old-timer, “and ain’t you never took notice how much richer a feller with one poor, little, old nugget in his pan is than the hombre what only thinks he’s got a bonanza somewheres on the insides of a mountain? An’ look at this, will you: If everybody was to certain sure find the mine he’s huntin’ there’d be so blame much gold in the world that it’d take a hundred-mule train to pack enough to buy a mess of frijoles. It’s a good thing, I say, that somebody, er something has fixed it somehow so’s all our fool dreams can’t come true.”

“Speakin’ of love,” said Thad on another occasion, when the two were discussing the happiness that had so strangely come to them with their partnership daughter, “love ain’t no big deposit that a feller is allus hopin’ to find but mostly never does. Love is jest a medium high-grade ore that you got to dig for.{6}”

{6}

“Yep,” agreed Bob, “an’ when you’ve got your ore you’ve sure got to run it through the mill an’ treat it scientific if you expect to recover much of the values.”

The affairs of the old Pardners and their daughter Marta were matters of great and never-failing interest to the loungers who gathered in front of the general store and post-office in Oracle.

Bill Janson, known as the Lizard, invariably opened and led the discussions. The Janson family, it should be said, had drifted into the Cañada del Oro from Arkansas. They were, in the picturesque vernacular of the cattlemen, “nesters.” The Lizard, an only son, was one of those rat-faced, shifty-eyed, loose-mouthed, male creatures who know everything about everybody and spend the major part of their days telling it.

It was on one of those social occasions when the Lizard was entertaining a group of idlers on the platform in front of the store that I first heard of the two old prospectors and their partnership girl.{7}

{7}

CHAPTER II AT THE ORACLE STORE

“My Gawd! Hit’s enough t’ drive a decent man plumb loony, a-tryin’ t’ figger hit out.”

“YES, sir,” said the Lizard, “I’m a-tellin’ ye that them thar Pardners an’ their gal—Marta her name is—are th’ beatenest outfit ye er ary other man ever seed. Ain’t nobody kin figger ’em out, nohow. They’ve been here nigh about five year, too. Me an’ paw an’ maw, we been here eight year ourselves—comin’ this fall. Yes, sir, they’re sure a queer actin’ lot.”

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