Chapter 115

I awoke at 6AM very well rested. I had forgotten my depression for a while and by the time I fell asleep it hadn't caught up with me. It was however back that Saturday morning clutching me like a too tight sweater. I hated the feeling of choking on my grief. I had felt it before but it had been a while since someone I knew and loved had died. I hated that feeling of overwhelming grief and depression.

I was in the shower, when I heard Wilson outside the shower starting the coffee. The problem was I had only brought a tee shirt and panties up to the shower. I had not expected him to be moving around so early in the morning. I thought I had time to do all my morning things before I woke him. I could just as easily brought up a pair of cutoffs, I really didn't even consider Wilson might be around.

He kept his back turned while I passed behind him headed into the bedroom area of the barge. After I was dressed and my hair was combed I went back to the kitchen area to drink a cup of the coffee. We had the big thermos loaded and ready to go. Wilson was dressed and all clean smelling. It was time to put the Honda on the road.

"Silvia you okay?" he asked. "You have been awfully quiet since you got back. Did something happen?"

"Yeah Wilson a friend got killed," I finally admitted to an outsider.

"Oh crap, I'm so sorry. Those guys in black make a huge impression on everyone in Warren County. Was he one of the guys at the school?" Wilson asked.

"Yeah he was the leader of that mission as well as the one he died on. The bad guys threw his body overboard so we didn't even had a body."

"Oh Sylvia I'm so sorry," he said.

"Yeah well we are going to keep moving forward Wilson it's all I know how to do," I said.

We had to stop once for gas and we got a couple of convenience store hot dogs with coke. Then we got more coffee for the road.

By 2PM we found the owner of the land we wanted to prospect upon. "Mr. Powell my name is Sylvia Porter. I came to see you about your new land on the blue knife creek."

"It used to be blue knife river till the environmentalist took all the dams downstream down," he said. We got the site where the first dam that started the change from steam to river,"

"That's is what we want to talk to you about. Mr. Wilson here is a computer nerd and I'm kind of an investigator. We would like to test the earth from behind the damn for minerals. We would be willing to pay you for the privilege," I suggested.

"What you mean," he said.

"Well we will do a little digging. Just what we can dig by hand nothing really big and we wont harm the land. When we finish we can tell you what you have out there. All we want is what we dig up in those two weeks. If it is nothing then so be it. We will be the only ones who lose. If we find anything you can have the information to do with what you will. We won't hold it against you, if you tell us to leave you want to process the site yourself."

"Well Sylvia that sounds fair to me. When you going to start?" he asked.

"It will be one day next week, I promise. And the time for our investigation will run two week from the day we arrive with out equipment. Don't worry there won't be any heavy equipment." I repeated.

"Okay then," Marshall said extending his hand. I had him hand write me a note of permission just in case somebody wanted to challenge us. What he didn't know was I planned to use it as a contract if the need arose.

Wilson and I were back on the road by 5PM but we didn't go home. We looked for a place to stay. There was nothing even close, so it looked like we had some improvising to do.

"You know Wilson when we get back you start getting all the parts you need for your machine. We can load them into the back of the truck for the drive up here. Lets drive the Honda up as well. I would rather sleep in the back here than on the ground. We can leave the back seat in the barge while we are gone," I suggested.

I waited while Wilson finished designing the small wash station. "We should have gone down and dug a bucket of that dirt to see what the rock content was," he said.

"Yeah we probably should have," I said.

"Oh well it's all or nothing," Wilson said. He was like me there was almost no investment. If we found any gold it would be so damn cool, if not there wouldn't be any real loss. Our real business was still moving right along.

"Okay we will make a shaker box out of plastic storage boxes. Then run the dirt that makes it through the shaker down the sluice trays. Finally we will pan it if there is anything to pan," Wilson said.

"When are you going to have all this shit ready to go?" I asked.

"Couple of days. I'm going to build all this shit myself," Wilson said.

"I tell you what Wilson I have some experience with pumps. I will build the water supply. First thing we are going to need is a Generator. I'll drive to Ellisboro and find a small generator and a couple of pumps," I said.

I bought the kiddie swimming pool to catch the wash water run off so that we could reuse it along with the fresh water from the pump in the creek. I also bought a hand truck to carry the crap from the road to the site. As was always the case work was the best therapy for depression. I just kept putting on foot in front of the other.

Somehow we managed to be ready for the grand experiment by late evening on Monday. We used Monday to finish up the equipment, load it up, then shut down the barge and office for a two week vacancy. EZ promised to stop by to be sure nothing terrible happened. As a final gesture Wilson dumped our computer files.