Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1910-08-27
THE AFFINITY BUG.

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was no common. ordinary bug, just from
the looks of the critter; no common
bug has big gold colored spots on its
back, and when Jake Simpson for the
third time found him perched on his
pet sample of "foat," he saw there was
something more about that bug than
there was to any ordinary bug.
Jake and his partner had been pros
pecting gulch in the Waniche Hills all
summer, trying to find the ledge from
which had come some rich float which
he had found near the spot where he
had built his cabin, but so far beyond
the few specimens of float ore which be
kept on the window sill outside his cab
in he had no luck in his search Now
tonight, when be came home fr3n his
prospecting and went TO compare the
rock he had in his pock with the sam
pie of float, there, for the third time was
that bug sitting on the same specimen.
He had knocked him off of it twice be-
fore, but it seemed like that float SEEM
ed to attract the bug, and the next
morning he would be perched up again
on the specimen as though he belonged
there.
Now Jake was naturally of an obser-
want nature, and it occurred to him this
time that there was some reason why
that bug should choose that one particu-
lar specimen to sit on, and he figgers it
out that the bug has an affinity for that
kind of rock. You see, there had been
an Irishman by the name of DR.. Roth
erstein around the camp during the sum-
mer, who explained that he had an af-
tinity for gold, and for a consideration,
would undertake to find gold mines for
anyone who would put up for the find
ing, and before he left camp, convinced
good many of the boys that he had an
affinity, not only for gold, but for any
kind of currency.
Jake has heard this talk about af1ini-
ties, and when he saw the bug acting in
this manner, he guessed at once that he
had an affinity for the rock on which he
perched so persistently, 30 he just was
dead set on seeing whether his affinity
would not lead him to the ledge where
the float came from, if he was once re-
moved from the range of influence Of
the sample.
Jake picks the bug carefully off of the
rock and carries him for hundred yards
up the gulch and whirls him round and
round his head 30 as he might lose his
bearings and then sits him on the ground
to see what he would do next. The bug
acts kind of dizzy like for spell and
then starts to hike up the draw, as though
he was going somewhere.
Following bug on his travels does
not need 80 much speed as it does pa
tience, because bug is not going to
break any speed limits, but Jake gets
down on his hands and knees and just
follows that bug with the determination
to see where he was bound for, and he
dassent leave him for fear he might not
be able to find him again. Fortunately
it was bright moonlight night and Jake
was able to keep on the track and during
the night he makes as much as three
hundred yards, keeping straight course
up the draw and climbing the side of
the hill to the right.
Just about when the day was breaking
the bug quits travelling and settles him
self down as though he had worked his
shift and heard the whistle blow, and
although Jake prods him with match
and blows tobacco smoke on him, he just
refuses to bulge. Jake being himself a
Union man sees how it is and knows it
is no good to try and get any business
out of him until it is his time to 60 on
shift again, so not knowing what his
hours are, he sits down alongside of him
with the determination to stay there un.
til he starts again. When Jake got an
idea into his head he was that sot in his
ways that he would see it through no
matter how long it took him.
Just about sundown the bug shakes
first one leg then the other, and off he
starts again, and Jake after him, and he
follows him up the hill to where some
ordinary looking rocks cropped out and
right there that bug gives sort ofquiver
all over and plants himself down to stay.
Jake picks loose rock and busts chunk
off of the ledge, and there 1t was, sure
enough, the identical rock his float came
from.
"Did Jake make anything out of his
fnd?" Say, stranger did you never hear
tell of the Affinity Mine. That was it.
w. E. III.