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Show . THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE, SEED At MORNING, AUGUST 5, 1923. MOTHER OF GOLD N a desert rendezvous ui northern Unco era encamped three Americans, Joht Palmer, Pag Hah lock and Don SUsby. Palmer is a veteran of the gold mutes; the others young engineers tchom Palmer mat while taking 'a course at Cor neltT Palmer believes he has discov . ered the secret of the Mother of Gold,'" end is to share it tcuh the others. All ere sworn to tecruty, as u Barry AUison, the fourth member of die party, whom they are now awaiting. Palmer voices the fear a woman u detaining AUison. He warns the youths they cannot have any thoughts of women if their venture is to succeed. Palmer is right. AUison, m Chicago, has not teen his fiancee for three years. He has gone to DenevUle, a small Ohio town, to bid her farewell. post-gra- d r TEE installment n. VISION' IN' THE CRTSTAL. scarce more than monosyllable j both were rather genuinely the two walked toward the lake front, Mary'i parasol her eyes straight ahead. Finally they came to the little strip of Beateq grans and scraggly trees known as the Lake Front Park; made their'w&y to one of the short Iron seats which served the public during the evening band performances which were given In a little wooden pagoda located mid- - . way of the park. The local band, the motion picture, the Carnegie library, the churchee these made pretty much the m of social resources in DenevUle. They sat now, still strangely silent, staring out over the unbelievable blue of the great lake which lay before them, dotted with far moke trail. A soft breeze stirred the lace of Mary's parasol, stirred also a long strand Of her hair ata white temple, fo that Allison suddenly felt half crazed to take it and press It to his lip. There were few thers besides themselves about a man who read a paper, a maid with a baby carriage. The message of the time and place was one of calm, of completion, of the finish of all Impatient effort. In no corner of the world could there have been found a more perfect example of practical workday success, of Common caution, of abhorrence of all Influence of chance and risk. Never a chance had been taken by the generation which had built DenevUle. Those men had played certainties ail their lives. Seeing: that her young man was too silent, that something had chilled him, Mary touched him in a gentle query, a hand on his arm, to make amends, to make some sort of beginning. In her eyes be caught her shy wish to express her love for him, to help him. since he wes so slow, embarrassed. X am so glad to see you, Barry," said she. "You don't know how lonesome It is WITH : v " Of course. It must have been something from my subconscious mind, something that must have been within my knowledge or my thoughts, or within the reach of my possible knowledge or yours! But it came e to me just the sams as if it was the of another world and it was so strange! Th stillest thing you know how impossible dreams ere sometimes? Well, I didn t have any Mr. Freud to help me." Tell me about It." "1 do tell ysu, Barry. It was there in the cry sta It-- picture as real as life' It was in the mountains" "Th mountams"" "Tee Majbe because you have been living out there so long. But It waa not any scene in the mountains that you ever told me about or that I have ever seen. It appeared to be In a warm country there were tropical plants, trees. Yes. it seemed to be in a warm land palihs, I' thought. The trees grew down all sicls of the hill into the vallej " The valley?" the valley, Barry. But what "Why, should I say about It? It was a dream place. You will think me crazy, call me a child. 1 see it! couldn't blame you. But I pio-tur- . . d-- d found. Mary, my dear, my dear," fa had her hands now " I delayed my start to get away and talk to you about that very thing " " I m afraid. Barry." " And so was I. 1 was so afraid you would think me crazy that I almost dared not tell you. It ' was utterly absurd. Impose. ble. If you d.dn't listen to ms I believe I would have been obliged to eet you tree. Because that very valley today is my one chance of any sudden fortune. I have wasted time enough for you. We can't go on this way. Only a gamble will do. Well, my dear, that was the gamble I was going to put before you. And so you have It you have seen it just as clearly as I ever did. More so. I think." "Was that what I saw, Barry?" " God help me, yes! I do so believe. Tou leave me sca-c- e able to realize that ws ara both awake and alive today. But; oh, if we are right! If, indeed, my friends and do find the Madre D Oro!" Madre D'Oro! Ive never dared tell you before now. Let me do so let ms tell you what you truly did see in the crystal. Ill go back a bit. too that asm impossible, Insane dream of great mother vein of gold, somewhere under the surface of the earth! But no man has don more than record th different Phase of that dream, that tremendous myth which comes up spontaneously. Independently, in every corner of the world" " Barry, you are talking crazily." Why. yes I am. But what you saw there in your crystal sphere is set down in tvpe by th United States Government." " But I don t understand what you were going to tU me Just now. You were going 'Lou where? are not going to try to find the valley sphere" " Don't Jeer at scrying