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diff --git a/18309-h/18309-h.htm b/18309-h/18309-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0937a1f --- /dev/null +++ b/18309-h/18309-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,8288 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Emerson's Wife and Other Western Stories, by Florence Finch Kelly</title> +<style type="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: medium; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: small } + +P.letter {font-size: small } + + hr.full { width: 100%; + height: 5px; } + a:link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + a:visited {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none; } + a:hover {color:#ff0000; + text-decoration: underline; } + pre {font-size: 70%; } + +</style> +</head> +<body> +<h1 align="center">The Project Gutenberg eBook, Emerson's Wife and Other Western Stories, by +Florence Finch Kelly, Illustrated by Stanley L. Wood</h1> +<pre> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: Emerson's Wife and Other Western Stories</p> +<p> Emerson's Wife -- Colonel Kate's Protégée -- The Kid of Apache Teju -- A Blaze on Pard Huff -- How Colonel Kate Won Her Spurs -- Hollyhocks -- The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of Johnson Sides -- A Piece of Wreckage -- The Story of a Chinee Kid -- Out of Sympathy -- An Old Roman of Mariposa -- Out of the Mouth of Babes -- Posey -- A Case of the Inner Imperative</p> +<p>Author: Florence Finch Kelly</p> +<p>Release Date: May 4, 2006 [eBook #18309]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EMERSON'S WIFE AND OTHER WESTERN STORIES***</p> +<br><br><center><h3>E-text prepared by Al Haines</h3></center><br><br> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<A NAME="img-front"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-front.jpg" ALT=""Want my guns?" shouted Nick derisively. "Then come and take 'em!"" BORDER="2" WIDTH="385" HEIGHT="672"> +<H4> +[Frontispiece: "Want my guns?" shouted Nick derisively. <BR> +"Then come and take 'em!"] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +EMERSON'S WIFE +</H1> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AND +<BR><BR> +OTHER WESTERN STORIES +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BY +<BR><BR> +FLORENCE FINCH KELLY +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +AUTHOR OF "WITH HOOPS OF STEEL," "THE DELAFIELD AFFAIR," ETC. +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +WITH ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOR +<BR><BR> +BY STANLEY L. WOOD +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHICAGO +<BR> +A. C. McCLURG & CO. +<BR> +1911 +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +COPYRIGHT +<BR> +A. C. McCLURG & CO. +<BR> +1911 +<BR><BR> +Published September, 1911 +<BR><BR> +Entered at Stationers' Hall, London, England +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap01"> +EMERSON'S WIFE +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap02"> +COLONEL KATE'S <I>Protégée</I> +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap03"> +THE KID OF APACHE TEJU +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap04"> +A BLAZE ON PARD HUFF +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap05"> +HOW COLONEL KATE WON HER SPURS +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap06"> +HOLLYHOCKS +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap07"> +THE RISE, FALL, AND REDEMPTION OF JOHNSON SIDES +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap08"> +A PIECE OF WRECKAGE +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap09"> +THE STORY OF A CHINEE KID +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap10"> +OUT OF SYMPATHY +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap11"> +AN OLD ROMAN OF MARIPOSA +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap12"> +OUT OF THE MOUTH OF BABES +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap13"> +POSEY +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#chap14"> +A CASE OF THE INNER IMPERATIVE +</A> +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +ILLUSTRATIONS +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-front"> +"Want my guns?" shouted Nick derisively. "Then<BR> + come and take 'em!" . . . . . . _Frontispiece_ +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-086"> +Wemple dug his spurs into its sweating side and<BR> + the beast sprang forward at a faster gallop +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-106"> +Out on the plain we saw the Kid yelling like a<BR> + wild man, with Dynamite at his highest speed,<BR> + chasing a jackrabbit +</A> +</H3> + +<H3> +<A HREF="#img-286"> +"I'd hate to have to spile your hide, but I'll do<BR> + it if you don't get out o' this trail" +</A> +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +EMERSON'S WIFE +</H1> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AND OTHER WESTERN STORIES +</H3> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +EMERSON'S WIFE +</H3> + +<P> +Nick Ellhorn awoke and looked around the room with curiosity and +interest, but without surprise. He had no recollection of having +entered it the night before, and he was lying across the bed fully +clothed. But he had long ago ceased to feel surprise over a matter of +that sort. His next movement was to reach for his revolver, and he +gave a grunt of satisfaction on finding that it hung, as usual, from +his cartridge belt. He was aware of a deep, insistent thirst, and as +he sat up on the edge of the bed he announced aloud, in a tone of +conviction, "I sure need a cocktail!" +</P> + +<P> +Glancing out of the window, he saw a little plaza, fresh in the morning +sunlight with its greening grass and budding trees, and beyond it the +pink walls and portalled front of a long adobe building. He nodded +approvingly. +</P> + +<P> +"I reckon I pulled my freight from Albuquerque all right. And I had a +good load too," he reflected with a chuckle. "And I reckon I sure +bunched myself all right into Santa Fe; for if this ain't the Plaza +Hotel, I 'm drunker 'n a feller has any right to be who 's been total +abstainin' ever since last night. But I 've sure got to have a +cocktail now, if it busts a gallus!" +</P> + +<P> +He stared wistfully at the door; but drunken lethargy was still upon +him, and his disinclination to move was stronger than his thirst. His +eyes, roving along the wall, fell upon the electric call button. +Stretching a sinewy arm to its full length he made dumb show of +pressing it, as he said, "One push, one cocktail; two pushes, two +cocktails!" Then he shook his head despairingly. "Too far, can't +reach it," he muttered. But his face brightened as his hand +accidentally touched his revolver. Out it flashed, and there was no +tremor in the long brown hand that held it in position. Bang! Bang! +Bang! went the gun, three shots in quick succession, and then three +more. "Six pushes, six cocktails!" he announced, triumphantly. +</P> + +<P> +The button had been driven into the wall, and several holes hovered +close upon its wreck. A clatter of hurrying feet on the stairway and +the din of excited voices told him that his summons had at least +attracted attention. "Push button's a sure handy thing!" he exclaimed +aloud as he fell back on the bed, laughing drunkenly. +</P> + +<P> +The footsteps halted outside and the voices sunk to whispers. +Presently Ellhorn, gazing expectantly at the door, saw a pair of +apprehensive eyes peering through the transom. At sight of the face he +waved his hand, which still grasped the gun, and called out, "Say, you, +I want six cocktails!" The face quickly dodged downward and the feet +and the whispering voices moved farther away. Then came the sound of a +rapid stride down the hall and a deep voice bellowed, "Nick, let me in!" +</P> + +<P> +Nick called out "Tommy Tuttle!" and in walked a big bulk of a man, six +feet and more tall, with shoulders broad and burly and legs like tree +trunks. Ellhorn turned toward him a beaming face and broke into a +string of oaths. But his profanity was cordial and joyous. It bloomed +with glad welcome and was fragrant with good fellowship and brotherly +love. +</P> + +<P> +"Nick, you 're drunk," said Tuttle reprovingly. +</P> + +<P> +"You 're away off, Tom! I was yesterday, but I 've been teetotallin' +ever since I came into this room last night, and the whole Arizona +desert ain't in it with my throat this mornin'! I want six cocktails!" +</P> + +<P> +"No, you don't," the other interrupted decisively. "You-all can have +some coffee," and he stepped back to the door and gave the order. +</P> + +<P> +Ellhorn sat up and looked with indignant surprise at his friend. "Tom +Tuttle—" he began. +</P> + +<P> +"Shut up!" Tuttle interrupted. "Come and soak your head." +</P> + +<P> +Ellhorn submitted to the head-soaking without protest, but drank his +coffee with grumblings that it was not coffee, but cocktails, that he +wanted. +</P> + +<P> +"Nick, ain't you-all ashamed of yourself?" Tuttle asked severely. But +it was anxiety rather than reproof that was evident in his large, round +face and blue eyes. His fair skin was tanned and burned to a bright +red, and against its blazing color glowed softly a short, tawny +mustache. +</P> + +<P> +"No, Tommy, not yet," Nick replied cheerfully. "It's too soon. It's +likely I will be to-morrow, or mebbe even this afternoon. But not now. +You-all ought to be more reasonable." +</P> + +<P> +"To think you 'd pile in here like this, when I 'm in a hole and need +you bad," Tuttle went on in a grieved tone. +</P> + +<P> +The fogs had begun to clear out of Ellhorn's head, and he looked up +with quick concern. "What's up, Tom?" +</P> + +<P> +"The Dysert gang 's broke loose again, and Marshal Black 's in San +Francisco, and Sheriff Williamson 's gone to Chicago. I 've got to +ride herd on 'em all by myself." +</P> + +<P> +"What have they done?" +</P> + +<P> +"Old man Paxton was found dead by his front gate yesterday morning. He +'d been killed by a knife-thrower, and a boss one at that—cut right +across his jugular. I went straight for Felipe Vigil, and last night I +got a clue from him, and he promised to tell me more to-day. But this +morning he was found dead under the long bridge with his tongue cut +out. That's enough for 'em; not another Greaser will dare open his +mouth now. I wired you yesterday at Plumas to come as quick as you +could." +</P> + +<P> +"Then what you gruntin' about, Tom? I left Plumas before your wire got +there, and how could I be any quicker 'n that?" +</P> + +<P> +"I wish Emerson was here. I 'd like to have his judgment about this +business. Emerson 's always got sure good judgment." +</P> + +<P> +"Send for him, then," was Nick's prompt rejoinder. +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle looked at him with surprise and disapproval. "Nick, are you +drunker than you look? You-all know he 's just got back from his +wedding trip." +</P> + +<P> +"But he 's back, all right, ain't he! Neither one of us has ever got +into a hole yet that Emerson did n't come a-runnin', and fixed for +whatever might happen. And he's never needed us that we did n't get +there as quick as we could. You-all don't reckon, Tom, that Emerson +Mead's liver 's turned white just because he 's got a wife!" +</P> + +<P> +Tom Tuttle fidgeted his big bulk and cleared his throat. Words did not +come so easily to him as deeds, but Ellhorn's way of putting it made +explanation necessary. "I don't mean it that way, Tom. Once, last +year, down in Plumas, when Emerson would n't let us shoot into that +crowd that wanted to hang him, I wondered for just a second if he was +afraid, and it made me plumb sick. But I saw right away that it was +just Emerson's judgment that there ought n't to be any shootin' right +then, and he was plumb right about it. No, Tom, I sure reckon there +ain't a drop of blood in Emerson's veins that would n't be ready for a +fight any minute, if 't was his judgment that there ought to be a +fight, even if he has got married. But we-all must remember that he 's +got a wife now, and can't cut out from his family and go rushin' round +the country like a steer on the prod every time you get drunk and raise +hell, or every time I need help. We 'll have to pull together after +this, Tom, and leave Emerson out. It would be too much like stackin' +the cards against Mrs. Emerson if we didn't." +</P> + +<P> +As Tuttle ended he saw a gleam in the other's eyes that caused him to +add with emphasis, "And I 'm not goin' to call him up here, and don't +you do it, either!" +</P> + +<P> +Nick got up, shook himself, and winked at the hole in the wall where +had been the electric button. He was a handsome man, as tall as +Tuttle, but more slenderly built, with clean-cut features, dancing +black eyes, and a black mustache that swept in an upward curve over his +tanned cheek. His friend scrutinized him anxiously as he slid +cartridges into the empty chambers of his revolver. +</P> + +<P> +"Sure you 're sober, Nick?" +</P> + +<P> +Ellhorn laughed. "How the devil can I tell? I can walk straight and +see straight and shoot straight; and if that ain't sober enough to +tackle any four-spot Greaser, I might just as well get drunk again!" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I reckon you 're sober enough to jump into this job with me now; +and if you stay sober, it's all right. But if I catch you drinkin' +another drop till we get through with this business, I 'll run you back +into this room and sit on your belly till you 're ready to holler +quits!" +</P> + +<P> +It was a dangerous solidarity of crime and mutual protection against +which the two deputy marshals started out alone. The Dysert gang had +been organized originally as a secret society to further the political +ambitions of men who were not overscrupulous as to instruments or +methods. But gradually it had drifted into a means of wreaking private +revenge and compelling money tribute. Those of its early members who +were of the law abiding sort had left it long before, and its +membership had dwindled to a handful of Mexicans of the recklessly +criminal sort. They were credited, in the general belief, with thefts, +assaults, and murders; but so closely had they held together, so potent +was their influence with men in public station, and so general was the +fear of the bloody revenges they did not hesitate to take, that not one +of them had yet been convicted of crime. +</P> + +<P> +Faustin Dysert, who had organized the society and was still its head, +combined in himself the worst tendencies of both Mexicans and +Americans, his mother having been of one race and his father of the +other, and both of the sort that reflect no credit upon their +offspring. But he owned the house in which he lived and two or three +other adobes which he rented, and was therefore lifted above the +necessity of labor and held in much regard by his fellow Mexicans. The +combination of that influence and the favor of the political boss of +his party, to whom he had been of use, had made him chief of police of +Santa Fé and had kept him in that office for several years. And he had +been careful to recruit his force from the membership of his society. +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle knew that he could not count on any open help or sympathy from +the public, for no one would dare to invite thus frankly the disfavor +of the gang. And he knew, too, that he could expect to get no more +information from leaky members of the society or their friends, since +that swift punishment had been meted out to the wagging tongue of +Felipe Vigil. He was well aware also that his chief, the United States +Marshal, had not been zealous in the pursuit of Dysert's criminals, and +that Black's friend, Congressman Dellmey Baxter, was known to have +under his protection several members of the society. Therefore, if he +bungled the job, he was likely to lose his official head; and if he +were not swift and sure in his movements against the gang, his physical +head would not be worth the lead that would undoubtedly come crashing +into it from behind, before the end of the week. +</P> + +<P> +"The thing for us to do, Tommy," advised Ellhorn, "is to take in all +the gang we can get hold of. We 'll herd 'em all into jail first, and +get the evidence afterwards. There 'll be some show to get it then, +and there ain't now. We 'll load up with warrants, and arrest every +kiote that's thought to be a member of the gang; and we 'll start in +with Faustin Dysert himself!" +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle looked perplexed. He had in his veins a strain of German blood, +which showed in his frank, sincere, blonde countenance and in his +direct and unimaginative habit of mind. But Ellhorn supplemented his +solidity and straightforwardness with an audacity of initiative and a +disregard of consequences that told of Celtic ancestry as plainly as +did the suggestion of a brogue that in moments of excitement touched +his soft Southern speech. +</P> + +<P> +"Marshal Black would be dead agin goin' at it that way," said Tuttle +doubtfully. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course he would! But he ain't here, and we 'll run this round-up +to suit ourselves; and if we don't bunch more bad steers than was ever +got together in this town before, I 'll pull my freight for hell +without takin' another drink!" +</P> + +<P> +"Mebbe you 're right," said Tuttle slowly, "and I think likely that +would be Emerson's judgment too. If he hadn't got married we 'd be all +right. Us three could go up agin the whole lot of 'em and win out in +three shakes!" +</P> + +<P> +"Then let's send for him, and see if he 'll come!" +</P> + +<P> +But Tuttle shook his head. "No," he said positively, "that would n't +be a square deal for Mrs. Emerson, and we won't do it. We 'll stack up +alone against this business, Nick. We 'll put on all the guns we 've +got and keep together. We might get Willoughby Simmons—he 's deputy +sheriff now; but he 's got no judgment, and he 's likely to get rattled +and shoot wild if things get excitin'. We 'll get the warrants and +start out right away, for we 've got to keep the thing quiet and nab +'em before they find out we 're on the warpath. You-all remember you +'re sure goin' to keep sober!" +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Nick with a laugh, "I 'll be sober enough to stack up with +any measly kiote that's pirootin' around this town!" +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle went for the warrants, and Ellhorn said he would get some +breakfast. But first he waited until his friend was out of sight and +then paid a visit to the bar-room. Next he went to the telegraph +office. The message that he sent was addressed to Emerson Mead, Las +Plumas, New Mexico, and it read: +</P> + +<P> +"Tommy and me are up against the Dysert gang alone, and I 'm drunk. +Nick." +</P> + +<P> +He came out of the telegraph office smiling joyously and humming under +his breath the air of "Bonnie Dundee." "I did n't ask him to come," he +said to himself, "and if he wants to now, that's his affair. Well, I +reckon he ain't any more likely to have daylight let through him now +than he was before he got married; and nobody's gun has made holes in +him yet!" +</P> + +<P> +It was early afternoon when the two friends started out on their +round-up of bad men. To attract as little notice as possible they took +a closed hack and drove rapidly toward the Mexican quarter. Nick's +manner showed such recklessness and high spirits that Tuttle regarded +him with anxiety and began to wonder if it would not be wiser to carry +out his threat of the morning before attempting anything else. But he +caught sight of two Mexicans coming toward them, one handsome and well +built and the other slouching and ill-favored. +</P> + +<P> +"There come two of 'em now! Liberate Herrera and Pablo Gonzalez!" he +exclaimed, with sudden concentration of interest and attention. +"Liberate is a boss knife-thrower, and I think likely he 's the one +that did the business for old man Paxton. Look out for 'im, Nick!" +</P> + +<P> +The carriage came abreast of the two men and Tuttle jumped out, with +Ellhorn close behind him. But quick as they were, Herrera, the +handsome one of the two, understood what was happening and leaped to +one side, a long knife flashing from his sleeve, before Tuttle's hand +could descend upon him. The other was slower and Ellhorn had him by +the arm before he could thrust his hand into his pocket for his +revolver. Herrera's knife slid into position against his wrist and +Tuttle's revolver clicked. The Mexican looked dauntlessly into its +black muzzle, but saw that his companion was submitting, and that both +were covered by the guns of the officers. +</P> + +<P> +"It's all right, Señor Tuttle," he said coolly. "You 've got the best +of me. I give up." +</P> + +<P> +They drove back to the adobe jail; and while Tuttle was turning his +prisoners into the custody of Willoughby Simmons, the deputy sheriff, +Ellhorn slipped out, crossed the street, and went into a saloon. The +men already there had watched the arrival of the hack and the two +prisoners at the jail, and two of them, when they saw Nick coming, +hurried into the back room, leaving the door open. +</P> + +<P> +"What's up, Nick?" the proprietor asked as he poured the whiskey +Ellhorn had ordered. +</P> + +<P> +"Tommy and me," answered Nick jauntily, pushing his glass across the +bar to be filled a second time. "We 're on top now, and I sure reckon +we 're goin' to stay there!" +</P> + +<P> +"After the Dysert gang?" +</P> + +<P> +"You bet! Hot and heavy! We'll have 'em all bunched in the jail by +night!" +</P> + +<P> +Ellhorn stood with his back toward the middle door; and the two men in +the rear room cautiously made their way into the front again, revolvers +in their hands. Nick turned and found himself facing Faustin Dysert +and Hippolito Chavez, a policeman and member of Dysert's society. His +two revolvers flashed out, the triggers clicked, and he stood waiting +for the next move of the others, for he saw at once that they did not +intend to shoot at that moment. +</P> + +<P> +"You 'll have to give me your guns, Nick," said Dysert. "You 're drunk +and disorderly, and I 'm going to arrest you." +</P> + +<P> +"Want my guns?" shouted Nick derisively. "Then come and take 'em!" +</P> + +<P> +"I 'm going to take them, and I 'll give you two minutes in which to +decide whether or not you 'll give them up peaceably." +</P> + +<P> +"You will, will you! Let me tell you, it's yourself that's goin' to be +taken, dead or alive, and not for any common 'drunk and disorderly,' +either! You-all are goin' to swing, you are! Whoo-oo-ee-ee!" +</P> + +<P> +Across the street, Tuttle had come out of the jail and was looking for +his friend. Ellhorn's peculiar yell came bellowing from the saloon, +and he knew that trouble of some sort was brewing. Dysert and Chavez +saw him leaping across the street, and rushed into the back room and +slammed the door as he entered at the front. With a glance Tuttle took +in the group of men with tense, excited faces, gathered at one side of +the room, Ellhorn, with a revolver in each hand, at the other, and the +saloon-keeper emerging from underneath the bar. +</P> + +<P> +"Nick, you 're drinkin' again! Put up your guns!" Tom exclaimed +angrily. +</P> + +<P> +"After 'em, Tommy! They went in there! Whoo-oo-ee-ee!" yelled Nick, +rushing toward the middle door. It gave before his weight and he +dashed in. Tuttle followed, not knowing what was happening, yet sure +that his friend was daring some danger. But the room was empty. +Through the back door Dysert and his companion had gained a corral, +into which opened several other houses, and in some one of these had +disappeared and found concealment. +</P> + +<P> +"Huh!" grunted Nick. "Tom, if you'd only had sense enough to stay away +a minute longer I 'd have got both of 'em myself!" +</P> + +<P> +They started forth on another raid, but the members of the Dysert gang +seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth. Neither in the +streets, the plaza, their homes, nor their usual haunts could the +officers of the law find one of those for whom they had warrants. +</P> + +<P> +"It's what I was afraid of," said Tuttle. "The hint got out too quick +for us, and now they 're all hiding." +</P> + +<P> +"They've holed up somewhere, all in a bunch, and we 've got to smoke +'em out. Whoo-oo-ee-ee!" +</P> + +<P> +The several whiskies with which Nick had succeeded in eluding his +friend's vigilance were beginning to have manifest effect, and Tuttle +decided that, whatever became of the Dysert gang, there was only one +thing to do with Nick Ellhorn, and that would have to be done at once. +He drove back to the Plaza Hotel, took Nick to his room, locked the +door, and put the key in his pocket. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Nick, you-all don't get out of here till you 're plumb +sober—sober enough to be sorry!" +</P> + +<P> +Nick protested, but Tuttle threw him down on the bed and then +deliberately sat down on his chest. Ellhorn swore valiantly and +threatened many and dire revenges. But Tom sat still, in unheeding +silence, and after a little Nick shut his mouth with a snap and gazed +sullenly at the ceiling. He labored for breath for a while, and at +last broke the silence by asking impatiently: "Say, Tom, how long you +goin' to make an easy chair of me?" +</P> + +<P> +"You know, without askin'!" +</P> + +<P> +Nick relapsed into silence again until his face grew purple and his +breath came in gasps. "Tom," he began, and there was no backbone left +in his voice, "what do you-all want me to promise?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not to drink another drop of whiskey, beer, wine, brandy, or anything +intoxicatin', till we get the Dysert gang corralled—or they get us." +</P> + +<P> +"All right, Tommy. I promise." +</P> + +<P> +Tattle got up and looked at his friend with an expression of mingled +apology and triumph on his big, red face. "I 'm sorry I had to do it. +Nick. You-all know that. But I had to, and you know that, too. We +can't do another thing now till to-morrow, and you 're sober again. I +don't see," he went on grumblingly, "as long as they were goin' to kill +old man Paxton anyway, why they did n't do it before Emerson got +married!" +</P> + +<P> +Nick had been soaking his head in the wash-bowl and he wheeled around +with the water streaming over his face. "Tom, I sure reckon Emerson +would come if you 'd send for him!" +</P> + +<P> +"Mebbe he would, Nick, but I ain't goin' to do it. For he sure had n't +ought to go and get himself killed now, just on our account. But if he +was here," Tommy went on wistfully, "we 'd wipe up the ground with that +Dysert gang too quick!" +</P> + +<P> +Nick rolled over on the bed, sleep heavy on his eyelids. "Well, I gave +Emerson the chance this mornin' to let us know whether he 's goin' to +keep on bein' one of us, or whether he 's goin' to bunch alone with +Mrs. Emerson after this!" +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle gazed in open-mouthed and wide-eyed astonishment. +"What—what—do you mean, Nick? You did n't wire him to come?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, I did n't! I told him you and me was up against the Dysert +gang—" Nick's voice trailed off into a sleepy murmur—"alone, and +I—was drunk—and likely to get—disorderly." +</P> + +<P> +"You measly, ornery—" Tuttle began. But he saw that Ellhorn was +already asleep and he would not abuse his friend unless Nick could hear +what he said. So he shut his mouth and considered the situation. He +knew well enough that in the days before Emerson's marriage any such +message would have brought Mead to their aid as fast as steam could +carry him. But now, if he did not come—well, what Nick had said was +true, and they would know that the end of the old close friendship had +come. But, for the young wife's sake, if he should come, he and Nick +must not let him do anything foolhardy and they must try to keep him +out of danger. +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle waited up for the midnight train, on which, if Mead heeded +Nick's telegram, he would be likely to arrive. In the meantime, he did +some spying out of the land and learned that Dysert and some of his +followers had hidden themselves, with arms, ammunition, and provisions, +in an empty adobe house belonging to the head of the band. The deputy +marshal knew this meant that the criminals would resist to the last, +and that any attempt to take them would be as perilous an adventure as +he and his friends had ever faced. If Emerson came and anything +happened to him—and it was very unlikely, if they carried the thing +through, that any one of them would come out of it without at least +serious injury—then he and Ellhorn would feel that they had been the +cause of the young wife's bereavement. And yet, with Mead's help, they +might succeed. And success in this enterprise would be the biggest, +the crowning achievement in all their experience as officers of the law. +</P> + +<P> +As midnight approached, Tuttle scarcely knew whether he more hoped or +dreaded that Mead would come. He had faced the muzzle of loaded guns +with less trepidation and anxiety than he felt as he stepped out on the +sidewalk when he heard the rattle of the omnibus. A tall figure, big +and broad-shouldered, swung down from the vehicle. +</P> + +<P> +"Emerson—Emerson—" Tuttle stammered, his voice shaking and dying in +his throat into something very like a sob. Then he gripped Mead's hand +and said casually, "How 's Mrs. Emerson?" +</P> + +<P> +Mead replied merely, "She's well"; but Tom caught an unwonted +intonation of tenderness in his voice and saw his face soften and glow +for an instant before he went on anxiously, "What's up?—and where 's +Nick?" +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle wavered a little the next morning in his purpose of attacking +the Dysert retreat. He took Ellhorn aside and asked his opinion about +letting the matter rest until the return of Marshal Black and Sheriff +Williamson. +</P> + +<P> +Nick was quite sober again and looked back over his misdeeds of the day +before with a jaunty smile and a penitent shake of the head. "Sure, +Tom," he said, and the Irish roll in his voice showed that his +contrition was sincere enough to move him deeply, "sure and I was a +measly, beastly, ornery kiote to go back on you like that, and you 'd +have served me right if you 'd set on me twice as long as you did!" +</P> + +<P> +But against Tuttle's suggestion of postponing the conflict he presented +a surprised and combative front. "What you-all thinkin' of, Tom? Why, +we 've got 'em holed up now, and all that's to do is to smoke 'em out!" +</P> + +<P> +"It's Emerson I 'm thinkin' of—and Mrs. Emerson. He—he wrote her a +letter this mornin', and put it in his pocket, and asked me if anything +happened to him to see that she got it. Nick, I—I don't like to think +about that! If we put this thing off, he 'll go home, and then we-all +can fight it through without him, mebbe. Nick, you was a sure kiote to +send for him yesterday." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I sure was," said Nick with sorrowful conviction. Then he added, +with an air of cheerful finality, "Well, I would n't 'a' done it if I +had n't been drunk! But you 're right, Tommy. It ain't the square +deal to Mrs. Emerson for us to take him into this business. It 'll be +a fight to a finish, for one side or the other, and it's just as likely +to be us as them." +</P> + +<P> +At that moment Mead came up, saying briskly, "Well, boys, had n't we +better be starting out?" +</P> + +<P> +Like his two friends, Emerson Mead was Texan born and bred; but a New +England strain in his blood, with its potent strength and sanity, had +given him such poise and force of character as had made him the leader +of the three through their long and intimate friendship and strenuous +life. +</P> + +<P> +"I 've just been sayin' to Nick," Tom replied, his eyes evading those +of his friend, "that mebbe we 'd better let this thing slide till Black +and Williamson get back." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Tom, this is your shindy, and whatever you say goes. But I sure +think that if you really want to get this Dysert gang, the thing to do +is to trot in and get 'em, right now. You know yourself that Black +ain't any too warm about it, and Williamson is so under Dell Baxter's +thumb that he 's more likely to trip you up, if he can, than he is to +help. You-all won't get another chance as good as this!" +</P> + +<P> +Ellhorn's martial ardor, and his buoyant belief that Mead's marriage +had in no wise lessened his immunity from bullets, obscured for the +moment his anxiety about Mrs. Mead. He slapped his thigh, exclaiming, +"Them's my sentiments, boys! Come on! Let's pull our freight!" +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle's manner still showed some reluctance, but he said no more, and +the three Texans, each of them six feet three or more in his stockings, +broad-shouldered, and straight as an arrow, swung into the street. +</P> + +<P> +They took with them Willoughby Simmons, the deputy sheriff for whose +judgment Tom had so little esteem. Tuttle sent him to guard the rear +of the house, a small, detached adobe, in which Dysert and an unknown +number of his followers had fortified themselves. Some twenty feet in +front and toward one corner of the house grew a large old apple tree, +its leaves and pink-nosed buds just beginning to make themselves +manifest, and underneath it were some piles of wood. It was the only +position that offered cover. Tuttle asked Mead to station himself +there, where he could command one end of the house, a view toward the +rear, and the whole front. Ellhorn he placed similarly at the other +front corner. His own position he took midway between the two, facing +the door and two small windows that blinked beneath the narrow <I>portal</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Mead saw that he was the only one for whom protection was possible, and +exclaimed, "Say, Tom, this ain't fair!" +</P> + +<P> +But Tuttle paid no attention to his protest, and began to call loudly: +</P> + +<P> +"Dysert! Faustin Dysert! We know you 're in there, you and your men, +and if you 'll give yourselves up you won't get hurt. But we 're goin' +to take you, dead or alive! If there 's anybody in there that don't +belong in your gang, send 'em out, and we 'll let 'em go away +peaceable!" +</P> + +<P> +There was no reply from the house. Evidently those within meant to +play a waiting game until they could get the officers of the law under +their hands, or perhaps take them unawares. Tuttle glanced at Mead and +saw that he was standing apart from the tree and the piles of wood. +Tom thought of the letter in his friend's pocket and remembered the +look that had crossed his face at the mention of his wife. Great beads +of sweat broke out on Tom's forehead. With his lips set and his eyes +on those squinting front windows he walked across to his friend and +said in a low tone: +</P> + +<P> +"I reckon, Emerson, we 'd better just stand here and guard the place +till they see they 'll starve to death if they don't give up." +</P> + +<P> +Mead turned upon him a look of supreme astonishment. "It's your fight, +Tom," he answered coolly, "and if you-all think that's the best way of +fightin' it, I 'll stand by and help as long as I 'm needed. But I did +n't come up here expectin' to take part in any cold-feet show!" +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle wiped his face vigorously and did not answer. "I think there's +only one thing to do," Mead went on, "and that is to rush 'em and make +'em show their hand!" +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle shook his head. "No, no," he exclaimed hurriedly, "that +wouldn't do at all, Emerson!" +</P> + +<P> +Mead left him and, keeping the front of the house in the tail of his +eye, hurried across the yard to Ellhorn. "Nick," he demanded, "what's +the matter with Tommy? Does he want to take these Greasers or not?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Emerson," said Nick hesitatingly, "I sure reckon the truth is +that he's afraid you 'll get hurt!" +</P> + +<P> +The ruddy tan of Mead's face deepened to purple, and a yellow light +blazed in his brown eyes. He strode back to where Tuttle had resumed +his post, his fist shot out, and Tom went staggering backward. "So +you-all think I 'm a coward, do you?" he shouted. Then, wheeling, with +a revolver in each hand, he rushed toward the front door. Nick saw +what he purposed to do, and dashed after him with a wild "Whoo-oo-ee!" +</P> + +<P> +Tuttle was left without support. For a moment he was so dazed by +Mead's blow that he stared about him bewilderedly. The men inside the +house were quick to take advantage of so unexpected a situation. The +windows flashed fire and Tom heard the thud of bullets against the +ground at his feet. One bit his cheek. With loud and angry oaths he +dropped to one knee, rifle in hand, and sent bullets and insults +hurtling together through the crashing windows. Springing to his feet +he ran a few steps forward, dropped to his knee again, and with bullets +pattering all around him emptied the magazine of his rifle. +</P> + +<P> +Mead and Ellhorn were trying to batter down the door, but it was +strongly built and had not yielded to their shoulders. Throwing down +his empty rifle, Tuttle ran into the <I>portal</I>, thrust Ellhorn to one +side as if he had been a boy, and lunged against the door with all his +ox-like weight. Mead threw himself against it at the same instant, and +it cracked, split, and flew into splinters. +</P> + +<P> +The three big Texans, each with a revolver in either hand, surged +through the opening. The Mexicans met them in mid-floor, and the room +was full of the whirr of flying bullets, the thud of bullets against +the walls, the spat of bullets upon human flesh. The officers rushed +forward, their guns blazing streams of fire, and Dysert and his men +backed toward the corner. Mead emptied both of his revolvers and, +pressing the leader closely, raised one of them to batter him over the +head. Dysert threw up his hands, exclaiming, "We give up!" and the +battle was over. +</P> + +<P> +On the floor were the bodies of four Mexicans, either dead or badly +wounded. Dysert and three of his followers were still alive, although +each had been hurt. Tuttle, besides the gash in his cheek, had a +bullet in his left arm, and Ellhorn a wound in his thigh. Mead's hat +and clothing had been pierced, but his body was untouched. +</P> + +<P> +They sent for physicians to attend to the wounded Mexicans and, having +handcuffed their prisoners, hurried them to the jail. As Simmons led +the men from the sheriff's office and the three friends were left +alone, Mead turned to Tuttle. +</P> + +<P> +"Tom," he said, "I 'm sure sorry I struck you just now. I was so mad I +hardly knew what I was doing. You 'd been acting queer, and when I +found it was because you thought I was afraid, I just boiled over. I +had no business to do it, Tom, and I 'm sorry." +</P> + +<P> +The red of Tom's face went a shade deeper, and he fidgeted uneasily. +"No, Emerson, you 're wrong," he protested. "I did n't think you was +afraid. You-all ought to know better than that. But—well—the truth +is, Emerson, I could n't help thinkin' what hard lines it would be for +Mrs. Emerson if anything—should happen to you." +</P> + +<P> +The tears came into Mead's eyes, and he turned away as Tuttle went on: +"I told Nick not to send for you, but the darned kiote went and done it +without me knowing it!" +</P> + +<P> +"No, I didn't," Nick exclaimed. "I just told him we was in a hole and +I was drunk! And, anyway, it's a good thing I did; for now we 've got +the Dyserts, and Emerson did n't get a scratch!" +</P> + +<P> +"Boys," said Mead, and his voice was thick in his throat, "you 're the +best friends any fellow ever had; but you-all don't know what a brick +Marguerite is! She 'd rather die than come between us, I know she +would! She would n't have any more use for me if she thought I 'd kept +a whole skin by going back on you! It's the truth, boys, and don't you +forget it!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +COLONEL KATE'S _PROTÉGÉE_ +</H3> + + +<P> +"Colonel Kate," as both the Select and the Unassorted of Santa Fé society +were accustomed to speak of Mrs. Harrison Winthrop Coolidge, had long ago +proved her right to do whatever she chose, by always accomplishing +whatever she attempted. She had done so many startling things, and +always with such dashing success, since Governor Coolidge had brought +her, a bride, to the old town, that people had become accustomed to her, +just as they had grown used to the climate, and expected her deeds of +daring as unthinkingly as they did cool breezes in summer, or sunshine in +winter. Besides, everybody liked her; for she had both the charm which +makes new friends and the tact which holds them loyal. +</P> + +<P> +When, finally, Colonel Kate brought an Indian girl from the pueblo of +Acoma and made it known that she intended her <I>protégée</I> to grace the +innermost circles of Santa Fé society, it is possible that some of the +Select may have shrugged their shoulders a trifle; but, if they did, they +were careful to have no witnesses. For Governor Coolidge was the +richest, the most influential, and the most prominent American in New +Mexico, and his wife could make and unmake social circles as she chose. +The Santa Fé <I>Blast</I>, which was the organ of the Governor's party, +announced the event as follows: +</P> + +<P> +"Mrs. Governor Coolidge and guests returned yesterday from a trip to +Acoma. As always, Mrs. Coolidge was the life of the party and charmed +all by her wit and beauty and vivacity.