Free Fools' Gold by Richard Wiley

but with only a third of the gold per day that they had been accustomed to. Fujino was not to hurry, and was not to brag about the claim or show his purse unnecessarily around the new buildings of the town. It was very exciting. Kaneda really wished he could be going too, or that he might be the one to go since only one could.
    At the height of their excitement, when conjecture had grown and they were happy, Fujino mentioned Kaneda’s daughter. It was a mistake, he knew, but he did not run after his words with apologies or quick changes of subject. “More than anyone else I miss your daughter,” he said, and they both remained quiet. It was not for Fujino to speak now. He would wait. Such a thing was unheard of, but surely Kaneda had recognized the unexpectedness of it, the way it escaped as from a locked cell. Fujino would not look at the old man. They sat like two Buddhas, teacher and student. He could expect nearly anything: a burst of anger, a laugh. The old man pushed another piece of bark onto the fire and began to speak.
    â€œOur nation of Japan is in reality one family,” he said. “Perhaps I am involved with its history for the same reason that another man might be interested in retracing his family tree.”
    Fujino listened sitting up, head bowed deeply toward the fire.
    â€œI wish my branch of the family tree to grow well and I wish my grandchildren to bear my name and understand life precisely as I do.”
    The old man stopped again but Fujino did not look up. What was he saying? What did it mean? There was nothing but silence again. Ah history! Kaneda had been thinking of Japan as a family and had remembered several events in the family history that Fujino still had not been told. Tonight he would tell about events he himself could half remember. As a young man, for example, he saw with his own eyes the black ships of the American fleet as they entered the port of Shimoda. He would not speak of his daughter again so Fujino relaxed and began to remember his upcoming journey. He still sat stiffly before the fire, but he thought of Nome. He listened to the old man’s melody, a slow introduction, then a detailed description of the large-boned face of Commodore Perry.
    Finn and Phil bought heavy canvas aprons and filled their pockets with long nails. They dug a square trench and worked for twenty hours mixing concrete and pouring the bath’s foundation. Finn insisted that it all had to be done at once, and that if they watched their starting time they’d be able to do the entire job during daylight hours. They had enough wood for the frame and had a promise of more wood, a promise that they would not have to stop for lack of supplies. Above the swirl of tents, here and there, other such frames were rising. Occasionally they saw an entire finished building side, blond boards reflected in the sun.
    Phil knew the ground and said that poles should be hammered into it, the tops of them surfacing and sticking like earth fingers, just into the hardening cement. That was what they had done with the reverend’s house. It would keep the structure in place for several seasons, perhaps longer. They were going to put the building up around Ellen’s tent; there was no other way. Later they would unfold the canvas, tuck it out through the door and then complete the interior. The ground floor of the building would have a high ceiling, but the upstairs would be small, enough space for a man to stand up, but no more. The idea of a bath had caught on, it seemed. Ellen told them that they were getting twenty customers a day, enough to pay for supplies and to pay Henriette and give Finn and Phil some of what they were owed as well, as a show of good faith.
    â€œWe know your good faith without having it displayed in coin,” Finn said, but he took the money anyway, and used it to buy wool shirts. Winter was sliding down off the top of the world, creeping up to the edges of the farthest