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diff --git a/old/dftsh10.txt b/old/dftsh10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..311995f --- /dev/null +++ b/old/dftsh10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6843 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext Drift from Two Shores, by Bret Harte +#4 in our series by Bret Harte + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +DRIFT FROM TWO SHORES + +by BRET HARTE + + + + +CONTENTS + + +DRIFT FROM TWO SHORES + + THE MAN ON THE BEACH + + TWO SAINTS OF THE FOOT-HILLS + + "JINNY" + + ROGER CATRON'S FRIEND + + "WHO WAS MY QUIET FRIEND?" + + A GHOST OF THE SIERRAS + + THE HOODLUM BAND + + THE MAN WHOSE YOKE WAS NOT EASY + + MY FRIEND, THE TRAMP + + THE MAN FROM SOLANO + + THE OFFICE SEEKER + + A SLEEPING-CAR EXPERIENCE + + MORNING ON THE AVENUE + + WITH THE ENTREES + + + + +DRIFT FROM TWO SHORES + + + +THE MAN ON THE BEACH + + +I + + +He lived beside a river that emptied into a great ocean. The +narrow strip of land that lay between him and the estuary was +covered at high tide by a shining film of water, at low tide with +the cast-up offerings of sea and shore. Logs yet green, and +saplings washed away from inland banks, battered fragments of +wrecks and orange crates of bamboo, broken into tiny rafts yet +odorous with their lost freight, lay in long successive curves,-- +the fringes and overlappings of the sea. At high noon the shadow +of a seagull's wing, or a sudden flurry and gray squall of sand- +pipers, themselves but shadows, was all that broke the monotonous +glare of the level sands. + +He had lived there alone for a twelvemonth. Although but a few +miles from a thriving settlement, during that time his retirement +had never been intruded upon, his seclusion remained unbroken. In +any other community he might have been the subject of rumor or +criticism, but the miners at Camp Rogue and the traders at Trinidad +Head, themselves individual and eccentric, were profoundly +indifferent to all other forms of eccentricity or heterodoxy that +did not come in contact with their own. And certainly there was no +form of eccentricity less aggressive than that of a hermit, had +they chosen to give him that appellation. But they did not even do +that, probably from lack of interest or perception. To the various +traders who supplied his small wants he was known as "Kernel," +"Judge," and "Boss." To the general public "The Man on the Beach" +was considered a sufficiently distinguishing title. His name, his +occupation, rank, or antecedents, nobody cared to inquire. Whether +this arose from a fear of reciprocal inquiry and interest, or from +the profound indifference before referred to, I cannot say. + +He did not look like a hermit. A man yet young, erect, well- +dressed, clean-shaven, with a low voice, and a smile half +melancholy, half cynical, was scarcely the conventional idea of a +solitary. His dwelling, a rude improvement on a fisherman's cabin, +had all the severe exterior simplicity of frontier architecture, +but within it was comfortable and wholesome. Three rooms--a +kitchen, a living room, and a bedroom--were all it contained. + +He had lived there long enough to see the dull monotony of one +season lapse into the dull monotony of the other. The bleak +northwest trade-winds had brought him mornings of staring sunlight +and nights of fog and silence. The warmer southwest trades had +brought him clouds, rain, and the transient glories of quick +grasses and odorous beach blossoms. But summer or winter, wet or +dry season, on one side rose always the sharply defined hills with +their changeless background of evergreens; on the other side +stretched always the illimitable ocean as sharply defined against +the horizon, and as unchanging in its hue. The onset of spring and +autumn tides, some changes among his feathered neighbors, the +footprints of certain wild animals along the river's bank, and the +hanging out of party-colored signals from the wooded hillside far +inland, helped him to record the slow months. On summer +afternoons, when the sun sank behind a bank of fog that, moving +solemnly shoreward, at last encompassed him and blotted out sea and +sky, his isolation was complete. The damp gray sea that flowed +above and around and about him always seemed to shut out an +intangible world beyond, and to be the only real presence. The +booming of breakers scarce a dozen rods from his dwelling was but a +vague and unintelligible sound, or the echo of something past +forever. Every morning when the sun tore away the misty curtain he +awoke, dazed and bewildered, as upon a new world. The first sense +of oppression over, he came to love at last this subtle spirit of +oblivion; and at night, when its cloudy wings were folded over his +cabin, he would sit alone with a sense of security he had never +felt before. On such occasions he was apt to leave his door open, +and listen as for footsteps; for what might not come to him out of +this vague, nebulous world beyond? Perhaps even SHE,--for this +strange solitary was not insane nor visionary. He was never in +spirit alone. For night and day, sleeping or waking, pacing the +beach or crouching over his driftwood fire, a woman's face was +always before him,--the face for whose sake and for cause of whom +he sat there alone. He saw it in the morning sunlight; it was her +white hands that were lifted from the crested breakers; it was the +rustling of her skirt when the sea wind swept through the beach +grasses; it was the loving whisper of her low voice when the long +waves sank and died among the sedge and rushes. She was as +omnipresent as sea and sky and level sand. Hence when the fog +wiped them away, she seemed to draw closer to him in the darkness. +On one or two more gracious nights in midsummer, when the influence +of the fervid noonday sun was still felt on the heated sands, the +warm breath of the fog touched his cheek as if it had been hers, +and the tears started to his eyes. + +Before the fogs came--for he arrived there in winter--he had found +surcease and rest in the steady glow of a lighthouse upon the +little promontory a league below his habitation. Even on the +darkest nights, and in the tumults of storm, it spoke to him of a +patience that was enduring and a steadfastness that was immutable. +Later on he found a certain dumb companionship in an uprooted tree, +which, floating down the river, had stranded hopelessly upon his +beach, but in the evening had again drifted away. Rowing across +the estuary a day or two afterward, he recognized the tree again +from a "blaze" of the settler's axe still upon its trunk. He was +not surprised a week later to find the same tree in the sands +before his dwelling, or that the next morning it should be again +launched on its purposeless wanderings. And so, impelled by wind +or tide, but always haunting his seclusion, he would meet it +voyaging up the river at the flood, or see it tossing among the +breakers on the bar, but always with the confidence of its +returning sooner or later to an anchorage beside him. After the +third month of his self-imposed exile, he was forced into a more +human companionship, that was brief but regular. He was obliged to +have menial assistance. While he might have eaten his bread "in +sorrow" carelessly and mechanically, if it had been prepared for +him, the occupation of cooking his own food brought the vulgarity +and materialness of existence so near to his morbid sensitiveness +that he could not eat the meal he had himself prepared. He did not +yet wish to die, and when starvation or society seemed to be the +only alternative, he chose the latter. An Indian woman, so hideous +as to scarcely suggest humanity, at stated times performed for him +these offices. When she did not come, which was not infrequent, he +did not eat. + +Such was the mental and physical condition of the Man on the Beach +on the 1st of January, 1869. + + +It was a still, bright day, following a week of rain and wind. Low +down the horizon still lingered a few white flecks--the flying +squadrons of the storm--as vague as distant sails. Southward the +harbor bar whitened occasionally but lazily; even the turbulent +Pacific swell stretched its length wearily upon the shore. And +toiling from the settlement over the low sand dunes, a carriage at +last halted half a mile from the solitary's dwelling. + +"I reckon ye'll hev to git out here," said the driver, pulling up +to breathe his panting horses. "Ye can't git any nigher." + +There was a groan of execration from the interior of the vehicle, a +hysterical little shriek, and one or two shrill expressions of +feminine disapprobation, but the driver moved not. At last a +masculine head expostulated from the window: "Look here; you agreed +to take us to the house. Why, it's a mile away at least!" + +"Thar, or tharabouts, I reckon," said the driver, coolly crossing +his legs on the box. + +"It's no use talking; I can never walk through this sand and horrid +glare," said a female voice quickly and imperatively. Then, +apprehensively, "Well, of all the places!" + +"Well, I never!" + +"This DOES exceed everything." + +"It's really TOO idiotic for anything." + +It was noticeable that while the voices betrayed the difference of +age and sex, they bore a singular resemblance to each other, and a +certain querulousness of pitch that was dominant. + +"I reckon I've gone about as fur as I allow to go with them +hosses," continued the driver suggestively, "and as time's +vallyble, ye'd better unload." + +"The wretch does not mean to leave us here alone?" said a female +voice in shrill indignation. "You'll wait for us, driver?" said a +masculine voice, confidently. + +"How long?" asked the driver. + +There was a hurried consultation within. The words "Might send us +packing!" "May take all night to get him to listen to reason," +"Bother! whole thing over in ten minutes," came from the window. +The driver meanwhile had settled himself back in his seat, and +whistled in patient contempt of a fashionable fare that didn't know +its own mind nor destination. Finally, the masculine head was +thrust out, and, with a certain potential air of judicially ending +a difficulty, said:-- + +"You're to follow us slowly, and put up your horses in the stable +or barn until we want you." + +An ironical laugh burst from the driver. "Oh, yes--in the stable +or barn--in course. But, my eyes sorter failin' me, mebbee, now, +some ev you younger folks will kindly pint out the stable or barn +of the Kernel's. Woa!--will ye?--woa! Give me a chance to pick +out that there barn or stable to put ye in!" This in arch +confidence to the horses, who had not moved. + +Here the previous speaker, rotund, dignified, and elderly, alighted +indignantly, closely followed by the rest of the party, two ladies +and a gentleman. One of the ladies was past the age, but not the +fashion, of youth, and her Parisian dress clung over her wasted +figure and well-bred bones artistically if not gracefully; the +younger lady, evidently her daughter, was crisp and pretty, and +carried off the aquiline nose and aristocratic emaciation of her +mother with a certain piquancy and a dash that was charming. The +gentleman was young, thin, with the family characteristics, but +otherwise indistinctive. + +With one accord they all faced directly toward the spot indicated +by the driver's whip. Nothing but the bare, bleak, rectangular +outlines of the cabin of the Man on the Beach met their eyes. All +else was a desolate expanse, unrelieved by any structure higher +than the tussocks of scant beach grass that clothed it. They were +so utterly helpless that the driver's derisive laughter gave way at +last to good humor and suggestion. "Look yer," he said finally, "I +don't know ez it's your fault you don't know this kentry ez well ez +you do Yurup; so I'll drag this yer team over to Robinson's on the +river, give the horses a bite, and then meander down this yer +ridge, and wait for ye. Ye'll see me from the Kernel's." And +without waiting for a reply, he swung his horses' heads toward the +river, and rolled away. + +The same querulous protest that had come from the windows arose +from the group, but vainly. Then followed accusations and +recrimination. "It's YOUR fault; you might have written, and had +him meet us at the settlement." "You wanted to take him by +surprise!" "I didn't. You know if I'd written that we were +coming, he'd have taken good care to run away from us." "Yes, to +some more inaccessible place." "There can be none worse than +this," etc., etc. But it was so clearly evident that nothing was +to be done but to go forward, that even in the midst of their +wrangling they straggled on in Indian file toward the distant +cabin, sinking ankle-deep in the yielding sand, punctuating their +verbal altercation with sighs, and only abating it at a scream from +the elder lady. + +"Where's Maria?" + +"Gone on ahead!" grunted the younger gentleman, in a bass voice, so +incongruously large for him that it seemed to have been a +ventriloquistic contribution by somebody else. + +It was too true. Maria, after adding her pungency to the general +conversation, had darted on ahead. But alas! that swift Camilla, +after scouring the plain some two hundred feet with her demitrain, +came to grief on an unbending tussock and sat down, panting but +savage. As they plodded wearily toward her, she bit her red lips, +smacked them on her cruel little white teeth like a festive and +sprightly ghoul, and lisped:-- + +"You DO look so like guys! For all the world like those English +shopkeepers we met on the Righi, doing the three-guinea excursion +in their Sunday clothes!" + +Certainly the spectacle of these exotically plumed bipeds, whose +fine feathers were already bedrabbled by sand and growing limp in +the sea breeze, was somewhat dissonant with the rudeness of sea and +sky and shore. A few gulls screamed at them; a loon, startled from +the lagoon, arose shrieking and protesting, with painfully extended +legs, in obvious burlesque of the younger gentleman. The elder +lady felt the justice of her gentle daughter's criticism, and +retaliated with simple directness:-- + +"Your skirt is ruined, your hair is coming down, your hat is half +off your head, and your shoes--in Heaven's name, Maria! what HAVE +you done with your shoes?" + +Maria had exhibited a slim stockinged foot from under her skirt. +It was scarcely three fingers broad, with an arch as patrician as +her nose. "Somewhere between here and the carriage," she answered; +"Dick can run back and find it, while he is looking for your +brooch, mamma. Dick's so obliging." + +The robust voice of Dick thundered, but the wasted figure of Dick +feebly ploughed its way back, and returned with the missing buskin. + +"I may as well carry them in my hand like the market girls at +Saumur, for we have got to wade soon," said Miss Maria, sinking her +own terrors in the delightful contemplation of the horror in her +parent's face, as she pointed to a shining film of water slowly +deepening in a narrow swale in the sands between them and the +cabin. + +"It's the tide," said the elder gentleman. "If we intend to go on +we must hasten; permit me, my dear madam," and before she could +reply he had lifted the astounded matron in his arms, and made +gallantly for the ford. The gentle Maria cast an ominous eye on +her brother, who, with manifest reluctance, performed for her the +same office. But that acute young lady kept her eyes upon the +preceding figure of the elder gentleman, and seeing him suddenly +and mysteriously disappear to his armpits, unhesitatingly threw +herself from her brother's protecting arms,--an action which +instantly precipitated him into the water,--and paddled hastily to +the opposite bank, where she eventually assisted in pulling the +elderly gentleman out of the hollow into which he had fallen, and +in rescuing her mother, who floated helplessly on the surface, +upheld by her skirts, like a gigantic and variegated water-lily. +Dick followed with a single gaiter. In another minute they were +safe on the opposite bank. + +The elder lady gave way to tears; Maria laughed hysterically; Dick +mingled a bass oath with the now audible surf; the elder gentleman, +whose florid face the salt water had bleached, and whose dignity +seemed to have been washed away, accounted for both by saying he +thought it was a quicksand. + +"It might have been," said a quiet voice behind them; "you should +have followed the sand dunes half a mile further to the estuary." + +They turned instantly at the voice. It was that of the Man on the +Beach. They all rose to their feet and uttered together, save one, +the single exclamation, "James!" The elder gentleman said "Mr. +North," and, with a slight resumption of his former dignity, +buttoned his coat over his damp shirt front. + +There was a silence, in which the Man on the Beach looked gravely +down upon them. If they had intended to impress him by any +suggestion of a gay, brilliant, and sensuous world beyond in their +own persons, they had failed, and they knew it. Keenly alive as +they had always been to external prepossession, they felt that they +looked forlorn and ludicrous, and that the situation lay in his +hands. The elderly lady again burst into tears of genuine +distress, Maria colored over her cheek-bones, and Dick stared at +the ground in sullen disquiet. + +"You had better get up," said the Man on the Beach, after a +moment's thought, "and come up to the cabin. I cannot offer you a +change of garments, but you can dry them by the fire." + +They all rose together, and again said in chorus, "James!" but this +time with an evident effort to recall some speech or action +previously resolved upon and committed to memory. The elder lady +got so far as to clasp her hands and add, "You have not forgotten +us--James, oh, James!"; the younger gentleman to attempt a brusque +"Why, Jim, old boy," that ended in querulous incoherence; the young +lady to cast a half-searching, half-coquettish look at him; and the +old gentleman to begin, "Our desire, Mr. North"--but the effort was +futile. Mr. James North, standing before them with folded arms, +looked from the one to the other. + +"I have not thought much of you for a twelvemonth," he said, +quietly, "but I have not forgotten you. Come!" + +He led the way a few steps in advance, they following silently. In +this brief interview they felt he had resumed the old dominance and +independence, against which they had rebelled; more than that, in +this half failure of their first concerted action they had changed +their querulous bickerings to a sullen distrust of each other, and +walked moodily apart as they followed James North into his house. +A fire blazed brightly on the hearth; a few extra seats were +quickly extemporized from boxes and chests, and the elder lady, +with the skirt of her dress folded over her knees,--looking not +unlike an exceedingly overdressed jointed doll,--dried her flounces +and her tears together. Miss Maria took in the scant appointments +of the house in one single glance, and then fixed her eyes upon +James North, who, the least concerned of the party, stood before +them, grave and patiently expectant. + +"Well," began the elder lady in a high key, "after all this worry +and trouble you have given us, James, haven't you anything to say? +Do you know--have you the least idea what you are doing? what +egregious folly you are committing? what everybody is saying? Eh? +Heavens and earth!--do you know who I am?" + +"You are my father's brother's widow, Aunt Mary," returned James, +quietly. "If I am committing any folly it only concerns myself; if +I cared for what people said I should not be here; if I loved +society enough to appreciate its good report I should stay with +it." + +"But they say you have run away from society to pine alone for a +worthless creature--a woman who has used you, as she has used and +thrown away others--a--" + +"A woman," chimed in Dick, who had thrown himself on James's bed +while his patent leathers were drying, "a woman that all the +fellers know never intended"--here, however, he met James North's +eye, and muttering something about "whole thing being too idiotic +to talk about," relapsed into silence. + +"You know," continued Mrs. North, "that while we and all our set +shut our eyes to your very obvious relations with that woman, and +while I myself often spoke of it to others as a simple flirtation, +and averted a scandal for your sake, and when the climax was +reached, and she herself gave you an opportunity to sever your +relations, and nobody need have been wiser--and she'd have had all +the blame--and it's only what she's accustomed to--you--you! you, +James North!--you must nonsensically go, and, by this extravagant +piece of idiocy and sentimental tomfoolery, let everybody see how +serious the whole affair was, and how deep it hurt you! and here in +this awful place, alone--where you're half drowned to get to it and +are willing to be wholly drowned to get away! Oh, don't talk to +me! I won't hear it--it's just too idiotic for anything!" + +The subject of this outburst neither spoke nor moved a single +muscle. + +"Your aunt, Mr. North, speaks excitedly," said the elder gentleman; +"yet I think she does not overestimate the unfortunate position in +which your odd fancy places you. I know nothing of the reasons +that have impelled you to this step; I only know that the popular +opinion is that the cause is utterly inadequate. You are still +young, with a future before you. I need not say how your present +conduct may imperil that. If you expected to achieve any good-- +even to your own satisfaction--but this conduct--" + +"Yes--if there was anything to be gained by it!" broke in Mrs. +North. + +"If you ever thought she'd come back!--but that kind of woman +don't. They must have change. Why"--began Dick suddenly, and as +suddenly lying down again. + +"Is this all you have come to say?" asked James North, after a +moment's patient silence, looking from one to the other. + +"All?" screamed Mrs. North; "is it not enough?" + +"Not to change my mind nor my residence at present," replied North, +coolly. + +"Do you mean to continue this folly all your life?" + +"And have a coroner's inquest, and advertisements and all the facts +in the papers?" + +"And have HER read the melancholy details, and know that you were +faithful and she was not?" + +This last shot was from the gentle Maria, who bit her lips as it +glanced from the immovable man. + +"I believe there is nothing more to say," continued North, quietly. +"I am willing to believe your intentions are as worthy as your +zeal. Let us say no more," he added, with grave weariness; "the +tide is rising, and your coachman is signaling you from the bank." + +There was no mistaking the unshaken positiveness of the man, which +was all the more noticeable from its gentle but utter indifference +to the wishes of the party. He turned his back upon them as they +gathered hurriedly around the elder gentleman, while the words, "He +cannot be in his right mind," "It's your duty to do it," "It's +sheer insanity," "Look at his eye!" all fell unconsciously upon his +ear. + +"One word more, Mr. North," said the elder gentleman, a little +portentously, to conceal an evident embarrassment. "It may be that +your conduct might suggest to minds more practical than your own +the existence of some aberration of the intellect--some temporary +mania--that might force your best friends into a quasi-legal +attitude of--" + +"Declaring me insane," interrupted James North, with the slight +impatience of a man more anxious to end a prolix interview than to +combat an argument. "I think differently. As my aunt's lawyer, +you know that within the last year I have deeded most of my +property to her and her family. I cannot believe that so shrewd an +adviser as Mr. Edmund Carter would ever permit proceedings that +would invalidate that conveyance." + +Maria burst into a laugh of such wicked gratification that James +North, for the first time, raised his eyes with something of +interest to her face. She colored under them, but returned his +glance with another like a bayonet flash. The party slowly moved +toward the door, James North following. + +"Then this is your final answer?" asked Mrs. North, stopping +imperiously on the threshold. + +"I beg your pardon?" queried North, half abstractedly. + +"Your final answer?" + +"Oh, certainly." + +Mrs. North flounced away a dozen rods in rage. This was +unfortunate for North. It gave them the final attack in detail. +Dick began: "Come along! You know you can advertise for her with a +personal down there and the old woman wouldn't object as long as +you were careful and put in an appearance now and then!" + +As Dick limped away, Mr. Carter thought, in confidence, that the +whole matter--even to suit Mr. North's sensitive nature--might be +settled there. "SHE evidently expects you to return. My opinion +is that she never left San Francisco. You can't tell anything +about these women." + +With this last sentence on his indifferent ear, James North seemed +to be left free. Maria had rejoined her mother; but as they +crossed the ford, and an intervening sand-hill hid the others from +sight, that piquant young lady suddenly appeared on the hill and +stood before him. + +"And you're not coming back?" she said directly. + +"No." + +"Never?" + +"I cannot say." + +"Tell me! what is there about some women to make men love them so?" + +"Love," replied North, quietly. + +"No, it cannot be--it is not THAT!" + +North looked over the hill and round the hill, and looked bored. + +"Oh, I'm going now. But one moment, Jem! I didn't want to come. +They dragged me here. Good-by." + +She raised a burning face and eyes to his. He leaned forward and +imprinted the perfunctory cousinly kiss of the period upon her +cheek. + +"Not that way," she said angrily, clutching his wrists with her +long, thin fingers; "you shan't kiss me in that way, James North." + +With the faintest, ghost-like passing of a twinkle in the corners +of his sad eyes, he touched his lips to hers. With the contact, +she caught him round the neck, pressed her burning lips and face to +his forehead, his cheeks, the very curves of his chin and throat, +and--with a laugh was gone. + + +II + + +Had the kinsfolk of James North any hope that their visit might +revive some lingering desire he still combated to enter once more +the world they represented, that hope would have soon died. +Whatever effect this episode had upon the solitary,--and he had +become so self-indulgent of his sorrow, and so careless of all that +came between him and it, as to meet opposition with profound +indifference,--the only appreciable result was a greater attraction +for the solitude that protected him, and he grew even to love the +bleak shore and barren sands that had proved so inhospitable to +others. There was a new meaning to the roar of the surges, an +honest, loyal sturdiness in the unchanging persistency of the +uncouth and blustering trade-winds, and a mute fidelity in the +shining sands, treacherous to all but him. With such bandogs to +lie in wait for trespassers, should he not be grateful? + +If no bitterness was awakened by the repeated avowal of the +unfaithfulness of the woman he loved, it was because he had always +made the observation and experience of others give way to the +dominance of his own insight. No array of contradictory facts ever +shook his belief or unbelief; like all egotists, he accepted them +as truths controlled by a larger truth of which he alone was +cognizant. His simplicity, which was but another form of his +egotism, was so complete as to baffle ordinary malicious cunning, +and so he was spared the experience and knowledge that come to a +lower nature, and help debase it. + +Exercise and the stimulus of the few wants that sent him hunting or +fishing kept up his physical health. Never a lover of rude freedom +or outdoor life his sedentary predilections and nice tastes kept +him from lapsing into barbarian excess; never a sportsman he +followed the chase with no feverish exaltation. Even dumb +creatures found out his secret, and at times, stalking moodily over +the upland, the brown deer and elk would cross his path without +fear or molestation, or, idly lounging in his canoe within the +river bar, flocks of wild fowl would settle within stroke of his +listless oar. And so the second winter of his hermitage drew near +its close, and with it came a storm that passed into local history, +and is still remembered. It uprooted giant trees along the river, +and with them the tiny rootlets of the life he was idly fostering. + +The morning had been fitfully turbulent, the wind veering several +points south and west, with suspicions lulls, unlike the steady +onset of the regular southwest trades. High overhead the long +manes of racing cirro stratus streamed with flying gulls and +hurrying water-fowl; plover piped incessantly, and a flock of +timorous sand-pipers sought the low ridge of his cabin, while a +wrecking crew of curlew hastily manned the uprooted tree that +tossed wearily beyond the bar. By noon the flying clouds huddled +together in masses, and then were suddenly exploded in one vast +opaque sheet over the heavens. The sea became gray, and suddenly +wrinkled and old. There was a dumb, half-articulate cry in the +air,--rather a confusion of many sounds, as of the booming of +distant guns, the clangor of a bell, the trampling of many waves, +the creaking of timbers and soughing of leaves, that sank and fell +ere you could yet distinguish them. And then it came on to blow. +For two hours it blew strongly. At the time the sun should have +set the wind had increased; in fifteen minutes darkness shut down, +even the white sands lost their outlines, and sea and shore and sky +lay in the grip of a relentless and aggressive power. + +Within his cabin, by the leaping light of his gusty fire, North sat +alone. His first curiosity passed, the turmoil without no longer +carried his thought beyond its one converging centre. SHE had come +to him on the wings of the storm, even as she had been borne to him +on the summer fog-cloud. Now and then the wind shook the cabin, +but he heeded it not. He had no fears for its safety; it presented +its low gable to the full fury of the wind that year by year had +piled, and even now was piling, protecting buttresses of sand +against it. With each succeeding gust it seemed to nestle more +closely to its foundations, in the whirl of flying sand that +rattled against its roof and windows. It was nearly midnight when +a sudden thought brought him to his feet. What if SHE were exposed +to the fury of such a night as this? What could he do to help her? +Perhaps even now, as he sat there idle, she--Hark! was not that a +gun--No? Yes, surely! + +He hurriedly unbolted the door, but the strength of the wind and +the impact of drifted sand resisted his efforts. With a new and +feverish strength possessing him he forced it open wide enough to +permit his egress when the wind caught him as a feather, rolled him +over and over, and then, grappling him again, held him down hard +and fast against the drift. Unharmed, but unable to move, he lay +there, hearing the multitudinous roar of the storm, but unable to +distinguish one familiar sound in the savage medley. At last he +managed to crawl flat on his face to the cabin, and refastening the +door, threw himself upon his bed. + +He was awakened from a fitful dream of his Cousin Maria. She with +a supernatural strength seemed to be holding the door against some +unseen, unknown power that moaned and strove without, and threw +itself in despairing force against the cabin. He could see the +lithe undulations of her form as she alternately yielded to its +power, and again drew the door against it, coiling herself around +the log-hewn doorpost with a hideous, snake-like suggestion. And +then a struggle and a heavy blow, which shook the very foundations +of the structure, awoke him. He leaped to his feet, and into an +inch of water! By the flickering firelight he could see it oozing +and dripping from the crevices of the logs and broadening into a +pool by the chimney. A scrap of paper torn from an envelope was +floating idly on its current. Was it the overflow of the backed-up +waters of the river? He was not left long in doubt. Another blow +upon the gable of the house, and a torrent of spray leaped down the +chimney, scattered the embers far and wide, and left him in utter +darkness. Some of the spray clung to his lips. It was salt. The +great ocean had beaten down the river bar and was upon him! + +Was there aught to fly to? No! The cabin stood upon the highest +point of the sand spit, and the low swale on one side crossed by +his late visitors was a seething mass of breakers, while the +estuary behind him was now the ocean itself. There was nothing to +do but to wait. + +The very helplessness of his situation was, to a man of his +peculiar temperament, an element of patient strength. The instinct +of self-preservation was still strong in him, but he had no fear of +death, nor, indeed, any presentiment of it; yet if it came, it was +an easy solution of the problem that had been troubling him, and it +wiped off the slate! He thought of the sarcastic prediction of his +cousin, and death in the form that threatened him was the +obliteration of his home and even the ground upon which it stood. +There would be nothing to record, no stain could come upon the +living. The instinct that kept him true to HER would tell her how +he died; if it did not, it was equally well. And with this simple +fatalism his only belief, this strange man groped his way to his +bed, lay down, and in a few moments was asleep. The storm still +roared without. Once again the surges leaped against the cabin, +but it was evident that the wind was abating with the tide. + +When he awoke it was high noon, and the sun was shining brightly. +For some time he lay in a delicious languor, doubting if he was +alive or dead, but feeling through every nerve and fibre an +exquisite sense of peace--a rest he had not known since his +boyhood--a relief he scarcely knew from what. He felt that he was +smiling, and yet his pillow was wet with the tears that glittered +still on his lashes. The sand blocking up his doorway, he leaped +lightly from his window. A few clouds were still sailing slowly in +the heavens, the trailing plumes of a great benediction that lay on +sea and shore. He scarcely recognized the familiar landscape; a +new bar had been formed in the river, and a narrow causeway of sand +that crossed the lagoon and marshes to the river bank and the +upland trail seemed to bring him nearer to humanity again. He was +conscious of a fresh, childlike delight in all this, and when, a +moment later, he saw the old uprooted tree, now apparently forever +moored and imbedded in the sand beside his cabin, he ran to it with +a sense of joy. + +Its trailing roots were festooned with clinging sea-weed and the +long, snaky, undulating stems of the sea-turnip; and fixed between +two crossing roots was a bamboo orange crate, almost intact. As he +walked toward it he heard a strange cry, unlike anything the barren +sands had borne before. Thinking it might be some strange sea bird +caught in the meshes of the sea-weed, he ran to the crate and +looked within. It was half filled with sea-moss and feathery +algae. The cry was repeated. He brushed aside the weeds with his +hands. It was not a wounded sea bird, but a living human child! + +As he lifted it from its damp enwrappings he saw that it was an +infant eight or nine months old. How and when it had been brought +there, or what force had guided that elfish cradle to his very +door, he could not determine; but it must have been left early, for +it was quite warm, and its clothing almost dried by the blazing +morning sun. To wrap his coat about it, to run to his cabin with +it, to start out again with the appalling conviction that nothing +could be done for it there, occupied some moments. His nearest +neighbor was Trinidad Joe, a "logger," three miles up the river. +He remembered to have heard vaguely that he was a man of family. +To half strangle the child with a few drops from his whisky flask, +to extricate his canoe from the marsh, and strike out into the +river with his waif, was at least to do something. In half an hour +he had reached the straggling cabin and sheds of Trinidad Joe, and +from the few scanty flowers that mingled with the brushwood fence, +and a surplus of linen fluttering on the line, he knew that his +surmise as to Trinidad Joe's domestic establishment was correct. + +The door at which he knocked opened upon a neat, plainly-furnished +room, and the figure of a buxom woman of twenty-five. With an +awkwardness new to him, North stammered out the circumstances of +his finding the infant, and the object of his visit. Before he had +finished, the woman, by some feminine trick, had taken the child +from his hands ere he knew it; and when he paused, out of breath, +burst into a fit of laughter. North tried to laugh too, but +failed. + +When the woman had wiped the tears from a pair of very frank blue +eyes, and hidden two rows of very strong white teeth again, she +said:-- + +"Look yar! You're that looney sort a' chap that lives alone over +on the spit yonder, ain't ye?" + +North hastened to admit all that the statement might imply. + +"And so ye've had a baby left ye to keep you company? Lordy!" +Here she looked as if dangerously near a relapse, and then added, +as if in explanation of her conduct,-- + +"When I saw ye paddlin' down here,--you thet ez shy as elk in +summer,--I sez, 'He's sick.' But a baby,--Oh, Lordy!" + +For a moment North almost hated her. A woman who, in this +pathetic, perhaps almost tragic, picture saw only a ludicrous +image, and that image himself, was of another race than that he had +ever mingled with. Profoundly indifferent as he had always been to +the criticism of his equals in station, the mischievous laughter of +this illiterate woman jarred upon him worse than his cousin's +sarcasm. It was with a little dignity that he pointed out the fact +that at present the child needed nourishment. "It's very young," +he added. "I'm afraid it wants its natural nourishment." + +"Whar is it to get it?" asked the woman. + +James North hesitated, and looked around. There should be a baby +somewhere! there MUST be a baby somewhere! "I thought that you," +he stammered, conscious of an awkward coloring,--"I--that is--I--" +He stopped short, for she was already cramming her apron into her +mouth, too late, however, to stop the laugh that overflowed it. +When she found her breath again, she said,-- + +"Look yar! I don't wonder they said you was looney! I'm Trinidad +Joe's onmarried darter, and the only woman in this house. Any fool +could have told you that. Now, ef you can rig us up a baby out o' +them facts, I'd like to see it done." + +Inwardly furious but outwardly polite, James North begged her +pardon, deplored his ignorance, and, with a courtly bow, made a +movement to take the child. But the woman as quickly drew it away. + +"Not much," she said, hastily. "What! trust that poor critter to +you? No, sir! Thar's more ways of feeding a baby, young man, than +you knows on, with all your 'nat'ral nourishment.' But it looks +kinder logy and stupid." + +North freezingly admitted that he had given the infant whisky as a +stimulant. + +"You did? Come, now, that ain't so looney after all. Well, I'll +take the baby, and when Dad comes home we'll see what can be done." + +North hesitated. His dislike of the woman was intense, and yet he +knew no one else and the baby needed instant care. Besides, he +began to see the ludicrousness of his making a first call on his +neighbors with a foundling to dispose of. She saw his hesitation, +and said,-- + +"Ye don't know me, in course. Well, I'm Bessy Robinson, Trinidad +Joe Robinson's daughter. I reckon Dad will give me a character if +you want references, or any of the boys on the river." + +"I'm only thinking of the trouble I'm giving you, Miss Robinson, I +assure you. Any expense you may incur--" + +"Young man," said Bessy Robinson, turning sharply on her heel, and +facing him with her black brows a little contracted, "if it comes +to expenses, I reckon I'll pay you for that baby, or not take it at +all. But I don't know you well enough to quarrel with you on +sight. So leave the child to me, and, if you choose, paddle down +here to-morrow, after sun up--the ride will do you good--and see +it, and Dad thrown in. Good by!" and with one powerful but well- +shaped arm thrown around the child, and the other crooked at the +dimpled elbow a little aggressively, she swept by James North and +entered a bedroom, closing the door behind her. + +When Mr. James North reached his cabin it was dark. As he rebuilt +his fire, and tried to rearrange the scattered and disordered +furniture, and