… She even persuaded old +Ambrosio, the grizzled civil chief of the pueblo, to entrust to her care +his most precious treasure, his lovely and charming daughter, Miss +Barbara Koitza. This beautiful and talented young lady, whom Mrs. +Coolidge has installed as a friend and guest in her hospitable and +interesting home, where she is soon to be introduced to Santa Fé society, +is as cultured as she is handsome. She has spent a year in the Indian +school at Albuquerque and two years at Carlyle, and is well fitted to +adorn the choicest social circles in the land. She will no doubt be +warmly welcomed by Santa Fé society and will at once take that position +in its midst to which her beauty, grace, and talents entitle her." +</P> + +<P> +If she had known of it, poor little Barbara would have been overwhelmed +by this flourish of trumpets. But Colonel Kate did not allow it to fall +under her eye. And the girl did not even know that, whatever she was +not, she certainly was interesting and picturesque on the day when she +first entered her new friend's door. +</P> + +<P> +She wore her Indian costume, and was neat and clean as any white maiden +with a heritage of bath-tubs. Spotlessly white were her buckskin +moccasins and leggings, which encased a pair of tiny feet and then wound +round and round her sturdy legs until they looked as shapeless as +telegraph posts. Her scant, red calico skirt met her leggings at the +knee; and her red mantle, of Navajo weave, fell back from her head, but +wrapped closely her waist and arms, and then dropped long ends down the +front of her dress. Her coal-black hair, heavy and shining, was combed +smoothly back from her forehead and fastened in a <I>chongo</I> behind. Her +brown face was handsomer than that of most Indian maidens, being longer +in proportion to its width than is the pueblo type, the cheek bones less +prominent, the forehead broader, and the lips fuller and more delicately +chiselled. It is possible that, far back in Barbara's ancestry, perhaps +even as far back as the times of the <I>Conquistadores</I>, there had been +some admixture of the white man's race which, after generations of +quiescence, in her had at last made its influence felt again. +</P> + +<P> +As Mrs. Coolidge led the girl into her new home she looked down at her +with approving eye and inwardly exclaimed, the conqueror's joy already +filling her heart, "She 'll be a success! A tremendous success! The +Colonel's wife can do what she pleases now!" +</P> + +<P> +For in the days of which this chronicle tells, Santa Fé was still a +military post, and the wife of the commanding officer had been all winter +a thorn in the flesh of Mrs. Coolidge. The Colonel had been recently +transferred from an Eastern post; and his wife, who had never been West +before, had supposed that of course she would at once become the social +leader of Santa Fe. Her disappointment was bitter when she found that +place already firmly held and learned that she, the wife of a colonel in +the army, and just from the East, would have to yield first place to the +wife of a mere civilian who had lived in the West for a dozen years. She +rebelled and tried to start a clique of her own, and all winter she had +made trouble among the Select by getting up affairs which clashed with +Colonel Kate's plans, and by introducing innovations of which Colonel +Kate did not approve. Mrs. Coolidge had no fears for her social +supremacy,—she had reigned too long for the thought of downfall to be +possible,—but she was tired of being crossed and annoyed, and she +purposed with one audacious blow to humble the Colonel's wife and put an +end to her pretensions. +</P> + +<P> +The plan came to her suddenly while she talked with old Ambrosio's +daughter in the street at Acoma. She saw that Barbara was discontented +and unhappy, and that she longed to return to even so much of the life of +the whites as she had found in the Indian schools. Colonel Kate pitied +her and determined to help her. She was saying to herself that the girl +was certainly intelligent and attractive, when she suddenly realized that +this Indian maid was gifted with that indefinable but most potent of +feminine attractions—personal charm. And then, like an inspiration, the +idea took possession of her mind. She turned impulsively to Barbara: +</P> + +<P> +"Will you go home with me and be my guest for all this spring and summer?" +</P> + +<P> +The joy that beamed in the girl's face told how gladly she would go. But +it faded quickly and she shook her head sadly, as she answered: +</P> + +<P> +"I can not. My father would not allow it. He will not even let me go +back to school. He says that I am an Indian, and that I must stay in +Acoma and be an Indian." +</P> + +<P> +When Mrs. Coolidge saw that look of eager desire leap into Barbara's eyes +she determined that the thing should be brought to pass and set herself +to the task of overcoming old Ambrosio's determination that his daughter +should never again leave Acoma. It was not an easy thing to do, but +Colonel Kate finally accomplished it, on condition that Barbara should +return whenever he wished her to do so. +</P> + +<P> +During the remaining days of Lent, dressmakers were busy with Barbara's +wardrobe; and Mrs. Coolidge carefully schooled her in a hundred little +particulars of manner and deportment. And meanwhile the Select of Santa +Fé waited with impatience for a first view of the Indian girl. For +Colonel Kate was too shrewd a manager to discount the sensation she +intended to produce, and so she kept Barbara at home, away from the front +doors and windows, and out of sight of curious callers. In the meantime +she diplomatically helped on the growing interest and excitement, and +lost no opportunity of arousing curiosity about her <I>protégée</I>. +</P> + +<P> +And at last, when Barbara had been three weeks in her home, and no one +outside her own household had even seen the girl's face; when the town +was full of rumors and chatter and all manner of romantic stories about +the Indian girl; when everybody was wondering what she could be like, and +why Colonel Kate had taken such a fancy to her, then Mrs. Coolidge gave +her a coming-out party which eclipsed everything in Santa Fe's social +annals. +</P> + +<P> +All the Select were there, including the Colonel's wife, who had not even +thought of trying to have a card party the same night. The doors had +been opened wide, also, for the Unassorted. All the most eligible of +these had received invitations, and not one had sent regrets. The editor +of <I>The Blast</I>, which was the mouthpiece of the Governor's party, and the +editor of <I>The Bugle</I>, the organ of the opposition, were both there; and +each of them published a glowing account of the occasion, the former +because he considered it his duty to "stand in" with whatever concerned +the Governor; and the latter because he hoped the Governor's wife would +make it possible for him to be transferred from the Unassorted to the +Select. +</P> + +<P> +<I>The Blast</I> said: "The Governor's palatial mansion was a dream of +Oriental magnificence, and the beautiful and artistic <I>placita</I>, lighted +by sparkling eyes of ladies fair and Japanese lanterns, was a vision of +fairy land." <I>The Bugle</I> declared: "No, not even in the marble +drawing-rooms of Fifth Avenue and adjoining streets, nor in the luxurious +mansions of Washington, could be gathered together a more cultured, a +more polished, a more interesting, a more <I>recherché</I> assemblage than +that which filled the Governor's palatial residence and vied with one +another in doing homage to the winsome Indian maiden." +</P> + +<P> +To call the Governor's residence "palatial" was part of the common law of +Santa Fé journalism. In actual fact, it was a one-story, flat-roofed, +adobe house, enclosing a <I>placita</I>, or little court, and having a +<I>portal</I>, or roofed sidewalk, along its front. +</P> + +<P> +When she first went to New Mexico, Mrs. Coolidge enjoyed transports of +enthusiasm over the quaintness and picturesqueness of its alien modes of +living. So she hunted all over Santa Fé for a house of the requisite +age, dilapidation, and eventful history, to transform into her own home. +And when at last she found this one, with an authenticated age of two +hundred years, and a romance, a crime, or a startling event for almost +every year in its history; with rough, irregular walls four feet thick; +with tiny, unglazed, iron-barred windows,—then time stopped, it seemed +to her, until the deed was recorded in her name. +</P> + +<P> +With much sadness of heart she made sentiment give way to civilization +and renovated the interior. Wooden floors, instead of the packed earth, +hardened and glazed by the tread of many generations, plastered and +papered ceilings and walls and ample windows gave to the inside of the +house a modern air which its mistress deeply regretted, but accepted +mournfully as a necessary evil. But she did not allow a weed or a blade +of grass to be plucked from its roof; and upon the suggestion that the +old brown adobe walls should be treated to a coat of gray plaster she +frowned as if it had been blasphemy. +</P> + +<P> +Upon the <I>placita</I>, which had been given over to weeds, tin cans, rags, +and broken dishes, she lavished loving care and made it the blooming, +fragrant heart of her home. In the centre was a locust tree of lusty +growth, plumy of foliage and brilliant of color; and underneath the tree +a little fountain shot upward a thin stream, which broke into a diamond +shower and fell plashing back into a pool whose rim was outlined by a +circle of purple-flowered iris. Around this spread a velvet turf, dotted +with dandelions and English daisies. An irregular, winding path inclosed +the tiny lawn, and all the space between the path and the narrow stone +walk that hugged the four sides of the house was rich with roses. La +France and American Beauty and Jacqueminot and many others were there in +profusion and made the placita a thing of beauty from the time the frosts +ended until they came again. A hand rail covered with climbing roses +guarded the stone walk on three sides of the court, while the fourth side +of the house was screened by a <I>portal</I> over which roses and honeysuckles +clambered to the roof. Facing the wide, roofed passage which gave +entrance from the street, stood an arch loaded with honeysuckle vines. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Coolidge's enthusiasm over New Mexican history, and her admiration +for the heroic times of the <I>Conquistadores</I>, had caused her to make the +interior of her home almost a museum of antiquities. On the floors +Navajo blankets—fifty, a hundred, a hundred and fifty years old, and +each one with its own dramatic tale—served as rugs. Silken <I>rebozos</I>, +worn by high-hearted cavaliers riding in search of "<I>la gran Quivera</I>" +draped her windows. Pueblo pottery, dug from villages that were in ruins +when the first white men saw them, filled cabinets and shelves. Saddle +skirts of embroidered leather, which had pleased the fancy of some brave +<I>capitan</I> leading a handful of men against a rebellious pueblo two +centuries ago, made a background for the huge silver spurs of cunning +workmanship with which some other daring <I>caballero</I> had urged his horse +in search of adventures and of gold. And beside them lay the stone axe +with which a courageous señora, a heroine of the Southwest, had cleft the +skull of a Navajo chief and saved her townspeople from falling into the +hands of the savage enemy. On the walls were old, old paintings of +<I>Nuestra Señora de</I> this and that, proud of neck and sad and sweet of +face, which had been brought from the City of Mexico on the backs of +burros, and adored in little adobe churches by generations of men, women, +and children, and pierced by the arrows of angry and revengeful Indians +during the pueblo rebellion, or scarred by fires of destruction, from +which they had been saved by brave and pious devotees. +</P> + +<P> +Such things as these made a picturesque setting for the Indian maid on +the night of her début. It might have been a painful ordeal for her had +she known that all these people were there mainly to satisfy their +curiosity concerning her. But Mrs. Coolidge had carefully kept from her +the knowledge that she was of especial interest and was expected to +produce a sensation. So she knew only that she was having a delightful +time and that everybody was so kind and cordial and took so much interest +in her that she did not have a minute during the whole evening in which +to think about herself. Everybody was eager to dance, or talk, or stroll +in the <I>placita</I> with her, and all who were not engaged with her were +talking enthusiastically in praise of her appearance, her manner, or her +conversation. +</P> + +<P> +Colonel Kate moved about, proud and happy in the brilliant success of her +hazardous undertaking and serene in the confidence that the Colonel's +wife would not again attempt rebellion. She was even more glad and happy +for Barbara's sake, for the two had grown very fond of each other and she +had begun to wonder if old Ambrosio could not be induced to let her adopt +the girl. Already it made her heart ache to think she might have to give +up her <I>protégée</I>. She cast a glance at Barbara, who was holding her +usual court, a circle of men about her, and thought: +</P> + +<P> +"Nonsense! Old Ambrosio is not so stupid as to refuse his daughter such +a chance as I can give her!" +</P> + +<P> +For Colonel Kate, with all her cleverness, had never measured, or even +imagined, the world-wide difference between the view-points of a pueblo +chief and an ambitious white woman. So she felt happy and secure, as she +smiled in response to one of Barbara's bright glances, and noticed that +Lieutenant Wemple was still dancing close attendance upon her young +friend. +</P> + +<P> +Barbara was gowned very simply in white, and carried a bouquet of +Jacqueminot roses. Her shining black hair was drawn back from her +forehead in loose, waving masses and filleted with bands of silver +filigree. The brown-faced girl, in her white dress with the glowing +roses at her breast, made a pleasing picture as she stood beside a +cabinet of pueblo pottery, against a Navajo <I>portière</I>. Lieutenant +Wemple, who stood nearest her, thought that, altogether, it made the most +striking and suggestive composition he had ever seen, and that he would +like to see her portrait painted just as she stood there; but that would +be impossible, for no artist could paint two girls into one figure. And +she—at one moment she was a bronze figure, listening with drooped +eyelids, closed lips, and impassive face, and the next she was vibrant +with life; her big black eyes, which would have redeemed a countenance of +less attractiveness than hers, sparkled and glowed; her face was radiant +with eager interest; and the Lieutenant felt that beneath those rich red +roses must beat a heart as glowing with warm bright life as they. +</P> + +<P> +Santa Fé might be, geographically, far in the deeps of the red and woolly +West, but the feminine portion of its social circles did not think that +any reason why they should relapse into barbarism. And as one means of +preventing such a dire catastrophe, they made the law of party calls even +as the laws of the Medes and Persians. Among themselves the men might +groan and swear and protest as much as they pleased, but if any one of +them neglected that duty the ladies forthwith hurled him from the circles +of the Select into the outer shades of the Unassorted. After the night +of Barbara's success these calls did not lag as usual, and Lieutenant +Wemple, who was wont to be the last, was the very first to present +himself. +</P> + +<P> +Then followed a series of gayeties in which Barbara was the central +figure, and Lieutenant Wemple her constant attendant. Whether it was a +dinner, or a reception, or a picnic party up the canyon, or a horseback +excursion to the turquoise mines, he spent as much time by her side as +the other people allowed. Barbara enjoyed it all with the zest of a +mortal let loose in wonderland, and thought that nowhere else in the +world could there be such delightful people as her new friends. It +seemed to her that she had at last come into her own inheritance and +found the people among whom she really belonged. But she liked best of +all the quiet afternoons at home, when she and Mrs. Coolidge sat in the +<I>placita</I>, and Lieutenant Wemple came, and they three read and talked +together. +</P> + +<P> +The young officer thought her a more interesting companion than any white +girl he had ever met. The world—his world—was all so new and +marvellous to her that it was like opening its doors to some visitor from +another planet. He took great pleasure in doing that service and in +seeing how quickly and eagerly she absorbed everything she saw and heard +and read; and he found her fresh and constant interest entirely +delightful. So it soon came about that the quiet afternoons at home grew +more and more frequent. +</P> + +<P> +One day in early June they stood together in the <I>placita</I> and agreed +that it was very beautiful. The proposition was evident enough and +likely to cap forth enthusiastic assent from any one. For the plumy +green branches of the locust tree were heavy with pendent clusters of +odorous white bloom; the iris that circled the fountain was glorious in +its purple raiment; the honeysuckle arch was a mass of red and white +blossoms trumpeting their fragrance; beside it a great spreading +rose-bush was yellow with golden treasure; the velvety, emerald turf was +dotted with white and gold; the rose-bushes were weighted with opening +buds or perfect flowers, and the warm, soft air was vivid with sunlight, +and sweet with mingled odors. +</P> + +<P> +So they could hardly have done anything but agree upon the beauty of the +little court, even if they had wanted to quarrel. But for the hundredth +time it struck him that it was very remarkable they should so often think +alike. When he made mention of this remarkable fact, she flashed up at +him one of her eager, brilliant glances. Then, meeting something more +than usual in his look, she quickly dropped her eyes again, and over her +manner there came that mystifying air of shyness and reserve, as if some +invisible attendant had wrapped about her an impenetrable veil. In their +early acquaintance he had often noticed that quick and baffling change in +her manner, and had liked it, because it seemed to tell of a refined and +sensitive nature. From their later frank and friendly intercourse it had +been absent, and now, when it appeared again and seemed to take her away +from him, his heart beat fast with the longing to tear the veil away. +</P> + +<P> +For a moment she stood with her gaze resolutely upon the ground and her +expression and figure impassive. But she felt his eyes upon her, and her +brown fingers trembled over the yellow rose in her hand. Suddenly, as if +compelled, she lifted her face and the look in his eyes called all her +heart into hers. For a second they stood so, revealing to each other +their inmost feeling, and then, covering her face with her hands, she ran +into the house. The Lieutenant picked up the yellow rose she had dropped +and went out through the street entrance, a very thoughtful look upon his +countenance. +</P> + +<P> +Wemple had not realized before what was happening to them both, although +all Santa Fé, except themselves, knew it very well. But at last he +understood that he loved her and that she knew it, and that she also knew +she had confessed in her eyes her love for him. What was he going to do +about it? That was the question he had to face and to settle; and he +went out alone and tramped over the brown hills and across <I>arroyos</I> and +through clumps of sage brush and juniper and cactus, and argued it out +with himself. +</P> + +<P> +He loved her, and she loved him. Yet—she was an Indian, and did he want +an Indian wife? But after all that had passed between them, and the +silent, mutual confession of the afternoon, could he in honor do else +than marry her? Ever since he had come West he had held the firm +conviction that an Indian can never be anything but an Indian, and that +to attempt to make anything else out of him is not only a sheer waste of +time, effort, and money, but is also an injury to the Indian himself, +because it gives him desires and ambitions that can do nothing but make +discord with his Indian nature. +</P> + +<P> +But it seemed different with her. In truth, he told himself, she seemed +more akin to the white than to the Indian race. That age-long heritage +of religious belief and practice that has made a basis of character for +the pueblo Indian did not seem to have found expression in her. But if +after years should bring it to the surface and she should prove to be +Indian at heart, would it raise a wall between them or would it drag him +down, because of his great love for her, to that same Indian level? If +that Indian nature was there now, patched over and hidden by present +surroundings, would not happiness be impossible between them? And if he +believed that unhappiness would be the sure result of their marriage +would it not be more dishonorable to marry her than to leave her at once? +But at the idea of leaving her a sharp pain pierced his heart. He thrust +at it the thought that in the long run she would probably be happier if +she were never to see him again. Then he ground his teeth together, +whirled about and started for the town. +</P> + +<P> +Presently he put his hand in his pocket and his fingers closed over +Barbara's yellow rose. He raised it to his lips and something very like +a sob trembled through his soldierly figure. And then suddenly, in a +great wave, came the remembrance of her graces of mind and heart and +body, and of how frank and simple and sincere she was, how sweet and +gentle and womanly and winning. At the same moment his own faults rose +up and upbraided him, and his heart cast away the arguments his brain had +been weaving, and cried out with all its strength, "Indian or not, she is +better than I!" All his white-man's pride and prejudice of race fell +from him as he pressed her rose to his lips and kissed it again and again. +</P> + +<P> +On the morrow it happened that Lieutenant Wemple was officer of the day +at the post and his duties kept him so closely confined in and about the +fort that he had not time to see Barbara. But in the latter part of the +afternoon it became necessary for him to see the commanding officer. The +Colonel had gone, he knew, on a business errand to the farther end of the +town, and the Lieutenant started out to find him. His way back took him +past the Coolidge residence. He was walking hurriedly down the street, +in haste to return to his duties, his blonde head erect, his cap at +right-eyed angle, his uniform buttoned tightly across his broad shoulders +and around his trim waist, his sword on hip, and his eyes straight in +front of him. But his thoughts were inside the adobe walls of the +Governor's home and he was calculating how long it would be until, +released from duty, he could hasten back to pour into a little brown ear +the words of love of which his heart was full. +</P> + +<P> +Across the street, in the shadow of a <I>portal</I>, an old Indian, +gray-haired and wrinkled, was curiously surveying the Coolidge house. +</P> + +<P> +The heavy, double doors of the <I>placita</I> entrance were open, and as +Lieutenant Wemple strode past he heard a sound from within, a half +suppressed exclamation in a voice that trembled with feeling. It sent +through him a sudden shock, stopped him in mid-step, and swiftly turned +him to the <I>placita</I> door. Barbara, in a white muslin gown, stood under +the honeysuckle arch, her hands full of yellow roses which she had just +been plucking from the bush that glowed behind her. She was looking at +him with soft and glowing eyes, her eager face radiant with love, her +lips still parted by the exclamation which sight of him had forced +through them. +</P> + +<P> +The old Indian under the <I>portal</I> considered him impassively for a moment +and then sauntered across the street. +</P> + +<P> +An instant only the Lieutenant stood looking at her, spellbound by the +beauty and sweetness of the picture, and then he sprang to her side and +gathered her in his arms, forgetful alike of the open doors behind them +and of his duties at the fort. It was only for a moment, and then he +took her hand and led her to Mrs. Coolidge. +</P> + +<P> +But during that moment the Indian with the gray hair and the wrinkled +face stood in front of the <I>placita</I> doors and looked at them with +evident interest. When they went indoors he shut his thin lips close +together, crossed to the other side of the street, and leaned against the +column of a <I>portal</I> while he watched the doors and windows of the +Governor's residence. +</P> + +<P> +It was only a few minutes until Lieutenant Wemple appeared again and +walked rapidly away. For army discipline must be remembered and +maintained, even in times of peace and days of love. The old man gazed +at him until he disappeared around a corner, and then crossed the street +and knocked at the Coolidge door. Colonel Kate herself opened it and at +once held out her hands in welcome, crying, "<I>Entra</I>! <I>Entra</I>!" She +seized his hands and drew him in, pouring forth a voluble welcome in +Spanish. He did not give much heed to her words, but coldly asked, in +the same tongue: +</P> + +<P> +"Where is my daughter?" +</P> + +<P> +Barbara, in the next room, heard his voice, and her first unthinking +thrill of pleasure was quickly followed by a sinking of her heart which +chilled and saddened her happy face. Intuitively she knew what would +happen. +</P> + +<P> +"She is here," Mrs. Coolidge replied. "She will be so glad! Barbara! +Come quickly! Here is some one very anxious to see you!" +</P> + +<P> +The girl came slowly and stood before her father with downcast eyes. His +piercing glance ran over her dress, and then he grunted in severe +disapproval. +</P> + +<P> +"Go, put on your own clothing. Then stand before your father." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, dear," chimed in Colonel Kate soothingly, "you must seem very +strange to him in that dress,—scarcely like his daughter. Put on your +native costume and come back to us quickly." +</P> + +<P> +Barbara went to her room and Mrs. Coolidge began to tell her visitor, +with her most charming enthusiasm and with all the delighted expletives +which her knowledge of Spanish made possible, of Barbara's success, of +her love affair, and of how very desirable the match would be. The old +man listened quietly to the end, looked at her steadily for a moment in +silence, and then spoke: +</P> + +<P> +"No!" +</P> + +<P> +Colonel Kate's eyes opened wide in amazement at the word. "What! Don +Ambrosio! Surely—" +</P> + +<P> +"He wishes to marry her?" the old man broke in. +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed he does! He told me so scarcely ten minutes ago. He is very +much in love with her and she with him!" +</P> + +<P> +"No!" repeated the Indian emphatically. "It cannot be!" +</P> + +<P> +"Surely, señor, you do not understand! You could not find a more +desirable husband for Barbara! Why, he is a lieutenant in the army, a +first lieutenant, too, and his position will take her into any society +she wishes to enter. He has money enough to keep her well, and he loves +her devotedly!" +</P> + +<P> +"No! He forgets she is an Indian! He has seen her in all these clothes +of the white women in which you have tricked her out, and he thinks she +is the same as a white woman. She is not. She was born an Indian, and +an Indian she must be until she dies. Never again shall she leave Acoma." +</P> + +<P> +"Señor! How can you be so blind to your daughter's interests? You will +break her heart! Surely you cannot be so cruel!" +</P> + +<P> +But Mrs. Coolidge's protests were broken off by Barbara's return. The +girl stood before her father with her eyes on the floor and her face cold +and impassive. She was dressed again in the garments she had worn when +she first entered the house, three months before, and she seemed a far +different creature from the happy and radiant girl to whom her lover had +but just said good-bye. Ambrosio looked her over approvingly. +</P> + +<P> +"Now you are my daughter. Come." +</P> + +<P> +With the pueblo children centuries of training have caused unhesitating +obedience to parents to become an instinct. So Barbara did not question, +but at once followed her father toward the door. Mrs. Coolidge was +weeping. Barbara threw both arms around her neck and kissed her again +and again. The girl's face was expressionless and there were no tears in +her voice, but her wide, black eyes, paling now to brown, told the agony +that was in her heart. +</P> + +<P> +"Tell him," she whispered in English, "that I must go back. My father +bids me, and I must go. My father will never again let me leave Acoma. +Tell him I shall never see him again, but I shall love him always." +</P> + +<P> +"My poor child!" sobbed Mrs. Coolidge. "We must find some way to bring +you back!" +</P> + +<P> +"It is useless to try. I know my father, and I know it will be +impossible for me ever again to leave the pueblo. I must be an Indian +all the rest of my life. But I shall love him always. Tell him so." +</P> + +<P> +"Come!" called Ambrosio from the <I>portal</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Half an hour later the train was carrying them back to Acoma. Colonel +Kate at once sent a note to Barbara's lover, telling him what had +happened. But the messenger, being a small boy, met other small boys on +the way, and by the time the young officer read the news the Indian girl +was well on her way toward home. +</P> + +<P> +Lieutenant Wemple applied for leave of absence, and as soon as possible +he followed old Ambrosio. At Laguna, where he left the railroad, he +hired a horse and inquired the way to Acoma. It was the middle of the +night, but he refused to wait for daylight, and started at once across +the plain, galloping as though life and death depended on his mission. +In the early morning he reached the great rock-island of Acoma, towering +four hundred feet above the plain, and climbed the steep ascent to the +village on its summit. A file of maidens, and among them his lover's eye +quickly sought out Barbara, were coming from the pool far beyond, +carrying water jars upon their heads, graceful as a procession of +Caryatides. Wemple found his way to Ambrosio's door, where the old chief +was sitting in the early sunlight. As he stopped his horse Barbara came +up the street, her <I>tinaja</I> poised on her head. One swift and frightened +flash of her black eyes was all the recognition she gave him as she +hurried into the house. +</P> + +<P> +Briefly the Lieutenant told the old man that he loved Barbara and wished +to marry her. Inside the house the girl stood out of sight, listening +anxiously for her father's reply, although she well knew what it would be. +</P> + +<P> +"The señor forgets that my daughter is an Indian and that he is a white +man." +</P> + +<P> +"I do not care whether she is Indian or white. I love her and I want her +to be my wife." +</P> + +<P> +"You mean that you do not care what she is now. But after she is your +wife you want her to be a white woman in her heart. You want to take her +away from me, her father, and away from her mother, and her clan, and all +our people, and make her forget us and forget that she is an Indian. No!" +</P> + +<P> +"No, señor!" urged the Lieutenant, "I do not wish her to forget you. She +shall come back to visit you whenever she wishes." +</P> + +<P> +A crafty look came into Ambrosio's eyes. "There is one way," he went on +quietly, not heeding Wemple's reply, "in which you may make her your +wife. But there is only one." +</P> + +<P> +The officer leaned eagerly forward in his saddle and the girl inside the +door clasped her hands and listened breathlessly. The old Indian went +on, slowly and deliberately, as if to give his listener time to weigh his +words, while his keen eyes searched the white man's face. +</P> + +<P> +"You think my daughter loves you well enough to forsake and forget her +people if I would let her. Do you love her well enough to leave your +people and become one of us? Do you love her well enough to be an Indian +all the rest of your life, wear your hair in side-locks, enter the clan +of the eagle, or the panther, become Koshare or Cuirana, dance at the +feasts, forget your people, and never again be other than an Indian? If +you do, speak, and she shall be your wife." +</P> + +<P> +Ambrosio shut his lips tightly and waited for the young man's answer. +And the young man stared back, his ruddy cheek paling under its sunburn, +and spoke not. A whirling panorama of visions was filling his brain as +he realized what the old chief's words meant. He saw himself living the +life of these people; renouncing everything that meant "the world" and +"life" to him—everything except Barbara; driving burros loaded with wood +to town and tramping about its streets with a basket of pottery at his +back; saw himself with painted face and nude, smeared body dancing the +clownish antics of the Koshare; planting prayer sticks; sprinkling the +sacred meal; taking part and pretending belief in all the heathen rites +of the pueblo secret religion—and then Barbara sprang out of the house, +crying to her father in the Indian tongue, "Wait! Wait!" +</P> + +<P> +Both men turned toward her inquiringly. She stood before them, +hesitating, excited, her eyes on the ground, as if anxious but yet +unwilling to speak. +</P> + +<P> +"Father," she began in Spanish, "it is useless for you and the señor to +speak longer about this. For since I have returned to my home I do not +feel as I did before." She stopped an instant and then went on +hurriedly, pouring out her words with now and then little, gasping stops +for breath. "Now I do not wish to marry him. I wish to marry one of my +own people. He is not an Indian and never can become one. I know now +that I can never be anything but an Indian and so it is better for me to +marry one of my own people. I do not wish to marry the señor, even if he +should become one of us." +</P> + +<P> +Wemple looked at her blankly, as if hardly comprehending her words, and +then cried out, "Barbara! You cannot mean this!" +</P> + +<P> +"You see, señor," said the old man, "there is nothing more to say." +</P> + +<P> +"Is there nothing more to say, Barbara?" Wemple appealed to her in a +broken voice. +</P> + +<P> +She did not look at him, but shook her head and went back into the house. +</P> + +<P> +Lieutenant Wemple turned his horse and with head hanging on his breast +rode slowly, very slowly, back toward the long declivity leading to the +plain below. If he had not ridden so slowly this tale might have had a +different ending. +</P> + +<P> +Ambrosio went into the house and began telling his wife what had +happened. Barbara took an empty <I>tinaja</I> and said she would go for more +water. When she stepped outside she could still see the forlorn figure +of her lover riding slowly down the trail. Her heart yearned after him +as she bitterly thought: +</P> + +<P> +"He will believe it! I made him believe it! And I can never tell him +that it is not true!" +</P> + +<P> +Then something set her heart on fire and put into it the thought of +rebellion. She looked around her at the village and thought of the life +it meant for her, as long as she should live; of the heartbreak she would +have to conceal from sneering eyes, of the obscene dances in which she +would soon be forced to take part, of the persecutions she would have to +suffer because she could no longer think as her people thought; and +hatred of it all filled her to the teeth. Rebellion burned high in her +soul and with clenched fingers she said to herself, "I hate the Indians! +In my heart I am a white woman!" She cast one more longing, loving +glance at the disappearing figure and resolution was born in her heart: +"And I will be a white woman, or die!" +</P> + +<P> +She looked hastily about. No one seemed to be watching her. She dropped +the <I>tinaja</I> beside the house and walked swiftly—she feared to run lest +she might attract attention—to the edge of the precipice. There she +looked down over the flight of rude steps, hacked centuries ago in the +stone and worn smooth by many scores of generations of moccasined feet, +which was once the only approach to the fortress-pueblo. It was three +hundred feet down that precipitous wall to where the steps joined the +trail, but from babyhood she had gone up and down, and she knew them +every one. From one to another she fearlessly sprang, and over several +at a time she dropped herself, catching here by her hands and there by +her toes and finally landed, with a last long leap, on the trail. One +glance told her that her lover had almost reached the road at the foot of +the cliff and that if he should then quicken his pace she could scarcely +hope to catch him. But love and determination made steel springs of her +muscles, and she bent herself to the task. For if she could not overtake +him there was no hope anywhere. +</P> + +<P> +Lieutenant Wemple, with his head still hanging on his breast and his +horse creeping along at its own pace, turned from the declivity into the +road which would take him back to Laguna, to the railroad, and to his own +life. There the horse decided to take a rest; and Wemple, aroused to +realization of his surroundings by the sudden stop, jerked himself +together again, straightened up, sent a keen glance across the plain and +over the road in front of him, and struck home his spurs for the gallop +to the railroad station. As the horse leaped forward, he thought he +heard some one calling. Turning in his saddle he saw Barbara running +toward him, her breast heaving, her arms outstretched. She almost fell +against the horse's side, panting for breath. +</P> + +<P> +"It was not true," she gasped, "what I said up there! I wanted to save +you. Take me with you if you still love me! For I love you and I +hate—I hate all that—" turning her face for an instant toward the +heights above them—"and if you do not want me I must die, for I will not +go back." +</P> + +<P> +For an instant their eyes read each other's souls, and then she hastily +put up her hand to stop him from leaping from his horse. +</P> + +<P> +"No, no! Do not get off! They will be sure to follow us and we must +lose no time. Take me up behind you and gallop for Laguna. If we can +catch the next train we'll be all right!" +</P> + +<P> +She seized his hand and sprang to her seat behind his saddle. He turned +and kissed her. +</P> + +<P> +"Put spurs to your horse," she said. "They will be sure to follow us +soon." +</P> + +<P> +There was need of haste, for scarcely had the horse pricked up his ears +and sprung into a long gallop when they heard loud shouts from the top of +the mesa. +</P> + +<P> +"Hurry, hurry!" exclaimed Barbara. "They have found me out and they will +follow us!" +</P> + +<P> +Scarcely had she spoken when the sound of a rifle report came from the +top of the cliff, and Wemple's left arm dropped helpless beside him. +</P> + +<P> +"They dare not shoot to kill," she said, "but they think they can +frighten you, and they may cripple the horse. My darling, you will not +let them have me again?" The terror in her voice told how intense was +her fear of capture. +</P> + +<P> +"Sweetheart, they shall not have you again unless they kill me first!" +</P> + +<P> +A dozen Indians were galloping recklessly down the steep trail. "Promise +me," Barbara, pleaded, "if it comes to that, if you must die, you will +kill me first! For it would be hell—it would be worse than hell—to go +back there now!" +</P> + +<P> +Wemple did not answer. "Promise me that you will," she begged. "You do +not know what you would save me from; but believe me, and promise me that +you will not send me back to it!" +</P> + +<P> +"I promise!" he answered as another shot whistled in front of them and +clipped the top of the horse's ear. Wemple dug his spurs into its +sweating side and the beast sprang forward at a faster gallop. The +Indians, shouting loudly, were urging their ponies across the plain at +breakneck speed. Lieutenant Wemple glanced back again and a frown +wrinkled his forehead, as he said, "If our horse does not break down we +may keep ahead of them until we reach Laguna." +</P> + +<A NAME="img-086"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-086.jpg" ALT="Wemple dug his spurs into its sweating side and the beast sprang forward at a faster gallop." BORDER="2" WIDTH="406" HEIGHT="664"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Wemple dug his spurs into its sweating side <BR> +and the beast sprang forward at a faster gallop.