Mango Digger Read online

  The question took the wind out of Digger's sails. He wanted to talk more about giving Abby a digging lesson. That had real possibilities. Her changing the subject could derail his plan. Still, he didn't want to do anything that might hurt his chances with her.

  He rubbed his chin like he was trying to think, then looked over at me and then back to Abby. He took a deep breath and said, “Yeah, I remember her. She showed up here last Thursday. Her and some guy. They spent all day Friday in the mine, but the guy she was with wasn't too happy with what they found. I offered to sell him some of my crystals, the really good ones, but he didn't want to spend the money.”

  Digger reached into his pocket and pulled out a flawless, six inch long, water clear quartz crystal with perfectly formed points on both ends. He held it out for Abby to see.

  “This is what the good stuff looks like. The kind of stuff I find. Museum quality.”

  Abby leaned in to get a closer look. Digger leaned in too, to get a better look at what was hiding under her tank top.

  She looked up and asked, “Can I hold it?”

  He grinned and said, “Yeah, but we might ought to sit down over there first. Don't want to risk you dropping it.”

  He nodded at the two lawn chairs in front of his trailer. Then he looked up at me. “You wouldn't happen to have any cold beer in that motorhome of yours, would you?”

  I shook my head. “No, we're totally out.”

  Abby had already taken a seat in one of the lawn chairs and was waiting for us to come join her. She'd heard me tell Digger we didn't have any beer and, instead of staying quiet, she said, “A cold beer sounds good to me too. Why don't you go get us some?”

  She was talking to me, playing some kind of mind game. She knew I wasn't going to unhook the motorhome and drive back to town to get beer, so I didn't know what she was thinking.

  Digger moved over and sat down in the chair beside her. He was in her corner when it came to beer. He said, “They sell it down at Castleberry's Store. Corner of 7 and 298. Only about four miles from here. Maybe you could go over there and get us a twelve pack of Bud. Two twelve packs would be even better.”

  I could see that Abby was nodding in agreement. She liked the idea of me leaving her and Digger alone while I ran off to get beer. I was pretty sure she wasn't trying to make me jealous. We didn't have that kind of relationship. Not yet. So I decided to play along.

  “I guess I wouldn't mind going on a beer run, but I'm not taking the motorhome. Too much trouble to unhook and park it back in the site again. I can give you the money and you could go.”

  Digger rubbed his unshaven face, looked over at Abby in her low-cut top, then back at me. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a key. “I'll stay here with her, and you can take mine.”

  He nodded toward the Pathfinder parked next to his trailer. “It'll get you there and back, no problem. Just be light on the pedal ’cause it's nearly out of gas. The brakes are a little soft so give yourself plenty of time to stop. Other than that, it's fine.”

  I could see Abby nodding. She wanted me to go. She had a plan, and part of it meant I needed to leave. But I didn't like the way Digger was looking at her and wanted to stay close in case things got out of hand.

  She could see my hesitation and said, “Walker, go get the beer. Don't worry about me. I'll be okay staying here with Digger. He’ll keep me safe.”

  I looked in his direction, and he nodded. Still holding out the key, he said, “It'll only take you a few minutes. Go down to the highway, turn left, and you'll see the place about a mile down the road. Get two twelves of Bud. From the cooler.”

  I reluctantly took the key from him, even though I didn't feel right about going. Still, if Abby had a plan, and it meant I needed to be gone for a few minutes, I'd do it. For her.

  I started to leave, but she stopped me. “You're going to need money.”

  She stood and turned to Digger. “We'll be right back.”

  She led me over to our motorhome and as soon as we were out of Digger's sight, she whispered, “Give me about twenty minutes alone with him, then come back. If you run into trouble, call me. You have money?”

  I had my wallet, so yeah, I had money. I nodded.

  “Good, take Digger's car, get the beer and come back. Don't get lost. Twenty minutes, that's all I need.”

