A Millionaire of Rough-and-Ready | Page 8

tidying the house in view of the same event. Something in
the tone of her good man's voice, and the unusual circumstance of his

return to the house before work was done, caused her, however, to drop
her dusting cloth, and run to the kitchen door to meet him. She saw him
running through the rows of cabbages, his face shining with
perspiration and excitement, a light in his eyes which she had not seen
for years. She recalled, without sentiment, that he looked like that when
she had called him--a poor farm hand of her father's--out of the brush
heap at the back of their former home, in Illinois, to learn the consent
of her parents. The recollection was the more embarrassing as he threw
his arms around her, and pressed a resounding kiss upon her sallow
cheek.
"Sakes alive! Mulrady!" she said, exorcising the ghost of a blush that
had also been recalled from the past with her housewife's apron, "what
are you doin', and company expected every minit?"
"Malviny, I've struck it; and struck it rich!"
She disengaged herself from his arms, without excitement, and looked
at him with bright but shrewdly observant eyes.
"I've struck it in the well--the regular vein that the boys have been
looking fer. There's a fortin' fer you and Mamie: thousands and tens of
thousands!"
"Wait a minit."
She left him quickly, and went to the foot of the stairs. He could hear
her wonderingly and distinctly. "Ye can take off that new frock,
Mamie," she called out.
There was a sound of undisguised expostulation from Mamie.
"I'm speaking," said Mrs. Mulrady, emphatically.
The murmuring ceased. Mrs. Mulrady returned to her husband. The
interruption seemed to have taken off the keen edge of his enjoyment.
He at once abdicated his momentary elevation as a discoverer, and
waited for her to speak.

"Ye haven't told any one yet?" she asked.
"No. I was alone, down in the shaft. Ye see, Malviny, I wasn't expectin'
of anything." He began, with an attempt at fresh enjoyment, "I was just
clearin' out, and hadn't reckoned on anythin'."
"You see, I was right when I advised you taking the land," she said,
without heeding him.
Mulrady's face fell. "I hope Don Caesar won't think"--he began,
hesitatingly. "I reckon, perhaps, I oughter make some sorter
compensation--you know."
"Stuff!" said Mrs. Mulrady, decidedly. "Don't be a fool. Any gold
discovery, anyhow, would have been yours--that's the law. And you
bought the land without any restrictions. Besides, you never had any
idea of this!"--she stopped, and looked him suddenly in the face--"had
you?"
Mulrady opened his honest, pale-gray eyes widely.
"Why, Malviny! You know I hadn't. I could swear!"
"Don't swear, and don't let on to anybody but what you DID know it
was there. Now, Alvin Mulrady, listen to me." Her voice here took the
strident form of action. "Knock off work at the shaft, and send your
man away at once. Put on your things, catch the next stage to
Sacramento at four o'clock, and take Mamie with you."
"Mamie!" echoed Mulrady, feebly.
"You want to see Lawyer Cole and my brother Jim at once," she went
on, without heeding him, "and Mamie wants a change and some proper.
clothes. Leave the rest to me and Abner. I'll break it to Mamie, and get
her ready."
Mulrady passed his hands through his tangled hair, wet with
perspiration. He was proud of his wife's energy and action; he did not

dream of opposing her, but somehow he was disappointed. The
charming glamour and joy of his discovery had vanished before he
could fairly dazzle her with it; or, rather, she was not dazzled with it at
all. It had become like business, and the expression "breaking it" to
Mamie jarred upon him. He would have preferred to tell her himself; to
watch the color come into her delicate oval face, to have seen her soft
eyes light with an innocent joy he had not seen in his wife's; and he felt
a sinking conviction that his wife was the last one to awaken it.
"You ain't got any time to lose," she said, impatiently, as he hesitated.
Perhaps it was her impatience that struck harshly upon him; perhaps, if
she had not accepted her good fortune so confidently, he would not
have spoken what was in his mind at the time; but he said gravely,
"Wait a minit, Malviny; I've suthin' to tell you 'bout this find of mine
that's sing'lar."
"Go on," she said, quickly.
"Lyin' among the rotten quartz of the vein was a pick," he said,
constrainedly; "and the face of the vein sorter looked ez if it had been
worked at. Follering the line outside to the base of the hill there was
signs of there having