THERE are some stories that have to be true - the sort that cannot be fabricated by a ready fiction-reckoner.And by the same token there are some men with stories to tell who cannot be doubted.Such a man was Julian Jones.Although I doubt if the average reader of this will believe the story Julian Jones told me.Nevertheless I believe it.So thoroughly am I convinced of its verity that I am willing, nay, eager, to invest capital in the enterprise and embark personally on the adventure to a far land.
It was in the Australian Building at the Panama Pacific Exposition that I met him.I was standing before an exhibit of facsimiles of the record nuggets which had been discovered in the goldfields of the Antipodes.Knobbed, misshapen and massive, it was as difficult to believe that they were not real gold as it was to believe the accompanying statistics of their weights and values.
"That's what those kangaroo-hunters call a nugget," boomed over my shoulder directly at the largest of the specimens.
I turned and looked up into the dim blue eyes of Julian Jones.I looked up, for he stood something like six feet four inches in height.His hair, a wispy, sandy yellow, seemed as dimmed and faded as his eyes.It may have been the sun which had washed out his colouring; at least his face bore the evidence of a prodigious and ardent sun-burn which had long since faded to yellow.As his eyes turned from the exhibit and focussed on mine I noted a queer look in them as of one who vainly tries to recall some fact of supreme importance.
"What's the matter with it as a nugget?"I demanded.
The remote, indwelling expression went out of his eyes as he boomed "Why, its size.""It does seem large," I admitted."But there's no doubt it's authentic.The Australian Government would scarcely dare - ""Large!" he interrupted, with a sniff and a sneer."Largest ever discovered - " I started on.
"Ever discovered!"His dim eyes smouldered hotly as he proceeded.
"Do you think that every lump of gold ever discovered has got into the newspapers and encyclopedias?""Well," I replied judicially, "if there's one that hasn't, I don't see how we're to know about it.If a really big nugget, or nugget- finder, elects to blush unseen - ""But it didn't," he broke in quickly."I saw it with my own eyes, and, besides, I'm too tanned to blush anyway.I'm a railroad man and I've been in the tropics a lot.Why, I used to be the colour of mahogany - real old mahogany, and have been taken for a blue- eyed Spaniard more than once - "It was my turn to interrupt, and I did.
"Was that nugget bigger than those in there, Mr.- er - ?" "Jones, Julian Jones is my name."He dug into an inner pocket and produced an envelope addressed to such a person, care of General Delivery, San Francisco; and I, in turn, presented him with my card.
"Pleased to know you, sir," he said, extending his hand, his voice booming as if accustomed to loud noises or wide spaces."Of course I've heard of you, seen your picture in the papers, and all that, and, though I say it that shouldn't, I want to say that I didn't care a rap about those articles you wrote on Mexico.You're wrong, all wrong.You make the mistake of all Gringos in thinking a Mexican is a white man.He ain't.None of them ain't - Greasers, Spiggoties, Latin-Americans and all the rest of the cattle.Why, sir, they don't think like we think, or reason, or act.Even their multiplication table is different.You think seven times seven is forty-nine; but not them.They work it out different.And white isn't white to them, either.Let me give you an example.Buying coffee retail for house-keeping in one-pound or ten-pound lots - ""How big was that nugget you referred to?" I queried firmly."As big as the biggest of those?""Bigger," he said quietly."Bigger than the whole blamed exhibit of them put together, and then some." He paused and regarded me with a steadfast gaze."I don't see no reason why I shouldn't go into the matter with you.You've got a reputation a man ought to be able to trust, andI've read you've done some tall skylarking yourself in out-of-the-way places.I've been browsing around with an eye open for some one to go in with me on the proposition.""You can trust me," I said.
And here I am, blazing out into print with the whole story just as he told it to me as we sat on a bench by the lagoon before the Palace of Fine Arts with the cries of the sea gulls in our ears.Well, he should have kept his appointment with me.But I anticipate.
As we started to leave the building and hunt for a seat, a small woman, possibly thirty years of age, with a washed-out complexion of the farmer's wife sort, darted up to him in a bird-like way, for all the world like the darting veering gulls over our heads and fastened herself to his arm with the accuracy and dispatch and inevitableness of a piece of machinery.
"There you go!" she shrilled."A-trottin' right off and never givin' me a thought."I was formally introduced to her.It was patent that she had never heard of me, and she surveyed me bleakly with shrewd black eyes, set close together and as beady and restless as a bird's.
"You ain't goin' to tell him about that hussy?" she complained.
"Well, now, Sarah, this is business, you see," he argued plaintively."I've been lookin' for a likely man this long while, and now that he's shown up it seems to me I got a right to give him the hang of what happened."The small woman made no reply, but set her thin lips in a needle- like line.She gazed straight before her at the Tower of Jewels with so austere an expression that no glint of refracted sunlight could soften it.We proceeded slowly to the lagoon, managed to obtain an unoccupied seat, and sat down with mutual sighs of relief as we released our weights from our tortured sightseeing feet.
"One does get so mortal weary," asserted the small woman, almost defiantly.
Two swans waddled up from the mirroring water and investigated us.When their suspicions of our niggardliness or lack of peanuts had been confirmed, Jones half-turned his back on his life-partner and gave me hisstory.
