Banker Snude and a young woman, Serafina, believe the map she owns will lead them to a lost gold mine in the Superstition Mountains of Arizona. The banker is partially funding the expedition and several other men are also funding it and coming along. Chuck was one of the men and he had the advantage of being familiar with the area.
One the way there they encounter bad guys and one man gets stabbed in the night by persons unknown. They find the mine and it is stacked to the ceiling with bags of ore, more ore than their little expedition can handle. They need to find help and they get the bright idea to hire a gang of smugglers, which turns out about as well as one would expect, dealing with criminals. They get ambushed, the smugglers make off with the ore, but they manage to get it back only to discover when they get to Snude's bank that the smugglers switched the ore with rocks. In the process, more members of the expedition die.
Chuck, who has grown attached to Serafina, talks her into going back to look for the ore. He knows the smugglers must have stashed it until they could get together enough mules to pack it out. Taking the banker's mules, he and Serafina head back out and sure enough, they find the stolen ore. But nothing turns out the way Chuck had hoped, plus one of the peaks of the Superstitions has decided to be a volcano.
I read this story because my father was one of those hopefuls who went looking for gold in the Superstitions. Like everyone else, he found nothing. So the idea of gold hunters in the Superstitions has some nostalgia for me. Too bad the story turned out to be really stupid and boring. Total waste of time.
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