birt dicey lay awake deep into the night, pondering and planning. but despite this unwonted vigil the old bark-mill was early astir, and he went alertly about his work. he felt eager, strong, capable. the spirit of progress was upon him.
the tanyard lay in the midst of a forest so dense that, except at the verge of the clearing, it showed hardly a trace of its gradual despoliation by the industry that nestled in its heart like a worm in the bud. there were many stumps about the margin of the woods, the felled trees, stripped of their bark, often lying among them still, for the supply of timber exceeded the need. in penetrating the wilderness you might mark, too, here and there, a vacant space, where the chestnut-oak, prized for its tannin, had once grown on the slope.
a little log house was in the midst of the clearing. it had, properly speaking, only one room, but there was a shed-room attached, for the purpose of storage, and also a large open shed at one side. the rail fence inclosed the space of an acre, perhaps, which was covered with spent bark. across the pits planks were laid, with heavy stones upon them to hold them in place. a rude roof sheltered the bark-mill from the weather, and there was the patient mule, with birt and a whip to make sure that he did not fall into reflective pauses according to his meditative wont. and there, too, was tennessee, perched on the lower edge of a great pile of bark, and gravely watching birt.
he deprecated the attention she attracted. he was sometimes ashamed to have the persistent little sister seen following at his heels like a midday shadow. he could not know that the men who stopped and spoke to him and to her, and laughed at the infirmities of the infant tongue when she replied unintelligibly, thought better of him for his manifestation of strong fraternal affection. they said to each other that he was a “peart boy an’ powerful good ter the t’other chill’en, an’ holped the fambly along ez well ez a man - better’n thar dad ever done;” for birt’s father had been characterized always as “slack-twisted an’ onlucky.”
the shadows dwindled on the tan. the winds had furled their wings. white clouds rose, dazzling, opaque, up to the blue zenith. the querulous cicada complained in the laurel. birt heard the call of a jay from the woods. and then, as he once more urged the old mule on, the busy bark-mill kept up such a whir that he could hear nothing else. he was not aware of an approach till the new-comer was close upon him; in fact, the first he knew of nate griggs’s proximity was the sight of him. nate was glancing about with his usual air of questioning disparagement, and cracking a long lash at the spent bark on the ground.
“hello, nate!” birt cried out, eagerly. “i’m powerful glad ye happened ter kem hyar, fur i hev a word ter say ter ye.”
“i dunno ez i’m minded ter bide,” nate said cavalierly. “i hates to waste time an’ burn daylight a-jowin’.”
he was still cracking his lash at the ground. there was a sudden, half-articulate remonstrance.
birt, who had turned away to the bark-mill, whirled back in a rising passion.
“did ye hit tennessee?” he asked, with a dangerous light in his eyes.
“no - i never!” nate protested. “i hain’t seen her till this minute. she war standin’ a-hint ye.”
“waal, ye skeered her, then,” said birt, hardly appeased. “quit snappin’ that lash. ’pears-like ter me ez ye makes yerself powerful free round this hyar tanyard.”
“tennie air a-growin’ wonderful fast,” the sly nathan remarked pleasantly.
birt softened instantly. “she air a haffen inch higher ’n she war las’ march, ’cordin’ ter the mark on the door,” he declared, pridefully. “she ain’t pretty, i know, but she air powerful peart.”
“what war the word ez ye war layin’ off ter say ter me?” nate asked, curiosity vividly expressed in his face.
birt leaned back against the pile of bark and hesitated. last night he had thought nate the most desirable person to whom he could confide his secret whose aid he could secure. there were many circumstances that made this seem wise. but when the disclosure was imminent, something in those small, bead-like eyes, unpleasantly close together, something in the expression of the thin, pale face, something in nate’s voice and manner repelled confidence.
“nate,” said birt, at last, speaking with that subacute conviction, so strong yet so ill-defined, which vividly warns the ill-judged and yet cannot stop the tongue constrained by its own folly, “what d’ye s’pose i fund in the woods yestiddy?”
the two small eyes, set close together, seemed merged in one, so concentrated was their gaze. again their expression struck birt’s attention. he hesitated once more. “ef i tell ye, will ye promise never ter tell enny livin’ human critter?”
“i hope i may drap stone dead ef i ever tell!” nate exclaimed.
“i fund a strange metal in the woods yestiddy. what d’ye s’pose ’t war?”
nate shook his head. his breath was quick and he could not control the keen anxiety in his face. a strong flush rose to the roots of his sandy hair, his lips quivered, and his small eyes glittered with greedy expectation. his tongue refused to frame a word.
“gold!” cried birt, triumphantly.
“whar be it?” exclaimed nate. he was about to start in full run for the spot.
“i ain’t agoin’ ter tell ye, without we-uns kin strike a trade.”
“waal,” said nate, with difficulty repressing his impatience, “what air you-uns aimin’ ter do?”
