Barkerville Gold Read Online Free PDF

toe.
    â€œOw!”
    He swung around and came face to face with the waitress. The beautiful waitress with the great smile. Only she was not smiling now. Her face was scrunched up in pain. “Nice work!” she said and thrust his sketchbook at him.
    â€œSorry,” he gulped.
    Grabbing a large jug of ice water, the waitress scurried past him. “Hold still!” she yelled and tossed the water at the man’s steaming pants.
    â€œI’m sorry!” Rusty offered for the third time, but no one heard. So he tucked his sketchbook under his arm, scuttled for the door and almost collided with someone coming in. Rusty gaped. The man wore a red-and-black-checked shirt, brown vest and brown pants tucked into high leather boots. Pale gray eyes studied him from under bushy eyebrows that blended into scraggly gray hair and a full white beard. In his right hand was a wide-brimmed hat.
    Rusty’s eyes dropped to the sketchbook he was holding. The man’s eyes followed, saw the ghost sketch and jerked back to Rusty’s face. “Sorry,” Rusty said. He bolted out the door and along the boardwalk. At the corner of the Wake-Up Jake he skidded to a halt.
    The adjoining building was set back several feet and its roof extended to overhang the plank sidewalk. A tall red-and-white-striped barber pole was tucked in the corner, next to a window. Standing in front of the barber pole were GJ and Gram. They did not look happy. A few feet away, Katie raised her left eyebrow and shook her head. Sheila rolled her eyes. Rusty turned back to his grandparents.
    He couldn’t blame them for being angry, even if he did have a good reason for disappearing this time. He was trying to think how to explain when, above his head, a wooden sign creaked in the wind. He glanced up. “Fashionable Haircutting,” he read aloud. “W.D. Moses… Wow…That’s the famous barber!” Rusty drew a deep breath and continued on quickly, hoping to divert their attention. “Do you know? Wellington Delaney Moses was a black man who came here from the United States and opened a barbershop. One day James Barry came in for a haircut and Moses recognized the gold stickpin he was wearing because it looked exactly like a man’s face.”
    Gram and GJ did not look impressed, but Rusty pressed on.
    â€œThe stickpin belonged to Moses’ friend Charles Blessing, and Moses was already worried because his friend went missing on the road from Quesnel. So he turned Barry in, and Barry was tried by Judge Begbie up in Richfield, and they hung him for murdering Blessing and…” His voice trailed off.
    â€œRusty.”
    â€œAnd Moses was famous for his Hair Invigorator too. It restored hair in one week.” He paused, but they only kept looking at him, so he started for the door.
    â€œRussell!” Gram’s voice was sharp, no-nonsense. It stopped him in his tracks. Gram was a tall, slender woman with dark, curly hair like Katie’s, except that Gram’s was mixed with gray. Her green eyes flashed. “Russell J. Gates, you have got to stay with us and not go wandering off on your own without saying a word to anyone. Believe it or not, your parents expect us to bring all three of you children home to Victoria safe and sound. They do not want us to lose you somewhere in the wilds of British Columbia.”
    Rusty’s eyes shifted to his grandfather, but there was no hint of sympathy in those blue eyes. Grampa Jerry was a few inches taller than Gram, a stocky man whose hair, what there was left of it, was a pale imitation of the fiery red it had once been. “Your grandmother is right, Russell. If you can’t stay with the group, we’ll have to make other arrangements.”
    Rusty gulped. “Sorry, it won’t happen again.” He almost added, I promise , but changed his mind, just to be on the safe side, because it’s never a good plan to make a promise you’re not