Maryland independent. [volume] (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1874-current, 1909-04-30
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A Fool and ;
His Money. ::
BY william Wallace Cook



One of the neatest Sailing" op-
erations that ever occurred in the
Southwest was the one engineered
by Ed Noyes and doc" Bigby; they
put something like fifty charges of
gold into the Lucky Strike with
shotgun, and worked the property off
upon viii Carver for $4,000. Aside
from the metal Noyes and Bigby blew
into the mine, there was about as
much gold in it as in an ordinary
sandbank.
Carver had Just arrived in Phoe-
nix. He was well dressed, mild
hammered young fellow, and SO conf
dental about himself that he hadn't
been in the town two days before it
was known that he had come to the
Territory with $4,000 and deter
mination to make or break. 1t was
also to understand that here was a
young lady in the case; that the
young lady was wealthy; that Carver
had asked paterfamilias for her hand,
and that saig pater had told the
young man t& take Greeley's advice,
prove that hR had brains and could
make money, 4 nd then come back and
ask for the dhushter again.
Noyes and figby figured out that a
man who wptp1 let out that much of
his family hisa. y before he had been
forty-eight hours in a strange town
would make pretty good picking. So
they salted the Lucky Strike. took
every dollar the young fastener
had, then laughed about It.
As the whole town knew that Car
yer had come West to demonstrate
his sharpness and his ability to amass
wealth all for the purpose of winning
the girl of his choice, so the public
knew that he had lost all at the very
start.
People sympathized with him on
account of the girl. but felt certain
that he was good ways from filling
his prospective father-in-law' speci-
fications. Unkind remarks reached
Carver about "a fool and his money"
but the young man merely smiled in
a mysterious way and gave every one
the impression that there was some
thing he knew which he could keen
to himself.
At any rate, he secured sufficient
funds-it afterward developed that
the girl had sent him her pin money
and started in to work the Strike.
The Strike was just over the ridge
from Baldwln's Prize, was a true fis-
sure. free gold proposition that paid
regular dividends of 100 per cent.
When Noyes and Bigby had located
the Strike they felt positive that It
was on Baldwin's vein, but fifty
foot shaft and hundred-foot level,
all in country rock. convinced them
that the Prize" dyke waAa other
ground.
Carver laid In supply of powder,
drills, picks. shovels and wheelbar-
rows. bought himself working suit
and went up to the Strike and pitched
his camp. Week after week and
month after month, he and colored
man. old Jack, whom he had hired,
worked away with Industry. A noun
tain Of rock, as bare OF color as Mich
igan hardheads, grew up around the
windlass at the mouth OF the shaft.
Miners from the Prize used to stand
on the ridge and Joke with Carver as
he tolled away at window on the
platform below.
IF that gal waits til ye find
pay-streak in them diggins," they
taunted, she'll have to get old Ne
thuselah's receipt for a long life"
Carver, however, paid no heed. He
worked like beaver. and he kept II
up until people got disguised with
him and declared that he ought to be
put in straitiacket and kept In re-
straint. They thought his hard luck
had gone to his head and unbalanced
him.
At last Phoenix was startled by
report that old Jack had brought into
town piece of ore that assayed $500
to the ton. People scoffed at the
news, and even after they had han
died the samples and looked at the
assayer's certificate they were in
clined to think that Jack had got the
ore out of some other mine than the
Strike.
As for Noyes and Bigby, they
showed signs of panic, and when they
got rig and drove out into the hills
and saw Carver hauling up bucket
after bucket of as fine rock as ever
came out of ground they were sad
looking pair.
I'm not as young as you gentle
men thought, Carver explained