me. Mary. Don't talk to me. I don't dare to tell you the truth but that la the truth!" She only sighed, deeply. "Listen, my darling At this very minute there ere three friend, all mining men, waiting for me at the border of Mexico, while I am talking to my sweetheart. One of them, John Palmer, has been prospecting for years in lower Mexico. I told him years ago you see he is an early alumnus of Cornell, the same as I am what. I had read In Washington. H had heard th same thing a dozen times 1 tali yon It is In hU the air of all the earth, that legend. Well, there are threA friends of u. all who swore with John. Palmer mining men, that If ever either of us found a good thing he was to call the other three together; and we four were to make the adventure together as partners. a of-t- X , jei By Emerson Hough I H I 71. r.t s-- 1 '1' m,Vvu?n f w 'v AtH w'" UKCttt 1 Jr vl,k here" "Don't I, though V1 ,?V j .4 f ' f If i Corn-stoc- mighubs 1 It is the dullest place on the surface of the earth. Dont I wish I could take you from here."' .. .. mifferj.ee.eA0 ary ' ij L- - She checked a little sigh He continued, turning to her half savagely. This time I said that you and I were going to have an understanding or else I would call it all oft between us. Time I came across with something We cant wait forever this way it's not right for you. I it for you ?" her slow smile challenged him. It's different for me. I can work alone all my life if I have to of course, I would be alone. But you've only got one life to ll've, and it ought to be a success. There d never be any one else its you or no one, that is one thing sure " " Wont It be that way for me, too" " It has been, yes, but a girl can't wait forever." They sat, again silent, for a long time, but tha fringa of Mary's white parasol, whose staff was steadied by her hand, trembled a little bit, though ht.eard her laugh. I'd such a bad time of it yesterday," said aha What, my dear?" He turned hi moody face toward her, hiS eyes devouring. "You know my aunts old crystal sphty the ' scrying ball we used to call it? I showed it to you once" Why. yes. Spooky sort of thing I would not go In for crystal gazing if I were you. Well, I did! I got It out yesterday for the first time, tried to use It, You know how It is done? No, X don't think so " Wall, I went into a darkened room Just a UUls light at ons window. I covered my desk with a big piecd of black velvet and put the crystal on the velvet. I sat there with my fingers on the edge and looked and looked into th crystal Oh, I wanted to ask it all sorts of things. That was after you wired me that you were coming. 1 wanted to tail my fortune our fortune, you know? Well, I was frightened, of course." " Of course. There Is no good In monkeying with those things. It lust upsets your terves, that's all," "Well, Ill say It waa spooky, as you call it. I looked and looked an hour it seemed to me end I didn't see anything at eiL I was about to quit It. Then it seemed to me I could see a kind of milky film starting down In tbs glass, deep, deep down. I couldn't be sure, so I went back at It again and tried one more. I looked straight Into the middle of th crystal ball!" "And you saw nothing? "Oh. but I did see something' As I kept on, .the streaks and films seemed to grow, to coite together, and I tell you. honest as I sit here, there waa A picture that showed in the middle of tha sphere. world, than there Is now? Mary, do we dare dream this way do we dare hope? " Why, Barry, since we have met I have been living In a wonderful world. Is this more wonderful than that jou and I are , here? " , His hand lay on hers now. Nothing is more wonderful than that, no. But I want you to feel that what we dream is known aJ over the world. If our little party of fools ever found the entrance to the valley why, then you would be the queen among the queen of all the world. What couldn t we do for jou" But I xnustn t talk that way I must only remember that you took me on when waa I poor and hadn t a prospect or a chance. I am not sure that 1 m better off today. ov, let me teS you some more things about your picture anl see if they are not true. The upper end of the valley is sharp rock, straight up and down " Yes, it waa there a straight wall" Of course, no one could come down It; find a stream of water f,l!fi down there. And that Is ,the little stream which pisses through the,- - entire valley, and pieces way of the entire vein of gold." Yes. I saw, that." But jou didn't see whqre it went? It disappears? " Why, yes, I think that is true" You don't knew where that stream" of water goes? No, I coudn't guess from what I saw. Well, 1 11 tell you. I learned about that In the last ook; and John Palmer has back confirmation of what the brought book said. Of course, there are lots of mins stories scattered all through every mineral bearing country. It does seem sometimes that these mine have actually been seen and then disappeared. Take the story of tha Blue Bucket mine, up in eastern Oregon, A party of emigrant under Jo Meek as guide, who separated from a big wagon train in 1S55 and tried to find a short cut across to the Willamette Valley those people really had made a tremendous gold disA woman came back with pieces covery. t purs gold and said she could have filled her blue milk bucket. But they were lost, crazy. After they got through, twenty parties tried to