Gangway!

    Francis looked at him in astonishment. "Can't you?"

    "I was never more than two blocks from the trolley line the first twenty-five years of my life," Gabe said. "What would I be doing driving one of these things?"

    Francis swallowed. "Well," he said, "I must confess I've always considered myself too butter fingered to want to…"

    "Oh, give me those," Vangie said in disgust, picking up the reins. "YYAAAAAAHHH!" she told the roan. "Giddap!"

    The wagon bolted away with a jerk that almost flipped Francis off the seat.

***

    The August sun on the Peninsula was hot, far too hot. Francis dragged his limp lace handkerchief over his face and regretted the moment of weakness in which he'd agreed to come out here. "I've only been to this awful hole in the ground twice in my life," he said. "I'm not sure I can find it again."

    "Oh, you'll find it," Gabe said. Between them, Vangie held the reins and watched the roan and occasionally glanced around at the barren countryside. Her bad temper seemed to have worked itself out on the act of driving, much to Francis' relief, and though there hadn't been that much conversation on the ride out at least they'd all been friendly to one another.

    But now there was the problem of finding the supposed mine. "But what if I can't find it?" Francis asked. "I'd hate to have brought us all out here for nothing."

    "You'll find it," Gabe told him, "because we're go

    The sun instantly became ten degrees hotter. "Uh," Francis said, and mopped his brow, and looked around harder for something to recognize.

    They passed a place where some hopeful hardrocker had tried to strike it rich. Vangie said, "I didn't know anyone ever found any gold on the Peninsula. I thought it was all in the mountains across the Bay."

    "Well they did find a few traces, apparently," Francis said. "But to my chagrin that's all they were. Traces."

    "But there's a tu

    "Yes."

    "Well that's all we need."

    "For what?" Vangie asked.

    "Just an idea I have," he said.

    "It's still that craziness about the Mint, isn't it?"

    "Could be," Gabe said easily. "What's wrong with that?"

    "Only one thing," she said. "If you try anything anywhere near that Mint they'll catch you. If they don't kill you on the spot, they'll put you away somewhere until you've got a long grey beard. Or maybe they'll just fall all over you-ten or fifteen of those guards we saw up there-and by the time they get finished with you, your skin won't be worth ta

    "Well," Gabe replied obscurely, "chicken today, feathers tomorrow." And he gri

    It was all steep hills down the spine of the Peninsula here, stands of pine and redwood among the rocks. As they prowled farther into the morning and into the noon sun, Francis drooped lower and lower in the seat. He was afraid he'd missed the turnoff, and he didn't doubt that Gabe had meant what he'd said about keeping him out here until he found the mine. It looked like it was going to be a long dry spell… No. There it was, right ahead. He straightened up. "That little dirt track. Turn off the road there."

    Vangie swung the buckboard expertly into the twin ruts and they went jouncing up into the trees. It was cool here in the shade and Francis began to feel somewhat less suicidal. "Just ahead now, on the left. There'll be another fork and we take the left one."

    "Well I told you not to expect anything," he said defensively.

    The place was nothing but a wide spot in the rocks and a man-sized hole in the hillside. The tu

    Gabe stood backed against a rock, thumbs hooked in his pockets, scowling, chewing a cigar, while Vangie fashioned a torch out of a broken branch and some twigs and grass. When she handed it to Gabe she smiled with mock-sweetness but Gabe ignored it, ducked into the tu

    It had been a long and bumpy ride, coming out. "Excuse me," Francis said to Vangie and went off into the woods to commune with Nature.

    When he returned he found Gabe and Vangie wrapped around each other as if they were the only survivors of a volcanic eruption. Francis rolled his eyes upward and said, by way of a

    They broke apart, both showing their embarrassment in the hue of their cheeks. Gabe grumbled something and went prowling back into the mine. Vangie fidgeted with her hair; Francis tipped his shoulder against the buckboard and folded his arms across his chest. "Well?"

    She shrugged, accepting no blame. "He likes the place."

    "He does?"

    "Francis, don't ask me. I don't know any more than you do."

    "Well he does seem sure of himself, doesn't he. But frankly I was a little worried right from the start. I mean, he said he wanted my help. Now that does make one a bit dubious of his judgment, doesn't it? I mean, what do you suppose he wants me to do for him? Maim and disfigure people and kill the ones he doesn't like?"

    "Well I imagine that's not exactly what he has in mind. Though God knows what he does have in his mind." She moved closer and dropped her voice to a confidential half whisper. "Francis, what was he like in the old days?"

    "Gabe? You mean back in New York? Oh, he was about the same. He always talked a bigger brand of mea

    "Does he have a girl back there?"

    "He usually did. I don't know about now. I hadn't seen him in years and years, you know."

    She looked pensively toward the tu

    Surprise on surprise. Francis looked at her and said, "Why on earth should you ever go there?"

    She shrugged again, looking more like a lost orphan than usual. "I don't know," she said. "Gabe keeps saying he's going back there just as soon as he gets enough money."

    "Back to New York? Whatever for?"

    "He says it's the only place to live."

    Francis' own memories of the Big Apple were less delicious. "After seeing San Francisco?" he said, astonished.

    "He says San Francisco is a lumpy Newark."

    "And you'd actually go with him?"

    "I don't know," she said. Her brow was as furrowed as the hillside. "I wouldn't want to, but I guess if he asked me I'd go, yes."

    "Oh, I can't lose you both," Francis said. "We'll just have to convince Gabe to change his mind."

    She looked hopeful. "Do you think we can?"

    "We can only try."

    She clasped his hand in both of hers. "Francis," she said, "I'm glad you're on my side."

    His heart full, Francis told her the simple truth: "You're my dearest friends," he said.