Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1892-03-11
ON THE ROAD TO GOLD BUTTE.

when the stage went light, they ran
out the small blackboard; but when there
were more than four passengers, the big
mud-wagOn was put on This was
blackboard day, for there was not a single
passenger What was more to the point,
as the Gold Butte Mining company regard
ed it, was that under the drivers seat was
box with $4,000 i'm the newest of new
tens and twenties in it.
The driver had looked very blue when he
drove his four mustangs from the post-of
fice-where he took on very flat leather
bag, which spoke loudly of the incapacity
or Discrimination of the Thimble Spring
people for letter wrting-over to the rail
road station, where he was to take on the
box. Things were all going wrong at
home. That was why his brown face look
ed so haggard; that was why he held SO
loosely to the "lines'': that was why he
chewed SO hard on the bit of plug in his
mouth.
"Such hard scratchm' | never seed
afore, was what he had said as he had
listlessly thrown the mailbag into the wag-
on: 'can't git no decent job nowadays
NOthin' ter be he'd by prospectin'-tred
tibet time an az in: ef | get anything, it
peters out inside of a week. | might make
a strike over ter Sand Gulch, but it's a
derned long way off, an me n Sue an the
kids hez moved SO often at We can't raise
nothin ter move on now. Why in Sam
Hill did Sue hey ter git that rheumatic ieS
now, when ives so hard up, an afore she
weaned the baby? It's - shame
Why can't Bill git somethin' ter do?-
great, big, lunk-headed cuss. Ell / he'd a
brother pOOrer'n a crow, dye think I'd 90
an live on him, an live on him, till thar
warn't nuthin' ter eat in the house? Sho
Zach Springer, you're a blamed fool. Bill
hain't done that. He amt ter blame fer
gittin his leg broke that time. Bits all
right but he's onlucky Been tryin' fur a
month ter git job, an can't git in no
where He's willin' ter work. He Il stan
crotch-deep in the creek all day long wash
in out tailin's. eff he could make his salt
at it. Tried it fer six weeks an didn't git
enough to buy pair O. gum-boots. Whoa,
Buckskin. He'd jam right inter the sta
tion platform EFF yer didn't saw his teeth
eout."
And then the box was taken ON, and the
express agent had something to say That
something was not to Zach Springer's
liking. He chewed harder than ever on
the bit of plug, and sawed the hard mouths
of the mustangs by an unnecessary yank-
ing of the reins. 1t was a positive relief
to be able at least to whack his lash down
upon the sides of the nervous brutes and
turn them loose for the forty-mile run to
Gold Butte. Why had he needed lecture
from a hireling of the express company.
and why should that smooth iowled agent
have looked at him with such dark suSpi-
ciOn?
They think cos | got stood up down
Ter Black Rocks las time | had a big load
o gold tibet | need to be preached to every
time 90 out now with full box. Stoop-
shouldered, desk-settin' hounds. I'd like
ter see one on EN- Mandolin the ribbons
when thar a Winchester lookin' at 'em
with an eye as big as IA bar'l head. Can't
tell me they wouldn't give in. The sweet
scented, calf-skin booted young ladies
Thar amt man among EN-.
Zach Springer indignation was now in
more complete possession of him than had
been his feelings of blueness little earli-
er. What he had delivered himself of just
now was not what he would have said had
he voiced his true sentiments with refer
ence to the express agents lecture In be-
tween the words ran the thought, that
they had suspected him of having
hand in the Black Rocks robbery. 1t had
come to him before in what he called
cleft handed way, and he had had other
Outbursts of righteous indignation, but
none in which the upheaval was so great
as that of the present. Had that been the
reason the stage company had cut down
his pay to ''siXty' a month? The chances
were that it was. 1t was too blamed mean
for lot of swine, like these people, to
come it so high-handedly over poor man
x1hn It,ft IL
serve them just right if
The white dust of the desert rolled up
from the mustangs hoofs in little puffs,
and sprays of it, powdery fine, followed the
turn of the wheels halfway up, there to
be caught by the breeze and drifted behind
in a long cloud that followed the buck
board like a haunting spirit Sometimes,
as the light breeze shifted, it came back up
on the blackboard and its driver like heavy
thoughts on the conscience of guilty
man.
1t would serve them just right! Besides
that, only think-ten thousand, What
would the people down in Mexico or Qua
temala, where he would fly, know or care
if somebody up in far-off Nevada had
dumped a box off his blackboard and gone
back and got it after few days-may be a
week? 1t would have to be a dark night,
wouldn't it? You couldn't 90 and get a
box like that in the daytime and take it
anywhere, for the whole country would be
out looking for the man who had it, May
be a month. That would be better. 1t
would all blow over by that time. Let's
see, would it? Ten thousand was good
deal. Those stage-stOppers were always
striking the box on the wrong day. They
never got so much as that at one haul. In
two months, then-perhaps two months
But it would have to be well-hidden.
And the thought stuck to him, despite
all attempts to keep it of, though by the
time he had driven the mustangs into Red
Canon, his Indignation at having been sus-
pected by the company had died down
The box at his feet had taken on a new
meaning for him. 1t meant smart gowns
for the wife. 1t meant a good school
ing for the children. Those five little ones
had had a hard rustic of it to get what
few scraps of learning they had thus far
managed to clutch; and, as for clothes,
they were dressed like juvenile scarecrows.
Yes, all the hard scratching would be over
if he dared to do what many another hard
pushed man had done Resolving the
whole matter down to a plain, clear-cut
proposition, it was, after all, simply a
ion, &c kkv,a