The Miner's Hidden Gold



Ping! Ping! Ping! The pick chipped the rocks. The old miner leaned forward towards the wall he was picking at. His lantern shed light on the rocks.
"Nothin' yet." He said to himself.
The miner started to pick again. He hummed while he worked. He noticed something flash as a chip of rock hit the ground. Bending over, the miner picked up the rock and got his lantern. He walked over to the wooden ladder that led out of his mine and began to climb. He squinted as the sun hit his eyes and he walked over to a flat rock.
The miner picked up a hammer and laid the piece of rock from the mine on the flat one in front of him. He chipped the gray and white off the gold and brushed the dust off. He laid the gold on the rock and started to beat with the hammer until it was flat. It didn't chip like pyrite.
"Yee-hoo!" The old miner danced a jig with the gold in his left hand and the hammer in his right.
The miner grabbed his pick and lantern and headed back into the mine with a sack. After picking, chipping, and cracking for a few hours, the miner had cleaned out the whole four-foot-long vein of gold. He whistled as he climbed back out of the mine.
"Goin' to town tomorra, Dinah!" the miner called to his mule.
He rolled out a blanket and crawled under. He lay on his back, looking at the stars until sleep claimed his tired body.
The mext morning the miner woke before the sun, packed Dinah, and headed towards the town at the base of the mountain he was mining on. Once he got into town, the miner went into the general store and bought some supplies, including some red material. He used some gold flakes to pay for his items, as some men nearby noticed.
Next he went to the Chinese section of town and knocked on the door of Mrs. Mi Yu's tailoring service. Mrs. Yu answered his knock and asked him in. The miner entered and requested that she make a shirt out of the red material he'd bought. Then he told her something else.
"I have a lot of gold and I don't trust the bank, but if I carry it around with me I'll be a walkin' dead man. I heard tell of how the Chinese can turn just about anything into thread. Do ya think you could make thread outta gold?" He asked.
"Oh, yes, yes!" Mrs. Yu said excitedley. "I can do for you! You go 'way and come next day." She told the miner.
He returned the next day at Mrs. Yu's and she had indeed made him a shirt, using the gold as thread.
"Well, thanks ma'am." the miner paid the Chinese woman."How do ya do it?"
"Oh, is a big secret!" she said. " I not tell you!"
" All right, goodbye!" the miner said he left.
He once again packed his mule, but this time he was going to his cabin. However, when he did reach his home, he found that the place had been ransacked and set on fire.
"Well, Dinah, we got nothin' holdin' us here anymore." the miner told his mule. "We might as well move on."
He scrounged up whatever was left of his stuff and headed down the trail. A few miles down the path, three men jumped out and demanded his gold.
"We know you've got gold , and we know it's with you." said the first.
"Let's see them nuggets!" cried the second bandit.
"Sorry, fellas," said the miner truthfully, "but I ain't got no gold nuggets on me."
"Right," the first man sneered,"Clem, check all his stuff." He ordered the third theif, referred to as Clem.
Clem did as he was commanded, but, of course found no gold. So the men took all his possessions and rode away puzzled.
" I jest don't get it! I know he was loaded with gold in the store." said second man.
"Maybe he's not the same guy. Are you sure your eyes ain't goin' bad?" asked Clem.
"Course not. It must be at the bank. Let's go , fellas." and their voices grew distant.

The miner turned and walked the other way with his mule, chuckling to himself and wearing a new red shirt.