remove the debris of last night's storm, he was +conscious for the first time of feeling lonely. He did not miss +the child. Beyond the instincts of humanity and duty he had really +no interest in its welfare or future. He was rather glad to get +rid of it, he would have preferred to some one else, and yet SHE +looked as if she were competent. And then came the reflection that +since the morning he had not once thought of the woman he loved. +The like had never occurred in his twelvemonth solitude. So he set +to work, thinking of her and of his sorrows, until the word +"Looney," in connection with his suffering, flashed across his +memory. "Looney!" It was not a nice word. It suggested something +less than insanity; something that might happen to a common, +unintellectual sort of person. He remembered the loon, an ungainly +feathered neighbor, that was popularly supposed to have lent its +name to the adjective. Could it be possible that people looked +upon him as one too hopelessly and uninterestingly afflicted for +sympathy or companionship, too unimportant and common for even +ridicule; or was this but the coarse interpretation of that vulgar +girl? + +Nevertheless, the next morning "after sun up" James North was at +Trinidad Joe's cabin. That worthy proprietor himself--a long, lank +man, with even more than the ordinary rural Western characteristics +of ill health, ill feeding, and melancholy--met him on the bank, +clothed in a manner and costume that was a singular combination of +the frontiersman and the sailor. When North had again related the +story of his finding the child, Trinidad Joe pondered. + +"It mout hev been stowed away in one of them crates for safe- +keeping," he said, musingly, "and washed off the deck o' one o' +them Tahiti brigs goin' down fer oranges. Least-ways, it never got +thar from these parts." + +"But it's a miracle its life was saved at all. It must have been +some hours in the water." + +"Them brigs lays their course well inshore, and it was just mebbe a +toss up if the vessel clawed off the reef at all! And ez to the +child keepin' up, why, dog my skin! that's just the contrariness o' +things," continued Joe, in sententious cynicism. "Ef an able +seaman had fallen from the yard-arm that night he'd been sunk in +sight o' the ship, and thet baby ez can't swim a stroke sails +ashore, sound asleep, with the waves for a baby-jumper." + +North, who was half relieved, yet half awkwardly disappointed at +not seeing Bessy, ventured to ask how the child was doing. + +"She'll do all right now," said a frank voice above, and, looking +up, North discerned the round arms, blue eyes, and white teeth of +the daughter at the window. "She's all hunky, and has an appetite-- +ef she hezn't got her 'nat'ral nourishment.' Come, Dad! heave +ahead, and tell the stranger what you and me allow we'll do, and +don't stand there swappin' lies with him." + +"Weel," said Trinidad Joe, dejectedly, "Bess allows she can rar +that baby and do justice to it. And I don't say--though I'm her +father--that she can't. But when Bess wants anything she wants it +all, clean down; no half-ways nor leavin's for her." + +"That's me! go on, Dad--you're chippin' in the same notch every +time," said Miss Robinson, with cheerful directness. + +"Well, we agree to put the job up this way. We'll take the child +and you'll give us a paper or writin' makin' over all your right +and title. How's that?" + +Without knowing exactly why he did, Mr. North objected decidedly. + +"Do you think we won't take good care of it?" asked Miss Bessy, +sharply. + +"That is not the question," said North, a little hotly. "In the +first place, the child is not mine to give. It has fallen into my +hands as a trust,--the first hands that received it from its +parents. I do not think it right to allow any other hands to come +between theirs and mine." + +Miss Bessy left the window. In another moment she appeared from +the house, and, walking directly towards North, held out a somewhat +substantial hand. "Good!" she said, as she gave his fingers an +honest squeeze. "You ain't so looney after all. Dad, he's right! +He shan't gin it up, but we'll go halves in it, he and me. He'll +be father and I'll be mother 'til death do us part, or the reg'lar +family turns up. Well--what do you say?" + +More pleased than he dared confess to himself with the praise of +this common girl, Mr. James North assented. Then would he see the +baby? He would, and Trinidad Joe having already seen the baby, and +talked of the baby, and felt the baby, and indeed had the baby +offered to him in every way during the past night, concluded to +give some of his valuable time to logging, and left them together. + +Mr. North was obliged to admit that the baby was thriving. He +moreover listened with polite interest to the statement that the +baby's eyes were hazel, like his own; that it had five teeth; that +she was, for a girl of that probable age, a robust child; and yet +Mr. North lingered. Finally, with his hand on the door-lock, he +turned to Bessy and said,-- + +"May I ask you an odd question, Miss Robinson?" + +"Go on." + +"Why did you think I was--'looney'?" + +The frank Miss Robinson bent her head over the baby. + +"Why?" + +"Yes, why?" + +"Because you WERE looney." + +"Oh!" + +"But--" + +"Yes--" + +"You'll get over it." + +And under the shallow pretext of getting the baby's food, she +retired to the kitchen, where Mr. North had the supreme +satisfaction of seeing her, as he passed the window, sitting on a +chair with her apron over her head, shaking with laughter. + +For the next two or three days he did not visit the Robinsons, but +gave himself up to past memories. On the third day he had--it must +be confessed not without some effort--brought himself into that +condition of patient sorrow which had been his habit. The episode +of the storm and the finding of the baby began to fade, as had +faded the visit of his relatives. It had been a dull, wet day and +he was sitting by his fire, when there came a tap at his door. +"Flora;" by which juvenescent name his aged Indian handmaid was +known, usually announced her presence with an imitation of a +curlew's cry: it could not be her. He fancied he heard the +trailing of a woman's dress against the boards, and started to his +feet, deathly pale, with a name upon his lips. But the door was +impatiently thrown open, and showed Bessy Robinson! And the baby! + +With a feeling of relief he could not understand he offered her a +seat. She turned her frank eyes on him curiously. + +"You look skeert!" + +"I was startled. You know I see nobody here!" + +"Thet's so. But look yar, do you ever use a doctor?" + +Not clearly understanding her, he in turn asked, "Why?" + +"Cause you must rise up and get one now--thet's why. This yer baby +of ours is sick. We don't use a doctor at our house, we don't +beleeve in 'em, hain't no call for 'em--but this yer baby's parents +mebbee did. So rise up out o' that cheer and get one." + +James North looked at Miss Robinson and rose, albeit a little in +doubt, and hesitating. + +Miss Robinson saw it. "I shouldn't hev troubled ye, nor ridden +three mile to do it, if ther hed been any one else to send. But +Dad's over at Eureka, buying logs, and I'm alone. Hello--wher yer +goin'?" + +North had seized his hat and opened the door. "For a doctor," he +replied amazedly. + +"Did ye kalkilate to walk six miles and back?" + +"Certainly--I have no horse." + +"But I have, and you'll find her tethered outside. She ain't much +to look at, but when you strike the trail she'll go." + +"But YOU--how will YOU return?" + +"Well," said Miss Robinson, drawing her chair to the fire, taking +off her hat and shawl, and warming her knees by the blaze, "I +didn't reckon to return. You'll find me here when you come back +with the doctor. Go! Skedaddle quick!" + +She did not have to repeat the command. In another instant James +North was in Miss Bessy's seat--a man's dragoon saddle,--and +pounding away through the sand. Two facts were in his mind: one +was that he, the "looney," was about to open communication with the +wisdom and contemporary criticism of the settlement, by going for a +doctor to administer to a sick and anonymous infant in his +possession; the other was that his solitary house was in the hands +of a self-invited, large-limbed, illiterate, but rather comely +young woman. These facts he could not gallop away from, but to his +credit be it recorded that he fulfilled his mission zealously, if +not coherently, to the doctor, who during the rapid ride gathered +the idea that North had rescued a young married woman from +drowning, who had since given birth to a child. + +The few words that set the doctor right when he arrived at the +cabin might in any other community have required further +explanation, but Dr. Duchesne, an old army surgeon, was prepared +for everything and indifferent to all. "The infant," he said, "was +threatened with inflammation of the lungs; at present there was no +danger, but the greatest care and caution must be exercised. +Particularly exposure should be avoided." "That settles the whole +matter, then," said Bessy potentially. Both gentlemen looked their +surprise. "It means," she condescended to further explain, "that +YOU must ride that filly home, wait for the old man to come to- +morrow, and then ride back here with some of my duds, for thar's no +'day-days' nor picknicking for that baby ontil she's better. And I +reckon to stay with her ontil she is." + +"She certainly is unable to bear any exposure at present," said the +doctor, with an amused side glance at North's perplexed face. +"Miss Robinson is right. I'll ride with you over the sands as far +as the trail." + +"I'm afraid," said North, feeling it incumbent upon him to say +something, "that you'll hardly find it as comfortable here as--" + +"I reckon not," she said simply, "but I didn't expect much." + +North turned a little wearily away. "Good night," she said +suddenly, extending her hand, with a gentler smile of lip and eye +than he had ever before noticed, "good night--take good care of +Dad." + +The doctor and North rode together some moments in silence. North +had another fact presented to him, i. e. that he was going a- +visiting, and that he had virtually abandoned his former life; also +that it would be profanation to think of his sacred woe in the +house of a stranger. + +"I dare say," said the doctor, suddenly, "you are not familiar with +the type of woman Miss Bessy presents so perfectly. Your life has +been spent among the conventional class." + +North froze instantly at what seemed to be a probing of his secret. +Disregarding the last suggestion, he made answer simply and +truthfully that he had never met any Western girl like Bessy. + +"That's your bad luck," said the doctor. "You think her coarse and +illiterate?" + +Mr. North had been so much struck with her kindness that really he +had not thought of it. + +"That's not so," said the doctor, curtly; "although even if you +told her so she would not think any the less of you--nor of +herself. If she spoke rustic Greek instead of bad English, and +wore a cestus in place of an ill-fitting corset, you'd swear she +was a goddess. There's your trail. Good night." + + +III + + +James North did not sleep well that night. He had taken Miss +Bessy's bedroom, at her suggestion, there being but two, and "Dad +never using sheets and not bein' keerful in his habits." It was +neat, but that was all. The scant ornamentation was atrocious; two +or three highly colored prints, a shell work-box, a ghastly winter +bouquet of skeleton leaves and mosses, a star-fish, and two china +vases hideous enough to have been worshiped as Buddhist idols, +exhibited the gentle recreation of the fair occupant, and the +possible future education of the child. In the morning he was met +by Joe, who received the message of his daughter with his usual +dejection, and suggested that North stay with him until the child +was better. That event was still remote; North found, on his +return to his cabin, that the child had been worse; but he did not +know, until Miss Bessy dropped a casual remark, that she had not +closed her own eyes that night. It was a week before he regained +his own quarters, but an active week--indeed, on the whole, a +rather pleasant week. For there was a delicate flattery in being +domineered by a wholesome and handsome woman, and Mr. James North +had by this time made up his mind that she was both. Once or twice +he found himself contemplating her splendid figure with a +recollection of the doctor's compliment, and later, emulating her +own frankness, told her of it. + +"And what did YOU say?" she asked. + +"Oh, I laughed and said--nothing." + +And so did she. + +A month after this interchange of frankness, she asked him if he +could spend the next evening at her house. "You see," she said, +"there's to be a dance down at the hall at Eureka, and I haven't +kicked a fut since last spring. Hank Fisher's comin' up to take me +over, and I'm goin' to let the shanty slide for the night." + +"But what's to become of the baby?" asked North, a little testily. + +"Well," said Miss Robinson, facing him somewhat aggressively, "I +reckon it won't hurt ye to take care of it for a night. Dad can't-- +and if he could, he don't know how. Liked to have pizened me +after mar died. No, young man, I don't propose to ask Hank Fisher +to tote thet child over to Eureka and back, and spile his fun." + +"Then I suppose I must make way for Mr. Hank--Hank--Fisher?" said +North, with the least tinge of sarcasm in his speech. + +"Of course. You've got nothing else to do, you know." + +North would have given worlds to have pleaded a previous engagement +on business of importance, but he knew that Bessy spoke truly. He +had nothing to do. "And Fisher has, I suppose?" he asked. + +"Of course--to look after ME!" + +A more unpleasant evening James North had not spent since the first +day of his solitude. He almost began to hate the unconscious cause +of his absurd position, as he paced up and down the floor with it. +"Was there ever such egregious folly?" he began, but remembering he +was quoting Maria North's favorite resume of his own conduct, he +stopped. The child cried, missing, no doubt, the full rounded +curves and plump arm of its nurse. North danced it violently, with +an inward accompaniment that was not musical, and thought of the +other dancers. "Doubtless," he mused, "she has told this beau of +hers that she has left the baby with the 'looney' Man on the Beach. +Perhaps I may be offered a permanent engagement as a harmless +simpleton accustomed to the care of children. Mothers may cry for +me. The doctor is at Eureka. Of course, he will be there to see +his untranslated goddess, and condole with her over the imbecility +of the Man on the Beach." Once he carelessly asked Joe who the +company were. + +"Well," said Joe, mournfully, "thar's Widder Higsby and darter; the +four Stubbs gals; in course Polly Doble will be on hand with that +feller that's clerking over at the Head for Jones, and Jones's +wife. Then thar's French Pete, and Whisky Ben, and that chap that +shot Archer,--I disremember his name,--and the barber--what's that +little mulatto's name--that 'ar Kanaka? I swow!" continued Joe, +drearily, "I'll be forgettin' my own next--and--" + +"That will do," interrupted North, only half concealing his disgust +as he rose and carried the baby to the other room, beyond the reach +of names that might shock its ladylike ears. The next morning he +met the from-dance-returning Bessy abstractedly, and soon took his +leave, full of a disloyal plan, conceived in the sleeplessness of +her own bedchamber. He was satisfied that he owed a duty to its +unknown parents to remove the child from the degrading influences +of the barber Kanaka, and Hank Fisher especially, and he resolved +to write to his relatives, stating the case, asking a home for the +waif and assistance to find its parents. He addressed this letter +to his cousin Maria, partly in consideration of the dramatic +farewell of that young lady, and its possible influence in turning +her susceptible heart towards his protege. He then quietly settled +back to his old solitary habits, and for a week left the Robinsons +unvisited. The result was a morning call by Trinidad Joe on the +hermit. "It's a whim of my gal's, Mr. North," he said, dejectedly, +"and ez I told you before and warned ye, when that gal hez an idee, +fower yoke of oxen and seving men can't drag it outer her. She's +got a idee o' larnin'--never hevin' hed much schoolin', and we ony +takin' the papers, permiskiss like--and she says YOU can teach her-- +not hevin' anythin' else to do. Do ye folly me?" + +"Yes," said North, "certainly." + +"Well, she allows ez mebbee you're proud, and didn't like her +takin' care of the baby for nowt; and she reckons that ef you'll +gin her some book larnin', and get her to sling some fancy talk in +fash'n'ble style--why, she'll call it squar." + +"You can tell her," said North, very honestly, "that I shall be +only too glad to help her in any way, without ever hoping to cancel +my debt of obligation to her." + +"Then it's a go?" said the mystified Joe, with a desperate attempt +to convey the foregoing statement to his own intellect in three +Saxon words. + +"It's a go," replied North, cheerfully. + +And he felt relieved. For he was not quite satisfied with his own +want of frankness to her. But here was a way to pay off the debt +he owed her, and yet retain his own dignity. And now he could tell +her what he had done, and he trusted to the ambitious instinct that +prompted her to seek a better education to explain his reasons for +it. + +He saw her that evening and confessed all to her frankly. She kept +her head averted, but when she turned her blue eyes to him they +were wet with honest tears. North had a man's horror of a ready +feminine lachrymal gland; but it was not like Bessy to cry, and it +meant something; and then she did it in a large, goddess-like way, +without sniffling, or chocking, or getting her nose red, but rather +with a gentle deliquescence, a harmonious melting, so that he was +fain to comfort her with nearer contact, gentleness in his own sad +eyes, and a pressure of her large hand. + +"It's all right, I s'pose," she said, sadly; "but I didn't reckon +on yer havin' any relations, but thought you was alone, like me." + +James North, thinking of Hank Fisher and the "mullater," could not +help intimating that his relations were very wealthy and +fashionable people, and had visited him last summer. A +recollection of the manner in which they had so visited him and his +own reception of them prevented his saying more. But Miss Bessy +could not forego a certain feminine curiosity, and asked,-- + +"Did they come with Sam Baker's team?" + +"Yes." + +"Last July?" + +"Yes." + +"And Sam drove the horses here for a bite?" + +"I believe so." + +"And them's your relations?" + +"They are." + +Miss Robinson reached over the cradle and enfolded the sleeping +infant in her powerful arms. Then she lifted her eyes, wrathful +through her still glittering tears, and said, slowly, "They don't-- +have--this--child--then!" + +"But why?" + +"Oh, why? I saw them! That's why, and enough! You can't play any +such gay and festive skeletons on this poor baby for flesh and +blood parents. No, sir!" + +"I think you judge them hastily, Miss Bessy," said North, secretly +amused; "my aunt may not, at first, favorably impress strangers, +yet she has many friends. But surely you do not object to my +cousin Maria, the young lady?" + +"What! that dried cuttle-fish, with nothing livin' about her but +her eyes? James North, ye may be a fool like the old woman,-- +perhaps it's in the family,--but ye ain't a devil, like that gal! +That ends it." + +And it did. North dispatched a second letter to Maria saying that +he had already made other arrangements for the baby. Pleased with +her easy victory, Miss Bessy became more than usually gracious, and +the next day bowed her shapely neck meekly to the yoke of her +teacher, and became a docile pupil. James North could not have +helped noticing her ready intelligence, even had he been less +prejudiced in her favor than he was fast becoming now. If he had +found it pleasant before to be admonished by her there was still +more delicious flattery in her perfect trust in his omniscient +skill as a pilot over this unknown sea. There was a certain +enjoyment in guiding her hand over the writing-book, that I fear he +could not have obtained from an intellect less graciously sustained +by its physical nature. The weeks flew quickly by on gossamer +wings, and when she placed a bunch of larkspurs and poppies in his +hand one morning, he remembered for the first that it was spring. + +I cannot say that there was more to record of Miss Bessy's +education than this. Once North, half jestingly, remarked that he +had never yet seen her admirer, Mr. Hank Fisher. Miss Bessy +(coloring but cool)--"You never will!" North (white but hot)-- +"Why?" Miss Bessy (faintly)--"I'd rather not." North +(resolutely)--"I insist." Bessy (yielding)--"As my teacher?" +North (hesitatingly, at the limitation of the epithet)--"Y-e-e-s!" +Bessy--"And you'll promise never to speak of it again?" North-- +"Never." Bessy (slowly--"Well, he said I did an awful thing to go +over to your cabin and stay." North (in the genuine simplicity of +a refined nature)--"But how?" Miss Bessy (half piqued, but +absolutely admiring that nature)--"Quit! and keep your promise!" + +They were so happy in these new relations that it occurred to Miss +Bessy one day to take James North to task for obliging her to ask +to be his pupil. "You knew how ignorant I was," she added; and Mr. +North retorted by relating to her the doctor's criticism on her +independence. "To tell you the truth," he added, "I was afraid you +would not take it as kindly as he thought." + +"That is, you thought me as vain as yourself. It seems to me you +and the doctor had a great deal to say to each other." + +"On the contrary," laughed North, "that was all we said." + +"And you didn't make fun of me?" + +Perhaps it was not necessary for North to take her hand to +emphasize his denial, but he did. + +Miss Bessy, being still reminiscent, perhaps, did not notice it. +"If it hadn't been for that ar--I mean that thar--no, that baby--I +wouldn't have known you!" she said dreamily. + +"No," returned North, mischievously, "but you still would have +known Hank Fisher." + +No woman is perfect. Miss Bessy looked at him with a sudden--her +first and last--flash of coquetry. Then stooped and kissed--the +baby. + +James North was a simple gentleman, but not altogether a fool. He +returned the kiss, but not vicariously. + +There was a footstep on the porch. These two turned the hues of a +dying dolphin, and then laughed. It was Joe. He held a newspaper +in his hand. "I reckon ye woz right, Mr. North, about my takin' +these yar papers reg'lar. For I allow here's suthin' that may clar +up the mystery o' that baby's parents." With the hesitation of a +slowly grappling intellect, Joe sat down on the table and read from +the San Francisco "Herald" as follows: "'It is now ascertained +beyond doubt that the wreck reported by the Aeolus was the American +brig Pomare bound hence to Tahiti. The worst surmises are found +correct. The body of the woman has been since identified as that +of the beau-ti-ful daughter of--of--of--Terp--Terp--Terpish'--Well! +I swow that name just tackles me." + +"Gin it to me, Dad," said Bessy pertly. "You never had any +education, any way. Hear your accomplished daughter." With a mock +bow to the new schoolmaster, and a capital burlesque of a confident +school girl, she strode to the middle of the room the paper held +and folded book-wise in her hands. "Ahem! Where did you leave +off? Oh, 'the beautiful daughter of Terpsichore--whose name was +prom-i-nently connected with a mysterious social scandal of last +year--the gifted but unfortunate Grace Chatterton'--No--don't stop +me--there's some more! 'The body of her child, a lovely infant of +six months, has not been recovered, and it is supposed was washed +overboard.' There! may be that's the child, Mr. North. Why, Dad! +Look, O my God! He's falling. Catch him, Dad! Quick!" + +But her strong arm had anticipated her father's. She caught him, +lifted him to the bed, on which he lay henceforth for many days +unconscious. Then fever supervened, and delirium, and Dr. Duchesne +telegraphed for his friends; but at the end of a week and the +opening of a summer day the storm passed, as the other storm had +passed, and he awoke, enfeebled, but at peace. Bessy was at his +side--he was glad to see--alone. + +"Bessy, dear," he said hesitatingly, "when I am stronger I have +something to tell you." + +"I know it all, Jem," she said with a trembling lip; "I heard it +all--no, not from THEM, but from your own lips in your delirium. +I'm glad it came from YOU--even then." + +"Do you forgive me, Bessy?" + +She pressed her lips to his forehead and said hastily, and then +falteringly, as if afraid of her impulse:-- + +"Yes. Yes." + +"And you will still be mother to the child?" + +"HER child?" + +"No dear, not hers, but MINE!" + +She started, cried a little, and then putting her arms around him, +said: "Yes." + +And as there was but one way of fulfilling that sacred promise, +they were married in the autumn. + + + +TWO SAINTS OF THE FOOT-HILLS + + +It never was clearly ascertained how long they had been there. The +first settler of Rough-and-Ready--one Low, playfully known to his +familiars as "The Poor Indian"--declared that the Saints were afore +his time, and occupied a cabin in the brush when he "blazed" his +way to the North Fork. It is certain that the two were present +when the water was first turned on the Union Ditch and then and +there received the designation of Daddy Downey and Mammy Downey, +which they kept to the last. As they tottered toward the +refreshment tent, they were welcomed with the greatest enthusiasm +by the boys; or, to borrow the more refined language of the "Union +Recorder,"--"Their gray hairs and bent figures, recalling as they +did the happy paternal eastern homes of the spectators, and the +blessings that fell from venerable lips when they left those homes +to journey in quest of the Golden Fleece on Occidental Slopes, +caused many to burst into tears." The nearer facts, that many of +these spectators were orphans, that a few were unable to establish +any legal parentage whatever, that others had enjoyed a State's +guardianship and discipline, and that a majority had left their +paternal roofs without any embarrassing preliminary formula, were +mere passing clouds that did not dim the golden imagery of the +writer. From that day the Saints were adopted as historical lay +figures, and entered at once into possession of uninterrupted +gratuities and endowment. + +It was not strange that, in a country largely made up of ambitious +and reckless youth, these two--types of conservative and settled +forms--should be thus celebrated. Apart from any sentiment or +veneration, they were admirable foils to the community's youthful +progress and energy. They were put forward at every social +gathering, occupied prominent seats on the platform at every public +meeting, walked first in every procession, were conspicuous at the +frequent funeral and rarer wedding, and were godfather and +godmother to the first baby born in Rough-and-Ready. At the first +poll opened in that precinct, Daddy Downey cast the first vote, +and, as was his custom on all momentous occasions, became volubly +reminiscent. "The first vote I ever cast," said Daddy, "was for +Andrew Jackson; the father o' some on your peart young chaps wasn't +born then; he! he! that was 'way long in '33, wasn't it? I +disremember now, but if Mammy was here, she bein' a school-gal at +the time, she could say. But my memory's failin' me. I'm an old +man, boys; yet I likes to see the young ones go ahead. I recklect +that thar vote from a suckumstance. Squire Adams was present, and +seein' it was my first vote, he put a goold piece into my hand, +and, sez he, sez Squire Adams, 'Let that always be a reminder of +the exercise of a glorious freeman's privilege!' He did; he! he! +Lord, boys! I feel so proud of ye, that I wish I had a hundred +votes to cast for ye all." + +It was hardly necessary to say that the memorial tribute of Squire +Adams was increased tenfold by the judges, inspectors, and clerks, +and that the old man tottered back to Mammy, considerably heavier +than he came. As both of the rival candidates were equally sure of +his vote, and each had called upon him and offered a conveyance, it +is but fair to presume they were equally beneficent. But Daddy +insisted upon walking to the polls,--a distance of two miles,--as a +moral example, and a text for the California paragraphers, who +hastened to record that such was the influence of the foot-hill +climate, that "a citizen of Rough-and-Ready, aged eighty-four, rose +at six o'clock, and, after milking two cows, walked a distance of +twelve miles to the polls, and returned in time to chop a cord of +wood before dinner." + +Slightly exaggerated as this statement may have been, the fact that +Daddy was always found by the visitor to be engaged at his wood- +pile, which seemed neither to increase nor diminish under his axe, +a fact, doubtless, owing to the activity of Mammy, who was always +at the same time making pies, seemed to give some credence to the +story. Indeed, the wood-pile of Daddy Downey was a standing +reproof to the indolent and sluggish miner. + +"Ole Daddy must use up a pow'ful sight of wood; every time I've +passed by his shanty he's been makin' the chips fly. But what gets +me is, that the pile don't seem to come down," said Whisky Dick to +his neighbor. + +"Well, you derned fool!" growled his neighbor, "spose some chap +happens to pass by thar, and sees the old man doin' a man's work at +eighty, and slouches like you and me lying round drunk, and that +chap, feelin' kinder humped, goes up some dark night and heaves a +load of cut pine over his fence, who's got anything to say about +it? Say?" Certainly not the speaker, who had done the act +suggested, nor the penitent and remorseful hearer, who repeated it +next day. + +The pies and cakes made by the old woman were, I think, remarkable +rather for their inducing the same loyal and generous spirit than +for their intrinsic excellence, and it may be said appealed more +strongly to the nobler aspirations of humanity than its vulgar +appetite. Howbeit, everybody ate Mammy Downey's pies, and thought +of his childhood. "Take 'em, dear boys," the old lady would say; +"it does me good to see you eat 'em; reminds me kinder of my poor +Sammy, that, ef he'd lived, would hev been ez strong and beg ez you +be, but was taken down with lung fever, at Sweetwater. I kin see +him yet; that's forty year ago, dear! comin' out o' the lot to the +bake-house, and smilin' such a beautiful smile, like yours, dear +boy, as I handed him a mince or a lemming turnover. Dear, dear, +how I do run on! and those days is past! but I seems to live in you +again!" The wife of the hotel-keeper, actuated by a low jealousy, +had suggested that she "seemed to live OFF them;" but as that +person tried to demonstrate the truth of her statement by reference +to the cost of the raw material used by the old lady, it was +considered by the camp as too practical and economical for +consideration. "Besides," added Cy Perkins, "ef old Mammy wants to +turn an honest penny in her old age, let her do it. How would you +like your old mother to make pies on grub wages? eh?" A suggestion +that so affected his hearer (who had no mother) that he bought +three on the spot. The quality of these pies had never been +discussed but once. It is related that a young lawyer from San +Francisco, dining at the Palmetto restaurant, pushed away one of +Mammy Downey's pies with every expression of disgust and +dissatisfaction. At this juncture, Whisky Dick, considerably +affected by his favorite stimulant, approached the stranger's +table, and, drawing up a chair, sat uninvited before him. + +"Mebbee, young man," he began gravely, "ye don't like Mammy +Downey's pies?" + +The stranger replied curtly, and in some astonishment, that he did +not, as a rule, "eat pie." + +"Young man," continued Dick, with drunken gravity, "mebbee you're +accustomed to Charlotte rusks and blue mange; mebbee ye can't eat +unless your grub is got up by one o' them French cooks'? Yet WE-- +us boys yar in this camp--calls that pie--a good--a com-pe-tent +pie!" + +The stranger again disclaimed anything but a general dislike of +that form of pastry. + +"Young man," continued Dick, utterly unheeding the explanation,-- +"young man, mebbee you onst had an ole--a very ole mother, who, +tottering down the vale o' years, made pies. Mebbee, and it's like +your blank epicurean soul, ye turned up your nose on the ole woman, +and went back on the pies, and on her! She that dandled ye when ye +woz a baby,--a little baby! Mebbee ye went back on her, and shook +her, and played off on her, and gave her away--dead away! And now, +mebbee, young man--I wouldn't hurt ye for the world, but mebbee, +afore ye leave this yar table, YE'LL EAT THAT PIE!" + +The stranger rose to his feet, but the muzzle of a dragoon revolver +in the unsteady hands of Whisky Dick, caused him to sit down again. +He ate the pie, and lost his case likewise, before a Rough-and- +Ready jury. + +Indeed, far from exhibiting the cynical doubts and distrusts of +age, Daddy Downey received always with childlike delight the +progress of modern improvement and energy. "In my day, long back +in the twenties, it took us nigh a week--a week, boys--to get up a +barn, and all the young ones--I was one then--for miles 'round at +the raisin'; and yer's you boys--rascals ye are, too--runs up this +yer shanty for Mammy and me 'twixt sun-up and dark! Eh, eh, you're +teachin' the old folks new tricks, are ye? Ah, get along, you!" +and in playful simulation of anger he would shake his white hair +and his hickory staff at the "rascals." The only indication of the +conservative tendencies of age was visible in his continual protest +against the extravagance of the boys. "Why," he would say, "a +family, a hull family,--leavin' alone me and the old woman,--might +be supported on what you young rascals throw away in a single +spree. Ah, you young dogs, didn't I hear about your scattering +half-dollars on the stage the other night when that Eyetalian +Papist was singin'? And that money goes out of Ameriky--ivry +cent!" + +There was little doubt that the old couple were saving, if not +avaricious. But when it was known, through the indiscreet +volubility of Mammy Downey, that Daddy Downey sent the bulk of +their savings, gratuities, and gifts to a dissipated and prodigal +son in the East,--whose photograph the old man always carried with +him,--it rather elevated him in their regard. "When ye write to +that gay and festive son o' yourn, Daddy," said Joe Robinson, "send +him this yer specimen. Give him my compliments, and tell him, ef +he kin spend money faster than I can, I call him! Tell him, ef he +wants a first-class jamboree, to kem out here, and me and the boys +will show him what a square drunk is!" In vain would the old man +continue to protest against the spirit of the gift; the miner +generally returned with his pockets that much the lighter, and it +is not improbable a little less intoxicated than he otherwise might +have been. It may be premised that Daddy Downey was strictly +temperate. The only way he managed to avoid hurting the feelings +of the camp was by accepting the frequent donations of whisky to be +used for the purposes of liniment. + +"Next to snake-oil, my son," he would say, "and dilberry-juice,-- +and ye don't seem to pro-duce 'em hereabouts,--whisky is good for +rubbin' onto old bones to make 'em limber. But pure cold water, +'sparklin' and bright in its liquid light,' and, so to speak, +reflectin' of God's own linyments on its surfiss, is the best, +onless, like poor ol' Mammy and me, ye gets the dumb-agur from +over-use." + +The fame of the Downey couple was not confined to the foot-hills. +The Rev. Henry Gushington, D.D., of Boston, making a bronchial tour +of California, wrote to the "Christian Pathfinder" an affecting +account of his visit to them, placed Daddy Downey's age at 102, and +attributed the recent conversions in Rough-and-Ready to their +influence. That gifted literary Hessian, Bill Smith, traveling in +the interests of various capitalists, and the trustworthy +correspondent of four "only independent American journals," quoted +him as an evidence of the longevity superinduced by the climate, +offered him as an example of the security of helpless life and +property in the mountains, used him as an advertisement of the +Union Ditch, and it is said in some vague way cited him as proving +the collateral facts of a timber and ore-producing region existing +in the foot-hills worthy the attention of Eastern capitalists. + +Praised thus by the lips of distinguished report, fostered by the +care and sustained by the pecuniary offerings of their fellow- +citizens, the Saints led for two years a peaceful life of gentle +absorption. To relieve them from the embarrassing appearance of +eleemosynary receipts,--an embarrassment felt more by the givers +than the recipients,--the postmastership of Rough-and-Ready was +procured for Daddy, and the duty of receiving and delivering the +United States mails performed by him, with the advice and +assistance of the boys. If a few letters went astray at this time, +it was easily attributed to this undisciplined aid, and the boys +themselves were always ready to make up the value of a missing +money-letter and "keep the old man's accounts square." To these +functions presently were added the treasurerships of the Masons' +and Odd Fellows' charitable funds,--the old man being far advanced +in their respective degrees,--and even the position of almoner of +their bounties was super-added. Here, unfortunately, Daddy's +habits of economy and avaricious propensity came near making him +unpopular, and very often needy brothers were forced to object to +the quantity and quality of the help extended. They always met +with more generous relief from the private hands of the brothers +themselves, and the remark, "that the ol' man was trying to set an +example,--that he meant well,"--and that they would yet be thankful +for his zealous care and economy. A few, I think, suffered in +noble silence, rather than bring the old man's infirmity to the +public notice. + +And so with this honor of Daddy and Mammy, the days of the miners +were long and profitable in the land of the foot-hills. The mines +yielded their abundance, the winters were singularly open and yet +there was no drouth nor lack of water, and peace and plenty smiled +on the Sierrean foothills, from their highest sunny upland to the +trailing falda of wild oats and poppies. If a certain superstition +got abroad among the other camps, connecting the fortunes of Rough- +and-Ready with Daddy and Mammy, it was a gentle, harmless fancy, +and was not, I think, altogether rejected by the old people. A +certain large, patriarchal, bountiful manner, of late visible in +Daddy, and the increase of much white hair and beard, kept up the +poetic illusion, while Mammy, day by day, grew more and more like +somebody's fairy godmother. An attempt was made by a rival camp to +emulate these paying virtues of reverence, and an aged mariner was +procured from the Sailor's Snug Harbor in San Francisco, on trial. +But the unfortunate seaman was more or less diseased, was not +always presentable, through a weakness for ardent spirits, and +finally, to use the powerful idiom of one of his disappointed +foster-children, "up and died in a week, without slinging ary +blessin'." + +But vicissitude reaches young and old alike. Youthful Rough-and- +Ready and the Saints had climbed to their meridian together, and it +seemed fit that they should together decline. The first shadow +fell with the immigration to Rough-and-Ready of a second aged pair. +The landlady of the Independence Hotel had not abated her +malevolence towards the Saints, and had imported at considerable +expense her grand-aunt and grand-uncle, who had been enjoying for +some years a sequestered retirement in the poorhouse at East +Machias. They were indeed very old. By what miracle, even as +anatomical specimens, they had been preserved during their long +journey was a mystery to the camp. In some respects they had +superior memories and reminiscences. The old man--Abner Trix--had +shouldered a musket in the war of 1812; his wife, Abigail, had seen +Lady Washington. She could sing hymns; he knew every text between +"the leds" of a Bible. There is little doubt but that in many +respects, to the superficial and giddy crowd of youthful +spectators, they