"How did you get on the trail of it and
what makes you think there is any truth to
the story?"
"This squaw I was tellin' you about. It
seems one of the Indians suspicioned some-
thin' was up and made his get-a-way. The
story was passed on from generation to
generation. This Greaser I'm countin' on to
take me there knows about it. He's been
there. Went up with three other Greasers
an' a nigger an' come back alone. His old
car was shot full of holes but nary a mark
on him. Some thinks he found the mine all
right an' killed off the rest so's nobody
would know about the mine but him."
"Looks like you're taking a pretty lon11:
chance if he is that sort of fellow," I
remarked.
"Me! I kin take care of myself. Been
doin' it for over fifty years an' no Indian or
Greaser ever's got the best of me yet."
After the work at the studio was over I
took the Old Timer and we drove out to
Terminal Island where in the middle of a
God-forsaken wasteland the "Greaser" lived
in a squalid adobe shack. No amount of
persuasion on the part of the Old Timer or
display of readiness to finance the trip on
my part would induce him to guide a party
back there.
Yes, he'd been there, seen the mine. No,
he had not been inside the shaft. They had
found it all as described. Inside could be
seen the gold hanging from the walls; the
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dead Indians lying in rows, but inside was
Death. His companions went in; never came
out. As he stood at the opening of the shaft
waiting for them the Black Death, "The
Curse of the Padres," he called it, came
over him. He lost consciousness; when he
came to he was back in camp not knowing
how he got there. Nothing on earth would
take him back to that spot.
That was that. The story was fantastic;
wierd; impossible. The Old Timer and I
parted never to meet again. But before he
went his way he gave me what brief direc-
tions he had as to how to locate the Lost
Padre which history showed actually did
exist long ago and in approximately the
place he described.
I tried to forget it but somehow the
memory of that mine kept coming back to
me and would not let me be. But I never
looked for it,
Years later I was hunting in Arizona. We
had made camp on a peak of the Winches-
ter range. It was a beautiful moonlight
night and below us the valley lay like a
lake of shimmering sand. On the other side
of the basin towered the Dos Cabezos Moun-
tains and Mexico. Afar a coyote made weird
music and in the distance his mate an-
swered with the age-old mating call.
We had finished our supper and were
sitting there smoking when I thought of the
Lost Padre Mine. We were, according to
my information, in the region where it was
supposed to be, if it existed at all. I made
mention of it to Nigger Jim, my guide and
friend.
Now Nigger Jim was a famous character
in Arizona, New Mexico and Mexico. Blacl~
as the Ace of Spades and straight as a
ram-rod, he claimed to be over a hundred
( the records proved him to be past eighty)
he could vault into the saddle without so
much as laying hand to horse. A dead shot,
he did not know the meaning of fear. Tomb-
stone knew him well in its Hell-roarin' hey-
dey. Wyatt Earp, the Clantons, Billy the
Kid, Doc Holliday, Curley Bill, he knew
them all. There were thirteen notches on
his gun and he claimed to be "wanted" in
seven states.
NAME AND
No matter. He was a man and loyal to
his friends. That he had killed many men
and would kill again mattered not. It was
due to the code under which he had been
raised. He guided Miles when Geronimo
was captured, drew a pension from the Gov-
ernment and each month marked his X
on the check when it came in to the Post
Office at Wilcox, for he could neither read
nor write.
Now he rolled and lit a cigarette before
he spoke. Then:
"What do you know about the Lost
Padre, Parker?" he asked.
I told him the story in more detail than
I've given here. When I had finished he did
not say anything for a long time. At last he
asked a question which seemed at the mo-
ment to me irrelevant. "That Greaser you
talked to, Parker, is he still alive?"
"As far as I know, Jim. Why?"
"I aims to meet up with him again some
day. You see, Parker, I'm that nigger he
left for dead in the shaft."
So I got the third link in the story of the
Lost Padre Mine. It checked in every point
with the others. Jim, the Greaser, and three
other Mexicans, had gone in search of the
mine. They found it with little difficulty and
PLAN NOW
TO ATI'END THE
WESTERN STATES COIN
MACHINE CONVENTION
* BILTMORE
LOS ANGELES
NOV. 18-19-20
The Biggest Show
Ever Staged in the West
DON'T MISS IT!
NUMBER
PLATES
"I DENTIFY YOUR MACHINES"
so @ 7c each - · Total $ 3.50
5.00
Total
100 @ Sc
each
each - Total 10.00
250 @ 4c
500 @ 3'/,c each - Total 17.50
Write fo r C ircular on
BRASS TRADE CHECKS
Polished brass or aluminum plates with your name and
add ress, consecutively numbered, black enamel filled
over-all size ¾" x 21/ 2 ". Can have any lettering or num-
bering on plate within reason.
Established 1872
W. W. Wilcox Mfg. Co.
564 W. Randolph St., Chicago, Ill.
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