find that place again they were all for killing Meek because he would not lead them to it. And without doubt or question there had been a rh h placer which was covered up with that outcrop of gold by some land slip. Now, that what we can call straight hlstorj- - The Blue Bucket placer ha never been found since then. Tet they had lumps of gold from It to prove that It waa there. "Take the Fegleg mine, the Lost Cabin mine, the hundred year old placers, who shall say they never existed? True, the mother vein never has been found. In all our history of mining there is only one real mother lode that is the Comstock. But the k itself would prove the Madre D'Oro fy ir "1 ' i f """a a- -' lifer-- Yes there was a sharp walled valley, and I was look.ng down into It. There was a great deal of color In the valley some birds were flying, they looaed like birds of paradise. But that was not the strangest, thing " What was it" He leaned toward her gravely, his eyes burning. I suppose it la because everybody Is trying to get rich its money, gold, in our house, all the time! Well, Barry, true as I live, across the middle of that whole valley there ran a lode, a dyke, a dam, pure as solid gold Why, I can see it as plainly as if it were out In front of me. " It was solid gold, I tell you and there In that dark I saw the raggedness of its wails, and sometimes there were little points of light like diamonds In the sun. And the sun was shining it made the west ablaze, coming up all the way over the terrible Shining wall that ran entirely across the valley. Oh. dont laugh at me" She sat. looking straight ahead, not daring to turn to him, but hi voice ended her laugh. I am not laughing, my dear, said he. He also sat motionless now, looking out across the lake. Mary, dear, he began again, after a long time with a deep breath. " I dont doubt in th least that you saw Just as you say! Ne.ther do I doubt that It exists Just as you describe It " That la so silly1" Indeed not, and you must not say that. On the contrary now don't think me silly or crazy youve seen whst I have come here to tell you about. Gold? A valley? Yea yes, yea! No more, no less. You have seen our valley my valley!" Yours' to acjf' - No, ours! I am on-m- y way right now go into that valley. We call it already tJ-- ' ' You see, during the war I was in Washington for a time, anl being a mining man by profession, I used to prowl around the Congressional Library, reading all sorts of things in my line. Well. I found a dusty old book there, big as a family Bible, put out once, many years ago. by the Bureau of M.nes. It was a great collection of facta and fiction and methods of the mining industry all over the world. 'Well, Mary, true as I ait hare, I saw there saw again four years ago, the whole story of the Madre DOro the mother vein of all the earth a gold. My friends and I ran across the same thing years ago at Cornell. And I waa going to tell you about It of our secret and now you have told me! .You have seen the same thing. Well, what shall we believe? Was I crazy ? Are you crazy also? The mother of gold' Yes, my dear. A belief in It axlet In every corner of the world. In Thibet there Is a great cavern where a people or a whole race of men disappeared hundreds of years a err. They walked down into another world. There Is gold all through that country. Lots of it. And that Is the tradition of the mother vein and they all believe in It! The theory there Is the same as aB over the earth It la the same crazy dream of all the prospector of the earth. Somewhere there Is a great solid vein of gold, from which all the gold of the eerth , comes It come up to the surface of the earth In places places, shall I say? It may be also In mines! The ancient myths all have the same n, known to story. There is a no one. Across It runs a wall of. gold. It lies between deep hills. It Is open to th sun. Birds fly serose It. A stream of water runs serosa the middle of th great lode." Oh. yes, yes. that is true, I saw the beautiful stream of water there." Precisely, my dear. And you will find that story you taw and that you describe In Peru, all through the Andes, In Colombia, in Central America you will hear of it in Alaska, and I am told It crops up in Africa, . valley-hidde- My dear, as you know, nothing but discouragements have happened to me In Colorado the industrial situation closed down our mine and put me out Just when I waa going to telegraph you to set the day. And only the other day came a telegram from John Palmen. naming the rendezvous. The others are in camp now waiting for me, but I wanted to see you first Again her sigh, deep drawn. Listen, my dear John Palmer is no visionary. He started as a mining engineer and then as a prospector but he never has played for anything but big stakes. His wire means that he has Jp sight the biggest stake that ever w as in all the world. I know his cipher. He has located the Madre D'Oro, as I believe with all my heart and . soul ! "And he knows of the valley that you have seen and of which I read that magic valley which holds the mother gold. If that Isn't magnificent, I don't know what is. And If we are hot crazy, two Bitting here In the dullest town on the face of th earth then I dont know anything at alL" Strang things have happened in tha world, Barry, he heard her voice, quiet, unagitated. " Though I wont say stranger " this things