The Argosy, Vol. XIII No. 465

# "An Idea and a Fortune" by Owen Hackett

Two prospectors, Phil Gormley and Tom Danvers, exhausted after three months of fruitless gold prospecting in McGowan's Pass, arrive at Sol Brunt's supply store seeking work. While collecting their kit, Phil notices unusually deep mud in the stream below Placer Notch mines, realizing it contains gold waste discarded by the sluices—estimating millions of dollars lost over decades.

The following morning, exploring Sol's property, they discover an artificial lake behind a dam created twenty-five years prior by mining inspector John Martin (who later disappeared), deliberately designed to trap and settle mining tailings. Phil proposes a partnership to extract gold from the lake's thirty-foot mud deposit, persuading Sol to agree to equal profit-sharing if Phil can devise an economical separation process. The story breaks off as Phil secures Sol's agreement to test the venture, contingent on proving the bottom mud yields recoverable gold.