He tagged along after them, wheedling and protesting while they bantered him about his mine, until they finally came to the place--the ruins of the old Eagle Tail.
It lay spraddled out along the hillside, a series of gopher-holes, dumps, and abandoned workings, looking more like a badly managed stone-quarry than a relic of _padre_ days. Kruger's magazine of giant powder exploded in one big blast, had destroyed all traces of his mine, besides starting an avalanche of loose shale that had poured down and filled the pocket.
Added to this, Aragon and his men had rooted around in the débris in search of the vein, and the story of their inefficient work was told by great piles of loose rock stacked up beside caved-in trenches and a series of timid tunnels driven into the neighboring ridges.
Under the circumstances it would certainly call for a mining engineer to locate the lost lead, and De Lancey looked it over thoughtfully as he began to figure on the work to be done. Undoubtedly there was a mine there--and the remains of an old Spanish smelter down the creek showed that the ground had once been very rich--but if Kruger had not told him in advance he would have passed up the job in a minute.
"Well," he said, turning coldly upon the fawning Mendez, who was all curves in his desire to please, "where is your prospecto?"
"_Aqui, señor!_" replied the Mexican, pointing to the disrupted rock-slide. "Here it was that the _Americano_ Crooka had his mine--rich with gold--_much_ gold!"
He shrilled his voice emphatically, and De Lancey shrilled his in reply.
"Here?" he exclaimed, gazing blankly at the hillside, and then he broke into a laugh. "All right, my friend," he said, giving Bud a facetious wink; "how much do you want for this prospect?"
"Four hundred dollars," answered Mendez in a tone at once hopeful and apologetic. "It is very rich. Señor Crooka shipped some ore that was full of gold. I packed it out for him on my burros; but, I am sorry, I have no piece of it."
"Yes," responded De Lancey, "I am sorry, too. So, of course, we cannot buy the prospecto since you have no ore to show; but I am glad for this, Señor Mendez," he continued with a kindly smile; "it shows that you are an honest man, or you would have stolen a piece of ore from the sacks. So show us now where the gold was found, the nearest that you can remember, and perhaps, if we think we can find it, we will pay you to denounce the claim for us."