The Gold and the Mountain

On a spring day in 1941 Will Bodie, a young teenage boy, is fishing on a dock on the St. Johns River in Jacksonville, Florida, while reading in a magazine about a lost gold mine. His fishing buddy, old Mr. McRae, soon joins him and this sets up a turn of events about Mr. McRae's gold find on a mountain in Mexico. He tells Will where it is on his death bed.This sets Will on a quest to find the gold on the mountain in Mexico. There is Will's sweetheart, Agnes, and his father, a shrimper,...
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On a spring day in 1941 Will Bodie, a young teenage boy, is fishing on a dock on the St. Johns River in Jacksonville, Florida, while reading in a magazine about a lost gold mine. His fishing buddy, old Mr. McRae, soon joins him and this sets up a turn of events about Mr. McRae's gold find on a mountain in Mexico. He tells Will where it is on his death bed.This sets Will on a quest to find the gold on the mountain in Mexico. There is Will's sweetheart, Agnes, and his father, a shrimper, and his mother, soon to be a widow. Will studies Spanish in high school. Will is smart. Too, there is a war going on. On graduating from high school, Will goes to the mountain in Mexico to search for the gold, and is attacked by wild pigs. Of this, Maria, a Mexican Maiden, washing clothes in a stream, sees him and saves him from bleeding to death of his injuries. Will eventually returns home and has to go to war. In battle he gets a serious head wound. Agnes rethinks her commitment and marries another. Will recovers, goes to mining school, becomes a degreed mining engineer. He searches again for his gold in Mexico, is attacked again by wild pigs, kills two, and later encounters Maria. At night, they eat roast pig, have coffee and tequila, and have sex under a poncho in the desert chill. The next day Maria is gone.Will is hired by a Canadian mining company and is a successful mining engineer, working in South America for 10 years. He obtains a share of ownership. However, the mines are ultimately nationalized. Will gets the company to venture with him on his quest to find the gold in Mexico. They agree, and Will, looking for his gold, encounters Maria again, and she has a son, his. At first, it seems, no gold is there, and the company abandons their interest.. But by happenstance, Will finds that it is there, as refractory gold, secret gold. Ultimately, Will finds his place, with Maria, his son, and the mountain with its gold.