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +Barbara patted the horse and whispered soft words of encouragement and +then under her breath she sent up a fervent petition to the Virgin Mary +to protect them. Looking back, she recognized their pursuers, and told +Wemple that one of them was her brother, and another was a young man whom +her parents wished her to marry. This one had a faster horse than the +others and perceptibly gained upon the fugitives. He left the road where +a turn in it seemed to offer an advantage and, galloping across the +plain, was presently parallel with them and not more than two hundred +yards away. He raised his gun and Wemple, with quick perception noting +that his aim was toward their horse's neck, gave the bridle a jerk that +brought the animal to its hind feet as the bullet whistled barely in +front of them. It would have been quickly followed by another, but the +Indian's pony stumbled, went down on its knees, and horse and rider +rolled over together. +</P> + +<P> +The other Indians came trooping on in a cloud of dust, yelling and +shouting, and now and then firing a shot, apparently aimed at the good +horse that so steadily kept his pace. +</P> + +<P> +"They only want me," said Barbara. "If they can overtake us there are +enough of them to overpower you. They will not try to do much harm to +you, for they would not dare. But they will take me and carry me back +with them—if you let them." +</P> + +<P> +"I will not let them," he replied between set teeth. +</P> + +<P> +At last Wemple saw that their pursuers were slowly but surely gaining on +them. Barbara saw it too, and she redoubled her prayers to the Virgin, +and both she and her lover with words and caresses strove to keep up the +courage in their horse's heart. The good steed was of the sort whose +spirit does not falter until strength is gone, and he seemed to +understand that these people on his back were under some mighty need. +For with unwavering pace he kept up his long, swift gallop, +notwithstanding his double burden and the distance he had travelled +before the race began. +</P> + +<P> +So they kept on, mile after mile, with their pursuers gaining, little by +little, upon them, and when at last they neared Laguna the Indians were +within a hundred yards. A banner of smoke across the plain told them +that the east-bound train was approaching. +</P> + +<P> +"I believe we can make it!" exclaimed Wemple, as they heard the engine's +announcing scream. Apparently their pursuers guessed what the fugitives +would try to do, for as they saw the train they shouted and yelled louder +than before and urged their ponies to a still higher speed. They gained +rapidly for a little while, for the Lieutenant's horse was beginning to +flag, and Wemple, leaning to one side, gave the bridle into Barbara's +hands and, with left arm dangling useless, reached for his revolver. He +began to fear that they might yet head him off and surround him. They +outnumbered him hopelessly, but he would try to fight his way through +them. If worst came to worst,—he would save two shots out of the +six,—Barbara should not fall into their hands. +</P> + +<P> +The train drew into the station and the Indians were not more than a +hundred feet behind him. The horse's faltering gait and heaving sides +showed that he had reached almost his limit of strength. Some dogs ran +out from a house, barking furiously. But being in his rear they only +made Wemple's horse quicken his pace. They darted at the heads of the +ponies, which shied and pranced about, and so lost to their riders some +valuable seconds. +</P> + +<P> +The train was already moving as Wemple dashed up to its hindmost car, his +horse staggering and their pursuers almost upon them. +</P> + +<P> +"Jump for the car-steps!" he shouted to Barbara. She had not leaped and +clambered up and down the stair in the Acoma cliff all her life for +nothing, and her strength and agility stood her in good stead in this +moment of supreme necessity. She leaped from the horse's back, landed +upon the upper step, and whirled about to assist her lover. +</P> + +<P> +The train was moving faster, the Indians, with shouts and yells and +curses, were grasping at his bridle, and Wemple felt his horse giving way +beneath him. With a last encouraging call to the poor beast he urged it +to one more leap, and as it brought him again even with the end of the +car he threw his leg over its neck and jumped. The horse staggered and +fell as he left the saddle and caused him to lose his balance. He went +down upon the car-steps, his wounded left arm beside him and his right +doubled beneath his body. In another instant he would have rolled back +to the ground beneath the hoofs of the Indian ponies, but Barbara seized +him by the shoulders, and held him until he recovered his footing. +</P> + +<P> +The Indians, seeing his predicament, whipped up their horses and galloped +beside the platform, reviling and jeering at him. Wemple scrambled to +his feet and put his arm about Barbara, as though fearful they might yet +try to take her from him. She leaned over the rail, laughed in their +faces, and called out, in the Indian tongue: +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye! Good-bye, forever! Now I shall be a white woman!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE KID OF APACHE TEJU +</H3> + + +<P CLASS="poem"> + Baby, my babe,<BR> +What waits you yonder,<BR> + Out in the world?<BR> + Dear little feet,<BR> +There must they wander,<BR> + Out in the world?<BR> + Soft little hands,<BR> +What shall they do there,<BR> + Out in the world?<BR> + Baby, my babe,<BR> +What fate must you dare,<BR> + Out in the world?<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +All around Apache Teju for miles and miles lies the gray, +cactus-dotted, heat-devoured plain, weird and fascinating, with its +placid, tree-fringed lakes, that are not; its barren, jagged, +turquoise-tinted mountain-peaks, born here and there of the horizon and +the desert; its whirling, dancing columns of sand, which mount to +mid-sky; its lying distances and deceiving levels; its silence and its +fierce, white, unclouded sunshine. +</P> + +<P> +And when you draw rein under the cottonwoods at Apache Teju, uncurl the +wrinkles of your eyelids in the welcome shade, and cool your eyes in +the vivid green of the alfalfa field, it suddenly comes to you that +never before did you understand what blessedness there is in a bit of +shadow and a patch of green things growing. +</P> + +<P> +From the spring at the top of the slope behind the house a line of +noble old cottonwoods files along the <I>acequia</I> halfway down the hill, +and there, where the ditch divides, forks into a spreading double row, +which incloses the house and stables and comes together again in a +little grove beyond the road, where the two ditches empty into a pond. +The house lies there in this circlet of trees, a low, whitewashed, +flat-roofed adobe, rambling along in apparent aimlessness from cosey +rooms through sheds and stables, until the whole connecting structure +incloses a large corral. +</P> + +<P> +In front of the house is a tiny square of blue-grass, bordered by beds +of geraniums and larkspurs and hollyhocks, inclosed by a low adobe +wall, and shaded by a young cottonwood growing in the centre. Beyond, +on the slope of the hill below the ditch, where its waters can be +spread over all the surface, is the rich, velvety emerald of the +alfalfa field. And the fame of that little square of grass and of that +little field of alfalfa fills all the land from Deming to Silver City, +and from Separ to the Mimbres. +</P> + +<P> +And that is Apache Teju, headquarters for the northern half of a ranch +that spreads over seven thousand square miles of the arid hills and +plains of southern New Mexico, where for hours and hours you may travel +toward a horizon swimming in heat, across the gray, hot, quivering +levels, broken only by clumps of gay-flowered cactus and the blanching +bones and sun-dried hides of cattle, dead of starvation and thirst. +</P> + +<P> +The superintendent's wife and I sat in the tiny grass plat enjoying the +balmy breath that in the late afternoon steals over and cools this +strange, hot land. Texas Bill had just galloped home from the nearest +railroad station with a big package of Eastern mail; and the combined +attractions of letters, late magazines, and a box of New York candy so +engrossed us that we did not see the Kid until the gate clicked and he +stood before us, asking, +</P> + +<P> +"Is this the double A, quart circ., bar H outfit?" +</P> + +<P> +"The what?" I gasped, looking at the queer little figure in +astonishment. He was perhaps a dozen years old, though the slender, +childish figure and the experienced face belied each other and made +guessing difficult. He wore a man's sombrero, old and dirty, which +came down to his ears and flopped a wide, unstiffened brim around his +face. With tardy recollection of his manners,—learned who knows +where,—he doffed his head-gear after he had spoken, and stood with +serious face, but unable to repress a smile that twinkled in his great +blue child's eyes at my astonishment. A big rent across one shoulder +of his shirt showed a strip of sunburned flesh beneath and sent one +sleeve dangling over his hand. His baggy trousers—no, that is not the +word, they were "pants"—were held in place by a halter strap buckled +tightly about his waist, and his feet were concealed in shoes so much +too large for him that his toes were not visible in the mouths gaping +at their front ends. And on one foot clanked and jingled the pride and +glory of his attire—a huge spur, three inches long, silver-plated and +highly polished, and so heavy that that foot dragged as he walked. +</P> + +<P> +He repeated his question, and the superintendent's wife leaned forward, +with a laughing aside to me: +</P> + +<P> +"You tenderfoot! Haven't you learned our brand yet?" And to the boy: +"Yes, this is Apache Teju. Do you want to see any one?" +</P> + +<P> +"Boss home yet from Deming?" +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Williams? I expect him this evening." +</P> + +<P> +The boy threw himself down full length upon the grass and pressed his +face against the cool, green blades. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," he exclaimed, "it's pretty fine here, ain't it? That green +down there is just out of sight. I heard there was blue-grass and +alfalfa here, but who 'd have thought it would look so nice?" +</P> + +<P> +"Do you want to see Mr. Williams?" +</P> + +<P> +"I guess it ain't necessary," and he sat up again, pressing a handful +of grass upon each glowing cheek. +</P> + +<P> +I handed him the candy box and he helped himself daintily with the +tongs, saying, "Thank you, ma'am," with a sidelong glance which let me +know that his heart was won to my service from that moment. He put a +piece in his mouth, and his face beamed with pleasure. +</P> + +<P> +"This just strikes my gait! 'T ain't much like Deming candy, is it? I +saw the boss last night in Deming," he added, turning to Mrs. Williams. +"You're his wife, ain't you? I thought so, soon as I saw you. He was +kidding me about coming out here to be a cowboy, and I told him all +right, if he wasn't running a blaze, I 'd go him on that. I was to +have rode out with him in his buggy, but I was up pretty late last +night with the boys, doing the town, and when I got up this morning he +was gone. I was n't going to have him think I 'd backed out of the +bargain, so I says to the conductor, 'I got a job out at +Apache—cowboy—gimme a ride to Whitewater.' And he says, 'All right, +jump on. You 're welcome to a ride on my train whenever you want it.' +So I walked over from Whitewater, and I 'm ready to go to work to-night +if the boss says so. He won't find me no tenderfoot, you hear me." +</P> + +<P> +The naive bravado of the child's speech was irresistible. It won my +heart as completely as I had won his, and I straightway emptied my +candy box into his hands. "Oh!" he breathed, looking at the heap of +dainties with infantile delight. And then he fell upon them with +avidity and did not speak another word until the last one had +disappeared down his throat. +</P> + +<P> +So that was how the Kid came to live at Apache Teju. He said his name +was Guy Silvestre Raymond. But whether a mother's lips had really +bestowed that name upon him, or he had appropriated it to himself out +of some blood-and-thunder romance, whose hero he had decided to +imitate, name and all, is one of the things that nobody but the Kid +will ever know. But it did n't matter much anyway, for he had always +been called Kid, and that name followed him to the ranch, much to his +disgust. For he had decided, as he told me one day, that the ladies of +the household should call him Guy, and that among the men his name +should be "Broncho Bob." +</P> + +<P> +He was a waif of the railroad. All his life had been spent along its +line, blacking boots, selling nuts, candy, papers, on the trains or +around the depots of the frontier cities and towns. And he had taken +care of himself ever since he could remember. He had reached Deming a +few days before in a worse but less picturesque state of dilapidation +than that in which he presented himself at Apache Teju. After deciding +that he would leave the railroad and become a cowboy, he had scraped +together, in Heaven knows what devious ways and by what lucky chances, +the apparel of state in which he set forth on his new life. +</P> + +<P> +The next morning there was trouble in the corral. Kid had been +directed to mount an old and gentle pony whose meek and humble +appearance did not at all agree with his ideas of the sort of steed +Broncho Bob should bestride. There was in the corral a black horse +called Dynamite, a mettlesome young thing whose one specialty was +bucking. And of this it never failed to give a continuous performance +from the time a rider mounted its back until he was dislodged. Kid was +determined to ride Dynamite. Texas Bill and Red Jack were trying to +persuade him out of his notion by telling him how dangerous the horse +was, and how he once landed Mr. Williams, the best rider on the whole +ranch, on top of the house. +</P> + +<P> +"Suppose he did," blustered the Kid. "He won't land me on top of the +house, nor on top of the ground, neither. I tell you, I ain't afraid +to fork any horse that ever bucked! I can ride anything that wears +hair! You hear me shout? Anything that wears hair!" +</P> + +<P> +"See here, youngster," said Texas Bill, in his longest and most +indifferent drawl, "I 've been ridin' horses more years than you 've +been born, an' I 've tamed more pitchin' horses than you ever saw any +other kind, an' I ain't a little bit afraid of a pitchin' horse. I 'm +a whole, big, blazin' lot afraid!" +</P> + +<P> +"What if you are?" retorted Kid. "I don't have to be a coward 'cause +you 're one!" +</P> + +<P> +Texas Bill's eye glared, and his hand jerked toward his hip pocket. +Then he grunted and walked over to where I was feeding the two Angora +goats out of my hands. +</P> + +<P> +"If he was a man—" he began in an angry voice, and then broke off. +"But I 'm not fightin' babies. I thought I 'd keep him from breakin' +his durn fool neck, but he can go it now as fast as he wants to." +</P> + +<P> +The superintendent came out and told Kid he would have to obey orders +or go back to Deming at once. So he sullenly mounted the meek and +humble pony and cantered off. +</P> + +<P> +About mid-forenoon, when there was no one at home but little Madge, the +ten-year-old daughter of the house, the cook, and myself, Kid galloped +back alone. Madge came dancing from the corral to where I sat in the +front yard, her eyes blazing and her hands quivering with excitement. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" she exclaimed, "He's going to ride Dynamite! He 's run off from +them and come back to ride Dynamite!" +</P> + +<P> +"He must not do it! I must not let him!" And I started for the +corral. Madge grasped my skirt with both hands. +</P> + +<P> +"Dynamite won't hurt him! I know he won't!" +</P> + +<P> +"What do you know about it?" +</P> + +<P> +"I know he won't because—don't you tell mamma—I was on him myself one +day, and he never bucked a bit!" +</P> + +<P> +"You! How did you dare?" +</P> + +<P> +"I wanted to see if I could, and there was nobody in the corral, and I +climbed on his back, and he was just lovely!" +</P> + +<P> +And just then, with Kid astride him, Dynamite pranced and curveted down +the road. With a beaming face Kid waved his hat at us and galloped +off. Dynamite making not even the sign of a desire to buck. After +that the boy could not be persuaded to ride any other horse. And as +long as Kid bestrode him, or Madge, with Kid's connivance and help, +surreptitiously mounted him, Dynamite's behavior was perfect. But he +worked woe upon any grown person that made the attempt. +</P> + +<P> +The black horse's life was not an easy one under Kid's mastership. The +boy never rode at a less pace than a gallop, and even in that dry, hot +air Dynamite was always reeking with sweat when they came home. +</P> + +<P> +Just how the Kid put in his time out on the plains was a mystery. The +cowboys with whom and for whose assistance he was sent out +good-naturedly swore that he was "not worth a whoop in h—l." If they +needed him, he was nowhere in sight, and if they particularly did not +want him he was sure to come charging over the plain, straight upon the +cattle they had bunched, and scatter the frightened creatures to the +four winds. But mostly they said he managed to get lost; which was +only their kindly way of putting the fact that he slipped away from +them and pursued his own amusements at a sufficient distance not to be +disturbed by their need of him. +</P> + +<P> +What he did with himself all day long Mrs. Williams and I discovered +one day when driving to Whitewater. Out on the plain we saw the Kid +yelling like a wild man, with Dynamite at his highest speed, chasing a +jack-rabbit. That evening I heard him giving Madge a thrilling account +of how he had chased a gray wolf, which, after running many miles, had +turned on him and viciously sprung at his throat, and how he had made +Dynamite jump on the beast and trample its life out. And I recognized +in the tale merely Kid's version for Madge's ears of his chase of the +jackrabbit. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-106"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-106.jpg" ALT="Out on the plain we saw the Kid yelling like a wild man, with Dynamite at his highest speed, chasing a jackrabbit." BORDER="2" WIDTH="406" HEIGHT="664"> +<H4> +[Illustration: Out on the plain we saw the Kid yelling like a wild man,<BR> +with Dynamite at his highest speed, chasing a jackrabbit.] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +For by that time he had become, in her eyes, the exemplar of all that +is inspiringly bold and daring, and he felt it necessary to keep up his +reputation. For her he was a knight of prowess who could do anything +he wished and against whom nothing could prevail. So he told her +wonderful tales of what he had seen and done and been through, and of +his daily adventures, and brought to her the occasional results of his +single-handed combats with birds and beasts. He offered to dig up a +tarantula's nest for her and to catch and tame for her pleasure a +side-winder rattlesnake, or, if she preferred, a golden oriole or a +mocking-bird. It did n't make any difference to him whether she chose +a rattlesnake or an oriole; whatever she wanted him to do, he was ready +to attempt. And Madge looked and listened and worshipped; and Kid, +basking in the warmth of her adoration, swaggered about in ever +increasing pride and importance. +</P> + +<P> +One day, just after he had returned from a two days' trip out on the +range, I heard him telling her a blood-curdling tale of an adventure +with a mysterious and villainous looking Mexican, who, he said, had +shot off the end of one of his fingers. Then, the Kid declared, he had +made Dynamite rear and strike the Mexican to the ground with his +forefeet and then trample him until he was so dead that he 'd never +shoot anybody else's finger off. +</P> + +<P> +Madge was filled with horror and admiration and pity, and begged to be +allowed to see and bind up the mutilated finger. But he refused with +superior indifference, clinched his bleeding finger in his fist and +said it was n't anything and did n't hurt, anyway. Madge's mother +called her away, and straightway there appeared at my door a boy with +pale face, quivering lips, and tear-filled eyes, holding up a bloody +hand. I bound up the wound, which was a clean cut chipping off the end +of one finger, and he buried his face in my lap and cried. Soothing +and cuddling him, for somehow I felt that was what the child needed, I +asked: +</P> + +<P> +"How did you hurt yourself, Kid?" +</P> + +<P> +"I was making a peg to hang my saddle on, and I chopped my finger with +the hatchet." +</P> + +<P> +I said nothing, but soothed and cuddled him the more, and he sobbed at +my knee in sheer enjoyment of the luxury of being babied. After that I +think he took occasion to hurt himself upon every possible opportunity +in order that he might come to my room to be taken care of and petted +and comforted. He left all his swagger and bluster and bravado +outside, and I babied him to his heart's content, feeling sure that it +was the first time in all his dozen years that this child's right had +come to him. But he did not allow these private seasons of relaxation, +which he trusted me not to betray, to interfere with his double +character of knight of prowess with Madge, and of Broncho Bob with the +men. +</P> + +<P> +Excitement did not lack at the ranch-house whenever Kid was at home. +If he was sent to help with the milking, one of the cows was sure to +kick over a full milk-pail, knock him over with her hoof, or break +loose from her restraining ropes, charge around the corral like a wild +beast, and crash through one of the house windows or plunge in at an +open door. If he was told to house the geese and chickens for the +night, such a commotion ensued as brought the whole household to see if +coyotes had broken into the chicken yard. At sight of him the pet +Angora goats fled on their swiftest legs, with a running leap mounted +one of the corral sheds, and then sped to what they had learned was the +only place of safety, the roof of the house. And when he was not +stirring up the animals, he was playing jokes on the cowboys. Holy +John, a middle-aged, thick-witted fellow, who never knew what had +happened to him until the rest were roaring with laughter, was the +special butt of his tricks. +</P> + +<P> +One evening the boys were sitting around the kitchen door talking +quietly, for Kid was off with Madge, helping her to bury a dead kitten. +Holy John sat in a slouching attitude on the doorsteps, his new +sombrero, with a stiff, curled brim, tipped far back on his head. Kid +came in through the corral and stood in the kitchen for a few minutes. +Then he seized the molasses jug and, tiptoeing very softly behind Holy +John, filled the brim of his brand-new sombrero with the sticky liquid. +It flowed out over his back and down into his trousers, and Holy John +lifted a wondering and bewildered face to see his companions breaking +into uproarious mirth. Then his long-enduring patience was smothered +in wrath, and he laid violent hands upon Kid and spanked him before +Madge's eyes. +</P> + +<P> +This was too much for a knight of prowess tamely to endure, and the boy +blustered around in his most vigorous impersonation of the character of +Broncho Bob. +</P> + +<P> +"This ranch ain't big enough to hold Holy John and me too. Him or me, +one or the other, has sure got to ask for his time, and it won't be me +either, you hear me shout. I 'll get him sure buffaloed, and if he +don't pull his freight before he 's a day older, there 'll be the +biggest killing here that Apache Teju ever heard of." +</P> + +<P> +It was very quiet the next day at the ranch. Mr. and Mrs. Williams and +Madge had driven to Silver City, the cowboys were all on the range, and +I kept in my room with some work. After a time I heard a noise at the +end of the house, just outside my room, and I went to see what it was. +Kid was there with a pick and shovel, toilsomely digging a hole in the +hard adobe soil. +</P> + +<P> +"What are you doing, Kid?" +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing much. Just digging a hole." +</P> + +<P> +"Isn't that where the old Apache chief is buried?" +</P> + +<P> +He looked up with interest. "Is this the place? Do you know right +where it is?" +</P> + +<P> +"They told me it is there where you are digging. Those rocks that you +can barely see, outline his grave. Are you going to dig him up?" +</P> + +<P> +"Me? What would I want to dig him up for? I ain't lost no Injun! I +'m just digging a hole—for Madge. She wants to plant a tree. What +did they bury him here for? Did they kill him here on the ranch?" +</P> + +<P> +"This was a fort once, before there was any ranch here, and there was a +war with the Apaches, and they were getting beaten, and so they sent +this old chief down to the fort to make terms for them. The commander +received him and put him in a tent and set a guard over him. In the +night the guard fell asleep, and when he wakened he was frightened lest +the Indian might have escaped. So he punched into the tent with his +bayonet to see if he was still there, and hit the chief in the foot. +That made him angry and he came out and killed the guard. The noise +roused the soldiers, and they killed the chief, and they buried him +here, inside the stockade, so that the Indians would n't suspect that +he was dead until they could get reinforcements." +</P> + +<P> +"The Injun killed the guard, did he? Good enough for him! I wish it +had been Holy John!" +</P> + +<P> +He fell to work again with more vigor than ever, but presently he +stopped and growled: +</P> + +<P> +"I 'd like to run a blaze on that ornery galoot that he 'd remember all +the rest of his life!" +</P> + +<P> +After a while I chanced to see Kid carrying a bundle done up in a gunny +sack down to the <I>acequia</I> and hide it among the currant bushes. I +noticed that he had carefully filled up the hole he had been digging, +and I asked, +</P> + +<P> +"Aren't you going to plant the tree?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," he replied carelessly, "it would n't grow there. The soil's too +hard." +</P> + +<P> +The cowboys spread their beds every night under the cottonwoods beside +the lower acequia, and that night we heard them in earnest discussion +long after they had gone to bed. Mr. Williams was with them for a +short time and came back, saying that they were talking about ghosts, +and that Kid had declared emphatically that the old Apache chief walked +o' nights and that he had both seen and heard him. +</P> + +<P> +"He gave a vivid description," Mr. Williams went on, "of waking up one +night and seeing the Indian's skeleton rise up out of the ground and +pounce on a soldier who stood near and kill him outright. He will have +Holy John so terrified that the poor fellow will want his time at once. +For John believes everything that is impossible, and he will see ghosts +all night long and be afraid of his own shadow in the daytime." +</P> + +<P> +That night, just as morning broke, the whole household was awakened by +a loud, piercing yell, followed by another and another, and all rushed +from their beds in time to see Holy John leap over the fence and dart +down the road, still shrieking as if fiends were after him. And beside +his deserted bed under the cottonwoods lay some grisly thing, shining +in the gray light with streaks and patches of white. Kid looked after +the flying figure and said, in a tone of extremest satisfaction, +</P> + +<P> +"He's sure buffaloed!" +</P> + +<P> +Holy John had awakened in the dim, early dawn and found the skeleton of +the Apache chief cuddling against him. +</P> + +<P> +That morning, as I sat in the yard reading, the voices of Kid and Madge +came to me from around the corner of the house, and I heard a snatch of +their conversation. +</P> + +<P> +"Madge, I 'm going to pull my freight. I won't work on the same ranch +with such a coward as that Holy John." +</P> + +<P> +"Truly, Guy, are you going away?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I am. I ain't going to stop to ask for my time. I 'm going +to-day, before the boss comes home." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, then, what am I going to do? You 're not going off to leave me?" +</P> + +<P> +Silence for the space of ten seconds. +</P> + +<P> +"Jiminy! Tell you what, you come too!" +</P> + +<P> +"I can't! Mamma wouldn't let me!" +</P> + +<P> +"Don't ask her. Come right along with me! We 'll elope! That's more +fun than anything! Girls that is anything always elopes!" +</P> + +<P> +Then they wandered off to the alfalfa field, and soon I saw them +throwing stones at the prairie dogs with which it was infested. So I +concluded that what I had heard was merely some of the Kid's +braggadocio, and, smiling at the sentimental turn he had taken, I went +on with my book and thought no more of it. +</P> + +<P> +But when lunch time came neither Madge nor Kid appeared for the meal. +Much calling failed to bring a response. Then I remembered and gave +account of the conversation I had heard. It was found that Dynamite +was gone from the corral. Evidently the little scapegrace had meant +what he said and had carried Madge off. Mrs. Williams ordered the cart +and at once we started after the fugitives. +</P> + +<P> +"He has most probably gone toward Deming," she said. "I will send Red +Jack to Whitewater to stop them if they are there, but I think we had +better drive toward Deming as fast as possible." +</P> + +<P> +About ten miles out we caught sight of the runaways. They were mounted +on Dynamite, Madge holding fast behind. Kid was urging the horse +furiously back and forth among a flock of carrion crows, and practising +with his lasso upon them as they rose and flapped about in short and +heavy flight. They seemed to be having great sport, for Kid was +shouting and yelling at the birds, and Madge screaming with laughter at +their clumsy efforts to escape. So absorbed were they in their play +that they did not see us until we were almost beside them. At first +Kid made as if he would start Dynamite off on the gallop, but Mrs. +Williams called to him sternly, and he turned and trotted back to us, +smiling and looking amazingly innocent. +</P> + +<P> +Madge sat still and stared at us with big, frightened eyes, until Mrs. +Williams had twice spoken to her, and then she slipped quickly down, to +be folded in her mother's arms and sob upon her bosom all the way home. +I persuaded the Kid to sit between us in the cart and drive us back, +tying Dynamite behind. +</P> + +<P> +"He was awful mad at first," the boy confidingly said, "to have to +carry double. But I made him sure hump himself right along." +</P> + +<P> +At home we found the superintendent just returned. He gave the Kid a +paternal lecture, which probably did him as much good as if it had been +in Chinese, and then, in cattle-ranch parlance, gave him his time—paid +him to date and discharged him. +</P> + +<P> +And a few minutes later we saw the last of the Kid, as the forlorn +little figure, with the wide, flopping sombrero, and the big, dragging +spur, walked out of the gate and down the road toward Whitewater, and +was soon swallowed in the shimmering heat of the plain. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A BLAZE ON PARD HUFF +</H3> + + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"And I 'm free to say that the grand results<BR> + of my explorations show<BR> +That somehow paint gets redder the farther<BR> + out West I go!"<BR> + --EUGENE FIELD.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +One summer night I was on a train that was speeding eastward across +southern New Mexico. It was one of the white nights of that region, +when the full moon, shining like sun-lighted snow and hanging so low in +the sky that it seems to be dropping earthward, fills the clear, dry +air with a silvery radiance and floods the barren plain with a +transfiguring whiteness, in which the gray sands glimmer as if with +some unearthly light of their own. +</P> + +<P> +The day had been long, wearisome, and unspeakably hot and dusty; and +with the coming of this beautiful night and its cool breezes most of +the passengers betook themselves to the car steps and platforms, where +they lingered until we reached the little town of Separ, late in the +evening. As the train stopped, we saw that apparently the entire +population of the village was crowded inside the station house. One +after another, men came cautiously out upon the platform, carrying guns +in their hands and casting long, anxious looks across the plain. Their +set faces and ready revolvers and rifles showed that it was no ordinary +matter which had sent the whole town to find protection in the railroad +depot. +</P> + +<P> +They told us that a man had come running into town a little while +before, and, falling headlong, exhausted, at the feet of the first +person he met, had cried out that the Apaches were coming. Hastily +revived and cared for, he explained that the Indians had attacked the +cattle camp, ten or twelve miles south of Separ, where he and some +other cowboys had been making a round-up, and killed all but himself. +He had managed to creep out undiscovered and had run at the top of his +speed all the way to Separ to bring the warning. He said that the +Apaches, in a large band, numbering at least a hundred, had surprised +the camp, killing the men as they lay in their blankets and committing +horrible atrocities upon the dead bodies, and had then fallen upon the +horses and cattle, killing and maiming the poor beasts in mere lust of +cruelty. He was sure they were following him—he had heard their yells +several times during his desperate race, and each time he had redoubled +his speed. His shoes were gone, his stockings hung in shreds from his +ankles, and his feet were a mass of raw and bleeding flesh, pierced by +hundreds of cactus thorns. He had hurried away on an Eastern-bound +freight train to Deming, the next station, to rouse the citizens and +help to raise a militia company, whose coming was expected in a few +hours. And telegrams had been sent to Fort Bayard giving news of the +outbreak and asking for a troop of cavalry. +</P> + +<P> +Every soul in Separ—men, women, and children—with all the arms and +ammunition in the town, had huddled into the station house, where they +hoped they would be able to make a successful resistance, and, as one +man said, "make as many good Injuns as the Lord would let them." For +in those days the hearts of the bravest in the Southwest knew terror, +and with good reason, when the Apache went on the war path. +</P> + +<P> +The train sped on into the radiant white night, but the car steps and +platforms were deserted. The passengers all sought their berths as +soon as possible, there to lie below the level of the windows and pile +all the pillows they could get between themselves and the side of the +car. When we reached Deming we found the place in an uproar. Every +bell in town, from the gong of the railroad restaurant to the church +bell, was ringing its loudest and wildest. Men in varied degrees of +undress were running up and down the streets calling loudly upon all +citizens to come out at once. The people were assembling at the depot, +where two or three of the cooler-headed had taken the place of leaders +and had begun to organize the excited mass into an armed and officered +company and get it ready to go quickly to the assistance of beleaguered +little Separ. +</P> + +<P> +Then our train sped on again through the wondrous night, and I knew no +more about the Indian war at Separ until I sat on the kitchen doorstep +at Apache Teju, one evening some years later, and beguiled Texas Bill +into telling me yarns of his long and checkered experience as a cowboy. +</P> + +<P> +The cool, soft breath of evening filled the air, the alfalfa field +glowed its most vivid emerald in the yellow rays of the setting sun, +and in the same rich light the gray, barren hillside beyond shone like +beaten gold. And Texas Bill, just in from a week's trip on the range, +soothed and inspired by the civilizing influences of the ranch-house, a +shave, clean clothes, and his supper, unbent from his usual bashful +dignity and talked. +</P> + +<P> +Texas Bill was tall and big and loose-jointed, and he spoke always in a +long, soft, indifferent drawl. He held two articles of belief which no +man might dispute without getting sight of the knife in his bootleg or +the revolver on his hip. One was that Texas was the biggest and best +State in the Union; and the other, that the cow business was no longer +fit for a gentleman to follow. He lounged on a bench beside the door +and told me tales of the range and the round-up, of herds of cattle +stampeded by the smell of water, of long rides in blinding sand storms, +of the taking in of the tenderfoot, of centipedes and side-winders, of +Indian fights and narrow escapes. +</P> + +<P> +"Were you ever in one of these Indian attacks yourself?" I asked, for +his Indian yarns had been about other men. +</P> + +<P> +Texas Bill solemnly considered the heel of his boot a moment, and then +just as solemnly replied: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I was killed by the Apaches oncet." +</P> + +<P> +He turned a serious face off toward Cooke's Peak, which towered, a +mighty, sculptured mass of purest sapphire blue, against a turquoise +sky; and I, seeing that his countenance bore just such an expression of +inscrutable solemnity as it might have done had he been acting as chief +mourner at his own funeral, answered just as soberly: +</P> + +<P> +"That must have been very interesting! I wish you would tell me about +it." +</P> + +<P> +His gaze returned to his feet, his face relaxed into a smile, a chuckle +began somewhere in his throat, wandered down his long frame and lost +itself in his boots, which were high-heeled and two sizes too small for +him. Then he spoke again: +</P> + +<P> +"That was the time we run a blaze on Pard Huff." +</P> + +<P> +Then he relapsed into silence, contemplation of his boots, and several +successive and long-drawn chuckles. But at last he began his story. +</P> + +<P> +"You see, Pard Huff, he was a tenderfoot, and there was n't nothin' he +was n't afraid of a-tall. You could n't convince him that coyotes +ain't dangerous; and he thought it was sure death if a tarantula looked +at him; and you could make him jump out of his boots any time by just +buzzin' your tongue behind his ear. I reckon he 'd have sure died of +fright if he had ever seen a live rattlesnake spittin' its tongue at +him. +</P> + +<P> +"And Injuns! Well, he watched for Apaches all day long a durn sight +more 'n he did for cattle, and he could n't sleep nights for bein' +afraid they 'd catch him. He did n't seem to think of anything but +Apaches, and he had n't been with us very long till the boys did n't +give him a chanst to think of anything else a-tall. +</P> + +<P> +"We was makin' a round-up down below Separ then, and there was ten of +us and the chuck wagon when we made camp at night. Well, one night, +Pard Huff, he was scareder than ever, and the boys struck his gait +right off and kep' him a-runnin'. I did n't know they was goin' to +blaze him quite so bad or I 'd have done my best to stop the thing. +Well, and they would n't, either, if he had n't been the meanest sort +of a coward that ever laid awake nights. He asked each of us separate, +and then all of us in a bunch at supper, if there was any danger of +Apaches down there, and we-all told him there was, lots of it. One of +the boys said he 'd seen signs over toward Hatchet Mountain that very +day that sure meant Apaches, and another said he 'd heard that a little +ranch about forty mile away had lately been cleaned out by them and +everybody killed. Then we-all talked about it and agreed that they +might come on us any minute, that most likely they 'd attack us that +very night and that we ought to be ready for them. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, sir, that Pard Huff, he never said another word. He just set +there with his eyes getting bigger and his face whiter every minute. +We kep' it up and told stories about the way them devils do—everything +we 'd ever heard of—how they hold you and pull out your tongue, or cut +off your ears, or run a stake through you and pin you to the ground, or +smash your face to a jelly with a rock, or burn you alive, till Pard +Huff did n't know which end he was a-standin' on a-tall. +</P> + +<P> +"We got out our blankets and turned in, but just kep' a-talkin' about +the Apaches till that Pard Huff, he was shakin' as if he had a fit. +One of the boys said he 'd bet if the Apaches did come, Pard Huff would +get his ears cut off the first rattle, because they was so big the +Injuns could n't see nothin' else a-tall in camp till they got them out +of the way. And then <I>bang! bang! bang!</I> went some six-shooters, the +boys yelled 'Injuns!'—'Apaches!' as loud as they could, and the feller +on the other side of Pard Huff (Pard was layin' next to me) yelled out. +'Boys, I 'm killed!' says he, and he rolled over on his face and kicked +and yelled and groaned. Then <I>bang! bang! bang!