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diff --git a/old/tpart10.txt b/old/tpart10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0dbaffd --- /dev/null +++ b/old/tpart10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7321 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Three Partners, by Bret Harte +#26 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* + + + + + +This etext was prepared by Donald Lainson, charlie@idirect.com. + + + + + +THE THREE PARTNERS + +by Bret Harte + + + + +PROLOGUE. + + +The sun was going down on the Black Spur Range. The red light it +had kindled there was still eating its way along the serried crest, +showing through gaps in the ranks of pines, etching out the +interstices of broken boughs, fading away and then flashing suddenly +out again like sparks in burnt-up paper. Then the night wind swept +down the whole mountain side, and began its usual struggle with the +shadows upclimbing from the valley, only to lose itself in the end +and be absorbed in the all-conquering darkness. Yet for some time +the pines on the long slope of Heavy Tree Hill murmured and +protested with swaying arms; but as the shadows stole upwards, and +cabin after cabin and tunnel after tunnel were swallowed up, a +complete silence followed. Only the sky remained visible--a vast +concave mirror of dull steel, in which the stars did not seem to be +set, but only reflected. + +A single cabin door on the crest of Heavy Tree Hill had remained +open to the wind and darkness. Then it was slowly shut by an +invisible figure, afterwards revealed by the embers of the fire it +was stirring. At first only this figure brooding over the hearth +was shown, but as the flames leaped up, two other figures could be +seen sitting motionless before it. When the door was shut, they +acknowledged that interruption by slightly changing their position; +the one who had risen to shut the door sank back into an invisible +seat, but the attitude of each man was one of profound reflection +or reserve, and apparently upon some common subject which made them +respect each other's silence. However, this was at last broken by +a laugh. It was a boyish laugh, and came from the youngest of the +party. The two others turned their profiles and glanced inquiringly +towards him, but did not speak. + +"I was thinking," he began in apologetic explanation, "how mighty +queer it was that while we were working like niggers on grub wages, +without the ghost of a chance of making a strike, how we used to +sit here, night after night, and flapdoodle and speculate about +what we'd do if we ever DID make one; and now, Great Scott! that we +HAVE made it, and are just wallowing in gold, here we are sitting +as glum and silent as if we'd had a washout! Why, Lord! I remember +one night--not so long ago, either--that you two quarreled over the +swell hotel you were going to stop at in 'Frisco, and whether you +wouldn't strike straight out for London and Rome and Paris, or go +away to Japan and China and round by India and the Red Sea." + +"No, we didn't QUARREL over it," said one of the figures gently; +"there was only a little discussion." + +"Yes, but you did, though," returned the young fellow mischievously, +"and you told Stacy, there, that we'd better learn something of the +world before we tried to buy it or even hire it, and that it was +just as well to get the hayseed out of our hair and the slumgullion +off our boots before we mixed in polite society." + +"Well, I don't see what's the matter with that sentiment now," +returned the second speaker good-humoredly; "only," he added +gravely, "we didn't quarrel--God forbid!" + +There was something in the speaker's tone which seemed to touch a +common chord in their natures, and this was voiced by Barker with +sudden and almost pathetic earnestness. "I tell you what, boys, we +ought to swear here to-night to always stand by each other--in luck +and out of it! We ought to hold ourselves always at each other's +call. We ought to have a kind of password or signal, you know, by +which we could summon each other at any time from any quarter of +the globe!" + +"Come off the roof, Barker," murmured Stacy, without lifting his +eyes from the fire. But Demorest smiled and glanced tolerantly at +the younger man. + +"Yes, but look here, Stacy," continued Barker, "comrades like us, +in the old days, used to do that in times of trouble and adventures. +Why shouldn't we do it in our luck?" + +"There's a good deal in that, Barker boy," said Demorest, "though, +as a general thing, passwords butter no parsnips, and the ordinary, +every-day, single yelp from a wolf brings the whole pack together +for business about as quick as a password. But you cling to that +sentiment, and put it away with your gold-dust in your belt." + +"What I like about Barker is his commodiousness," said Stacy. +"Here he is, the only man among us that has his future fixed and +his preemption lines laid out and registered. He's already got a +girl that he's going to marry and settle down with on the strength +of his luck. And I'd like to know what Kitty Carter, when she's +Mrs. Barker, would say to her husband being signaled for from Asia +or Africa. I don't seem to see her tumbling to any password. And +when he and she go into a new partnership, I reckon she'll let the +old one slide." + +"That's just where you're wrong!" said Barker, with quickly rising +color. "She's the sweetest girl in the world, and she'd be sure to +understand our feelings. Why, she thinks everything of you two; +she was just eager for you to get this claim, which has put us +where we are, when I held back, and if it hadn't been for her, by +Jove! we wouldn't have had it." + +"That was only because she cared for YOU," returned Stacy, with a +half-yawn; "and now that you've got YOUR share she isn't