were the more interesting spectacle. + +Whether it was jealousy, distrust, or timidity that overcame the +Saints, was never known, but they studiously declined to meet the +strangers. When directly approached upon the subject, Daddy Downey +pleaded illness, kept himself in close seclusion, and the Sunday +that the Trixes attended church in the school-house on the hill, +the triumph of the Trix party was mitigated by the fact that the +Downeys were not in their accustomed pew. "You bet that Daddy and +Mammy is lying low jest to ketch them old mummies yet," explained a +Downeyite. For by this time schism and division had crept into the +camp; the younger and later members of the settlement adhering to +the Trixes, while the older pioneers stood not only loyal to their +own favorites, but even, in the true spirit of partisanship, began +to seek for a principle underlying their personal feelings. "I +tell ye what, boys," observed Sweetwater Joe, "if this yer camp is +goin' to be run by greenhorns, and old pioneers, like Daddy and the +rest of us, must take back seats, it's time we emigrated and shoved +out, and tuk Daddy with us. Why, they're talkin' of rotation in +offiss, and of putting that skeleton that Ma'am Decker sets up at +the table, to take her boarders' appetites away, into the post- +office in place o' Daddy." And, indeed, there were some fears of +such a conclusion; the newer men of Rough-and-Ready were in the +majority, and wielded a more than equal influence of wealth and +outside enterprise. "Frisco," as a Downeyite bitterly remarked, +"already owned half the town." The old friends that rallied around +Daddy and Mammy were, like most loyal friends in adversity, in bad +case themselves, and were beginning to look and act, it was +observed, not unlike their old favorites. + +At this juncture Mammy died. + +The sudden blow for a few days seemed to reunite dissevered Rough- +and-Ready. Both factions hastened to the bereaved Daddy with +condolements, and offers of aid and assistance. But the old man +received them sternly. A change had come over the weak and +yielding octogenarian. Those who expected to find him maudlin, +helpless, disconsolate, shrank from the cold, hard eyes and +truculent voice that bade them "begone," and "leave him with his +dead." Even his own friends failed to make him respond to their +sympathy, and were fain to content themselves with his cold +intimation that both the wishes of his dead wife and his own +instincts were against any display, or the reception of any favor +from the camp that might tend to keep up the divisions they had +innocently created. The refusal of Daddy to accept any service +offered was so unlike him as to have but one dreadful meaning! The +sudden shock had turned his brain! Yet so impressed were they with +his resolution that they permitted him to perform the last sad +offices himself, and only a select few of his nearer neighbors +assisted him in carrying the plain deal coffin from his lonely +cabin in the woods to the still lonelier cemetery on the hill-top. + +When the shallow grave was filled, he dismissed even these curtly, +shut himself up in his cabin, and for days remained unseen. It was +evident that he was no longer in his right mind. + +His harmless aberration was accepted and treated with a degree of +intelligent delicacy hardly to be believed of so rough a community. +During his wife's sudden and severe illness, the safe containing +the funds intrusted to his care by the various benevolent +associations was broken into and robbed, and although the act was +clearly attributable to his carelessness and preoccupation, all +allusion to the fact was withheld from him in his severe +affliction. When he appeared again before the camp, and the +circumstances were considerately explained to him, with the remark +that "the boys had made it all right," the vacant, hopeless, +unintelligent eye that he turned upon the speaker showed too +plainly that he had forgotten all about it. "Don't trouble the old +man," said Whisky Dick, with a burst of honest poetry. "Don't ye +see his memory's dead, and lying there in the coffin with Mammy?" +Perhaps the speaker was nearer right than he imagined. + +Failing in religious consolation, they took various means of +diverting his mind with worldly amusements, and one was a visit to +a traveling variety troupe, then performing in the town. The +result of the visit was briefly told by Whisky Dick. "Well, sir, +we went in, and I sot the old man down in a front seat, and kinder +propped him up with some other of the fellers round him, and there +he sot as silent and awful ez the grave. And then that fancy +dancer, Miss Grace Somerset, comes in, and dern my skin, ef the old +man didn't get to trembling and fidgeting all over, as she cut them +pidgin wings. I tell ye what, boys, men is men, way down to their +boots,--whether they're crazy or not! Well, he took on so, that +I'm blamed if at last that gal HERSELF didn't notice him! and she +ups, suddenly, and blows him a kiss--so! with her fingers!" + +Whether this narration were exaggerated or not, it is certain that +the old man Downey every succeeding night of the performance was a +spectator. That he may have aspired to more than that was +suggested a day or two later in the following incident: A number +of the boys were sitting around the stove in the Magnolia saloon, +listening to the onset of a winter storm against the windows, when +Whisky Dick, tremulous, excited, and bristling with rain-drops and +information, broke in upon them. + +"Well, boys, I've got just the biggest thing out. Ef I hadn't seed +it myself, I wouldn't hev believed it!" + +"It ain't thet ghost ag'in?" growled Robinson, from the depths of +his arm-chair; "thet ghost's about played." + +"Wot ghost?" asked a new-comer. + +"Why, ole Mammy's ghost, that every feller about yer sees when he's +half full and out late o' nights." + +"Where?" + +"Where? Why, where should a ghost be? Meanderin' round her grave +on the hill, yander, in course." + +"It's suthin bigger nor thet, pard," said Dick confidently; "no +ghost kin rake down the pot ag'in the keerds I've got here. This +ain't no bluff!" + +"Well, go on!" said a dozen excited voices. + +Dick paused a moment, diffidently, with the hesitation of an +artistic raconteur. + +"Well," he said, with affected deliberation, "let's see! It's nigh +onto an hour ago ez I was down thar at the variety show. When the +curtain was down betwixt the ax, I looks round fer Daddy. No Daddy +thar! I goes out and asks some o' the boys. 'Daddy WAS there a +minnit ago,' they say; 'must hev gone home.' Bein' kinder +responsible for the old man, I hangs around, and goes out in the +hall and sees a passage leadin' behind the scenes. Now the queer +thing about this, boys, ez that suthin in my bones tells me the old +man is THAR. I pushes in, and, sure as a gun, I hears his voice. +Kinder pathetic, kinder pleadin', kinder--" + +"Love-makin'!" broke in the impatient Robinson. + +"You've hit it, pard,--you've rung the bell every time! But she +says, 'wants thet money down, or I'll--' and here I couldn't get to +hear the rest. And then he kinder coaxes, and she says, sorter +sassy, but listenin' all the time,--woman like, ye know, Eve and +the sarpint!--and she says, 'I,ll see to-morrow.' And he says, +'You won't blow on me?' and I gets excited and peeps in, and may I +be teetotally durned ef I didn't see--" + +"What?" yelled the crowd. + +"Why, DADDY ON HIS KNEES TO THAT THERE FANCY DANCER, Grace +Somerset! Now, if Mammy's ghost is meanderin' round, why, et's +about time she left the cemetery and put in an appearance in +Jackson's Hall. Thet's all!" + +"Look yar, boys," said Robinson, rising, "I don't know ez it's the +square thing to spile Daddy's fun. I don't object to it, provided +she ain't takin' in the old man, and givin' him dead away. But ez +we're his guardeens, I propose that we go down thar and see the +lady, and find out ef her intentions is honorable. If she means +marry, and the old man persists, why, I reckon we kin give the +young couple a send-off thet won't disgrace this yer camp! Hey, +boys?" + +It is unnecessary to say that the proposition was received with +acclamation, and that the crowd at once departed on their discreet +mission. But the result was never known, for the next morning +brought a shock to Rough-and-Ready before which all other interest +paled to nothingness. + +The grave of Mammy Downey was found violated and despoiled; the +coffin opened, and half filled with the papers and accounts of the +robbed benevolent associations; but the body of Mammy was gone! +Nor, on examination, did it appear that the sacred and ancient form +of that female had ever reposed in its recesses! + +Daddy Downey was not to be found, nor is it necessary to say that +the ingenuous Grace Somerset was also missing. + +For three days the reason of Rough-and-Ready trembled in the +balance. No work was done in the ditches, in the flume, nor in the +mills. Groups of men stood by the grave of the lamented relict of +Daddy Downey, as open-mouthed and vacant as that sepulchre. Never +since the great earthquake of '52 had Rough-and-Ready been so +stirred to its deepest foundations. + +On the third day the sheriff of Calaveras--a quiet, gentle, +thoughtful man--arrived in town, and passed from one to the other +of excited groups, dropping here and there detached but concise and +practical information. + +"Yes, gentlemen, you are right, Mrs. Downey is not dead, because +there wasn't any Mrs. Downey! Her part was played by George F. +Fenwick, of Sydney,--a 'ticket-of-leave-man,' who was, they say, a +good actor. Downey? Oh, yes Downey was Jem Flanigan, who, in '52, +used to run the variety troupe in Australia, where Miss Somerset +made her debut. Stand back a little, boys. Steady! 'The money?' +Oh, yes, they've got away with that, sure! How are ye, Joe? Why, +you're looking well and hearty! I rather expected ye court week. +How's things your way?" + +"Then they were only play-actors, Joe Hall?" broke in a dozen +voices. + +"I reckon!" returned the sheriff, coolly. + +"And for a matter o' five blank years," said Whisky Dick, sadly, +"they played this camp!" + + + +"JINNY" + + +I think that the few who were permitted to know and love the object +of this sketch spent the rest of their days not only in an attitude +of apology for having at first failed to recognize her higher +nature, but of remorse that they should have ever lent a credulous +ear to a priori tradition concerning her family characteristics. +She had not escaped that calumny which she shared with the rest of +her sex for those youthful follies, levities, and indiscretions +which belong to immaturity. It is very probable that the firmness +that distinguished her maturer will in youth might have been taken +for obstinacy, that her nice discrimination might at the same +period have been taken for adolescent caprice, and that the +positive expression of her quick intellect might have been thought +youthful impertinence before her years had won respect for her +judgment. + +She was foaled at Indian Creek, and one month later, when she was +brought over to Sawyer's Bar, was considered the smallest donkey +ever seen in the foot-hills. The legend that she was brought over +in one of "Dan the Quartz Crusher's" boots required corroboration +from that gentleman; but his denial being evidently based upon a +masculine vanity regarding the size of his foot rather than a +desire to be historically accurate, it went for nothing. It is +certain that for the next two months she occupied the cabin of Dan, +until, perhaps incensed at this and other scandals, she one night +made her way out. "I hadn't the least idee wot woz comin'," said +Dan, "but about midnight I seemed to hear hail onto the roof, and a +shower of rocks and stones like to a blast started in the canyon. +When I got up and struck a light, thar was suthin' like onto a cord +o' kindlin' wood and splinters whar she'd stood asleep, and a hole +in the side o' the shanty, and--no Jinny! Lookin' at them hoofs o' +hern--and mighty porty they is to look at, too--you would allow she +could do it!" I fear that this performance laid the foundation of +her later infelicitous reputation, and perhaps awakened in her +youthful breast a misplaced ambition, and an emulation which might +at that time have been diverted into a nobler channel. For the +fame of this juvenile performance--and its possible promise in the +future--brought at once upon her the dangerous flattery and +attention of the whole camp. Under intelligently directed +provocation she would repeat her misguided exercise, until most of +the scanty furniture of the cabin was reduced to a hopeless wreck, +and sprains and callosities were developed upon the limbs of her +admirers. Yet even at this early stage of her history, that +penetrating intellect which was in after years her dominant quality +was evident to all. She could not be made to kick at quartz +tailings, at a barrel of Boston crackers, or at the head or shin of +"Nigger Pete." An artistic discrimination economized her surplus +energy. "Ef you'll notiss," said Dan, with a large parental +softness, "she never lets herself out to onst like them mules or +any jackass ez I've heerd of, but kinder holds herself in, and, so +to speak, takes her bearings--sorter feels round gently with that +off foot, takes her distance and her rest, and then with that ar' +foot hoverin' round in the air softly, like an angel's wing, and a +gentle, dreamy kind o' look in them eyes, she lites out! Don't ye, +Jinny? Thar! jist ez I told ye," continued Dan, with an artist's +noble forgetfulness of self, as he slowly crawled from the +splintered ruin of the barrel on which he had been sitting. "Thur! +did ye ever see the like! Did ye dream that all the while I was +talkin' she was a meditatin' that?" + +The same artistic perception and noble reticence distinguished her +bray. It was one of which a less sagacious animal would have been +foolishly vain or ostentatiously prodigal. It was a contralto of +great compass and profundity--reaching from low G to high C-- +perhaps a trifle stronger in the lower register, and not altogether +free from a nasal falsetto in the upper. Daring and brilliant as +it was in the middle notes, it was perhaps more musically +remarkable for its great sustaining power. The element of surprise +always entered into the hearer's enjoyment; long after any ordinary +strain of human origin would have ceased, faint echoes of Jinny's +last note were perpetually recurring. But it was as an +intellectual and moral expression that her bray was perfect. As +far beyond her size as were her aspirations, it was a free and +running commentary of scorn at all created things extant, with +ironical and sardonic additions that were terrible. It reviled all +human endeavor, it quenched all sentiment, it suspended frivolity, +it scattered reverie, it paralyzed action. It was omnipotent. +More wonderful and characteristic than all, the very existence of +this tremendous organ was unknown to the camp for six months after +the arrival of its modest owner, and only revealed to them under +circumstances that seemed to point more conclusively than ever to +her rare discretion. + +It was the beginning of a warm night and the middle of a heated +political discussion. Sawyer's Bar had gathered in force at the +Crossing, and by the light of flaring pine torches, cheered and +applauded the rival speakers who from a rude platform addressed the +excited multitude. Partisan spirit at that time ran high in the +foot-hills; crimination and recrimination, challenge, reply, +accusation, and retort had already inflamed the meeting, and +Colonel Bungstarter, after a withering review of his opponent's +policy, culminated with a personal attack upon the career and +private character of the eloquent and chivalrous Colonel Culpepper +Starbottle of Siskiyou. That eloquent and chivalrous gentleman was +known to be present; it was rumored that the attack was expected to +provoke a challenge from Colonel Starbottle which would give +Bungstarter the choice of weapons, and deprive Starbottle of his +advantage as a dead shot. It was whispered also that the sagacious +Starbottle, aware of this fact, would retaliate in kind so +outrageously as to leave Bungstarter no recourse but to demand +satisfaction on the spot. As Colonel Starbottle rose, the eager +crowd drew together, elbowing each other in rapt and ecstatic +expectancy. "He can't get even on Bungstarter, onless he allows +his sister ran off with a nigger, or that he put up his grandmother +at draw poker and lost her," whispered the Quartz Crusher; "kin +he?" All ears were alert, particularly the very long and hairy +ones just rising above the railing of the speaker's platform; for +Jinny, having a feminine distrust of solitude and a fondness for +show, had followed her master to the meeting and had insinuated +herself upon the platform, where way was made for her with that +frontier courtesy always extended to her age and sex. + +Colonel Starbottle, stertorous and purple, advanced to the railing. +There he unbuttoned his collar and laid his neckcloth aside, then +with his eye fixed on his antagonist he drew off his blue frock +coat, and thrusting one hand into his ruffled shirt front, and +raising the other to the dark canopy above him, he opened his +vindictive lips. The action, the attitude, were Starbottle's. But +the voice was not. For at that supreme moment, a bray--so +profound, so appalling, so utterly soul-subduing, so paralyzing +that everything else sank to mere insignificance beside it--filled +woods, and sky, and air. For a moment only the multitude gasped in +speechless astonishment--it was a moment only--and then the welkin +roared with their shouts. In vain silence was commanded, in vain +Colonel Starbottle, with a ghastly smile, remarked that he +recognized in the interruption the voice and the intellect of the +opposition; the laugh continued, the more as it was discovered that +Jinny had not yet finished, and was still recurring to her original +theme. "Gentlemen," gasped Starbottle, "any attempt by [Hee-haw! +from Jinny] brutal buffoonery to restrict the right of free speech +to all [a prolonged assent from Jinny] is worthy only the +dastardly"--but here a diminuendo so long drawn as to appear a +striking imitation of the Colonel's own apoplectic sentences +drowned his voice with shrieks of laughter. + +It must not be supposed that during this performance a vigorous +attempt was not made to oust Jinny from the platform. But all in +vain. Equally demoralizing in either extremity, Jinny speedily +cleared a circle with her flying hoofs, smashed the speaker's table +and water pitcher, sent the railing flying in fragments over the +cheering crowd, and only succumbed to two blankets, in which, with +her head concealed, she was finally dragged, half captive, half +victor, from the field. Even then a muffled and supplemental bray +that came from the woods at intervals drew half the crowd away and +reduced the other half to mere perfunctory hearers. The +demoralized meeting was adjourned; Colonel Starbottle's withering +reply remained unuttered, and the Bungstarter party were +triumphant. + +For the rest of the evening Jinny was the heroine of the hour, but +no cajolery nor flattery could induce her to again exhibit her +powers. In vain did Dean of Angel's extemporize a short harangue +in the hope that Jinny would be tempted to reply; in vain was every +provocation offered that might sting her sensitive nature to +eloquent revolt. She replied only with her heels. Whether or not +this was simple caprice, or whether she was satisfied with her +maiden effort, or indignant at her subsequent treatment, she +remained silent. "She made her little game," said Dan, who was a +political adherent of Starbottle's, and who yet from that day +enjoyed the great speaker's undying hatred, "and even if me and her +don't agree on politics--YOU let her alone." Alas, it would have +been well for Dan if he could have been true to his instincts, but +the offer of one hundred dollars from the Bungstarter party proved +too tempting. She passed irrevocably from his hands into those of +the enemy. But any reader of these lines will, I trust, rejoice to +hear that this attempt to restrain free political expression in the +foot-hills failed signally. For, although she was again covertly +introduced on the platform by the Bungstarters, and placed face to +face with Colonel Starbottle at Murphy's Camp, she was dumb. Even +a brass band failed to excite her emulation. Either she had become +disgusted with politics or the higher prices paid by the party to +other and less effective speakers aroused her jealousy and shocked +her self-esteem, but she remained a passive spectator. When the +Hon. Sylvester Rourback, who received, for the use of his political +faculties for a single night, double the sum for which she was +purchased outright, appeared on the same platform with herself, she +forsook it hurriedly and took to the woods. Here she might have +starved but for the intervention of one McCarty, a poor market +gardener, who found her, and gave her food and shelter under the +implied contract that she should forsake politics and go to work. +The latter she for a long time resisted, but as she was considered +large enough by this time to draw a cart, McCarty broke her to +single harness, with a severe fracture of his leg and the loss of +four teeth and a small spring wagon. At length, when she could be +trusted to carry his wares to Murphy's Camp, and could be checked +from entering a shop with the cart attached to her,--a fact of +which she always affected perfect disbelief,--her education was +considered as complete as that of the average California donkey. +It was still unsafe to leave her alone, as she disliked solitude, +and always made it a point to join any group of loungers with her +unnecessary cart, and even to follow some good-looking miner to his +cabin. The first time this peculiarity was discovered by her owner +was on his return to the street after driving a bargain within the +walls of the Temperance Hotel. Jinny was nowhere to be seen. Her +devious course, however, was pleasingly indicated by vegetables +that strewed the road until she was at last tracked to the veranda +of the Arcade saloon, where she was found looking through the +window at a game of euchre, and only deterred by the impeding cart +from entering the building. A visit one Sunday to the little +Catholic chapel at French Camp, where she attempted to introduce an +antiphonal service and the cart, brought shame and disgrace upon +her unlucky master. For the cart contained freshly-gathered +vegetables, and the fact that McCarty had been Sabbath-breaking was +painfully evident. Father Sullivan was quick to turn an incident +that provoked only the risibilities of his audience into a moral +lesson. "It's the poor dumb beast that has a more Christian sowl +than Michael," he commented; but here Jinny assented so positively +that they were fain to drag her away by main force. + +To her eccentric and thoughtless youth succeeded a calm maturity in +which her conservative sagacity was steadily developed. She now +worked for her living, subject, however, to a nice discrimination +by which she limited herself to a certain amount of work, beyond +which neither threats, beatings, nor cajoleries would force her. +At certain hours she would start for the stable with or without the +incumbrances of the cart or Michael, turning two long and deaf ears +on all expostulation or entreaty. "Now, God be good to me," said +Michael, one day picking himself out from a ditch as he gazed +sorrowfully after the flying heels of Jinny, "but it's only the +second load of cabbages I'm bringin' the day, and if she's shtruck +NOW, it's ruined I am entoirely." But he was mistaken; after two +hours of rumination Jinny returned of her own free will, having +evidently mistaken the time, and it is said even consented to draw +an extra load to make up the deficiency. It may be imagined from +this and other circumstances that Michael stood a little in awe of +Jinny's superior intellect, and that Jinny occasionally, with the +instinct of her sex, presumed upon it. After the Sunday episode, +already referred to, she was given her liberty on that day, a +privilege she gracefully recognized by somewhat unbending her usual +austerity in the indulgence of a saturnine humor. She would visit +the mining camps, and, grazing lazily and thoughtfully before the +cabins, would, by various artifices and coquetries known to the +female heart, induce some credulous stranger to approach her with +the intention of taking a ride. She would submit hesitatingly to a +halter, allow him to mount her back, and, with every expression of +timid and fearful reluctance, at last permit him to guide her in a +laborious trot out of sight of human habitation. What happened +then was never clearly known. In a few moments the camp would be +aroused by shouts and execrations, and the spectacle of Jinny +tearing by at a frightful pace, with the stranger clinging with his +arms around her neck, afraid to slip off, from terror of her +circumvolving heels, and vainly imploring assistance. Again and +again she would dash by the applauding groups, adding the +aggravation of her voice to the danger of her heels, until suddenly +wheeling, she would gallop to Carter's Pond, and deposit her +luckless freight in the muddy ditch. This practical joke was +repeated until one Sunday she was approached by Juan Ramirez, a +Mexican vaquero, booted and spurred, and carrying a riata. A crowd +was assembled to see her discomfiture. But, to the intense +disappointment of the camp, Jinny, after quietly surveying the +stranger, uttered a sardonic bray, and ambled away to the little +cemetery on the hill, whose tangled chapparal effectually prevented +all pursuit by her skilled antagonist. From that day she forsook +the camp, and spent her Sabbaths in mortuary reflections among the +pine head-boards and cold "hic jacets" of the dead. + +Happy would it have been if this circumstance, which resulted in +the one poetic episode of her life, had occurred earlier; for the +cemetery was the favorite resort of Miss Jessie Lawton, a gentle +invalid from San Francisco, who had sought the foot-hills for the +balsam of pine and fir, and in the faint hope that the freshness of +the wild roses might call back her own. The extended views from +the cemetery satisfied Miss Lawton's artistic taste, and here +frequently, with her sketch-book in hand, she indulged that taste +and a certain shy reserve which kept her from contact with +strangers. On one of the leaves of that sketch-book appears a +study of a donkey's head, being none other than the grave features +of Jinny, as once projected timidly over the artist's shoulder. +The preliminaries of this intimacy have never transpired, nor is it +a settled fact if Jinny made the first advances. The result was +only known to the men of Sawyer's Bar by a vision which remained +fresh in their memories long after the gentle lady and her four- +footed friend had passed beyond their voices. As two of the +tunnel-men were returning from work one evening, they chanced to +look up the little trail, kept sacred from secular intrusion, that +led from the cemetery to the settlement. In the dim twilight, +against a sunset sky, they beheld a pale-faced girl riding slowly +toward them. With a delicate instinct, new to those rough men, +they drew closer in the shadow of the bushes until she passed. +There was no mistaking the familiar grotesqueness of Jinny; there +was no mistaking the languid grace of Miss Lawton. But a wreath of +wild roses was around Jinny's neck, from her long ears floated Miss +Jessie's hat ribbons, and a mischievous, girlish smile was upon +Miss Jessie's face, as fresh as the azaleas in her hair. By the +next day the story of this gentle apparition was known to a dozen +miners in camp, and all were sworn to secrecy. But the next +evening, and the next, from the safe shadows of the woods they +watched and drank in the beauty of that fanciful and all +unconscious procession. They kept their secret, and never a +whisper or footfall from these rough men broke its charm or +betrayed their presence. The man who could have shocked the +sensitive reserve of the young girl would have paid for it with his +life. + +And then one day the character of the procession changed, and this +little incident having been told, it was permitted that Jinny +should follow her friend, caparisoned even as before, but this time +by the rougher but no less loving hands of men. When the cortege +reached the ferry where the gentle girl was to begin her silent +journey to the sea, Jinny broke from those who held her, and after +a frantic effort to mount the barge fell into the swiftly rushing +Stanislaus. A dozen stout arms were stretched to save her, and a +rope skilfully thrown was caught around her feet. For an instant +she was passive, and, as it seemed, saved. But the next moment her +dominant instinct returned, and with one stroke of her powerful +heel she snapped the rope in twain and so drifted with her mistress +to the sea. + + + +ROGER CATRON'S FRIEND + + +I think that, from the beginning, we all knew how it would end. He +had always been so quiet and conventional, although by nature an +impulsive man; always so temperate and abstemious, although a man +with a quick appreciation of pleasure; always so cautious and +practical, although an imaginative man, that when, at last, one by +one he loosed these bands, and gave himself up to a life, perhaps +not worse than other lives which the world has accepted as the +natural expression of their various owners, we at once decided that +the case was a hopeless one. And when one night we picked him up +out of the Union Ditch, a begrimed and weather-worn drunkard, a +hopeless debtor, a self-confessed spendthrift, and a half- +conscious, maudlin imbecile, we knew that the end had come. The +wife he had abandoned had in turn deserted him; the woman he had +misled had already realized her folly, and left him with her +reproaches; the associates of his reckless life, who had used and +abused him, had found him no longer of service, or even amusement, +and clearly there was nothing left to do but to hand him over to +the state, and we took him to the nearest penitential asylum. +Conscious of the Samaritan deed, we went back to our respective +wives, and told his story. It is only just to say that these +sympathetic creatures were more interested in the philanthropy of +their respective husbands than in its miserable object. "It was +good and kind in you, dear," said loving Mrs. Maston to her spouse, +as returning home that night he flung his coat on a chair with an +air of fatigued righteousness; "it was like your kind heart to care +for that beast; but after he left that good wife of his--that +perfect saint--to take up with that awful woman, I think I'd have +left him to die in the ditch. Only to think of it, dear, a woman +that you wouldn't speak to!" Here Mr. Maston coughed slightly, +colored a little, mumbled something about "women not understanding +some things," "that men were men," etc., and then went comfortably +to sleep, leaving the outcast, happily oblivious of all things, and +especially this criticism, locked up in Hangtown Jail. + +For the next twelve hours he lay there, apathetic and half- +conscious. Recovering from this after a while, he became furious, +vengeful, and unmanageable, filling the cell and corridor with +maledictions of friend and enemy; and again sullen, morose, and +watchful. Then he refused food, and did not sleep, pacing his +limits with the incessant, feverish tread of a caged tiger. Two +physicians, diagnosing his case from the scant facts, pronounced +him insane, and he was accordingly transported to Sacramento. But +on the way thither he managed to elude the vigilance of his guards, +and escaped. The alarm was given, a hue and cry followed him, the +best detectives of San Francisco were on his track, and finally +recovered his dead body--emaciated and wasted by exhaustion and +fever--in the Stanislaus Marshes, identified it, and, receiving the +reward of $1,000 offered by his surviving relatives and family, +assisted in legally establishing the end we had predicted. + +Unfortunately for the moral, the facts were somewhat inconsistent +with the theory. A day or two after the remains were discovered +and identified, the real body of "Roger Catron, aged 52 years, +slight, iron-gray hair, and shabby in apparel," as the +advertisement read, dragged itself, travel-worn, trembling, and +disheveled, up the steep slope of Deadwood Hill. How he should do +it, he had long since determined,--ever since he had hidden his +Derringer, a mere baby pistol, from the vigilance of his keepers. +Where he should do it, he had settled within his mind only within +the last few moments. Deadwood Hill was seldom frequented; his +body might lie there for months before it was discovered. He had +once thought of the river, but he remembered it had an ugly way of +exposing its secrets on sandbar and shallow, and that the body of +Whisky Jim, bloated and disfigured almost beyond recognition, had +been once delivered to the eyes of Sandy Bar, before breakfast, on +the left bank of the Stanislaus. He toiled up through the chimisal +that clothed the southern slope of the hill until he reached the +bald, storm-scarred cap of the mountain, ironically decked with the +picked, featherless plumes of a few dying pines. One, stripped of +all but two lateral branches, brought a boyish recollection to his +fevered brain. Against a background of dull sunset fire, it +extended two gaunt arms--black, rigid, and pathetic. Calvary! + +With the very word upon his lips, he threw himself, face downwards, +on the ground beneath it, and, with his fingers clutched in the +soil, lay there for some moments, silent and still. In this +attitude, albeit a skeptic and unorthodox man, he prayed. I cannot +say--indeed I DARE not say--that his prayer was heard, or that God +visited him thus. Let us rather hope that all there was of God in +him, in this crucial moment of agony and shame, strove outward and +upward. Howbeit, when the moon rose he rose too, perhaps a trifle +less steady than the planet, and began to descend the hill with +feverish haste, yet with this marked difference between his present +haste and his former recklessness, that it seemed to have a well- +defined purpose. When he reached the road again, he struck into a +well-worn trail, where, in the distance, a light faintly twinkled. +Following this beacon, he kept on, and at last flung himself +heavily against the door of the little cabin from whose window the +light had shone. As he did so, it opened upon the figure of a +square, thickset man, who, in the impetuosity of Catron's onset, +received him, literally, in his arms. + +"Captain Dick," said Roger Catron, hoarsely, "Captain Dick, save +me! For God's sake, save me!" + +Captain Dick, without a word, placed a large, protecting hand upon +Catron's shoulder, allowed it to slip to his waist, and then drew +his visitor quietly, but firmly, within the cabin. Yet, in the +very movement, he had managed to gently and unobtrusively possess +himself of Catron's pistol. + +"Save ye! From which?" asked Captain Dick, as quietly and +unobtrusively dropping the Derringer in a flour sack. + +"From everything," gasped Catron, "from the men that are hounding +me, from my family, from my friends, but most of all--from, from-- +myself!" + +He had, in turn, grasped Captain Dick, and forced him frenziedly +against the wall. The captain released himself, and, taking the +hands of his excited visitor, said slowly,-- + +"Ye wan some blue mass--suthin' to unload your liver. I'll get it +up for ye." + +"But, Captain Dick, I'm an outcast, shamed, disgraced--" + +"Two on them pills taken now, and two in the morning," continued +the captain, gravely, rolling a bolus in his fingers, "will bring +yer head to the wind again. Yer fallin' to leeward all the time, +and ye want to brace up." + +"But, Captain," continued the agonized man, again clutching the +sinewy arms of his host, and forcing his livid face and fixed eyes +within a few inches of Captain Dick's, "hear me! You must and +shall hear me. I've been in jail--do you hear?