Sourdough Creek (25 page)

“Cassie, get back here!”

“Not on your life, Sam Ridgeway, not on your life!”

Sam looked at Arvid, who smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “Takes after her uncle.”

“Hardly,” Sam shot back.
She’s the complete opposite of you—you selfish, deceitful disgusting son of a warthog
! Sam picked up his own mining things, following Cassie. He needed to calm her down so they could map out a plan. Several things, like swapping out the horses and going hunting for some fresh meat, had to get done before he could even think about panning for gold. If she’d let him, he wanted to give her some pointers to keep her safe while she did what she felt in her heart she had to do.

Cassie was on the riverbank looking at the water, her pick dangling from her hand.

“Cassie, we need to talk.”

“No, we don’t,” she answered without turning around.

“There are things I need to do to support us here, like do some hunting, before I can join you. Please, will you turn around and talk to me?”

When she turned to face him Sam couldn’t miss the tears sparking in her eyes.

Chapter Forty-One

“A
re you crying?” Sam asked, his mouth going dry at the sight of her tears.

“Only because I’m so mad. I can’t believe everything that’s happened. Uncle Arvid showing up at Grace’s house and ruining Jonathan and Annabelle’s wedding.”
And ours, too
. “His accusing you and you accusing him, all the while I thought the claim was mine. Now, because of me, he’s gotten hurt so badly you have to take care of him even though you two hate each other. This whole debacle is so frustrating I could scream.”

Sam heaved a sigh of relief. He could argue with a mad Cassie, but he couldn’t deal with a crying one. He knew a lot of what she was leaving out of her little speech was her hurt over what had happened between them. She thought all he’d wanted to do was to dupe her. Play with her heart and then throw her away after he had the claim. Would he ever be able to regain her trust?

“I hear what you’re saying,” he said gently, nodding. “It’s pretty unbelievable what’s happened, I agree. But, I’m concerned about
now
. Right now. I need to go hunting. That may take hours, or the whole day.” He let his gaze drop to the ground where her boots made an indentation in the soft grass.

“And?”

“Thing is, I’m uneasy about leaving you working in the river alone. Can you wait to start panning until I get back?”

Cassie let out a harsh laugh that Sam was sure was a result of dealing with the situation at hand. “Wait? I’m trying to beat you, remember? We’re not working together.”

“What if you slip and fall in? No one will be here to pull you out.” He pointed to the rapids.

“Who says you’re responsible for our food situation and that you have to go hunting? I have enough flour to keep making biscuits for weeks. And we have bacon and coffee.”

“Just thought some fresh meat might be nice.”

“Cassie!” Arvid yelled from camp. “My back is plum wore out from sitting. I need to get back to my bed. Come up here and help me.” Cassie clamped her eyes closed. “Girl,” he shouted louder, “can you hear me down there?”

Sam had a hard time hiding his smile. He looked out to the meadow where the horses were grazing peacefully.

“Go ahead, laugh all you want,” Cassie said as she walked away from him up the trail toward camp.

“Cassie? Can you hear me, girlie?” Arvid called again.

“I didn’t say a word,” Sam called to her back. “You need my help with him?” The chirping birds and rushing water were his only reply.

After settling her uncle in his bedroll, Cassie took the better part of an hour to clean up the camp dishes and straighten up her own tent and belongings. Standing on the log that started the whole dilemma, she could see Sam down on the river’s edge, mining away.
So much for going hunting
. Oh, well. She’d be down there soon enough and was actually excited over the prospect of perhaps finding some gold. She plopped her hat on her head and started toward the river.

“And she returns.” Sam pushed the rim of his hat up with his thumb; the only finger that wasn’t a muddy mess, and smiled. “How’d it go up there?”

“Fine.”

He’d rolled up his pants; his boots were soaked. He took a kerchief from his pocket and wiped his brow, leaving a few little wet blobs of dirt clinging to his temple. “This is harder than it looks.”

“Mmhmmm.”

He turned and sat with a plop on the edge of the bank, and set his pan down. “Come on, don’t be angry. We’re going to be working side by side for a month. No reason we can’t be friends.”