</I> went the six-shooters +again; and then you ought to have seen that Pard Huff! Well, sir, he +was sure buffaloed! He jumped out of his blankets and let out one +yell. The chuck wagon was right behind us, and he give one jump and +went clean over it and lit out across country like an antelope. +You-all just ought to 've seen that tenderfoot pull his freight! +</P> + +<P> +"The boys come up a-laughin' and watched him run. They was a-bettin' +he would n't stop till he got to Apache Teju, but I said it was n't +right to buffalo him that bad. So we-all yelled and called him to come +back, but he only run the faster. The durn fool tenderfoot thought it +was the Apaches chasin' him! We-all thought he 'd soon find out there +was nothin' wrong a-tall and come back, and so we went to bed again. +But he did n't. +</P> + +<P> +"The next day I had to come to Apache Teju and I found Pard Huff's +bloody tracks most all the way to Separ. He 'd run right over stones +and cactus and prairie dog holes and everything else in his way. And +them fool people at Separ was all huddled up in the depot, and a +company of men with Winchesters and six-shooters was there from Deming, +and everybody was watchin' the country all 'round with spyglasses, for +Injuns! Well, sir, that durn fool tenderfoot, that Pard Huff, had told +them a fool yarn about the Apaches surprisin' our camp and killin' +everybody but him, and they was sure buffaloed!" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," I said, "I know they were." +</P> + +<P> +"You! How did you know anything about it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I was there that night. I passed through on the train, and Separ +and Deming were the worst scared towns I ever saw." +</P> + +<P> +Texas Bill chuckled, pleased at this verification of his story, and +went on: +</P> + +<P> +"Then you know what I 'm tellin' you is sure true! I thought mebbe +you-all mightn't believe it, a-tall, for it sure don't look reasonable +that folks could get so buffaloed over a durn fool tenderfoot's yarn. +They looked at me with mighty big eyes when I rode into Separ. +</P> + +<P> +"'Why,' says they, 'how did you-all get out alive? We sure thought you +was dead!' +</P> + +<P> +"'Well,' says I, 'as far as I know, I 'm sure alive; and I don't know +as I 've been into anything to get out of a-tall.' +</P> + +<P> +"'Why,' says they, 'Pard Huff—' +</P> + +<P> +"'Oh,' says I, 'damn Pard Huff! He 's a tenderfoot and afraid of his +shadder! He dreamed about Apaches and jumped up with a yell and lit +out for God's sake. We tried to call him back, and he thought it was +the Apaches after him. I reckon he 's scared you-all half to death +with his yarn. You 're as bad as tenderfeet yourselves!' +</P> + +<P> +"But they 'd got the notion scared into them so bad they could n't +believe anything else, and they sure thought there must be Injuns +around somewheres; and so I left 'em and rode on for Apache Teju. +Pretty soon I met a troop of cavalry from Fort Bayard on the trot for +Separ. The captain rode up to me and says, 'Have you been near the +scene of the Indian depredations?' +</P> + +<P> +"'No, sir,' says I, 'I hain't seen no Injun depredations, nor Injuns +neither, this summer.' +</P> + +<P> +"'Humph!' says he, 'that's queer!' +</P> + +<P> +"'Yes, sir,' says I, 'I think likely. I <I>heard</I> there was some trouble +with 'em last night down below Separ, but if there 's <I>been</I> any Injun +depredations I hain't seen 'em a-tall.' And then I rode on, for I had +n't time to be bothered with no more of his questions, and, too, I +reckoned likely him and his soldiers needed some exercise. +</P> + +<P> +"And they got it, too. They just kep' on the trot for the Mexican +line, and kep' a-goin' for three months. They 'd started out for +Injuns, and Injuns they was bound to have. They jest wound around +through all that country south of Separ, and over into old Mexico, and +back again, and up into the mountains and across the plains, and did +n't even see an Apache the whole three months. And they did n't find +out it was all nothin' but a blaze on Pard Huff till after they 'd come +back. I reckon about that time they concluded there ain't no bigger +fool on earth than a tenderfoot, a-tall. And there ain't, neither. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I tell you, that Pard Huff was sure mad when he found out we-all +had been running a blaze on him! I don't know as I blame him much, for +that ten-mile run of his to Separ in his sock feet over cactus and +stones was n't much of a joke, a-tall. But he was an all-fireder fool +tenderfoot than we s'posed, or we would n't have done it." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +HOW COLONEL KATE WON HER SPURS +</H3> + + +<P> +Mrs. Harrison Winthrop Coolidge had long been the recognized leader of +Santa Fé society. Her husband, who had twice been Governor of New +Mexico (this was long before the Territory had put on the garment of +Statehood), was the best known and most esteemed man in the Southwest. +He was rich, energetic, capable, and popular, and he came of the family +of the Massachusetts Coolidges; while his wife, who was just as capable +and as popular as he, sprang from the Adams family of the same State. +But, notwithstanding all this, to the Unassorted of Santa Fé society +she was always "Colonel Kate"; and the Select themselves, in moments of +sprightly intimacy, would sometimes refer to her or even address her by +that sobriquet. +</P> + +<P> +The occasional new resident and the frequent health-seeker were sure to +hear of Colonel Kate before they had spent more than a day or two in +the ancient city; and if they had come from the strait-laced East they +were likely to be much scandalized when they learned the identity of +the lady spoken of thus disrespectfully, and would at once want to know +how and why such things could be. Then they would be told that the +shocking appellation was only a good-natured and admiring recognition +of Mrs. Coolidge's general efficiency. For it was the universal +opinion in Santa Fé that Colonel Kate would always accomplish whatever +she started out to do, and that nobody ever could guess what she would +start out to do next. +</P> + +<P> +All this was quite true, but it was also true that the Governor's wife +had won her military title by the especial daring and efficiency which +she had once displayed on a particular occasion. The facts in the case +are known only to some three or four people who have always kept them +very quiet. It happened, however, when I asked for information about +Mrs. Coolidge's nickname, that the man with whom I was talking was the +very one who had first bestowed it upon her, and he told me the secret +truth about it. Mrs. Coolidge had no stancher friend than he, nor any +who regarded her with greater respect and admiration, but he rarely +spoke of her or addressed her by any other name than "Colonel Kate." +</P> + +<P> +It all happened a good many years ago, when Harrison Winthrop Coolidge, +then a comparatively young man and newly married, had just come out +from Massachusetts to be Governor of New Mexico. His wife was a young +woman of tall and shapely figure, handsome face, and striking presence, +and possessed of such vivacity, vigor, health, and strength as few +women enjoy. Her superabundant vitality found many emergencies upon +which to expend itself, but the man who told me this story declared +that she never found one that was too big for her. She probably never +found a bigger or more important one than that which she faced on the +night when she won her spurs. Governor and Mrs. Coolidge reached New +Mexico in the days of the first coming of the railroad, when the sleepy +old Territory woke to a brief season of active and hilarious life. And +the Governor, fresh from New England reverence for law and legal forms +and accepted methods, was inexpressibly shocked by the low opinion in +which such things were held in his new bailiwick. Especially was he +horrified by the frequent and brief proceedings which left men who had +been too free with their guns or with other people's property hanging +from trees, projecting beams, and other convenient places. The usual +rough justice of the affair did not, in his eyes, mitigate the +offensiveness of its irregularity. +</P> + +<P> +The Santa Fé <I>Bugle</I> at once interviewed him about his plans and +intentions, and Governor Coolidge talked very strongly on the subject +of lynch law. He said that it was entirely wrong, unworthy even of +barbarians, and was not to be endorsed or palliated in either principle +or practice. He deplored the frequency of its operations in New +Mexico, and emphatically declared his intention of stamping it out. +</P> + +<P> +And he took that opportunity to announce that all persons connected +with lynching affairs would be treated as murderers or accessories to +murder. +</P> + +<P> +The editor of <I>The Bugle</I>, which was the organ of the opposition, +published every word the Governor said, and then gleefully waited for +something to happen. He did not know what it would be, but he was +perfectly sure there would be something, and that it would be +interesting. +</P> + +<P> +On the night after the interview was published Mrs. Coolidge awoke, +possessed by an uneasy feeling that something unusual was taking place. +They were living then in the ancient adobe "Governor's palace," with +its four-foot walls and its eventful history ante-dating the landing at +Plymouth Rock, and for a half-waking instant she wondered if some +unshriven victim of century-gone enmity and revenge still walked those +old halls or sought its mortal habiliments among the rotting bones in +the <I>placita</I>. She listened and heard whispering voices and cautious +movements in the <I>portal</I> that fronted the entire length of the +building. Then she arose, wrapped a long, dark cloak about her, and +peeped out of the window. Directly in front of their bedroom, in the +<I>portal</I>, were three or four men who bore among them some long and +heavy burden. She drew her dark hair across her face, that there might +be no white gleam to attract their attention, and crouched beside the +window to watch. +</P> + +<P> +One of the men, who was apparently a leader, mounted the shoulders of +two others and seemed to be feeling for something in the wall above the +window. The dim rays of an old moon, which showed that the time must +be near morning, did not afford as much light as he needed, and he +fumbled for some time before he found the hook in the wall for which he +was looking. Over it he passed the end of a rope and then jumped to +the ground. They pulled together on the rope, and the long, dark +burden, which had been left lying on the ground, was drawn upward until +it hung in front of the window beside which Mrs. Coolidge was watching, +and she saw that it was a human body. Then they fastened the rope to +one of the iron bars across the window and stood for a few moments +looking at the swaying body and chuckling together. The one who seemed +to be the leader rolled a cigarette and lighted it, and by the glare of +the match she recognized him. He was a man of prominence in Santa Fé +and the leader of the opposing party, not only locally but for the +whole Territory as well. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Coolidge's first impulse was to awaken her husband, but a swift +intuition warned her that that would not be wise. So she controlled +her horror and indignation, and, as she stared at the poor, lifeless +thing swaying outside, she did some very rapid thinking. She +understood that there had been a lynching and that the corpse had been +brought there and hung in front of her husband's bedroom window, where +his first waking glance would fall upon it, as a sign of how public +opinion regarded his ideas and intentions on the subject of lynch law. +She saw that it was intended as a warning and a contemptuous defiance, +and her spirit rose high in righteous wrath. She knew well that this +event presaged for the Governor trouble and humiliation, and probably, +if a conflict were precipitated at once, an early defeat, and she +quickly decided that he must not see the body or know what had +happened. But what could she do with it? +</P> + +<P> +Then an idea occurred to her and she smiled and said to herself that it +was impossible. But it seemed such a good idea, and it pleased her so +much, that she kept on thinking about it. Presently she assured +herself that her husband was still sleeping quietly; then she put on +some clothes, and, laughing softly, went out on the <I>portal</I>. +</P> + +<P> +The man who had been the leader in the affair that night, and whom Mrs. +Coolidge had recognized, was awakened early the next morning by the +sound of voices in front of his house. It was barely dawn, but already +a little group of Mexicans were staring at his door and talking with +much excitement. Wondering what it could mean he hastily dressed +himself and went out. As he opened the front door he ran into the body +of the man, swinging above his own threshold, which he had left a few +hours before hanging at the Governor's window. +</P> + +<P> +"My jaw dropped and I shut the door mighty quick, when I saw that," he +told me, with a reminiscent, amused chuckle at himself. "I knew in a +second that the Governor was onto us, that he must have seen us in +front of his window, and that it was up to me to do some lively pullin' +of freight. As a matter of fact, I had n't had anything to do with the +lynching. That had been done by some cowboys who were in town the day +before, and the fellow they 'd done for was an ornery cuss of a +half-breed Mexican, who was a whole lot better off dead than alive, +anyway. He tried to play some low-down game on 'em at poker, and they +just strung him up and rode off. Some of our fellows heard about it, +and three or four of us decided it would be a good thing to let +Coolidge know what our sentiments were. +</P> + +<P> +"We were in dead earnest, and we meant to get his political scalp and +drive him out of the Territory with his tail between his hind legs, +before he knew what had happened to him. I won't say," and the man +grinned and his eyes twinkled, "I was n't expecting to be appointed +Governor myself afterwards. Anyway, I did n't care to be roped into a +trial for murder just then. It would have interfered with my plans. +And if the Governor had seen us apparently lynching a man right under +his eyes, he could cinch us if he wanted to. +</P> + +<P> +"I called the Mexicans up to the door, told them I didn't know how the +body got there (I didn't, either), but it must have been put there by +some of my enemies. Then I gave them money to take charge of it, say +the dead man was a friend of theirs, and do the proper thing. So the +poor cuss was in luck by the affair after all, for he got a mass said +over him. Then I sent word to my friends who 'd been with me, and we +all just quietly skipped, on the minute. At sun-up that morning there +was n't one of us in town. I had urgent business in Texas for the next +week. +</P> + +<P> +"You see, we 'd all of us thought our new Governor was just a +highfalutin' tenderfoot, and it would n't be any job at all to buffalo +him. But this move of his gave us a suspicion that maybe we 'd sized +him up wrong. It was just the kind of quiet warning that we 'd be +likely to give if we had cards up our sleeve that the other fellow did +n't know about. It looked as if he really could and would strike back +good and plenty if we pushed him too hard. So we sent word to our +crowd all over the Territory to keep quiet a while. And let me tell +you, life in New Mexico was not nearly so exciting for the next few +weeks as some of us had planned it should be. +</P> + +<P> +"Still, I was n't quite satisfied about it. Somehow, the Governor did +n't seem to pan out to be just the kind of man who would give that kind +of a jolt to his enemies. He was too Eastern. I was still chawin' it +over in my mind, when one day I met Mrs. Coolidge, two or three weeks +after it happened and the first time I 'd seen her since. She was +lively and cordial, as she always was, and is; but as I shook hands +with her and looked her in the eyes she suddenly dropped her eyelids, +and a queer expression crossed her face. She had hold of herself again +in a second and was looking at me and smiling and talking. But that +second was enough. It flashed into my mind that she was the one who 'd +done it. I reckon I would n't have dared to bone her about it if I 'd +waited two minutes. But the impulse took me, and I just asked her +bluntly right then and there if it was she who had transferred that +Greaser from her husband's window to my door. +</P> + +<P> +"She threw up her head and looked me square in the eyes—you know that +straight, frank gaze she has—frowned a little and said, 'Yes, I did +it. I thought your doorway was the rightful place for that corpse to +be found in.' +</P> + +<P> +"Well, the joke of it and the pluck of her just struck me right where I +lived, and I fairly roared. 'Put it there, Mrs. Coolidge,' I said, and +stuck out my hand, as soon as I could speak. 'You 're a regular +captain! No, you 're bigger than that—you 're a colonel! Shake, and +let's be friends!' +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I just thought it would be a shame to drive a woman with as much +pluck and <I>sabe</I> as that back East to live. So I passed the word down +the line in our party that we 'd give the Governor a show—let him have +fair play anyhow, and, if he could make good, all right, the pot should +be his. I was so tickled by Mrs. Coolidge's trick and the way she won +out on it that I never called her anything but 'Colonel' after that, +and, somehow, the title stuck. Anyway, she deserves it." +</P> + +<P> +For a long time after this affair, so I learned from Mrs. Coolidge when +I asked her about the story her friend had told me, the Governor +thought it was that interview and the stern spirit he displayed in it +that had made the change in the opposition's attitude toward him and +had seemed to affect the feeling of the whole Territory. For his +official path became unexpectedly easy. There were few attempts to +balk him in his administration of affairs and there was a general +manifestation of tolerance, and even of willingness to see how his +ideas would work out. +</P> + +<P> +But the time came when, understanding better the people with whom he +had to deal, he knew that that interview ought to have had just the +opposite result. One day he said to his wife how surprising it was +that it had not landed him in the hottest of hot water, and how puzzled +he was to account for what seemed to have been its effect. Then she +confessed to him what had happened on that crucial night, how she had +taken the body away and hung it in front of the other house, and what +she partly knew and partly guessed about the results of the affair. At +once he realized that her instant and audacious retaliation was what +had made possible his success and his growing popularity. +Nevertheless, he was shocked at first, for New England was still but a +little way behind him. But amusement soon overcame every other +feeling, and he laughed heartily in admiration of her daring, just as +his opponent had done. After that, he seemed to take particular pride +in her sobriquet, and himself often called her "Colonel Kate." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +HOLLYHOCKS +</H3> + + +<P> +Green and peaceful, the long, low undulations of the prairie sea of +southern Kansas spread away to the horizon in lines as graceful and +pleasing as those of a reclining Venus. Here and there against a +hillside the emerald waves broke in a bright foam of many-colored +flowers. In all that vast extent over which I could look, there was +visible no living creature save the tiny furred and feathered things +whose home it was. The soft prairie wind blew caressingly against my +cheek and seemed to whisper in my ear: "Why do men cling to the +boisterous, cruel, lying sea as the emblem of freedom? Is not here +beauty that allures with freedom's own charms? Is not here freedom +herself, serene, smiling, constant, and blessed with a blessedness the +sea knows not?" +</P> + +<P> +The prairie wind blew the freedom it sang of into my heart, and it +dwelt there with joy and exultation as I drove on and on over the waves +of that smiling emerald sea. I salved my eyes, wearied and scorched by +brick walls and city pavements, with those long, swinging reaches of +green, and their silent benediction filled and soothed my very soul. +</P> + +<P> +At last, when the low-lying hills began to cast cool shadows down their +eastern slopes, there appeared against the velvet green of the distance +the sprawling blotch of a little town, ugly, naked, and unashamed in +its bustling newness. And nearer, by a mile or more, on a green slope +which caught the golden-red rays of the sinking sun, was a little +enclosure, naked and ugly as the town itself, but silent and +awe-inspiring with the silence and awe of death. A barbed-wire fence +enclosed it, and the prairie turf still covered much of its space. +There were here no sunken mounds, no reeling headstones, no discolored +marbles. The grave heaps were trimly rounded, the wooden crosses which +marked most of them grinned their newness, and the few headstones and +monuments shone upstartishly white in the sun. Barren of that curtain +of verdure with which love strives to conceal the footprints of death, +the little cemetery lay there against the green hillside like some +fresh, gaping, ghastly wound in the face of a loved one. +</P> + +<P> +One grave stood out startlingly from the rest. On the others only an +infrequent trailing vine or a faded bunch of flowers told of loving +effort to cover death's nakedness. But this one, which lay in the +centre of the enclosure, was covered from headstone to foot-cross with +a dense growth of hollyhocks. Their tall shafts were clothed with a +luxuriance of vivid red bloom, as if they had sucked into their petals +the life blood of the sleeper below. In the level red sun-rays they +glowed with lusty contempt of the silent impotence beneath them. +</P> + +<P> +A woman in a white dress, with her hands full of the red hollyhock +blooms, walked between the graves down to the barred gate and came out +upon the road as I drove up. I recognized her as the woman whose +acquaintance I had made in the train a few days previously, and in +whose company I had travelled from Chicago hither. She had been a +pleasant chance acquaintance—intelligent, gentle, and refined. +</P> + +<P> +"Will you ride back to town with me?" I said. +</P> + +<P> +She accepted the offer of the seat beside me, carefully holding her +flowers. +</P> + +<P> +"How odd that grave looks with its marshalled array of hollyhocks!" I +said, by way of opening conversation, for she sat there silent. "What +a peculiar taste, to adorn a loved one's last resting-place in that +way!" +</P> + +<P> +She looked up at me silently, and I noticed that her eyes were hollow, +and her face sad. Then she turned toward the graveyard and the tall +red hollyhocks standing out so vividly in the sunset glow, and said +quietly: +</P> + +<P> +"It is my mother's grave. I planted the hollyhocks upon it." +</P> + +<P> +She was silent again, looking sadly and tenderly at the flowers in her +lap, but presently she went on: +</P> + +<P> +"I do not mind telling you why I did it. Perhaps talking about it will +lessen the heaviness of my heart. No one but my sister knows why I +planted them there, and she has never seen the grave, nor have I seen +her, since our mother died. When we were young girls at home, our +mother loved hollyhocks. She had the yard filled with great clumps of +them. We were away at school for a few years and when we went home +again they quite horrified our advanced, young ladyish taste. We +thought them vulgar, and between ourselves we fretted and scolded about +them and declared to each other that they were horrid, and that we were +ashamed to have any one visit us while those great, ugly, coarse things +filled the yard. We apologized for them to visitors and said they were +mother's flowers, but we hated them. And after a while we complained +about them to mother and said before her how common and coarse and +old-fashioned they were. And she, dear, gentle soul, said not a word, +but looked sadly out at the flowers she loved so well and had cared for +so long and so tenderly. And one day, after we had fretted and worried +her a long time about them, she said to us—I can see yet how she tried +to smile and disguise the sadness in her heart—that we might dig up +all the hollyhocks and plant other flowers in their places. And we +did. It stabs me to the heart now to think of it,—but we did it +joyfully. +</P> + +<P> +"After we were married and went away from home—my sister to London and +I to Chicago—our mother came here to this town and soon died. In the +sorrow of that time, when first I knew how much and how tenderly I +loved her, I remembered about the hollyhocks, and at last realized how +brutally thoughtless and unfeeling we had been. So, in shame and +remorse, I did the one little thing that was all I could do, and +covered the grave of our dear, patient, gentle, saint-like mother with +the flowers she loved the best of all, but which we had not let her +gladden her life with. I do not pretend to know whether or not there +is a hereafter, or whether there is anything more of her than what lies +under those red flowers back there. But often I wish—oh, how I +wish!—that it may be so, and that from somewhere her spirit may look +down and see and be pleased by the atonement I have tried to make! +</P> + +<P> +"I wrote to my sister what I had done, and I found that she also felt +as I did about it. Every summer I come here and see that the +hollyhocks grow and flourish as we wish them to; and, at her request, I +gather and send to her some of the blooms. These in my lap are for +that purpose, and two weeks from now she will be weeping over them in +her London home. If we could only have known—then—how we should feel +about it now!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE RISE, FALL, AND REDEMPTION OF JOHNSON SIDES +</H3> + + +<P> +The day was hot, and the wind was high, and the alkali dust from the +sagebrush plains sifted into the car, and whitened the stuffy +upholstering, and burrowed into the nerves of the passengers. +Everybody longed for the coming of night, and the relief of the climb +up the cool heights of the Sierras. +</P> + +<P> +I looked out on the sun-flooded platform at Winnemucca and wondered, +with a feeling of irritation against all things earthly, what I should +do with myself during all the long, hot, and uncomfortable hours that +were still to be endured. And then I saw the big, broad-shouldered +figure and the round, good-natured face of the Nevadan enter the car +and come straight toward my section. At once I forgot the heat and the +alkali dust, and my heart sang with joy, for I knew the Nevadan of old, +and knew him for the prince of story tellers. So there was content in +my soul and foreknowledge of delightful entertainment with tales new +and old. For the Nevadan's old stories are just as interesting as his +new ones, because you never recognize them as anything you ever heard +before. His store of yarns is limitless and needs only a listener to +set it unwinding, like an endless cable, warranted to run as long as +his audience laughs. +</P> + +<P> +So the Nevadan talked, and I listened and felt at peace with the world. +And presently he began to tell me about Johnson Sides. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course, you 've heard about him, have n't you?" he asked. +"Everybody who has lived on either slope of the Sierras must have heard +about Johnson. Well, Johnson Sides is a whole lot of a man, even if he +is only a Piute Indian. It ain't quite fair, though, to speak of him +as only an Indian, for he has developed into an individual and wears +store clothes. +</P> + +<P> +"The first time I ever saw Johnson was away back, years ago, when I +first went to Virginia City. Going down C Street one day I stopped to +look at some workmen who were excavating for the foundation of a house. +They had been blasting, and were working away like good fellows getting +the pieces of rock off the site. On the south side of the biggest +stone they had removed, where the sun shone on him and he was sheltered +from the wind, a big Piute was lying on the ground and watching the +workmen as if he had been their boss. He was wrapped in an army +blanket, new but dirty, and he wore a fairly good hat and a pair of +boots without holes. His face and hands were dirty, and his hair hung +around his ears and neck and eyes in that fine disorder which the +Piutes admire. +</P> + +<P> +"I wondered why he was watching the workmen, for it is little short of +a miracle for a Piute to take any interest whatever in manual labor. +So I spoke to him. Without paying any attention to me or what I had +said, or even seeming to be conscious of my presence, he rose, +straightened himself up, threw his head back, and said, as if he were +addressing the world in general: 'White man work, white man eat; Injun +no work, Injun eat; white man damn fool.' +</P> + +<P> +"I laughed and said, 'You 've struck it, right at the bottom. Anybody +with as much wisdom as that deserves to be supported by the community. +Here 's a dollar for you.' +</P> + +<P> +"He took the money as disdainfully as if he had been a prince and I a +subject paying back taxes, and without once looking at me stalked off +down the street. An hour afterwards I ran across Johnson, two other +bucks, and a squaw, sitting on the ground in the sun behind a barn, +playing poker. Johnson must have raked in everything the whole party +had, for that night the rest of them were sober and he was whooping +drunk. In consequence, he got locked up for a while. The police of +Virginia City always paid Johnson the compliment of locking him up when +he got drunk, for with whiskey inside of him he was more like a mad +devil than anything else. +</P> + +<P> +"After he got out of jail I saw him standing around for several days +looking as lordly and unconscious as if he had been worth a million. +But the pangs of hunger must have set his wits to work. For pretty +soon he appeared on the streets with a wrinkled, decrepit, old Piute +tied to a string. He had fastened the string to the old fellow's arm +and he walked behind, holding the other end, but apparently as +unconscious of the whole business as if he 'd been the sole inhabitant +of Virginia City. He stalked along with his head in the air, and the +old fellow trotted out in front until Johnson yanked the string. Then +they stopped and the old man began to beg money of the passers-by, and +Johnson turned his back on his companion and looked off down the +street, proudly pretending that they weren't together. If any one gave +the old man money Johnson took it at once and it disappeared somewhere +inside his blanket. Johnson and his prime minister, we used to call +the combination. But Johnson would n't beg for himself. Oh, no! He +was too proud. It's a fact, I never knew or heard of Johnson Sides +himself asking for money. But he kept his prime minister trotting +around for several weeks, and he never let go the string or let the old +fellow keep a two-bit piece. +</P> + +<P> +"But Johnson was reformed at last; and it was the power of the press +that did it. Talk about the press as a moral agent! Why, bless your +soul, when one newspaper can reform a whole Piute Indian and make a man +of him—well, the question's settled, then and there, and the pulpit +and the platform ain't in it after that. +</P> + +<P> +"We did n't try to reform him—in fact, we 'd rather have kept him as +he was at first. He was more amusing. But the aspirations of +Johnson's soul were too much for us. I used to give him money +sometimes—he was sure to do something if he got drunk that was worth +writing up—and so he got into the habit of coming to our newspaper +office whenever he felt the need of more cash. He did n't ask for +anything, and he always made you feel that he was doing you a great +favor in accepting any stray chicken-feed you might have about your +clothes. He just sat around like a bronzed and blanketed statue of +Caesar, or Alexander, or Napoleon Bonaparte. Not one of the whole lot +of them ever looked more as if he owned the whole earth than Johnson +did after he 'd sat there three hours waiting for somebody to give him +two bits or a chew of tobacco. +</P> + +<P> +"I found out after a while that he could give me scraps of news about +the Indians over at Pyramid Lake or in the city that were worth making +into local items, and I always paid him for them. Nobody ever saw a +prouder Indian than Johnson was the first day I did that. I marked the +paragraphs with a blue pencil and gave him a copy of the paper, and he +carried it around with him until it was worn out. The money I gave him +for them he kept in his pocket for two whole days. But at last there +was a big poker game behind a barn—six bucks down from Pyramid Lake +with five dollars apiece, and it was too much for Johnson. His proudly +earned silver went into the pot with the rest. +</P> + +<P> +"Johnson brought up items every day after that, and soon began to feel +himself one of the profession and a man of consequence. He always +brought two or three other bucks with him to see his importance and be +impressed by his superiority. While they stood against the wall or +squatted in a corner Johnson would take a chair at a dignified distance +from me and begin, 'Now, you make 'um paper talk.' And he always ended +his account with the emphatic command, 'Now, you make 'um paper talk +straight.' +</P> + +<P> +"But his information was not always 'straight.' He had all the +instincts of the modern and progressive journalist, and he did n't +hesitate to fake when news was scarce and he wanted money. For after +he joined the newspaper profession he gave up begging by proxy and +allowed his prime minister to beg on his own account and keep his own +earnings. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, it was n't long after Johnson's entrance into literature until +he discarded his blanket and appeared in a coat. The other Indians +began to regard him with awe-struck admiration. Every afternoon he +waited in the office until the paper came out, and then he marched off +with a copy in which his 'talk' was marked. He showed this to every +Indian he saw, and together they admired it with the paper wrong side +up, sidewise, and every other way. Johnson's special friends among the +whites were similarly favored. He would hand the paper with a +magnificent air, point a dirty finger to a marked paragraph, and say, +'Make 'um paper talk—me!' +</P> + +<P> +"The civilizing influence of literary pursuits and universal respect +soon told upon Johnson's personal appearance. He began to wash his +face and hands. His self-respect seemed to grow, like love, by what it +fed on; and the more he became respectable, the more his ambitions +spread out and flourished. The next time he had big luck in a poker +game, instead of spending his money in a spree, he bought a brand-new +suit of store clothes. +</P> + +<P> +"His new position in society by that time demanded more money to +support it properly than his literary efforts brought in; and as poker +games were not always on hand, and sometimes turned out the wrong way, +Johnson actually decided to work. His free, proud soul had been so +effectually tamed by respectability and harnessed by civilization that +he accepted every odd job of work that came along by which he could +earn money. He looked quite decent and respectable, and, by virtue of +really trying to do it, he managed to get a fairly good command of +English. +</P> + +<P> +"The civilizing process had been going on two or three years when +Johnson's mind got an illumination as to the value of knowledge. He +decided that the young Piutes ought to go to school, though Johnson +himself never had showed any great desire for knowledge. He has since +learned to read a little, and can write his own name, but at that time +he was satisfied with 'making the paper talk' through my agency. +However, he set his heart on having a school for the young Indians. I +suppose he realized that they could n't all achieve social position and +influence in the field of journalism, as he had done, but must be +provided with some of the implements of civilization to start with. +</P> + +<P> +"There was some Government money with which the school could be run +after it was started, but there was no building in which it could be +held. The thing lagged along for a while, and Johnson tried to set +several schemes going, without success. Finally, one fine morning, the +proprietor of a lumber yard thought some of his piles of lumber had +been tampered with. He saw some tracks, which he followed, and in the +outskirts of the town, near a bunch of wickiups, he came upon two other +lumber-yard men, also following tracks. A little farther on they found +Johnson, even more important and dignified than usual, superintending +the construction of a schoolhouse. Half a dozen Indians were at work, +and Johnson was bossing them as if he had been building schoolhouses +all his life. +</P> + +<P> +"The men boned him about stealing the lumber, and he frankly said yes, +he had stolen it. That is, he had bossed the job, and made the other +bucks do all the packing. He explained that he had to steal it, +because he could n't buy it, and they would n't give it to him, and he +had to have that schoolhouse. His frankness amused them, and they told +him, all right, go ahead, and if he needed any more lumber he might +have it. +</P> + +<P> +"He finally got the schoolhouse finished, corralled the Indian brats, +and after the school was started visited it three times a week, when he +did n't go every day. If any of the youngsters showed signs of mutiny, +all the teacher had to do was to threaten to call in Johnson Sides, and +immediately peace became profound. For by that time he had more +influence among the Indians, big and little, than anybody else, white +or red. They looked up to him with a veneration which he accepted as +his right as calmly as he had formerly taken the quarters and +half-dollars his prime minister had begged for him. +</P> + +<P> +"That schoolhouse was the last stealing he ever did, even by proxy, and +pretty soon he quit getting drunk. He has never given up poker +entirely but he has quit gambling away everything he gets, and only +joins in a social game now and then, when he is flush, as any gentleman +might. +</P> + +<P> +"He was a good deal of a man, was Johnson, and everybody respected him +and was glad to help him along. He worked and earned money, and saved +a little, and proved himself quite capable, and was clean and decent +and respectable. People liked to employ him, for he was industrious +and sober. That is, he was sober for a long time. There must have +been five or six years in which Johnson was never even tipsy. He was +mighty proud of himself and his good reputation, and when he did fall +it hurt him bad. +</P> + +<P> +"For fall he did, at last, when a big enough temptation came along. +And then he got whizzing, whooping, roaring drunk. It was a wilder, +madder, more devilish drunk than any he had ever taken in the old days +when he was only a dirty Piute buck, without ambitions or achievements. +It seemed as if he were making up for all the time he had lost while he +was respectable, and condensing into one all the drunks he might have +taken and had n't. +</P> + +<P> +"He kept it up for three weeks. Part of the time he was with the +Indians, part in Virginia City, and part in Carson. How he managed to +escape arrest is more than I can tell, and how it happened that he did +n't massacre the whole population of Nevada is still more of a mystery. +He had fights with Indians and with whites, with men who were drunk and +men who were sober, and they drew guns, knives, and fists. But Johnson +didn't get hurt, and nobody else got killed. +</P> + +<P> +"After it was all over and he had sobered up, Johnson came to me and he +was so repentant and humiliated that, I declare, I never felt so sorry +for anybody in all my life. He thought it was all up with him, that he +had ruined all his good repute and influence, that nobody would ever +believe him, or trust him, or respect him after that, and that it was +quite useless for him to try to be a good Indian again. Of course he +did n't put it in so many words—he expressed more by gestures and +looks and grunts than by words—but that was the meaning of it all. +</P> + +<P> +"I felt so sorry for him that I made up my mind I 'd give him a lift; +and as I began to talk and try to encourage him I had an inspiration +that was just the thing. +</P> + +<P> +"'Don't you be so discouraged, Johnson,' I said. 'We can make things +all right again. We 'll get the Legislature to repeal this drunk of +yours and that'll set you right up where you were before. I 'm going +over to Carson to-morrow, and I 'll have the Legislature make a law +that will wipe out the whole business and fix everything for you as if +you had n't been drunk at all.' +</P> + +<P> +"Johnson was delighted, but he did n't feel quite sure about it. So I +had to make him understand that I knew what I was talking about. +</P> + +<P> +"'It's all straight,' I said. 'They do that every session for +somebody. Why, So-and-So'—and I mentioned the name of a prominent +citizen—'was on an awful drunk last winter; and just as soon as he +sobered up he went right over to Carson and had the Legislature pass a +bill repealing his spree, and you know that he is just as much +respected as he was before. I'll attend to your business myself +to-morrow, and then I 'll publish the whole thing in the paper and +everybody will read it and know that you are all right again. But you +must remember one thing, Johnson,' I said. 