“ye knows ez i hev ter bide hyar with the bark-mill mos’ly, jes’ now,” said birt, beginning to expound the series of ideas which he had carefully worked out in his midnight vigil, “‘kase they hev got ter hev a heap o’ tan ter fill them thar vats ag’in. ef i war ter leave an’ go a-gold huntin’, the men on the mounting would find out what i war arter, an’ they’d come a-grabblin’ thar too, an’ mebbe git it all, ’kase i dunno how much or how leetle thar be. i wants ter make sure of enough ter buy a horse, or a mule, or su’thin’, ef i kin, ’fore i tells ennybody else. an’ i ’lowed ez ye an’ me would go pardners. ye’d take my place hyar at the tanyard one day, whilst i dug, an’ i’d bide in the tanyard nex’ day. an’ we would divide fair an’ even all we fund.”
nate did not reply. he was absorbed in a project that had come into his head as his friend talked, and the two dissimilar trains of thought combined in a mental mosaic that would have amazed birt dicey.
“ye see,” birt presently continued, “i dunno when i kin git shet o’ the tanyard this year. old jube perkins ’lows ez he air mighty busy ’bout’n them hides an’ sech, an’ he wants me ter holp around ginerally. he say ef i do mo’ work’n i owes him, he’ll make that straight with my mother. an’ he declares fur true ef i don’t holp him at this junctry, when he needs me, he won’t hire his mule to my mother nex’ spring; an’ ye know it won’t do fur we-uns ter resk the corn-crap an’ gyarden truck with sech a pack o’ chill’n ter vittle ez we-uns hev got at our house.”
nate deduced an unexpected conclusion. “ye oughter gin me more’n haffen the make,” he said. “‘kase ef ’twarn’t fur me, ye couldn’t git none. an’ ef ye don’t say two thurds, i’ll tell every critter on the mounting an’ they’ll be grabblin’ in yer gold mine d’rec’ly.”
“ye dunno whar it is,” said birt, quietly.
if a sudden jet from the cold mountain torrent, that rioted through the wilderness down the ravine hard by, had been dashed into nate’s thin, sharp face, he could not have cooled more abruptly. the change almost took his breath away.
“i don’t mean that, nuther,” he gasped with politic penitence, “kase i hev promised not ter tell. i dunno whether i kin holp nohow. i hev got ter do my sheer o’ work at home; we ain’t through pullin’ fodder off’n our late corn yit.”
birt looked at him in silent surprise.
nate was older than his friend by several years. he was of an unruly and insubordinate temper, and did as little work as he pleased at home. he often remarked that he would like to see who could make him do what he had no mind to do.
“mebbe old jube wouldn’t want me round ’bout,” he suggested.
“waal,” said birt, eager again to detail his plans, “he ’lowed when i axed him this mornin’ ez he’d be willin’ ef i could trade with another boy ter take my place wunst in a while.”
nate affected to meditate on this view of the question. “but it will be toler’ble fur away fur me ter go prowlin’ in the woods, a-huntin’ fur gold, an’ our fodder jes’ a-sufferin’ ter be pulled. ef the spot air fur off, i can’t come an’ i won’t, not fur haffen the make.”
“‘t ain’t fur off at all - scant haffen mile,” replied unwary birt, anxious to convince. “it air jes’ yander nigh that thar salt lick down the ravine. i marks the spot by a bowlder - biggest bowlder i ever see - on the slope o’ the mounting.”
the instant this revelation passed his lips, regret seized him. “but ye ain’t ter go thar ’thout me, ye onderstand, till we begins our work.”
“i ain’t wantin’ ter go,” nate protested. “i ain’t sati’fied in my mind whether i’ll ondertake ter holp or no. that pullin’ fodder ez i hev got ter do sets mighty heavy on my stomach.”
“tim an’ yer dad always pulls the fodder an’ sech - i knows ez that air a true word,” said birt, bluntly. “an’ i can’t git away from the tanyard at all ef ye won’t holp me, ’kase old jube ’lowed he wouldn’t let me swop with a smaller boy ter work hyar; an’ all them my size, an’ bigger, air made ter work with thar dads, ’ceptin’ you-uns.”
nate heard, but he hardly looked as if he did, so busily absorbed was he in fitting this fragment of fact into his mental mosaic. it had begun to assume the proportions of a distinct design.
he suddenly asked a question of apparent irrelevancy.
“this hyar land down the ravine don’t b’long ter yer folkses - who do it b’long ter?”
“don’t b’long ter nobody, ye weasel!” birt retorted, in rising wrath. “d’ye s’pose i’d be a-stealin’ of gold off’n somebody else’s land?”
nate’s sly, thin face lighted up wonderfully. he seemed in a fever of haste to terminate the conference and get away. he agreed to his friend’s proposition and promised to be at the bark-mill bright and early in the morning. as he trudged off, birt dicey stood watching the receding figure. his eyes were perplexed, his mind full of anxious foreboding. he hardly knew what he feared. he had only a vague sense of mischief in the air, as slight but as unmistakable as the harbinger of storm on a sunshiny summer day.