Cassie struggled to hold onto her irritation. When he smiled like that all she could think about was the kiss. That first one in the hall. The one that had her body tingling from her crown to her toes, even now. How many women had he kissed like that? she wondered. His eyes gleamed, as if he had the greatest secret to tell her, and his brows arched knowingly over his thickly lashed eyes. Without a doubt, Sam Ridgeway was the most disarmingly handsome man she’d ever seen.

“Truce?”

She bent and rolled up the cuffs of her dungarees. “Why should I?”

“Because it will make life so much nicer.”

“I think life is as nice as it can get.” She carefully inched down the bank until she was standing on a rock in the shallow water. He seemed inclined to just sit where he was and watch her.

“Hah! That’s a joke. Did you see I switched out the horses while you were helping Arvid?”

“I saw,” she answered. She felt around the side of the bank, trying to decide where to start. “Thought you were going hunting?”

“Guess I got involved. I’m planning to go in a while. Here.” Without getting up, Sam hoisted the pick and made a hole right where she was looking.

“Sam! I want to do this on my own. Now if I find a big nugget I’ll feel responsible to give you half.”

“Sorry.”

Squatting, Cassie reached into the broken earth and took a handful of the cold dirt, setting it in her pan. She grimaced when a long, fat worm wriggled into view. Moving quickly, she plucked it out and dropped it into the river, averting her eyes. Then she dipped the edge of her pan down and took in a small amount of water. It turned the clump of earth instantly to mud. She gave the murky water a tentative swish, but in the process lost her balance momentarily. While righting herself, the mud spilled over the side of her pan into the rushing water.

“Darn, there goes my gold nugget…”

Sam picked up his pan and stood. Bending, he took a fist full of the gravelly dirt off the bottom of the river where the water ran shallow and put it into his own gold pan.

“Like this.” He dipped his edge and swished the water so a small amount escaped over the lip. “It takes a while to get the hang of it. The trick is not to try to drain the pan too fast. Slowly, she goes…”

Cassie watched him carefully as he moved the gold pan around and around. It really was quite beautiful how he did it, rhythmic and slow. He made it look easy. The water took a little more dirt out of the pan with it each swish. Soon there was only a tiny bit of gravelly soil left as the lighter dirt had been washed out. “As you know, the density of gold makes it very heavy. It stays in while the other gets washed away.”

She came closer and looked into his pan. “Have you had any luck so far?”

“Not yet.” He brought the pan up close to his face and poked around at the leftovers with his finger for several long minutes. “Nothin’.”

He tossed the dregs out and dipped his pan into the river, washing it out.

“Just like that?” Cassie said, under her breath. “Doesn’t seem too hard. How many times have you done it already?”

Sam pointed to a big hollow in the side of the bank where his pick lay on the green grass. The aroma of rich, dark soil pervaded the air. “More than you’d care to know.”

He laughed and she couldn’t help but smile. “Are we crazy?”

“Could be.” He nudged her with his elbow. “You give it a try.”

Sam stood by her side as she worked pan after pan, giving her suggestions and encouraging her whenever she got disheartened. A good hour elapsed without the hint of a sparkle, as Cassie’s teeth began to chatter like the dice in a gambler’s cup before he threw down. For what seemed like the millionth time, she peered at the bottom of her pan. Then she gasped.

“Sam! What’s that?”

Chapter Forty-Two

S
am crowded close to Cassie and looked into her gold pan. Concentrating on her task was difficult with Sam’s hard body smashed up close to hers. His warm breath caressed her cold face. He scooted in a bit closer still. “Let me see, Cassie. Where?” A moment passed. “I don’t see anything.”

Their heads bumped together as they examined the inky black soil. “
There
!” she exclaimed. “There! Do you see it? Is that gold?”

“Eureka!” Sam shouted, smiling into her face. “You found the first flake. Congratulations.” He patted her back several times, as she laughed. “Get your vial out and open it up.”

Once the vial was open, he took her shaking hand in his own and pressed her little finger onto the tiny flake, pushing down hard. They brought it up together. It was so small she was hard pressed to see it on the tip of her pinky.

“Scrape it off in here,” he said, holding up her vial. “Careful. Careful. Go slowly now. You don’t want to lose it.”

“Are you teasing me?”

