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survive somehow, he’d miss them sorely. Taking pity on her husband without losing a bit of her resolve, Adeline comforted Michael. Then she cajoled him into making a further concession, even more vexing than the last. She talked him into brewing beer her father’s way.
    Adeline was sure that once word spread about the lake, anyone traveling through these mountains would stop there to replenish their water supplies. Doubtless, many of those who did would like something stronger to drink. She was sure that Michael could brew and sell the beer her father had taught him to make.
    With great gentleness, she reminded him that her father’s beer was a very good brew.
    “And everyone thinks mine is snake oil,” Michael Walsh said bitterly.
    Hurt to his soul, but still wanting to make his fortune, he reluctantly agreed.
    When the remainder of the Masked Man Party was told of the Walshes’s decision, they viewed it with suspicion. To a man, they were sure that Michael Walsh had somehow stumbled on to gold. The Miner’s Commandment said: Thou shall not tell any false tales of good diggings. Meaning don’t send your fellow gold-seeker off on a wild goose chase to your own advantage, lest you taste his vengeance.
    But Michael Walsh hadn’t done that.
    Rather, he’d said he was staying because his wife wanted him to stay. With one exception, the other twenty-three gold seekers of the Masked Man Party were bachelors — but even the married man couldn’t imagine having come so far, enduring so many hardships, and then stopping just short of your goal solely for the sake of a woman.
    In the early days of the gold rush, one of the most alluring tales pulling migrants westward was that of Goldstrike Lake. Legend had it that a prospector had found a beautiful mountain lake where gold was strewn on the shores just waiting to be picked up. Unfortunately, the prospector had died, been killed, some said, before he could file his claim and reveal the lake’s whereabouts.
    The common suspicion in the Masked Man Party was that Michael Walsh had found those legendary golden shores. So in the name of gratitude for the aid the Walshes had given in the face of the cholera outbreak, the party delayed its departure to help the family fell trees and erect a rough log cabin. Of course, they really stayed to make a collective effort to find the gold that tight-mouthed, want-it-all-for-himself, papist bastard Walsh had blundered upon.
    The problem was, the lakeshore was twelve miles long. And with all of the shoreline’s inlets and points, there had to be twenty-five miles of ground to explore. More daunting than that, some parts of the shoreline could be reached only by descending sheer cliffs. That or paddling in by canoe. Many a gold seeker in the Masked Man Party tried to worm the secret out of Michael Walsh, but the brewer never let on. Not a word. Just pretended like he didn’t know what the hell any of them was hinting at.
    The cunning Mick.
    Several men took to following Michael Walsh around when he wasn’t busy working on his cabin. They watched him fish and hunt. But they couldn’t catch him out. He didn’t drop the smallest clue as to where he’d made his strike. When he wasn’t engaged in providing for his family, he spent most of his free time filling his bucket in the little springs that fed the lake, and then he toted the water home.
    Pretty soon, some of the men wanted to beat his secret out of him.
    If he hadn’t had his wife and children with him, they might have tried.
    But as October approached all but one of the party finally decided they had to push on before they became snowbound. As a farewell gift, Michael Walsh gave them a barrel of his new beer — the kind Hans Koenig had taught him to make. The Masked Man Party was delighted with the brew, said it was the best beer they’d ever tasted. Then they rebuked Michael Walsh for not making it earlier. Such good beer certainly would have made crossing the desert less