Free Searching for Silverheels by Jeannie Mobley Page B

black veil, apparently.”
    â€œMust be Silverheels, then,” Orv said.
    â€œUnless Buck Wilson had other family around, right?”Frank said. “I mean, Mrs. Nelson was up there because she’s got family buried there. Maybe Buck Wilson had a sister or niece or someone like that too. Does anybody know anything about him?”
    â€œHe was just another bachelor gold seeker,” Harry said. “They were all the same—when they weren’t digging up gold they were spending it on whiskey and women. The miners were a greedy, dirty lot.”
    I felt my hackles going up. How could Silverheels have loved a man like that? Like Mrs. Nelson had said, it had to have been a powerful love for her to still pine at his grave so long after.
    â€œSurely they weren’t all so bad,” I said. “Some of them might have been decent fellows just trying to make enough money to marry their sweethearts.”
    â€œI can’t really recall many miners that fit that description,” said Harry.
    â€œWell, my father is working a mine right now, and he’s not like that!” I said.
    â€œOf course we didn’t mean your pa, honey,” Harry said quickly. “I was talking about the fifty-niners.”
    â€œIf someone was to go up to the cemetery to watch, like Mae did as a little girl, I bet you could catch old Silverheels sneaking around. Find out for yourselves,” Orv said.
    â€œSay, there’s a fine idea,” Willie said, grinning at Frank and me. “We could spend the night in the cemetery.”
    â€œBut do you think she’d show up? She’s already tended thegrave. Maybe she just comes once each spring,” Frank said.
    â€œYou won’t know until you try,” said Orv.
    â€œUnless you’re too chicken to spend the night in a graveyard,” Willie said, his eyes daring Frank to do it.
    Frank smiled up at me. “I’ll go if you two will go with me.”
    â€œPearl can’t go,” Willie said. “Mother will need her here in the café. Besides, she’d just run off at the first crack of a twig, like Mrs. Nelson’s little sister did.”
    â€œI would not! And Mother might let me go, if I could be back in time for lunch,” I said.
    Willie called to my mother, asking for permission to take Frank camping the next day.
    Mother appeared in the doorway. “What about Frank’s companions? Aren’t they due back in Como tomorrow?”
    â€œWe aren’t planning to leave for Denver till the day after. We’ll be back by then,” Frank said.
    Mother considered. “You will have to do your morning chores before you go, Willie, and chop enough wood to keep my cook stove working till you get back.”
    â€œI will,” Willie promised.
    â€œCan I go too? If I’m back before lunch?” I asked.
    Mother’s brow knitted. “I don’t think I can spare you, Pearl. Not with your father and Willie away.”
    â€œThat’s not fair. Why can’t Willie stay and I go?” After all, I was the one who needed to find Silverheels, though I couldn’t tell my mother why.
    â€œPearl, you know you can’t spend the night up there alonewith a young man! We’ll go on a family outing later in the summer.” She disappeared back into the kitchen.
    â€œSee? I told you,” Willie said. Then he and Frank put their heads together and started planning.
    I turned my back on Willie and went to fill cups at the other two tables still occupied by diners. Everyone said women were the weaker sex, but once again I’d be hard at work while the boys would be off having fun.

CHAPTER 10
    A t last, the only folks left in the café were the old-timers, Frank, and Willie lingering over their coffee and pie. Mother had tidied the kitchen and gone to join them, which meant that I could quit too. So as soon as the plates were all dried and put away, I left through the kitchen door and