Books: Madame Midas
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Fergus Hume >> Madame Midas
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Vandeloup looked idly at all this beauty with an unobservant eye,
being too much occupied with his thoughts to take notice of
anything; and it was only when two magpies near him broke into a
joyous duet, in which each strove to emulate the other's mellow
notes, that he awoke from his brown study, and began to walk back
again to the mine.
'I must let nothing stand in my way to acquire money,' he said,
musingly; 'with it one can rule the world; without it--but how trite
and bald these well-worn maxims seem! Why do I repeat them, parrot-
like, when I see what I have to do so clearly before me? That
woman, for instance--I must begin by making her my friend. Bah! she
is that already; I saw it in her eyes, which she can't control as
she does her face. Yes, I must make her my friend; my very dear
friend--and then--well, to my mind, the world-pivot is a woman. I
will spare no one in order to attain my ends--I will make myself my
own God, and consider no one but myself, and those who stand in my
path must get out of it or run the chance of being crushed. This,'
with a cynical smile, 'is what some would call the devil's
philosophy; at all events, it is good enough for me.'
He was near the mine by this time, and hearing someone calling to
him he looked up, and saw McIntosh walking towards him. There was a
stir in the men's quarters now, and he could see the door was open
and several figures were moving briskly about, while a number of
others were crossing the fields. The regular beat of the machinery
still continued, and the smoke was pouring out thick and black from
the tall red chimney, while the wheels were spinning round in the
poppet-heads as the mine slowly disgorged the men who had been
working all night.
McIntosh came slowly along with his hands in his pockets and a
puzzled look on his severe face. He could not make up his mind
whether to like or dislike this young man, but Madame Midas had
seemed so impressed that he had half made up his mind to dislike him
out of a spirit of contradiction.
'Weemen are sae easy pleased, puir feckless bodies,' he said to
himself, 'a bonny face is a' they fash their heads aboot, though the
same may be already in the grip of auld Nickyben. Weel, weel, if
Madam does fancy the lad--an' he's no bad lookin', I'll say that--
she may just hae her ain way, and I'll keep my e'e on baith.'
He looked grimly at the young man as he came briskly forward with a
gay smile.
'Ye're a verra early bird,' he said, fondling his frill of white
hair, and looking keenly at the tall, slim figure of the Frenchman.
'Case of "must", my friend,' returned Vandeloup, coolly; 'it's only
rich men can afford to be in bed, not poor devils like me.'
'You're no muckle like ither folk,' said the suspicious old
Scotchman, with a condemnatory sniff.
'Of that I am glad,' retorted Vandeloup, with suavity, as he walked
beside him to the men's quarters. 'What a horrible thing to be the
duplicate of half-a-dozen other men. By the way,' breaking off into
a new subject, 'Madame Midas is charming.'
'Aye, aye,' said Archie, jealously, 'we ken all aboot they French-
fangled way o' gieing pretty words, and deil a scrap of truth in ony
o' them.'
Gaston was about to protest that he said no more than he felt, which
was indeed the truth, but Archie impatiently hurried him off to
breakfast at the office, as he declared himself famishing. They made
a hearty meal, and, having had a smoke and a talk, prepared to go
below.
First of all, they arrayed themselves in underground garments--not
grave clothes, though the name is certainly suggestive of the
cemetery--which consisted of canvas trousers, heavy boots, blue
blouses of a rough woollen material, and a sou'wester each. Thus
accoutred, they went along to the foot of the poppet heads, and
Archie having opened a door therein, Vandeloup saw the mouth of the
shaft yawning dark and gloomy at his feet. As he stood there, gazing
at the black hole which seemed to pierce down into the entrails of
the earth, he turned round to take one last look at the sun before
descending to the nether world.
This is quite a new experience to me,' he said, as they stepped into
the wet iron cage, which had ascended to receive them in answer to
Archie's signal, and now commenced to drop down silently and swiftly
into the pitchy darkness. 'It puts me in mind of Jules Verne's
romances.'
Archie did not reply, for he was too much occupied in lighting his
candle to answer, and, moreover, knew nothing about romances, and
cared still less. So they went on sliding down noiselessly into the
gloom, while the water, falling from all parts of the shaft, kept
splashing constantly on the top of the cage and running in little
streams over their shoulders.
'It's like a nightmare,' thought the Frenchman, with a nervous
shudder, as he saw the wet walls gleaming in the faint light of the
candle. 'Worthy of Dante's "Inferno".'