“Heck no! This is exactly how fortunes are made. One itty-bitty flake at a time.”

Cassie scraped it off her finger and into the container half-filled with river water and screwed the lid on tight. She shook it and held it up to the sun, turning it back and forth. The flake floated around ever so slowly in the bottom of the vial.

“Isn’t it pretty, Sam? So shiny. So—
gold
.”

She was so excited she could hardly stand it. Her dream was actually coming true! She and Josephine would open a modest bakery in some little town. With the profits, Josephine would have all the finer things in life—an education, a cozy home, plenty of food on the table each and every evening…all the things her little sister deserved. This little flake of gold was the beginning of all that.

“You might not want to keep it in your pocket, do you think? Might fall out.”

“You’re right.”

Cassie proudly carried her reward up to the top of the bank clutched in her hand, and looked around.

“Just set it over there, where we can see it easily, and where it won’t get lost. Tomorrow I’ll bring something down with us that will keep our vials safe.”

Cassie bounded back down the riverbank so fast that her foot caught on a rock and she slipped onto her backside. When Sam reached down to help her up she was shaking from the cold. Her blue lips encased chattering teeth and her hand felt like a chunk of ice.

“You’re frozen. I think we’ve done enough for our first day out. Arvid’s got to be hungry by now, and we’re both going to be sore in the morning from all this bending and digging. If you go fix him something to eat, I’ll take Blu and see if there’s any game close by.”

“But it’s still early, Sam, and you haven’t found any gold yet. I think we should just try a few more pans before we call it quits.” She reached down and grabbed a handful of mud.

He knew if he pushed the point she’d get all huffy and stay on her own, fingers miniature icicles or not, just to be stubborn. Her jaw clenched over and over as she tried to stop the chattering, but it wasn’t working.

“Okay, one more,” he said.

“Two?”

“I’m just thinkin’ of your uncle. Poor fellah can’t even move.”

Her eyes turned dark and she glanced toward the camp. “All right, just one more try. But tomorrow I think I should make up some lunch and put it in with Uncle so he can eat when he’s hungry, and not have to depend totally on me.” She swished her pan with confidence and familiarity now, smiling up into his face. One thing was certain: Cassie Angel had been bitten by the gold bug, and he wasn’t going to be able to squash her enthusiasm very easily.

On his knees, Arvid peeked from between his tent flaps to see if the coast was clear. The top of the shabby structure sagged down, touching his head like a hat, and his belongings were lying all around in a messy heap. The air inside was hot and pungent from his being inside for so long.

He needed to relieve himself in the worst way, but didn’t want his niece, or Sam Ridgeway, to see that he was capable of taking care of himself. Actually, this arrangement could work out quite well, if he played his cards right. Cassie was as stubborn as they came when she set her mind to something. She’d win this contest for him without him having to lift a finger. He’d done some mining when he was a younger man, when he had more brawn than brain, and knew what backbreaking, freezing work it was. He hadn’t been looking forward to standing in that frigid spring runoff for hours on end, picking through the mud and gunk.

No, he’d rather relax on his bed doing nothin’. Young’uns were supposed to earn their keep. He laughed, marveling at his cleverness. It was too bad he’d never had a chance to run for a public office of some sort. He’d have made a wonderful politician.

Since the camp was deserted, he slipped from his tent and slowly made his way into the bushes. He relieved himself and was just starting back when he heard Cassie’s humming as she came up the trail to the camp. She laughed once and said something he couldn’t hear under her breath and resumed humming. He’d miscalculated! She would be in camp in seconds. He froze, trying to decide what he should do.

“Uncle Arvid, are you awake?” Cassie said quietly next to his tent opening, not fifteen feet from where he lay, stomach down on the ground, between the manzanita and shrub brush.

“Uncle?”

“Aaarrrggg. Help me, Cassie! Please! It hurts somethin’ awful!”

The cry pierced Cassie like a hot poker, sending her heart straight up her throat. She’d been ready to pull back the tent flap to make sure her uncle was sleeping. Turning in the direction of his voice, she ran a short ways and found him. Uncle Arvid writhed back and forth, gasping and whimpering. His hands clawed at the sky and his back arched up in a bow so far that he was supported only by his heels and his head. His eyes were squeezed closed.