--in jail, like a +common felon. I've been sent to the asylum, like a demented +pauper. I've--" + +"Two now, and two in the morning," continued the captain, quietly +releasing one hand only to place two enormous pills in the mouth of +the excited Catron, "thar now--a drink o' whisky--thar, that'll do-- +just enough to take the taste out of yer mouth, wash it down, and +belay it, so to speak. And how are the mills running, gin'rally, +over at the Bar?" + +"Captain Dick, hear me--if you ARE my friend, for God's sake hear +me! An hour ago I should have been a dead man--" + +"They say that Sam Bolin hez sold out of the Excelsior--" + +"Captain Dick! Listen, for God's sake; I have suffered--" + +But Captain Dick was engaged in critically examining his man. "I +guess I'll ladle ye out some o' that soothin' mixture I bought down +at Simpson's t' other day," he said, reflectively. "And I +onderstand the boys up on the Bar think the rains will set in +airly." + +But here Nature was omnipotent. Worn by exhaustion, excitement, +and fever, and possibly a little affected by Captain Dick's later +potion, Roger Catron turned white, and lapsed against the wall. In +an instant Captain Dick had caught him, as a child, lifted him in +his stalwart arms, wrapped a blanket around him, and deposited him +in his bunk. Yet, even in his prostration, Catron made one more +despairing appeal for mental sympathy from his host. + +"I know I'm sick--dying, perhaps," he gasped, from under the +blankets; "but promise me, whatever comes, tell my wife--say to--" + +"It has been lookin' consid'ble like rain, lately, hereabouts," +continued the captain, coolly, in a kind of amphibious slang, +characteristic of the man, "but in these yer latitudes no man kin +set up to be a weather sharp." + +"Captain! will you hear me?" + +"Yer goin' to sleep, now," said the captain, potentially. + +"But, Captain, they are pursuing me! If they should track me +here?" + +"Thar is a rifle over thar, and yer's my navy revolver. When I've +emptied them, and want you to bear a hand, I'll call ye. Just now +your lay is to turn in. It's my watch." + +There was something so positive, strong, assuring, and a little +awesome in the captain's manner, that the trembling, nervously- +prostrated man beneath the blankets forbore to question further. +In a few moments his breathing, albeit hurried and irregular, +announced that he slept. The captain then arose, for a moment +critically examined the sleeping man, holding his head a little on +one side, whistling softly, and stepping backwards to get a good +perspective, but always with contemplative good humor, as if Catron +were a work of art, which he (the captain) had created, yet one +that he was not yet entirely satisfied with. Then he put a large +pea-jacket over his flannel blouse, dragged a Mexican serape from +the corner, and putting it over his shoulders, opened the cabin +door, sat down on the doorstep, and leaning back against the door- +post, composed himself to meditation. The moon lifted herself +slowly over the crest of Deadwood Hill, and looked down, not +unkindly, on his broad, white, shaven face, round and smooth as her +own disc, encircled with a thin fringe of white hair and whiskers. +Indeed, he looked so like the prevailing caricatures in a comic +almanac of planets, with dimly outlined features, that the moon +would have been quite justified in flirting with him, as she +clearly did, insinuating a twinkle into his keen, gray eyes, making +the shadow of a dimple on his broad, fat chin, and otherwise +idealizing him after the fashion of her hero-worshiping sex. +Touched by these benign influences, Captain Dick presently broke +forth in melody. His song was various, but chiefly, I think, +confined to the recital of the exploits of one "Lorenzo," who, as +related by himself,-- + + + "Shipped on board of a Liner, + 'Renzo, boys, Renzo,"-- + + +a fact that seemed to have deprived him at once of all metre, +grammar, or even the power of coherent narration. At times a groan +or a half-articulate cry would come from the "bunk" whereon Roger +Catron lay, a circumstance that always seemed to excite Captain +Dick to greater effort and more rapid vocalization. Toward +morning, in the midst of a prolonged howl from the captain, who was +finishing the "Starboard Watch, ahoy!" in three different keys, +Roger Catron's voice broke suddenly and sharply from his en- +wrappings:-- + +"Dry up, you d--d old fool, will you?" + +Captain Dick stopped instantly. Rising to his feet, and looking +over the landscape, he took all nature into his confidence in one +inconceivably arch and crafty wink. "He's coming up to the wind," +he said softly, rubbing his hands. "The pills is fetchin' him. +Steady now, boys, steady. Steady as she goes on her course," and +with another wink of ineffable wisdom, he entered the cabin and +locked the door. + + +Meanwhile, the best society of Sandy Bar was kind to the newly-made +widow. Without being definitely expressed, it was generally felt +that sympathy with her was now safe, and carried no moral +responsibility with it. Even practical and pecuniary aid, which +before had been withheld, lest it should be diverted from its +proper intent, and, perhaps through the weakness of the wife, made +to minister to the wickedness of the husband,--even that was now +openly suggested. Everybody felt that somebody should do something +for the widow. A few did it. Her own sex rallied to her side, +generally with large sympathy, but, unfortunately, small pecuniary +or practical result. At last, when the feasibility of her taking a +boarding-house in San Francisco, and identifying herself with that +large class of American gentlewomen who have seen better days, but +clearly are on the road never to see them again, was suggested, a +few of her own and her husband's rich relatives came to the front +to rehabilitate her. It was easier to take her into their homes as +an equal than to refuse to call upon her as the mistress of a +lodging-house in the adjoining street. And upon inspection it was +found that she was still quite an eligible partie, prepossessing, +and withal, in her widow's weeds, a kind of poetical and +sentimental presence, as necessary in a wealthy and fashionable +American family as a work of art. "Yes, poor Caroline has had a +sad, sad history," the languid Mrs. Walker Catron would say, "and +we all sympathize with her deeply; Walker always regards her as a +sister." What was this dark history never came out, but its very +mystery always thrilled the visitor, and seemed to indicate plainly +the respectability of the hostess. An American family without a +genteel skeleton in its closet could scarcely add to that gossip +which keeps society from forgetting its members. Nor was it +altogether unnatural that presently Mrs. Roger Catron lent herself +to this sentimental deception, and began to think that she really +was a more exquisitely aggrieved woman than she had imagined. At +times, when this vague load of iniquity put upon her dead husband +assumed, through the mystery of her friends, the rumor of murder +and highway robbery, and even an attempt upon her own life, she +went to her room, a little frightened, and had "a good cry," +reappearing more mournful and pathetic than ever, and corroborating +the suspicions of her friends. Indeed, one or two impulsive +gentlemen, fired by her pathetic eyelids, openly regretted that the +deceased had not been hanged, to which Mrs. Walker Catron responded +that, "Thank Heaven, they were spared at least that disgrace!" and +so sent conviction into the minds of her hearers. + +It was scarcely two months after this painful close of her +matrimonial life that one rainy February morning the servant +brought a card to Mrs. Roger Catron, bearing the following +inscription:-- + + + "Richard Graeme Macleod." + + +Women are more readily affected by names than we are, and there was +a certain Highland respectability about this that, albeit, not +knowing its possessor, impelled Mrs. Catron to send word that she +"would be down in a few moments." At the end of this femininely +indefinite period,--a quarter of an hour by the French clock on the +mantel-piece,--Mrs. Roger Catron made her appearance in the +reception-room. It was a dull, wet day, as I have said before, but +on the Contra Costa hills the greens and a few flowers were already +showing a promise of rejuvenescence and an early spring. There was +something of this, I think, in Mrs. Catron's presence, shown +perhaps in the coquettish bow of a ribbon, in a larger and more +delicate ruche, in a tighter belting of her black cashmere gown; +but still there was a suggestion of recent rain in the eyes, and +threatening weather. As she entered the room, the sun came out, +too, and revealed the prettiness and delicacy of her figure, and I +regret to state, also, the somewhat obtrusive plainness of her +visitor. + +"I knew ye'd be sorter disapp'inted at first, not gettin' the +regular bearings o' my name, but I'm 'Captain Dick.' Mebbe ye've +heard your husband--that is, your husband ez waz, Roger Catron-- +speak o' me?" + +Mrs. Catron, feeling herself outraged and deceived in belt, ruche, +and ribbon, freezingly admitted that she had heard of him before. + +"In course," said the captain; "why, Lord love ye, Mrs. Catron,--ez +waz,--he used to be all the time talkin' of ye. And allers in a +free, easy, confidential way. Why, one night--don't ye remember?-- +when he came home, carryin', mebbee, more canvas than was +seamanlike, and you shet him out the house, and laid for him with a +broomstick, or one o' them crokay mallets, I disremember which, and +he kem over to me, ole Captain Dick, and I sez to him, sez I, 'Why, +Roger, them's only love pats, and yer condishun is such ez to make +any woman mad-like.' Why, Lord bless ye! there ain't enny of them +mootool differences you and him hed ez I doesn't knows on, and +didn't always stand by, and lend ye a hand, and heave in a word or +two of advice when called on." + +Mrs. Catron, ice everywhere but in her pink cheeks, was glad that +Mr. Catron seemed to have always a friend to whom he confided +EVERYTHING, even the base falsehoods he had invented. + +"Mebbe now they WAZ falsehoods," said the captain, thoughtfully. +"But don't ye go to think," he added conscientiously, "that he kept +on that tack all the time. Why, that day he made a raise, +gambling, I think, over at Dutch Flat, and give ye them bracelets,-- +regular solid gold,--why, it would have done your heart good to +have heard him talk about you--said you had the prettiest arm in +Californy. Well," said the captain, looking around for a suitable +climax, "well, you'd have thought that he was sorter proud of ye! +Why, I woz with him in 'Frisco when he bought that A 1 prize bonnet +for ye for $75, and not hevin' over $50 in his pocket, borryed the +other $25 outer me. Mebbe it was a little fancy for a bonnet; but +I allers thought he took it a little too much to heart when you +swopped it off for that Dollar Varden dress, just because that +Lawyer Maxwell said the Dollar Vardens was becomin' to ye. Ye +know, I reckon, he was always sorter jealous of that thar shark--" + +"May I venture to ask what your business is with me?" interrupted +Mrs. Catron, sharply. + +"In course," said the captain, rising. "Ye see," he said, +apologetically, "we got to talking o' Roger and ole times, and I +got a little out o' my course. It's a matter of--" he began to +fumble in his pockets, and finally produced a small memorandum- +book, which he glanced over--"it's a matter of $250." + +"I don't understand you," said Mrs. Catron, in indignant +astonishment. + +"On the 15th of July," said the captain, consulting his memorandum- +book, "Roger sold his claim at Nye's Ford for $1,500. Now, le's +see. Thar was nigh on $350 ez he admitted to me he lost at poker, +and we'll add $50 to that for treating, suppers, and drinks +gin'rally--put Roger down for $400. Then there was YOU. Now you +spent $250 on your trip to 'Frisco thet summer; then $200 went for +them presents you sent your Aunt Jane, and thar was $400 for house +expenses. Well, thet foots up $1,250. Now, what's become of thet +other $250?" + +Mrs. Catron's woman's impulse to retaliate sharply overcame her +first natural indignation at her visitor's impudence. + +Therein she lost, woman-like, her ground of vantage. + +"Perhaps the woman he fled with can tell you," she said savagely. + +"Thet," said the captain, slowly, "is a good, a reasonable idee. +But it ain't true; from all I can gather SHE lent HIM money. It +didn't go THAR." + +"Roger Catron left me penniless," said Mrs. Catron, hotly. + +"Thet's jist what gets me. You oughter have $250 somewhar lying +round." + +Mrs. Catron saw her error. "May I ask what right you have to +question me? If you have any, I must refer you to my lawyer or my +brother-in-law; if you have none, I hope you will not oblige me to +call the servants to put you from the house." + +"Thet sounds reasonable and square, too," said the captain, +thoughtfully; "I've a power of attorney from Roger Catron to settle +up his affairs and pay his debts, given a week afore them +detectives handed ye over his dead body. But I thought that you +and me might save lawyer's fees and all fuss and feathers, ef, in a +sociable, sad-like way,--lookin' back sorter on Roger ez you and me +once knew him,--we had a quiet talk together." + +"Good morning, sir," said Mrs. Catron, rising stiffly. The captain +hesitated a moment, a slight flush of color came in his face as he +at last rose as the lady backed out of the room. "Good morning, +ma'am," said the captain, and departed. + +Very little was known of this interview except the general +impression in the family that Mrs. Catron had successfully resisted +a vague attempt at blackmail from one of her husband's former +dissolute companions. Yet it is only fair to say that Mrs. Catron +snapped up, quite savagely, two male sympathizers on this subject, +and cried a good deal for two days afterward, and once, in the +hearing of her sister-in-law, to that lady's great horror, "wished +she was dead." + +A week after this interview, as Lawyer Phillips sat in his office, +he was visited by Macleod. Recognizing, possibly, some practical +difference between the widow and the lawyer, Captain Dick this time +first produced his credentials,--a "power of attorney." "I need +not tell you," said Phillips, "that the death of your principal +renders this instrument invalid, and I suppose you know that, +leaving no will, and no property, his estate has not been +administered upon." + +"Mebbe it is, and mebbe it isn't. But I hain't askin' for anythin' +but information. There was a bit o' prop'ty and a mill onto it, +over at Heavytree, ez sold for $10,000. I don't see," said the +captain, consulting his memorandum-book, "ez HE got anything out of +it." + +"It was mortgaged for $7,000," said the lawyer, quickly, and the +interest and fees amount to about $3,000 more." + +"The mortgage was given as security for a note?" + +"Yes, a gambling debt," said the lawyer, sharply. + +"Thet's so, and my belief ez that it wasn't a square game. He +shouldn't hev given no note. Why, don't ye mind, 'way back in '60, +when you and me waz in Marysville, that night that you bucked agin +faro, and lost seving hundred dollars, and then refoosed to take up +your checks, saying it was fraud and a gambling debt? And don't ye +mind when that chap kicked ye, and I helped to drag him off ye-- +and--" + +"I'm busy now, Mr. Macleod," said Phillips, hastily; "my clerk will +give you all the information you require. Good morning." + +"It's mighty queer," said the captain, thoughtfully, as he +descended the stairs, "but the moment the conversation gets limber +and sociable-like, and I gets to runnin' free under easy sail, it's +always 'Good morning, Captain,' and we're becalmed." + +By some occult influence, all the foregoing conversation, slightly +exaggerated, and the whole interview of the captain with the widow +with sundry additions, became the common property of Sandy Bar, to +the great delight of the boys. There was scarcely a person who had +ever had business or social relations with Roger Catron, whom "The +Frozen Truth," as Sandy Bar delighted to designate the captain, had +not "interviewed," as simply and directly. It is said that he +closed a conversation with one of the San Francisco detectives, who +had found Roger Catron's body, in these words: "And now hevin' got +throo' bizness, I was goin' to ask ye what's gone of Matt. Jones, +who was with ye in the bush in Austraily. Lord, how he got me +quite interested in ye, telling me how you and him got out on a +ticket-of-leave, and was chased by them milishy guards, and at last +swam out to a San Francisco bark and escaped;" but here the +inevitable pressure of previous business always stopped the +captain's conversational flow. The natural result of this was a +singular reaction in favor of the late Roger Catron in the public +sentiment of Sandy Bar, so strong, indeed, as to induce the Rev. +Mr. Joshua McSnagly, the next Sunday, to combat it with the moral +of Catron's life. After the service, he was approached in the +vestibule, and in the hearing of some of his audience, by Captain +Dick, with the following compliment: "In many pints ye hed jess got +Roger Catron down to a hair. I knew ye'd do it: why, Lord love ye, +you and him had pints in common; and when he giv' ye that hundred +dollars arter the fire in Sacramento, to help ye rebuild the +parsonage, he said to me,--me not likin' ye on account o' my being +on the committee that invited ye to resign from Marysville all +along o' that affair with Deacon Pursell's darter; and a piece she +was, parson! eh?--well, Roger, he ups and sez to me, 'Every man hez +his faults,' sez he; and sez he, 'there's no reason why a parson +ain't a human being like us, and that gal o' Pursell's is pizen, ez +I know.' So ye see, I seed that ye was hittin' yourself over +Catron's shoulder, like them early martyrs." But here, as Captain +Dick was clearly blocking up all egress from the church, the sexton +obliged him to move on, and again he was stopped in his +conversational career. + +But only for a time. Before long, it was whispered that Captain +Dick had ordered a meeting of the creditors, debtors, and friends +of Roger Catron at Robinson's Hall. It was suggested, with some +show of reason, that this had been done at the instigation of +various practical jokers of Sandy Bar, who had imposed on the +simple directness of the captain, and the attendance that night +certainly indicated something more than a mere business meeting. +All of Sandy Bar crowded into Robinson's Hall, and long before +Captain Dick made his appearance on the platform, with his +inevitable memorandum-book, every inch of floor was crowded. + +The captain began to read the expenditures of Roger Catron with +relentless fidelity of detail. The several losses by poker, the +whisky bills, and the record of a "jamboree" at Tooley's, the vague +expenses whereof footed up $275, were received with enthusiastic +cheers by the audience. A single milliner's bill for $125 was +hailed with delight; $100 expended in treating the Vestal Virgin +Combination Troupe almost canonized his memory; $50 for a simple +buggy ride with Deacon Fisk brought down the house; $500 advanced, +without security, and unpaid, for the electioneering expenses of +Assemblyman Jones, who had recently introduced a bill to prevent +gambling and the sale of lager beer on Sundays, was received with +an ominous groan. One or two other items of money loaned +occasioned the withdrawal of several gentlemen from the audience +amidst the hisses or ironical cheers of the others. + +At last Captain Dick stopped and advanced to the footlights. + +"Gentlemen and friends," he said, slowly. "I foots up $25,000 as +Roger Catron hez MADE, fair and square, in this yer county. I +foots up $27,000 ez he has SPENT in this yer county. I puts it to +you ez men,--far-minded men,--ef this man was a pauper and debtor? +I put it to you ez far-minded men,--ez free and easy men,--ez +political economists,--ez this the kind of men to impoverish a +county?" + +An overwhelming and instantaneous "No!" almost drowned the last +utterance of the speaker. + +"Thar is only one item," said Captain Dick, slowly, "only one item, +that ez men,--ez far-minded men,--ez political economists,--it +seems to me we hez the right to question. It's this: Thar is an +item, read to you by me, of $2,000 paid to certing San Francisco +detectives, paid out o' the assets o' Roger Catron, for the finding +of Roger Catron's body. Gentlemen of Sandy Bar and friends, I +found that body, and yer it is!" + +And Roger Catron, a little pale and nervous, but palpably in the +flesh, stepped upon the platform. + +Of course the newspapers were full of it the next day. Of course, +in due time, it appeared as a garbled and romantic item in the San +Francisco press. Of course Mrs. Catron, on reading it, fainted, +and for two days said that this last cruel blow ended all relations +between her husband and herself. On the third day she expressed +her belief that, if he had had the slightest feeling for her, he +would, long since, for the sake of mere decency, have communicated +with her. On the fourth day she thought she had been, perhaps, +badly advised, had an open quarrel with her relatives, and +intimated that a wife had certain obligations, etc. On the sixth +day, still not hearing from him, she quoted Scripture, spoke of a +seventy-times-seven forgiveness, and went generally into mild +hysterics. On the seventh, she left in the morning train for Sandy +Bar. + +And really I don't know as I have anything more to tell. I dined +with them recently, and, upon my word, a more decorous, correct, +conventional, and dull dinner I never ate in my life. + + + +"WHO WAS MY QUIET FRIEND?" + + +"Stranger!" + +The voice was not loud, but clear and penetrating. I looked vainly +up and down the narrow, darkening trail. No one in the fringe of +alder ahead; no one on the gullied slope behind. + +"O! stranger!" + +This time a little impatiently. The California classical vocative, +"O," always meant business. + +I looked up, and perceived for the first time on the ledge, thirty +feet above me, another trail parallel with my own, and looking down +upon me through the buckeye bushes a small man on a black horse. + +Five things to be here noted by the circumspect mountaineer. +FIRST, the locality,--lonely and inaccessible, and away from the +regular faring of teamsters and miners. SECONDLY, the stranger's +superior knowledge of the road, from the fact that the other trail +was unknown to the ordinary traveler. THIRDLY, that he was well +armed and equipped. FOURTHLY, that he was better mounted. +FIFTHLY, that any distrust or timidity arising from the +contemplation of these facts had better be kept to one's self. + +All this passed rapidly through my mind as I returned his +salutation. + +"Got any tobacco?" he asked. + +I had, and signified the fact, holding up the pouch inquiringly. + +"All right, I'll come down. Ride on, and I'll jine ye on the +slide." + +"The slide!" Here was a new geographical discovery as odd as the +second trail. I had ridden over the trail a dozen times, and seen +no communication between the ledge and trail. Nevertheless, I went +on a hundred yards or so, when there was a sharp crackling in the +underbrush, a shower of stones on the trail, and my friend plunged +through the bushes to my side, down a grade that I should scarcely +have dared to lead my horse. There was no doubt he was an +accomplished rider,--another fact to be noted. + +As he ranged beside me, I found I was not mistaken as to his size; +he was quite under the medium height, and but for a pair of cold, +gray eyes, was rather commonplace in feature. + +"You've got a good horse there," I suggested. + +He was filling his pipe from my pouch, but looked up a little +surprised, and said, "Of course." He then puffed away with the +nervous eagerness of a man long deprived of that sedative. +Finally, between the puffs, he asked me whence I came. + +I replied, "From Lagrange." + +He looked at me a few moments curiously, but on my adding that I +had only halted there for a few hours, he said: "I thought I knew +every man between Lagrange and Indian Spring, but somehow I sorter +disremember your face and your name." + +Not particularly caring that he should remember either, I replied +half laughingly, that, as I lived the other side of Indian Spring, +it was quite natural. He took the rebuff, if such it was, so +quietly that as an act of mere perfunctory politeness I asked him +where he came from. + +"Lagrange." + +"And you are going to--" + +"Well! that depends pretty much on how things pan out, and whether +I can make the riffle." He let his hand rest quite unconsciously +on the leathern holster of his dragoon revolver, yet with a strong +suggestion to me of his ability "to make the riffle" if he wanted +to, and added: "But just now I was reck'nin' on taking a little +pasear with you." + +There was nothing offensive in his speech save its familiarity, and +the reflection, perhaps, that whether I objected or not, he was +quite able to do as he said. I only replied that if our pasear was +prolonged beyond Heavytree Hill, I should have to borrow his beast. +To my surprise he replied quietly, "That's so," adding that the +horse was at my disposal when he wasn't using it, and HALF of it +when he was. "Dick has carried double many a time before this," he +continued, "and kin do it again; when your mustang gives out I'll +give you a lift and room to spare." + +I could not help smiling at the idea of appearing before the boys +at Red Gulch en croupe with the stranger; but neither could I help +being oddly affected by the suggestion that his horse had done +double duty before. "On what occasion, and why?" was a question I +kept to myself. We were ascending the long, rocky flank of the +divide; the narrowness of the trail obliged us to proceed slowly, +and in file, so that there was little chance for conversation, had +he been disposed to satisfy my curiosity. + +We toiled on in silence, the buckeye giving way to chimisal, the +westering sun, reflected again from the blank walls beside us, +blinding our eyes with its glare. The pines in the canyon below +were olive gulfs of heat, over which a hawk here and there drifted +lazily, or, rising to our level, cast a weird and gigantic shadow +of slowly moving wings on the mountain side. The superiority of +the stranger's horse led him often far in advance, and made me hope +that he might forget me entirely, or push on, growing weary of +waiting. But regularly he would halt by a bowlder, or reappear +from some chimisal, where he had patiently halted. I was beginning +to hate him mildly, when at one of those reappearances he drew up +to my side, and asked me how I liked Dickens! + +Had he asked my opinion of Huxley or Darwin, I could not have been +more astonished. Thinking it were possible that he referred to +some local celebrity of Lagrange, I said, hesitatingly:-- + +"You mean--" + +"Charles Dickens. Of course you've read him? Which of his books +do you like best?" + +I replied with considerable embarrassment that I liked them all,-- +as I certainly did. + +He grasped my hand for a moment with a fervor quite unlike his +usual phlegm, and said, "That's me, old man. Dickens ain't no +slouch. You can count on him pretty much all the time." + +With this rough preface, he launched into a criticism of the +novelist, which for intelligent sympathy and hearty appreciation I +had rarely heard equaled. Not only did he dwell upon the +exuberance of his humor, but upon the power of his pathos and the +all-pervading element of his poetry. I looked at the man in +astonishment. I had considered myself a rather diligent student of +the great master of fiction, but the stranger's felicity of +quotation and illustration staggered me. It is true, that his +thought was not always clothed in the best language, and often +appeared in the slouching, slangy undress of the place and period, +yet it never was rustic nor homespun, and sometimes struck me with +its precision and fitness. Considerably softened toward him, I +tried him with other literature. But vainly. Beyond a few of the +lyrical and emotional poets, he knew nothing. Under the influence +and enthusiasm of his own speech, he himself had softened +considerably; offered to change horses with me, readjusted my +saddle with professional skill, transferred my pack to his own +horse, insisted upon my sharing the contents of his whisky flask, +and, noticing that I was unarmed, pressed upon me a silver-mounted +Derringer, which he assured me he could "warrant." These various +offices of good will and the diversion of his talk beguiled me from +noticing the fact that the trail was beginning to become obscure +and unrecognizable. We were evidently pursuing a route unknown +before to me. I pointed out the fact to my companion, a little +impatiently. He instantly resumed his old manner and dialect. + +"Well, I reckon one trail's as good as another, and what hev ye got +to say about it?" + +I pointed out, with some dignity, that I preferred the old trail. + +"Mebbe you did. But you're jiss now takin' a pasear with ME. This +yer trail will bring you right into Indian Spring, and ONNOTICED, +and no questions asked. Don't you mind now, I'll see you through." + +It was necessary here to make some stand against my strange +companion. I said firmly, yet as politely as I could, that I had +proposed stopping over night with a friend. + +"Whar?" + +I hesitated. The friend was an eccentric Eastern man, well known +in the locality for his fastidiousness and his habits as a recluse. +A misanthrope, of ample family and ample means, he had chosen a +secluded but picturesque valley in the Sierras where he could rail +against the world without opposition. "Lone Valley," or "Boston +Ranch," as it was familiarly called, was the one spot that the +average miner both respected and feared. Mr. Sylvester, its +proprietor, had never affiliated with "the boys," nor had he ever +lost their respect by any active opposition to their ideas. If +seclusion had been his object, he certainly was gratified. +Nevertheless, in the darkening shadows of the night, and on a +lonely and unknown trail, I hesitated a little at repeating his +name to a stranger of whom I knew so little. But my mysterious +companion took the matter out of my hands. + +"Look yar," he said, suddenly, "thar ain't but one place twixt yer +and Indian Spring whar ye can stop, and that is Sylvester's." + +I assented, a little sullenly. + +"Well," said the stranger, quietly, and with a slight suggestion of +conferring a favor on me, "ef yer pointed for Sylvester's--why--I +DON'T MIND STOPPING THAR WITH YE. It's a little off the road--I'll +lose some time--but taking it by and large, I don't much mind." + +I stated, as rapidly and as strongly as I could, that my +acquaintance with Mr. Sylvester did not justify the introduction of +a stranger to his hospitality; that he was unlike most of the +people here,--in short, that he was a queer man, etc., etc. + +To my surprise my companion answered quietly: "Oh, that's all +right. I've heerd of him. Ef you don't feel like checking me +through, or if you'd rather put 'C. O. D.' on my back, why it's all +the same to me. I'll play it alone. Only you just count me in. +Say 'Sylvester' all the time. That's me!" + +What could I oppose to this man's quiet assurance? I felt myself +growing red with anger and nervous with embarrassment. What would +the correct Sylvester say to me? What would the girls,--I was a +young man then, and had won an entree to their domestic circle by +my reserve,--known by a less complimentary adjective among "the +boys,"--what would they say to my new acquaintance? Yet I +certainly could not object to his assuming all risks on his own +personal recognizances, nor could I resist a certain feeling of +shame at my embarrassment. + +We were beginning to descend. In the distance below us already +twinkled the lights in the solitary rancho of Lone Valley. I +turned to my companion. "But you have forgotten that I don't even +know your name. What am I to call you?" + +"That's so," he said, musingly. "Now, let's see. 'Kearney' would +be a good name. It's short and easy like. Thar's a street in +'Frisco the same title; Kearney it is." + +"But--" I began impatiently. + +"Now you leave all that to me," he interrupted, with a superb self- +confidence that I could not but admire. "The name ain't no +account. It's the man that's responsible. Ef I was to lay for a +man that I reckoned was named Jones, and after I fetched him I +found out on the inquest that his real name was Smith, that +wouldn't make no matter, as long as I got the man." + +The illustration, forcible as it was, did not strike me as offering +a prepossessing introduction, but we were already at the rancho. +The barking of dogs brought Sylvester to the door of the pretty +little cottage which his taste had adorned. + +I briefly introduced Mr. Kearney. "Kearney will do--Kearney's good +enough for me," commented the soi-disant Kearney half-aloud, to my +own horror and Sylvester's evident mystification, and then he +blandly excused himself for a moment that he might personally +supervise the care of his own beast. When he was out of ear-shot I +drew the puzzled Sylvester aside. + +"I have picked up--I mean I have been picked up on the road by a +gentle maniac, whose name is not Kearney. He is well armed and +quotes Dickens. With care, acquiescence in his views on all +subjects, and general submission to his commands, he may be +placated. Doubtless the spectacle of your helpless family, the +contemplation of your daughter's beauty and innocence, may touch +his fine sense of humor and pathos. Meanwhile, Heaven help you, +and forgive me." + +I ran upstairs to the little den that my hospitable host had kept +always reserved for me in my wanderings. I lingered some time over +my ablutions, hearing the languid, gentlemanly drawl of Sylvester +below, mingled with the equally cool, easy slang of my mysterious +acquaintance. When I came down to the sitting-room I was +surprised, however, to find the self-styled Kearney quietly seated +on the sofa, the gentle May Sylvester, the "Lily of Lone Valley," +sitting with maidenly awe and unaffected interest on one side of +him, while on the other that arrant flirt, her cousin Kate, was +practicing the pitiless archery of her eyes, with an excitement +that seemed almost real. + +"Who is your deliciously cool friend?" she managed to whisper to me +at supper, as I sat utterly dazed and bewildered between the enrapt +May Sylvester, who seemed to hang upon his words, and this giddy +girl of the period, who was emptying the battery of her charms in +active rivalry upon him. "Of course we know his name isn't +Kearney. But how romantic! And isn't he perfectly lovely? And +who is he?" + +I replied with severe irony that I was not aware what foreign +potentate was then traveling incognito in the Sierras of +California, but that when his royal highness was pleased to inform +me, I should be glad to introduce him properly. "Until then," I +added, "I fear the acquaintance must be Morganatic." + +"You're only jealous of him," she said pertly. "Look at May--she +is completely fascinated. And her father, too." And actually, the +languid, world-sick, cynical Sylvester was regarding him with a +boyish interest and enthusiasm almost incompatible with his nature. +Yet I submit honestly to the clear-headed reason of my own sex, +that I could see nothing more in the man than I have already +delivered to the reader. + +In the middle of an exciting story of adventure, of which he, to +the already prejudiced mind of his fair auditors, was evidently the +hero, he stopped suddenly. + +"It's only some pack train passing the bridge on the lower trail," +explained Sylvester; "go on." + +"It may be my horse is a trifle oneasy in the stable," said the +alleged Kearney; "he ain't used to boards and covering." Heaven +only knows what wild and delicious revelation lay in the statement +of this fact, but the girls looked at each other with cheeks pink +with excitement as Kearney arose, and, with quiet absence of +ceremony, quitted the table. + +"Ain't he just lovely?" said Kate, gasping for breath, "and so +witty." + +"Witty!" said the gentle May, with just the slightest trace of +defiance in her sweet voice; "witty, my dear? why, don't you see +that his heart is just breaking with pathos? Witty, indeed; why, +when he was speaking of that poor Mexican woman that was hung, I +saw the tears gather in his eyes. Witty, indeed!" + +"Tears," laughed the cynical Sylvester, "tears, idle tears. Why, +you silly children, the man is a man of the world, a philosopher, +quiet, observant, unassuming." + +"Unassuming!" Was Sylvester intoxicated, or had the mysterious +stranger mixed the "insane verb" with the family pottage? He +returned before I could answer this self-asked inquiry, and resumed +coolly his broken narrative. Finding myself forgotten in the man I +had so long hesitated to introduce to my friends, I retired to rest +early, only to hear, through the thin partitions, two hours later, +enthusiastic praises of the new guest from the voluble lips of the +girls, as they chatted in the next room before retiring. + +At midnight I was startled by the sound of horses' hoofs and the +jingling of spurs below. A conversation between my host and some +mysterious personage in the darkness was carried on in such a low +tone that I could not learn its import. As the cavalcade rode away +I raised the window. + +"What's the matter?" + +"Nothing," said Sylvester, coolly, "only another one of those +playful homicidal freaks peculiar to the country. A man was shot +by Cherokee Jack over at Lagrange this morning, and that was the +sheriff of Calaveras and his posse hunting him. I told him I'd +seen nobody but you and your friend. By the way, I hope the cursed +noise hasn't disturbed him. The poor fellow looked as if he wanted +rest." + +I thought so, too. Nevertheless, I went softly to his room. It +was empty. My impression was that he had distanced the sheriff of +Calaveras about two hours. + + + +A GHOST OF THE SIERRAS + + +It was a vast silence of pines, redolent with balsamic breath, and +muffled with the dry dust of dead bark and matted mosses. Lying on +our backs, we looked upward through a hundred feet of clear, +unbroken interval to the first lateral branches that formed the +flat canopy above us. Here and there the fierce sun, from whose +active persecution we had just escaped, searched for us through the +woods, but its keen blade was dulled and turned aside by +intercostal boughs, and its brightness dissipated in nebulous mists +throughout the roofing of the dim, brown aisles around us. We were +in another atmosphere, under another sky; indeed, in another world +than the dazzling one we had just quitted. The grave silence +seemed so much a part of the grateful coolness, that we hesitated +to speak, and for some moments lay quietly outstretched on the pine +tassels where we had first thrown ourselves. Finally, a voice +broke the silence:-- + +"Ask the old Major; he knows all about it!" + +The person here alluded to under that military title was myself. I +hardly need explain to any Californian that it by no means followed +that I was a "Major," or that I was "old," or that I knew anything +about "it," or indeed what "it" referred to. The whole remark was +merely one of the usual conventional feelers to conversation,--a +kind of social preamble, quite common to our slangy camp +intercourse. Nevertheless, as I was always known as the Major, +perhaps for no better reason than that the speaker, an old +journalist, was always called Doctor, I recognized the fact so far +as to kick aside an intervening saddle, so that I could see the +speaker's face on a level with my own, and said nothing. + +"About ghosts!" said the Doctor, after a pause, which nobody broke +or was expected to break. "Ghosts, sir! That's what we want to +know. What are we doing here in this blanked old mausoleum of +Calaveras County, if it isn't to find out something about 'em, eh?" + +Nobody replied. + +"Thar's that haunted house at Cave City. Can't be more than a mile +or two away, anyhow. Used to be just off the trail." + +A dead silence. + +The Doctor (addressing space generally) "Yes, sir; it WAS a mighty +queer story." + +Still the same reposeful indifference. We all knew the Doctor's +skill as a raconteur; we all knew that a story was coming, and we +all knew that any interruption would be fatal. Time and time +again, in our prospecting experience, had a word of polite +encouragement, a rash expression of interest, even a too eager +attitude of silent expectancy, brought the Doctor to a sudden +change of subject. Time and time again have we seen the unwary +stranger stand amazed and bewildered between our own indifference +and the sudden termination of a promising anecdote, through his own +unlucky interference. So we said nothing. "The Judge"--another +instance of arbitrary nomenclature--pretended to sleep. Jack began +to twist a cigarrito. Thornton bit off the ends of pine needles +reflectively. + +"Yes, sir," continued the Doctor, coolly resting the back of his +head on the palms of his hands, "it WAS rather curious. All except +the murder. THAT'S what gets me, for the murder had no new points, +no fancy touches, no sentiment, no mystery. Was just one of the +old style, 'sub-head' paragraphs. Old-fashioned miner scrubs along +on hardtack and beans, and saves up a little money to go home and +see relations. Old-fashioned assassin sharpens up knife, old +style; loads old flint-lock, brass-mounted pistol; walks in on old- +fashioned miner one dark night, sends him home to his relations +away back to several generations, and walks off with the swag. No +mystery THERE; nothing to clear up; subsequent revelations only +impertinence. Nothing for any ghost to do--who meant business. +More than that, over forty murders, same old kind, committed every +year in Calaveras, and no spiritual post obits coming due every +anniversary; no assessments made on the peace and quiet of the +surviving community. I tell you what, boys, I've always been +inclined to throw off on the Cave City ghost for that alone. It's +a bad precedent, sir. If that kind o' thing is going to obtain in +the foot-hills, we'll have the trails full of chaps formerly +knocked over by Mexicans and road agents; every little camp and +grocery will have stock enough on hand to go into business, and +where's there any security for surviving life and property, eh? +What's your opinion, Judge, as a fair-minded legislator?" + +Of course there was no response. Yet it was part of the Doctor's +system of aggravation to become discursive at these moments, in the +hope of interruption, and he continued for some moments to dwell on +the terrible possibility of a state of affairs in which a gentleman +could no longer settle a dispute with an enemy without being +subjected to succeeding spiritual embarrassment. But all this +digression fell upon apparently inattentive ears. + +"Well, sir, after the murder, the cabin stood for a long time +deserted and tenantless. Popular opinion was against it. One day +a ragged prospector, savage with hard labor and harder luck, came +to the camp, looking for a place to live and a chance to prospect. +After the boys had taken his measure, they concluded that he'd +already tackled so much in the way of difficulties that a ghost +more or less wouldn't be of much account. So they sent him to the +haunted cabin. He had a big yellow dog with him, about as ugly and +as savage as himself; and the boys sort o' congratulated +themselves, from a practical view-point, that while they were +giving the old ruffian a shelter, they were helping in the cause of +Christianity against ghosts and goblins. They had little faith in +the old man, but went their whole pile on that dog. That's where +they were mistaken. + +"The house stood almost three hundred feet from the nearest cave, +and on dark nights, being in a hollow, was as lonely as if it had +been on the top of Shasta. If you ever saw the spot when there was +just moon enough to bring out the little surrounding clumps of +chapparal until they looked like crouching figures, and make the +bits of broken quartz glisten like skulls, you'd begin to +understand how big a contract that man and that yellow dog +undertook. + +"They went into possession that afternoon, and old Hard Times set +out to cook his supper. When it was over he sat down by the embers +and lit his pipe, the yellow dog lying at his feet. Suddenly 'Rap! +rap!' comes from the door. 'Come in,' says the man, gruffly. +'Rap!' again. 