Barkerville Gold by Dayle Gaetz Read Free Book Online

would capture gold particles while water and lighter gravel flowed back to the creek.
    So who was that man at the back? Why was he dressed as a prospector if he didn’t work here? Was it him they saw last night and not Three Finger’s ghost at all? Rusty glanced over his shoulder. Prospector Man slipped his sunglasses down and peered over them. Slate gray eyes, cold as steel, bored into Rusty’s face.
    Rusty gulped. Something weird was going on, and he needed time to sort it out.
    Earlier, at the restaurant, the waitress had said, Nice work! But did she mean his sketch, which she had obviously looked at because his book was closed when he left it there, or was she commenting on the way he spilled coffee on the big guard’s pants? Rusty had no idea, so he switched to something else that needed thinking about.
    Where did those two dusty old bottles of Hair Invigorator come from? What did Frizzy Hair know about it? Could the bottles have been put there by the ghost of Three Finger Evans? And if so, why?
    â€œAren’t you coming, Rusty?” Katie called.
    â€œGive your head a shake, boy,” GJ whispered and nudged him from behind.
    Rusty hurried over to the waterwheel. Mustache Man, Dark Beard, Katie, Sheila and a small woman were already there. The woman was older than Gram and wore sneakers, jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, a straw hat with a blue ribbon and oval sunglasses.
    Dark Beard picked up a pan that looked like a large pie plate and was filled with water and gravel. “The idea is that gold is heavy,” he explained as he sloshed the water around in the pan. “So it sinks to the bottom while sand and water and gravel spill out. Watch how I do it, then each of you can have a turn.”
    Slowly he rotated the pan. The woman stepped closer to Rusty. “It feels so strange to be here after 136 years,” she murmured, seemingly to herself.
    Rusty’s jaw dropped. He tried not to stare, but couldn’t help himself. Obviously she had left a part of her brain somewhere along the road to Barkerville. The woman was old all right, but sure as anything she was nowhere near 136 years old!
    â€œNow it’s your turn,” Dark Beard said. “Who’s first?”
    Rusty dragged his eyes away from the 136-year-old woman. “Me!” he said and reached out with both hands to take the large metal pan. His arms drooped. It was heavier than he expected. Dark Beard showed him how to tip the pan slightly and rotate it in a smooth motion, allowing water and gravel to slosh over its rim. When most of the water and gravel were gone, Rusty looked at what remained. His eyes widened. Like little kernels of popcorn that hadn’t popped, a cluster of gold particles had worked their way to the bottom of the pan. “I’m rich!” he shouted.
    â€œNot quite,” Dark Beard told him, snatching the gold pan away. “We mix gold nuggets with the gravel so tourists can see how it works. Besides, any gold you find here belongs to Barkerville Historic Town.”
    As Dark Beard refilled the gold pan, Rusty had the feeling that other eyes were watching him. He glanced over his shoulder. Prospector Man was looking directly at him, his eyes impossible to see behind dark sunglasses.

7

Prospector Man
    B y mid-afternoon everyone had done enough sight-seeing for one day, so they climbed wearily onto their bikes and rode back to the campground. After a cold drink and a large snack, Rusty and the girls were full of energy again and decided to take a bike ride around the campground.
    â€œBe sure to be back in an hour,” GJ told them. “We’re going to drive up to Bowron Lake and have a swim before dinner.”
    The campsites were large and quite private, set back in the trees on both sides of two parallel roads. The roads were joined at each end by a semicircular drive and so formed a long, narrow oval. A short road cut through the center of the oval, running from the