'You must remember that as +you are an Indian the Legislature can't do this for you more than once. +If you were a white man you could have as many drunks repealed as you +wanted. But being an Indian this is your last chance, and you must +keep straight after this.' +</P> + +<P> +"Well, the upshot of it was that Johnson put his trust in me; and I +flatter myself that I was just the man he needed in the emergency. You +'ve lived in the West, and you know what the Nevada Legislature is, and +always has been. There never was one that you couldn't count on to do +anything under the sun that tickled its sense of humor. I thought that +bill about Johnson's drunk would strike 'em in just about the right +place, and it did. They dropped everything else and sent it through +with a hurrah. +</P> + +<P> +"There was a long preamble, telling about Johnson Sides's prominence +and influence and the great importance of his retaining the high +position in the respect of the community which he had won, and about +the misfortune into which he had fallen, and how it was the universal +wish that he should be reinstated in public esteem. And then there was +a resolution which declared that Johnson Sides's drunk should be and +was thereby repealed, destroyed, wiped out, for ever and ever, and that +all statutes not in accordance with that act were thereby annulled from +that time forth. They passed it through both houses unanimously, and +the next day I published the bill verbatim and all the proceedings in +our paper. +</P> + +<P> +"Johnson's face fairly shone with joy when I read it to him. It was +his patent of respectability, and he stowed it away in his breast +pocket as carefully as if it had been his passport to heaven. He +carried it there until it was worn out, and then he came after another. +He's worn out three or four since then, but he always keeps one in his +pocket. +</P> + +<P> +"The scheme worked like a charm; for his redemption has been complete, +and he 's been a good Indian, sober, industrious, and respectable—but +not nearly so interesting—ever since." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A PIECE OF WRECKAGE +</H3> + + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Delay not thy coming, my love, my own!<BR> +Though patient I wait thee, my love unknown,<BR> +Yet long I thy figure to see, and know<BR> +What form thou wilt have, and what face be thine,<BR> +And when thou wilt clasp me, dear love of mine;<BR> +For all that is left me is thy cold breath,<BR> +And wond'ring I wait thee, my sweetheart, Death!<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +It may be that the high tide of material development which in late +years has been sweeping over Southern California has penetrated even to +that isolated nook in the hills which, when I knew it, was the saddest +place I had ever seen. It was a lonely region, miles and miles away +from railroads, telegraphs, newspapers—all the mighty, roaring music +of civilization. Off toward the east the desert stretched its level +expanse of vague coloring, and westward the rounded hills, green in the +winter, yellow as ripe wheat fields through the long, rainless summer, +reared their mounds higher and higher until they stopped, as if cowed +and ashamed, at the flanks of Monte Pinos. And the mountain, majestic +and vapor-veiled, seemed always to be watching them in their work of +protecting and comforting the wrecks that clung to their feet. +</P> + +<P> +For that was why this region, despite its soft, reposeful beauty, +seemed so sad—because of the wrecks, the human wrecks, who dwelt +there, who had seized such fast hold of the sphinx-like hills that only +death could unloose their grasp. Some of them were relics of +California's heyday, men who, when the waves of hope and adventure and +endeavor were rolling fast and high over the Golden State, were so +dashed about and bruised and beaten that at last they were glad to be +cast ashore among these hills. Some had hidden themselves there +because they were weary of the world and all its works, and wished to +go where they could no longer hear even its heart-beats. Others there +were who had fled thither to escape the scorn of men or the vengeance +of the law. And there were a few who were staying on and on, and would +always stay, because those enchantresses that whisper in the evening +breezes of the mountains and the desert, that put forth caressing hands +in the balmy air that bathes the hills and canyons in the early +morning, whose wooing voices sing in the music of birds and chant in +the cries of wild things at night, had taken captive their wills, and +they could not go if they would. +</P> + +<P> +Their cabins were scattered through the valleys, or on the sides of the +hills, or in the recesses of the canyons, miles apart. Sometimes, +though rarely, there was a little family in one. But usually the only +occupant was an elderly or middle-aged man, who spoke but little about +himself or his past, and was as destitute of curiosity as to what was +going on in the outside world as he was about the former lives and +affairs of his fellow wreckage. +</P> + +<P> +Nevertheless, I had the good fortune to learn much of the story of one +of these men. A member of our camping party chanced to make speaking +acquaintance with him at the quaint old adobe house under its huge, +spreading grapevine and waving cottonwoods, which served as stage +station and supply store—the centre of such civilization as there was +in all the region within a radius of thirty or forty miles. Every one +in that country called him "Old Dan." I found his name one day in the +Great Register—twin relic, with the shabby old stage, of the outer +world—which hung in the stage station. But as it was not his real +name, nor probably any name by which he was ever known outside of those +hills, it will be of no use to mention it here. +</P> + +<P> +Old Dan, learning that we were not pleased with our camping-place, +invited us to pitch our tents under some trees near his cabin. And for +one delightful month of the southern summer we brought into his life +the strange sensation of voices fresh from the world he had discarded. +The unwonted influence unlocked his memories and sent his mind back to +dwell among the almost forgotten years when he, too, was of the world +and delighted in it. +</P> + +<P> +We soon fell into the habit of sociability. Every evening he would +come down to our camp, usually bringing his violin, and sit with us for +hours at our camp fire. His cats—he had near a dozen of them—came +trailing after him, and his two dogs trotted by his side. Two or three +of the cats sprang into his lap as soon as he sat down, and the rest +snarled at the dogs for appropriating the choice positions nearest him, +and then disposed themselves in an outer row. The stable inclosure was +only a few rods distant, and the three burros it contained, as soon as +they heard his voice, ranged themselves in a solemn row at the nearest +point, looking as wise and mysterious as so many sphinxes. +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes he played for us, with unexpected skill and feeling, on his +violin. As the days went by and our acquaintance grew more intimate, +he gradually fell back into memories of the past and turned over for +us, now and then, the pages of his life's history. But all these bits, +heard at many different times, and some things which were told me +afterwards by men who had known him in other years and places, I have +gathered into one continuous narrative. For in my memory they are all +fused together, as if he had told us the whole of his story in one +evening—one special evening, of which remembrance is most vivid. +</P> + +<P> +The moon was at its half, and showered down just enough of its silver +light to bring out sharply the darkling woods on the hill beyond the +little stream and to make his cabin under the trees, off in the +opposite direction, take on strange shapes, while it cut out, sharp and +distinct against the background of light, the silhouettes of the solemn +and unmoving burros, standing in a row behind the fence. Our camp fire +blazed and crackled and the crimson and orange flames mounted high in +the air and showed our little party, sitting or half lying about it on +blankets. Old Dan, sitting on a great chunk of wood, his lap full of +cats, his violin beside him, and his usual bodyguard of cats and dogs +around him, went far back into his youth and let us know—what probably +he had told no other being since he broke those ties—why he left the +home, the heritage, and the name of his ancestors. +</P> + +<P> +He had been playing on his violin, and then, putting it down, had begun +to tell us about some hunting adventure. The red light danced over his +wrinkled, weather-beaten face and scraggly, grizzled beard; and as I +considered his large, well-shaped head and strongly marked features, it +seemed to me there was something familiar in his countenance. In his +voice a peculiar intonation—I had noticed it many times before—teased +me with suggestions of a voice heard somewhere else. +</P> + +<P> +And presently I remembered. +</P> + +<P> +He turned his face toward me, the firelight fell bright and strong upon +it, that peculiar tone in his voice sounded at just the same instant, +and there flashed upon me the memory of a scene in Boston two years +before. It was in Faneuil Hall, and a great mass of eager, +enthusiastic faces was turned toward the platform, where stood a member +of one of Massachusetts' old and distinguished families. His speech, +full of persuasive fire, had welded his whole audience into one +personality that, for the time being, at least, felt as he felt and +thought as he thought. And the voice of the orator, which had +impressed me by reason of a certain peculiar intonation, was like this +man's voice, and his face had in it much that was like the face of Old +Dan. +</P> + +<P> +I spoke of the resemblance, and Old Dan at first drew back within +himself. Then he began to question me eagerly about the man. And +presently he had let us know who he was. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," he said, "you are right. There is a strong resemblance between +us, or there was when we were young. I have not seen him for more than +forty years. He is my brother—younger than I. You know what the +family has been in New England. There has not been a generation of it +for a hundred, yes, a hundred and fifty years, that has not made its +influence felt either in Massachusetts or the nation. I cut loose from +it before I was twenty, and they have known nothing about me since. In +fact, they think me dead—they thought I died then, and I do not intend +they shall ever know that I did not. This is the first time since I +left that anybody has known my real name, and you 'll do me a favor if +you never speak of it to any one else, here or elsewhere. I have not +always been known by the same name since then, but what difference does +that make? When a man leads as many different lives as I have done, he +has a right to more names than one or two. +</P> + +<P> +"I was in Harvard College and it was the summer vacation after my +junior year. Every male member of our family"—Old Dan spoke that +"our" with timid and shame-faced, but very evident, pride—"for I don't +know how many generations, has gone to Harvard, and I suppose I am the +only one of the whole lot of them that didn't graduate. I went to New +York that summer to transact some business for my father. I succeeded +with it very well, but in the meantime I did n't neglect the +opportunities of enjoying myself with a good deal more freedom than I +would have dared to take at home. I probably was n't born quite up to +the high standard of morality, dignity, and self-respect which my +ancestors had set; and if I had stayed there all my life I would +probably have found living up to it either very galling or quite +impossible. I dare say it is just as well that I did break loose and +burn the bridge behind me, for if I had stayed in New England it's +likely I should have turned out a black sheep and brought shame and +disgrace upon my people. +</P> + +<P> +"While I was in New York I fell in with a pleasant, companionable man, +some years older than myself. He went around with me a good deal, took +me to his home, where I met his wife and sister, gave me sensible +advice about a number of things, and was altogether so entertaining and +so kind and such a good fellow that I thought myself fortunate in +having met him. +</P> + +<P> +"One evening, when I was almost ready to return to Boston, I dined with +him at his home. He had had me there to dinner several times, and the +evening had always passed off pleasantly. But on this evening I drank +more wine than was good for me. Probably it was doctored, but I don't +know. All my life, whenever I have taken a glass too much, one sure +result has followed. All the restraints of conduct which I ordinarily +feel drop away, and I become reckless. +</P> + +<P> +"So this evening, when he brought out cards and we began to bet on the +game, both my moral sense and my prudence deserted me. I drank more +and more, and bet higher and higher, and after a while I realized that +he had won from me quite a sum of money which I had neglected to send +to my father during the day. +</P> + +<P> +"Then I drank more; and after that I do not know what happened until I +awoke with a dazed sense of having heard a woman scream and of being in +the midst of some confusion. I felt a blow on my head and a grip on my +arm and heard a voice shouting in my ear, 'You scoundrel, I 'll kill +you!' I was in another room, my friend's wife was sobbing hysterically +on a lounge, and he was gripping and shaking me and pointing a pistol +at my head. +</P> + +<P> +"He said I had shamefully insulted his wife and that he was going to +kill me. And I was drunk enough to believe him, and maudlin enough to +beg for my life and to accept with tears what terms he was willing to +offer. It was finally settled that he should keep me under his +personal charge until I could get five thousand dollars from my father +to pay over to him. Then he made me write a letter to my father which +he dictated. +</P> + +<P> +"He locked me in a room with himself, put the key in his pocket, waited +until he thought I had gone to sleep, and then threw himself down on +the bed with the pistol in his hand and was soon fast asleep. +</P> + +<P> +"But instead of going to sleep I was rapidly getting sober enough to +understand what a rat in a hole I had made of myself, and I was so +overcome with horror and shame that I felt I would rather die than face +my father again. I put the letter, which he had left lying on a table, +in my pocket. With my knife I took out the screws of the door lock and +was soon creeping stealthily downstairs. As I turned the first street +corner I saw that my keeper was rushing after me in hot pursuit. Day +was just breaking, and through the dim, deserted streets I ran at the +top of my speed, turning corners, dodging down side streets, trying my +best to get out of sight of my pursuer. He kept close behind me, but +at last I reached the docks,—where I meant to drown myself,—just +enough ahead of him to dodge behind a pile of lumber. +</P> + +<P> +"My sudden appearance startled some poor wretch, who was crouched +there, making his preparations for eternity, just as I myself was about +to do. He gave me one scared look, as if he feared I was some one come +to stop him, and jumped into the water. In his sudden leap one foot +dragged after him the little pile of clothing and the letter he had +been writing. +</P> + +<P> +"I crouched down into a hiding-place, so startled by this sudden +apparition, in the very act of doing what I had made up my mind to do, +that I drew back from the deed with sudden awe and shrinking. I had no +time to think before my pursuer dashed up, calling my name loudly. He +had seen the suicide and thought it was I. He waited about and watched +for the body a while and then went away, and that was the last I ever +saw of him. +</P> + +<P> +"When I crawled out of my hiding-place I had no idea what I was going +to do. The suicidal impulse had spent itself, and although I had +escaped from my pursuer for the moment I was so afraid of meeting him +again that I slunk along like a criminal. But strong as that fear was, +I would rather have met him than faced my father. Soon I came to a +wharf where a steamer was taking aboard passengers for California. At +once my determination was made. I hurried to a pawnbroker's shop, and +from my watch and what little jewelry I had I realized enough money to +buy a steerage ticket, and in a few hours was on my way, under a new +name. +</P> + +<P> +"The Boston papers which the next San Francisco steamer brought told me +the story of my suicide, of the recovery of my body, and of its burial +in our family lot in Mt. Auburn Cemetery. I hope the poor wretch whose +bones are crumbling under the monument was more worthy of its praises +than I. +</P> + +<P> +"After I read that, all thought of the possibility of returning, or of +letting them know that I was not dead, dropped from my mind. I plunged +into the furious life of those days with such eagerness and enjoyment +that I lost all desire to go back,—would have had none, even if I had +not disgraced my name before I left. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course, I soon understood that I had been caught in the simplest +sort of a blackmailer's trap. But I had betrayed my father's trust in +me and had gambled away his money, and—what was as crushing to my +vanity as this other was to my sense of honor—I had been duped in a +way that any greenhorn ought to have seen through. So I put it all +behind me and was glad to be alone among strangers. +</P> + +<P> +"I rushed off to the mines, of course, as soon as I could get there, +and I made piles of money, especially at first. And I was probably the +most hot-headed, reckless, devil-may-care young rascal on the whole +Coast. I made many enemies and had many a narrow escape, as most +everybody did in those days. +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps the closest call I had was at Foley's Gulch. A fellow had +lately come there who thought he could sing. Op'ry Bill, we called +him. We got him started to singing in a saloon one night, and I led +the boys on in making fun of him. We got him wild, but he did n't +offer to shoot, not even when I sent a bullet spinning through his hat. +He knew I was the leader in it all, but he just waited for a good +chance before he hinted at revenge. It was a week or two before the +chance came, and in the meantime he pretended to be friendly with me. +</P> + +<P> +"One afternoon I was in a saloon, and the barkeeper had just told me +how Shirty Smith and Op'ry Bill had had a quarrel, and how Shirty was +tearing around like a mad bull and swearing he 'd shoot Bill on sight, +when in walked Op'ry himself. He came up almost behind me, slapped me +on the shoulder with his left hand, asked me to take a drink with him, +slipped his hand down on my right arm and began feeling of it and +praising my muscle. My eye happened to fall on a broken bit of a +mirror behind the bar, and I saw that his right hand was cocking a +pistol at the back of my head. I called out loudly and angrily, +'Shirty, don't shoot him in the back!' +</P> + +<P> +"Op'ry Bill was so taken aback by what he supposed to be his own danger +that he wheeled around and turned his pistol the other way. Shirty was +n't there, but I had him covered when he turned back, red hot at having +been deceived. +</P> + +<P> +"Did I kill him? No, I thought I 'd give him a lecture first, as I had +him well covered, about being so ornery mean, and while I was talking +Shirty rushed in, hot on the trail, and swore he 'd let daylight +through me if I did n't give him first chance at the sneak. +</P> + +<P> +"A good many of the young fellows, like me, for instance, and plenty of +the older ones, too, were utterly reckless about how much money we made +and how much we lost. Everything went at a fast and furious rate, and +it was all the same to us whether we were raking in or pouring out the +dust. It was many a year after those stirring days before I tried to +figure up how much I took out of the ground and might have got for my +mine locations if I had had a particle of thrift—such as I ought to +have had, considering my New England birth and ancestry. It footed up +past the million mark, and, if I had had sense enough to handle it +properly, would have made me worth several times that amount by the +time I reached middle age. +</P> + +<P> +"But I don't know that I regret it now. I 'm as well off here with my +cats and dogs and burros as if they were so many mines and ranches and +railroads. +</P> + +<P> +"I had a partner once, a fellow a little older than I, and not so +reckless and hare-brained, and together we had been sinking a prospect +hole that promised to be one of the best I ever struck. We had been at +work two or three months, and I was just as sure there was a big +fortune in that hole as I could be of anything. But I got tired of +staying in one place so long,—it was lonely and monotonous,—and I +wanted some excitement. So one evening I challenged him to play +seven-up for the mine, the loser to take his outfit and walk. He +refused and tried to argue me out of my crazy whim, but finally I +taunted him into it. I lost, and the next morning I packed up my +blankets and walked away. A month afterwards he sold the mine for a +hundred thousand dollars, and in less than a year its owners had +realized a round half million out of it. +</P> + +<P> +"But the most exciting part of all those years was the time when I was +called 'Grizzly Dick.' I ought to be ashamed to tell anything about +that portion of my history; but it is all so long ago, and things have +changed so much since then, that it almost seems as if I were talking +about some other man. +</P> + +<P> +"It all began at Grizzly Gulch, where a man named Johnson had taken a +strong dislike to me. I had played some joke on him which made him +ridiculous, and he hated me more than if I 'd tried to kill him. He +started down to the city with his dust, and somebody robbed him, and +half killed him into the bargain. He accused me of being the robber +and I had no witnesses to prove an alibi. They had a trial and +convicted me of the crime, as Johnson swore that he recognized me. I +knew that it was simply a scheme of his to get even with me, and I +didn't believe that he had been robbed at all. But I was sentenced to +prison for two years and I had to go. +</P> + +<P> +"When I got out my teeth were on edge for revenge on Johnson, the +lawyers, the judge, the jury, and the whole law-making system that had +made me, an innocent man, spend those two years fuming in a cell. I +was ready to fight the whole organization of society and the whole +system of government, from President to jailer. I swore the biggest, +hardest kind of an oath that I would give them a reason for being so +anxious to put people in prison. Only, I didn't propose that they +should ever send me there again. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, for two years Grizzly Dick was the terror of that county and all +the adjoining ones. To take him, alive or dead, was the ambition of +half the sheriffs in California. After my first few escapades I had +plenty of helpers. Men as desperate and as dare-devil as I gathered +around me and we carried things with a high hand. I cared nothing for +the profits of being an outlaw. What I wanted was revenge on society, +and the excitement and risk of the game. The greater part of whatever +we took went to my followers, and I never kept more than was necessary +for my immediate needs. +</P> + +<P> +"We had many a desperate fight with sheriffs and their posses, many a +wild ride over the hills and through the pine woods on dark nights, and +many a day of lying hidden in the brush or in caves. +</P> + +<P> +"I followed that sort of life for two years, and then, one day, I +suddenly felt a disgust for it all, and concluded I 'd had enough +revenge and was ready to be an honest man again. +</P> + +<P> +"So I deliberately left that part of the State and everybody supposed +that Grizzly Dick had been killed and his body carried off and buried +by his gang. But nothing of the sort had happened. He reappeared +under another name a good many days' travel from that region. +</P> + +<P> +"Five or six years afterwards I went back to that same county and was +elected sheriff. Yes, I was recognized. A good many people suspected +and two or three openly declared that I was Grizzly Dick. But I made +the best sheriff they had ever had, and I did some work in the way of +catching a stage robber, cleaning out a nest of gamblers, and getting +rid of a couple of desperadoes, which they were so glad to have done +that they didn't care who or what I might have been. +</P> + +<P> +"I served two terms and they wanted me to run again. But by that time +I had come to realize that I had frittered away a big part of my life, +and I began to have some of the ambitions to accomplish something worth +while that I ought to have had a dozen years before. +</P> + +<P> +"So I went down to San Francisco and raised a tidy sum of money to +begin on by going in with an acquaintance on a trip to Bering Sea to +catch otters. We chartered a vessel, spent a whole summer up there, +and realized nearly ten thousand dollars apiece out of it. +</P> + +<P> +"I had a pretty good practical knowledge of mining matters, and so my +operations in mines and mining stocks were generally successful. It +was n't long until I was a rich, a very rich, man, and a prominent one, +too. There is a street named for me in San Francisco. That is, it +bears the name I was known by while I was sheriff and while I lived in +the city. I married and built a fine residence, and altogether I was +as prosperous and had as bright a future as any man in California. +</P> + +<P> +"But one day, after I had been living in San Francisco five or six +years, I made a deal that wasn't a success, and half my fortune went in +less than a week. And at the same time I discovered that my wife was +not all I had thought her. She had evil tendencies that I had not +suspected, and bad companions of whom I had known nothing; and together +they had taken her at a flying pace down the road to destruction. And +when the end came, at the same time that I had my first financial blow, +the surprise was overwhelming. It was an end so shameful and to me so +humiliating that I could not bear at first to go out among men and meet +my friends. It was a critical time and my affairs needed my closest +attention. But I was too broken down and overcome by the disgrace to +attempt to do anything. And when I did go back everything was ruined. +</P> + +<P> +"I did n't care very much, for my greatest desire just then was to get +away from everybody I had known. I wanted to put behind me and forget +everything that would remind me of my wife, and her ruin, and my +disaster. +</P> + +<P> +"So I started out alone with a prospector's outfit, and finally brought +up here. I 've been here now, I guess, about ten years, and it's very +likely that I 'll stay here all the rest of my life. I 've got a +prospect hole over on the other side of that hill that may amount to +something some time. But I don't care whether it does or not. I like +to work in it and think about whether or not I 'm going to strike +anything, but I don't care two bits one way or the other. +</P> + +<P> +"No, I 'm not lonely. My cats and dogs and burros are pretty good +company, and then I have my violin. But just these hills, and the sky, +and the breezes, and the birds and beasts that come around, are as much +company as any man needs to wish for. +</P> + +<P> +"When I came here I was tired of the world, dead tired of it. And I +have n't got rested yet. I shall not leave here until I do. And I +don't suppose that will ever be. For my time will soon come. It's all +I have to look forward to, and I just sit here and wait for it and +wonder what shape Death will have when he does finally find me out. +That is the only thing in the world I have any curiosity about, now; +and I often think about it in much the same way that I used to wonder, +when I was a youth, what the woman would be like whom I was to love." +</P> + +<P> +The next summer we camped at the mouth of a canyon near the foot of +Monte Pinos, but one day we drove across the hills to pay a visit to +Old Dan, and learned at the stage station that he was no more. He had +sickened and died alone, in the early spring, and his body had been +found, after many days, in his cabin by his nearest "neighbor," another +lone man living ten miles away. We drove on to his deserted little +ranch and found that they had made a grave for him on the side of the +hill above the cabin—a grave marked only by its settling mound of +earth and one poor piece of board, cracked, aslant, and weather-beaten, +and bearing neither name nor date. +</P> + +<P> +Doubtless it is as well so. For he that lies beneath was only a piece +of wreckage, with a past that was dead and a future that was empty. +The memory of all those turbulent years was heavy upon his gray head, +and he wished only that the hills might cover him and give him rest and +concealment. +</P> + +<P> +And away on the other side of the continent there is a grave that has +known the tears of love and the hand of remembrance. Its flowers are +bright and its shining marble is graven fair with name and date and +words of praise. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE STORY, OF A CHINEE KID +</H3> + + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "Little Ah Sid<BR> + Was a Chinee Kid,<BR> +A cute little cuss, you 'd declare,<BR> + With eyes full of fun<BR> + And a nose that begun<BR> +Right up at the roots of his hair."<BR> + --M. C. SPEER.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This Chinee Kid was not Ah Sid, but another one whose name was Ah Wing. +He was a Chinee Kid only so far as he was n't a Boy, and just how much +of him was Chinee Kid and how much was Boy is difficult to say. +Sometimes he seemed to be mostly all one, and sometimes just as much +the other, and, again, he was a harmonized mixture of the two. +</P> + +<P> +Wing's father and mother were both Chinese, but Wing had been born and +had lived all his nine years in the town of Tobin, which is in +California, on the overland road, far enough up the Sierra climb for +the east-bound trains to have always two engines when they pass its +depot. He wore Chinese clothes, except upon his head, whereon +invariably reposed the time-honored hat of the American village boy, +that always looks the same whether it is one week or one year old—the +hat that is dirty gray in color, conical as to crown, sloping as to +brim, and dilapidated as to general appearance, the hat that is +irrefragable proof that its wearer is a Boy. This head-gear he wore +over the queue of his forefathers, braided, ebony, shining, and hanging +half-way down his little legs. +</P> + +<P> +Wing could jabber Chinese as shrilly and rapidly as any of his +playmates of the Chinese quarter, and with his young friends of the +white race he could reel off amazing vocabularies of American slang. +And he could swear, and frequently did so, with all the nonchalance of +a Chinaman and the intensity and picturesqueness of an American. He +could, if the occasion seemed to demand it, drop his eyelids and "<I>No +sabe</I>" as stupidly as any Celestial who ever entered the Golden Gate. +But with any man, woman, or child whom he chose to favor with his +conversation he could talk volubly in fairly good English. And his +lungs were just as capable, and just as frequently put to the test, as +those of any white boy in Tobin, of the ear-splitting shouts and yells +without which boys' games cannot be played and boys' thoughts +communicated to one another. +</P> + +<P> +Wing had such an amazing ability to seem to be everywhere at the same +time that he was nicknamed "Wings." But no one ever called him that to +his face who wanted him to answer a question or pay any attention to +what was said to him. The first time it was tried he protested, with +all the dignity of George Washington insisting on his title of +President, that his name was Wing. After that he merely met the +nickname with a blank, solemn, "<I>No sabe</I>" stare, as uncompromising and +as impenetrable as a stone wall. It was impossible to look out of +doors at any time or in any part of Tobin without seeing Wing. He was +always going somewhere and was always in a hurry, but he was always +ready to stop and chat for a moment with any one, large or small, who +addressed him without giving offence. +</P> + +<P> +Everybody knew him, residents and summer visitors alike. The men all +teased him and the women all petted him. Nobody knew or cared in which +one of the dozen houses of the Chinese quarter Wing's father and mother +lived, nor whether his father had a laundry, a store, or a garden. +They were nobodies; but Wing was a public character. +</P> + +<P> +Wing's chief daily function was to assist at the arrival of the +east-bound passenger train. The west-bound, having only one engine, +was of less consequence. But at the passing of the other he never +missed a day, Sundays, holidays, or rainy season. He inspected the +engines, counted the wheels, considered the possibility of getting a +ride on the pilot of the second engine, dodged around through the +crowd, ran against people, had his toes trodden on, saw everybody who +went away, stared at all who came, capered up and down the car-steps, +put pins on the rail to be flattened by the wheels, stood with one foot +inside the track until the train started, and, after it was all over, +rode away triumphantly, hanging to the steps of the hotel omnibus. +</P> + +<P> +After a while he began to thrill with the desire to know how it would +feel to run backward on the track in front of the moving engine. He +had had a brief glimpse of the possibility of that bliss as he crossed +the track one day when the train was coming in; and the more he thought +about it, the surer he felt that some day he would have to do it. He +was well acquainted by that time with the engines, and the engineers +too, and his trick of standing astride the rail and looking up with +sparkling, defiant eyes at the engine's noble front was only a sort of +preparation for other deeds. +</P> + +<P> +One day he had assisted at the dismounting of the passengers, had seen +the last departing traveller disappear inside the cars, had had his +queue pulled by the news agent, and a narrow escape from being knocked +over by the baggage man's trunk van, when he started off at top speed +to get in front of the engine before the train should start. A young +woman with a baggage check in her hand was standing near an omnibus +waiting for the driver to come. Wing's headlong speed would have +carried him safely past her, but a big man with two suit-cases was +rushing toward him, and as he veered to one side he struck heavily +against the girl. The blow knocked her against the steps of the +omnibus and sent Wing sprawling in the dust. +</P> + +<P> +A slender, trim-looking young man, who had got off the train and was +about to enter the omnibus of another hotel, saw the collision and +sprang to her assistance. Helping her to her feet, he asked anxiously +if she was hurt, and then seized Wing's arm and gave him a little +shaking. +</P> + +<P> +"You young rascal!" he exclaimed. "Why don't you look where you are +going?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, don't scold him, please!" the girl pleaded. "He did n't intend to +do it, and I 'm not hurt at all. Wing, how do you do? Did it hurt +you?" +</P> + +<P> +Wing was indignantly tearing himself loose from the young man's hand +and was looking wishfully after the departing train and the lost +opportunity. +</P> + +<P> +"Lemme go," he demanded. "No, didn't hurt." +</P> + +<P> +The young woman blushingly thanked the stranger as he helped her into +the vehicle. Then, instead of returning to the other omnibus, which +was waiting for him, he shook his head at the driver and stepped in +after her. As they rattled up the street he found it difficult to keep +his eyes off her slender, supple figure and the shining glory of +golden-red hair that aureoled the clear, soft brilliance of her pink +and white complexion. When she looked up once and caught his look of +admiration she blushed deeply and endeavored to disguise her +embarrassment in lively talk with some people who sat near her. The +newcomer saw that they were evidently old friends and inferred that she +was a resident of the town. From scraps of their talk that reached his +ears he learned that her name was Annie Millner, and that she was a +physician's daughter.' +</P> + +<P> +The young man inscribed his name on the hotel register, "Robert +Ellison, Worcester, Mass.," and then sauntered out to take a look at +the town. He watched the omnibus from which he had just dismounted, as +it stopped in front of a pretty cottage set back in some pleasant +grounds on the slope of the opposite hill, until he saw Miss Millner +enter the gate. +</P> + +<P> +"I guess I 'll like it better here than I expected to," was his thought +as his eye followed her figure. "This air feels good, the sunshine is +fine, and that's a glorious blue sky. They say I 'm likely to become +an invalid if I try to live East any longer, and so that's cut out. +Well, a fellow could have plenty of out-door life here, and enjoy it, +if there are many days like this. It looks as if there 'd be money in +these orchards too. I reckon Dr. Millner must live in that cottage. +What an inviting looking place it is! I guess I 'd better go back to +the hotel and ask the clerk about the physicians here. I might need +one sometime." +</P> + +<P> +Discreet inquiry of the hotel clerk as to the population of the town, +resident and floating, its general healthfulness, the number of +health-seekers, their success, and the number and relative skill of the +physicians it supported finally elicited for Ellison all the +information his present interest desired concerning Dr. Millner and his +family. +</P> + +<P> +He also learned much about the history of Tobin. In its early days it +had been a mining camp and, as Tobin's Gulch, had been rich and famous. +Then, as the mines petered out, it had dwindled to poverty and two rows +of houses. But, after a long while, new people had begun to come. +Some of them had planted miles upon miles of orchards and vineyards, +others had come to be cured of bodily ills by its climate, at once +bracing and caressing, and still others, there for a brief summer +sojourn, had spread the knowledge that it was a pleasant and +picturesque retreat. So the town had dropped the plebeian "Gulch" from +its name and as "Tobin" counted with ever increasing pride the hundreds +of cars that carried its fruit from ocean to ocean and the growing +numbers of its health-seekers and summer visitors. +</P> + +<P> +"It looks good to me," was Ellison's inward comment as he walked up the +street again. "I think I 'll look into this fruit business. That +would give me an out-door life, and there seems to be money in it. +That's a neat cottage of Dr. Millner's. I 'll walk past and look at +the grounds. Hello, here comes that Chinee Kid—what 'd she call him? +Wing, wasn't it? Queer-looking little critter, but she seemed to like +him. Hello, Wing! Where are you flying to now? Got over your bumps +yet?" +</P> + +<P> +But the Chinee Kid cast one sober, stupid look at Ellison's sociable +countenance, opened his mouth just wide enough to grunt "<I>No sabe</I>," +and hurried on. +</P> + +<P> +Ellison looked after him with a foolish little smile and exclaimed +aloud, "Well, I 'll be hanged! If that is n't a kid!" +</P> + +<P> +He heard the sound of a girl's laugh, and turning quickly, saw a merry +face surrounded by golden-red hair disappearing from a window of the +Millner cottage. He blushed furiously, frowned and muttered an angry +little word, as he thought, "That kid needs to be spanked." But, +although he was smarting a little with the feeling that the boy had +made him seem ridiculous in her eyes, his glance covertly searched her +windows as he walked on, hoping for another glimpse of the girlish +figure and the glowing hair. +</P> + +<P> +A year went by, and Ellison, brown and athletic-looking, was building a +pretty cottage on the crest of a gently sloping hill just outside the +town. Annie Millner, wearing a new ring and carrying a great happiness +in her heart, went often to see how the cottage was progressing and how +the trees were growing. For the hill-slope was covered with the +gray-green of young olive trees, the dense, dark foliage of young +oranges, and the stunted, scraggy boughs of the Japanese persimmon. +His fruit ranch promised well, the day for their bridal was set, and +they were hopeful, glad, and happy. +</P> + +<P> +But Wing was the young man's implacable enemy. He neither forgot nor +forgave the shaking he had received at their first meeting, and he +revenged himself for it as much as lay in his small power whenever he +found opportunity. He succeeded occasionally in making Ellison look +foolish in his own eyes; and he, in consequence, disliked the child and +disapproved of the universal petting that was given him. It +particularly annoyed him that Annie showed his small enemy so much +favor, and he would sometimes think angrily, when irritated by some +trick of the Chinee Kid, that if she had more regard for his feelings +she would not join in the general encouragement that was given to the +heathen brat in being a public nuisance. +</P> + +<P> +As for Wing, if he had known, or could have understood what happiness +his childish sport had been instrumental in bringing to these two +people, it is probable that his antipathy to Ellison would have +extended even to Annie, whom, as it was, he considered one of his best +friends. But he could not know, nor could they, that he was their +kismet and that his small brown hands wound and unwound, tangled and +straightened, the threads of their lives. +</P> + +<P> +One day they were all three at the depot again. Wing, of course, was +there in the discharge of his usual duties. Annie had walked down to +welcome a friend whom she expected, and Ellison had come because it +gave him an opportunity to be with her. As the railroad approached the +town from the west it passed through a deep cut, from which it came out +on a low embankment, and rounded a sharp curve before it reached the +station, a few yards beyond. The roar of the oncoming train was borne +to them on the wind and before it emerged from the cut a ridiculous +little figure darted out of the crowd on the platform and raced down +the track to the curve. It was dressed in a Chinese blouse and +trousers of faded and dirty blue denim, while a pair of old Chinese +slippers, partly covering the feet, left in full view two bare, brown +heels. +</P> + +<P> +"There goes Wing!" exclaimed one man to another. "That kid 's going to +get killed at this little trick of his some day." +</P> + +<P> +The train rushed at the curve with a shout that was thrown back from +the hills, and the people on the platform held their breath—though to +many of them it was nothing new—as with flying feet and monkey-like +agility the Chinee Kid danced backward on the track. There was a brief +vision of a pair of big, blue sleeves waving in the air, of a black, +flying queue, and of a pair of twinkling feet, and then with sparkling +eyes, a triumphant countenance and a loud "Ki-yi!" Wing leaped to the +platform, the engine scarcely a yard behind him. +</P> + +<P> +"Is it lots of fun, Wing?" said Annie, smiling at him indulgently. +</P> + +<P> +"Bet your boots it is!" he shouted as he darted off to inspect the +dismounting passengers. +</P> + +<P> +"See here, Wing," said Ellison, putting his hand in a kindly way on the +boy's shoulder, "you mustn't do that! You'll get killed at it some +day." +</P> + +<P> +Wing looked up at him with an uncomprehending stare, wriggled from +under his detaining hand, stopped long enough to shake his head with a +stolid "<I>No sabe</I>," and then dodged away. +</P> + +<P> +Annie had heard the little dialogue and now turned to Ellison with a +merry laugh. Her friend had not come, and as they walked back together +she began to rally him about Wing's refusal to understand anything he +said. It nettled him slightly and he replied that people made entirely +too much of the little ape, and that if they would teach him better +manners instead of petting him so much, it would be a good thing for +him as well as for the public comfort. +</P> + +<P> +Then Annie took up his case rather warmly and declared that he was a +cute little thing, and that his manners were all right if he was +treated with good manners in the first place. The consequence was that +by the time they reached her gate they were deep in the lurid +entanglements of a lovers' quarrel. +</P> + +<P> +The previous day she had taken a horseback ride with a man of whom +Ellison strongly disapproved. He had intended to explain the matter to +her calmly and tell her just what kind of man the other was, and why it +was unwise for her to accept his attentions. But in the heat of temper +engendered by their quarrel about Wing, he lost his bearings, and what +he had meant should be a request for her not to show the man any favor +again became very like an explicit command. +</P> + +<P> +Annie asked him sarcastically if he thought he had bought with his +engagement ring a slave who was never to open her mouth unless he gave +her leave. Then, feeling a bit ashamed of his vehemence and mentally +fumbling for words of explanation, he began to say something about what +"self-respecting girls" should do. Annie flashed a blazing look at +him, slammed the gate, and left him alone on the sidewalk. A little +later he saw the objectionable man making a bargain with Wing about +carrying a note, and with a sore and angry heart he watched the shabby +hat and the long queue travel up the hill to the Millner home. +</P> + +<P> +While he was at work among his trees that afternoon he saw them ride +past. He noted the defiant poise of Annie's head, which did not turn +by so much as a hair's breadth toward the cottage and the trees and +him, but he was not near enough to see that her eyes were red and that +she bit her lip to control its trembling. So he wrote a letter to her +that evening saying that evidently they had made a mistake; and an hour +later he had the engagement ring in his pocket and a great bitterness +in his heart. +</P> + +<P> +Two days afterward, as Annie sat on the veranda of a friend's house +near the depot she saw the hotel omnibus coming down the street with +Ellison in it. "Why, there's Robert!" she exclaimed. