The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1914-06-10
CHAPTER XIII.

For sixty days and more, while the
weather had been turning from cold
TO warm and they had been laboring
feebly to clear away the great slide
of loose rock that covered up the
ledge, the Eagle Tail mine had re-
NAMED mystery
Whether, like the old Eagle Tail Of
frontier fable, 1t was so rich that only
the eagles head was needed to turn
the chunks into twenty-dollar gold
pieces; or whether like many other
frontier mines, 1t was nothing but
hole In the ground, was matter still
to be settled. And Bud, for one, was
determined to settle it quickly.
Come on" he said, as Phil hesi-
tated to open up the way to the lead;
I'VE got a month, maybe less, to get to
the bottom Of this; and then the hills
will be lousy with rebels. If they's
nothing here, we want to find out
about 1t quick and skip-and If we
strike 1t. by grab, they amt enough
red-faggers In Sonora to pry me
loose from 1t. SO show these hombres
where to work and We'll be up against
rock by the end Of the week."
The original Eagle Tail tunnel had
been driven into the side of steep
hill; 30 steep. in fact. that the loose
shale stretched in long shoots from
the base Of the frowning porphyry
bikes that crowned the tops of the
hills to the bottom Of the canyon. On
either side Of the discovery gulch
sharp ridges, perforated by the gopher
holes of the Mexicans and the ancient
workings of the Spaniards, ran d.
rectly up the hill to meet the contact
But 1t was against the face of the big
ridge itself that Kruger had driven
his drift and exploded his giant blast
OF dynamite. and the whole slope had
been altered and covered with a slide
OF rock.
Against this slide, In the days when
they were marking time, Bud and his
pardner had directed their energies
throwing the loose stones aside, build
ing up walls against the slip. and
clearing the way to the solid schist
There, somewhere beneath the tumble
OF powder-riven rock, lay the ledge
which. II they found 1t, would make
them rich; and now with single-j ach
and drill, they attacked the last huge
fragments. blasting them into piece,
and groveling deeper until they could
strike the contact, where the schis,
and porphyry met and the gold spray
had spewed up between.
Il was slow work: slower than they
had thought. and the gang Of Mexi
cans that they had hired for muckers
were marvels Of ineptitude Left te
themselves, they accomplished moth
ing, since each problem they encoun
tered seemed to present to them some
element of insuperable difficulty, t.
solve which they either went into eau
Gus or waited for the boss. Mean
while they kept themselves awake BY
smoking cigarettes and telling storie!
about Bernardo Bravo.
To the Mexicans of Sonora Bernardo
Bravo was the personification of al
the malevolent qualities-he being
bandit chief who had turned first gen
eral and then rebel under Madero-
and the fact that he had at last beef
driven out Of Chihuahua and Therefore
over into Sonora, made his malevC
lence all the more imminent.
Undoubtedly, somewhere over to tn
east, where the Sierras lowered like
blue wall, Bernardo and his OUTLAY
followers were gathering for raid
and the raid would bring death to Sc
nora.
He was bad man, this Bernard
Bravo, and II half of the current ste
ries were true, he killed men wher
ever they failed to give him money
and was never too hurried to take
fair daughter of the country up benin
him. provided she took his fancy.
Yes, surely he was a bad man-bu
that did not clear away the rock.
For the first week Phil took charg
OF the gang, urging, directing and CO
joling them, and the work went mel
rily on, though rather slowly. Tn
Mexicans liked to work for Don Felipe
he was so polite and spoke such goo
Spanish; but at the end of the wee
1t developed that Bud could get NOR
results out of them.
Every time Phil started to explai
anything to one Mexican all the otl
ere stopped to listen to him, and tina
took time. But Buds favorite way {
directing man was by grunts an
signs and bending his own back {
the task. Also, he refused to unde,
stand Spanish, and cut of all Ion,
wtnded explanations and suggestion
by an impatient motion to go to worl
which the trabajadores obeyed wit
shrugs and grins.
So Don Felipe turned powder-ma
and blacksmith sharpening up tn