'Come in and be d--d to you,' says the man, who has +no idea of getting up to open the door. But no one responded, and +the next moment smash goes the only sound pane in the only window. +Seeing this, old Hard Times gets up, with the devil in his eye, and +a revolver in his hand, followed by the yellow dog, with every +tooth showing, and swings open the door. No one there! But as the +man opened the door, that yellow dog, that had been so chipper +before, suddenly begins to crouch and step backward, step by step, +trembling and shivering, and at last crouches down in the chimney, +without even so much as looking at his master. The man slams the +door shut again, but there comes another smash. + +This time it seems to come from inside the cabin, and it isn't +until the man looks around and sees everything quiet that he gets +up, without speaking, and makes a dash for the door, and tears +round outside the cabin like mad, but finds nothing but silence and +darkness. Then he comes back swearing and calls the dog. But that +great yellow dog that the boys would have staked all their money on +is crouching under the bunk, and has to be dragged out like a coon +from a hollow tree, and lies there, his eyes starting from their +sockets; every limb and muscle quivering with fear, and his very +hair drawn up in bristling ridges. The man calls him to the door. +He drags himself a few steps, stops, sniffs, and refuses to go +further. The man calls him again, with an oath and a threat. +Then, what does that yellow dog do? He crawls edgewise towards the +door, crouching himself against the bunk till he's flatter than a +knife blade; then, half way, he stops. Then that d--d yellow dog +begins to walk gingerly--lifting each foot up in the air, one after +the other, still trembling in every limb. Then he stops again. +Then he crouches. Then he gives one little shuddering leap--not +straight forward, but up,--clearing the floor about six inches, as +if--" + +"Over something," interrupted the Judge, hastily, lifting himself +on his elbow. + +The Doctor stopped instantly. "Juan," he said coolly, to one of +the Mexican packers, "quit foolin' with that riata. You'll have +that stake out and that mule loose in another minute. Come over +this way!" + +The Mexican turned a scared, white face to the Doctor, muttering +something, and let go the deer-skin hide. We all up-raised our +voices with one accord, the Judge most penitently and +apologetically, and implored the Doctor to go on. "I'll shoot the +first man who interrupts you again," added Thornton; persuasively. + +But the Doctor, with his hands languidly under his head, had lost +his interest. "Well, the dog ran off to the hills, and neither the +threats nor cajoleries of his master could ever make him enter the +cabin again. The next day the man left the camp. What time is it? +Getting on to sundown, ain't it? Keep off my leg, will you, you +d--d Greaser, and stop stumbling round there! Lie down." + +But we knew that the Doctor had not completely finished his story, +and we waited patiently for the conclusion. Meanwhile the old, +gray silence of the woods again asserted itself, but shadows were +now beginning to gather in the heavy beams of the roof above, and +the dim aisles seemed to be narrowing and closing in around us. +Presently the Doctor recommenced lazily, as if no interruption had +occurred. + +"As I said before, I never put much faith in that story, and +shouldn't have told it, but for a rather curious experience of my +own. It was in the spring of '62, and I was one of a party of +four, coming up from O'Neill's, when we had been snowed up. It was +awful weather; the snow had changed to sleet and rain after we +crossed the divide, and the water was out everywhere; every ditch +was a creek, every creek a river. We had lost two horses on the +North Fork, we were dead beat, off the trail, and sloshing round, +with night coming on, and the level hail like shot in our faces. +Things were looking bleak and scary when, riding a little ahead of +the party, I saw a light twinkling in a hollow beyond. My horse +was still fresh, and calling out to the boys to follow me and bear +for the light, I struck out for it. In another moment I was before +a little cabin that half burrowed in the black chapparal; I +dismounted and rapped at the door. There was no response. I then +tried to force the door, but it was fastened securely from within. +I was all the more surprised when one of the boys, who had +overtaken me, told me that he had just seen through a window a man +reading by the fire. Indignant at this inhospitality, we both made +a resolute onset against the door, at the same time raising our +angry voices to a yell. Suddenly there was a quick response, the +hurried withdrawing of a bolt, and the door opened. + +"The occupant was a short, thick-set man, with a pale, careworn +face, whose prevailing expression was one of gentle good humor and +patient suffering. When we entered, he asked us hastily why we had +not 'sung out' before. + +"'But we KNOCKED!' I said, impatiently, 'and almost drove your door +in.' + +"'That's nothing,' he said, patiently. 'I'm used to THAT.' + +"I looked again at the man's patient, fateful face, and then around +the cabin. In an instant the whole situation flashed before me. +'Are we not near Cave City?' I asked. + +"'Yes,' he replied, 'it's just below. You must have passed it in +the storm.' + +"'I see.' I again looked around the cabin. 'Isn't this what they +call the haunted house?' + +"He looked at me curiously. 'It is,' he said, simply. + +"You can imagine my delight! Here was an opportunity to test the +whole story, to work down to the bed rock, and see how it would pan +out! We were too many and too well armed to fear tricks or dangers +from outsiders. If--as one theory had been held--the disturbance +was kept up by a band of concealed marauders or road agents, whose +purpose was to preserve their haunts from intrusion, we were quite +able to pay them back in kind for any assault. I need not say that +the boys were delighted with this prospect when the fact was +revealed to them. The only one doubtful or apathetic spirit there +was our host, who quietly resumed his seat and his book, with his +old expression of patient martyrdom. It would have been easy for +me to have drawn him out, but I felt that I did not want to +corroborate anybody else's experience; only to record my own. And +I thought it better to keep the boys from any predisposing terrors. + +"We ate our supper, and then sat, patiently and expectant, around +the fire. An hour slipped away, but no disturbance; another hour +passed as monotonously. Our host read his book; only the dash of +hail against the roof broke the silence. But--" + +The Doctor stopped. Since the last interruption, I noticed he had +changed the easy slangy style of his story to a more perfect, +artistic, and even studied manner. He dropped now suddenly into +his old colloquial speech, and quietly said: "If you don't quit +stumbling over those riatas, Juan, I'll hobble YOU. Come here, +there; lie down, will you?" + +We all turned fiercely on the cause of this second dangerous +interruption, but a sight of the poor fellow's pale and frightened +face withheld our vindictive tongues. And the Doctor, happily, of +his own accord, went on:-- + +"But I had forgotten that it was no easy matter to keep these high- +spirited boys, bent on a row, in decent subjection; and after the +third hour passed without a supernatural exhibition, I observed, +from certain winks and whispers, that they were determined to get +up indications of their own. In a few moments violent rappings +were heard from all parts of the cabin; large stones (adroitly +thrown up the chimney) fell with a heavy thud on the roof. Strange +groans and ominous yells seemed to come from the outside (where the +interstices between the logs were wide enough). Yet, through all +this uproar, our host sat still and patient, with no sign of +indignation or reproach upon his good-humored but haggard features. +Before long it became evident that this exhibition was exclusively +for HIS benefit. Under the thin disguise of asking him to assist +them in discovering the disturbers OUTSIDE the cabin, those inside +took advantage of his absence to turn the cabin topsy-turvy. + +"'You see what the spirits have done, old man,' said the arch +leader of this mischief. 'They've upset that there flour barrel +while we wasn't looking, and then kicked over the water jug and +spilled all the water!' + +"The patient man lifted his head and looked at the flour-strewn +walls. Then he glanced down at the floor, but drew back with a +slight tremor. + +"'It ain't water!' he said, quietly. + +"'What is it, then?' + +"'It's BLOOD! Look!' + +"The nearest man gave a sudden start and sank back white as a +sheet. + +"For there, gentlemen, on the floor, just before the door, where +the old man had seen the dog hesitate and lift his feet, there! +there!--gentlemen--upon my honor, slowly widened and broadened a +dark red pool of human blood! Stop him! Quick! Stop him, I say!" + +There was a blinding flash that lit up the dark woods, and a sharp +report! When we reached the Doctor's side he was holding the +smoking pistol, just discharged, in one hand, while with the other +he was pointing to the rapidly disappearing figure of Juan, our +Mexican vaquero! + +"Missed him! by G-d!" said the Doctor. "But did you hear him? Did +you see his livid face as he rose up at the name of blood? Did you +see his guilty conscience in his face. Eh? Why don't you speak? +What are you staring at?" + +"Was it the murdered man's ghost, Doctor?" we all panted in one +quick breath. + +"Ghost be d--d! No! But in that Mexican vaquero--that cursed Juan +Ramirez!--I saw and shot at his murderer!" + + + +THE HOODLUM BAND + +OR + +THE BOY CHIEF, THE INFANT POLITICIAN, AND THE PIRATE PRODIGY + +BY JACK WHACKAWAY + +Author of "The Boy Slaver," "The Immature Incendiary," "The +Precocious Pugilist," etc., etc. + + +CHAPTER I + + +It was a quiet New England village. Nowhere in the valley of the +Connecticut the autumn sun shone upon a more peaceful, pastoral, +manufacturing community. The wooden nutmegs were slowly ripening +on the trees, and the white pine hams for Western consumption were +gradually rounding into form under the deft manipulation of the +hardy American artisan. The honest Connecticut farmer was quietly +gathering from his threshing floor the shoe-pegs, which, when +intermixed with a fair proportion of oats, offered a pleasing +substitute for fodder to the effete civilizations of Europe. An +almost Sabbath-like stillness prevailed. Doemville was only seven +miles from Hartford, and the surrounding landscape smiled with the +conviction of being fully insured. + +Few would have thought that this peaceful village was the home of +the three young heroes whose exploits would hereafter--but we +anticipate. + +Doemville Academy was the principal seat of learning in the county. +Under the grave and gentle administration of the venerable Doctor +Context, it had attained just popularity. Yet the increasing +infirmities of age obliged the doctor to relinquish much of his +trust to his assistants, who, it is needless to say, abused his +confidence. Before long their brutal tyranny and deep-laid +malevolence became apparent. Boys were absolutely forced to study +their lessons. The sickening fact will hardly be believed, but +during school hours they were obliged to remain in their seats with +the appearance at least of discipline. It is stated by good +authority that the rolling of croquet balls across the floor during +recitation was objected to, under the fiendish excuse of its +interfering with their studies. The breaking of windows by base +balls, and the beating of small scholars with bats, were declared +against. At last, bloated and arrogant with success, the under- +teachers threw aside all disguise and revealed themselves in their +true colors. A cigar was actually taken out of a day scholar's +mouth during prayers! A flask of whisky was dragged from another's +desk, and then thrown out of the window. And finally, Profanity, +Hazing, Theft, and Lying were almost discouraged! + +Could the youth of America, conscious of their power and a +literature of their own, tamely submit to this tyranny? Never! We +repeat it firmly. Never! We repeat it to parents and guardians. +Never! But the fiendish tutors, chuckling in their glee, little +knew what was passing through the cold, haughty intellect of +Charles Fanuel Hall Golightly, aged ten; what curled the lip of +Benjamin Franklin Jenkins, aged seven; or what shone in the bold +blue eyes of Bromley Chitterlings, aged six and a half, as they sat +in the corner of the playground at recess. Their only other +companion and confidant was the negro porter and janitor of the +school, known as "Pirate Jim." + +Fitly, indeed, was he named, as the secrets of his early wild +career--confessed freely to his noble young friends--plainly +showed. A slaver at the age of seventeen, the ringleader of a +mutiny on the African Coast at the age of twenty, a privateersman +during the last war with England, the commander of a fire-ship and +its sole survivor at twenty-five, with a wild intermediate career +of unmixed piracy, until the Rebellion called him to civil service +again as a blockade-runner, and peace and a desire for rural repose +led him to seek the janitorship of the Doemville Academy, where no +questions were asked and references not exchanged: he was, indeed, +a fit mentor for our daring youth. Although a man whose days had +exceeded the usual space allotted to humanity, the various episodes +of his career footing his age up to nearly one hundred and fifty- +nine years, he scarcely looked it, and was still hale and vigorous. + +"Yes," continued Pirate Jim, critically, "I don't think he was any +bigger nor you, Master Chitterlings, if as big, when he stood on +the fork'stle of my ship, and shot the captain o' that East Injymen +dead. We used to call him little Weevils, he was so young-like. +But, bless your hearts, boys! he wa'n't anything to little Sammy +Barlow, ez once crep' up inter the captain's stateroom on a Rooshin +frigate, stabbed him to the heart with a jack-knife, then put on +the captain's uniform and his cocked hat, took command of the ship +and fout her hisself." + +"Wasn't the captain's clothes big for him?" asked B. Franklin +Jenkins, anxiously. + +The janitor eyed young Jenkins with pained dignity. + +"Didn't I say the Rooshin captain was a small, a very small man? +Rooshins is small, likewise Greeks." + +A noble enthusiasm beamed in the faces of the youthful heroes. + +"Was Barlow as large as me?" asked C. F. Hall Golightly, lifting +his curls from his Jove-like brow. + +"Yes; but then he hed hed, so to speak, experiences. It was +allowed that he had pizened his schoolmaster afore he went to sea. +But it's dry talking, boys." + +Golightly drew a flask from his jacket and handed it to the +janitor. It was his father's best brandy. The heart of the honest +old seaman was touched. + +"Bless ye, my own pirate boy!" he said, in a voice suffocating with +emotion. + +"I've got some tobacco," said the youthful Jenkins, "but it's fine- +cut; I use only that now." + +"I kin buy some plug at the corner grocery," said Pirate Jim, "only +I left my port-money at home." + +"Take this watch," said young Golightly; "it is my father's. Since +he became a tyrant and usurper, and forced me to join a corsair's +band, I've began by dividing the property." + +"This is idle trifling," said young Chitterlings, mildly. "Every +moment is precious. Is this an hour to give to wine and wassail? +Ha, we want action--action! We must strike the blow for freedom +to-night--aye, this very night. The scow is already anchored in +the mill-dam, freighted with provisions for a three months' voyage. +I have a black flag in my pocket. Why, then, this cowardly delay?" + +The two elder youths turned with a slight feeling of awe and shame +to gaze on the glowing cheeks, and high, haughty crest of their +youngest comrade--the bright, the beautiful Bromley Chitterlings. +Alas! that very moment of forgetfulness and mutual admiration was +fraught with danger. A thin, dyspeptic, half-starved tutor +approached. + +"It is time to resume your studies, young gentlemen," he said, with +fiendish politeness. + +They were his last words on earth. + +"Down, tyrant!" screamed Chitterlings. + +"Sic him--I mean, Sic semper tyrannis!" said the classical +Golightly. + +A heavy blow on the head from a base-ball bat, and the rapid +projection of a base ball against his empty stomach, brought the +tutor a limp and lifeless mass to the ground. Golightly shuddered. +Let not my young readers blame him too rashly. It was his first +homicide. + +"Search his pockets," said the practical Jenkins. + +They did so, and found nothing but a Harvard Triennial Catalogue. + +"Let us fly," said Jenkins. + +"Forward to the boats!" cried the enthusiastic Chitterlings. + +But C. F. Hall Golightly stood gazing thoughtfully at the prostrate +tutor. + +"This," he said calmly, "is the result of a too free government and +the common school system. What the country needs is reform. I +cannot go with you, boys." + +"Traitor!" screamed the others. + +C. F. H. Golightly smiled sadly. + +"You know me not. I shall not become a pirate--but a Congressman!" + +Jenkins and Chitterlings turned pale. + +"I have already organized two caucuses in a base ball club, and +bribed the delegates of another. Nay, turn not away. Let us be +friends, pursuing through various ways one common end. Farewell!" +They shook hands. + +"But where is Pirate Jim?" asked Jenkins. + +"He left us but for a moment to raise money on the watch to +purchase armament for the scow. Farewell!" + +And so the gallant, youthful spirits parted, bright with the +sunrise of hope. + +That night a conflagration raged in Doemville. The Doemville +Academy, mysteriously fired, first fell a victim to the devouring +element. The candy shop and cigar store, both holding heavy +liabilities against the academy, quickly followed. By the lurid +gleams of the flames, a long, low, sloop-rigged scow, with every +mast gone except one, slowly worked her way out of the mill-dam +towards the Sound. The next day three boys were missing--C. F. +Hall Golightly, B. F. Jenkins, and Bromley Chitterlings. Had they +perished in the flames who shall say? Enough that never more under +these names did they again appear in the homes of their ancestors. + +Happy, indeed, would it have been for Doemville had the mystery +ended here. But a darker interest and scandal rested upon the +peaceful village. During that awful night the boarding-school of +Madam Brimborion was visited stealthily, and two of the fairest +heiresses of Connecticut--daughters of the president of a savings +bank, and insurance director--were the next morning found to have +eloped. With them also disappeared the entire contents of the +Savings Bank. and on the following day the Flamingo Fire Insurance +Company failed. + + +CHAPTER II + + +Let my young readers now sail with me to warmer and more hospitable +climes. Off the coast of Patagonia a long, low, black schooner +proudly rides the seas, that breaks softly upon the vine-clad +shores of that luxuriant land. Who is this that, wrapped in +Persian rugs, and dressed in the most expensive manner, calmly +reclines on the quarter-deck of the schooner, toying lightly ever +and anon with the luscious fruits of the vicinity, held in baskets +of solid gold by Nubian slaves? or at intervals, with daring grace, +guides an ebony velocipede over the polished black walnut decks, +and in and out the intricacies of the rigging. Who is it? well may +be asked. What name is it that blanches with terror the cheeks of +the Patagonian navy? Who but the Pirate Prodigy--the relentless +Boy Scourer of Patagonian seas? Voyagers slowly drifting by the +Silurian beach, coasters along the Devonian shore, still shudder at +the name of Bromley Chitterlings--the Boy Avenger, late of +Hartford, Connecticut. + +It has been often asked by the idly curious, Why Avenger, and of +what? Let us not seek to disclose the awful secret hidden under +that youthful jacket. Enough that there may have been that of +bitterness in his past life that he + + + "Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave," + + +or "whose soul would heave above the sickening wave," did not +understand. Only one knew him, perhaps too well--a queen of the +Amazons, taken prisoner off Terra del Fuego a week previous. She +loved the Boy Avenger. But in vain; his youthful heart seemed +obdurate. + +"Hear me," at last he said, when she had for the seventh time +wildly proffered her hand and her kingdom in marriage, "and know +once and forever why I must decline your flattering proposal: I +love another." + +With a wild, despairing cry, she leaped into the sea, but was +instantly rescued by the Pirate Prodigy. Yet, even in that supreme +moment, such was his coolness that on his way to the surface he +captured a mermaid, and, placing her in charge of his steward, with +directions to give her a stateroom, with hot and cold water, calmly +resumed his place by the Amazon's side. When the cabin door closed +on his faithful servant, bringing champagne and ices to the +interesting stranger, Chitterlings resumed his narrative with a +choking voice:-- + +"When I first fled from the roof of a tyrannical parent, I loved +the beautiful and accomplished Eliza J. Sniffen. Her father was +president of the Workingmen's Savings Bank, and it was perfectly +understood that in the course of time the entire deposits would be +his. But, like a vain fool, I wished to anticipate the future, and +in a wild moment persuaded Miss Sniffen to elope with me; and, with +the entire cash assets of the bank, we fled together." He paused, +overcome with emotion. "But fate decreed it otherwise. In my +feverish haste, I had forgotten to place among the stores of my +pirate craft that peculiar kind of chocolate caramel to which Eliza +Jane was most partial. We were obliged to put into New Rochelle on +the second day out, to enable Miss Sniffen to procure that delicacy +at the nearest confectioner's, and match some zephyr worsteds at +the first fancy shop. Fatal mistake. She went--she never +returned!" In a moment he resumed in a choking voice, "After a +week's weary waiting, I was obliged to put to sea again, bearing a +broken heart and the broken bank of her father. I have never seen +her since." + +"And you still love her?" asked the Amazon queen, excitedly. + +"Aye, forever!" + +"Noble youth. Here take the reward of thy fidelity, for know, +Bromley Chitterlings, that I am Eliza Jane. Wearied with waiting, +I embarked on a Peruvian guano ship--but it's a long story, dear." + +"And altogether too thin," said the Boy Avenger, fiercely, +releasing himself from her encircling arms. "Eliza Jane's age, a +year ago, was only thirteen, and you are forty, if a day." + +"True," she returned, sadly, "but I have suffered much, and time +passes rapidly, and I've grown. You would scarcely believe that +this is my own hair." + +"I know not," he replied, in gloomy abstraction. + +"Forgive my deceit," she returned. "If you are affianced to +another, let me at least be--a mother to you." + +The Pirate Prodigy started, and tears came to his eyes. The scene +was affecting in the extreme. Several of the oldest seamen--men +who had gone through scenes of suffering with tearless eyes and +unblanched cheeks--now retired to the spirit-room to conceal their +emotion. A few went into caucus in the forecastle, and returned +with the request that the Amazonian queen should hereafter be known +as the "Queen of the Pirates' Isle." + +"Mother!" gasped the Pirate Prodigy. + +"My son!" screamed the Amazonian queen. + +They embraced. At the same moment a loud flop was heard on the +quarter-deck. It was the forgotten mermaid, who, emerging from her +state-room and ascending the companion-way at that moment, had +fainted at the spectacle. The Pirate Prodigy rushed to her side +with a bottle of smelling-salts. + +She recovered slowly. "Permit me," she said, rising with dignity, +"to leave the ship. I am unaccustomed to such conduct." + +"Hear me--she is my mother!" + +"She certainly is old enough to be," replied the mermaid; "and to +speak of that being her own hair!" she added with a scornful laugh, +as she rearranged her own luxuriant tresses with characteristic +grace, a comb, and a small hand-mirror. + +"If I couldn't afford any other clothes, I might wear a switch, +too!" hissed the Amazonian queen. "I suppose you don't dye it on +account of the salt water. But perhaps you prefer green, dear?" + +"A little salt water might improve your own complexion, love." + +"Fishwoman!" screamed the Amazonian queen. + +"Bloomerite!" shrieked the mermaid. + +In another instant they had seized each other. + +"Mutiny! Overboard with them!" cried the Pirate Prodigy, rising to +the occasion, and casting aside all human affection in the peril of +the moment. + +A plank was brought and two women placed upon it. + +"After you, dear," said the mermaid, significantly, to the +Amazonian queen; "you're the oldest." + +"Thank you!" said the Amazonian queen, stepping back. "Fish is +always served first." + +Stung by the insult, with a wild scream of rage, the mermaid +grappled her in her arms and leaped into the sea. + +As the waters closed over them forever, the Pirate Prodigy sprang +to his feet. "Up with the black flag, and bear away for New +London," he shouted in trumpet-like tones. "Ha, ha! Once more the +Rover is free!" + +Indeed it was too true. In that fatal moment he had again loosed +himself from the trammels of human feeling, and was once more the +Boy Avenger. + + +CHAPTER III + + +Again I must ask my young friends to mount my hippogriff and hie +with me to the almost inaccessible heights of the Rocky Mountains. +There, for years, a band of wild and untamable savages, known as +the "Pigeon Feet," had resisted the blankets and Bibles of +civilization. For years the trails leading to their camp were +marked by the bones of teamsters and broken wagons, and the trees +were decked with the drying scalp locks of women and children. The +boldest of military leaders hesitated to attack them in their +fortresses, and prudently left the scalping knives, rifles, powder, +and shot, provided by a paternal government for their welfare, +lying on the ground a few miles from their encampment, with the +request that they were not to be used until the military had safely +retired. Hitherto, save an occasional incursion into the territory +of the "Knock-knees," a rival tribe, they had limited their +depredations to the vicinity. + +But lately a baleful change had come over them. Acting under some +evil influence, they now pushed their warfare into the white +settlements, carrying fire and destruction with them. Again and +again had the government offered them a free pass to Washington and +the privilege of being photographed, but under the same evil +guidance they refused. There was a singular mystery in their mode +of aggression. School-houses were always burned, the schoolmasters +taken into captivity, and never again heard from. A palace car on +the Union Pacific Railway, containing an excursion party of +teachers en route to San Francisco, was surrounded, its inmates +captured, and--their vacancies in the school catalogue never again +filled. Even a Board of Educational Examiners, proceeding to +Cheyenne, were taken prisoners, and obliged to answer questions +they themselves had proposed, amidst horrible tortures. By degrees +these atrocities were traced to the malign influence of a new chief +of the tribe. As yet little was known of him but through his +baleful appellations, "Young Man who Goes for his Teacher," and "He +Lifts the Hair of the School Marm." He was said to be small and +exceedingly youthful in appearance. Indeed, his earlier +appellative, "He Wipes his Nose on his Sleeve," was said to have +been given to him to indicate his still boy-like habits. + +It was night in the encampment and among the lodges of the "Pigeon +Toes." Dusky maidens flitted in and out among the camp-fires like +brown moths, cooking the toothsome buffalo hump, frying the +fragrant bear's meat, and stewing the esculent bean for the braves. +For a few favored ones spitted grasshoppers were reserved as a rare +delicacy, although the proud Spartan soul of their chief scorned +all such luxuries. + +He was seated alone in his wigwam, attended only by the gentle +Mushymush, fairest of the "Pigeon Feet" maidens. Nowhere were the +characteristics of her great tribe more plainly shown than in the +little feet that lapped over each other in walking. A single +glance at the chief was sufficient to show the truth of the wild +rumors respecting his youth. He was scarcely twelve, of proud and +lofty bearing, and clad completely in wrappings of various-colored +scalloped cloths, which gave him the appearance of a somewhat +extra-sized pen-wiper. An enormous eagle's feather, torn from the +wing of a bald eagle who once attempted to carry him away, +completed his attire. It was also the memento of one of his most +superhuman feats of courage. He would undoubtedly have scalped the +eagle but that nature had anticipated him. + +"Why is the Great Chief sad?" asked Mushymush, softly. "Does his +soul still yearn for the blood of the pale-faced teachers? Did not +the scalping of two professors of geology in the Yale exploring +party satisfy his warrior's heart yesterday? Has he forgotten that +Hayden and Clarence King are still to follow? Shall his own +Mushymush bring him a botanist to-morrow? Speak, for the silence +of my brother lies on my heart like the snow on the mountain, and +checks the flow of my speech." + +Still the proud Boy Chief sat silent. Suddenly he said: "Hist!" +and rose to his feet. Taking a long rifle from the ground he +adjusted its sight. Exactly seven miles away on the slope of the +mountain the figure of a man was seen walking. The Boy Chief +raised the rifle to his unerring eye and fired. The man fell. + +A scout was dispatched to scalp and search the body. He presently +returned. + +"Who was the pale face?" eagerly asked the chief. + +"A life insurance agent." + +A dark scowl settled on the face of the chief. + +"I thought it was a book-peddler." + +"Why is my brother's heart sore against the book-peddler?" asked +Mushymush. + +"Because," said the Boy Chief, fiercely, "I am again without my +regular dime novel, and I thought he might have one in his pack. +Hear me, Mushymush; the United States mails no longer bring me my +'Young America,' or my 'Boys' and Girls' Weekly.' I find it +impossible, even with my fastest scouts, to keep up with the rear +of General Howard, and replenish my literature from the sutler's +wagon. Without a dime novel or a 'Young America,' how am I to keep +up this Injin business?" + +Mushymush remained in meditation a single moment. Then she looked +up proudly. + +"My brother has spoken. It is well. He shall have his dime novel. +He shall know what kind of a hair-pin his sister Mushymush is." + +And she arose and gamboled lightly as the fawn out of his presence. + +In two hours she returned. In one hand she held three small flaxen +scalps, in the other "The Boy Marauder," complete in one volume, +price ten cents. + +"Three pale-faced children," she gasped, "were reading it in the +tail end of an emigrant wagon. I crept up to them softly. Their +parents are still unaware of the accident," and she sank helpless +at his feet. + +"Noble girl!" said the Boy Chief, gazing proudly on her prostrate +form; "and these are the people that a military despotism expects +to subdue!" + + +CHAPTER IV + + +But the capture of several wagon-loads of commissary whisky, and +the destruction of two tons of stationery intended for the general +commanding, which interfered with his regular correspondence with +the War Department, at last awakened the United States military +authorities to active exertion. A quantity of troops were massed +before the "Pigeon Feet" encampment, and an attack was hourly +imminent. + +"Shine your boots, sir?" + +It was the voice of a youth in humble attire, standing before the +flap of the commanding general's tent. + +The General raised his head from his correspondence. + +"Ah," he said, looking down on the humble boy, "I see; I shall +write that the appliances of civilization move steadily forward +with the army. Yes," he added, "you may shine my military boots. +You understand, however, that to get your pay you must first--" + +"Make a requisition on the commissary-general, have it certified to +by the quartermaster, countersigned by the post-adjutant, and +submitted by you to the War Department--" + +"And charged as stationery," added the General, gently. "You are, +I see, an intelligent and thoughtful boy. I trust you neither use +whisky, tobacco, nor are ever profane?" + +"I promised my sainted mother--" + +"Enough! Go on with your blacking; I have to lead the attack on +the 'Pigeon Feet' at eight precisely. It is now half-past seven," +said the General, consulting a large kitchen clock that stood in +the corner of his tent. + +The little boot-black looked up; the General was absorbed in his +correspondence. The boot-black drew a tin putty blower from his +pocket, took unerring aim, and nailed in a single shot the minute +hand to the dial. Going on with his blacking, yet stopping ever +and anon to glance over the General's plan of campaign, spread on +the table before him, he was at last interrupted by the entrance of +an officer. + +"Everything is ready for the attack, General. It is now eight +o'clock." + +"Impossible! It is only half-past seven." + +"But my watch and the watches of your staff--" + +"Are regulated by my kitchen clock, that has been in my family for +years. Enough! It is only half-past seven." + +The officer retired; the boot-black had finished one boot. Another +officer appeared. + +"Instead of attacking the enemy, General, we are attacked +ourselves. Our pickets are already driven in." + +"Military pickets should not differ from other pickets," +interrupted the boot-black, modestly. "To stand firmly they should +be well driven in." + +"Ha! there is something in that," said the General, thoughtfully. +"But who are you, who speak thus?" + +Rising to his full height, the boot-black threw off his outer rags, +and revealed the figure of the Boy Chief of the "Pigeon Feet." + +"Treason!" shrieked the General; "order an advance along the whole +line." + +But in vain. The next moment he fell beneath the tomahawk of the +Boy Chief, and within the next quarter of an hour the United States +Army was dispersed. Thus ended the battle of Boot-black Creek. + + +CHAPTER V + + +And yet the Boy Chief was not entirely happy. Indeed, at times he +seriously thought of accepting the invitation extended by the Great +Chief at Washington, immediately after the massacre of the +soldiers, and once more revisiting the haunts of civilization. His +soul sickened in feverish inactivity; schoolmasters palled on his +taste; he had introduced base ball, blind hooky, marbles, and peg- +top among his Indian subjects, but only with indifferent success. +The squaws insisted in boring holes through the china alleys and +wearing them as necklaces; his warriors stuck spikes in their base +ball bats and made war clubs of them. He could not but feel, too, +that the gentle Mushymush, although devoted to her pale-faced +brother, was deficient in culinary education. Her mince pies were +abominable; her jam far inferior to that made by his Aunt Sally of +Doemville. Only an unexpected incident kept him equally from the +extreme of listless Sybaritic indulgence, or of morbid cynicism. +Indeed, at the age of twelve, he already had become disgusted with +existence. + +He had returned to his wigwam after an exhausting buffalo hunt in +which he had slain two hundred and seventy-five buffalos with his +own hand, not counting the individual buffalo on which he had +leaped so as to join the herd, and which he afterward led into the +camp a captive and a present to the lovely Mushymush. He had +scalped two express riders and a correspondent of the "New York +Herald"; had despoiled the Overland Mail Stage of a quantity of +vouchers which enabled him to draw double rations from the +government, and was reclining on a bear skin, smoking and thinking +of the vanity of human endeavor, when a scout entered, saying that +a pale-face youth had demanded access to his person. + +"Is he a commissioner? If so, say that the red man is rapidly +passing to the happy hunting-grounds of his fathers, and now +desires only peace, blankets, and ammunition; obtain the latter and +then scalp the commissioner." + +"But it is only a youth who asks an interview." + +"Does he look like an insurance agent? If so, say that I have +already policies in three Hartford companies. Meanwhile prepare +the stake, and see that the squaws are ready with their implements +of torture." + +The youth was admitted; he was evidently only half the age of the +Boy Chief. As he entered the wigwam and stood revealed to his host +they both started. In another moment they were locked in each +other's arms. + +"Jenky, old boy!" + +"Bromley, old fel!" + +B. F. Jenkins, for such was the name of the Boy Chief, was the +first to recover his calmness. Turning to his warriors he said, +proudly-- + +"Let my children retire while I speak to the agent of our Great +Father in Washington. Hereafter no latch keys will be provided for +the wigwams of the warriors. The practice of late hours must be +discouraged." + +"How!" said the warriors, and instantly retired. + +"Whisper," said Jenkins, drawing his friend aside; "I am known here +only as the Boy Chief of the 'Pigeon toes.'" + +"And I," said Bromley Chitterlings, proudly, "am known everywhere +as the Pirate Prodigy--the Boy Avenger of the Patagonian Coast." + +"But how came you here?" + +"Listen! My pirate brig, the 'Lively Mermaid,' now lies at +Meiggs's Wharf in San Francisco, disguised as a Mendocino lumber +vessel. My pirate crew accompanied me here in a palace car from +San Francisco." + +"It must have been expensive," said the prudent Jenkins. + +"It was, but they defrayed it by a collection from the other +passengers--you understand, an enforced collection. The papers +will be full of it to-morrow. Do you take the 'New York Sun'?" + +"No; I dislike their Indian policy. But why are you here?" + +"Hear me, Jenk! 