The goldmine problem (2)

Though Klondike Island lies on the same archipelago as Happy Island, it is a journey of several hundred miles, due to the complex geography of the Jules Verne Strait on which the islands lie.

The journey by hovercraft takes a full four days, the boat stopping regularly at islands so obscure they don’t even feature on the map, maps being a modern extravagance our archapelego has never fully engaged with.

During the journey Alun and I perused maps of the Klondike Mountain, where lies claim 127, the goldmine we had recently inherited. Once we arrived on the Island it was going to be a long, arduous trek of several hundred miles through hostile icy terrains. We would need a guide, and agreed to seek one out at Big Town, the main town on Klondike Island. 

We were not the only craft heading in that direction. En route we passed numerous rowing boats, dinghies, rafts, all manner of vessel. The hovercraft itself was heavily laden with gold-seeking passengers.

“It’s gold fever, Jed,” Alun said, as we surveyed the multitude, braving perilous seas, not to mention the long trek ahead of them, all in the hope that they will find a nugget of pure gold that will make their fortune. “They’re all driven here by the insane hope that they’ll make their fortune.”

“Many people do,” I said. “You read accounts of it all the time. There was one in the OffMainlander Magazine just last week, about an old lady who got lost on the way to the shops, found herself on a golden mountain, picked up what she thought was  carrot, but turned out to be a golden nugget which she sold for a million mainland pounds.”

“She doesn’t sound so foolish to me, not if she went straight to the assay office and sold it for its full value. Had she really mistaken it for a carrot she’d have tried to turn it into a casserole, broken her tooth and choked to death on it. Now that would be a doddery old lady. The truth is that particular old lady is the widow of Goldman McCann, owner of one of the biggest goldmines in the whole of the Klondike. The ‘old lady stumbles upon nugget’ tale was simply PR spin to cover up the fact that over 20 of her workers died in digging up the £1 million of gold for her.”

“Twenty dead workers. It is really so perilous?”

“Of course it is, Jed. People are dying in their thousands, both in the Klondike mountains and even trying to get there - a 200 mile crawl along icy terrain, ill-prepared in food and dress, thousands will die before they even set foot on Klondike mountains. And if they do get there, there are a million and one ways to die in the quest for gold, ill-trained people with dynamite, dangerous drunks with picks, every hazard imaginable.”

“But some of them must get rich. A million pounds worth of gold is being produced every week.”

“The immigrants will never become rich, Jed. All the gold mined on a claim goes to the claims owners.  The miner who finds the million pound nugget won’t see a penny of it. These people (he gestured to the thousands travelling ill-prepared on hazardous rafts) will walk, climb and crawl 200 miles though icy terrain for the privilege of working long hours in the most dangerous conditions imaginable for little more than the minimum wage, simply for the privelege and honour of making the rich richer.”

I looked at the immigrants through new eyes. All this vain hope, work and sacrifice done for nothing more than to make the rich richer.  At least, I consoled myself, Alun and I were members of the claim-owning classes and would face neither the same threat of death nor the same certainty of continued impoverishment.

After a few days of event-free travel we arrived at Big Town, the main town on Klondike Island. Our first priority was finding a guide who would take us across the dangerous terrain that separated Big Town from Klondike Mountain.

“We must find a guide,” I reminded Alun. “Else we’ll never find a safe passage to Klondike Mountain.”

“We could try here,” he said.

I followed his gaze, to a sign which read: ‘Not Very Good Guide for hire’.

“Really,” I said. “He doesn’t seem very good.”

“Not that one Jed, that one.” He pointed to the neighbouring shack, which bore a plaque that read: ‘Very Good Guide for hire’.

We knocked and the guide answered swiftly. After a brief talk about provisions, fees and copyright (it was agreed that the guide should remain nameless, in case he was later hired for a more lucrative story) we shook hands and agreed to depart the next day.

I shall skim over the journey, this is a short story not a novel, enough to say that every adventure you can imagine was endured, involving huskies, mules, steamships, nuns, icy menace, erupting volcanos and fights with bad-tempered Americans (This story’s called The Goldmine Adventure for a reason).

Enough to say that after two and a half weeks’ arduous travel we arrived at our claim with several days to spare. We had met the first requirement of the will, we could begin work on the mine at the start of summer, and then begin the important task of seeking a buyer for our claim.