Spanish Gold Fever by Bill Sheehy

Author:Bill Sheehy [Sheehy, Bill]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Robert Hale
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 19

One morning when the sun was warm, the sky a brilliant blue, Hodges declared spring had arrived. Dan looked at the snow still covering the mountain tops to the north and shook his head. Almost overnight the grass down on the flats had begun to green up. Finally, after a couple days of being warm while sitting outside enjoying the sunshine, Dan had to agree. Maybe, he decided, his partner was right. This was a good place.

It was even better when they rode out and started driving stakes, formally laying out and marking the ranch boundaries. It took more than a week of riding and when they finished Hodges figured they had about a thousand acres of good grassland staked out.

‘We’ll have to make a trip back into Union soon,’ he said one evening after the supper dishes had been washed up. ‘Seems like we’re always running out of coffee and tobacco.’

Dan nodded. ‘Yeah, I’ve been thinking that, too. How does this sound, you’ve talked about writing a letter to your daughters and we’re going to have to register our claim. So, you have more need to ride in than I do. What say you ride in, take care of business, get supplies while I ride back over to see if I can find that Spanish mine.’

‘Gold bug still got you?’ Hodges chuckled.

‘Not so you’d notice. But if we’re going to stock this grass we’re calling a ranch, we’re going to need money. I figure I can dig out enough to get a good start on it while you’re in town.’

Through the winter, they had killed and hung the meat of one deer on racks along the back wall. Another carcass had been hung outside and allowed to freeze. Even with the slim rations they had, Dan had been able to put on a little weight and now stood just under six feet. Keeping the firewood split and piled high had given his shoulders and upper body a chance to toughen up. Hodges, on the other hand, didn’t appear to have changed, except for letting his beard grow out.

Finally agreeing with Dan’s plan, Tom Hodges rode out on the same morning that the younger man headed up into the mountains.

Remembering the way they had gone when leaving the narrow canyon, or ravine as Hodges called it, he rode north a little, looking for a way up over the nearest ridge. When the two men had ridden out of the canyon with the Spanish mine they had taken time to study the surrounding mountains.

‘This is something to think about,’ Hodges had said, reining his horse around at one point. ‘Things look different from different angles.’ He sat, taking a moment to pack and light his pipe.

They had just come out of the canyon and into a wider valley. This one was as dry and rocky but wider. It ran in a more north south direction.

‘Now,’ he said once he got his tobacco burning right, ‘if we wanted to come back

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