We lived on a large cattle and horse ranch just outside of a town that no longer exists in the far western reaches of Virginia, and our lives were unremarkable. XXX Inhaling sharply, the world seemed brighter as if someone had turned up the sun a notch. “There are too many ears around.”
“Please don’t take this the wrong way, Dao-Ming, but I’m going to need a little bit more than that. I made a moderately large find of gold in a long overlooked part of the Black Hills in South Dakota in 1883, well after the “gold rush” had peaked. The lands, house, and livestock would all go to the eldest surviving son when our parents passed, leaving me no other option (to my mind) but to take what little education I had – and in the 1860’s and 70’s, it wasn’t much – and set out into the wide world to make my fortune as