  I wasn't totally convinced. “Abby, you sure about this? Leaving you alone with Digger, it doesn't feel right.”

  She smiled. “Don't worry, I've got this. Now go.”

  She kissed me on the cheek and pushed me away. We walked back over to Digger's and saw that while we were gone, he'd put on a different shirt and combed his hair, obviously wanting to make a good impression with Abby.

  She headed for the chair next to his and I headed for the Pathfinder. The door was unlocked and I climbed in. I wasn't surprised the floorboard was caked in red clay from the nearby crystal mine but was surprised by the silver crucifix hanging from the rear-view mirror. Maybe Digger was religious. I hoped so.

  I looked back to where they were sitting just in time to see him pull Abby's chair closer to his. He looked over his shoulder and gave me a thumbs up and a toothy grin.

  The Pathfinder wasn't the worst vehicle I'd ever been in, but it was close. The windshield had a diagonal crack running from the top of the driver's side to the bottom of the passenger’s. The driver's seat was ripped, the armrest on the door was missing, the headliner hung down like a sail, and there was an empty can of brake fluid on the floor.

  When I turned the key to start the motor, the check engine light, the ABS warning light, and the low fuel light lit up and stayed lit even after the motor was running. I shifted into reverse and heard the transmission clunk as it tried to find a gear. I tapped the gas and was relieved when the car lurched backwards. At least reverse worked.

  Out on the road, I shifted into drive and again felt the transmission clunk as it searched for matching gears. Being fairly certain the clunk meant I was in drive, I gave it gas and headed out toward the highway, leaving Abby and Digger behind.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  My biggest mistake was believing Digger when he'd said there was enough fuel to get to the store and back. Instead of listening to him, I should have believed the flashing warning light on the dash. It was telling me I was about to run out of gas. The gauge said the same thing; the needle was pointing to the wrong side of empty.

  I'd gone little over a mile when the engine stumbled. At first, I figured it was cold and just needed to warm up. I punched the gas, and it ran fine until I was about halfway through a right-hand curve. The engine stumbled again. A cough, then no power. It came back to life on the straight-away but stumbled a third time on the next right hander.

  I pumped the pedal, trying to keep the motor going, but it didn't help. It died, and the rest of the warning lights on the dash lit up. The Pathfinder was out of gas.

  I shifted into neutral and let it coast. It was mostly downhill to the highway and I figured if I got that far, I might be able to restart the engine and find a gas station nearby. Worst case, I could walk.

  When I got to the highway, I lightly braked for the stop sign and not seeing any traffic, coasted on through taking a left. Up ahead about a quarter mile, like an oasis in the desert, I saw a sign for Wyles Kwik Stop. A gas station right where I needed it to be, downhill all the way from the stop sign.

  I coasted the Pathfinder up the pumps and put twenty dollars of gas in the tank. Seeing a beer sign in the store window, I went inside and bought two twelve packs of cold Budweiser.

  Digger would be happy, beer and half a tank of gas on me. With the little Pathfinder fueled up and twenty-four cans of cold beer in the passenger seat beside me, I headed back to his trailer to see how he and Abby were getting along. Hopefully, they were both fully clothed and still outside sitting in the lawn chairs.

  Getting back to the campground was easy. The Pathfinder's check engine and ABS lights were still lit, but the low fuel
light wasn't. Wind whistled through the plastic covering the busted rear window and cold air streamed out of the heater vents. I was glad Abby had made me change into warmer clothes. Had I not, I would have been mighty cold. Maybe her 'gift' had told her I'd be taking a trip in Digger's broken-down SUV.

  I'd been gone a little over twenty minutes when I got back to campground. I parked the Pathfinder where it had been parked before, grabbed the beer out of the passenger seat and headed to where I had left Abby.

  As I got close, I noticed that Digger was no longer sitting in the chair next to her. He was squatting on the ground facing her, about five feet away, a row of crystals lined up in front of him.