going to +take a breathless interest in US. And, by the way, I'd rather +YOU'D remind us that we owe our luck to her than that SHE should +ever remind YOU of it." + +"What do you mean?" said Barker quickly. But Demorest here rose +lazily, and, throwing a gigantic shadow on the wall, stood between +the two with his back to the fire. "He means," he said slowly, +"that you're talking rot, and so is he. However, as yours comes +from the heart and his from the head, I prefer yours. But you're +both making me tired. Let's have a fresh deal." + +Nobody ever dreamed of contradicting Demorest. Nevertheless, +Barker persisted eagerly: "But isn't it better for us to look at +this cheerfully and happily all round? There's nothing criminal in +our having made a strike! It seems to me, boys, that of all ways +of making money it's the squarest and most level; nobody is the +poorer for it; our luck brings no misfortune to others. The gold +was put there ages ago for anybody to find; we found it. It hasn't +been tarnished by man's touch before. I don't know how it strikes +you, boys, but it seems to me that of all gifts that are going it +is the straightest. For whether we deserve it or not, it comes to +us first-hand--from God!" + +The two men glanced quickly at the speaker, whose face flushed and +then smiled embarrassedly as if ashamed of the enthusiasm into +which he had been betrayed. But Demorest did not smile, and +Stacy's eyes shone in the firelight as he said languidly, "I never +heard that prospecting was a religious occupation before. But I +shouldn't wonder if you're right, Barker boy. So let's liquor up." + +Nevertheless he did not move, nor did the others. The fire leaped +higher, bringing out the rude rafters and sternly economic details +of the rough cabin, and making the occupants in their seats before +the fire look gigantic by contrast. + +"Who shut the door?" said Demorest after a pause. + +"I did," said Barker. "I reckoned it was getting cold." + +"Better open it again, now that the fire's blazing. It will light +the way if any of the men from below want to drop in this evening." + +Stacy stared at his companion. "I thought that it was understood +that we were giving them that dinner at Boomville tomorrow night, +so that we might have the last evening here by ourselves in peace +and quietness?" + +"Yes, but if any one DID want to come it would seem churlish to +shut him out," said Demorest. + +"I reckon you're feeling very much as I am," said Stacy, "that this +good fortune is rather crowding to us three alone. For myself, I +know," he continued, with a backward glance towards a blanketed, +covered pile in the corner of the cabin, "that I feel rather +oppressed by--by its specific gravity, I calculate--and sort of +crampy and twitchy in the legs, as if I ought to 'lite' out and do +something, and yet it holds me here. All the same, I doubt if +anybody will come up--except from curiosity. Our luck has made +them rather sore down the hill, for all they're coming to the +dinner to-morrow." + +"That's only human nature," said Demorest. + +"But," said Barker eagerly, "what does it mean? Why, only this +afternoon, when I was passing the 'Old Kentuck' tunnel, where those +Marshalls have been grubbing along for four years without making a +single strike, I felt ashamed to look at them, and as they barely +nodded to me I slinked by as if I had done them an injury. I don't +understand it." + +"It somehow does not seem to square with this 'gift of God' idea of +yours, does it?" said Stacy. "But we'll open the door and give +them a show." + +As he did so it seemed as if the night were their only guest, and +had been waiting on the threshold to now enter bodily and pervade +all things with its presence. With that cool, fragrant inflow of +air they breathed freely. The red edge had gone from Black Spur, +but it was even more clearly defined against the sky in its +towering blackness. The sky itself had grown lighter, although the +stars still seemed mere reflections of the solitary pin-points of +light scattered along the concave valley below. Mingling with the +cooler, restful air of the summit, yet penetratingly distinct from +it, arose the stimulating breath of the pines below, still hot and +panting from the day-long sun. The silence was intense. The far- +off barking of a dog on the invisible river-bar nearly a mile +beneath them came to them like a sound in a dream. They had risen, +and, standing in the doorway, by common consent turned their faces +to the east. It was the frequent attitude of the home-remembering +miner, and it gave him the crowning glory of the view. For, beyond +the pine-hearsed summits, rarely seen except against the evening +sky, lay a thin, white cloud like a dropped portion of the Milky +Way. Faint with an indescribable pallor, remote yet distinct +enough to assert itself above and beyond all surrounding objects, +it was always there. It was the snow-line of the Sierras. + +They turned away and silently reseated themselves, the same thought +in the minds of each. Here was something they could not take away, +something to be left forever and irretrievably behind,--left with +the healthy life they had been leading, the cheerful endeavor, the +undying hopefulness which it had fostered and blessed. Was what +they WERE taking away worth it? And oddly enough, frank and +outspoken as they had always been to each other, that common +thought remained unuttered. Even Barker was silent; perhaps he was +also thinking of Kitty. + +Suddenly two figures appeared in the very doorway of the cabin. +The effect was startling upon the partners, who had only just +reseated themselves, and for a moment they had forgotten that the +narrow band of light which shot forth from the open door rendered +the darkness on either side of it more impenetrable, and that