than said he moodily, No, I suppose It Isn't strange that by radio you cam tiit across the word that by wireless you can span the Atlantlo by submarine cross under the Atlantic. I tell you, there is nothing too big, nothing too impossible. And it all is as natural and commonplace as eating breakfast, when it does come. Now. I u tel you what I have been thinking, Mary I should Just as well be altogether crazy as part way. Here is th entire currency qf Europe gone to piece nothing under it in gold value, or anything over there normal except what ia left of the British pound. But always, every time, when the world has needed a great discovery of gold, that great discovery has been made. It aeeme that the great mother of gold shows herself, fractionally at least. Just when there is need for it. Well, was there ever a more terrible crisis in all the Industry of the, world, a moft terrible crisis of aU humanity of the w--e A found. Well, who knows1 I tell you, It is time for the Madre D'Oro' And I tell you also. It does exist. And I tell you also, John Palmer say that he has found It! " Mary, your little valley was a hole punched down in the center of th earth. There was no way to get into it or out-o- nly one. Your little stream of water disappeared In the side of the valley nearest to you where you looked. Well. It ran directly under the mountain. It cam out under the foot of tha rock and there It seemed like an original well spring. Just a spring stream starting out as so many do, later to be lost in the sands. "Now, where this stream comes out at the rock wall there Is no trace or Indies tion that there is sn entrance Into any place no one would ever dream of going up after the water, because there the water Is, use. for But I know as It well as ready If I had been there with John Palmer a leaning rock almost covers the spring where It comes out. The aperture is shaded by heavy tropical vines and bushes. No one with his senses or without them could dream that this is the entrance to the mother of ail the gold of all th world. " There she lies, shining, waiting, I think. Waiting for the day! I would rather say that than to say waiting for us " But, Barry, where Is all this? " Mexico, my dear Mexico today. It la distinct, concrete, objective. We are not going on a wild goose chase. We know precisely where ws want to land and what w want to do. You know avut the great gold suppUea of the Aztecs d n In Mexico? You know how Cortes, the original conquistador, extorted gold from Montezuma? Well, our history agrees that the Aztecs had some sort of tremendous supply of gold, fine, pure gold. Montezuma used that gold, though they could grill him or pull put his fingernail and ask him where it came from, he would not tell them because he did not know himself. Now, that is the truth about it. Not even the king of th Aztecs knew where lay his supply of gold; If that knowledge were general how long would It have lasted But it was guarded, kept as th sacred seerst of the Aztec people. It la always mysterious and baffling, as is the whole history of that people. Now, the story tells that only three men of all the world, chiefs of the war clan of th Aztec tribe, ever had the secret of the There were only three of magic valley. them there will be four of ut! V Tell me all about it. Barry." Suddenly he drew up. to think at laL Mary, If you and I were not one, I could not tell you anything without breaking my own oath. You know what they say about giving a secret to a Why. Barryl" " True, thi Is too big to be a secret of two we simply are one. And we must remember that." Go on! Well, then, I shall. When Montezuma needed gold, be left word at the council of the tribe that he must have It. .As tbougn he had robbed Aladdin's lamp it came la due course. No one knew whence it came or who brought It it only wa there, that waa alL Now, the tradition, as I get It, was that no one knew the Identity of any of these, three owners of the secret of the tadre D'Oro. No one suspectsd that they even lived. It was general knowledge' of tha Aztecs, of course, that there were rich placers in their country; hut they did not live on the same standards which ws have -- wealth meant little to them; they were happy in their own way. When the king needed gold he wished for it end, being king, he got it." But th three men, Barry? They could not live forever," " No. That ia true. But th secret cam down for a couple of centnriea perhaps, and only three men at on time ever had It, " Those three men knew th Identity of each of th three guardian, go when death took one of them in war or in disease th remaining two guardian must choose a Kill all three of them and you killed th secret, of course. Well, very likely ali three of the guardians were killed by the Spaniards in the fighting around In Mexico, and that was how ths Madre D Oro dl&appeared for these centuries since then. "Well, say oiir two remaining guardians held a conference at once. They agreed that a certain man. wise and mature, of their clan, might be candidate timber. On of them went to him an 4, made some excuse to go back Into the mountains alone with them for a few daja. He never could suspect what was the actual reason. " Well, the three of them now would camp out and talk of general t hinge, th two guardians feeling out their candidate, whose fitness was pretty well determined In advance. Little by little they broke to him the purpose of their visit. By and by tbey told him outright if they concluded he would be fit, and worthy, andl tbey killed t hull if they did JlOt him " And then they sent him alone Into the wilderness for a week of fasting and prayer. Patiently they waited In the wilderness for his return. FurffledNeinctified. If they did " not accept him well, then h did not go back to ths settlements again. But well say he was accepted aa tha missing ons of the Three Guardians. Now he was bound by oaths, whose terribleness you and I can only guess, to protect forever, as dearer than his life, this secret of his people. So now, with the wrath of their god impending over him in case of hts faithlessness, the new man came Into this terrible secret." 