The Young Engineers in Nevada Part 35

"Getting anything out of those ore-tests of yesterday's dump?"

Harry demanded, entering their shack.

"Not so much," Tom replied cheerily. "We're in a bad streak of stuff, Harry. But I thought you were watching the dump. What's the matter? Too cold out there?"

"Yes," nodded Harry. "I feel like a last year's cold storage egg. Don't you want to spell me a bit out there, Tom? I can run the furnace in here."

"Certainly," Reade agreed, leaping up. "There's nothing to do, now, but weigh the b.u.t.ton when it cools."

"Did you really get a b.u.t.ton?" Harry asked, casually, as he drew off his heavy overcoat.

"Yes; a small one."

"How much ore did you take it from?"

"About two tons, I should say."

"Then, if the b.u.t.ton is worth sixty cents," mocked Harry, "it will show that our ore is running thirty cents to the ton."

"Oh, we'll have better ore, after a while," Tom laughed.

"We've got to have," grunted Hazelton, "or else we'll have to walk all the way to our next job."

"Just weigh the b.u.t.ton, when it cools, and enter the weight on this page of the notebook," directed Reade, then went for his own outdoor clothing. "Have you been inspecting the dump as the stuff came up?"

"You'll think me a fool," cried Harry, "but I totally forgot it."

"No matter," Tom answered cheerily. "I've been doing bench work so long in here that I need exercise. I can run over all the stuff."

After Reade had pulled on his overcoat and b.u.t.toned it he fastened a belt around his waist. Through this he thrust a geologist's hammer.

"Don't go to sleep, Harry, old fellow, until you've cooled and weighed the b.u.t.ton. Then you may just as well take a nap as not."

"There he goes," muttered Hazelton, as the door closed briskly.

"Faith and enthusiasm are keeping Tom up. He could work twenty-four hours and never feel it. I wish I had some of his faith in this ridge. I could work better for it. Humph! I'm afraid the ridge will never yield anything better than clay for brick-making!"

Harry did succeed in keeping his eyes open long enough to attend to the b.u.t.ton. That tiny object weighed, and the weight entered, Hazelton sat back in his chair. Within a minute his eyes had closed and he was asleep.

Tom Reade, out at the ore dump, looked anything but sleepy. With tireless energy he turned over the pieces of rock, pausing, now and then, to hold up one for inspection.

In reaching for a new piece his foot slipped. Glancing down, to see just where the object was on which he had slipped, Tom suddenly became so interested that he dropped down on his knees in the snow.

It was a piece of rock that had come up in the first tubful.

At one point on the piece of rock there was a small, dull yellow glow.

Reads pawed the rock over in eager haste. Then he drew the hammer from his belt, striking the rock sharply. Piece after piece fell away until a solid yellow ma.s.s, streaked here and there faintly with quartz, lay in his hand.

"By the great Custer!" quivered Tom.

"What's the matter, boss?" called one of the workmen. "Got a sliver in your hand?"

"Have I?" retorted Tom joyously. "Come here and take a look."

"Haul away!" sounded Ferrers's hoa.r.s.e voice from below.

"Tell Jim to stop sending and come up a minute," nodded Tom.

"Do you often see a finer lump than this?" Tom wanted to know as the two workmen came to him. He held up a nugget. Shaped somewhat like a horn-of-plenty, it weighed in the neighborhood of three ounces.

"Say, if there are many more like that down at the foot of the shaft this old hole-in-the-ridge will be a producer before another week is out!" answered one of the workmen. "How much is it worth, boss?"

"Allowing for the quartz that streaks this little gold-piece, it ought to be worth from forty to fifty dollars," Tom responded thoughtfully.

"Fifty dollars?" broke in Jim Ferrers, as he sprang from the top ladder to the ground. "Is there that much money on the Indian Smoke?"

"Not minted, of course," laughed Tom. "But here's something as good as money."

"Where did you get it?" Jim demanded, tersely, after one look at the nugget.

"In this ore-dump."

"Today's send-up, then?"

"Of course."

Without a word Ferrers fell at work on the pile of rocks, turning them over fast.

Tom helped him. The two men, released from hoisting duty, also aided.

"Nothing more like that sticking out of the rock," Jim grunted, turning to one of the men. "Bring me a sledge."

With that larger hammer, held in both hands, Jim placed ore pieces with his feet, swiftly bringing down sharp blows that reduced the rocks to nearly the size of pebbles.

"I don't see any more nuggets coming," mused! Tom. "But wait a minute. Look at the yellow streak through some of these fragments."

"We're getting into the vein, I believe," spoke Jim solemnly.

"Look at the stuff! But wait! I've a little more hammering to do."

Back of them stood the teamster, who had just come up with the horses.

"Am I to take that stuff and dump it down the ravine?" he asked slowly.

"If you do," retorted Ferrers heatedly, "I'll hammer in the top of your head, Andy! Reade, won't you pick out what you want for the site of the ore-dump. We've got some real ore at last!"

One of the two hoist-men now ran to the shaft, shouting down the great news.

"Hold on there, Bill," Tom called dryly. "Don't get the boys excited over what may turn out to be nothing. Don't tell 'em any more than that we have-----"

"Tell 'em yourself, boss," retorted Bill. "Here they come!"

From the ladder a steady stream of men discharged itself until the last one was up.