“i wisht i hedn’t tole him nuthin’,” he said, as he wended his way home that night. “ef my mother hed knowed bout’n it all, i wouldn’t hev been ’lowed ter tell him. she despises the very sight o’ this hyar nate griggs - an’ yit she say she dunno why.”
after supper he sat gloomy and taciturn in the uninclosed passage between the two rooms, watching alternately the fire-flies, as they instarred the dark woods with ever-shifting gold sparks, and the broad, pale flashes of heat lightning which from time to time illumined the horizon. there was no motion in the heavy black foliage, but it was filled with the shrill droning of the summer insects, and high in the branches a screech-owl pierced the air with its keen, quavering scream.
“tennessee!” exclaimed birt, as the unwelcome sound fell upon his ear - ”tennessee! run an’ put the shovel in the fire!”
whether the shovel, becoming hot among the live coals, burned the owl that was high in the tree-top outside, according to the countryside superstition, or whether by a singular coincidence, he discovered that he had business elsewhere, he was soon gone, and the night was left to the chorusing katydids and tree-toads and to the weird, fitful illuminations of the noiseless heat lightning.
birt dicey rose suddenly and walked away silently into the dense, dark woods.
“stop, tennessee! ye can’t go too!” exclaimed mrs. dicey, appearing in the doorway just in time to intercept the juvenile excursionist. “ketch her, rufus! ef she wouldn’t hev followed birt right off in the pitch dark! she ain’t afeared o’ nothin’ when birt is thar. git that pomegranate she hed an’ gin it ter her ter keep her from hollerin’, rufe; i hed a sight ruther hear the squeech-owel.”
tennessee, overpowered by disappointment, sobbed herself to sleep upon the floor, and then ensued an interval of quiet. rufe, a towheaded boy of ten, dressed in an unbleached cotton shirt and blue-checked homespun trousers, concluded that this moment was the accepted time to count the balls in his brother’s shot-pouch. this he proceeded to do, with the aid of the sullen glare from the embers within and the fluctuating gleams of the lightning without. there was no pretense of utility in rufe’s performance; only the love of handling lead could explain it.
“ye hed better mind,” his mother admonished him. “birt war powerful tried the t’other day ter think what hed gone with his bullets. he’ll nose ye out afore long.”
“they hev got sech a fool way o’ slippin’ through the chinks in the floor,” said the boy in exasperation. “i never seen the beat! an’ thar’s no gittin’ them out, nuther. i snaked under the house yestiddy an’ sarched, an’ sarched! - an’ i never fund but two. an’ towse, he dragged hisself under thar, too - jes’ a-growlin’ an’ a-snappin’. i thought fur sartin every minit he’d bite my foot off.”
he resumed his self-imposed task of counting the rifle balls, and now and then a sharp click told that another was consigned to that limbo guarded by towse. mrs. dicey stood in silence for a time, gazing upon the unutterably gloomy forest, the distant, throbbing stars, and the broad, wan flashes at long intervals gleaming through the sky.
“it puts me in a mighty tucker ter hev yer brother a-settin’ out through the woods this hyar way, an’ a-leavin’ of we-uns hyar, all by ourselves sech a dark night. i’m always afeared thar mought be a bar a-prowlin’ round. an’ the cornfield air close ter the house, too.”
“pete thompson - him ez war yander ter the tanyard day ’fore yestiddy with his dad,” said the boy, “he tole it ter me ez how he seen a bar las’ wednesday a-climbin’ over the fence ter thar cornfield, with a haffen dozen roastin’-ears under his arm an’ a watermillion on his head. but war it a haffen dozen? i furgits now ef pete said it war a haffen dozen or nine ears of corn the bar hed;” and he paused to reflect in the midst of his important occupation.
“i’ll be bound pete never stopped ter count ’em,” said mrs. dicey. “pick that chile up an’ come in. i’m goin’ ter bar up the door.”
birt dicey plodded away through the deep woods and the dense darkness down the ravine. although he could not now distinguish one stone from another, he had an uncontrollable impulse to visit again the treasure he had discovered. the murmur of the gently bubbling water warned him of the proximity of the deep salt spring almost at the base of the mountain, and, guiding himself partly by the sound, he made his way along the slope to the great bowlder beneath the cliffs that served to mark the spot. as he laid his hand on the bowlder, he experienced a wonderful exhilaration of spirit. once more he canvassed his scheme. this was the one great opportunity of his restricted life. visions of future possibilities were opening wide their fascinating vistas. he might make enough to buy a horse, and this expressed his idea of wealth. “but ef i live ter git a cent out’n it,” he said to himself, “i’ll take the very fust money i kin call my own an’ buy tennessee a chany cup an’ sarcer, an’ a string o’ blue beads an’ a caliky coat - ef i die fur it.”
his pleased reverie was broken by a sudden discovery. he was not standing among stones about the great bowlder; no - his foot had sunk deep in the sand! he stooped down in the darkness and felt about him. the spot was not now as he had left it yesterday afternoon. he was sure of this, even before a fleet, wan flash of the heat lightning showed him at his feet the unmistakable signs of a recent excavation. it was not deep, it was not broad; but it was fresh and it betrayed a prying hand. again the heat lightning illumined the wide, vague sky. he saw the solemn dark forests; he saw the steely glimmer of the lick; the distant mountains flickered against the pallid horizon; and once more - densest gloom.
