The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-04-07

silver mines of the mountains. And
DAYS and months passed for me as they
viii in such an out-of-the-Way place,
where the events and talk OF the
world seem OF no moment: and, as i
say. I longed with an ever-increasing
desire for all / had frittered away
honor and position and love l had lost
in the New England town, where the
winters might be bitter and the sum-
mers fierce. but where the old habit of
my Anglo-SaXOn blood called All, if
only had money TO repair that wrong.
For gold I longed, and of its potential
ity dreamed.
I had been at Corpus Christi a year
before the two who were TO be my COM
rades appeared. One-I knew him as
John Fenton-was little clerkly, book
ish man with a certain fright always
in his Sunken eyes; yet plainly a man
OF gentle breeding. The other, who
called himself Borden, was his antithe-
sis, a. burly, red-faced, oath-fiinging
bravo. What interests, wondered, did
they have in common. But I did not
dare ask them of their past, of their
bond of union, lest they should ask of
mine Possibly they had the same rea-
son, for they never inquired. We knew
that we belonged somewhere over the
border. Isolation, and the same condi-
lions of past, make strange companion
pie village folH-I struck up a friend
ship with Borden. Many sunny day
was passed in the shaded court of the
inn, playing gloOmiiy with a greasy
pack Borden had. On one thing we
agreed; we wanted money; that alone
would repair the cloak Of responsibility
we had worn threadbare.
AS we talked little Fenton would
smile gloCmily, and would disappear up
the slope to the monastery. For he
strangely had made an acquaintance
there: and every day he would return
with pile of old manuscripts from the
library Of the place; records-fOrgotten
by scholars-of the early history of
Sonora Then Borden let drop the only
remark he ever had about the pasts of
either; Eenton was scholar, a lin
guist, who had been a tutor at a New
England college. Again 1 wondered
what had brought together these two,
so dissimilar.
One evening-ah, I never may forget
tive were sitting by Pickering can
dies in my room, Borden and 1, at our
gaming, and Fenton reading a manu-
script he had brought that day from the
monastery. The monks, an illiterate
lot, did not care, or note, their treas
ures of the time when Spain was great,
and her venturesome gentlemen were
about these far mountaineering
gold and it's power. Possibly these
brothers of Corpus Christi wondered at
this pale, little-faced man who amused
his exile with papers that to them had
no value; for, as 1 have said, scholar
ship had died in that cloister
IF il were so" said Fenton, looking
at US suddenly.
Eth, what's that, Bob?" said Dor
den.
That Miguel Santos left his treas
ures in the mountains back from Cor
pus Christi"
II said Borden, stop your -
lingo. No such luck
'Lucki" said l YEARLY. maligning
my own.
Listen" said the little man, whose
IN those days the governor ruled
Sonora not so much as Miguel Santos.
Nay, Santos laid tribute of the gov
ernor, and Of all who passed: and Mi
guel Santos wealth was great beyond
Imagination. Yet every piece OF gold.
they say. was blood stained"
There are Others said Borden, deal
ing the cards.
eagerly.
but in his old age remorse seized
Santos. and he retired into the monas-
terry Of Corpus Christi, where he led in
every respect a sanity life-save in the
single one. that he made no restitution.
To this day the treasure is hid in the
mountains-wealth greater than all the
king Of Spain ever had from Peru"
Eth" said Borden, 4 wish I'd it, It's
something Bob, 10 know as much as
.you about languages.