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said her friend, looking at her curiously, "he 's going East. +Did n't you know it?" +</P> + +<P> +Instantly all of Annie's pride gave way. She was in the wrong, she +told herself, and she would ask him to forgive her. She would send a +note to him at the station and ask him not to go away without seeing +her. +</P> + +<P> +"I 'll have time," she thought, "for they said the train is a few +minutes late to-day and I 'll get Wing to carry it over to the station. +There he is now, waiting at the curve." +</P> + +<P> +She hurriedly pencilled a few words upon a scrap of paper and, folding +it as she went, ran down the steps and up a side street parallel with +the railroad, and then climbed the low embankment upon which the boy +stood. +</P> + +<P> +Wing was waiting in the middle of the track for the train and the +ecstasy of his daily performance. In the meantime he was holding out +at arm's length and considering with proud and satisfied eyes a big, +artificial spider and web which had that morning been given to him by +one of the ladies at the hotel. +</P> + +<P> +"Wing," she called, "I want you to run back to the station and give +this note to Mr. Ellison. You 'll see him there on the platform, or, +perhaps, in the baggage room. You 'll have plenty of time, for the +train 's late today. Please go quickly, Wing, for I want him to have +the note at once." +</P> + +<P> +The train was already rumbling in the deep cut just beyond the turn, +but the wind was blowing strongly toward it, and neither of them heard +the fateful sound. The high wind caught her dress and blew it against +the spider in the boy's hand. It tangled the toy in the folds and +wrenched it from his fingers and then caught the hem of her gown upon +the splitting edge of a worn rail. As she stooped to loose it the +terrible front of the engine appeared, rounding the curve. +</P> + +<P> +Wing looked in blank amazement at his empty fingers and then, as he saw +his plaything hanging to the folds of her dress, he sprang after it +exclaiming, "My bug! My bug!" As he seized it again he saw the +approaching train, and, his mind bent on what he was intending to do, +turned to begin his usual backward race. Annie, stooping to loose her +dress, with her back to the approaching train, was not yet aware of the +oncoming doom. Her gown blew again across his legs, and to free +himself he gave her a little push. With the warning shriek of the +engine in her ears and darkness surging over her brain she fell just +outside the track and rolled down the sloping embankment as far as her +skirt, held beneath the wheels of the engine, allowed. +</P> + +<P> +But for the Chinee Kid there was no such escape. The iron hoof of the +engine was upon him as he made his first backward leap. When they +picked up his little, mangled body the spider was still grasped in his +brown fist. +</P> + +<P> +The crowd on the station platform had seen it all—had seen him, as the +engine rounded the curve, turn to Annie and push her off the track, +thus saving her life at the cost of his own. +</P> + +<P> +The townspeople persuaded his parents to let them give him a public +funeral, to which all Tobin turned out, with tears and flowers and +resolutions praising the little boy in high-sounding words for his +heroic deed. A public subscription was taken up for the benefit of +Wing's parents, to which Annie's father and lover and all her friends +and everybody who had liked and petted the child contributed so +liberally that his father and mother took his remains and sailed back +to China. +</P> + +<P> +When Ellison, from the platform, saw Annie's danger everything left his +heart save absorbing love for her, and with a white face and +alarm-distended eyes he dashed across the track and had her in his arms +before the others had recovered from their brief paralysis of horror. +</P> + +<P> +They were married as soon as Wing's obsequies were over. And now, if +you ever pass through Tobin and will look for that sunny hillside with +the olive and orange trees climbing its slope and the pretty cottage on +its crest, you will see a home in which Wing's memory is enshrined with +all possible love and honor and gratitude. +</P> + +<P> +You see, they do not know that it was all on account of his "bug." +Neither do they know that, small, brown, Chinee Kid though he was, he +had stood in their lives for Fate. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +OUT OF SYMPATHY +</H3> + + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"Sympathy with his kind and well-doing for its +welfare, direct or indirect, are the essential conditions of +the existence and development of the more complex +social organism; and no mortal can transcend these +conditions with any success."—HENRY MAUDSLEY. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Our party was going from the Yosemite +Valley to Lake Tenaiya—that +beautiful bit of shining, liquid sapphire ringed +by its mighty setting of granite peaks and +domes—by the long and roundabout way of +Cloud's Rest. It would be an all-day trip, but +we knew that at the end would be the cabin +of Henry Moulton, a lone mountaineer, to +receive us, with such comfort as it could give, +and Henry Moulton himself to cook for us +a supper of fresh fish and game. The thoughts +of the whole party began to turn longingly in +that direction as the afternoon of the late +summer day waned, and in straggling, silent file +we hurried our horses, with such speed as was +possible, over the blind trail. The Artist, who +was next in front of me, turned in his saddle +and said: +</P> + +<P> +"We ought to get a warm welcome at Moulton's +cabin. For this is the first party that has +been up here for two months, and it's not likely +that he has seen another human being in all that time." +</P> + +<P> +"Does he live all alone, then?" +</P> + +<P> +"Absolutely alone. He has a cabin on the +banks of Lake Tenaiya—it is only about three +or four miles farther, now—and whenever +parties of tourists come up from the Valley to +stay a day or two, he cooks for them and lets +them sleep in his shanty if they wish. He is +a very strange man, and I hope you will be +able to draw him into conversation, for I 'm +sure you would find him an interesting +character. His life story is the queerest thing I 've +run across on the Pacific Coast, and if you +won't give away to him that you know +anything about it, I 'll tell it to you." +</P> + +<P> +At once I scented big game, for the Artist +had spent many summers in that region and +knew all that was strange or weird or startling +in its history. Already he had told me many +tales, and if this was to be the strangest of them +all I wanted to hear it. So I urged my horse +on and by dint of circling around trees and +jumping over logs and occasionally falling +into single file, we managed to keep within +talking distance of each other while he told +me this tale of the lone man at Lake Tenaiya: +</P> + +<P> +"I knew Moulton years ago—thirty, yes, +thirty-five of them—in Cambridge, where we +were boys together. He went to Harvard and +was graduated from both the academic and the +law departments, and was looked upon as a +promising young man. If any prophet had +foretold to me, in those days, that Henry +Moulton would become a hermit in the Sierras +and do cooking for tourists, I would have told +him he was the father of lies, and had better +retreat to his natural home. Moulton married +a handsome young woman of an influential +family—his own people were poor—and all +his friends were confident that a brilliant +future awaited him. +</P> + +<P> +"A few years after his marriage he came +West, intending to settle in San Francisco and +practise law. His wife stayed behind until he +should get a start. The gold fever was n't +dead yet in those days, and Moulton had a bad +attack of it. When I came to the Coast he +was working in some played-out placer mines, +and feeling perfectly sure that he was going +to strike a fortune almost any day. When a +man has once dug gold out of the ground with +his own hands, he seems to be unfitted for doing +anything else. It's as bad as the gambler's +mania. Well, the fever got into Moulton's +blood, and he gave himself up to it, drifting +about, prospecting, and sometimes striking a +good thing, but often quite the contrary. +</P> + +<P> +"Finally his wife came on, and she persuaded +him to give up the gold hunt and his roving +life and settle down in San Francisco to the +practice of his profession. He got on +remarkably well, had all the business he could attend +to, and was making a heap more money than +there was the slightest probability of his ever +digging out of the ground. But the fever of +his vagrant, irresponsible life was still in his +veins, and with all that promise of a successful +career before him he was restless and unhappy. +He could not forget the camp fire in the +mountains and the whispering of the pine trees and +the life of the woods. I don't know if you +understand—" and the Artist hesitated, +turning upon me an uncertain, questioning glance. +</P> + +<P> +"I know what you mean," I answered. "Go +on and say what you had in mind. It's a +fascinating question." +</P> + +<P> +"That it is," he replied, "and I never can +decide whether it is something fine and high +in a man's nature which makes him want to +yield to that sort of a yearning, or whether it +is mere latent savagery, coming out all the +stronger for having been long repressed. +</P> + +<P> +"But what's the use of speculating? The +bald truth is that if a man has a strong feeling +for Nature and once knows the charm of +wandering alone in wild places, he 'll have a string +tied to him forever after, that will give him +some mighty hard jerks. +</P> + +<P> +"Moulton felt all that fascination very +keenly, and the mountains and the forests +seemed to be always calling him and commanding +him to return to them. The follies and the +faults of men and the baseness of human +nature, of which, of course, the practice of his +profession gave him special knowledge, +irritated him, and every new case made him more +impatient with civilization and more +contemptuous of his fellow men. +</P> + +<P> +"I was in the courtroom once when he won +a big case which had been bitterly contested. +A crowd of lawyers was there, and they were +all enthusiastic about the way he had conducted +it and the brilliant victory he had won. They +pressed around to congratulate him, but he got +away from them as soon as he could and went +into the street with me. We walked a block +or more before he spoke, and then he burst out bitterly: +</P> + +<P> +"'I 've won some thousands of dollars and +a lot of prestige in this case, but what is it all +worth? I 'd give it all to lie just one night, +perfectly free, under the pine trees in the +mountains, beside a worthless prospect hole, +watching a bear shambling through the brush, +and listening to the coyotes yelping in the +distance. Even a coyote is better than most men, +and a bear is noble company beside them!' +</P> + +<P> +"Moulton's wife was as dissatisfied as he, but +in a different way. She was of Puritan +stock—and the sturdy moral sense of those old +fellows, their rock-ribbed principles, and their +determination to make other people think as they +thought, came out strong in her character. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course, that kind of a woman was bound +to be shocked by the more free and easy life +of the Pacific Coast. Her constant mental +state was one of stern disapproval. And the +gypsy outcropping in her husband's nature +filled her with anxiety. It was quite +impossible for her to understand it or to sympathize +with it in the least. +</P> + +<P> +"Their marriage had been an ardent love +match, and notwithstanding the way their +natures had been drifting apart they still loved +each other devotedly. At home, where she +had been in harmony with her surroundings, +she had been a very charming woman. And +so she was still—only—well, I must admit +that she did seem out of place here. She was +so uncompromising, you know. +</P> + +<P> +"I did n't wonder, though, that she was +amazed and confounded by the change in her +husband's character. It would have shocked +any of his old friends and it must have been +an awful blow to his wife, who was still as +ambitious for him as he had once been for himself. +</P> + +<P> +"She had one general name for this +unexpected development in him and called it all +his 'bearism.' At first she applied it in fun, +when he told her how much he had enjoyed +watching and hunting the wild animals in the +mountains, but she soon decided that it was a +pretty good name for his new characteristics. +And so his 'bearism' came to be more and more +of a division between them. Not that they ever +quarrelled—I am sure they did not. They +just agonized over the hopeless state of affairs, +and each one seemed to be always pained and +grieved because it was impossible to come round +to the other one's way of thinking. +</P> + +<P> +"Finally, Dorothy—his wife—went home +on a visit. I think she did it in a last desperate +hope that she might induce him to follow her +and stay in the East. For a little while after +she left, Moulton braced up and put more heart +into his work. He seemed to feel, at last, some +pride in his really splendid capacities, and to +have some revival of his old ambitions. +</P> + +<P> +"I thought he had overcome the gypsy +longing, and had buckled down to work for good. +And so I was much surprised one day, when I +found him in an unusually gloomy mood, to +see him take down both of his diplomas and +fling them into the fire. +</P> + +<P> +"'Gewgaws!' he exclaimed, contemptuously. +'Trinkets! No sensible man ought to care a +snap of his finger either for them or for what +they represent.' +</P> + +<P> +"We had a long talk after that, and he told +me fully what shape his thoughts had been +taking. It was that same story, which so many +people have been telling of late years, of +sneering pessimism as to the human race and its +possibilities, and of contempt for the labors and +rewards of life. We argued the matter for +hours, and each one of us convinced himself +that the other was entirely wrong. +</P> + +<P> +"Moulton was then finishing up an +important case, and as soon as it was concluded, he +and some friends went away to have a few days +of hunting in the mountains. He did not +return with the others, who said that he had not +quite finished his hunt, but that he expected to +be back within a week. I went East just then +and stayed a year, and when I reached San +Francisco again I found he had not yet +returned. And he has not been back to this day. +</P> + +<P> +"I heard of him occasionally, sometimes in +one part of the State, sometimes in another, +prospecting, hunting, trapping, roaming +about, but always in the mountains, and always +keeping pretty well away from signs of civilization. +</P> + +<P> +"Six years ago, when I first came to the +Yosemite, I found Moulton here, acting as a +guide. The loveliness and the majesty of the +place had entranced him, just as they have +entranced many another, and he stayed here, +working as a guide, for several years. But he +let me know at once that he did n't want me +to speak about his past life, either to him or +to others, and so no one here ever knew that +we were anything more than the merest +roadside acquaintances. +</P> + +<P> +"Four or five years ago he tired of even the +civilization of the Valley, and built a cabin up +here at Lake Tenaiya, so that he would not see +so many people. He is willing to cook for the +occasional parties that go up to the lake, and +very glad, I guess, when they leave him alone +again with the trees and the mountains. When +the snow drives him out in the fall he goes down +to the Valley and lives as caretaker during the +winter in one of the hotels—which is quite as +lonely as his summer life—until it is possible +to come up to his cabin again in the spring." +</P> + +<P> +"And his wife?" I asked. "What has become of her?" +</P> + +<P> +"After she found that she could not induce +him to return to civilization she got a divorce; +and the last I knew of her she was devoting +herself to the advancement—Whoa, there! +What's the matter with you?" +</P> + +<P> +Both his horse and mine gave a sudden snort +and a bound, and started to run. We checked +them at the second leap and peered through the +underbrush to see what had frightened them. +A dark object was rustling the leaves on the +ground beside a clump of bushes. +</P> + +<P> +"It's a bear!" the Artist whispered excitedly, +drawing his revolver. "I know this is reckless, +but—you are n't afraid, are you?—the +temptation is too much for my prudence. If he +comes for us we 'll give our horses the rein and +they 'll outrun him." +</P> + +<P> +I leaned forward, trying to get a better view, +and just as I heard the click of the trigger I +caught a glimpse of a white human foot. +</P> + +<P> +"Stop!" I cried. "It's a man!" +</P> + +<P> +It was too late to stop the discharge, but a +quick turn of his wrist sent the bullet whistling +harmlessly through the trees. The creature +scrambled hurriedly away through the dead +leaves, and our horses, trembling and snorting, +tried again to run. +</P> + +<P> +"It is a bear!" he cried as we saw its shaggy +bulk awkwardly climbing the slope between +two clumps of bushes. "No, by Jove, it's got +hands and feet! Now, what in the—" +</P> + +<P> +Then the thing half turned toward us, and +we saw that it had a man's head and face, +covered with hair and beard. +</P> + +<P> +"Good God! It's Henry Moulton!" cried +the Artist. "Moulton! Moulton! Come back +here! What's the matter with you!" +</P> + +<P> +At the sound of his name the man sprang +to his feet, facing us. The bearskin which +wrapped his body slipped down and left him +entirely nude. In an instant he dropped upon +all fours again, drew the skin over him and +shambled away. +</P> + +<P> +We turned our staring eyes upon each other, +and there was no need to speak the appalling +thought that was in both our minds. With one +accord we plied our whips and drove our +unwilling and terrified horses in the direction he +had taken. We came near enough to see that +he was digging among the dry leaves for +acorns, and that his beard and mouth were +defiled with earth, and full of fragments of +leaves and acorn shells. But as soon as he saw +us he darted off into the thick underbrush, +whither we could not follow him. +</P> + +<P> +We hurried on to his shack, where the rest +of the party had already arrived, and the men +all started back at once with ropes and lariats +for Moulton's capture and garments for his covering. +</P> + +<P> +The cabin was a rough affair, made of logs +and chinked with fir boughs, and having an +earthen floor. A bunk made of rough timbers +and mattressed with twigs of fur was covered +with some blankets and clothing, tossed into +heaps. Under the blankets at the head of the +bunk I found a little pile of books—a +Shakespeare, a volume of Emerson's essays, +Thoreau's "Walden," and a well-worn "Iliad," in +the Greek text. +</P> + +<P> +"How queer," said one of the women, as she +looked curiously at the volumes, "that an +ignorant creature such as this crazy mountaineer +must be should have such books as these in his +cabin! They must have been left here by some +tourist, and he has put them away and kept +them. It shows how much respect even the +ignorant have for learning." +</P> + +<P> +Some torn scraps of paper were scattered +over the floor, and I picked them all up and +tried to piece them together. +</P> + +<P> +When the men returned with the lunatic he +was quiet and obedient, except when they tried +to substitute proper clothing for his bearskin. +Against this he fought with all his strength, +striking, scratching, and kicking with hands +and feet, snapping and biting viciously, and all +the time either roaring with fury, or, when they +succeeded in pulling the hide a little away from +him, groaning, shrieking, and writhing as if +he were being flayed. +</P> + +<P> +So they desisted and left him wrapped in +the skin and tied to a tree near the cabin door. +There he constantly walked back and forth on +all fours, the length of his rope, restlessly and +in silence, as caged animals do. If any one +approached too near he sprang at the intruder +with a savage growl and a snap of his jaws. +But otherwise he paid no attention to any of +those who had expected to be his guests. He +refused to eat, unless they offered him acorns +or dry oak leaves. These he devoured voraciously. +</P> + +<P> +There was some scrawled writing on the +scraps of paper I had pieced together and the +Artist and I made out some disjointed +sentences. We agreed that the lunatic must have +written them himself, in the first beclouding of +his mind, and we thought the words might have +some effect upon him. So we went out to +where the poor, crazed creature was tied, and, +looking him squarely in the eyes, the Artist +spoke very slowly: +</P> + +<P> +"Dorothy. Dorothy. She said I am a bear. +Where is Dorothy?" +</P> + +<P> +He stopped and stared and a puzzled, human +look came into his eyes. He rose slowly to +his feet and stood upright, leaning against the +tree. For the moment he forgot his bearskin +covering and it half fell off. He stared at us, +mumbling strange sounds, which presently +became incoherent words of human speech. But +he spoke thickly and uncertainly, like one long +unused to the sound of his voice: +</P> + +<P> +"Where is—Dorothy? I want—she +said—Dorothy—Dorothy—she said—I—a +bear—I—I—am—a bear." +</P> + +<P> +Then he dropped to all fours again and drew +his bearskin closely about him and that was the +last flicker of human intelligence that he showed. +</P> + +<P> +The next morning the men made a small +platform of some loose boards to which they +tied the lunatic. He fought desperately +against his bonds, and it required the combined +strength of all the men of the party to fasten +him securely to the platform. Then the guide +improvised a harness of ropes and hitched to +this primitive sled the horse which he himself +rode. Watching the poor creature closely, our +little party went slowly back to the Valley, +whence he was sent to an asylum. The Artist +wrote to Mrs. Moulton an account of his +condition, and told her also its probable cause. +</P> + +<P> +Some months afterward I went to the +asylum, purposely to learn what had become of +him. The physician said his mental condition +was steadily improving, that there was a pretty +sure prospect of his recovery, and that he would +probably be sane all the rest of his life, if—and +the doctor put a significant emphasis upon +that little word—"if he lives as a sane man +should, among men, and busies himself as other men do." +</P> + +<P> +Then the man of healing took from a shelf +a book and read to me the words which I have +put at the beginning of this account. +</P> + +<P> +He told me also that Mrs. Moulton was +there, that she had been there almost from +the first, and that she spent all the time with the +unfortunate man that the physicians would allow. +</P> + +<P> +"Her presence," the doctor added, "has had a +singularly helpful effect upon him." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AN OLD ROMAN OF MARIPOSA +</H3> + + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"I thank whatever gods may be<BR> +For my unconquerable soul."<BR> + --WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Mariposa, in the days when I first knew it, was still a wreck of the +gold fever. The merest skeleton of its former self, it lay there in +the gulch between the chaparral-covered foothills and hugged its +memories of the days when it was young and lusty and had a murder every +morning for breakfast. All around it the gashed and seamed and scarred +and furrowed earth bore testimony to the labors of those stirring +times, when men dug a fortune out of the ground in a day—and spent it +in the town at night. +</P> + +<P> +It was my first visit to the town, but I soon found that the people +still lived in the past. The first man with whom I talked made vivid +for my eyes the placer mines down the bed of the creek, in his young +days as thronged as a city street, but now deserted and blistering in +the sun; made me hear the sounds of bar-room frolicking and fighting, +and the rolling chorus of "Forty-nine"; made me see, as he had seen, +the piles of gold-dust and nuggets upon the gaming tables, and the +hundreds of gold-weighted miners trooping into town on Saturday night. +And every man and woman with whom I talked did the same thing for me, +with new incidents and characters, until the hours became a fast-moving +panorama of the "days of gold," and I began to feel as if I myself were +living through their excitements and had drawn their delirium into my +veins. +</P> + +<P> +My hostess, herself an old-timer, began the entertainment anew as we +sat on her porch in the early forenoon of the next day, breathing deep +draughts of the honey-scented air blowing down the hills from thousands +of pink-flowered manzanita bushes. She told me how she and her sister +had alighted from the stage in Mariposa one evening, so many years +before, when they were both "just slips of girls." They were the very +first white women there, and the men, hundreds of them, who had not +seen the form of woman, save Indian squaws, for many months, came to +their shanty, called their father outside and begged to be allowed just +to look at them. So the two came shyly out, hand in hand, and the men +crowded around them with looks of respectful adoration, and then passed +on to make way for others. One fell on his knees and kissed the hem of +her dress. And presently a voice rose out of the throng, and the whole +great crowd quickly joined in the hymn, "Nearer, my God, to Thee." +</P> + +<P> +As we talked, one or another old-timer stopped to greet us and to add +for my entertainment still more recollections of the days when they and +hope and Mariposa were young. My pulses beat fast with the excitement +of that dead life which their stories called into being again and I +forgot that they and the century too had grown old since the times of +which they spoke—until the Newspaper Man came along, and the sight of +him brought me back to the present with a sudden jerk. I had seen him +last in San Francisco, only a week previous, but he had been in +out-of-the-way, ghost-of-the-past Mariposa, he told me, for several +days, reporting a murder trial for his paper. +</P> + +<P> +"Better come to this afternoon's session of the case," he said. "The +prisoner is n't much, but his father 's the most interesting old chap I +'ve run across since I 've been on the Coast. I 'll tell you about him +as we walk over." +</P> + +<P> +So we sauntered up the hot, dusty street to the court-house, between +the rows of straggling, forlorn little houses, each one with its own +thrilling memory of the "days of Forty-nine"; and the Newspaper Man's +tale, like everything else in Mariposa, took its being and its +beginning from that same boisterous time. +</P> + +<P> +"It's a brutal, ghastly case," he said, "and to my mind the only +mystery about it is the prisoner's father. He is a fine-looking man, +with the manner and the head of an old Roman. He has the reputation of +being the straightest and squarest man in the county; and how he ever +came to be the father of such a good-for-nothing scum-of-the-earth as +the prisoner I can explain only on the supposition that he is n't. +</P> + +<P> +"The old man is one of the pioneers in Mariposa, and they tell me that +he was one of the nerviest men that ever drew a gun in this town. He +killed his man in those days, just as lots of other good men did, but +it was in self-defence; and everybody was glad that the town was rid of +the man he dropped, and so nothing was said about it. There was a +coroner's jury, which gave a verdict of suicide, and explained their +finding on the ground that it was suicidal for any man to draw on Dan +Hopkins and then give Dan the chance to shoot first. +</P> + +<P> +"Along in the latter years of the gold excitement a woman came to the +town, who seems to have been part Portuguese, part Mexican, and all +bad. She followed some man here from San Francisco, and lived as hard +a life as the times and place made possible. And after a while she +went to Dan Hopkins and told him that he must marry her. At first he +would n't consider seriously either her story or her proposition. But +she kept at him, swore by all the saints in the calendar that the child +was his, and then swore them all over again that if he did not marry +her she would kill the child and herself too as soon as it was born, +and their blood would be on his head. And finally he did marry her, +and made a home for her. +</P> + +<P> +"Time and again during this trial I 've watched that man's fine, stern +old face and wondered what his motives and his feelings were when he +took that poor beast of a woman to be his wife—whether he really +believed her and thought it was his duty; or whether he feared that if +he did not, the blood of a woman and a child would haunt him all the +rest of his life; or whether the underside of his nature, under her +influence, rose up and dominated all that was best in him and made him +love her and be willing to marry her. +</P> + +<P> +"Whatever it was, the deed was done, and the woman of the town became +Mrs. Hopkins, with Dan Hopkins's gun at her service, ready to take +revenge upon anybody who might offer her the least insult or whisper a +slighting word about the past. +</P> + +<P> +"He did not try to crowd her down people's throats—they might let her +alone if they wished, and they mostly did, I believe—but they were +made to understand that they had to treat her and speak of her with +respect. +</P> + +<P> +"He bought a big ranch a little way out of town, and there they lived +from that time on. As far as I can find out, the woman lived a +straight, respectable kind of life for a dozen years or more, and then +she died. +</P> + +<P> +"But all her badness seems to have descended to the boy. It's one of +the oddest studies in heredity I ever came across. The people here all +tell me that until he was thirteen or fourteen years old he was a manly +sort of a lad, and gave promise of being something like his father as +he grew up. But about that time the evil in him began to show itself, +and the older he grew the less moral principle he seemed to possess. +He was courageous, they say, and that was the only good quality he had. +It was a sort of dare-devil bravery, and along with it he was cruel, +thieving, untruthful, and—well, about as near thoroughly bad as they +make 'em. At least, that's the sum of the account of him the people +here have given me. +</P> + +<P> +"The old man was universally known to be so honest and square in all +his dealings, and so upright and honorable in every way, that the son's +depravity seemed all the blacker by contrast. He has stood by the +young fellow from the first of his wickedness, so everybody says, and +has always shown toward him not only steadfast affection, but just the +same sort of spirit that he did toward the boy's mother. +</P> + +<P> +"He has never intimated even to his best friend that the young man was +anything but the best and most dutiful son that ever lived. He has +kept him supplied with money, so that the fellow's only reason for the +petty thievery he did was pure love of stealing. He has paid his fines +when he has been arrested, and shielded him from public contempt, and +done everything possible to make it easy for him to be honest and +respectable. +</P> + +<P> +"But the boy has steadily gone on, they say, from bad to worse; and now +he has capped it all with this crime, which, in wilful and unprovoked +brutality, was worthy of a criminal hardened by twice his years and +experience. +</P> + +<P> +"He and another young blade about as bad as he is (though this one +seems to have been the one who planned it and led in its execution), +went to the house of an old man, who lived alone a little farther up in +the foothills toward the Yosemite Valley, and asked to be allowed to +stay all night. The old man took them in, got supper for them, and +made them as comfortable as he could. In the night they got up and +murdered him, stole all his money—he had just sold some horses and +cattle to the prisoner's father—and were preparing to skip the country +and go to Australia, when they were arrested. +</P> + +<P> +"The thing 's not been absolutely proved on young Hopkins yet, but the +circumstantial evidence is so plain that, even if there is nothing +else, I don't see how he 's going to escape the rope. I 've just heard +a rumor, though, that there 's to be some new evidence this afternoon +that will settle the matter without a doubt." +</P> + +<P> +The room rapidly filled up, and as we waited for court to open, the +Newspaper Man pointed out one and another hale old man whose clear eyes +and fresh skin belied his years, and told tales of his daring forty +years before, of the wealth he had dug from the earth, and of the +reckless ways in which he had lost it. And at last came the prisoner +and his father. The old man's figure was tall, erect, broad-chested, +and muscular, and his bearing proud and reserved. +</P> + +<P> +"I 'm always half expecting to see that old man get up," the Newspaper +Man whispered to me, "fold his arms across that great chest of his, and +say '<I>Romanus sum</I>,' and then proudly lead his son away." +</P> + +<P> +He must have been sixty-five years old or more, though he looked twenty +years younger. His dark hair and beard were only sifted with gray, and +he held himself so erect and with such dignity, and all the lines of +his countenance expressed such force and nobleness of character, that +the suggestion of his appearance was of the strength of middle age. +</P> + +<P> +But the boy was a painful contrast. His eye was shifty, his expression +weak and sensual, and the hard lines of his face and the indifference +of his manner told the story of a man old in criminal thoughts if not +in years and deeds. For he looked no more than twenty-five, and may +have been even younger. +</P> + +<P> +The father sat near him, and although they seldom spoke together he +frequently by some small act or apparently unconscious movement showed +a tenderness and affection for the wayward son that seemed all the +greater by contrast with his own proud reserve and the boy's hardened +indifference. +</P> + +<P> +The new testimony was brought in. The sheriff had set a go-between at +work with the two prisoners, and with his aid had secured copies of all +the notes they had at once begun writing to each other. In these +letters, which were all produced in court, they had freely discussed +their crime and argued about the points wherein they had made mistakes. +Young Hopkins had boasted to the other that they need not fear +conviction, because his father would certainly get them clear; and they +had planned what they would do after the trial was over, wallowing in +anticipations of a course of crime and debauchery. +</P> + +<P> +When the sheriff began to give this testimony the old man's hand was +resting affectionately on his son's shoulder. As it went on, laying +bare the depravity of the boy's soul, the muscles of his face quivered +a little, and presently, with just the suggestion of a flinching +shudder in face and figure, he took his hand away and shrank back a +little from the young man. I wondered as I watched him whether he was +admitting to himself for the first time that this was the evil child of +an evil woman, for whom there was no hope, or whether it was a +revelation to him of a depth of depravity in his son's heart of which +he had not guessed. +</P> + +<P> +Then the prosecution asked for a few minutes' recess, announcing that +it had a new witness to bring forward. After much hurrying to and fro, +and whispering and consulting among lawyers and court and prison +officials, young Hopkins's accomplice appeared on the witness-stand and +turned State's evidence. He had learned of the intercepted letters, +and, frightened by their probable result for himself, told the whole +story of the crime, from the time Hopkins had first broached it to him +until they were arrested in San Francisco. And during the entire +narration of the cold-blooded, brutal, and cowardly deed, old Dan +Hopkins sat with his eyes on the witness, as steady and unflinching in +color and nerve and muscle as if he had been listening to a lecture or +a sermon. +</P> + +<P> +I think he had decided, even then, what he would do, no matter what the +finding of the jury might be. +</P> + +<P> +At last it was all over; the jury listened to the judge's charge, and +filed out. "It's hanging, sure," said the Newspaper Man. "After that +evidence and that charge there's only one verdict they can bring in. +It's a good thing as far as the boy's concerned, but I do feel sorry +for his governor." +</P> + +<P> +Every one felt so sure that the jury would soon return that none left +their places, and a buzz of conversation soon filled the room. Old Dan +Hopkins sat with his arms folded, his head erect, and his eyes, steady +and clear, upon the empty witness chair. There were many sympathizing +glances sent toward him, though no one approached or spoke to him; for +it was evident from his compressed lips and frowning brow that he +preferred to be left alone. He had moved a little away from his son, +and sat scarcely ten feet distant on my left. When the jury returned, +in less than half an hour, he bent upon them the same abstracted gaze +and unmoved countenance. +</P> + +<P> +The foreman stood up and glanced sadly toward the man who had been his +friend and neighbor for many years. There were tears in his eyes, and +his voice broke and trembled as he gave their verdict, "Guilty of +murder in the first degree." +</P> + +<P> +Not a sound broke the death-like stillness of the room as he sat down, +and I noticed that every face within my view was turned away from the +prisoner's chair and the old man who sat near it. The tense strain of +the moment was broken by the prisoner's counsel, who arose and began a +motion for a new trial. +</P> + +<P> +But the click of a revolver sharply halted his first sentence, as Dan +Hopkins jumped to his feet with a sudden, swift movement of his right +arm. A dozen men leaped forward with outstretched arms crying, "Stop! +Stop!" +</P> + +<P> +But even before they could reach him the report rang through the room, +and just as they seized the father's arms the son dropped to the floor, +dead. He waved back the men who were pressing around him. +</P> + +<P> +"Stop!" he cried. "Stand back a minute!" And they fell back +instinctively. +</P> + +<P> +He walked calmly to the judge's desk and laid down his smoking pistol. +Then he folded his arms and faced about, with head thrown back, +flashing eyes, and colorless face. He looked at the sheriff, who, with +the sense of official duty strong upon him, had stepped out from the +huddled crowd and was coming toward him. +</P> + +<P> +"Wait one minute, let me speak," he said. "I believe you are all my +friends, for I have lived most of my life here, among you, and I hope I +have the respect and confidence and friendship of you all. But that," +and his flashing eyes rested for a moment upon the sheriff, the +lawyers, and then upon the judge, "must have no influence upon the +penalty I shall pay for what I have just done. The knowledge has been +bitter enough to me this afternoon that that poor boy there deserved +death. For the first time I have been convinced that he was bad from +the bottom of his heart, and that there was no hope for him. But with +my own hand I have killed him, that he might be saved the last horror +and disgrace. Let them, and the law's justice, be my portion, for I +deserve them for having given him life in the first place. Mine was +the first sin, and it is right that I should suffer the disgrace and +the penalty." +</P> + +<P> +He turned to the sheriff, holding out his arms for the handcuffs. +"Now, I am ready. Arrest me." