The Elk Mountain pilot., 1921-02-03
Old Moddington's
Mine
By WILL LIsENBEE

tCopyrixht)
Epidemic Joe had succumbed to the
drowsiness induced by the tropical
warmth diffused by the fire of quak-
; ing ash that blazed In the fireplace,
and was snoring audibly. Jim Sui
Ivan and Big Abe were playing a
game of pitch. and Arizona Al. who
had just lighted his second pipe since
supper and taken a drink of melted
snow from the bucket In the corner,
wiped his mouth with a sigh of salts
faction.
''The man that crosses Death Valley
once can never turn down water for
any other drink" he remarked. ''and
you Of my search for Old Modding
tons mine out In the desert. did I?
"You didn't knee Old Moddington.
of course" AL went on; but that don't
matter, for you're a good many drinks
ahead. He. had a far average thirst.
and he was pretty near always en-
gagged in lodging anything that resem-
bled work, the boys didn't pay much
attention to his talk about there being
a mine out in the desert.
"About a week later Moddington dis
appeared, and we didn't see anything
of him for month. That he went
into Death Valley was pretty well
known, and when he dropped into the
Desert Fountain saloon one day, with
three or four heavy bags Of gold mug
gets and threw them on the floor and
ordered drinks for every one in the
house, 1t was very plain that he had
found the mine he had been talking
about.
"'Give every feller what he wants.
was his order, and bring me four
glasses of ice water
''He took a nugget as big as the end
of your thumb from one o the sacks
and tossed 1t to the barkeeper.
"'You can just let the boys work
through that he said. Then he went
over to the bank and deposited 5000
worth of the stuff.
HE had the secret of the mine, he
said. and intended to keep 1t. He got
him a claw-hammer suit and a lot Of
togs to rhyme with 1t. and he hit the
road for his old home in the East.
abb Dingley, an old-timer who had
crossed the desert in search of mine,
was in favor Of going on an expedition
to find Moddington's treasure. He had
discovered. he said, that an Indian,
Perrigo. the Navajo, had accompanied
Moddington on his trip.
"The most important bit of informa-
tion he could give us was that he had
seen Moddington writing something
on rock.
1--WE all agreed that this undoubted-
ly had something to do with the loca-
tion of the mine. and we were all in
halfway to the Devils Cup the moist
ure had evaporated out of our bodies
like water through sieve.
There's little spring at the DEVILS
Cup, and we just fell into 1t and siz-
zled like lime a Stacking.
"As soon as we had daylight Perrigo
led us to the big rock on which he had
seen Moddington writing. and Abb ut
tered regular Comanche yell when
he saw the markings on the rock.
"'It's cipher, boys he says, but
1t won't be hard to make 1t out
alt was simply lot Of figures cut
In a soft rock with the blade Of a
knife.
swell. Abb took what Moddingfon
had written on the rock and tried .
key. and 1t worked like a charm. But
It didn't help us to find the mine none.
and wr hit the trail back home the
rext day.
when We got back we found out
that Moddington never got his gold
in the desert. hut that 1t had been left
him by an uncle who had struck a big
mine In Alaska and died on board the
vessel that was bringing him to Sc,
attic with his fortune In gold nuggets.
$50 Moddington had worked us.
after all. and the more we thought
about II the madder we got"
Here the narrator paused and again
took long pull at the melted snow.
"But what was 1t that Moddington
wrote on the rock?" asked Jim Sui
livan.
He laid down a greasy. worn card
with the following roughly printed
thereon:
Its long time between drinks"