6uddenly Barry Allison straightened up, as if Smitten of hit conscience. s "But today there are four and you would make five:" Don't! Barry I think that you and I suo-ceii- lM-- that we So be I never come back to tell." is still my secret and not your it hinis h wcfth-lt- -, darHn. me, I think ws can trust ons another. Finish! " Wery welL Now, the Three Guardians went back to the villages, the temples, back to their lives, os though nothing had hapIn oil ths history of Abe Aztec pened. people there la no hint or trace or suspicion that one of them ever endangered th secret. And the actual history of th Spanish Conquest shows that the source of the Aztec gold never was determined. Neither have we ever found the great mines of Peru, where the Incas got their the actual secret of El Dogold. Nor rado. in Colombia, ever found by Drake or th Spanish pirates. The wealth that came from Carthage never really wa traced back to Its source in the mountains. The ' ist a gimans never has been followed back to its source. At that time the world waa crazy for gold and great ships brought gold to Spain, France, England, tons and tons of It, because Europe needed that gold. But no one knew the actual aecret of the source. Is It too much to suppose that some one of those old peoples knew the outcrop of the Madre DOro- - some place where natural, continuous deposit of gold, deep down, in the middle of the earth, riaes aa If in' the writhing of a great snake, and ahows itself a little at a time here or there just enough to show that th Madre D Oro' does not forget her people?" "Well. Mary," he went on after a long silence between them, it costs no more, since we are Into this, to go on with th whole story. Suppose the Aztec king needs gold and sajs so in his council. No ons shows a trace of having heard th message as for himself. But, silently, one man or two never all three stroll away from tha village and disappear. If only one, he knows where the little river runs down in the sands. He follows it up slowly, and comes to the place where a spring seems to hurst out from a solid rock. He knows how to push aside or to get under that leaning rock. He goes in and the passage' opens before him. In the pebbly valley of the stream he walks, or crawls, a long, long way, through the channel. And so at length he sees what no one but the Aztec guardians ever before have seen that which you saw before you yesterday in your scrying glass the face of th Madre DOro herself! My dear girl, the thought in my own mind is hofr John Palmer has stood at that leaning rock. He has seen ths flash of th morning sun on th face of the Madre D'Oro more. He could not handle it adone he needed u& He cam out. He sent for hie three friends, aa we agreed long ago, solemnly. We four and you are the guardians today. Well, am I crazy? I suppose I am. Yonder cornea the amok of a steamship of a man whose fortune was mads in ore he mined and sold but made by using th raw resources of th world. Well, gold is a raw resource, no better. Only, we must have It. as much as we must have youth. And there it is. There it lie, waiting. That is how I came," be added at length, simply. " Am I a tool?" " Oh, glorious fool ye, yes. you re.'" . You believe we'll find It, Mary?" Don't ask me that, I believe I love you: isn't that enough? Can you say so much for me He choked as he turned to her. Then, forgetting even the wild vision that had burned his brain, in epl'e of all who might have seen he cast an arm about her, under her great umbrella. Hla lips burned at her lips, his cheek lay against her there in the open day, looking out on the open lake where the lazy emoke told of a steamship -going out for the wealth of the worldrproved and sure. Now there could be so further talk between them. The great thought of their love outweighed everything else in all th world. Touth was theirs, and was hope. He rose at last, seemingly ten year older than when he had come to that little feat where both had talked of magic. Give me a year," said he. If I don't come back, forget me. If you find another man well, you are free but don't tell him. ever. Part of you ia mlna whether I live 1 -- ?- are one." it then. If ' another man. Her great gray eyee looked Into hie questionlngly. i Neither could strangely, have said when they actually parted. But presently she wa walking hack alone, advancing along a sbady street of DenevUle town. Her lover waa gone whither, and-owhat wild errand. A secret waa burled in her heart, and never to be told to a living soul- - " 1923- - By Emertoa Bough J To be continued l Copyright- t 4 |