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +OUT OF THE MOUTH OF BABES +</H3> + + +<P> +Perhaps it was a mere matter of nerves, but it seemed to me that +morning that it was the cliffs of the Valley. Those mighty, +overshadowing, everlasting walls and towers of the Yosemite seem to be +endowed with the power to produce numberless changes of feeling. +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes you gaze at them, and they lift up your spirit and hold it +aloft in the free air, and send it up, and up, and up, until it reaches +the very blue of heaven, and you know that you are free and powerful +and ennobled, made one with the saints and mighty ones of earth. +</P> + +<P> +The next morning you go forth and look up at those silent granite +heights, and expect them to repeat their miracle. But they will not. +They frown upon you and crush you down into the earth you are made of. +Like an accusing conscience, they lift their stern, forbidding faces +above you on all sides and look you steadily in the eyes with their +insistence upon your unworthiness, until, in despair, you are ready to +shut yourself up to escape their persecutions. +</P> + +<P> +Of course, as I said before, it may not be the cliffs at all. It may +be nothing but nerves. But I think it is the walls of the Valley. +</P> + +<P> +On that particular morning they had made me bite the dust until I could +no longer endure the sight of them. To escape their solemn, +contemptuous faces I ran down a little path which led into a dense +thicket of young pines and cedars. The trees grew so close together +that they shut out all view of everything beyond a few feet on each +side of the path. The ground was brown with their cast-off needles, +and the air was pungent with their fragrance. Overhead there were +glimpses of a smiling blue sky, and the cool, fragrant shadows of the +thicket were brightened by patches of gleaming sunshine. The friendly +sounds of woodpeckers hammering the trees, and of birds singing among +the branches, pleased my ears and diverted my thoughts. +</P> + +<P> +The only reminder of those towering granite Preachers, with their +everlasting "All is vanity," was the roaring and crashing of the +Yosemite Falls, which filled the Valley with their thunder and made the +air tremble. +</P> + +<P> +The sights, the sounds, the odors, enveloped my senses and filled me +with delighted, languorous content. It was very comforting, and I sat +down on a log in the edge of a little opening, all pink and fragrant +with wild roses, to enjoy the sensuous delight of it all and so take +revenge upon the great stone Preachers waiting for me outside the +thicket. +</P> + +<P> +Presently there came from beyond the glade a soft, crooning noise, +which in an instant more became that sweetest of sounds, the voice of a +happy child alone with nature. +</P> + +<P> +A little girl, perhaps four or five years old, came slowly down the +path. She was talking to herself and to the trees and birds and +squirrels, and even to the brown pine-needles under her feet. Her hat, +which she had stuck full of wild roses, hung at the back of her head, +the ends of her brown curls just peeping below it. Without the least +trace of childish shyness she came straight to where I sat, mounted the +log beside me, and asked me to take a thorn from her finger. +</P> + +<P> +"Did it hurt you?" I asked, as I patted the chubby brown fist after the +operation. "You are a very brave little girl not to cry." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I know it," she replied, looking at me with big violet eyes, +frank and confiding. She was a beautiful child, with a glorious +perfection of feature and complexion. "I 'm always brave. My papa +says so, and my new mamma says so, too. I 've got two mammas—my new +mamma and my gone-away mamma. But I like my new mamma best." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you? Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"'Cause she's always and always dust as good as she can be. And she +never and never says 'Stop this minute!' er 'at I make her head ache, +er 'at I 'm naughty, er anything. She dust puts her arms all 'round me +and says, 'Dear little girl.' An' 'en I 'm good. And I love my new +mamma, I do, better than my gone-away mamma." And she gave a decided +little nod, as if in defiance of some privately urged claim. +</P> + +<P> +"Where has your other mamma gone?" I asked, expecting to hear but the +one answer. She raised her long lashes and looked at me seriously. +</P> + +<P> +"You 're a tourist lady, ain't you? That's why you don't know. Well, +it was a tourist man, 'at stayed a long time, who tooked my gone-away +mamma away." +</P> + +<P> +"A tourist man? Why did he do that?" +</P> + +<P> +"'Cause he did n't want me 'round, I guess. When the flowers was here +that other time he comed to the store where my mamma sold all the +pretty things my papa made dust every day an' every day. An' I did n't +like him a bit, I did n't." +</P> + +<P> +"Why didn't you like him?" +</P> + +<P> +"'Cause he did n't like me, and did n't want me 'round. When my mamma +was there and I was there, he would come and talk to my mamma, an' 'en +he would tell her to send me away. An' 'en she would put me in the +back room; an' if I cried an' kicked the door, she would put me in the +closet. If the tourist man wasn't there, she loved me most all the +time." +</P> + +<P> +"Did n't she love you all the time, anyway?" +</P> + +<P> +For answer the small maiden shut her eyes tightly and shook her head +rapidly and decidedly. +</P> + +<P> +"Why do you think she did n't love you all the time?" +</P> + +<P> +"'Cause sometimes she was n't good to me." +</P> + +<P> +"Did you love her all the time?" +</P> + +<P> +Another decided head-shaking. +</P> + +<P> +"You did n't? Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"I did n't love her when she did n't love me. But my new mamma loves +me all the time an' all day an' all night an' every day an' every night +an' always. An' we dust have the bestest times togevver, an' I love +her dust all I can love anybody." She hugged her chubby arms close up +to her breast as if she had them around the loved one's neck, screwed +up her pretty face, and gave the little grunt with which childhood +expresses the fulness of its affection. +</P> + +<P> +"Did you see the tourist man take your gone-away mamma away?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, I didn't see him, but he did, 'cause once she went to take a walk +an' 'en he never came back any more." +</P> + +<P> +"And did n't she ever come back?" +</P> + +<P> +"'Course not!" She looked at me in wide-eyed amazement at my +ignorance. "One day she said for me to stay there 'cause she was going +to take a walk. An' I cried to go too, an' 'en she picked me up quick +an' hugged me tight an' kissed me. An' 'en she put me down an' said +no, she was going too far. An' she took off her ring, her pretty gold +ring, 'at she never let me have before, an' said to play wif it and +when papa come give it to him. An' I did, an' papa readed a letter 'at +was on the table, an' 'en he fell down on the bed an' cried. An' I put +my hand on his face an' said, 'Poor papa, what's 'e matter?' An' 'en +he took me up in his arms, an' we bofe cried, an' cried, an' cried. +An' he said, 'Poor little girl!'" +</P> + +<P> +She paused a moment, and then, with the air of one summing up a long +discourse, she exclaimed, "An' that's why I 've got a gone-away mamma!" +</P> + +<P> +I stroked the little one's hand, which nestled confidingly in mine, and +said, half absently, "And she never came back?" +</P> + +<P> +The child had fallen into a reverie, her big violet eyes fastened on +the ground at our feet, but my words roused her into sociability again +and she chattered on: +</P> + +<P> +"No, 'course not, she never comed back. But one day 'ere was a letter, +all alone dust for me, an' my papa called me an' said, 'Here is a +letter for my little girl; now, I wonder who it's from?' She said this +with the quaintest imitation of grown-up condescension addressing a +child, waited a moment, as if to give to suspense its proper effect, +and then went on: +</P> + +<P> +"He tored it open an' inside the en'lope was dust a tiny bit of a +letter wif just a little bit of reading and writing on it. An' 'en my +papa dropped it 's if it was a yellow-jacket an' he said, great big an' +loud, 'Money! from them! Don't touch it, child!' An' he frowed it in +the fire. But I did n't see no money and I wanted to keep my letter, +'cause it was all mine. But I had my new mamma then, an' when I cried +she writed me another letter." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," I said, "it's very queer to have two mammas, is n't it? But +when did you get your new mamma?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, one day, after there was n't any more snow, we all went to +church. And I had on my new white dress—it's awful pretty—and a new +ribbon on my hair, and a new hat—not this old one—prettier than this, +lots, with pretty flowers on it. And papa and—and—<I>her</I>, they stood +up and talked wif the preacher, an' I would n't sit still. I dust +runned right up side of my papa and held on to his leg all the time. +An' when the preacher did n't talk any more she picked me up an' hugged +me tight, an' kissed me an' said, 'I 'm going to be your mamma now, +darling.' +</P> + +<P> +"An' she 's been my new mamma ever since, an' I 'm going to keep her +for my mamma always and always, and I don't want my gone-away mamma +ever to come back, 'cause I love my new mamma best." +</P> + +<P> +Just then there burst upon the warm, soft air a babel of shouts and +yells and loud hurrahs. The wee maiden turned a brightening face in +the direction of the uproar, and announced: +</P> + +<P> +"That's wecess. I must go now. I 'spect my mamma will want me. She +is n't dust my new mamma, she is n't. She's the teacher, too. An' I +go to school wif her every day. But I don't have to stay in the +schoolhouse 'less I want to." +</P> + +<P> +She slipped off the log and started down the path, and then came back +to kiss me good-bye. The hurried tread of a woman rustled through the +thicket, and a Madonna-like face appeared between the branches. +</P> + +<P> +"Come, dearie," she called, and the child ran across the glade, jumped +into her arms and nestled upon her neck with a cry of delight. +</P> + +<P> +Months afterward, in a city on the other side of the continent, I met a +beautiful woman. She was a little overdressed and over-jewelled, but I +thought as I talked with her that never before had I seen a woman of +such glorious perfection of features and complexion and figure. +</P> + +<P> +My visit to the Yosemite, the previous summer, chanced to be mentioned, +and at once she began to ask me question after question about the +Valley, and about those who live in it and cater to the comfort of +travellers. Her husband, tall, athletic-looking, and handsome, leaned +upon the back of her chair and made tactful efforts to divert the +conversation into other channels. She yielded for the moment, but soon +managed to lead me away to a quiet nook where she at once re-commenced +her inquiries. Her beautiful face haunted and teased me with +suggestions of previous sight. But I could not recall any former +meeting, and so I decided that some chance street view of her +countenance had impressed its beauty upon my memory. +</P> + +<P> +As she rapidly poured forth question after question, I could not help +noticing and wondering about the pathetic wistfulness in her eyes and +the nervous eagerness of her manner. Presently she said she hoped to +visit the Yosemite herself some time, and then hurriedly asked if I had +seen any of the people who live there during the winter, and if any of +them had children, and if the little ones, too, were subjected to that +hardship. +</P> + +<P> +There was intense longing in her lovely violet eyes as she asked these +questions, but she quickly dropped her lids, and only her hands, +trembling in her lap, betrayed that she felt more than casual interest. +</P> + +<P> +I told her everything I could remember, facts, incidents, and +anecdotes, that I thought would interest her. It did not occur to me +that her eagerness for information was anything more than an unusually +keen curiosity about a mode of life so different from her own. +Chancing to recall my adventure with the little maid I told her about +it. +</P> + +<P> +I dwelt on the child's beauty and precocity, and repeated her account +of why she had two mammas. The red blood was dyeing my listener's face +a deep crimson, but still I did not understand, and went on lightly— +</P> + +<P> +"She was as charming a little thing as I ever saw, but she was not at +all complimentary to the 'gone-away mamma,' for she declared, +emphatically, that she loved her new mamma best, and meant to keep her +always, and did n't want her gone-away mamma ever to come back, because +the new mamma loved her so much, and they had such good times together." +</P> + +<P> +The surging color flowed in a quick tide from her face and left there a +gray pallor, like that of granite cliffs when the sun goes down, and +her hands were so tightly locked that her fingers looked white and +ghastly. I thought it was indignation against that distant and unknown +woman who had yielded to temptation that was moving her so strongly, +and expected to hear from her parted lips some sweeping sentence of +fiery feminine scorn and contempt. +</P> + +<P> +But it was a low moan that came through their paling curves as she +swayed once in her chair and then fell to the floor. +</P> + +<P> +The physician, who was hurriedly summoned, said that it was a case of +heart failure, and that she must have died instantly from some sudden +shock. +</P> + +<P> +And then, looking again at the beautiful, cold face, I understood at +last. For death had completed the likeness which life had only +suggested, and the faultless features, lying now in their eternal, +expressionless calm, were exactly those of the beautiful child. +</P> + +<P> +Her friends wondered much at her strange and sudden death. But I knew +that remorse had had its perfect work, and that the sudden vision of a +sweet child-face out of whose rosy lips came the accusing words, "I +love my new mamma best, and I don't want my gone-away mamma ever to +come back," had pierced her heart through and through. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +POSEY +</H3> + + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "Since I breathed,<BR> +A houseless head, beneath the sun and stars,<BR> +The soul of the wood has stricken through my blood."<BR> + --THE FORESTERS.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Everybody who has ever seen him knows him only as "Posey"—a name for +which he is indebted solely to the accident of birth. For in that +Indiana county where he first saw the light, and when he went to +California, some forty years ago, that was the name at once bestowed +upon him, and by it he has been known ever since. It is possible that +Posey has not forgotten what his name really is; but, if so, he is the +only person who has allowed his memory to be burdened with that useless +knowledge. +</P> + +<P> +The traveller is likely to meet him striding along any one of the +forest roads or trails within forty miles of the Yosemite Valley, or +lounging around a stage station, or taking his ease in some +mountaineer's cabin. And he will know at once that that is Posey, for +no one who has ever heard of him can mistake his identity at even the +first glance. Moreover, Sunday is always with him, and Sunday is just +as unmistakable as Posey. Sunday is a very small dog, of about the +bigness of your two fists, that carries within his small skin enough +courage, audacity, and dignity to befit the size of an elephant. He is +also known as "Posey's bear dog"—a sobriquet bestowed upon him partly +in humor, because of his ridiculously small size, and partly in honor, +because of his utter fearlessness. +</P> + +<P> +Posey is a sparely built, muscular man, of medium size, quick and jerky +in his movements, and springy in his gait. His face is broad and +tanned, his cheek bones high, and his nose a snub. His beard is short +and thin and grizzled, and his gray hair, curling at the ends, hangs +around his neck. His shoulders are sloping, his chest deep but not +wide, his arms long, and his hips narrow. He is always dressed in a +blue flannel shirt, blue overalls, hob-nailed shoes, and a gray slouch +hat; and the whole outfit is always very old and very dirty. His +overalls, fastened upon him in some miraculous way, hang far below his +waist. Why they stay in place suggests the goodness of God since it +passeth all understanding. +</P> + +<P> +Nature made a great mistake when she caused Posey to be born a white +man, heir to all the white man's achievement. For he is a child of +earth—a gentle, kindly savage, a white man with the soul of an Indian. +But Posey has done his best to correct nature's mistake, and has made +himself as much of an Indian as his white man's heritage will allow. +He is a nomad, as thorough a nomad as any barbarian who never heard of +those wondrous works of man called civilization. In all that wide +stretch of country which he frequents and in which he has lived for +thirty years and better, there is not one spot which he can call home. +But that is nothing to Posey. He would not know what to do with a home +if he had one. +</P> + +<P> +His sole possessions are some blankets, a gun, and Sunday. If he wants +to go anywhere, whether it be one mile or fifty miles away, he straps +his blankets on his back, whistles to Sunday, shoulders his gun, and +goes. Sometimes he sleeps on the ground and sometimes he stops for a +night or for three months in the cabin of some lone mountaineer or in +an Indian <I>rancheria</I>. It is doubtful if Posey himself knows how many +Indian wives and half-breed children he has in these Indian villages +scattered through the mountains. He will drop in on one of them for a +day or a month, divide his possessions with her and her children, +provide lavishly for them with gun and fishing-tackle while he is +there, and when the desire fills him to be somewhere else he will leave +them with as little concern as he feels for the birds and squirrels in +the trees. +</P> + +<P> +Save in the mirthfulness of which he is an ever-bubbling spring, Posey +has become, in looks and gestures, in mode of thought and manner of +expression, as much Indian as white. Nevertheless, he prefers, very +greatly, the society of his own race, and likes best that of people of +superior mental qualities and force of character. In Posey's creed +there is but one article, namely, that all men are eternally and +immutably equal—just as good as he is. That is, that would be the +sole article in his creed if he had any creed and if he were conscious +that such is his belief. For it is very certain that Posey never gave +thought, in all his life, to the question of human equality. He simply +has an unconscious feeling about it which he has breathed into his +being from the mountain air around him and absorbed from the earth +which has been his bed for many and many a night. It is there, just as +the dirt on his neck is there, and Posey is equally unconscious of them +both. +</P> + +<P> +Formerly, for a good many years, he was a guide in the Yosemite Valley, +and once he had in his charge a woman who was a many times millionaire, +of social prestige throughout two continents, and known by name all +over her own land from the palaces of Newport to the huts in the +Sierras. She found fault with many things, and finally insisted that +her stirrup was too small. Posey, who had cheerfully endeavored to +satisfy all her complaints, examined it carefully and then told her, in +gentlest voice and politest manner: "The stirrup 's all right, madam. +It's your foot that 's too damn big." +</P> + +<P> +Nobody ever saw Posey troubled in the least about anything in this +world or the next. To him, mere existence is a pleasure, and the days +of his life have been a linked merriment long drawn out. He is always +ready to listen to and laugh at and join in jokes and fun; and if +nothing new of that sort is at hand, old ones will answer the purpose +almost as well. He is quick to repay such entertainment from his own +inexhaustible store, and he never fails to turn anything that happens, +no matter how serious it may be, into jest and farce. He has even been +known to fling witticisms and ridicule at a bear that was coming at him +full speed. But, no; that is not quite accurate. Posey has been known +to say that he said these things to a charging bruin. But Posey +usually hunts alone. +</P> + +<P> +He is learned in the habits and secrets of the beasts and birds and +reptiles and insects of the mountain and the forest, and in the virtues +and malefactions of trees and flowers. But he does not consider this +knowledge of any consequence, and sets far more store upon another +stock of learning, which he does not display upon ordinary occasions. +For such chance acquaintances among the tourists as he considers +unusual in mental attainments he rolls out the scientific names of +trees and plants with unction and delight. Usually they are not +recognizable at first, because, having been learned by ear and +preserved by memory, their Latin has become somewhat Poseyized. +</P> + +<P> +He can reel off yards upon yards of narrative about adventures in +mountain storms, exciting incidents in hunting, the people he has +guided in the Yosemite Valley and upon the mountains, and all the +strange things that could not but have happened to a merry +earth-spirit, living alternately among the denizens of the wilderness +and in the midst of a stream of people from all the four quarters of +the globe. When he tells these tales he generally adopts the crescendo +method, being spurred on by the applause of his hearers to larger and +larger achievements as story succeeds story. +</P> + +<P> +One autumn afternoon I sat on the veranda at Wawona and listened to the +tales of luck and pluck in forest and mountain that Posey, squatted on +the steps, poured forth for my entertainment and that of such others as +chose to stop and listen. He talked in quick, jerky sentences, +constantly bobbing his head about and making little, angular gestures +with his hands and arms. +</P> + +<P> +"Posey," I said, "did you ever meet a bear, face to face, when you did +n't have a gun?" +</P> + +<P> +"Lots of times!" +</P> + +<P> +"What did you do?" +</P> + +<P> +"Pooh! I don't care, if 't ain't a grizzly. If I meet a grizzly on +the trail when I hain't no gun with me I don't tramp on his toes, you +bet. I jest hide behind a bush and purtend I don't see him till he +gets out the way. But any other kind of a bear 's got to give me right +o' way, gun or no gun. Me get out of the way fer an ornery brown bear! +Huh! Not much! All you've got to do is jest to stand up and lay down +the law to 'em, and they 'll sneak out and into the bushes and leave +you the trail, 'fore you can get furder 'n 'Be it enacted.' I 'll bet +I could talk any brown bear in the Sierras out o' the trail in five +minutes. +</P> + +<P> +"Once I was comin' down Pinoche Mountain, windin' along a narrow trail +through some high bushes, when I seed a bear roundin' a turn not more +'n ten yards ahead of me. I did n't have no gun, and it was n't much +of a trail, but I reckoned it was a heap sight better 'n scramblin' +through them bushes, and I jest thought I 'd let the bear do the +scramblin'. Sunday, he rushed out between my legs and begun to +bow-wow, bold as if he 'd been John Sullivan. 'Hist, Sunday!' says I, +'I've got the floor! Gimme the first chance; and if there 's any +talking to do after that, you can do it.' So he come and squatted down +beside me; and the bear, he stood there lookin' at us. +</P> + +<P> +"'Mr. Bear,' says I, 'I 'd hate to have to spile your hide, but I 'll +do it if you don't get out o' this trail. I 've killed eighty bear in +these mountains, and I won't take no sass from you. The climate in +this trail ain't what you need, an' I advise you to git out of it. Off +into the bushes with you! Whoop! Git!' An' off he went, just as if I +owned that trail an' he was trespassin'. +</P> + +<A NAME="img-286"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG SRC="images/img-286.jpg" ALT=""I 'd hate to have to spile your hide, but I 'll do if if you don't get out o' this trail."" BORDER="2" WIDTH="406" HEIGHT="664"> +<H4> +[Illustration: "I 'd hate to have to spile your hide, <BR> +but I 'll do it if you don't get out o' this trail."] +</H4> +</CENTER> + +<P> +"That bear was as reasonable as any I ever see, but I had more trouble +with a big feller up toward Crescent Lake. I got sleepy that +afternoon, for I 'd been settin' up watchin' fer bear the night before. +So I put my gun an' a snack I had on a stump and went to sleep. When I +waked up there was a big brown bear nosin' my lunch and tryin' to open +the bundle with his paw. I picked up some pine cones—<I>Pinus +pondyrosy</I> it was I was sleepin' under" (he rolled this out with the +slyest glance at a professor from an Eastern college who had joined his +little audience)—"an' begun peltin' 'em at him just so's to tip his +ears and his tail. Sunday, he 'd travelled off somewhere and missed +this fun. Then I started in to abusin' that bear. My! I called him +everything I could lay my tongue to. He 'd stop an' listen a minute, +cock up one ear and wink, and then he 'd go to work at that lunch +passel ag'in. I jest kept on swearin' harder and harder at him till I +could taste brimstone. And at last it got too much for 'im. He took +his paws down off 'n that stump an' marched off as dignified as a woman +who 's heard you say somethin' you did n't mean her to. +</P> + +<P> +"But the cheekiest thing I ever did with a bear was one night over in +Devil's Gulch. A big storm come up just about dark an' I found a sort +o' cave to crawl into. A big tree, a <I>Pinus Lamberteeny</I>" (another sly +glance at the professor), "had fell alongside o' some rocks an' made a +fine dry den. A lot of dry leaves was made into a bed, an' I says to +Sunday: 'Reckon we 'll have company before long. Wonder whether it 'll +be a brown or a grizzly.' Sunday, he curled up an' went to sleep, an' +I was settin' down at the mouth of the den lookin' out into the dark +when up come a big, black thing. I knew 't was the bear, an' it was +too dark to see if it was a grizzly. But it just made me mad to think +of that bear comin' to turn me out into the rain, an' I up with my fist +an' give 'im a cuff. 'Git out o' this, you ole tramp,' says I. 'I was +here first, an' there ain't no room fer you.' An' I belted him on the +other ear. That bear jest turned tail an' walked off as meek as Moses, +an' me an' Sunday had the den to ourselves all night. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir," and he shook his head and chuckled in delighted remembrance +of his waggishness, "that was jest about the cheekiest joke I ever +played on a bear!" +</P> + +<P> +Posey's mirthful spirits make him always a welcome visitor in the +cabins that, tucked away among trees and bowlders, shelter the lone +mountaineers. But of all those who live within the circuit of his +peregrinations his particular chum is Win Davis—"J. Winthrop Davis" is +the name painted in big, black letters on a pine board nailed to his +cabin door, although nobody ever takes the trouble to call him anything +but "Win." After seeing that doorplate, you will hardly need to hear +his nasal intonation to know that he came from the land of the tutelary +codfish. +</P> + +<P> +That was nearly half a century ago and ever since he has been the child +of the mines, the forests, and the mountains. And Nature, as if in +gratitude for his loving allegiance, seems to have taken him under her +protection and stayed the progress of years over his head. For, +although he has almost reached the allotted three score and ten, his +big frame, his ruddy face, his shock of hair, his auburn beard that +flows to his waist, his actions, and his apparent feelings do not +indicate a day over forty. +</P> + +<P> +When our buckboard stopped at his cabin door he rushed out, shouting +hospitable welcome in a tremendous voice. If he ever spoke in anything +less than a roar he would make his Herculean body and Jovian head +ridiculous. As he never does, he is grand. +</P> + +<P> +Posey was there, and, while Win bustled about in the lean-to kitchen +making hot biscuits and coffee, he began to tell us entrancing yarns of +the adventures and successes they had enjoyed hunting and trapping +together during the previous winter. Apparently neither had felt it +any hardship that for months they had been shut off entirely from all +companionship with their kind. Nature is good to these lone men of the +mountains. She gives them happiness and serenity in her arms, steeps +them in lore of all manner of wild things, and makes them simple and +honest of heart as a child. But for what she gives she exacts an awful +price, for she cuts from their hearts the dearest ties of the race. In +all those little cabins scattered along the slopes and through the +gorges of the Sierras there is scarcely one in which you will find wife +or child, or regret that there is none, or wish that such might yet be. +</P> + +<P> +The talk drifted from one thing to another, and finally one of our +party told Mark Twain's yarn about "the meanest man on earth." Our +host listened at the kitchen door, a streak of flour shining white +athwart the cataract of his auburn beard, and testified his amusement +by a delighted roar that was like unto the rejoicings of a bull of +Bashan. +</P> + +<P> +"Posey," he exclaimed, "tell 'em about that stingy friend o' yours!" +</P> + +<P> +Posey chuckled and pushed his old slouch hat to the back of his head. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," he said, "I reckon that feller was jest about as stingy as the +feller you 've been tellin' about, and mebby stingier, 'cause he 'd +take more risks. Anyway, he was as ornery stingy as he could be an' +live. If he 'd been any wuss he 'd of died to save grub an' shoe +leather. W'y, him and me was out huntin' together oncet, over toward +Mono. But I oughter tell you fust it was a long time ago, 'way back in +the days when everybody had to carry powder-flasks, an' each of us had +one on a string 'round his neck. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, 'long about noon we come to a clear, purty little lake and set +down to eat a snack. I was stoopin' over the edge of the lake to get +some water in my hat an' my powder-flask slipped off an' went, +kersplash, down to the bottom! The water was so clear I could see it +layin' down there, as plain as could be, fifty feet down, I reckon, fer +them mountain lakes is prodeejus deep. Well, the other feller, he +could dive better 'n I could—he was a great one fer divin'—an' he +said he 'd go down after it. So he stripped, but kep' his powder-flask +'round his neck. That kinder riled me, fer it looked as if he was +afeared I 'd run off with it while he was gone. I did n't say nothin', +though, an' down he went. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I set there an' waited, an' finished eatin' my snack, an' waited +an' waited for him to come up agin. I reckon I must a' set there about +fifteen minutes, anyhow, and at last I begun to git so curious about +what he could be doin' all that time, that I up an' went over to the +edge of the bank an' peeked down into the water. An' consarn my +soul!"—here Posey bristled up with as much excited interest in voice +and manner as if he were at that moment peering down into the depths of +the lake—"What do you s'pose he was a-doin' down there?" +</P> + +<P> +"Drowning?" suggested one of our party in a tone that Posey must have +thought too flippant for the occasion, for he turned upon the speaker +with an indignation that could not all have been inspired by the memory +of his stingy friend's deed. +</P> + +<P> +"Drownin'! Him! An' leave his duds up on the ground fer somebody else +to git the good of? Huh! Not much! No, sir! There he was, down +there at the bottom of the lake—an' I 'm a-tellin' you the Gospel +truth, an' you may take me out an' drown me in that there very lake if +I ain't—there was that ornery, stingy cuss down there takin' his time +to empty the powder out o' my flask into his'n! I was so mad I felt +like heavin' a rock down on 'im!" +</P> + +<P> +Like many a man in far less humble station, Posey has but to repeat an +idea or a statement a few times to convince himself of its absolute +truth, no matter how reckless may have been its first enunciation. As +we talked, the sound and savor of frying venison came appetizingly from +the kitchen. Posey sniffed it and straightened up, with childlike, +pleased expectancy. +</P> + +<P> +"Venison 's a mighty healthy meat, ain't it, Doc?" he said, addressing +a physician who was with us. The doctor gave assent, and Posey swelled +and beamed with pleasure that his opinion had won scientific approval. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir," he went on enthusiastically, "it's the healthiest meat +there is! Wy, if a man would jest eat venison all the time, he 'd +never be sick, an'—an' he'd never die, neither!" He paused a moment, +the least mite taken aback by the sweepingness of his proposition, then +glanced belligerently around his little circle of listeners and +repeated with emphasis: "No, sir! he'd never die!" He stopped again, +but this time with triumph shining in his face, as who would say. +Dispute it if you dare! Evidently he was quite convinced by that time +of the truth of his statement, but still felt the need of making his +hearers believe. He brought his fist down upon the table with a blow +that made the dishes Win Davis was placing thereon jump and rattle, and +exclaimed in tones of the most serious and heartfelt conviction: +</P> + +<P> +"No, sir! He'd live forever, he would! He 'd never, <I>never</I> die!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A CASE OF THE INNER IMPERATIVE +</H3> + + +<P> +"This is my section," said Dr. Elizabeth Black; and the three women who +were convoying her down the aisle crowded around her for a last +good-bye. There was an excited flurry of talk as they hoped her +journey would be pleasant and wished they were going too; and she +heartily wished they were; and they wondered if she would find it +tiresome; and she assured them she was a good traveller; and they +charged her to write them a postal every day. Then all four had to +press into the section to make room for two men to walk past them to +the next seat. +</P> + +<P> +"But they did n't get on here—they 've only been out on the platform," +said the youngest and prettiest of the three, lowering her voice and +casting a swift glance in their direction. "They look interesting, +Doctor, and if they stay on long enough maybe you 'll scrape +acquaintance with them. When I take a long journey I always know +everybody in the car by the end of the second day." +</P> + +<P> +"We must go, girls," exclaimed another. "It's time for the train to +start." Then she produced a florist's parcel, which she had been +trying to conceal in the folds of her dress, and unrolled from it a +bunch of glowing roses. Another pressed into Dr. Black's hands a book; +and the third, a box of candy. +</P> + +<P> +"And here 's a magazine Dr. Wallace sent—you know she could n't +come—and we agreed not to give them to you till the very last +minute—for our last good-bye—" Her voice wavered and Dr. Black broke +in with surprised and grateful exclamations. +</P> + +<P> +"The book 's a love story," said the youngest one, an apologetic note +perceptible in her voice, "but it's a pretty story, and the treatment's +interesting, and I thought you might enjoy it, for railroad travelling +always makes one feel sentimental, anyway." