I have it here," replied Mr. March, and took a small bag of it from his pocket. Mr. Kleesman examined it very carefully. His face did not look cheerful. He took piece after piece out of the bag, and, after examining them, tossed them on the table with a dissatisfied air.
"Is it all as dis?" he said.
"Yes, about like that," replied Mr. March.
Nelly watched Mr. Kleesman's face breathlessly.
"I know he don't think it is good," she whispered to Rob.
"I cannot tell till I make assay," said Mr. Kleesman. "But I t'ink it not so very good. To-morrow I vill know. To-day I cannot do. I send you vord."
"Oh, no, you need not take that trouble," said Mr. March. "The children will be in day after to-morrow. They can call."
"No, I send you vord," repeated Mr. Kleesman. "I send you vord. Dere are plenty vays. I send you vord to-morrow night. Alvays men go past my door down to valley. I send you vord."
"What do you suppose is the reason he did not want us to call for it?" said Rob, as they walked down street.
"I know," said Nelly.
"What?" said Rob, sulkily. His pride was a little touched at Mr. Kleesman's having so evidently preferred to send the message by some one else rather than by them.
"Because," said Nelly, "he is so kind he doesn't want to tell us to our face the mine isn't good."
"Oh, Nell!" exclaimed Rob, in a tone of distress, "do you think it's that?"
"I know it's that," said Nelly, calmly. "It couldn't be any thing else: you'll see. He doesn't believe that ore's good for any thing. I know by his face he doesn't. I've seen him look so at ore before now."
"Oh, Nell!" cried Rob, "what'll we do if it turns out not to be good for any thing?"
"Do!" said Nelly; "why, we shall do just what we did before. But I'm awful sorry I ever told papa about the old thing. It's too mean!"
"We haven't spent any money on it: that's one good thing," said Rob.
"Yes," said Nelly; "and it's lucky we happened in at Mr. Kleesman's just when we did: there was some good luck in that, if there isn't any in the mine."
"But I don't see why you're so sure, Nell," cried Rob: "Mr. Kleesman said he couldn't tell till he tried it."
"Well, I am sure," said Nelly; "just as sure's any thing. I know Mr. Kleesman thinks it isn't good for any thing; and if he thinks so just by looking at the stone, won't he think so a great deal more when he has burnt all the bad stuff away?"
"Well, anyhow, I shan't give up till he send 'vord,' as he calls it," said Rob. "I guess it'll be good for a little if it isn't for much. Everybody says Mr. Scholfield knows all about mines."
"You'll see!" was all Nelly replied; and she trudged along with a very grave and set look on her face. Mr. March was to stay in town later, to see some farmers who were coming in from the country: so the children had a lonely walk home. They stopped only a moment at Ulrica's and at Lucinda's; and both Ulrica and Lucinda saw that something was wrong. But Nelly had cautioned Rob to say nothing about the ore, and she herself said nothing about it; and so the two faithful hearts that loved them could only wonder what had happened to cloud the usually bright little faces.
When it drew near to sunset, the time at which the farmers who had been up into Rosita usually returned into the valley, Rob and Nelly went down the lane to the gate, to watch for the messenger from Mr. Kleesman. The sun set, and the twilight deepened into dusk, and no messenger came. Several farm wagons passed; and, as each one approached, the children's hearts began to beat quicker, thinking that the wagon would stop, and the man would hand out a letter; but wagon after wagon passed,—and no letter. At last Nelly said:—
"It is so dark we really must go in, Rob. I don't believe it's coming to-night."
"Perhaps his furnace is broken again, and he couldn't do it to-day," said Rob.
"Perhaps so," said Nelly, drearily. "Oh, dear! I wish the old mine was in Guinea. Weren't we happier without it, Rob?"
"Yes, lots!" said Rob; "and we're making a good lot of money off the butter and eggs and trout. I don't care about the old mine."
"I do!" said Nelly: "if it was a good mine—if it were a good mine, I mean, because then we could all have every thing we want, and papa wouldn't have to work. But I know this mine isn't a good one, and I ain't ever going to look for another 's long as I live. Nor I won't tell of one, if I find it, either!"
"Pshaw, Nell! don't be a goose," said Rob. "If this one isn't good for any thing, it don't prove that the next one won't be. I'll find all I can, and try 'em one after the other."
"Well, you may: I won't!" said Nelly.
Bedtime came: still no letter. All through the evening, the children were listening so closely for the sound of wheels, that they could not attend to any thing else. Even Mr. March found it rather hard to keep his thoughts from wandering down the lane in expectation of the message from Rosita. But it did not come; and the whole family finally went to bed with their suspense unrelieved.
The next morning, while they were sitting at breakfast, and not thinking about the message at all, a man knocked at the door and handed in a letter. He had brought it from Rosita the night before, but had forgotten all about it, he said, till he was a mile past the house; and he thought as he would be going in again early in the morning, it would do as well to bring it then.
"Oh, certainly, certainly!" said Mr. March: "it was not on any pressing business. Much obliged to you, sir. Sit down and have some breakfast with us: won't you?"