'Tis a long and a sad story. The lovely Eliza J. +Sniffen, who fled with me from Doemville, was seized by her parents +and torn from my arms at New Rochelle. Reduced to poverty by the +breaking of the savings bank of which he was president,--a failure +to which I largely contributed, and the profits of which I +enjoyed,--I have since ascertained that Eliza Jane Sniffen was +forced to become a schoolmistress, departed to take charge of a +seminary in Colorado, and since then has never been heard from." + +Why did the Boy Chief turn pale, and clutch at the tent-pole for +support? Why, indeed! + +"Eliza J. Sniffen," gasped Jenkins, "aged fourteen, red-haired, +with a slight tendency to strabismus?" + +"The same." + +"Heaven help me! She died by my mandate!" + +"Traitor!" shrieked Chitterlings, rushing at Jenkins with a drawn +poniard. + +But a figure interposed. The slight girlish form of Mushymush with +outstretched hands stood between the exasperated Pirate Prodigy and +the Boy Chief. + +"Forbear," she said sternly to Chitterlings; "you know not what you +do." + +The two youths paused. + +"Hear me," she said rapidly. "When captured in a confectioner's +shop at New Rochelle, E. J. Sniffen was taken back to poverty. She +resolved to become a schoolmistress. Hearing of an opening in the +West, she proceeded to Colorado to take exclusive charge of the +pensionnat of Mad. Choflie, late of Paris. On the way thither she +was captured by the emissaries of the Boy Chief--" + +"In consummation of a fatal vow I made never to spare educational +instructors," interrupted Jenkins. + +"But in her captivity," continued Mushymush, "she managed to stain +her face with poke-berry juice, and mingling with the Indian +maidens was enabled to pass for one of the tribe. Once undetected, +she boldly ingratiated herself with the Boy Chief,--how honestly +and devotedly he best can tell,--for I, Mushymush, the little +sister of the Boy Chief, am Eliza Jane Sniffen." + +The Pirate Prodigy clasped her in his arms. The Boy Chief, raising +his hand, ejaculated:-- + +"Bless you, my children!" + +"There is but one thing wanting to complete this reunion," said +Chitterlings, after a pause, but the hurried entrance of a scout +stopped his utterance. + +"A commissioner from the Great Father in Washington." + +"Scalp him!" shrieked the Boy Chief; "this is no time for +diplomatic trifling." + +"We have, but he still insists upon seeing you, and has sent in his +card." + +The Boy Chief took it, and read aloud, in agonized accents:-- + +"Charles F. Hall Golightly, late Page in United States Senate, and +Acting Commissioner of United States." + +In another moment, Golightly, pale, bleeding, and, as it were, +prematurely bald, but still cold and intellectual, entered the +wigwam. They fell upon his neck and begged his forgiveness. + +"Don't mention it," he said, quietly; "these things must and will +happen under our present system of government. My story is brief. +Obtaining political influence through caucuses, I became at last +Page in the Senate. Through the exertions of political friends I +was appointed clerk to the commissioner whose functions I now +represent. Knowing through political spies in your own camp who +you were, I acted upon the physical fears of the commissioner, who +was an ex-clergyman, and easily induced him to deputize me to +consult with you. In doing so, I have lost my scalp, but as the +hirsute signs of juvenility have worked against my political +progress I do not regret it. As a partially bald young man I shall +have more power. The terms that I have to offer are simply this: +you can do everything you want, go anywhere you choose, if you will +only leave this place. I have a hundred thousand-dollar draft on +the United States Treasury in my pocket at your immediate +disposal." + +"But what's to become of me?" asked Chitterlings. + +"Your case has already been under advisement. The Secretary of +State, who is an intelligent man, is determined to recognize you as +de jure and de facto the only loyal representative of the +Patagonian government. You may safely proceed to Washington as its +envoy extraordinary. I dine with the secretary next week." + +"And yourself, old fellow?" + +"I only wish that twenty years from now you will recognize by your +influence and votes the rights of C. F. H. Golightly to the +presidency." + +And here ends our story. Trusting that my dear young friends may +take whatever example or moral their respective parents and +guardians may deem fittest from these pages, I hope in future years +to portray further the career of those three young heroes I have +already introduced in the spring-time of life to their charitable +consideration. + + + +THE MAN WHOSE YOKE WAS NOT EASY + + +He was a spare man, and, physically, an ill-conditioned man, but at +first glance scarcely a seedy man. The indications of reduced +circumstances in the male of the better class are, I fancy, first +visible in the boots and shirt; the boots offensively exhibiting a +degree of polish inconsistent with their dilapidated condition, and +the shirt showing an extent of ostentatious surface that is +invariably fatal to the threadbare waist-coat that it partially +covers. He was a pale man, and, I fancied, still paler from his +black clothes. + +He handed me a note. + +It was from a certain physician; a man of broad culture and broader +experience; a man who had devoted the greater part of his active +life to the alleviation of sorrow and suffering; a man who had +lived up to the noble vows of a noble profession; a man who locked +in his honorable breast the secrets of a hundred families, whose +face was as kindly, whose touch was as gentle, in the wards of the +great public hospitals as it was beside the laced curtains of the +dying Narcissa; a man who, through long contact with suffering, had +acquired a universal tenderness and breadth of kindly philosophy; a +man who, day and night, was at the beck and call of anguish; a man +who never asked the creed, belief, moral or worldly standing of the +sufferer, or even his ability to pay the few coins that enabled him +(the physician) to exist and practice his calling; in brief, a man +who so nearly lived up to the example of the Great Master that it +seems strange I am writing of him as a doctor of medicine and not +of divinity. + +The note was in pencil, characteristically brief, and ran thus:-- + +"Here is the man I spoke of. He ought to be good material for +you." + +For a moment I sat looking from the note to the man, and sounding +the "dim perilous depths" of my memory for the meaning of this +mysterious communication. The good "material," however, soon +relieved my embarrassment by putting his hand on his waistcoat, +coming toward me, and saying, "It is just here, you can feel it." + +It was not necessary for me to do so. In a flash I remembered that +my medical friend had told me of a certain poor patient, once a +soldier, who, among his other trials and uncertainties, was +afflicted with an aneurism caused by the buckle of his knapsack +pressing upon the arch of the aorta. It was liable to burst at any +shock or any moment. The poor fellow's yoke had indeed been too +heavy. + +In the presence of such a tremendous possibility I think for an +instant I felt anxious only about myself. What I should do; how +dispose of the body; how explain the circumstance of his taking +off; how evade the ubiquitous reporter and the coroner's inquest; +how a suspicion might arise that I had in some way, through +negligence or for some dark purpose, unknown to the jury, +precipitated the catastrophe, all flashed before me. Even the +note, with its darkly suggestive offer of "good material" for me, +looked diabolically significant. What might not an intelligent +lawyer make of it? + +I tore it up instantly, and with feverish courtesy begged him to be +seated. + +"You don't care to feel it?" he asked, a little anxiously. + +"No." + +"Nor see it?" + +"No." + +He sighed, a trifle sadly, as if I had rejected the only favor he +could bestow. I saw at once that he had been under frequent +exhibition to the doctors, and that he was, perhaps, a trifle vain +of this attention. This perception was corroborated a moment later +by his producing a copy of a medical magazine, with a remark that +on the sixth page I would find a full statement of his case. + +"Could I serve him in any way?" I asked. + +It appeared that I could. If I could help him to any light +employment, something that did not require any great physical +exertion or mental excitement, he would be thankful. But he wanted +me to understand that he was not, strictly speaking, a poor man; +that some years before the discovery of his fatal complaint he had +taken out a life insurance policy for five thousand dollars, and +that he had raked and scraped enough together to pay it up, and +that he would not leave his wife and four children destitute. "You +see," he added, "if I could find some sort of light work to do, and +kinder sled along, you know--until--" + +He stopped, awkwardly. + +I have heard several noted actors thrill their audiences with a +single phrase. I think I never was as honestly moved by any spoken +word as that "until," or the pause that followed it. He was +evidently quite unconscious of its effect, for as I took a seat +beside him on the sofa, and looked more closely in his waxen face, +I could see that he was evidently embarrassed, and would have +explained himself further, if I had not stopped him. + +Possibly it was the dramatic idea, or possibly chance; but a few +days afterward, meeting a certain kind-hearted theatrical manager, +I asked him if he had any light employment for a man who was an +invalid? "Can he walk?" "Yes." "Stand up for fifteen minutes?" +"Yes." "Then I'll take him. He'll do for the last scene in the +'Destruction of Sennacherib'--it's a tremendous thing, you know. +We'll have two thousand people on the stage." I was a trifle +alarmed at the title, and ventured to suggest (without betraying my +poor friend's secret that he could not actively engage in the +"Destruction of Sennacherib," and that even the spectacle of it +might be too much for him. "Needn't see it at all," said my +managerial friend; "put him in front, nothing to do but march in +and march out, and dodge curtain." + +He was engaged. I admit I was at times haunted by grave doubts as +to whether I should not have informed the manager of his physical +condition, and the possibility that he might some evening +perpetrate a real tragedy on the mimic stage, but on the first +performance of "The Destruction of Sennacherib," which I +conscientiously attended, I was somewhat relieved. I had often +been amused with the placid way in which the chorus in the opera +invariably received the most astounding information, and witnessed +the most appalling tragedies by poison or the block, without +anything more than a vocal protest or command, always delivered to +the audience and never to the actors, but I think my poor friend's +utter impassiveness to the wild carnage and the terrible +exhibitions of incendiarism that were going on around him +transcended even that. Dressed in a costume that seemed to be the +very soul of anachronism, he stood a little outside the proscenium, +holding a spear, the other hand pressed apparently upon the secret +within his breast, calmly surveying, with his waxen face, the gay +auditorium. I could not help thinking that there was a certain +pride visible even in his placid features, as of one who was +conscious that at any moment he might change this simulated +catastrophe into real terror. I could not help saying this to the +Doctor, who was with me. "Yes," he said with professional +exactitude; "when it happens he'll throw his arms up above his +head, utter an ejaculation, and fall forward on his face,--it's a +singular thing, they always fall forward on their face,--and +they'll pick up the man as dead as Julius Caesar." + +After that, I used to go night after night, with a certain hideous +fascination; but, while it will be remembered the "Destruction of +Sennacherib" had a tremendous run, it will also be remembered that +not a single life was really lost during its representation. + +It was only a few weeks after this modest first appearance on the +boards of "The Man with an Aneurism," that, happening to be at +dinner party of practical business men, I sought to interest them +with the details of the above story, delivered with such skill and +pathos as I could command. I regret to say that, as a pathetic +story, it for a moment seemed to be a dead failure. At last a +prominent banker sitting next to me turned to me with the awful +question: "Why don't your friend try to realize on his life +insurance?" I begged his pardon, I didn't quite understand. "Oh, +discount, sell out. Look here--(after a pause). Let him assign +his policy to me, it's not much of a risk, on your statement. +Well--I'll give him his five thousand dollars, clear." + +And he did. Under the advice of this cool-headed--I think I may +add warm-hearted--banker, "The Man with an Aneurism" invested his +money in the name of and for the benefit of his wife in certain +securities that paid him a small but regular stipend. But he still +continued upon the boards of the theatre. + +By reason of some business engagements that called me away from the +city, I did not see my friend the physician for three months +afterward. When I did I asked tidings of The Man with the +Aneurism. The Doctor's kind face grew sad. "I'm afraid--that is, +I don't exactly know whether I've good news or bad. Did you ever +see his wife?" + +I never had. + +"Well, she was younger than he, and rather attractive. One of +those doll-faced women. You remember, he settled that life +insurance policy on her and the children: she might have waited; +she didn't. The other day she eloped with some fellow, I don't +remember his name, with the children and the five thousand +dollars." + +"And the shock killed him," I said with poetic promptitude. + +"No--that is--not yet; I saw him yesterday," said the Doctor, with +conscientious professional precision, looking over his list of +calls. + +"Well, where is the poor fellow now?" + +"He's still at the theatre. James, if these powders are called +for, you'll find them, here in this envelope. Tell Mrs. Blank I'll +be there at seven--and she can give the baby this until I come. +Say there's no danger. These women are an awful bother! Yes, he's +at the theatre yet. Which way are you going? Down town? Why +can't you step into my carriage, and I'll give you a lift, and +we'll talk on the way down? Well--he's at the theatre yet. And-- +and--do you remember the 'Destruction of Sennacherib?' No? Yes +you do. You remember that woman in pink, who pirouetted in the +famous ballet scene! You don't? Why, yes you do! Well, I +imagine, of course I don't know, it's only a summary diagnosis, but +I imagine that our friend with the aneurism has attached himself to +her." + +"Doctor, you horrify me." + +"There are more things, Mr. Poet, in heaven and earth than are yet +dreamt of in your philosophy. Listen. My diagnosis may be wrong, +but that woman called the other day at my office to ask about him, +his health, and general condition. I told her the truth--and she +FAINTED. It was about as dead a faint as I ever saw; I was nearly +an hour in bringing her out of it. Of course it was the heat of +the room, her exertions the preceding week, and I prescribed for +her. Queer, wasn't it? Now, if I were a writer, and had your +faculty, I'd make something out of that." + +"But how is his general health?" + +"Oh, about the same. He can't evade what will come, you know, at +any moment. He was up here the other day. Why, the pulsation was +as plain--why, the entire arch of the aorta-- What! you get out +here? Good-by." + +Of course no moralist, no man writing for a sensitive and strictly +virtuous public, could further interest himself in this man. So I +dismissed him at once from my mind, and returned to the literary +contemplation of virtue that was clearly and positively defined, +and of Sin, that invariably commenced with a capital letter. That +this man, in his awful condition, hovering on the verge of +eternity, should allow himself to be attracted by--but it was +horrible to contemplate. + +Nevertheless, a month afterwards, I was returning from a festivity +with my intimate friend Smith, my distinguished friend Jobling, my +most respectable friend Robinson, and my wittiest friend Jones. It +was a clear, star-lit morning, and we seemed to hold the broad, +beautiful avenue to ourselves; and I fear we acted as if it were +so. As we hilariously passed the corner of Eighteenth Street, a +coupe rolled by, and I suddenly heard my name called from its +gloomy depths. + +"I beg your pardon," said the Doctor, as his driver drew up by the +sidewalk, "but I've some news for you. I've just been to see our +poor friend ----. Of course I was too late. He was gone in a +flash." + +"What! dead?" + +"As Pharaoh! In an instant, just as I said. You see, the rupture +took place in the descending arch of--" + +"But, Doctor!" + +"It's a queer story. Am I keeping you from your friends? No? +Well, you see she--that woman I spoke of--had written a note to him +based on what I had told her. He got it, and dropped in his +dressing-room, dead as a herring." + +"How could she have been so cruel, knowing his condition? She +might, with woman's tact, have rejected him less abruptly." + +"Yes; but you're all wrong. By Jove! she ACCEPTED him! was willing +to marry him!" + +"What?" + +"Yes. Don't you see? It was joy that killed him. Gad, we never +thought of THAT! Queer, ain't it? See here, don't you think you +might make a story out of it?" + +"But, Doctor, it hasn't got any moral." + +"Humph! That's so. Good morning. Drive on, John." + + + +MY FRIEND, THE TRAMP + + +I had been sauntering over the clover downs of a certain noted New +England seaport. It was a Sabbath morning, so singularly reposeful +and gracious, so replete with the significance of the seventh day +of rest, that even the Sabbath bells ringing a mile away over the +salt marshes had little that was monitory, mandatory, or even +supplicatory in their drowsy voices. Rather they seemed to call +from their cloudy towers, like some renegade muezzin: "Sleep is +better than prayer; sleep on, O sons of the Puritans! Slumber +still, O deacons and vestrymen! Let, oh let those feet that are +swift to wickedness curl up beneath thee! those palms that are +itching for the shekels of the ungodly lie clasped beneath thy +pillow! Sleep is better than prayer." + +And, indeed, though it was high morning, sleep was still in the +air. Wrought upon at last by the combined influences of sea and +sky and atmosphere, I succumbed, and lay down on one of the +boulders of a little stony slope that gave upon the sea. The great +Atlantic lay before me, not yet quite awake, but slowly heaving the +rhythmical expiration of slumber. There was no sail visible in the +misty horizon. There was nothing to do but to lie and stare at the +unwinking ether. + +Suddenly I became aware of the strong fumes of tobacco. Turning my +head, I saw a pale blue smoke curling up from behind an adjacent +boulder. Rising, and climbing over the intermediate granite, I +came upon a little hollow, in which, comfortably extended on the +mosses and lichens, lay a powerfully-built man. He was very +ragged; he was very dirty; there was a strong suggestion about him +of his having too much hair, too much nail, too much perspiration; +too much of those superfluous excrescences and exudations that +society and civilization strive to keep under. But it was +noticeable that he had not much of anything else. It was The +Tramp. + +With that swift severity with which we always visit rebuke upon the +person who happens to present any one of our vices offensively +before us, in his own person, I was deeply indignant at his +laziness. Perhaps I showed it in my manner, for he rose to a half- +sitting attitude, returned my stare apologetically, and made a +movement toward knocking the fire from his pipe against the +granite. + +"Shure, sur, and if I'd belaved that I was trispassin on yer +honor's grounds, it's meself that would hev laid down on the say +shore and takin' the salt waves for me blankits. But it's +sivinteen miles I've walked this blessed noight, with nothin' to +sustain me, and hevin' a mortal wakeness to fight wid in me bowels, +by reason of starvation, and only a bit o' baccy that the Widdy +Maloney gi' me at the cross roads, to kape me up entoirley. But it +was the dark day I left me home in Milwaukee to walk to Boston; and +if ye'll oblige a lone man who has left a wife and six children in +Milwaukee, wid the loan of twenty-five cints, furninst the time he +gits worruk, God'll be good to ye." + +It instantly flashed through my mind that the man before me had the +previous night partaken of the kitchen hospitality of my little +cottage, two miles away. That he presented himself in the guise of +a distressed fisherman, mulcted of his wages by an inhuman captain; +that he had a wife lying sick of consumption in the next village, +and two children, one of whom was a cripple, wandering in the +streets of Boston. I remembered that this tremendous indictment +against Fortune touched the family, and that the distressed +fisherman was provided with clothes, food, and some small change. +The food and small change had disappeared, but the garments for the +consumptive wife, where were they? He had been using them for a +pillow. + +I instantly pointed out this fact, and charged him with the +deception. To my surprise, he took it quietly, and even a little +complacently. + +"Bedad, yer roight; ye see, sur" (confidentially), "ye see, sur, +until I get worruk--and it's worruk I'm lukin' for--I have to +desave now and thin to shute the locality. Ah, God save us! but on +the say-coast thay'r that har-rud upon thim that don't belong to +the say." + +I ventured to suggest that a strong, healthy man like him might +have found work somewhere between Milwaukee and Boston. + +"Ah, but ye see I got free passage on a freight train, and didn't +sthop. It was in the Aist that I expected to find worruk." + +"Have you any trade?" + +"Trade, is it? I'm a brickmaker, God knows, and many's the lift +I've had at makin' bricks in Milwaukee. Shure, I've as aisy a hand +at it as any man. Maybe yer honor might know of a kill hereabout?" + +Now to my certain knowledge, there was not a brick kiln within +fifty miles of that spot, and of all unlikely places to find one +would have been this sandy peninsula, given up to the summer +residences of a few wealthy people. Yet I could not help admiring +the assumption of the scamp, who knew this fact as well as myself. +But I said, "I can give you work for a day or two;" and, bidding +him gather up his sick wife's apparel, led the way across the downs +to my cottage. At first I think the offer took him by surprise, +and gave him some consternation, but he presently recovered his +spirits, and almost instantly his speech. "Ah, worruk, is it? God +be praised! it's meself that's ready and willin'. 'Though maybe me +hand is spoilt wid brickmakin'." + +I assured him that the work I would give him would require no +delicate manipulation, and so we fared on over the sleepy downs. +But I could not help noticing that, although an invalid, I was a +much better pedestrian than my companion, frequently leaving him +behind, and that even as a "tramp," he was etymologically an +impostor. He had a way of lingering beside the fences we had to +climb over, as if to continue more confidentially the history of +his misfortunes and troubles, which he was delivering to me during +our homeward walk, and I noticed that he could seldom resist the +invitation of a mossy boulder or a tussock of salt grass. "Ye see, +sur," he would say, suddenly sitting down, "it's along uv me +misfortunes beginnin' in Milwaukee that--" and it was not until I +was out of hearing that he would languidly gather his traps again +and saunter after me. When I reached my own garden gate he leaned +for a moment over it, with both of his powerful arms extended +downward, and said, "Ah, but it's a blessin' that Sunday comes to +give rest fur the wake and the weary, and them as walks sivinteen +miles to get it." Of course I took the hint. There was evidently +no work to be had from my friend, the Tramp, that day. Yet his +countenance brightened as he saw the limited extent of my domain, +and observed that the garden, so called, was only a flower-bed +about twenty-five by ten. As he had doubtless before this been +utilized, to the extent of his capacity, in digging, he had +probably expected that kind of work; and I daresay I discomfitted +him by pointing him to an almost leveled stone wall, about twenty +feet long, with the remark that his work would be the rebuilding of +that stone wall, with stone brought from the neighboring slopes. +In a few moments he was comfortably provided for in the kitchen, +where the cook, a woman of his own nativity, apparently, "chaffed" +him with a raillery that was to me quite unintelligible. Yet I +noticed that when, at sunset, he accompanied Bridget to the spring +for water, ostentatiously flourishing the empty bucket in his hand, +when they returned in the gloaming Bridget was carrying the water, +and my friend, the Tramp, was some paces behind her, cheerfully +"colloguing," and picking blackberries. + +At seven the next morning he started in cheerfully to work. At +nine, A. M., he had placed three large stones on the first course +in position, an hour having been spent in looking for a pick and +hammer, and in the incidental "chaffing" with Bridget. At ten +o'clock I went to overlook his work; it was a rash action, as it +caused him to respectfully doff his hat, discontinue his labors, +and lean back against the fence in cheerful and easy conservation. +"Are you fond uv blackberries, Captain?" I told him that the +children were in the habit of getting them from the meadow beyond, +hoping to estop the suggestion I knew was coming. "Ah, but, +Captain, it's meself that with wanderin' and havin' nothin' to pass +me lips but the berries I'd pick from the hedges,--it's meself +knows where to find thim. Sure, it's yer childer, and foine boys +they are, Captain, that's besaching me to go wid 'em to the place, +known'st only to meself." It is unnecessary to say that he +triumphed. After the manner of vagabonds of all degrees, he had +enlisted the women and children on his side--and my friend, the +Tramp, had his own way. He departed at eleven and returned at +four, P. M., with a tin dinner-pail half filled. On interrogating +the boys it appeared that they had had a "bully time," but on +cross-examination it came out that THEY had picked the berries. +From four to six, three more stones were laid, and the arduous +labors of the day were over. As I stood looking at the first +course of six stones, my friend, the Tramp, stretched his strong +arms out to their fullest extent and said: "Ay, but it's worruk +that's good for me; give me worruk, and it's all I'll be askin' +fur." + +I ventured to suggest that he had not yet accomplished much. + +"Wait till to-morror. Ah, but ye'll see thin. It's me hand that's +yet onaisy wid brick-makin' and sthrange to the shtones. An ye'll +wait till to-morror?" + +Unfortunately I did not wait. An engagement took me away at an +early hour, and when I rode up to my cottage at noon my eyes were +greeted with the astonishing spectacle of my two boys hard at work +laying the courses of the stone wall, assisted by Bridget and +Norah, who were dragging stones from the hillsides, while +comfortably stretched on the top of the wall lay my friend, the +Tramp, quietly overseeing the operation with lazy and humorous +comment. For an instant I was foolishly indignant, but he soon +brought me to my senses. "Shure, sur, it's only larnin' the boys +the habits uv industhry I was--and may they niver know, be the same +token, what it is to worruk fur the bread betune their lips. Shure +it's but makin' 'em think it play I was. As fur the colleens +beyint in the kitchen, sure isn't it betther they was helping your +honor here than colloguing with themselves inside?" + +Nevertheless, I thought it expedient to forbid henceforth any +interruption of servants or children with my friend's "worruk." +Perhaps it was the result of this embargo that the next morning +early the Tramp wanted to see me. + +"And it's sorry I am to say it to ye, sur," he began, "but it's the +handlin' of this stun that's desthroyin' me touch at the brick- +makin', and it's better I should lave ye and find worruk at me own +thrade. For it's worruk I am nadin'. It isn't meself, Captain, to +ate the bread of oidleness here. And so good-by to ye, and if it's +fifty cints ye can be givin' me ontil I'll find a kill--it's God +that'll repay ye." + +He got the money. But he got also conditionally a note from me to +my next neighbor, a wealthy retired physician, possessed of a large +domain, a man eminently practical and businesslike in his +management of it. He employed many laborers on the sterile waste +he called his "farm," and it occurred to me that if there really +was any work in my friend, the Tramp, which my own indolence and +preoccupation had failed to bring out, he was the man to do it. + +I met him a week after. It was with some embarrassment that I +inquired after my friend, the Tramp. "Oh, yes," he said, +reflectively, "let's see: he came Monday and left me Thursday. He +was, I think, a stout, strong man, a well-meaning, good-humored +fellow, but afflicted with a most singular variety of diseases. +The first day I put him at work in the stables he developed chills +and fever caught in the swamps of Louisiana--" + +"Excuse me," I said hurriedly, "you mean in Milwaukee!" + +"I know what I'm talking about," returned the Doctor, testily; "he +told me his whole wretched story--his escape from the Confederate +service, the attack upon him by armed negroes, his concealment in +the bayous and swamps--" + +"Go on, Doctor," I said, feebly; "you were speaking of his work." + +"Yes. Well, his system was full of malaria; the first day I had +him wrapped up in blankets, and dosed with quinine. The next day +he was taken with all the symptoms of cholera morbus, and I had to +keep him up on brandy and capsicum. Rheumatism set in on the +following day, and incapacitated him for work, and I concluded I +had better give him a note to the director of the City Hospital +than keep him here. As a pathological study he was good; but as I +was looking for a man to help about the stable, I couldn't afford +to keep him in both capacities." + +As I never could really tell when the Doctor was in joke or in +earnest, I dropped the subject. And so my friend, the Tramp, +gradually faded from my memory, not however without leaving behind +him in the barn where he had slept a lingering flavor of whisky, +onions, and fluffiness. But in two weeks this had gone, and the +"Shebang" (as my friends irreverently termed my habitation) knew +him no more. Yet it was pleasant to think of him as having at last +found a job at brick-making, or having returned to his family at +Milwaukee, or making his Louisiana home once more happy with his +presence, or again tempting the fish-producing main--this time with +a noble and equitable captain. + +It was a lovely August morning when I rode across the sandy +peninsula to visit a certain noted family, whereof all the sons +were valiant and the daughters beautiful. The front of the house +was deserted, but on the rear veranda I heard the rustle of gowns, +and above it arose what seemed to be the voice of Ulysses, reciting +his wanderings. There was no mistaking that voice, it was my +friend, the Tramp! + +From what I could hastily gather from his speech, he had walked +from St. John, N. B., to rejoin a distressed wife in New York, who +was, however, living with opulent but objectionable relatives. +"An' shure, miss, I wouldn't be askin' ye the loan of a cint if I +could get worruk at me trade of carpet-wavin'--and maybe ye know of +some mannfacthory where they wave carpets beyant here. Ah, miss, +and if ye don't give me a cint, it's enough for the loikes of me to +know that me troubles has brought the tears in the most beautiful +oiyes in the wurruld, and God bless ye for it, miss!" + +Now I knew that the Most Beautiful Eyes in the World belonged to +one of the most sympathetic and tenderest hearts in the world, and +I felt that common justice demanded my interference between it and +one of the biggest scamps in the world. So, without waiting to be +announced by the servant, I opened the door, and joined the group +on the veranda. + +If I expected to touch the conscience of my friend, the Tramp, by a +dramatic entrance, I failed utterly; for no sooner did he see me, +than he instantly gave vent to a howl of delight, and, falling on +his knees before me, grasped my hand, and turned oratorically to +the ladies. + +"Oh, but it's himself--himself that has come as a witness to me +carrakther! Oh, but it's himself that lifted me four wakes ago, +when I was lyin' with a mortal wakeness on the say-coast, and tuk +me to his house. Oh, but it's himself that shupported me over the +faldes, and whin the chills and faver came on me and I shivered wid +the cold, it was himself, God bless him, as sthripped the coat off +his back, and giv it me, sayin', 'Take it, Dinnis, it's shtarved +with the cowld say air ye'll be entoirely.' Ah, but look at him-- +will ye, miss! Look at his swate, modist face--a blushin' like +your own, miss. Ah! look at him, will ye? He'll be denyin' of it +in a minit--may the blessin' uv God folly him. Look at him, miss! +Ah, but it's a swate pair ye'd make! (the rascal knew I was a +married man). Ah, miss, if you could see him wroightin' day and +night with such an illigant hand of his own--(he had evidently +believed from the gossip of my servants that I was a professor of +chirography)--if ye could see him, miss, as I have, ye'd be proud +of him." + +He stopped out of breath. I was so completely astounded I could +say nothing: the tremendous indictment I had framed to utter as I +opened the door vanished completely. And as the Most Beautiful +Eyes in the Wurruld turned gratefully to mine--well-- + +I still retained enough principle to ask the ladies to withdraw, +while I would take upon myself the duty of examining into the case +of my friend, the Tramp, and giving him such relief as was +required. (I did not know until afterward, however, that the +rascal had already despoiled their scant purses of three dollars +and fifty cents.) When the door was closed upon them I turned upon +him. + +"You infernal rascal!" + +"Ah, Captain, and would ye be refusin' ME a carrakther and me +givin' YE such a one as Oi did! God save us! but if ye'd hav' seen +the luk that the purty one give ye. Well, before the chills and +faver bruk me spirits entirely, when I was a young man, and makin' +me tin dollars a week brick-makin', it's meself that wud hav' +given--" + +"I consider," I broke in, "that a dollar is a fair price for your +story, and as I shall have to take it all back and expose you +before the next twenty-four hours pass, I think you had better +hasten to Milwaukee, New York, or Louisiana." + +I handed him the dollar. "Mind, I don't want to see your face +again." + +"Ye wun't, captain." + +And I did not. + +But it so chanced that later in the season, when the migratory +inhabitants had flown to their hot-air registers in Boston and +Providence, I breakfasted with one who had lingered. It was a +certain Boston lawyer,--replete with principle, honesty, self- +discipline, statistics, aesthetics, and a perfect consciousness of +possessing all these virtues, and a full recognition of their +market values. I think he tolerated me as a kind of foreigner, +gently but firmly waiving all argument on any topic, frequently +distrusting my facts, generally my deductions, and always my ideas. +In conversation he always appeared to descend only half way down a +long moral and intellectual staircase, and always delivered his +conclusions over the balusters. + +I had been speaking of my friend, the Tramp. "There is but one way +of treating that class of impostors; it is simply to recognize the +fact that the law calls him a 'vagrant,' and makes his trade a +misdemeanor. Any sentiment on the other side renders you particeps +criminis. I don't know but an action would lie against you for +encouraging tramps. Now, I have an efficacious way of dealing with +these gentry." He rose and took a double-barreled fowling-piece +from the chimney. "When a tramp appears on my property, I warn him +off. If he persists, I fire on him--as I would on any criminal +trespasser." + +"Fire on him?" I echoed in alarm. + +"Yes--BUT WITH POWDER ONLY! Of course HE doesn't know that. But +he doesn't come back." + +It struck me for the first time that possibly many other of my +friend's arguments might be only blank cartridges, and used to +frighten off other trespassing intellects. + +"Of course, if the tramp still persisted, I would be justified in +using shot. Last evening I had a visit from one. He was coming +over the wall. My shot gun was efficacious; you should have seen +him run!" + +It was useless to argue with so positive a mind, and I dropped the +subject. After breakfast I strolled over the downs, my friend +promising to join me as soon as he arranged some household +business. + +It was a lovely, peaceful morning, not unlike the day when I first +met my friend, the Tramp. The hush of a great benediction lay on +land and sea. A few white sails twinkled afar, but sleepily; one +or two large ships were creeping in lazily, like my friend, the +Tramp. A voice behind me startled me. + +My host had rejoined me. His face, however, looked a little +troubled. + +"I just now learned something of importance," he began. "It +appears that with all my precautions that Tramp has visited my +kitchen, and the servants have entertained him. Yesterday morning, +it appears, while I was absent, he had the audacity to borrow my +gun to go duck-shooting. At the end of two or three hours he +returned with two ducks and--the gun." + +"That was, at least, honest." + +"Yes--but! That fool of a girl says that, as he handed back the +gun, he told her it was all right, and that he had loaded it up +again to save the master trouble." + +I think I showed my concern in my face, for he added, hastily: "It +was only duck-shot; a few wouldn't hurt him!" + +Nevertheless, we both walked on in silence for a moment. "I +thought the gun kicked a little," he said at last, musingly; "but +the idea of-- Hallo! what's this?" + +He stopped before the hollow where I had first seen my Tramp. It +was deserted, but on the mosses there were spots of blood and +fragments of an old gown, blood-stained, as if used for bandages. +I looked at it closely: it was the gown intended for the +consumptive wife of my friend, the Tramp. + +But my host was already nervously tracking the bloodstains that on +rock, moss, and boulder were steadily leading toward the sea. When +I overtook him at last on the shore, he was standing before a flat +rock, on which lay a bundle I recognized, tied up in a +handkerchief, and a crooked grape-vine stick. + +"He may have come here to wash his wounds--salt is a styptic," said +my host, who had recovered his correct precision of statement. + +I said nothing, but looked toward the sea. Whatever secret lay hid +in its breast, it kept it fast. Whatever its calm eyes had seen +that summer night, it gave no reflection now. It lay there +passive, imperturbable, and reticent. But my friend, the Tramp, +was gone! + + + +THE MAN FROM SOLANO + + +He came toward me out of an opera lobby, between the acts,--a +figure as remarkable as anything in the performance. His clothes, +no two articles of which were of the same color, had the appearance +of having been purchased and put on only an hour or two before,--a +fact more directly established by the clothes-dealer's ticket which +still adhered to his coat-collar, giving the number, size, and +general dimensions of that garment somewhat obtrusively to an +uninterested public. His trousers had a straight line down each +leg, as if he had been born flat but had since developed; and there +was another crease down his back, like those figures children cut +out of folded paper. I may add that there was no consciousness of +this in his face, which was good-natured, and, but for a certain +squareness in the angle of his lower jaw, utterly uninteresting and +commonplace. + +"You disremember me," he said, briefly, as he extended his hand, +"but I'm from Solano, in Californy. I met you there in the spring +of '57. I was tendin' sheep, and you was burnin' charcoal." + +There was not the slightest trace of any intentional rudeness in +the reminder. It was simply a statement of fact, and as such to be +accepted. + +"What I hailed ye for was only this," he said, after I had shaken +hands with him. "I saw you a minnit ago standin' over in yon box-- +chirpin' with a lady--a young lady, peart and pretty. Might you be +telling me her name?" + +I gave him the name of a certain noted belle of a neighboring city, +who had lately stirred the hearts of the metropolis, and who was +especially admired by the brilliant and fascinating young +Dashboard, who stood beside me. + +The Man from Solano mused for a moment, and then said, "Thet's so! +thet's the name! It's the same gal!" + +"You have met her, then?" I asked, in surprise. + +"Ye-es," he responded, slowly: "I met her about fower months ago. +She'd bin makin' a tour of Californy with some friends, and I first +saw her aboard the cars this side of Reno. She lost her baggage- +checks, and I found them on the floor and gave 'em back to her, and +she thanked me. I reckon now it would be about the square thing to +go over thar and sorter recognize her." He stopped a moment, and +looked at us inquiringly. + +"My dear sir," struck in the brilliant and fascinating Dashboard, +"if your hesitation proceeds from any doubt as to the propriety of +your attire, I beg you to dismiss it from your mind at once. The +tyranny of custom, it is true, compels your friend and myself to +dress peculiarly, but I assure you nothing could be finer than the +way that the olive green of your coat melts in the delicate yellow +of your cravat, or the pearl gray of your trousers blends with the +bright blue of your waistcoat, and lends additional brilliancy to +that massive oroide watch-chain which you wear." + +To my surprise, the Man from Solano did not strike him. He looked +at the ironical Dashboard with grave earnestness, and then said +quietly:-- + +"Then I reckon you wouldn't mind showin' me in thar?" + +Dashboard was, I admit, a little staggered at this. But he +recovered himself, and, bowing ironically, led the way to the box. +I followed him and the Man from Solano. + +Now, the belle in question happened to be a gentlewoman--descended +from gentlewomen--and after Dashboard's ironical introduction, in +which the Man from Solano was not spared, she comprehended the +situation instantly. To Dashboard's surprise she drew a chair to +her side, made the Man from Solano sit down, quietly turned her +back on Dashboard, and in full view of the brilliant audience and +the focus of a hundred lorgnettes, entered into conversation with +him. + +Here, for the sake of romance, I should like to say he became +animated, and exhibited some trait of excellence,--some rare wit or +solid sense. But the fact is he was dull and stupid to the last +degree. He persisted in keeping the conversation upon the subject +of the lost baggage-checks, and every bright attempt of the lady to +divert him failed signally. At last, to everybody's relief, he +rose, and leaning over her chair, said:-- + +"I calklate to stop over here some time, miss, and you and me bein' +sorter strangers here, maybe when there's any show like this goin' +on you'll let me--" + +Miss