  When he saw me, he quickly stood and walked over. “You make it there okay?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. No problem.”

  “Good. I was worried about the gas. Wasn't much in the tank.”

  “Yeah, I know. I put some in for you. You want to take the beer?”

  He took both twelve packs and headed to his trailer. He stepped up on the deck and went inside, presumably to put the beer in the fridge.

  With him out of the way, I went over to Abby.

  “So, how'd it go? You learn anything?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, a lot. And just so you know, he was a perfect gentleman, especially after I told him about your time in the service. He wanted to know if you saw any action, so I told him about the time you took on those three guys and left them in the dirt. After that, he decided he was sitting a little too close to me, so he got up and moved over there by those rocks.”

  She pointed to the row of crystals Digger had set up in front of her. “He was telling me about phantoms when you drove up. It's real interesting.”

  Behind me, I heard Digger coming back out of his trailer. He was heading in our direction carrying six beers. He handed one to me, another to Abby, and kept one for himself. He put the other three on a flat rock in front of us.

  The chair he had been sitting in was empty. I waited to see if he was going to take it, but he didn't. Instead, he said, “You sit by the lady, and I'll sit over here by my rocks.”

  He plopped down, pulled the tab on his beer and took a long drink. When he was done, he wiped the foam from his lips with the back of his hand and said, “Now that there is some good beer.”

  He put the can down on the ground in front of him and pointed to one of the crystals he had lined up in front of Abby. It looked like a chunk of glass about the size of a pill bottle. One end was pointed and the other end jagged.

  He picked it up and said, “This here is a busted point. It has nice size and clarity, but it's been broken, probably by a digging tool. The damage hurts its value. The people who buy healing crystals want them to be all natural and unbroken. Not like this. Rocks like these are only good for yard art and aquariums.”

  He picked up the rock beside it; it was much larger, flat on the bottom with a lot of tiny crystals on top. “This here is a cluster. Has a rock base with lots of crystal points growing out of it. Clusters like this come in all shapes and sizes, some as small as a quarter, some larger than a car. They got one up there at the welcome center probably weighs twenty tons.

  “You'll find clusters just about everywhere in these hills. Most won't be jewelry or collector quality, but some will be. Look for ones with unbroken points. Those are the keepers.”

  He set the cluster down and picked up a crystal about the size of a cigar. When he handed it to Abby, he said, “That there is a phantom. If you hold it up to the light, you'll see the ghost of another crystal inside.”

  Abby held it up and said, “Yeah, I see what you mean. It looks like another crystal growing inside it.”

  She showed it to me, and I saw the ghost image of the crystal inside the big one. I nodded and had to admit it was pretty cool. Abby took the crystal back and handed it to Digger.

  He carefully wrapped it in a tissue he pulled from his pocket and gently put it on the ground next to the others. He pointed at it and said, “People who believe crystals have healing powers, cherish phantoms. If you ever find one, keep it forever.”

  He bent over and picked up another crystal about the same length of the phantom, but a bit thicker. He handed it to Abby and said, “Tilt it to one side. Tell me what you see.”

  She held the crystal vertically with her thumb and forefinger, then slowly rotated it until it was horizontal. Something caught her attention and she leaned in to get a closer look. She shook her head and repeated the rotation. Then she looked up at me with surprise in her eyes and said, “There's water in it!”

  Digger nodded. “There sure is, and that water is millions of years old; probably got there back when dinosaurs roamed this part of the world.”

  Abby showed me the crystal, and when she tilted it, I could see the water trapped inside. It moved like the bubble on a carpenter's level. Clear liquid, maybe half an ounce.

  Digger waited until we looked back up at him, then said, “We call them 'hydros'. They're rare, but they do exist. I found that one about six miles from here.”

  He took the hydro from Abby and put it back on the ground next to his other crystals. He picked up another one but kept it hidden in his hand until he was close enough to Abby to reveal it with a bit of flair.