At last they reached the ground, and found themselves in the main
chamber, from whence the galleries branched off to east and west.
It was upheld on all sides by heavy wooden supports of bluegum and
stringy bark, the scarred surfaces of which made them look like the
hieroglyphic pillars in old Egyptian temples. The walls were
dripping with damp, and the floor of the chamber, though covered
with iron plates, was nearly an inch deep with yellow-looking water,
discoloured by the clay of the mine. Two miners in rough canvas
clothes were waiting here, and every now and then a trolly laden
with wash would roll suddenly out of one of the galleries with a
candle fastened in front of it, and would be pushed into the cage
and sent up to the puddlers. Round the walls candles fastened to
spikes were stuck into the woodwork, and in their yellow glimmer the
great drops of water clinging to the roof and sides of the chamber
shone like diamonds.
'Aladdin's garden,' observed Vandeloup, gaily, as he lighted his
candle at that of Archie's and went towards the eastern gallery,
'only the jewels are not substantial enough.'
Archie showed the Frenchman how to carry his candle in the miner's
manner, so that it could not go out, which consisted in holding it
low down between the forefinger and third finger, so that the hollow
palm of the hand formed a kind of shield; and then Vandeloup,
hearing the sound of falling water close to him, asked what it was,
whereupon Archie explained it was for ventilating purposes. The
water fell the whole height of the mine through a pipe into a
bucket, and a few feet above this another pipe was joined at right
angles to the first and stretched along the gallery near the roof
like a never-ending serpent right to the end of the drive. The air
was driven along this by the water, and then, being released from
the pipe, returned back through the gallery, so that there was a
constant current circulating all through the mine.
As they groped their way slowly along, their feet splashed into
pools of yellow clayey water at the sides of the drive, or stumbled
over the rough ground and rugged rails laid down for the trollies.
All along the gallery, at regular intervals, were posts of stringy
bark in a vertical position, while beams of the same were laid
horizontally across the top, but so low that Vandeloup had to stoop
constantly to prevent himself knocking his head against their
irregular projections.
Clinging to these side posts were masses of white fungus, which the
miners use to remove discolorations from their hands, and from the
roof also it hung like great drifts of snow, agitated with every
breath of wind as the keen air, damped and chilled by the
underground darkness, rushed past them. Every now and then they
would hear a faint rumble in the distance, and Archie would drag his
companion to one side while a trolly laden with white, wet-looking
wash, and impelled by a runner, would roll past with a roaring and
grinding of wheels.
At intervals on each side of the main drive black chasms appeared,
which Archie informed his companion were drives put in to test the
wash, and as these smaller galleries continued branching off,
Vandeloup thought the whole mine resembled nothing so much as a
herring-bone.
Being accustomed to the darkness and knowing every inch of the way,
the manager moved forward rapidly, and sometimes Vandeloup lagged so
far behind that all he could see of his guide was the candle he
carried, shining like a pale yellow star in the pitchy darkness. At
last McIntosh went into one of the side galleries, and going up an
iron ladder fixed to the side of the wall, they came to a second
gallery thirty feet above the other, and branching off at right
angles.
This was where the wash was to be found, for, as Archie informed
Vandeloup, the main drives of a mine were always put down thirty or
forty feet below the wash, and then they could work up to the higher
levels, the reason of this being that the leads had a downward
tendency, and it was necessary for the main drive to be sunk below,
as before mentioned, in order to get the proper levels and judge the
gutters correctly. At the top of the ladder they found some empty
trucks which had delivered their burden into a kind of shoot,
through which it fell to the lower level, and there another truck
was waiting to take it to the main shaft, from whence it went up to
the puddlers.
Archie made Vandeloup get into one of these trucks, and though they
were all wet and covered with clay, he was glad to do so, and be
smoothly carried along, instead of stumbling over the rails and
splashing among the pools of water. Every now and then as they went
along there would be a gush of water from the dripping walls, which
was taken along in pipes to the main chamber, and from thence pumped
out of the mine by a powerful pump, worked by a beam engine, by
which means the mine was kept dry.
