GM - - GM
BUICK — PONTIAC — GMC TRUCKS
*

SIMMS MOTORS

Courtenay Phone 132

SUTTON’S

Courtenay Undertaking Parlors

A Third of a Century of Service in the
Comox, Courtenay and Campbell River
District

255 Cliffe Ave.

COURTENAY HOTEL

R. Cannings, Mgr.
“KR Friendly Place To Stay”

*
VANCOUVER ISLAND

Courtenay, B.C.

COURTENAY

SUNNYDALE GOLF CLUB
Sandwick, B.C.

Three Miles North of Courtenay,
Vancouver Island

Headquarters for the
Ancient Order of the “Peach’’

Fishermen’s Lodge

CHARLIE CHAPPELL, Proprietor

OYSTER RIVER B.C.

R. H. GRANT
President

Phone 465L

GRANT BROS. LOGGING CO. LTD.

P.O. BOX 358, COURTENAY, B.C.
VANCOUVER ISLAND

*

Page Forty-two

with gold. Traders who saw samples
of this rock at Fort Benton later de-
scribed it as resembling a body of
solid gold with a little rock shot
through it.

Gold Fever

Smitten by the gold-fever, the two
men talked wildly as they made camp
that night, assured that their fortunes
were already within their grasp. “Tell
you what,” Blackjack’s excited eyes
met his partner’s over the campfire
as they fried their flap-jacks and
bacon, ‘‘we’ll stake out our claims
and high-tail it tomorrow and get ’em
registered. Once it gets out we've
struck it rich we're liable to get
crowded out if we don’t get everything
tied up good and regular.”

“Like hell we will!” Bill Lemon’s
face froze in angry disagreement.
“Now we've found what we want we'd
be fools if we didn’t cash in on it
and work the diggings for all they're
worth. Nobody knows where we
headed for. We can record ’em later.
Me—I’m staying right here till I’ve
got a stake.”

In the bitter argument that fol-
lowed unforgivable insults were flung
at each other under the heady wine
of the new-found gold. Finally they
rolled themselves up in their blankets
and the scattered poplars no longer
echoed to their bitter quarrel. Soon
Blackjack’s heavy breathing told that
he was sleeping. But Lemon did not
sleep. His mind in a torment, he
crawled stealthily from his blanket,
picked up duis axe and brought it
down with venomous force on the
head of his sleeping partner. ‘Then,
overwhelmed with panic as the re-
alization of the enormity of his crime
penetrated his befuddled _ brain,
Lemon would have fled but was afraid
to venture forth until daylight. Build-
ing an enormous fire, he tucked his
rifle beneath his arm and strode to
and fro like a caged beast.

A Witness
Little did Lemon think that two

pairs of beady black eyes had wit-
nessed the entire tragedy from the

A. F. GRANT Ph. 170
Sec.-Treas.

Phone 108X

Courtenay

cover of the surrounding bush. Old
Bearspaw, Chief of the Stony tribe,
whose village the prospectors had
stopped at to rest, had despatched two
young braves, Calf Child and Medi-
cine Owl, to trail them, and they'd
seen the men sink holes and discover
the fatal gold.

As night wore on Lemon appeared
half-crazed with the thought of his

The father of David Bearspaw, present Chief

of the Stoney Indians, swore the coppery

braves who visited the scene of the gold-
strike, to everlasting secrecy.

terrible deed while, with grim humor,
the young braves added to his distress
by whistling, moaning and making
other weird and ghostly sounds. With
the first exploratory streak of dawn
Lemon mounted his cayuse and high-
tailed it southward.

No sooner had he broken camp
than the two Stoneys ransacked the
spot, took the two remaining cayuses
and set out for the tepees of their
tribesmen on the Morley reserve,
where they reported all they’d see to
old Bearspaw. Fearful lest other

Yard & Factory: The Bridge, Courtenay

INKSTER LUMBER
COMPANY

LUMBER DEALERS — BUILDERS’ SUPPLIES
SASH AND DOOR MANUFACTURERS

e
B.C.

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