  With the crystal still hidden, he said, “This is one of my prized possessions. I almost cried the day I found it.”

  He opened his hand and revealed a clear quartz crystal with what looked like blades of grass embedded inside.

  Abby leaned in to get a closer look. She stared at it for a moment then looked up at Digger with wide eyes. “Is it real?”

  He nodded. “You bet it is. And rare too. We call that green stuff an inclusion, something that got caught inside the crystal while it was growing. Inclusions can be almost anything. Dirt, minerals, even bits of grass or leaves.

  “I've found a few inclusions in my life, but this is the one I like best. Never seen another like it.”

  He showed it to both of us but didn't let us hold it. I guess it was too rare or valuable to risk putting it in our hands. When we had seen enough, he wrapped the crystal in tissue and put it in his shirt pocket.

  Then he pointed to the remaining crystals laid out in front of him. “These are the kinds I look for, the really special ones, the kind most people who dig all their lives will never find. But I find them because I know where to look.”

  Abby nodded. “That's some pretty amazing crystals you got there. Probably worth a lot of money.”

  Digger leaned back, taking the compliment in full. He obviously liked it when people praised his collection. He took a drink from his beer and said, “I showed all these to your friend, the gal who showed up in the motorhome next door.”

  Abby nodded. “What'd she think about them?”

  “She liked them, so much so that she begged me to show her where she could find others like them.”

  He grinned but said nothing else.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  We waited for Digger to tell us the rest of the story about what happened after he showed Kat his collection of crystals. But instead of talking, he popped the top on another beer, leaned back and just nodded.

  It was clear he was waiting for us, or, more specifically, Abby in her low-cut top, to beg him to tell us more.

  When it became apparent that he wasn't going to say anything unless she asked, she took the bait. “Digger, did you show Kat where to find crystals?”

  He didn't answer right away. He was sitting on the ground in front of the crystals lined up in front of him, seemingly mesmerized by what he was seeing. He didn't look up in response to Abby's question.

  She asked him again, this time a little louder. “Digger, did you show Kat where to find crystals?”

  This time he heard the question. He looked up at Abby and started nodding. Then he pointed over his shoulder and said, “Back during World War II, the government needed quartz crystals. Not just regular crystals. They needed to be oscillator grade
to use in radar and guidance systems.

  “But there were only a few places in the US where they could be found. One of them was here in these mountains. They sent in a survey team, and after a few weeks of hunting, they found the mother lode—a place packed with high quality oscillators.

  “Back then, there were so many crystals on the mountain, you could just pick them up off the ground. Cigar size and bigger. The locals knew about them, but to them they were just fancy rocks. Yard art or trinkets to put on the window sill.

  “But to the government the crystals meant the difference between winning or losing the war. As soon as the site was located, President Roosevelt signed a bill making about half a million acres around the mother lode a protected national forest.

  “Not many people lived in those woods back then, and no one really cared what the government did as long as it would shorten the war. Of course, no one knew the government was taking all that land just to get to the crystals.

  “Anyway, the Army came in, bulldozed a road to the site and set up a small camp. They kept a team of geologists up there digging crystals for the rest of the war.

  “Later on, the government scientists figured out how to grow oscillators in their labs and didn't need to dig them out of the ground anymore. So they abandoned their dig site up on the mountain and erased all mention of it in their records.

  “Fifteen years later, when the Forest Service started mapping the area, they had to come up with names for all the mountains. Most of them, they just made up. But one of the fellas doing the mapping remembered the dig site where the Army had found crystals, and he named that site Crystal Mountain.

  “It don't show up like that in any road map because there aren't any paved roads going to the place. But if you get a GS topo map and know where to look, you'll see a spot labeled Crystal Mountain.

  “If you go up there and know where to look, you can still find the best crystals on the planet. The army only took a small fraction of what was there, they left most of them behind.”

  Digger was nodding while he was telling the story, never looking up, just staring at his rock collection.