At last, after they had gone some considerable distance, they saw
the dim light of a candle, and heard the dull blows of a pick, then
found themselves at the end of the drive, where a miner was working
at the wash. The wash wherein the gold is found was exceedingly well
defined, and represented a stratified appearance, being sandwiched
in between a bed of white pipe-clay and a top layer of brownish
earth, interspersed with gravel. Every blow of the pick sent forth
showers of sparks in all directions, and as fast as the wash was
broken down the runner filled up the trollies with it. After asking
the miner about the character of the wash, and testing some himself
in a shovel, Archie left the gallery, and going back to the shoot,
they descended again to the main drive, and visited several other
faces of wash, the journey in each instance being exactly the same
in all respects. Each face had a man working at it, sometimes two,
and a runner who loaded the trucks, and ran them along to the
shoots. In spite of the ventilation, Vandeloup felt as if he was in
a Turkish bath, and the heat was in some places very great. At the
end of one of the drives McIntosh called Vandeloup, and on going
towards him the young man found him seated on a truck with the plan
of the mine before him, as he wanted to show him all the
ramifications of the workings.
The plan looked more like a map of a city than anything else, with
the main drive doing duty as the principal street, and all the
little galleries, branching off in endless confusion, looked like
the lanes and alleys of a populous town.
'It's like the catacombs in Rome,' said Vandeloup to McIntosh, after
he had contemplated the plan for some time; 'one could easily get
lost here.'
'He micht,' returned McIntosh, cautiously, 'if he didna ken a' aboot
the lie of the mine--o'er yonder,' putting one finger on the plan
and pointing with the other to the right of the tunnel; 'we found a
twenty-ounce nugget yesterday, and ain afore that o' twenty-five,
and in the first face we were at twa months ago o'er there,'
pointing to the left, 'there was yin big ain I ca'd the Villiers
nugget, which as ye ken is Madame's name.'
'Oh, yes, I know that,' said Vandeloup, much interested; 'do you
christen all your nuggets?'
'If they're big enough,' replied Archie.
'Then I hope you will find a hundred-ounce lump of gold, and call it
the Vandeloup,' returned the young man, laughing.
There's mony a true word spoke in jest, laddie,' said Archie,
gravely; 'when we get to the Deil's Lead we may find ain o' that
size.'
'What do you mean by leads?' asked Vandeloup, considerably puzzled.
Thereupon Archie opened his mouth, and gave the young man a
scientific lecture on mining, the pith of which was as follows:--
'Did ye no ken,' said Mr McIntosh, sagaciously, 'in the auld days--I
winna say but what it micht be as far back as the Fa' o' Man, may be
a wee bit farther--the rains washed a' the gold fra the taps o' the
hills, where the quartz reefs were, down tae the valleys below,
where the rivers ye ken were flowin'. And as the ages went on, an'
nature, under the guidance o' the Almighty, performed her work, the
river bed, wiv a' its gold, would be covered o'er with anither
formation, and then the river, or anither yin, would flow on a new
bed, and the precious metal would be washed fra the hills in the
same way as I tauld ye of, and the second river bed would be also
covered o'er, and sae the same game went on and is still
progressin'. Sae when the first miners came doon tae this land of
Ophir the gold they got by scratchin' the tap of the earth was the
latest deposit, and when ye gae doon a few hundred feet ye come on
the second river--or rather, I should say, the bed o' the former
river-and it is there that the gold is tae be found; and these
dried-up rivers we ca' leads. Noo, laddie, ye ma ken that at present
we are in the bed o' ain o' these auld streams three hun'red feet
frae the tap o' the earth, and it's here we get the gold, and as we
gae on we follow the wandrin's o' the river and lose sight o' it.'
'Yes,' said Vandeloup quickly, 'but you lost this river you call the
Devil's Lead--how was that?'
'Weel,' said Mr McIntosh, deliberately, 'rivers are varra like human
bein's in the queer twists they take, and the Deil's Lead seems to
hae been ain like that. At present we are on the banks o' it, where
we noo get these nuggets; but 'tis the bed I want, d'ye ken, the
centre, for its there the gold is; losh, man,' he went on,
excitedly, rising to his feet and rolling up the plan, 'ye dinna ken
how rich the Deil's Lead is; there's just a fortune in it."
"I suppose these rivers must stop at a certain depth?"
"Ou, ay," returned the old Scotchman, "we gae doon an' doon till we
come on what we ma ca' the primary rock, and under that there is
nothin'--except," with a touch of religious enthusiasm, "maybe 'tis
the bottomless pit, where auld Hornie dwells, as we are tauld in the
Screepture; noo let us gae up again, an' I'll show ye the puddlers
at wark."
