pt
herself, to whom he told it only when he began to sing his death
song.

Mary Greenwater swore to Carson that the hiding place of the Spanish
treasure would never be known except to one other member of her tribe,
and then not until after her death. She told him there were valuable
papers which she knew none of her people could ever use, and which she
later gave to Carson.

The documents were discolored and the ink faded and this much Carson
was able to decipher: "Jean Maldonado visited a far distant country
north of Santa Fe--a wide valley through which flowed a stream, along
the banks were bushes that bore fruit like unto those of Spain--in the
valley were herds of oxen of the bigness and color of our bulls--their
horns are not so great--they have a great bunch upon their fore
shoulders and more hair on the forepart than on the hindpart; they
have a horse's mane upon their backbone and much hair and very long
from the knees downward--they have great tufts of hair hanging from
their foreheads and it seemeth they have beards--they push with their
horns--they overtake and kill a horse--finally it is a fierce beast of
countenance and form of body--we feared these beasts and stayed near
the mountains named the Sangre de Christo.... Climbed the mountain to
a great flat rock that stood on end like a platter.... Jean Maldonado,
commander of an expedition reached this place 1750.... The mine
yielded much gold in a rock like white china--Babtiste beat it out
with--Mattheo returned from Santa Fe with more donkeys--loaded donkeys
with much unbeaten rock--returned to Santa Fe"--

Here the ink was so faded that nothing more could be made of the
manuscript. The accompanying map was more perfect. The tracings showed
the mountain ranges. It had been drawn almost with the precision of an
engineer. The route from Santa Fe through the mountain passes was
clearly shown; there were marks of each day's stops. Where the map
showed the end of the journey there was the rude drawing of a cliff
set on edge and below it was marked "Gold."

Carson pondered over the quaint document for many days. The Indian
marriage with Mary Greenwater had become a matter of regret. While the
woman loved him, yet her love was like a new bowie knife, to be
handled with care. He decided to leave the Grand River country and
bide his time until Mary Greenwater should make one of her long visits
to the hills. One night he mounted the best horse on the ranch and