X. said somewhat hastily that the multiplicity of her +engagements and the brief limit of her stay in New York she feared +would, etc., etc. The two other ladies had their handkerchiefs +over their mouths, and were staring intently on the stage, when the +Man from Solano continued:-- + +"Then, maybe, miss, whenever there is a show goin' on that you'll +attend, you'll just drop me word to Earle's Hotel, to this yer +address," and he pulled from his pocket a dozen well-worn letters, +and taking the buff envelope from one, handed it to her with +something like a bow. + +"Certainly," broke in the facetious Dashboard, "Miss X. goes to the +Charity Ball to-morrow night. The tickets are but a trifle to an +opulent Californian, and a man of your evident means, and the +object a worthy one. You will, no doubt, easily secure an +invitation." + +Miss X. raised her handsome eyes for a moment to Dashboard. "By +all means," she said, turning to the Man from Solano; "and as Mr. +Dashboard is one of the managers and you are a stranger, he will, +of course, send you a complimentary ticket. I have known Mr. +Dashboard long enough to know that he is invariably courteous to +strangers and a gentleman." She settled herself in her chair again +and fixed her eyes upon the stage. + +The Man from Solano thanked the Man of New York, and then, after +shaking hands with every body in the box, turned to go. When he +had reached the door he looked back to Miss X., and said,-- + +"It WAS one of the queerest things in the world, miss, that my +findin' them checks--" + +But the curtain had just then risen on the garden scene in "Faust," +and Miss X. was absorbed. The Man from Solano carefully shut the +box door and retired. I followed him. + +He was silent until he reached the lobby, and then he said, as if +renewing a previous conversation, "She IS a mighty peart gal-- +that's so. She's just my kind, and will make a stavin' good wife." + +I thought I saw danger ahead for the Man from Solano, so I hastened +to tell him that she was beset by attentions, that she could have +her pick and choice of the best of society, and finally, that she +was, most probably, engaged to Dashboard. + +"That's so," he said quietly, without the slightest trace of +feeling. "It would be mighty queer if she wasn't. But I reckon +I'll steer down to the ho-tel. I don't care much for this +yellin'." (He was alluding to a cadenza of that famous cantatrice, +Signora Batti Batti.) "What's the time?" + +He pulled out his watch. It was such a glaring chain, so obviously +bogus, that my eyes were fascinated by it. "You're looking at that +watch," he said; "it's purty to look at, but she don't go worth a +cent. And yet her price was $125, gold. I gobbled her up in +Chatham Street day before yesterday, where they were selling 'em +very cheap at auction." + +"You have been outrageously swindled," I said, indignantly. "Watch +and chain are not worth twenty dollars." + +"Are they worth fifteen?" he asked, gravely. + +"Possibly." + +"Then I reckon it's a fair trade. Ye see, I told 'em I was a +Californian from Solano, and hadn't anything about me of +greenbacks. I had three slugs with me. Ye remember them slugs?" +(I did; the "slug" was a "token" issued in the early days--a +hexagonal piece of gold a little over twice the size of a twenty- +dollar gold piece--worth and accepted for fifty dollars.) + +"Well, I handed them that, and they handed me the watch. You see +them slugs I had made myself outer brass filings and iron pyrites, +and used to slap 'em down on the boys for a bluff in a game of draw +poker. You see, not being reg'lar gov-ment money, it wasn't +counterfeiting. I reckon they cost me, counting time and anxiety, +about fifteen dollars. So, if this yer watch is worth that, it's +about a square game, ain't it?" + +I began to understand the Man from Solano, and said it was. He +returned his watch to his pocket, toyed playfully with the chain, +and remarked, "Kinder makes a man look fash'nable and wealthy, +don't it?" + +I agreed with him. "But what do you intend to do here?" I asked. + +"Well, I've got a cash capital of nigh on seven hundred dollars. I +guess until I get into reg'lar business I'll skirmish round Wall +Street, and sorter lay low." I was about to give him a few words +of warning, but I remembered his watch, and desisted. We shook +hands and parted. + +A few days after I met him on Broadway. He was attired in another +new suit, but I think I saw a slight improvement in his general +appearance. Only five distinct colors were visible in his attire. +But this, I had reason to believe afterwards, was accidental. + +I asked him if he had been to the ball. He said he had. "That +gal, and a mighty peart gal she was too, was there, but she sorter +fought shy of me. I got this new suit to go in, but those waiters +sorter run me into a private box, and I didn't get much chance to +continner our talk about them checks. But that young feller, +Dashboard, was mighty perlite. He brought lots of fellers and +young women round to the box to see me, and he made up a party that +night to take me round Wall Street and in them Stock Boards. And +the next day he called for me and took me, and I invested about +five hundred dollars in them stocks--may be more. You see, we +sorter swopped stocks. You know I had ten shares in the Peacock +Copper Mine, that you was once secretary of." + +"But those shares are not worth a cent. The whole thing exploded +ten years ago." + +"That's so, may be; YOU say so. But then I didn't know anything +more about Communipaw Central, or the Naphtha Gaslight Company, and +so I thought it was a square game. Only I realized on the stocks I +bought, and I kem up outer Wall Street about four hundred dollars +better. You see it was a sorter risk, after all, for them Peacock +stocks MIGHT come up!" + +I looked into his face: it was immeasurably serene and commonplace. +I began to be a little afraid of the man, or, rather, of my want of +judgment of the man; and after a few words we shook hands and +parted. + +It was some months before I again saw the Man from Solano. When I +did, I found that he had actually become a member of the Stock +Board, and had a little office on Broad Street, where he transacted +a fair business. My remembrance going back to the first night I +met him, I inquired if he had renewed his acquaintance with Miss X. +"I heerd that she was in Newport this summer, and I ran down there +fur a week." + +"And you talked with her about the baggage-checks?" + +"No," he said, seriously; "she gave me a commission to buy some +stocks for her. You see, I guess them fash'nable fellers sorter +got to runnin' her about me, and so she put our acquaintance on a +square business footing. I tell you, she's a right peart gal. Did +ye hear of the accident that happened to her?" + +I had not. + +"Well, you see, she was out yachting, and I managed through one of +those fellers to get an invite, too. The whole thing was got up by +a man that they say is going to marry her. Well, one afternoon the +boom swings round in a little squall and knocks her overboard. +There was an awful excitement,--you've heard about it, may be?" + +"No!" But I saw it all with a romancer's instinct in a flash of +poetry! This poor fellow, debarred through uncouthness from +expressing his affection for her, had at last found his fitting +opportunity. He had-- + +"Thar was an awful row," he went on. "I ran out on the taffrail, +and there a dozen yards away was that purty creature, that peart +gal, and--I--" + +"You jumped for her," I said, hastily. + +"No!" he said gravely. "I let the other man do the jumping. I +sorter looked on." + +I stared at him in astonishment. + +"No," he went on, seriously. "He was the man who jumped--that was +just then his 'put'--his line of business. You see, if I had +waltzed over the side of that ship, and cavoorted in, and flummuxed +round and finally flopped to the bottom, that other man would have +jumped nateral-like and saved her; and ez he was going to marry her +anyway, I don't exactly see where I'D hev been represented in the +transaction. But don't you see, ef, after he'd jumped and hadn't +got her, he'd gone down himself, I'd hev had the next best chance, +and the advantage of heving him outer the way. You see, you don't +understand me--I don't think you did in Californy." + +"Then he did save her?" + +"Of course. Don't you see she was all right. If he'd missed her, +I'd have chipped in. Thar warn't no sense in my doing his duty +onless he failed." + +Somehow the story got out. The Man from Solano as a butt became +more popular than ever, and of course received invitations to +burlesque receptions, and naturally met a great many people whom +otherwise he would not have seen. It was observed also that his +seven hundred dollars were steadily growing, and that he seemed to +be getting on in his business. Certain California stocks which I +had seen quietly interred in the old days in the tombs of their +fathers were magically revived; and I remember, as one who has seen +a ghost, to have been shocked as I looked over the quotations one +morning to have seen the ghostly face of the "Dead Beat Beach +Mining Co.," rouged and plastered, looking out from the columns of +the morning paper. At last a few people began to respect, or +suspect, the Man from Solano. At last, suspicion culminated with +this incident:-- + +He had long expressed a wish to belong to a certain "fash'n'ble" +club, and with a view of burlesque he was invited to visit the +club, where a series of ridiculous entertainments were given him, +winding up with a card party. As I passed the steps of the club- +house early next morning, I overheard two or three members talking +excitedly,-- + +"He cleaned everybody out." "Why, he must have raked in nigh on +$40,000." + +"Who?" I asked. + +"The Man from Solano." + +As I turned away, one of the gentlemen, a victim, noted for his +sporting propensities, followed me, and laying his hand on my +shoulders, asked:-- + +"Tell me fairly now. What business did your friend follow in +California?" + +"He was a shepherd." + +"A what?" + +"A shepherd. Tended his flocks on the honey-scented hills of +Solano." + +"Well, all I can say is, d--n your California pastorals!" + + + +THE OFFICE SEEKER + + +He asked me if I had ever seen the "Remus Sentinel." + +I replied that I had not, and would have added that I did not even +know where Remus was, when he continued by saying it was strange +the hotel proprietor did not keep the "Sentinel" on his files, and +that he, himself, should write to the editor about it. He would +not have spoken about it, but he, himself, had been an humble +member of the profession to which I belonged, and had often written +for its columns. Some friends of his--partial, no doubt--had said +that his style somewhat resembled Junius's; but of course, you +know--well, what he could say was that in the last campaign his +articles were widely sought for. He did not know but he had a copy +of one. Here his hand dived into the breast-pocket of his coat, +with a certain deftness that indicated long habit, and, after +depositing on his lap a bundle of well-worn documents, every one of +which was glaringly suggestive of certificates and signatures, he +concluded he had left it in his trunk. + +I breathed more freely. We were sitting in the rotunda of a famous +Washington hotel, and only a few moments before had the speaker, an +utter stranger to me, moved his chair beside mine and opened a +conversation. I noticed that he had that timid, lonely, helpless +air which invests the bucolic traveler who, for the first time, +finds himself among strangers, and his identity lost, in a world so +much larger, so much colder, so much more indifferent to him than +he ever imagined. Indeed, I think that what we often attribute to +the impertinent familiarity of country-men and rustic travelers on +railways or in cities is largely due to their awful loneliness and +nostalgia. I remember to have once met in a smoking-car on a +Kansas railway one of these lonely ones, who, after plying me with +a thousand useless questions, finally elicited the fact that I knew +slightly a man who had once dwelt in his native town in Illinois. +During the rest of our journey the conversation turned chiefly upon +his fellow-townsman, whom it afterwards appeared that my Illinois +friend knew no better than I did. But he had established a link +between himself and his far-off home through me, and was happy. + +While this was passing through my mind I took a fair look at him. +He was a spare young fellow, not more than thirty, with sandy hair +and eyebrows, and eyelashes so white as to be almost imperceptible. +He was dressed in black, somewhat to the "rearward o' the fashion," +and I had an odd idea that it had been his wedding suit, and it +afterwards appeared I was right. His manner had the precision and +much of the dogmatism of the country schoolmaster, accustomed to +wrestle with the feeblest intellects. From his history, which he +presently gave me, it appeared I was right here also. + +He was born and bred in a Western State, and, as schoolmaster of +Remus and Clerk of Supervisors, had married one of his scholars, +the daughter of a clergyman, and a man of some little property. He +had attracted some attention by his powers of declamation, and was +one of the principal members of the Remus Debating Society. The +various questions then agitating Remus,--"Is the doctrine of +immortality consistent with an agricultural life?" and, "Are round +dances morally wrong?"--afforded him an opportunity of bringing +himself prominently before the country people. Perhaps I might +have seen an extract copied from the "Remus Sentinel" in the +"Christian Recorder" of May 7, 1875? No? He would get it for me. +He had taken an active part in the last campaign. He did not like +to say it, but it had been universally acknowledged that he had +elected Gashwiler. + +Who? + +Gen. Pratt C. Gashwiler, member of Congress from our deestrict. + +Oh! + +A powerful man, sir--a very powerful man; a man whose influence +will presently be felt here, sir--HERE! Well, he had come on with +Gashwiler, and--well, he did not know why--Gashwiler did not know +why he should not, you know (a feeble, half-apologetic laugh here), +receive that reward, you know, for these services which, etc., etc. + +I asked him if he had any particular or definite office in view. + +Well, no. He had left that to Gashwiler. Gashwiler had said--he +remembered his very words: "Leave it all to me; I'll look through +the different departments, and see what can be done for a man of +your talents." + +And-- + +He's looking. I'm expecting him back here every minute. He's gone +over to the Department of Tape, to see what can be done there. Ah! +here he comes. + +A large man approached us. He was very heavy, very unwieldy, very +unctuous and oppressive. He affected the "honest farmer," but so +badly that the poorest husbandman would have resented it. There +was a suggestion of a cheap lawyer about him that would have +justified any self-respecting judge in throwing him over the bar at +once. There was a military suspicion about him that would have +entitled him to a court-martial on the spot. There was an +introduction, from which I learned that my office-seeking friend's +name was Expectant Dobbs. And then Gashwiler addressed me:-- + +"Our young friend here is waiting, waiting. Waiting, I may say, on +the affairs of State. Youth," continued the Hon. Mr. Gashwiler, +addressing an imaginary constituency, "is nothing but a season of +waiting--of preparation--ha, ha!" + +As he laid his hand in a fatherly manner--a fatherly manner that +was as much of a sham as anything else about him--I don't know +whether I was more incensed at him or his victim, who received it +with evident pride and satisfaction. Nevertheless he ventured to +falter out:-- + +"Has anything been done yet?" + +"Well, no; I can't say that anything--that is, that anything has +been COMPLETED; but I may say we are in excellent position for an +advance--ha, ha! But we must wait, my young friend, wait. What is +it the Latin philosopher says? 'Let us by all means hasten +slowly'--ha, ha!" and he turned to me as if saying confidentially, +"Observe the impatience of these boys!" "I met, a moment ago, my +old friend and boyhood's companion, Jim McGlasher, chief of the +Bureau for the Dissemination of Useless Information, and," lowering +his voice to a mysterious but audible whisper, "I shall see him +again to-morrow." + +The "All aboard!" of the railway omnibus at this moment tore me +from the presence of this gifted legislator and his protege; but as +we drove away I saw through the open window the powerful mind of +Gashwiler operating, so to speak, upon the susceptibilities of Mr. +Dobbs. + +I did not meet him again for a week. The morning of my return I +saw the two conversing together in the hall, but with the palpable +distinction between this and their former interviews, that the +gifted Gashwiler seemed to be anxious to get away from his friend. +I heard him say something about "committees" and "to-morrow," and +when Dobbs turned his freckled face toward me I saw that he had got +at last some expression into it--disappointment. + +I asked him pleasantly how he was getting on. + +He had not lost his pride yet. He was doing well, although such +was the value set upon his friend Gashwiler's abilities by his +brother members that he was almost always occupied with committee +business. I noticed that his clothes were not in as good case as +before, and he told me that he had left the hotel, and taken +lodgings in a by-street, where it was less expensive. Temporarily +of course. + +A few days after this I had business in one of the great +departments. From the various signs over the doors of its various +offices and bureaus it always oddly reminded me of Stewart's or +Arnold and Constable's. You could get pensions, patents, and +plants. You could get land and the seeds to put in it, and the +Indians to prowl round it, and what not. There was a perpetual +clanging of office desk bells, and a running hither and thither of +messengers strongly suggestive of "Cash 47." + +As my business was with the manager of this Great National Fancy +Shop, I managed to push by the sad-eyed, eager-faced crowd of men +and women in the anteroom, and entered the secretary's room, +conscious of having left behind me a great deal of envy and +uncharitableness of spirit. As I opened the door I heard a +monotonous flow of Western speech which I thought I recognized. +There was no mistaking it. It was the voice of the Gashwiler. + +"The appointment of this man, Mr. Secretary, would be most +acceptable to the people in my deestrict. His family are wealthy +and influential, and it's just as well in the fall elections to +have the supervisors and county judge pledged to support the +administration. Our delegates to the State Central Committee are +to a man"--but here, perceiving from the wandering eye of Mr. +Secretary that there was another man in the room, he whispered the +rest with a familiarity that must have required all the politician +in the official's breast to keep from resenting. + +"You have some papers, I suppose?" asked the secretary, wearily. + +Gashwiler was provided with a pocketful, and produced them. The +secretary threw them on the table among the other papers, where +they seemed instantly to lose their identity, and looked as if they +were ready to recommend anybody but the person they belonged to. +Indeed, in one corner the entire Massachusetts delegation, with the +Supreme Bench at their head, appeared to be earnestly advocating +the manuring of Iowa waste lands; and to the inexperienced eye, a +noted female reformer had apparently appended her signature to a +request for a pension for wounds received in battle. + +"By the way," said the secretary, "I think I have a letter here +from somebody in your district asking an appointment, and referring +to you? Do you withdraw it?" + +"If anybody has been presuming to speculate upon my patronage," +said the Hon. Mr. Gashwiler, with rising rage. + +"I've got the letter somewhere here," said the secretary, looking +dazedly at his table. He made a feeble movement among the papers, +and then sank back hopelessly in his chair, and gazed out of the +window as if he thought and rather hoped it might have flown away. +"It was from a Mr. Globbs, or Gobbs, or Dobbs, of Remus," he said +finally, after a superhuman effort of memory. + +"Oh, that's nothing--a foolish fellow who has been boring me for +the last month." + +"Then I am to understand that this application is withdrawn?" + +"As far as my patronage is concerned, certainly. In fact, such an +appointment would not express the sentiments--indeed, I may say, +would be calculated to raise active opposition in the deestrict." + +The secretary uttered a sigh of relief, and the gifted Gashwiler +passed out. I tried to get a good look at the honorable scamp's +eye, but he evidently did not recognize me. + +It was a question in my mind whether I ought not to expose the +treachery of Dobbs's friend, but the next time I met Dobbs he was +in such good spirits that I forebore. It appeared that his wife +had written to him that she had discovered a second cousin in the +person of the Assistant Superintendent of the Envelope Flap +Moistening Bureau of the Department of Tape, and had asked his +assistance; and Dobbs had seen him, and he had promised it. "You +see," said Dobbs, "in the performance of his duties he is often +very near the person of the secretary, frequently in the next room, +and he is a powerful man, sir--a powerful man to know, sir--a VERY +powerful man." + +How long this continued I do not remember. Long enough, however, +for Dobbs to become quite seedy, for the giving up of wrist cuffs, +for the neglect of shoes and beard, and for great hollows to form +round his eyes, and a slight flush on his cheek-bones. I remember +meeting him in all the departments, writing letters or waiting +patiently in anterooms from morning till night. He had lost all +his old dogmatism, but not his pride. "I might as well be here as +anywhere, while I'm waiting," he said, "and then I'm getting some +knowledge of the details of official life." + +In the face of this mystery I was surprised at finding a note from +him one day, inviting me to dine with him at a certain famous +restaurant. I had scarce got over my amazement, when the writer +himself overtook me at my hotel. For a moment I scarcely +recognized him. A new suit of fashionably-cut clothes had changed +him, without, however, entirely concealing his rustic angularity of +figure and outline. He even affected a fashionable dilettante air, +but so mildly and so innocently that it was not offensive. + +"You see," he began, explanatory-wise, "I've just found out the way +to do it. None of these big fellows, these cabinet officers, know +me except as an applicant. Now, the way to do this thing is to +meet 'em fust sociably; wine 'em and dine 'em. Why, sir,"--he +dropped into the schoolmaster again here,--"I had two cabinet +ministers, two judges, and a general at my table last night." + +"On YOUR invitation?" + +"Dear, no! all I did was to pay for it. Tom Soufflet gave the +dinner and invited the people. Everybody knows Tom. You see, a +friend of mine put me up to it, and said that Soufflet had fixed up +no end of appointments and jobs in that way. You see, when these +gentlemen get sociable over their wine, he says carelessly, 'By the +way, there's So-and-so--a good fellow--wants something; give it to +him.' And the first thing you know, or they know, he gets a +promise from them. They get a dinner--and a good one--and he gets +an appointment." + +"But where did you get the money?" + +"Oh,"--he hesitated,--"I wrote home, and Fanny's father raised +fifteen hundred dollars some way, and sent it to me. I put it down +to political expenses." He laughed a weak, foolish laugh here, and +added, "As the old man don't drink nor smoke, he'd lift his +eyebrows to know how the money goes. But I'll make it all right +when the office comes--and she's coming, sure pop." + +His slang fitted as poorly on him as his clothes, and his +familiarity was worse than his former awkward shyness. But I could +not help asking him what had been the result of this expenditure. + +"Nothing just yet. But the Secretary of Tape and the man at the +head of the Inferior Department, both spoke to me, and one of them +said he thought he'd heard my name before. He might," he added, +with a forced laugh, "for I've written him fifteen letters." + +Three months passed. A heavy snow-storm stayed my chariot wheels +on a Western railroad, ten miles from a nervous lecture committee +and a waiting audience; there was nothing to do but to make the +attempt to reach them in a sleigh. But the way was long and the +drifts deep, and when at last four miles out we reached a little +village, the driver declared his cattle could hold out no longer, +and we must stop there. Bribes and threats were equally of no +avail. I had to accept the fact. + +"What place is this?" + +"Remus." + +"Remus, Remus," where had I heard that name before? But while I +was reflecting he drove up before the door of the tavern. It was a +dismal, sleep-forbidding place, and only nine o'clock, and here was +the long winter's night before me. Failing to get the landlord to +give me a team to go further, I resigned myself to my fate and a +cigar, behind the red-hot stove. In a few moments one of the +loungers approached me, calling me by name, and in a rough but +hearty fashion condoled with me for my mishap, advised me to stay +at Remus all night, and added: "The quarters ain't the best in the +world yer at this hotel. But thar's an old man yer--the preacher +that was--that for twenty years hez taken in such fellers as you +and lodged 'em free gratis for nothing, and hez been proud to do +it. The old man used to be rich; he ain't so now; sold his big +house on the cross roads, and lives in a little cottage with his +darter right over yan. But ye couldn't do him a better turn than +to go over thar and stay, and if he thought I'd let ye go out o' +Remus without axing ye, he'd give me h-ll. Stop, I'll go with ye." + +I might at least call on the old man, and I accompanied my guide +through the still falling snow until we reached a little cottage. +The door opened to my guide's knock, and with the brief and +discomposing introduction, "Yer, ole man, I've brought you one o' +them snow-bound lecturers," he left me on the threshold, as my +host, a kindly-faced, white-haired man of seventy, came forward to +greet me. + +His frankness and simple courtesy overcame the embarrassment left +by my guide's introduction, and I followed him passively as he +entered the neat, but plainly-furnished sitting-room. At the same +moment a pretty, but faded young woman arose from the sofa and was +introduced to me as his daughter. "Fanny and I live here quite +alone, and if you knew how good it was to see somebody from the +great outside world now and then, you would not apologize for what +you call your intrusion." + +During this speech I was vaguely trying to recall where and when +and under what circumstances I had ever before seen the village, +the house, the old man or his daughter. Was it in a dream, or in +one of those dim reveries of some previous existence to which the +spirit of mankind is subject? I looked at them again. In the +careworn lines around the once pretty girlish mouth of the young +woman, in the furrowed seams over the forehead of the old man, in +the ticking of the old-fashioned clock on the shelf, in the faint +whisper of the falling snow outside, I read the legend, "Patience, +patience; Wait and Hope." + +The old man filled a pipe, and offering me one, continued, +"Although I seldom drink myself, it was my custom to always keep +some nourishing liquor in my house for passing guests, but to-night +I find myself without any." I hastened to offer him my flask, +which, after a moment's coyness, he accepted, and presently under +its benign influence at least ten years dropped from his shoulders, +and he sat up in his chair erect and loquacious. + +"And how are affairs at the National Capital, sir?" he began. + +Now, if there was any subject of which I was profoundly ignorant, +it was this. But the old man was evidently bent on having a good +political talk. So I said vaguely, yet with a certain sense of +security, that I guessed there wasn't much being done. + +"I see," said the old man, "in the matters of resumption; of the +sovereign rights of States and federal interference, you would +imply that a certain conservative tentative policy is to be +promulgated until after the electoral committee have given their +verdict." I looked for help towards the lady, and observed feebly +that he had very clearly expressed my views. + +The old man, observing my look, said: "Although my daughter's +husband holds a federal position in Washington, the pressure of his +business is so great that he has little time to give us mere +gossip--I beg your pardon, did you speak?" + +I had unconsciously uttered an exclamation. This, then, was Remus-- +the home of Expectant Dobbs--and these his wife and father; and +the Washington banquet-table, ah me! had sparkled with the yearning +heart's blood of this poor wife, and had been upheld by this +tottering Caryatid of a father. + +"Do you know what position he has?" + +The old man did not know positively, but thought it was some +general supervising position. He had been assured by Mr. Gashwiler +that it was a first-class clerkship; yes, a FIRST class. + +I did not tell him that in this, as in many other official +regulations in Washington, they reckoned backward, but said:-- + +"I suppose that your M. C., Mr.--Mr. Gashwiler--" + +"Don't mention his name," said the little woman, rising to her feet +hastily; "he never brought Expectant anything but disappointment +and sorrow. I hate, I despise the man." + +"Dear Fanny," expostulated the old man, gently, "this is +unchristian and unjust. Mr. Gashwiler is a powerful, a very +powerful man! His work is a great one; his time is preoccupied +with weightier matters." + +"His time was not so preoccupied but he could make use of poor +Expectant," said this wounded dove, a little spitefully. + +Nevertheless it was some satisfaction to know that Dobbs had at +last got a place, no matter how unimportant, or who had given it to +him; and when I went to bed that night in the room that had been +evidently prepared for their conjugal chamber, I felt that Dobbs's +worst trials were over. The walls were hung with souvenirs of +their ante-nuptial days. There was a portrait of Dobbs, aetat. 25; +there was a faded bouquet in a glass case, presented by Dobbs to +Fanny on examination-day; there was a framed resolution of thanks +to Dobbs from the Remus Debating Society; there was a certificate +of Dobbs's election as President of the Remus Philomathean Society; +there was his commission as Captain in the Remus Independent +Contingent of Home Guards; there was a Freemason's chart, in which +Dobbs was addressed in epithets more fulsome and extravagant than +any living monarch. And yet all these cheap glories of a narrow +life and narrower brain were upheld and made sacred by the love of +the devoted priestess who worshiped at this lonely shrine, and kept +the light burning through gloom and doubt and despair. The storm +tore round the house, and shook its white fists in the windows. A +dried wreath of laurel that Fanny had placed on Dobbs's head after +his celebrated centennial address at the school-house, July 4, +1876, swayed in the gusts, and sent a few of its dead leaves down +on the floor, and I lay in Dobbs's bed and wondered what a first- +class clerkship was. + +I found out early the next summer. I was strolling through the +long corridors of a certain great department, when I came upon a +man accurately yoked across the shoulders, and supporting two huge +pails of ice on either side, from which he was replenishing the +pitchers in the various offices. As I passed I turned to look at +him again. It was Dobbs! + +He did not set down his burden; it was against the rules, he said. +But he gossiped cheerily, said he was beginning at the foot of the +ladder, but expected soon to climb up. That it was Civil Service +Reform, and of course he would be promoted soon. + +"Had Gashwiler procured the appointment?" + +No. He believed it was ME. I had told his story to Assistant- +secretary Blank, who had, in turn related it to Bureau-director +Dash--both good fellows--but this was all they could do. Yes, it +was a foothold. But he must go now. + +Nevertheless, I followed him up and down, and, cheered up with a +rose-colored picture of his wife and family, and my visit there, +and promising to come and see him the next time I came to +Washington, I left him with his self-imposed yoke. + +With a new administration, Civil Service Reform came in, crude and +ill-digested, as all sudden and sweeping reforms must be; cruel to +the individual, as all crude reforms will ever be; and among the +list of helpless men and women, incapacitated for other work by +long service in the dull routine of federal office, who were +decapitated, the weak, foolish, emaciated head of Expectant Dobbs +went to the block. It afterward appeared that the gifted Gashwiler +was responsible for the appointment of twenty clerks, and that the +letter of poor Dobbs, in which he dared to refer to the now +powerless Gashwiler, had sealed his fate. The country made an +example of Gashwiler and--Dobbs. + +From that moment he disappeared. I looked for him in vain in +anterooms, lobbies, and hotel corridors, and finally came to the +conclusion that he had gone home. + +How beautiful was that July Sabbath, when the morning train from +Baltimore rolled into the Washington depot. How tenderly and +chastely the morning sunlight lay on the east front of the Capitol +until the whole building was hushed in a grand and awful repose. +How difficult it was to think of a Gashwiler creeping in and out of +those enfiling columns, or crawling beneath that portico, without +wondering that yon majestic figure came not down with flat of sword +to smite the fat rotundity of the intruder. How difficult to think +that parricidal hands have ever been lifted against the Great +Mother, typified here in the graceful white chastity of her +garments, in the noble tranquillity of her face, in the gathering +up her white-robed children within her shadow. + +This led me to think of Dobbs, when, suddenly a face flashed by my +carriage window. I called to the driver to stop, and, looking +again, saw that it was a woman standing bewildered and irresolute +on the street corner. As she turned her anxious face toward me I +saw that it was Mrs. Dobbs. + +What was she doing here, and where was Expectant? + +She began an incoherent apology, and then burst into explanatory +tears. When I had got her in the carriage she said, between her +sobs, that Expectant had not returned; that she had received a +letter from a friend here saying he was sick,--oh very, very sick,-- +and father could not come with her, so she came alone. She was so +frightened, so lonely, so miserable. + +Had she his address? + +Yes, just here! It was on the outskirts of Washington, near +Georgetown. Then I would take her there, if I could, for she knew +nobody. + +On our way I tried to cheer her up by pointing out some of the +children of the Great Mother before alluded to, but she only shut +her eyes as we rolled down the long avenues, and murmured, "Oh, +these cruel, cruel distances!" + +At last we reached the locality, a negro quarter, yet clean and +neat in appearance. I saw the poor girl shudder slightly as we +stopped at the door of a low, two-story frame house, from which the +unwonted spectacle of a carriage brought a crowd of half-naked +children and a comely, cleanly, kind-faced mulatto woman. + +Yes, this was the house. He was upstairs, rather poorly, but +asleep, she thought. + +We went upstairs. In the first chamber, clean, though poorly +furnished, lay Dobbs. On a pine table near his bed were letters +and memorials to the various departments, and on the bed-quilt, +unfinished, but just as the weary fingers had relaxed their grasp +upon it, lay a letter to the Tape Department. + +As we entered the room he lifted himself on his elbow. "Fanny!" he +said, quickly, and a shade of disappointment crossed his face. "I +thought it was a message from the secretary," he added, +apologetically. + +The poor woman had suffered too much already to shrink from this +last crushing blow. But she walked quietly to his side without a +word or cry, knelt, placed her loving arms around him, and I left +them so together. + +When I called again in the evening he was better; so much better +that, against the doctor's orders, he had talked to her quite +cheerfully and hopefully for an hour, until suddenly raising her +bowed head in his two hands, he said, "Do you know, dear, that in +looking for help and influence there was one, dear, I had +forgotten; one who is very potent with kings and councilors, and I +think, love, I shall ask Him to interest Himself in my behalf. It +is not too late yet, darling, and I shall seek Him to-morrow." + +And before the morrow came he had sought and found Him, and I doubt +not got a good place. + + + +A SLEEPING-CAR EXPERIENCE + + +It was in a Pullman sleeping-car on a Western road. After that +first plunge into unconsciousness which the weary traveler takes on +getting into his berth, I awakened to the dreadful revelation that +I had been asleep only two hours. The greater part of a long +winter night was before me to face with staring eyes. + +Finding it impossible to sleep, I lay there wondering a number of +things: why, for instance, the Pullman sleeping-car blankets were +unlike other blankets; why they were like squares cut out of cold +buckwheat cakes, and why they clung to you when you turned over, +and lay heavy on you without warmth; why the curtains before you +could not have been made opaque, without being so thick and +suffocating; why it would not be as well to sit up all night half +asleep in an ordinary passenger-car as to lie awake all night in a +Pullman. But the snoring of my fellow-passengers answered this +question in the negative. + +With the recollection of last night's dinner weighing on me as +heavily and coldly as the blankets, I began wondering why, over the +whole extent of the continent, there was no local dish; why the +bill of fare at restaurant and hotel was invariably only a weak +reflex of the metropolitan hostelries; why the entrees were always +the same, only more or less badly cooked; why the traveling +American always was supposed to demand turkey and cold cranberry +sauce; why the pretty waiter-girl apparently shuffled your plates +behind your back, and then dealt them over your shoulder in a +semicircle, as if they were a hand at cards, and not always a good +one? Why, having done this, she instantly retired to the nearest +wall, and gazed at you scornfully, as one who would say, "Fair sir, +though lowly, I am proud; if thou dost imagine that I would permit +undue familiarity of speech, beware!" And then I began to think of +and dread the coming breakfast; to wonder why the ham was always +cut half an inch thick, and why the fried egg always resembled a +glass eye that visibly winked at you with diabolical dyspeptic +suggestions; to wonder if the buckwheat cakes, the eating of which +requires a certain degree of artistic preparation and deliberation, +would be brought in as usual one minute before the train started. +And then I had a vivid recollection of a fellow-passenger who, at a +certain breakfast station in Illinois, frantically enwrapped his +portion of this national pastry in his red bandana handkerchief, +took it into the smoking-car, and quietly devoured it en route. + +Lying broad awake, I could not help making some observations which +I think are not noticed by the day traveler. First, that the speed +of a train is not equal or continuous. That at certain times the +engine apparently starts up, and says to the baggage train behind +it, "Come, come, this won't do! Why, it's nearly half-past two; +how in h-ll shall we get through? Don't you talk to ME. Pooh, +pooh!" delivered in that rhythmical fashion which all meditation +assumes on a railway train. Exempli gratia: One night, having +raised my window-curtain to look over a moonlit snowy landscape, as +I pulled it down the lines of a popular comic song flashed across +me. Fatal error! The train instantly took it up, and during the +rest of the night I was haunted by this awful refrain: "Pull down +the bel-lind, pull down the bel-lind; simebody's klink klink, O +don't be shoo-shoo!" Naturally this differs on the different +railways. On the New York Central, where the road-bed is quite +perfect and the steel rails continuous, I