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, the train 's moving! Good-bye, dear!" The one who was nearest to +Dr. Black left a hurried kiss upon her cheek, the others hastily +pressed her hands, and all three scurried toward the door. Their +friend raised her window and looked out in time to wave a final +farewell as they landed safely upon the platform. As she settled back +in her seat she saw that one of the men in the next section had also +been watching for their reappearance outside. Their eyes met as she +turned from the window, relieved and smiling. +</P> + +<P> +She admired her roses for a moment, tucked them into her belt, and then +opened her magazine. But her expression was more pensive than +interested as she idled over its pages, looking now and then at a +picture and reading only a paragraph or a stanza here and there. Her +thoughts were more with the scenes of the life she was leaving behind +her, or flying on, with inquiry and indecision, into that whither she +was bound. Should she stay on the Pacific Coast where she was going to +visit her father and mother in their new home, open an office in some +city near them, and build up a practice there? Or should she return to +take the position which had been offered her in the faculty of the +women's medical college from which she had been graduated with high +honors three years before? After her graduation, a year's work as +interne in the women's hospital had heightened the expectations of her +friends; and the success with which she had then served as physician +and superintendent of a branch dispensary and hospital in the slum +district had made all who were watching her progress predict for her a +brilliant career. +</P> + +<P> +She had accepted the appointment to the college corps of instructors +with the deepest gratification, and she looked forward longingly to the +opportunities it would give her for special work and to the surety of +advancement that would follow. But her heart misgave her not a little +as she thought of the great joy it would give her father and mother +should she decide to stay near them in California, and of the grief +that her mother would try to dissemble if she should return to the East. +</P> + +<P> +Well, she would not decide the question now, and she put it from her as +she cast a careless eye over her fellow travellers, let it rest for a +moment on the two men in the section in front of her own and then +turned to her book. Alternately reading, looking at the passing +landscape, and now and then lapsing into reverie, her attention was so +withdrawn from her surroundings that she was not aware that one of the +men in front had turned several times and allowed a casual glance to +pass from her down the row of heads behind her. Nor did she notice, +when they returned from an hour's absence in the smoker, that he sat +down in the front seat of their section. +</P> + +<P> +"You don't mind riding backward?" commented his companion. +</P> + +<P> +"I 'm not particularly stuck on it, but just now I want to look at that +girl in the section behind us. It's good for the eyes to rest on such +a splendid creature as she is." +</P> + +<P> +"I 'll come over there with you and we 'll study her together," the +other replied, as he changed his seat. +</P> + +<P> +"Is n't she a fine specimen?" said the first. "She 's five feet nine +if she 's an inch,—I noticed her when she got on at +Philadelphia,—broad-shouldered and deep-chested and clear-skinned. +And that glow in her cheeks rivals the roses her friends gave her. How +old do you guess her, Wilson?" +</P> + +<P> +"I 'd never try guessing such a problem as that! She's evidently one +of the new women—you can tell that by her looks. And they never show +their age, maybe because they don't think about it. This girl might be +twenty, perhaps a year or two more, if you judge by her face. But if +you take her expression into account—these women who do things always +look as if they 'd had an experience of life that in former days they +could n't acquire under forty. Well, you might split the difference +and say she 's thirty." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't think so. I 'd guess her under twenty-five. And she probably +won't look a day older than she does now for the next fifteen years." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know about that, Adams. If she's a school-teacher she 'll get +more or less sharp-featured or anxious-faced and have wrinkles and +crow's-feet. And those are things that do not aid and abet a woman in +forgetting her birthdays." +</P> + +<P> +"But she is n't a school-teacher, Wilson. She has n't got the +unmistakable school-ma'am look. I 've been wondering what she is, and +I don't make it out. I don't think she 's a doctor, because she has +n't got the professional cast of countenance, and she 's too carefully +dressed." +</P> + +<P> +Wilson laughed and turned a bantering eye upon his companion. "You +must be getting interested, Adams! Is it a case of love at first +sight?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, you know I 'm not given to that sort of thing. But I don't read +much on the cars, on account of my eyes, and while you 've been reading +I 've spent the time looking at the passengers. And I found that girl +and her roses by far the most pleasing items in the car." +</P> + +<P> +"But she is n't beautiful," Wilson objected. "Her face is not pretty, +and she 's inclined to be raw-boned." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I 'll admit her features are irregular, and there 's fault to be +found with each one. But that does n't matter. No woman with that +live, creamy skin, that clear red in her cheeks, and that intelligent +expression, could be any less than handsome. And she fairly glows with +health and vitality. She has made me just curious enough about her +vocation to want to know what it is, and if she stays on the train long +enough to make an opening possible I intend to try to find out." +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Wilson, yawning, "you 're fortunate to be able to get up +so much interest in your fellow-passengers. It is n't once in a dozen +journeys that I find anybody on a railroad train who does n't strike me +as being an entirely superfluous person." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, well," responded Adams good-naturedly, "you must remember that you +are ten years older than I am, and that you are married and settled +down, while I 'm not." +</P> + +<P> +"It would be better for you if you were." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I know you are always preaching at me the advantages of double +blessedness. But I 'm not going to marry until I can't help it. When +the girl comes along who can make me forget everything in the world but +herself, I 'll marry her, if she 'll have me." +</P> + +<P> +"Which she probably won't, as things generally turn out in this world," +the other rejoined, smiling. +</P> + +<P> +In the meantime Dr. Black was dipping here and there into the pages of +her book, which had proved to be Mallock's "Human Document," more +interested in its speculations concerning human nature and human +nature's twin problems of life and love than in its slender thread of +story. Gradually her interludes of meditation grew longer and more +frequent, until the book closed in her lap and she looked dreamily out +of the window, her thoughts busy with herself, her past, and her future. +</P> + +<P> +Should she ever marry? She thought it rather unlikely, but she had no +definite intentions on either side of the question. She smiled as her +thoughts travelled back to her first engagement, in her high-school +days. She admitted to herself that she had been rather a gay lassie +then, and had thought more about the boys than about her studies. She +remembered, too, that she had been very popular among those same boys, +and that that very popularity had doomed the engagement to a brief but +exciting existence. +</P> + +<P> +Then she recalled how she had passed, soon after this episode, under +the influence of an enthusiastic teacher who had wakened her ambitions +and led her to decide that she must make of herself something out of +the usual and go out into the world and take part in its work. Then +succeeded a period of such close application to her books that her +parents and friends became alarmed lest she should injure herself. She +ceased to smile upon her youthful admirers and treated them so curtly +or talked to them so toploftily that she got the reputation of having +become a man-hater. +</P> + +<P> +"And I was n't anything of the sort," she said to herself, smiling and +smelling her roses. "I simply did n't like that kind of young men any +more. They bored me to death." +</P> + +<P> +About that time, she remembered, she began to be much more interested +in older men, men of more knowledge and achievement, and that they also +began to show a liking for her. The teachers in the high school seemed +to find it interesting to talk with her. The district attorney, who +was their next door neighbor, seemed just as well satisfied, when he +strolled across the lawns for a chat with her father, if he found +Elizabeth alone on the veranda. The family physician encouraged the +scientific trend of her reading, loaned her books by Maudsley and +Darwin and Havelock Ellis, and often dropped in to talk with her about +her studies, her reading, and her plans. He applauded and encouraged +her first tentative notion that she would like to study medicine, and +it was his arguments and influence that overcame her mother's +objections and persuaded her father that it would be worth while to +spend upon her medical education the money it would demand. And, +finally, came the doctor's wife, asking to see her alone. +</P> + +<P> +"I am sure you do not realize what you are doing," the doctor's wife +said, "and so I want to put it frankly before you, as one woman to +another. The truth is, my husband is falling in love with you; he is +fascinated by you. And I want to ask you to save him from himself, and +me from no end of heartache and misery, I 'm fond of you, Elizabeth, +you know that, and I 'm proud of your abilities, and I want you to have +a great success, but I don't want you to trample down my happiness on +your way. He and I have always been happy together until now; and it +all rests with you, Elizabeth,—as a woman you know that—whether we +keep our happiness and content with each other or go straight on into +such disaster and wretchedness as you cannot imagine. And so I 've put +my pride in my pocket—it was no small thing to do, my girl,—and have +come to ask you not to take my husband's love away from me." +</P> + +<P> +As Elizabeth looked back to that time she owned to herself that, deeply +moved as she had been by the appeal of the doctor's wife, her feelings +had not all been of the same sort. In the depths of her soul there had +been no little pride and exultation that the doctor was being chained +to her chariot wheels, and she remembered quite distinctly that she had +had a strong desire to keep him there. She herself had felt for him +nothing more than cordial friendship and gratitude; but, nevertheless, +there had been mingled with generous compassion some resentment against +the wife, whose appeal she could not disregard. +</P> + +<P> +Two years after that episode, while at home on her summer vacation, she +met a lawyer, a man of high position, wide intellectual sympathies, and +much culture, who promptly fell in love with her and proposed marriage. +He interested her deeply and exercised over her a greater fascination +than any man she had met before, and she gave her promise to be his +wife, without thought as to its effect upon her future. But when she +began to prepare for her return to the medical college he interposed an +amazed veto. If she was to be his wife she must give up all +expectation of a career separate from their home. She wavered and +hesitated for two days, and then packed her trunk and returned to her +studies. Thinking of him, as she gazed at the picturesque, wooded +hills and valleys of Pennsylvania, she did not regret her action. She +had never regretted it, she said to herself, but, nevertheless, she was +sorry, she had always felt a distinct sense of loss, that he had passed +out of her life. +</P> + +<P> +Since then, the straight road to her medical degree and through her +subsequent labors had been undisturbed by emotional storms. Twice she +had refused offers of marriage, but they had come from men for whom she +felt no more than the merest passing friendship. She had worked hard, +and the farther she had progressed the more pleasure she had taken in +her work and the more absorbed she had become in her prospects and +ambitions. Looking into the future, for which she had planned and +toward which she was working with all her powers, she said calmly to +herself that it was more attractive to her than any other. And yet, +would she be tempted to give up her ambitions and hopes of achievement +if, for instance, she were to meet a man as well endowed in mind and +heart as the hero of the book she had just been reading,—with such +fineness of fibre and such power of loving? She would not face the +question squarely, but told herself that she was not at all likely to +meet such a paragon. +</P> + +<P> +"And, at any rate," she thought, as she was roused from her reverie by +the cry of "Dinner now ready in the dining-car," "of one thing I am +very sure, and that is that I shall never marry until I meet a man +strong enough in himself and in his love for me to make me forget +everything else and not care whether or not I go on with my profession." +</P> + +<P> +The dining-car was so full that she was about to turn back, when the +waiter beckoned her to a table at which the two forward seats were +unoccupied. She took one with some hesitation and turned her face +toward the window. +</P> + +<P> +"I beg your pardon," said a voice from the other side of the table, +"but if you find it disagreeable to ride backward won't you take my +seat? I do not mind it in the least." +</P> + +<P> +She turned with a smiling and grateful refusal upon her tongue, saw +that her two neighbors across the table were the men from the section +in front of hers, and hesitated. The other man quickly added his plea +to his companion's, and in a few moments they had changed seats. The +one who had first spoken asked if her friends in Philadelphia got +safely off the car, and presently all three were chatting pleasantly +together. +</P> + +<P> +When Elizabeth returned to the Pullman the one who had proposed +exchanging seats, and whom his friend called Adams, brought her some +evening papers. She thanked him, and, seeing that he did not at once +turn away, asked him to sit down. They talked about the news in the +papers, laughed over stories which one or the other told, branched off +upon books, and were pleased to find that they had some favorites in +common. They spoke of the scenery through which they had passed during +the day and of the brilliant sunset into which the train seemed to be +plunging, and he told her of the gorgeous sunset panoramas of the Rocky +Mountains and of striking effects he had seen among the snow-clad peaks +of the Sierras. He related adventures into which his profession, that +of mining engineer, had taken him; and Elizabeth listened with +interest, asked questions, made comments, and talked entertainingly, +but said nothing of her own walk in life. When finally he said +good-night and went to rejoin his companion in the smoker, the evening +was so far gone that the busy porter had transformed the car into a +lane of tapestry. +</P> + +<P> +As Elizabeth lay in her berth, musing pleasantly over the events of the +evening, it occurred to her that Mr. Adams had left a number of +openings into which it would have been easy for her to step with some +remark about herself or her work, which would have revealed her +vocation. She had not done so merely because something else which she +wanted to say had happened, each time, to come into her mind. Thinking +it over, she remembered so many such openings that it seemed as if they +must have been made with intent. She wondered if he had been trying to +find out her occupation, and smiled gleefully. +</P> + +<P> +"If that's what he wants to know," she thought, "I 'll give him an +interesting time to-morrow trying to find out. I wonder if he and his +friend have made a wager about what my profession is. Very likely. +Well, he 's a good talker and interesting enough to help pass the time; +and if he wants to try again to-morrow, I 'll be at home in this +section until we reach Chicago." +</P> + +<P> +The next morning, with the excuse of some trivial attention to her +comfort, Adams came again to Elizabeth's seat and they were soon +talking as interestedly as on the previous evening. A piece of news in +the morning paper gave him opportunity to turn the conversation upon +the profession of teaching for women and he talked of the noble work +for the public good which women do in that way. Elizabeth listened +with a little gleam in the corner of her eye, agreed with him warmly +and spoke with enthusiasm of her own indebtedness to some of those +under whom she had studied. +</P> + +<P> +Then Adams dwelt on the widening opportunities for work and +self-expression which women have nowadays, and said he thought that the +profession of medicine was one for which women were well fitted, and +that he was not surprised that so many women found in it congenial work +and marked success. With some effort Elizabeth kept her face very +serious and doubted if the profession was one for which any but the +most exceptional women were suited, and, on the whole, was inclined to +think that if she were very ill she would rather call a man than a +woman physician. He led the talk on to other occupations in which +women engage, and some Elizabeth praised and others deprecated as +vocations for her sex. But not once did she give any indication that +they had touched upon her own kind of work. Adams looked puzzled and +Elizabeth concealed behind her handkerchief a smile which she was not +able to repress. +</P> + +<P> +"I wonder what it can be," he thought. "She surely does something. +The expression of her face, her intelligence, and her interest in all +kinds of things tell that very plainly. I wish Chicago were not so +near. She 's an extremely interesting woman." +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose I shall soon have to bid you good-bye," he said, as they +neared the station in Chicago. "I have enjoyed our brief acquaintance +very much, and if I can be of any assistance to you in Chicago I shall +be glad to do so. I am going farther west, to California, on the Santa +Fé line, but as my train does not leave at once I shall have some time +to spare." +</P> + +<P> +"Why, what a jolly coincidence!" Elizabeth exclaimed. "I also am going +to California on the Santa Fé line!" +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed! Then I am more fortunate than I expected to be!" His +pleasure shone in his brightening face. "My friend, Mr. Wilson, stops +in Chicago and I have been rather dreading the boredom of the rest of +the trip. I don't read much on the cars, as I have to be careful of my +eyes, and the time is apt to hang heavily on my hands. I have enjoyed +our talks so much that I shall be very grateful if you will let me pay +you an occasional visit during the rest of the journey." +</P> + +<P> +Elizabeth cast him a sidewise glance and smile. "I think the passing +acquaintances one makes now and then and the brief friendships with +people who merely cross one's path are among the most delightful of the +small things of life. It often happens that they are more pleasant, +for the time, than the old friendships that have lasted so long they +have become commonplace." +</P> + +<P> +"For my part," he answered, "I don't think a friendship is worth +continuing after it has become commonplace. I think I 'd like to be +arbiter of manners and customs long enough to make it quite the proper +thing to march up to any one whose appearance you like and say, 'How do +you do? Your face interests me and I 'd like to know you. Here 's my +card.'" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, if you 'll do that," smiled Elizabeth, "I 'll do my best to help +make you dictator! I've so often wished to do that very thing! But of +course you don't dare. And yet you see such interesting faces, +sometimes, faces of people you know you would like. Sometimes a face +of that sort haunts me long afterward, and I almost wish I had had the +courage to speak." +</P> + +<P> +"I am glad you understand," Adams replied with a little embarrassed +laugh, "because now I can confess that that very desire took possession +of me when I saw you come into the car yesterday." +</P> + +<P> +Elizabeth bent a demure glance upon his feet. "Shall I be very +gracious and make a reciprocal confession, or shall I be entirely +truthful and admit that I scarcely saw you yesterday until you offered +me your seat in the dining-car?" +</P> + +<P> +The next day, as the train swept through the emerald levels of Iowa, +Adams spent most of the time at Elizabeth's side and they talked +together with constant interest and satisfaction, each feeling a +growing pleasure in the other's society, and an increasing sense of +consequence in whatever the other said. When Elizabeth withdrew that +night behind the curtains of her berth she was possessed by such a +feeling of elation as she had not felt in a long time. A smile was on +her lips, and a smile was in her heart. Her pulse beat fast, her brain +was active, she could not sleep. Her mind was full of the happenings +and the conversation of the last two days, and all that he had said to +her she went over again with vivid remembrance of the least details of +look and gesture. And in the background of her consciousness a +triumphant refrain was keeping time with her thoughts. "He loves me," +it chanted, "already he loves me, more than he knows." +</P> + +<P> +In the smoking-room Adams was making up for the cigars he had denied +himself during the day. He moved about restlessly, possessed by an +intense desire to get out of doors and walk fast and far. His mind was +filled by a galloping troop of vivid memories—a pair of bright, +dark-lashed gray eyes, the sound of a low, clear laugh, the turn of a +rosy cheek, an opinion which had interested him, a pretty thought, a +way she had of smiling appealingly after she had said something +whimsical or perverse. And underlying and overlying and penetrating +through all these was an irritated consciousness of the fact that it +would be a long time until the next day. +</P> + +<P> +Dr. Black looked out the next morning on the wide, forlorn plains of +western Kansas, with her heart as flooded with happiness as they were +with sunshine. A luxurious sense of power throbbed in her veins as she +smiled a good-morning to Adams across the aisle. He came at once to +ask how she had slept, and if she was beginning to feel the journey +wearisome. Close upon the heels of her thrilling sense of gladness and +mastery came the feminine instinct of concealment, and presently Adams +began to notice in her manner a suggestion of reserve. There was +certainly a difference, he said to himself, a little lessening of the +frank comradeship she had shown toward him the day before. He wondered +if he bored her, if he had shown too much desire for her society. He +went away to the smoking car, where he fidgeted about, began a cigar, +threw it out of the window, and in ten minutes was back again with a +book he had fished out of his travelling-bag, asking if Miss Black had +read it and, if not,—would she like to take it for a while? +</P> + +<P> +It was Lubbock's "Pleasures of Life." No, Elizabeth had not read it, +but she had read Lubbock's book on ants, bees, and wasps, and she began +to tell him about it, forgetting in the pleasure of companionship the +consciousness which a little while before had veiled her manner. He +followed with some stories about the tarantula and tarantula hawk which +he had seen while on a professional trip in the Southwest. And so they +wandered on, through talk about insects and animals, back to the book +which lay on Elizabeth's lap. He took it up and read to her a page +here and there, and soon they were talking earnestly about the varied +ideals that are possible to the young and ambitious. +</P> + +<P> +Adams had not tried again, since their second conversation, to find out +her vocation. His pleasure in her society had driven all thought of it +from his mind. He had even forgotten that he had ever supposed her to +have a profession. Elizabeth had said nothing about her work, at first +from whimsical perversity. But this morning, as they talked, a +definite desire crept into her mind that he should not know. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall not tell him I am a physician," she thought. "It's not much +longer, and for this little while I want to be just a mere woman." +</P> + +<P> +And for the rest of that day it was only at rare intervals, and even +then with a little shock of surprise, like that with which one suddenly +comes upon some old picture of himself, that she remembered she was a +doctor of medicine. The physician was submerged in the woman. And the +woman was alive to her finger-tips with realization of her endowment of +the "eternal feminine." +</P> + +<P> +Adams slept little that night, but lay with his head on his interlocked +hands, staring out of his window at the fleeting shadows of the summer +night, thinking of Elizabeth, remembering what Elizabeth had said +during the day, seeing Elizabeth's face and eyes and the bit of white +throat that showed above her collar, hearing Elizabeth's voice, and +longing to touch, with even a finger-tip, the sweep of soft brown hair +that rippled away from her neck. It seemed to him that morning would +never come. He looked at his watch a score of times, and, finally, +rose at the first flush of dawn. +</P> + +<P> +For a while he moved restlessly back and forth between his section and +the smoking-room, like an uneasy ghost of murdered sleep. But at last +it occurred to him that he ought to stay out until Miss Black was ready +for breakfast, lest he might embarrass her by being near when she +should emerge from behind her curtains in morning dishabille. So he +retired to the smoker, gave the porter a goodly fee to tell him when +the lady in Number 8 arose, and sat down resolutely at the window with +his elbows on the sill and his chin in his hands. He sat there +determinedly, not allowing himself even to turn around, through what +seemed hours and hours of time. Now and then he dozed a little, and +awoke with a start, dreaming he had heard her voice beside him or had +felt the ripple of her dress against his hand. +</P> + +<P> +When at last the porter brought the welcome news, he went back to his +seat and waited for Elizabeth to reappear from the dressing-room. It +seemed to him that it must be near noon, although it was only eight +o'clock, when finally he saw her coming down the aisle. He quickly +bent his head over some memoranda with which he had been trying to +occupy himself, and pretended to be writing very busily as she moved +toward her section. But afterwards, when he looked at the paper he +found on it only some meaningless scrawls. Elizabeth's color deepened +as she saw him and a dark crimson wave swept to his brow as he felt her +draw near. +</P> + +<P> +That day Adams rarely left her side. In his tones, his looks, his +manner, she was able to read his love as plainly as if it had been put +into words. "And of course," she thought, with an inward smile, "he +thinks he is concealing it all from me, and he would be surprised to +find that I know anything about it." +</P> + +<P> +Her own heart throbbed in response so exultantly and so gladly that it +carried her feeling beyond the doors of expression and transformed it +into irradiating feminine charm. It sparkled in her eyes, gave a new +winsomeness to her smile, a softer grace to her movements, and a +penetrating sweetness to her voice. +</P> + +<P> +Once, when Adams had gone to fetch her a glass of water, she leaned her +head upon her hand for a moment and was conscious of a little nervous +catch in her breath. Something he had just said brought back to her +mind a memory of the lawyer to whom she had been engaged and of whom +she had been thinking—was it only three days ago? It seemed as if she +had lived through many months since then. "If I had felt like this +toward him," she thought, "I would not have gone back to college." +</P> + +<P> +Adams gave her the water with adoration in his eyes. For an instant +her glance met his and then quickly dropped. He leaned forward with a +sudden start and barely checked the words of love that were ready to +rush from his tongue. Then he left her for a little while and walked +about restlessly for the few paces that were possible in the end of the +car. +</P> + +<P> +He must keep a closer watch on himself, he mused. What would she think +of him if he dared to speak to her of love after a three days' +acquaintance? By the merest scratch he had kept himself from clamoring +"I love you! I love you!" in her ear. And justly she might have +considered it an insult. What was he to her but a mere car +acquaintance? True, she had seemed to find his company pleasant and +congenial, and perhaps she would allow him to go to see her at her +home. And then, after he had made himself known to her father and +mother and allowed them to find out who and what he was—then, he would +bring his fate to the test. +</P> + +<P> +He went back with a tighter curb upon himself and a determination to +guard his tongue more closely. Elizabeth felt at once the slight +change in his demeanor. But she did not stop to reason about it or to +question herself as to its cause. Conscious only of an instinctive, +imperious desire for him to be again just as he had been before, she +leaned toward him with a jesting remark, and the slow turn of her head, +the witchery of her smile, the way her eyes flashed and dropped, +strained his new resolution almost to the breaking-point. He leaned +back in the seat with his arms rigid and his fists clenched until she, +noticing the tense muscles of his hand, laughingly told him he would +have nervous prostration if he did not learn to relax his nerves. +</P> + +<P> +Presently the train switched and stopped at a small station, and Adams +learned from the conductor that they would wait there, perhaps fifteen +or twenty minutes, for an east-bound train to pass. Most of the +passengers got out to walk up and down while they were waiting, and +when Adams and Elizabeth saw, across the road, beside a restaurant, a +little vine-covered arbor in which were tables and chairs, they decided +that it looked inviting, and went in to see if they could get some +lemonade. It was quite deserted and after a few minutes Adams went out +to see if he could find a waiter. +</P> + +<P> +When he returned, Elizabeth, sitting with her face toward the door, +looked up with a welcoming smile, their eyes met, and hers did not +drop. He rushed toward her, his face shining with love. Scarcely +knowing what she did, she sprang to her feet, all her consciousness +engrossed in the thrilling prescience that in another instant she would +sink into his arms. But at her very side, as he seized her hand, he +stopped with a perceptible rigor of muscles and expression. His +resolution of an hour before had flashed into his mind and he had +pulled himself together with a mighty effort. +</P> + +<P> +A little tremor passed through Elizabeth's body and she drew back a +little as he dropped her hand. "Oh, look! The train is going!" she +exclaimed, and rushed for the door. +</P> + +<P> +They ran at top speed across the road, he lifted her bodily to the +front steps of the last car, and swung himself upon the rear platform. +They gained their seats, flushed and panting, and the conductor, coming +to see if they had got on without injury, explained that the east-bound +train was late and he had been ordered to go on to the next siding and +wait there. He lingered for a few minutes, chatting with them and +denying their charge that he had not rung the bell. After he was gone, +Adams turned to Elizabeth with a paling face and said: +</P> + +<P> +"I hope you will pardon me, Miss Black. I can only throw myself on +your mercy. My only excuse is that I—" +</P> + +<P> +She stopped him with a gesture. "Don't speak of it," she said, in a +low tone, her eyes on the floor, "and don't think of it again. In such +an unusual friendship as ours, unusual incidents must be—" +</P> + +<P> +A thumping jar broke her speech and a sudden stop threw them both +violently forward against the other seat. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you hurt?" Adams asked anxiously as they scrambled to their feet. +"There must have been an accident," he went on, putting his head out of +the window. He drew it back quickly, his face white. "Don't look," he +exclaimed. "There's been a collision! It's horrible! But don't be +alarmed. There 's no more danger now. I 'll go out and see just what +has happened." +</P> + +<P> +"Wait a minute, please! Perhaps you can help me," Elizabeth exclaimed, +reaching for her suit case. "I'll be needed, and I 'll want help." +She was hurriedly opening the case and taking out articles and +packages. With face intent and manner preoccupied she appeared a +different person. The woman had sunk out of sight and the physician +was uppermost. +</P> + +<P> +Adams looked on with an amazed face. "Then you are a physician!" he +exclaimed. "I did not know—" +</P> + +<P> +She nodded, without looking up, absorbed in a search for something. +"That package of bandages," she murmured. "Oh, here it is. Yes, I 'm +a physician, and I 've had practice in surgery. Come, let's get out +there at once. If you will carry these packages I 'll take my surgical +case and my medicine bag. I 'm so glad I put all these things in my +suit case." +</P> + +<P> +It had been a head-on collision between the two trains. In some way, +nobody knew how, there had been a misunderstanding of orders, and the +east-bound train, instead of waiting at the next switch, had come on +toward the usual passing place. In the shock of meeting, its engine +had reared and ploughed its way over the other and the two monsters lay +upon the ground, a mass of twisted scraps of iron. One engineer had +stuck to his post, the other had jumped, as had both the firemen. One +was dead, the other three all severely injured. Among the train crews +and the passengers of the day coaches there were a number of broken +limbs and many severe cuts, bruises, and shocks. +</P> + +<P> +From the east-bound train another physician appeared, and he and +Elizabeth worked over the injured, sometimes together, sometimes +separately. Adams was constantly beside her, ready to carry out her +directions. He brought water, held bandages, helped her to put them +on, handed instruments, and kept her belongings close at hand. She had +cast aside her hat and rolled her sleeves above her elbows, and as she +bent a flushed, perspiring, and absorbed face above her work, forgetful +alike of her own and of his personality, she seemed so utterly unlike +the woman he had known for the last three days that a feeling of +bewilderment and estrangement began to creep over him. Once she +complimented him upon his watchfulness and dexterity, and the smile +with which she did it set his heart to throbbing again and bridged what +had seemed like a chasm between the two Elizabeths. +</P> + +<P> +He watched her long, slender, strong hands as she deftly and rapidly +manipulated the bandages, felt for a broken bone, or used her +instruments, and a great, awed wonder, the homage of intelligence to +skilled capacity, mingled with the adoration that filled his soul. +</P> + +<P> +He began to torture himself with doubts and questions. Could such a +woman care for him? What was there about him that could appeal to so +rare a prize? What had he to offer in character, or personality, or +achievement, or promise? And the more he doubted the more intense +became his desire to know. +</P> + +<P> +Elizabeth rose from her knees beside a man whose crushed foot she had +been bandaging. "Is there anybody else?" she said to Adams. Her hands +and arms were smeared with blood stains, and upon her dress there were +smirches of earth and blood. But Adams saw only that the red sunset +rays gilded her brown hair into a halo. +</P> + +<P> +"No," he answered, "I think not. The last bruise has been cared for +and the last hysterical woman has quit crying. Now you must rest and +refresh yourself and have some dinner. An engine is coming from the +west to take the cars of the east-bound train back to the next station +and all the passengers who wish can go there; and to-night another +train will continue on their way those for California. It will be here +before long, but perhaps it will be possible to get something to eat +first." +</P> + +<P> +They started toward their car and met the other physician. "Will you +do me the honor of exchanging cards with me?" he said to Elizabeth. +"You have shown yourself so competent here this afternoon, and your +work has been so skilfully done that I want to compliment you upon it, +and to say that I am sure you have before you a promising future." +</P> + +<P> +Dr. Black's face flushed and her eyes sparkled with pleasure, as she +read on the card the name of a famous surgeon. "You are very kind," +she replied, "and I thank you heartily. Praise from one of your skill +and standing is more worth having than anything else I can think of." +</P> + +<P> +Her words carried fresh doubt and despair to Adams's heart. "It can't +be possible," he thought, "that such a woman would care, could care, +for me and my love. And yet, I must know, I must know before this day +ends." +</P> + +<P> +They returned to their car and found it deserted. Adams waited while +Elizabeth went to the dressing-room to remove the stains of her +afternoon's work. +</P> + +<P> +"It can't be possible," he kept saying to himself, "but I must know—I +must know, at once." +</P> + +<P> +With a great effort he forced himself into an appearance of composure. +He feared that he might startle and offend her if he gave expression to +the ardors that throbbed in his heart and brain. "She must be tired +and nervous," he thought, "and I will try to speak and act calmly. +</P> + +<P> +"You would not let me finish my apology a few hours ago," he began, as +soon as she returned, "but now you must listen to the only excuse I +have for my fault—if it was a fault. The only thing I can say for +myself is that I love you—love you so much that I almost forgot +myself. I love you more than I had thought it would be possible to +love any woman—and back there, in the summer-house, when I went in and +saw you sitting there, my love broke from my control and swept over me +like a flood, and for a moment I scarcely knew what I did—I forgot +myself and the respect which was your due. But it was all because I +love you so, and want you for my wife, my mate, more than I want +anything else in the world. I know, we 've only known each other for +three days, but I had to speak to you, now, at once. And if you care +enough for me even to think about it, I won't ask for anything more +until you 've had time, you and your family, to know me better and find +out who and what I am." +</P> + +<P> +Elizabeth listened with her gaze on her lap. She was conscious of a +feeling of resentment, that increased as he went on, because he could +speak so calmly and composedly. It showed in her eyes as she lifted +them to his face, but quickly changed to compassion as she saw there +such suspense and longing as smote her heart with pain. +</P> + +<P> +"You do not need to speak," he said, and she saw his countenance wince +and change. "I have read my answer in your eyes." He rose as if to go. +</P> + +<P> +"Wait a moment," she said hastily. "It is right that you should know +how much I also cared until—" she broke off, hesitating, and then went +on, slowly and thoughtfully, with a puzzled air, as though she herself +did not quite understand. "When you came back to me, in that little +summer-house, and I looked into your eyes, my heart told me that you +were going to seize me in your arms; and I knew that if you did I was +ready to sink into your embrace and to give up everything for your +sake. For you had swept me clean off my feet and had made me not care +for my career, or for anything but you. But when you did n't—believe +me, I don't know how or why it was—somehow the shock of your not doing +it, when I was so ready to give my love—well, the tide seemed to turn +then and go back. And now—I 'm on my feet again, and care +tremendously about my profession and my career." +</P> + +<P> +He looked at her blankly, and as his lips twitched and moved she barely +heard, "And I did n't—I barely kept myself from doing it, because it +seemed unworthy—" +</P> + +<P> +She shrugged her shoulders and interrupted him, in a tone as low as +his. "We who are strong can be taken only by a strength that is +greater than ours." +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye," he said, rising. "Either my love was not quite great +enough, or my strength was too great. I will send the porter to carry +your bags and help you to find your section in the other train. I +shall stay here until to-morrow. Good-bye." +</P> + +<P> +His voice was very tender as he spoke the last word. She held out her +hand, and he touched it with his lips. She pressed both hands upon her +heart, which seemed bursting with cross-currents of feeling and desire. +He was halfway down the aisle when she sprang to her feet and called to +him to stop, to come back. He turned and saw her slowly take a step or +two toward him. The intent gaze which he bent upon her wavered for an +instant, and then she saw his lips grow tense and white. +</P> + +<P> +"No," he said deliberately, "I shall not come back. I do not want a +wife who would bring to me any less than the greatest love of which she +is capable. Good-bye, Dr. Black." +</P> + +<P> +He was gone, and Elizabeth, sinking back into her seat, saw him walk +away into the hills. The tears gathered in her eyes. She watched him +as his figure disappeared among the twilight shadows. +</P> + +<P> +"I wonder if it would have been different—it might have been +different," she was thinking, "if he—he had been—as he was this +afternoon." She mused a little longer and then her face brightened as +she rose with a triumphant lifting of her head and a half-smile on her +face. "And anyway," she said aloud, "he has my address!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EMERSON'S WIFE AND OTHER WESTERN STORIES***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 18309-h.txt or 18309-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/3/0/18309">http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/3/0/18309</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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