"Yes. I'll come," she whispered.

Their crawl down the rock-rolling embankment seemed desperately slow.

"Wait here," bade Milt, at the bottom.

She looked away from the grotesque car. She had seen that one side of it

was crumpled like paper in an impatient hand.

Milt was stooping, looking under; seemed to be saying something. When he

came back, he did not speak. He wiped his forehead. "Come. We'll climb

back up. Nothing to do, now. Guess you better not try to help, anyway.

You might not sleep well."

He gave her his hand up the embankment, drove to the nearest house,

telephoned to Dr. Beach. Later she waited while Milt and the doctor,

with two other men, were raising the car. As she waited she thought of

the Teal bug as a human thing--as her old friend, to which she had often

turned in need.

Milt returned to her. "There is one thing for you to do. Before he died,

Pinky asked me to go get his wife--Dolores, I think it is. She's up in a

side canyon, few miles away. She may want a woman around. Beach will

take care of--of him. Can you come?"

"Of course. Oh, Milt, I didn't----"

"I didn't----"

"--mean you were a caveman! You're my big brother!"

"--mean you were a snob!"

They drove five miles along the highway, then up a trail where the Gomez

brushed the undergrowth on each side as it desperately dug into moss,

rain-gutted ruts, loose rocks, all on a vicious slant which seemed to

push the car down again. Beside them, the mountain woods were sacredly

quiet, with fern and lily and green-lit spaces. They came out in a

clearing, before dusk. Beside the clearing was a brook, with a crude

cradle--sign of a not very successful gold miner. Before a log cabin, in

a sway-sided rocker, creaked a tall, white, flabby woman, once nearly

beautiful, now rubbed at the edges. She rose, huddling her wrapper about

her bosom, as they drove into the clearing and picked their way through

stumps and briars.

"Where you folks think you're going?" she whimpered.

"Why, why just----"

"I cer'nly am glad to see somebody! I been 'most scared to death. Been

here alone two weeks now. Got a shotgun, but if anybody come, I guess

they'd take it away from me. I was brought up nice, no rough-house

or---- Say, did you folks come to see the gold-mine?"

"M-mine?" babbled Milt.

"Course not. Pinky said I was to show it, but I'm so sore on that

low-life hound now, I swear I won't even take the trouble and lie about

it. No more gold in that crick than there is in my eye. Or than there's

flour or pork in the house!"




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