have heard this +irreverent train give the words of a certain popular revival hymn +after this fashion: "Hold the fort, for I am Sankey; Moody slingers +still. Wave the swish swash back from klinky, klinky klanky kill." +On the New York and New Haven, where there are many switches, and +the engine whistles at every cross road, I have often heard, "Tommy +make room for your whooopy! that's a little clang; bumpity, +bumpity, boopy, clikitty, clikitty, clang." Poetry, I fear, fared +little better. One starlit night, coming from Quebec, as we +slipped by a virgin forest, the opening lines of Evangeline flashed +upon me. But all I could make of them was this: "This is the +forest primeval-eval; the groves of the pines and the hemlocks- +locks-locks-locks-loooock!" The train was only "slowing" or +"braking" up at a station. Hence the jar in the metre. + +I had noticed a peculiar Aeolian harp-like cry that ran through the +whole train as we settled to rest at last after a long run--an +almost sigh of infinite relief, a musical sigh that began in C and +ran gradually up to F natural, which I think most observant +travelers have noticed day and night. No railway official has ever +given me a satisfactory explanation of it. As the car, in a rapid +run, is always slightly projected forward of its trucks, a +practical friend once suggested to me that it was the gradual +settling back of the car body to a state of inertia, which, of +course, every poetical traveler would reject. Four o'clock the +sound of boot-blacking by the porter faintly apparent from the +toilet-room. Why not talk to him? But, fortunately, I remembered +that any attempt at extended conversation with conductor or porter +was always resented by them as implied disloyalty to the company +they represented. I recalled that once I had endeavored to impress +upon a conductor the absolute folly of a midnight inspection of +tickets, and had been treated by him as an escaped lunatic. No, +there was no relief from this suffocating and insupportable +loneliness to be gained then. I raised the window-blind and looked +out. We were passing a farm-house. A light, evidently the lantern +of a farm-hand, was swung beside a barn. Yes, the faintest tinge +of rose in the far horizon. Morning, surely, at last. + +We had stopped at a station. Two men had got into the car, and had +taken seats in the one vacant section, yawning occasionally and +conversing in a languid, perfunctory sort of way. They sat +opposite each other, occasionally looking out of the window, but +always giving the strong impression that they were tired of each +other's company. As I looked out of my curtains at them, the One +Man said, with a feebly concealed yawn:-- + +"Yes, well, I reckon he was at one time as poplar an ondertaker ez +I knew." + +The Other Man (inventing a question rather than giving an answer, +out of some languid, social impulse): "But was he--this yer +ondertaker--a Christian--hed he jined the church?" + +The One Man (reflectively): "Well, I don't know ez you might call +him a purfessin' Christian; but he hed--yes, he hed conviction. I +think Dr. Wylie hed him under conviction. Et least that was the +way I got it from HIM." + +A long, dreary pause. The Other Man (feeling it was incumbent upon +him to say something): "But why was he poplar ez an ondertaker?" + +The One Man (lazily): "Well, he was kinder poplar with widders and +widderers--sorter soothen 'em a kinder, keerless way; slung 'em +suthin' here and there, sometimes outer the Book, sometimes outer +hisself, ez a man of experience as hed hed sorror. Hed, they say +(VERY CAUTIOUSLY), lost three wives hisself, and five children by +this yer new disease--dipthery--out in Wisconsin. I don't know the +facts, but that's what's got round." + +The Other Man: "But how did he lose his poplarity?" + +The One Man: "Well, that's the question. You see he interduced +some things into ondertaking that waz new. He hed, for instance, a +way, as he called it, of manniperlating the features of the +deceased." + +The Other Man (quietly): "How manniperlating?" + +The One Man (struck with a bright and aggressive thought): "Look +yer, did ye ever notiss how, generally speakin', onhandsome a +corpse is?" + +The Other Man had noticed this fact. + +The One Man (returning to his fact): "Why there was Mary Peebles, +ez was daughter of my wife's bosom friend--a mighty pooty girl and +a professing Christian--died of scarlet fever. Well, that gal--I +was one of the mourners, being my wife's friend--well, that gal, +though I hedn't, perhaps, oughter say--lying in that casket, +fetched all the way from some A1 establishment in Chicago, filled +with flowers and furbelows--didn't really seem to be of much +account. Well, although my wife's friend, and me a mourner--well, +now, I was--disappointed and discouraged." + +The Other Man (in palpably affected sympathy): "Sho! now!" + +"Yes, SIR! Well, you see, this yer ondertaker, this Wilkins, hed a +way of correctin' all thet. And just by manniperlation. He worked +over the face of the deceased ontil he perduced what the survivin' +relatives called a look of resignation,--you know, a sort of smile, +like. When he wanted to put in any extrys, he perduced what he +called--hevin' reglar charges for this kind of work--a Christian's +hope." + +The Other Man: "I want to know." + +"Yes. Well, I admit, at times it was a little startlin'. And I've +allers said (a little confidentially) that I had my doubts of its +being Scriptoorl, or sacred, we being, ez you know, worms of the +yearth; and I relieved my mind to our pastor, but he didn't feel +like interferin', ez long ez it was confined to church membership. +But the other day, when Cy Dunham died--you disremember Cy Dunham?" + +A long interval of silence. The Other Man was looking out of the +window, and had apparently forgotten his companion completely. But +as I stretched my head out of the curtain I saw four other heads as +eagerly reached out from other berths to hear the conclusion of the +story. One head, a female one, instantly disappeared on my looking +around, but a certain tremulousness of her window-curtain showed an +unabated interest. The only two utterly disinterested men were the +One Man and the Other Man. + +The Other Man (detaching himself languidly from the window): "Cy +Dunham?" + +"Yes; Cy never hed hed either convictions or purfessions. Uster +get drunk and go round with permiscous women. Sorter like the +prodigal son, only a little more so, ez fur ez I kin judge from the +facks ez stated to me. Well, Cy one day petered out down at Little +Rock, and was sent up yer for interment. The fammerly, being +proud-like, of course didn't spare no money on that funeral, and it +waz--now between you and me--about ez shapely and first-class and +prime-mess affair ez I ever saw. Wilkins hed put in his extrys. +He hed put onto that prodigal's face the A1 touch,--hed him fixed +up with a 'Christian's hope.' Well, it was about the turning- +point, for thar waz some of the members and the pastor hisself +thought that the line oughter to be drawn somewhere, and thar was +some talk at Deacon Tibbet's about a reg'lar conference meetin' +regardin' it. But it wasn't thet which made him onpoplar." + +Another silence; no expression nor reflection from the face of the +Other Man of the least desire to know what ultimately settled the +unpopularity of the undertaker. But from the curtains of the +various berths several eager and one or two even wrathful faces, +anxious for the result. + +The Other Man (lazily recurring to the fading topic): "Well, what +made him onpoplar?" + +The One Man (quietly): "Extrys, I think--that is, I suppose, not +knowin'" (cautiously) "all the facts. When Mrs. Widdecombe lost +her husband, 'bout two months ago, though she'd been through the +valley of the shadder of death twice--this bein' her third +marriage, hevin' been John Barker's widder--" + +The Other Man (with an intense expression of interest): "No, you're +foolin' me!" + +The One Man (solemnly): "Ef I was to appear before my Maker to- +morrow, yes! she was the widder of Barker." + +The Other Man: "Well, I swow." + +The One Man: "Well, this Widder Widdecombe, she put up a big +funeral for the deceased. She hed Wilkins, and thet ondertaker +just laid hisself out. Just spread hisself. Onfort'natly,-- +perhaps fort'natly in the ways of Providence,--one of Widdecombe's +old friends, a doctor up thar in Chicago, comes down to the +funeral. He goes up with the friends to look at the deceased, +smilin' a peaceful sort o' heavinly smile, and everybody sayin' +he's gone to meet his reward, and this yer friend turns round, +short and sudden on the widder settin' in her pew, and kinder +enjoyin, as wimen will, all the compliments paid the corpse, and he +says, says he:-- + +"'What did you say your husband died of, marm?' + +"'Consumption,' she says, wiping her eyes, poor critter. +'Consumption--gallopin' consumption.' + +"'Consumption be d--d,' sez he, bein' a profane kind of Chicago +doctor, and not bein' ever under conviction. 'Thet man died of +strychnine. Look at thet face. Look at thet contortion of them +fashal muscles. Thet's strychnine. Thet's risers Sardonikus' +(thet's what he said; he was always sorter profane). + +"'Why, doctor,' says the widder, 'thet--thet is his last smile. +It's a Christian's resignation.' + +"'Thet be blowed; don't tell me,' sez he. 'Hell is full of thet +kind of resignation. It's pizon. And I'll--' Why, dern my skin, +yes we are; yes, it's Joliet. Wall, now, who'd hey thought we'd +been nigh onto an hour." + +Two or three anxious passengers from their berths: "Say; look yer, +stranger! Old man! What became of--" + +But the One Man and the Other Man had vanished. + + + +MORNING ON THE AVENUE + + +NOTES BY AN EARLY RISER. + + +I have always been an early riser. The popular legend that "Early +to bed and early to rise," invariably and rhythmically resulted in +healthfulness, opulence, and wisdom, I beg here to solemnly protest +against. As an "unhealthy" man, as an "unwealthy" man, and +doubtless by virtue of this protest an "unwise" man, I am, I think, +a glaring example of the untruth of the proposition. + +For instance, it is my misfortune, as an early riser, to live upon +a certain fashionable avenue, where the practice of early rising is +confined exclusively to domestics. Consequently, when I issue +forth on this broad, beautiful thoroughfare at six A. M., I cannot +help thinking that I am, to a certain extent, desecrating its +traditional customs. + +I have more than once detected the milkman winking at the maid with +a diabolical suggestion that I was returning from a carouse, and +Roundsman 9999 has once or twice followed me a block or two with +the evident impression that I was a burglar returning from a +successful evening out. Nevertheless, these various indiscretions +have brought me into contact with a kind of character and phenomena +whose existence I might otherwise have doubted. + +First, let me speak of a large class of working-people whose +presence is, I think, unknown to many of those gentlemen who are in +the habit of legislating or writing about them. A majority of +these early risers in the neighborhood of which I may call my +"beat" carry with them unmistakable evidences of the American type. +I have seen so little of that foreign element that is popularly +supposed to be the real working class of the great metropolis, that +I have often been inclined to doubt statistics. The ground that my +morning rambles cover extends from Twenty-third Street to +Washington Park, and laterally from Sixth Avenue to Broadway. The +early rising artisans that I meet here, crossing three avenues,-- +the milkmen, the truck-drivers, the workman, even the occasional +tramp,--wherever they may come from or go to, or what their real +habitat may be,--are invariably Americans. I give it as an honest +record, whatever its significance or insignificance may be, that +during the last year, between the hours of six and eight A. M., in +and about the locality I have mentioned, I have met with but two +unmistakable foreigners, an Irishman and a German. Perhaps it may +be necessary to add to this statement that the people I have met at +those early hours I have never seen at any other time in the same +locality. + +As to their quality, the artisans were always cleanly dressed, +intelligent, and respectful. I remember, however, one morning, +when the ice storm of the preceding night had made the sidewalks +glistening, smiling and impassable, to have journeyed down the +middle of Twelfth Street with a mechanic so sooty as to absolutely +leave a legible track in the snowy pathway. He was the fireman +attending the engine in a noted manufactory, and in our brief +conversation he told me many facts regarding his profession which I +fear interested me more than the after-dinner speeches of some +distinguished gentlemen I had heard the preceding night. I +remember that he spoke of his engine as "she," and related certain +circumstances regarding her inconsistency, her aberrations, her +pettishnesses, that seemed to justify the feminine gender. I have +a grateful recollection of him as being one who introduced me to a +restaurant where chicory, thinly disguised as coffee, was served +with bread at five cents a cup, and that he honorably insisted on +being the host, and paid his ten cents for our mutual entertainment +with the grace of a Barmecide. I remember, in a more genial +season,--I think early summer,--to have found upon the benches of +Washington Park a gentleman who informed me that his profession was +that of a "pigeon catcher"; that he contracted with certain parties +in this city to furnish these birds for what he called their +"pigeon-shoots"; and that in fulfilling this contract he often was +obliged to go as far west as Minnesota. The details he gave--his +methods of entrapping the birds, his study of their habits, his +evident belief that the city pigeon, however well provided for by +parties who fondly believed the bird to be their own, was really +ferae naturae, and consequently "game" for the pigeon-catcher--were +all so interesting that I listened to him with undisguised delight. +When he had finished, however, he said, "And now, sir, being a poor +man, with a large family, and work bein' rather slack this year, if +ye could oblige me with the loan of a dollar and your address, +until remittances what I'm expecting come in from Chicago, you'll +be doin' me a great service," etc., etc. He got the dollar, of +course (his information was worth twice the money), but I imagine +he lost my address. Yet it is only fair to say that some days +after, relating his experience to a prominent sporting man, he +corroborated all its details, and satisfied me that my pigeon- +catching friend, although unfortunate, was not an impostor. + +And this leads me to speak of the birds. Of all early risers, my +most importunate, aggressive, and obtrusive companions are the +English sparrows. Between six and seven A. M. they seem to possess +the avenue, and resent my intrusion. I remember, one chilly +morning, when I came upon a flurry of them, chattering, quarreling, +skimming, and alighting just before me. I stopped at last, fearful +of stepping on the nearest. To my great surprise, instead of +flying away, he contested the ground inch by inch before my +advancing foot, with his wings outspread and open bill +outstretched, very much like that ridiculous burlesque of the +American eagle which the common canary-bird assumes when teased. +"Did you ever see 'em wash in the fountain in the square?" said +Roundsman 9999, early one summer morning. I had not. "I guess +they're there yet. Come and see 'em," he said, and complacently +accompanied me two blocks. I don't know which was the finer +sight,--the thirty or forty winged sprites, dashing in and out of +the basin, each the very impersonation of a light-hearted, +mischievous puck, or this grave policeman, with badge and club and +shield, looking on with delight. Perhaps my visible amusement, or +the spectacle of a brother policeman just then going past with a +couple of "drunk and disorderlies," recalled his official +responsibilities and duties. "They say them foreign sparrows drive +all the other birds away," he added, severely; and then walked off +with a certain reserved manner, as if it were not impossible for +him to be called upon some morning to take the entire feathered +assembly into custody, and if so called upon he should do it. + +Next, I think, in procession among the early risers, and surely +next in fresh and innocent exterior, were the work-women or shop- +girls. I have seen this fine avenue on gala afternoons bright with +the beauty and elegance of an opulent city, but I have see no more +beautiful faces than I have seen among these humbler sisters. As +the mere habits of dress in America, except to a very acute critic, +give no suggestion of the rank of the wearer, I can imagine an +inexperienced foreigner utterly mystified and confounded by these +girls, who perhaps work a sewing-machine or walk the long floors of +a fashionable dry-goods shop. I remember one face and figure, +faultless and complete,--modestly yet most becomingly dressed,-- +indeed, a figure that Compte-Calix might have taken for one of his +exquisite studies, which, between seven and eight A. M. passed +through Eleventh Street, between Sixth Avenue and Broadway. So +exceptionally fine was her carriage, so chaste and virginal her +presence, and so refined and even spiritual her features, that, as +a literary man, I would have been justified in taking her for the +heroine of a society novel. Indeed, I had already woven a little +romance about her, when one morning she overtook me, accompanied by +another girl--pretty, but of a different type--with whom she was +earnestly conversing. As the two passed me, there fell from her +faultless lips the following astounding sentence: "And I told him, +if he didn't like it he might lump it, and he traveled off on his +left ear, you bet!" Heaven knows what indiscretion this speech +saved me from; but the reader will understand what a sting the pain +of rejection might have added to it by the above formula. + +The "morning-cocktail" men come next in my experience of early +rising. I used to take my early cup of coffee in the cafe of a +certain fashionable restaurant that had a bar attached. I could +not help noticing that, unlike the usual social libations of my +countrymen, the act of taking a morning cocktail was a solitary +one. In the course of my experience I cannot recall the fact of +two men taking an ante-breakfast cocktail together. On the +contrary, I have observed the male animal rush savagely at the bar, +demand his drink of the bar-keeper, swallow it, and hasten from the +scene of his early debauchery, or else take it in a languid, +perfunctory manner, which, I think, must have been insulting to the +bar-keeper. I have observed two men, whom I had seen drinking +amicably together the preceding night, standing gloomily at the +opposite corners of the bar, evidently trying not to see each other +and making the matter a confidential one with the bar-keeper. I +have seen even a thin disguise of simplicity assumed. I remember +an elderly gentleman, of most respectable exterior, who used to +enter the cafe as if he had strayed there accidentally. After +looking around carefully, and yet unostentatiously, he would walk +to the bar, and, with an air of affected carelessness, state that +"not feeling well this morning, he guessed he would take--well, he +would leave it to the bar-keeper." The bar-keeper invariably gave +him a stiff brandy cocktail. When the old gentleman had done this +half a dozen times, I think I lost faith in him. I tried +afterwards to glean from the bar-keeper some facts regarding those +experiences, but I am proud to say that he was honorably reticent. +Indeed, I think it may be said truthfully that there is no record +of a bar-keeper who has been "interviewed." Clergymen and doctors +have, but it is well for the weakness of humanity that the line +should be drawn somewhere. + +And this reminds me that one distressing phase of early rising is +the incongruous and unpleasant contact of the preceding night. The +social yesterday is not fairly over before nine A. M. to-day, and +there is always a humorous, sometimes a pathetic, lapping over the +edges. I remember one morning at six o'clock to have been +overtaken by a carriage that drew up beside me. I recognized the +coachman, who touched his hat apologetically, as if he wished me to +understand that he was not at all responsible for the condition of +his master, and I went to the door of the carriage. I was +astonished to find two young friends of mine, in correct evening +dress, reclining on each other's shoulders and sleeping the sleep +of the justly inebriated. I stated this fact to the coachman. Not +a muscle of his well-trained face answered to my smile. But he +said: "You see, sir, we've been out all night, and more than four +blocks below they saw you, and wanted me to hail you, but you know +you stopped to speak to a gentleman, and so I sorter lingered, and +I drove round the block once or twice, and I guess I've got 'em +quiet again." I looked in the carriage door once more on these +sons of Belial. They were sleeping quite unconsciously. A +bouttonniere in the lappel of the younger one's coat had shed its +leaves, which were scattered over him with a ridiculous suggestion +of the "Babes in the Wood," and I closed the carriage door softly. +"I suppose I'd better take 'em home, sir?" queried the coachman, +gravely. "Well, yes, John, perhaps you had." + +There is another picture in my early rising experience that I wish +was as simply and honestly ludicrous. It was at a time when the +moral sentiment of the metropolis, expressed through ordinance and +special legislation, had declared itself against a certain form of +"variety" entertainment, and had, as usual, proceeded against the +performers, and not the people who encouraged them. I remember, +one frosty morning, to have encountered in Washington Park my +honest friend Sergeant X. and Roundsman 9999 conveying a party of +these derelicts to the station. One of the women, evidently, had +not had time to change her apparel, and had thinly disguised the +flowing robe and loose cestus of Venus under a ragged "waterproof"; +while the other, who had doubtless posed for Mercury, hid her +shapely tights in a plaid shawl, and changed her winged sandals for +a pair of "arctics." Their rouged faces were streaked and stained +with tears. The man who was with them, the male of their species, +had but hastily washed himself of his Ethiopian presentment, and +was still black behind the ears; while an exaggerated shirt collar +and frilled shirt made his occasional indignant profanity +irresistibly ludicrous. So they fared on over the glittering snow, +against the rosy sunlight of the square, the gray front of the +University building, with a few twittering sparrows in the +foreground, beside the two policemen, quiet and impassive as fate. +I could not help thinking of the distinguished A., the most +fashionable B., the wealthy and respectable C., the sentimental D., +and the man of the world E., who were present at the performance, +whose distinguished patronage had called it into life, and who were +then resting quietly in their beds, while these haggard servants of +their pleasaunce were haled over the snow to punishment and +ignominy. + +Let me finish by recalling one brighter picture of that same +season. It was early; so early that the cross of Grace Church had, +when I looked up, just caught the morning sun, and for a moment +flamed like a crusader's symbol. And then the grace and glory of +that exquisite spire became slowly visible. Fret by fret the +sunlight stole slowly down, quivering and dropping from each, until +at last the whole church beamed in rosy radiance. Up and down the +long avenue the street lay in shadow; by some strange trick of the +atmosphere the sun seemed to have sought out only that graceful +structure for its blessing. And then there was a dull rumble. It +was the first omnibus,--the first throb in the great artery of the +reviving city. I looked up. The church was again in shadow. + + + +WITH THE ENTREES + + +"Once, when I was a pirate--!" + +The speaker was an elderly gentleman in correct evening dress, the +room a tasteful one, the company of infinite respectability, the +locality at once fashionable and exclusive, the occasion an +unexceptionable dinner. To this should be added that the speaker +was also the host. + +With these conditions self-evident, all that good breeding could do +was to receive the statement with a vague smile that might pass for +good-humored incredulity or courteous acceptation of a simple fact. +Indeed, I think we all rather tried to convey the impression that +our host, when he WAS a pirate,--if he ever really was one,--was +all that a self-respecting pirate should be, and never violated the +canons of good society. This idea was, to some extent, +crystallized by the youngest Miss Jones in the exclamation, "Oh, +how nice!" + +"It was, of course, many years ago, when I was quite a lad." + +We all murmured "Certainly," as if piracy were a natural expression +of the exuberance of youth. + +"I ought, perhaps, explain the circumstances that led me into this +way of life." + +Here Legrande, a courteous attache of the Patagonian legation, +interposed in French and an excess of politeness, "that it was not +of a necessity," a statement to which his English neighbor +hurriedly responded, "Oui, oui." + +"There ess a boke," he continued, in a well-bred, rapid whisper, +"from Captain Canot,--a Frenchman,--most eenteresting--he was--oh, +a fine man of education--and what you call a 'slavair,'" but here +he was quietly nudged into respectful silence. + +"I ran away from home," continued our host. He paused, and then +added, appealingly, to the two distinguished foreigners present: "I +do not know if I can make you understand that this is a peculiarly +American predilection. The exodus of the younger males of an +American family against the parents' wishes does not, with us, +necessarily carry any obloquy with it. To the average American the +prospect of fortune and a better condition lies OUTSIDE of his +home; with you the home means the estate, the succession of honors +or titles, the surety that the conditions of life shall all be kept +intact. With us the children who do not expect, and generally +succeed in improving the fortunes of the house, are marked +exceptions. Do I make myself clear?" + +The French-Patagonian attache thought it was "charming and +progressif." The Baron Von Pretzel thought he had noticed a +movement of that kind in Germany, which was expressed in a single +word of seventeen syllables. Viscount Piccadilly said to his +neighbor: "That, you know now, the younger sons, don't you see, go +to Australia, you know in some beastly trade--stock-raising or +sheep--you know; but, by Jove! them fellahs--" + +"My father always treated me well," continued our host. "I shared +equally with my brothers the privileges and limitations of our New +England home. Nevertheless, I ran away and went to sea--" + +"To see--what?" asked Legrande. + +"Aller sur mer," said his neighbor, hastily. + +"Go on with your piracy!" said Miss Jones. + +The distinguished foreigners looked at each other and then at Miss +Jones. Each made a mental note of the average cold-blooded +ferocity of the young American female. + +"I shipped on board of a Liverpool 'liner,'" continued our host. + +"What ess a 'liner'?" interrupted Legrande, sotto voce, to his next +neighbor, who pretended not to hear him. + +"I need not say that these were the days when we had not lost our +carrying trade, when American bottoms--" + +"Que est ce, 'bot toom'?" said Legrande, imploringly, to his other +friend. + +"When American bottoms still carried the bulk of freight, and the +supremacy of our flag--" + +Here Legrande recognized a patriotic sentiment and responded to it +with wild republican enthusiasm, nodding his head violently. +Piccadilly noticed it, too, and, seeing an opening for some general +discussion on free trade, began half audibly to HIS neighbor: "Most +extraordinary thing, you know, your American statesmen--" + +"I deserted the ship at Liverpool--" + +But here two perfunctory listeners suddenly turned toward the other +end of the table, where another guest, our Nevada Bonanza lion, was +evidently in the full flood of pioneer anecdote and narration. +Calmly disregarding the defection, he went on:-- + +"I deserted the ship at Liverpool in consequence of my ill- +treatment by the second mate,--a man selected for his position by +reason of his superior physical strength and recognized brutality. +I have been since told that he graduated from the state prison. On +the second day out I saw him strike a man senseless with a belaying +pin for some trifling breach of discipline. I saw him repeatedly +beat and kick sick men--" + +"Did you ever read Dana's 'Two Years before the Mast'?" asked +Lightbody, our heavy literary man, turning to HIS neighbor, in a +distinctly audible whisper. "Ah! there's a book! Got all this +sort of thing in it. Dev'lishly well written, too." + +The Patagonian (alive for information): "What ess this Dana, eh?" + +His left hand neighbor (shortly): "Oh, that man!" + +His right hand neighbor (curtly): "The fellah who wrote the +Encyclopaedia and edits 'The Sun'? that was put up in Boston for +the English mission and didn't get it." + +The Patagonian (making a mental diplomatic note of the fact that +the severe discipline of the editor of "The Sun," one of America's +profoundest scholars, while acting from patriotic motives, as the +second mate of an American "bottom," had unfitted him for +diplomatic service abroad): "Ah, ciel!" + +"I wandered on the quays for a day or two, until I was picked up by +a Portuguese sailor, who, interesting himself in my story, offered +to procure me a passage to Fayal and Lisbon, where, he assured me, +I could find more comfortable and profitable means of returning to +my own land. Let me say here that this man, although I knew him +afterward as one of the most unscrupulous and heartless of +pirates,--in fact the typical buccaneer of the books,--was to me +always kind, considerate, and, at times, even tender. He was a +capital seaman. I give this evidence in favor of a much ridiculed +race, who have been able seamen for centuries." + +"Did you ever read that Portuguese Guide-book?" asked Lightbody of +his neighbor; "it's the most exquisitely ridiculous thing--" + +"Will the great American pirate kindly go on, or resume his +original functions," said Miss Jones, over the table, with a +significant look in the direction of Lightbody. But her anxiety +was instantly misinterpreted by the polite and fair-play loving +Englishman: "I say, now, don't you know that the fact is these +Portuguese fellahs are always ahead of us in the discovery +business? Why, you know--" + +"I shipped with him on a brig, ostensibly bound to St. Kitts and a +market. We had scarcely left port before I discovered the true +character of the vessel. I will not terrify you with useless +details. Enough that all that tradition and romance has given you +of the pirate's life was ours. Happily, through the kindness of my +Portuguese friend, I was kept from being an active participant in +scenes of which I was an unwilling witness. But I must always bear +my testimony to one fact. Our discipline, our esprit de corps, if +I may so term it, was perfect. No benevolent society, no moral +organization, was ever so personally self-sacrificing, so honestly +loyal to one virtuous purpose, as we were to our one vice. The +individual was always merged in the purpose. When our captain blew +out the brains of our quartermaster, one day--" + +"That reminds me--DID you read of that Georgia murder?" began +Lightbody; "it was in all the papers I think. Oh, I beg pardon--" + +"For simply interrupting him in a conversation with our second +officer," continued our host, quietly. "The act, although harsh +and perhaps unnecessarily final, was, I think, indorsed by the +crew. James, pass the champagne to Mr. Lightbody." + +He paused a moment for the usual casual interruption, but even the +active Legrande was silent. + +Alas! from the other end of the table came the voice of the Bonanza +man:-- + +"The rope was around her neck. Well, gentlemen, that Mexican woman +standing there, with that crowd around her, eager for her blood, +dern my skin! if she didn't call out to the sheriff to hold on a +minit. And what fer? Ye can't guess! Why, one of them long +braids she wore was under the noose, and kinder in the way. I +remember her raising her hand to her neck and givin' a spiteful +sort of jerk to the braid that fetched it outside the slip-knot, +and then saying to the sheriff: 'There, d--n ye, go on.' There was +a sort o' thoughtfulness in the act, a kind o' keerless, easy way, +that jist fetched the boys--even them thet hed the rope in their +hands, and they--" (suddenly recognizing the silence): "Oh, beg +pardon, old man; didn't know I'd chipped into your yarn--heave +ahead; don't mind me." + +"What I am trying to tell you is this: One night, in the Caribbean +Sea, we ran into one of the Leeward Islands, that had been in olden +time a rendezvous for our ship. We were piloted to our anchorage +outside by my Portuguese friend, who knew the locality thoroughly, +and on whose dexterity and skill we placed the greatest reliance. +If anything more had been necessary to fix this circumstance in my +mind, it would have been the fact that two or three days before he +had assured me that I should presently have the means of honorable +discharge from the pirate's crew, and a return to my native land. +A launch was sent from the ship to communicate with our friends on +the island, who supplied us with stores, provisions, and general +information. The launch was manned by eight men, and officered by +the first mate,--a grim, Puritanical, practical New Englander, if I +may use such a term to describe a pirate, of great courage, +experience, and physical strength. My Portuguese friend, acting as +pilot, prevailed upon them to allow me to accompany the party as +coxswain. I was naturally anxious, you can readily comprehend, to +see--" + +"Certainly," "Of course," "Why shouldn't you?" went round the +table. + +"Two trustworthy men were sent ashore with instructions. We, +meanwhile, lay off the low, palm-fringed beach, our crew lying on +their oars, or giving way just enough to keep the boat's head to +the breakers. The mate and myself sat in the stern sheets, looking +shoreward for the signal. The night was intensely black. Perhaps +for this reason never before had I seen the phosphorescence of a +tropical sea so strongly marked. From the great open beyond, +luminous crests and plumes of pale fire lifted themselves, ghost- +like, at our bows, sank, swept by us with long, shimmering, +undulating trails, broke on the beach in silvery crescents, or +shattered their brightness on the black rocks of the promontory. +The whole vast sea shone and twinkled like another firmament, +against which the figures of our men, sitting with their faces +toward us, were outlined darkly. The grim, set features of our +first mate, sitting beside me, were faintly illuminated. There was +no sound but the whisper of passing waves against our lap-streak, +and the low, murmuring conversation of the men. I had my face +toward the shore. As I looked over the glimmering expanse, I +suddenly heard the whispered name of our first mate. As suddenly, +by the phosphorescent light that surrounded it, I saw the long +trailing hair and gleaming shoulders of a woman floating beside us. +Legrande, you are positively drinking nothing. Lightbody, you are +shirking the Burgundy--you used to like it!" + +He paused, but no one spoke. + +"I--let me see! where was I? Oh, yes! Well, I saw the woman, and +when I turned to call the attention of the first mate to this fact, +I knew instantly, by some strange instinct, that he had seen and +heard her, too. So, from that moment to the conclusion of our +little drama, we were silent, but enforced spectators. + +"She swam gracefully--silently! I remember noticing through that +odd, half-weird, phosphorescent light which broke over her +shoulders as she rose and fell with each quiet stroke of her +splendidly rounded arms, that she was a mature, perfectly-formed +woman. I remember, also, that when she reached the boat, and, +supporting herself with one small hand on the gunwale, she softly +called the mate in a whisper by his Christian name, I had a boyish +idea that she was--the--er--er--female of his species--his--er-- +natural wife! I'm boring you--am I not?" + +Two or three heads shook violently and negatively. The youngest, +and, I regret to say, the OLDEST, Miss Jones uttered together +sympathetically, "Go on--please; do!" + +"The--woman told him in a few rapid words that he had been +betrayed; that the two men sent ashore were now in the hands of the +authorities; that a force was being organized to capture the +vessel; that instant flight was necessary, and that the betrayer +and traitor was--my friend, the Portuguese, Fernandez! + +"The mate raised the dripping, little brown hand to his lips, and +whispered some undistinguishable words in her ear. I remember +seeing her turn a look of ineffable love and happiness upon his +grim, set face, and then she was gone. She dove as a duck dives, +and I saw her shapely head, after a moment's suspense, reappear a +cable's length away toward the shore. + +"I ventured to raise my eyes to the mate's face; it was cold and +impassive. I turned my face toward the crew; they were conversing +in whispers with each other, with their faces toward us, yet +apparently utterly oblivious of the scene that had just taken place +in the stern. There was a moment of silence, and then the mate's +voice came out quite impassively, but distinctly:-- + +"'Fernandez!' + +"'Aye, aye, sir!' + +"'Come aft and--bring your oar with you.' + +"He did so, stumbling over the men, who, engaged in their whispered +yarns, didn't seem to notice him. + +"'See if you can find soundings here.' + +"Fernandez leaned over the stern and dropped his oar to its shaft +in the phosphorescent water. But he touched no bottom; the current +brought the oar at right angles presently to the surface. + +"'Send it down, man,' said the mate, imperatively; 'down, down. +Reach over there. What are you afraid of? So; steady there; I'll +hold you.' + +"Fernandez leaned over the stern and sent the oar and half of his +bared brown arm into the water. In an instant the mate caught him +with one tremendous potential grip at his elbows, and forced him +and his oar head downward in the waters. The act was so sudden, +yet so carefully premeditated, that no outcry escaped the doomed +man. Even the launch scarcely dipped her stern to the act. In +that awful moment I heard a light laugh from one of the men in +response to a wanton yarn from his comrade,--James, bring the vichy +to Mr. Lightbody! You'll find that a dash of cognac will improve +it wonderfully. + +"Well--to go on--a few bubbles arose to the surface. Fernandez +seemed unreasonably passive, until I saw that when the mate had +gripped his elbows with his hands he had also firmly locked the +traitor's knees within his own. In a few moments--it seemed to me, +then, a century--the mate's grasp relaxed; the body of Fernandez, a +mere limp, leaden mass, slipped noiselessly and heavily into the +sea. There was no splash. The ocean took it calmly and quietly to +its depths. The mate turned to the men, without deigning to cast a +glance on me. + +"'Oars!' The men raised their oars apeak. + +"'Let fall!' There was a splash in the water, encircling the boat +in concentric lines of molten silver. + +"'Give way!' + +"Well, of course, that's all. WE got away in time. I knew I bored +you awfully! Eh? Oh, you want to know what became of the woman-- +really, I don't know! And myself--oh, I got away at Havana! Eh? +Certainly; James, you'll find some smelling salts in my bureau. +Gentlemen, I fear we have kept the ladies too long." + +But they had already risen, and were slowly filing out of the room. +Only one lingered--the youngest Miss Jones. + +"That was a capital story," she said, pausing beside our host, with +a special significance in her usual audacity. "Do you know you +absolutely sent cold chills down my spine a moment ago. Really, +now, you ought to write for the magazines!" + +Our host looked up at the pretty, audacious face. Then he said, +sotto voce,-- + +"I do!" + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext Drift from Two Shores, by Bret Harte + diff --git a/old/dftsh10.zip b/old/dftsh10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d225acf --- /dev/null +++ b/old/dftsh10.zip |