Vandeloup had not the least idea what the puddlers were, but
desirous of learning, he followed his guide, who led him into
another gallery, which formed a kind of loop, and joined again with
the main drive. As Gaston stumbled along, he felt a touch on his
shoulder, and on turning, saw it was Pierre, who had been put to
work with the other men, and was acting as one of the runners.
"Ah! you are there, my friend," said Vandeloup, coolly, looking at
the uncouth figure before him by the feeble glimmer of his candle;
"work away, work away; it's not very pleasant, but at all events,"
in a rapid whisper, "it's better than New Caledonia."
Pierre nodded in a sullen manner, and went back to his work, while
Vandeloup hurried on to catch up to McIntosh, who was now far ahead.
"I wish," said this pleasant young man to himself, as he stumbled
along, "I wish that the mine would fall in and crush Pierre; he's
such a dead weight to be hanging round my neck; besides, he has such
a gaol-bird look about him that it's enough to make the police find
out where he came from; if they do, good-bye to wealth and
respectability."
He found Archie waiting for him at the entrance to the main drive,
and they soon arrived at the bottom of the shaft, got into the cage,
and at last reached the top of the earth again. Vandeloup drew a
long breath of the fresh pure air, but his eyes felt quite painful
in the vivid glare of the sun.
"I don't envy the gnomes," he said gaily to Archie as they went on
to the puddlers; "they must have been subject to chronic
rheumatism."
Mr McIntosh, not having an acquaintance with fairy lore, said
nothing in reply, but took Vandeloup to the puddlers, and showed all
the process of getting the gold.
The wash was carried along in the trucks from the top of the shaft
to the puddlers, which were large circular vats into which water was
constantly gushing. The wash dirt being put into these, there was an
iron ring held up by chains, having blunt spikes to it, which was
called a harrow. Two of these being attached to beams laid crosswise
were dragged round and round among the wash by the constant
revolution of the cross-pieces. This soon reduced all the wash dirt
to a kind of fine, creamy-looking syrup, with heavy white stones in
it, which were removed every now and then by the man in charge of
the machine. Descending to the second story of the framework,
Vandeloup found himself in a square chamber, the roof of which was
the puddler. In this roof was a trap-door, and when the wash dirt
had been sufficiently mixed the trap-door was opened, and it was
precipitated through on to the floor of the second chamber. A kind
of broad trough, running in a slanting direction and called a
sluice, was on one side, and into this a quantity of wash was put,
and a tap at the top turned on, which caused the water to wash the
dirt down the sluice. Another man at the foot, with a pitchfork,
kept shifting up the stones which were mixed up with the gravel, and
by degrees all the surplus dirt was washed away, leaving only these
stones and a kind of fine black sand, in which the gold being heavy,
had stayed. This sand was carefully gathered up with a brush and
iron trowel into a shallow tin basin, and then an experienced miner
carefully manipulated the same with clear water. What with blowing
with the breath, and allowing the water to flow gently over it, all
the black sand was soon taken away, and the bottom of the tin dish
was then covered with dirty yellow grains of gold interspersed with
little water-worn nuggets. Archie took the gold and carried it down
to the office, where it was first weighed and then put into a little
canvas bag, which would be taken to the bank in Ballarat, and there
sold at the rate of four pounds an ounce or thereabouts.
'Sae this, ye ken,' said Archie, when he had finished all his
explanations, 'is the way ye get gold.'
'My faith,' said Vandeloup, carelessly, with a merry laugh, 'gold is
as hard to get in its natural state as in its artificial.'
"An' harder," retorted Archie, "forbye there's nae sic wicked wark
aboot it."
"Madame will be rich some day," remarked Vandeloup, as they left the
office and walked up towards the house.
"Maybe she will," replied the other, cautiously. "Australia's a
gran' place for the siller, ye ken. I'm no verra far wrang but what
wi' industry and perseverance ye may mak a wee bit siller yersel',
laddie."
"It won't be my fault if I don't," returned M. Vandeloup, gaily;
"and Madame Midas," he added, mentally, "will be an excellent person
to assist me in doing so."
CHAPTER VI
KITTY
Gaston Vandeloup having passed all his life in cities found that his
existence on the Pactolus claim was likely to be very dreary. Day
after day he arose in the morning, did his office work, ate his
meals, and after a talk with Madame Midas in the evening went to bed
at ten o'clock. Such Arcadian simplicity as this was not likely to
suit the highly cultivated tastes he had acquired in his earlier
life. As to the episode of New Caledonia M. Vandeloup dismissed it
completely from his mind, for this young man never permitted his
thoughts to dwell on disagreeable subjects.
