Mother Lode Page #3

...hiding behind the next ton of rock.

Making a living don't enter into it.

A man grows old, you know.

Don't you worry about this hanging wall,

I'll have it shored proper in a day or two.

But, Mr. McGee,

where exactly is the silver vein?

Well, you're sitting in it.

Did you think it was all silver and shiny,

so as you just dig it out with a pick...

...and melt it down

for spoons and things?

Aye, this is the ore.

Good stuff it is too.

Oh, it takes a steady hand for blasting.

What part of the country

are you set on prospecting, Mr. Dupre?

- I said, what part of the country?

- This part.

You cannot fool an old sourdough, lad.

I can see the wanting in your eyes.

I thought I'd start down at the creeks.

Try to follow placer upstream to the lode.

I tried that myself, you know,

following placer to the lode.

It don't work.

Why is that?

It don't work because there ain't no gold.

Hey, wait a second. That's not

a whole hell of a lot of fuse you got there.

Nearly three minutes, lad.

Fuse does not come cheap, you know.

If you cannot get out of a tunnel

in three minutes...

...you have no business

being in there at all.

We're not staying here?

No, it's the safest place. It's well shored.

Damn.

That was a bad beam when I put it in.

Let's get topside.

I can muck this out tomorrow.

It's not safe where you're sitting there,

Mr. Dupre.

I think you crashed in the wrong lake.

Listen, McGee lied about the bagpipes

and I think he lied about George.

I wouldn't trust that old guy

any further than I could throw him.

I'll tell you what else,

McGee is not digging silver in that mine.

What's he doing then?

I don't know yet, but we can find out.

We prospect the creek.

If there's anything in that creek,

it washed out of the mountain.

The same mountain the mine is dug in.

So, what if there is gold up there?

Maybe McGee is being secretive.

It's his mine.

What's the difference?

George is the difference.

Isn't he?

Jean. Jean, wake up.

For chrissakes, wake up.

I think I hear something.

Aah! Oh, my God.

- What happened? Are you all right?

- A man. There was a man.

What man? McGee?

I don't know. It was dark.

- What did he do?

- He scared the hell out of me.

- Was it George?

- No.

Jean, I told you, it was dark.

He... He was...

I don't know,

something was wrong with him.

Come on.

Let's get back to camp.

Whoever he is, he's gone.

You okay?

Don't you own anything that works?

Now, there's enough gas in the tank

for about half an hour.

If I stay down longer,

you can fill it up with the jerry can.

I got it, Jean.

I'm gonna try to get

under that ledge there.

Keep your eye on my air hose.

- What if it runs out of gas?

- Don't let it run out of gas.

Idiot.

Jean!

Oh, no.

Jean! Jean!

What the hell happened?

I don't know. It just stopped.

Why did you pull my hose away?

I had to take my mask off

to get back in there.

There's a hell of a cave, goes way back.

- What do you mean it just stopped?

- The gas cap got stuck.

So I ran back to get the pliers

and it just stopped.

But there was gas in the tank.

The spark wire came off.

I didn't touch it. I mean, I swear I didn't.

Oh, my God.

- Come on.

- Wait a second.

- What if he catches us in there?

- He won't.

I only need about 15 minutes.

I'm staying here.

If he starts up toward the mine,

I can stall him.

Stall him? What are you gonna say?

I'll think of something.

Trust me. Go.

Mr. McGee?

McGee?

McGee?

Have you ever heard the black silence?

When you're 400 foot underground...

...and the air's so dark and still...

...you can hold it in your hand?

It's a hard, hollow land, I'll tell you.

Twenty-nine year I been here.

Twenty-nine winter.

A hard, hollow land

for a wee lass like you.

A hard, hollow land!

It's me, damn it.

Jesus.

What are you doing down here?

In the cabin.

I heard these voices shouting...

...so I went down

to see what was going on...

...and there was this guy sitting there,

like some crazy man.

- What did he do?

- Nothing.

He just sat there

and said something in Gaelic.

What's Gaelic?

My brother spoke the Gaelic.

He was raised on a wee isle

in the Hebrides...

...named Teanga na Dubhaird.

The Tongue of the Black Cape.

My parents died

and left him with a family...

...worked a small croft

for the laird of the isle.

That is like a feudal lord, is the laird.

I'm not like me brother,

so I'm a wee bit tetched, you see.

I'll be with him soon, I expect.

Where is he now?

Why, with his maker.

Lan's been dead these 15 year.

How'd he die?

He was killed, lad, in a cave-in.

You said your partner

was killed in a cave-in.

So I did.

And so it was.

Alistair Ian McGee was my partner

and my brother.

He was killed in a cave-in,

as I have told you.

It's a hard, empty land, Mr. Dupre.

Many a man has come to grief,

chasing a high-grade vein.

How goes your prospecting?

Oh, a little color down the creek a ways.

We found color in all these streams.

Yeah. Well, you never know, though.

No.

There's always one place

you have not looked.

I'll be taking the canoe

tomorrow afternoon.

You see that you're ready to leave.

What the hell are you doing up here,

McGee?

What are you doing, Master Dupre?

Where were you

when I blasted out 1600 foot...

...of tunnel stope and shaft...

...and carried the rock out by hand?

I've been here 30 year.

Let's go, Jean.

Master Dupre.

You stay the hell

out of my mine, laddie.

- I'm absolutely certain...

- Jean, I think...

I'm sorry.

Let's leave. Right now.

It would take us two weeks

to walk out of here.

- So what?

- Look, there is gold in the creek.

There's probably gold in the mine.

McGee's had 30 years to find it.

Just let me pan out the samples.

If there's anything at all in that ore,

it'll show up.

God, what a cold bastard you are.

Do you really give a damn

about George...

...or me or anything

besides that lousy gold?

What did you find?

It's what I didn't find.

Which is?

Silver.

There isn't any silver

in McGee's silver ore.

And no goddamn gold.

- What's he mining then?

- Gold.

Only not in that drift tunnel

he showed us.

What about George?

Come here.

What about George?

What is it brings you to call upon

a tired old miner, Miss Andrea Spalding?

There's an airplane

at the bottom of the lake.

It was George Patterson's plane.

I don't suppose you'd know anything

about that, would you, Mr...?

Will you have a cup of coffee, lass?

I'd offer you whiskey...

...but I fear I used up the last of it

a month ago.

- I have to go down to Telegraph Creek.

- Hey!

I already told you,

I know nothing about that.

I can't keep account of every airplane

that goes down in these hills.

- Why, you yourself...

- That plane didn't crash.

It was sunk. Deliberately.

That's me and Ian there.

Aye.

Fishing on the isle.

Many a year ago, that was.

In the auld lang syne.

- Jean's down in your mine.

- I know he is, lass.

- And he thinks that you're a...

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