His experiences as a convict had been novel but not pleasant, and he
looked upon the time which had elapsed since he left France in the
convict ship to the day he landed on the coast of Queensland in an
open boat as a bad nightmare, and would willingly have tried to
treat it as such, only the constant sight of his dumb companion,
Pierre Lemaire, reminded him only too vividly of the reality of his
trouble. Often and often did he wish that Pierre would break his
neck, or that the mine would fall in and crush him to death; but
nothing of the sort happened, and Pierre continued to vex his eyes
and to follow him about with a dog-like fidelity which arose--not
from any love of the young man, but--from the fact that he found
himself a stranger in a strange land, and Vandeloup was the only
person he knew. With such a millstone round his neck, the young
Frenchman often despaired of being able to get on in Australia.
Meanwhile he surrendered himself to the situation with a kind of
cynical resignation, and looked hopefully forward to the time when a
kind Providence would rid him of his unpleasant friend.
The feelings of Madame Midas towards Vandeloup were curious. She had
been a very impressionable girl, and her ill-fated union with
Villiers had not quite succeeded in deadening all her feelings,
though it had doubtless gone a good way towards doing so. Being of
an appreciative nature, she liked to hear Vandeloup talk of his
brilliant life in Paris, Vienna, London, and other famous cities,
which to her were merely names. For such a young man he had
certainly seen a great deal of life, and, added to this, his skill
as a talker was considerable, so that he frequently held Madame,
Selina, and McIntosh spell-bound by his fairy-like descriptions and
eloquent conversation. Of course, he only talked of the most general
subjects to Mrs Villiers, and never by any chance let slip that he
knew the seamy side of life--a side with which this versatile young
gentleman was pretty well acquainted. As a worker, Gaston was
decidedly a success. Being quick at figures and easily taught
anything, he soon mastered all the details of the business connected
with the Pactolus claim, and Madame found that she could leave
everything to him with perfect safety, and could rely on all matters
of business being well and promptly attended to. But she was too
clever a woman to let him manage things himself, or even know how
much she trusted him; and Vandeloup knew that whatever he did those
calm dark eyes were on him, and that the least slip or neglect on
his part would bring Madame Midas to his side with her quiet voice
and inflexible will to put him right again.
Consequently the Frenchman was careful not to digress or to take too
much upon himself, but did his work promptly and carefully, and soon
became quite indispensable to the work of the mine. In addition to
this he had made himself very popular with the men, and as the
months rolled on was looked upon quite as a fixture in the Pactolus
claim.
As for Pierre Lemaire, he did his work well, ate and slept, and kept
his eye on his companion in case he should leave him in the lurch;
but no one would have guessed that the two men, so different in
appearance, were bound together by a guilty secret, or were, morally
speaking, both on the same level as convicts from a French prison.
A whole month had elapsed since Madame had engaged M. Vandeloup and
his friend, but as yet the Devil's Lead had not been found. Madame,
however, was strong in her belief that it would soon be discovered,
for her luck--the luck of Madame Midas--was getting quite a proverb
in Ballarat.
One bright morning Vandeloup was in the office running up endless
columns of figures, and Madame, dressed in her underground garments,
was making ready to go below, just having stepped in to see Gaston.
'By the way, M. Vandeloup,' she said in English, for it was only in
the evenings they spoke French, 'I am expecting a young lady this
morning, so you can tell her I have gone down the mine, but will be
back in an hour if she will wait for me.'
'Certainly, Madame,' said Vandeloup, looking up with his bright
smile; 'and the young lady's name?'
'Kitty Marchurst,' replied Madame, pausing a moment at the door of
the office; 'she is the daughter of the Rev. Mark Marchurst, a
minister at Ballarat. I think you will like her, M. Vandeloup,' she
went on, in a conversational tone; 'she is a charming girl--only
seventeen, and extremely pretty.'
'Then I am sure to like her,' returned Gaston, gaily; 'I never could
resist the charm of a pretty woman.'
'Mind,' said Madame, severely, holding up her finger, 'you must not
turn my favourite's head with any of your idle compliments; she has
been very strictly brought up, and the language of gallantry is
Greek to her.'
Vandeloup tried to look penitent, and failed utterly.
'Madame,' he said, rising from his seat, and gravely bowing, 'I will
speak of nothing to Mademoiselle Kitty but of the weather and the
crops till you return.'
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