out +of this darkness, although themselves guided by the light, the +figures had just emerged. Yet one was familiar enough. It was the +Hill drunkard, Dick Hall, or, as he was called, "Whiskey Dick," or, +indicated still more succinctly by the Hill humorists, "Alky Hall." + +Everybody had seen that sodden, puffy, but good-humored face; +everybody had felt the fiery exhalations of that enormous red +beard, which always seemed to be kept in a state of moist, unkempt +luxuriance by liquor; everybody knew the absurd dignity of manner +and attempted precision of statement with which he was wont to +disguise his frequent excesses. Very few, however, knew, or cared +to know, the pathetic weariness and chilling horror that sometimes +looked out of those bloodshot eyes. + +He was evidently equally unprepared for the three silent seated +figures before the door, and for a moment looked at them blankly +with the doubts of a frequently deceived perception. Was he sure +that they were quite real? He had not dared to look at his +companion for verification, but smiled vaguely. + +"Good-evening," said Demorest pleasantly. + +Whiskey Dick's face brightened. "Good-evenin', good-evenin' +yourselves, boys--and see how you like it! Lemme interdrush my ole +frien' William J. Steptoe, of Red Gulch. Stepsho--Steptoe--is +shtay--ish stay--" He stopped, hiccupped, waved his hand gravely, +and with an air of reproachful dignity concluded, "sojourning for +the present on the Bar. We wish to offer our congrashulashen and +felish--felish--" He paused again, and, leaning against the door- +post, added severely, "--itations." + +His companion, however, laughed coarsely, and, pushing past Dick, +entered the cabin. He was a short, powerful man, with a closely +cropped crust of beard and hair that seemed to adhere to his round +head like moss or lichen. He cast a glance--furtive rather than +curious around the cabin, and said, with a familiarity that had not +even good humor to excuse it, "So you're the gay galoots who've +made the big strike? Thought I'd meander up the Hill with this old +bloat Alky, and drop in to see the show. And here you are, feeling +your oats, eh? and not caring any particular G-d d--n if school +keeps or not." + +"Show Mr. Steptoe--the whiskey," said Demorest to Stacy. Then +quietly addressing Dick, but ignoring Steptoe as completely as +Steptoe had ignored his unfortunate companion, he said, "You quite +startled us at first. We did not see you come up the trail." + +"No. We came up the back trail to please Steptoe, who wanted to +see round the cabin," said Dick, glancing nervously yet with a +forced indifference towards the whiskey which Stacy was offering to +the stranger. + +"What yer gettin' off there?" said Steptoe, facing Dick almost +brutally. "YOU know your tangled legs wouldn't take you straight +up the trail, and you had to make a circumbendibus. Gosh! if you +hadn't scented this licker at the top you'd have never found it." + +"No matter! I'm glad you DID find it, Dick," said Demorest, "and I +hope you'll find the liquor good enough to pay you for the trouble." + +Barker stared at Demorest. This extraordinary tolerance of the +drunkard was something new in his partner. But at a glance from +Demorest he led Dick to the demijohn and tin cup which stood on a +table in the corner. And in another moment Dick had forgotten his +companion's rudeness. + +Demorest remained by the door, looking out into the darkness. + +"Well," said Steptoe, putting down his emptied cup, "trot out your +strike. I reckon our eyes are strong enough to bear it now." +Stacy drew the blanket from the vague pile that stood in the +corner, and discovered a deep tin prospecting-pan. It was heaped +with several large fragments of quartz. At first the marble +whiteness of the quartz and the glittering crystals of mica in its +veins were the most noticeable, but as they drew closer they could +see the dull yellow of gold filling the decomposed and honeycombed +portion of the rock as if still liquid and molten. The eyes of the +party sparkled like the mica--even those of Barker and Stacy, who +were already familiar with the treasure. + +"Which is the richest chunk?" asked Steptoe in a thickening voice. + +Stacy pointed it out. + +"Why, it's smaller than the others." + +"Heft it in your hand," said Barker, with boyish enthusiasm. + +The short, thick fingers of Steptoe grasped it with a certain +aquiline suggestion; his whole arm strained over it until his face +grew purple, but he could not lift it. + +"Thar useter be a little game in the 'Frisco Mint," said Dick, +restored to fluency by his liquor, "when thar war ladies visiting +it, and that was to offer to give 'em any of those little boxes of +gold coin, that contained five thousand dollars, ef they would +kindly lift it from the counter and take it away! It wasn't no +bigger than one of these chunks; but Jiminy! you oughter have seed +them gals grip and heave on it, and then hev to give it up! You +see they didn't know anything about the paci--(hic) the speshif--" +He stopped with great dignity, and added with painful precision, +"the specific gravity of gold." + +"Dry up!" said Steptoe roughly. Then turning to Stacy he said +abruptly, "But where's the rest of it? You've got more than that." + +"We sent it to Boomville this morning. You see we've sold out our +claim to a company who take it up to-morrow, and put up a mill and +stamps. In fact, it's under their charge now. They've got a gang +of men on the claim already." + +"And what mout ye hev got for it, if it's a fair question?" said +Steptoe, with a forced smile. + +Stacy smiled also. "I don't know that it's a business question," +he said. + +"Five hundred thousand dollars," said Demorest abruptly from the +doorway, "and a treble interest." + +The eyes of the two men met. There was no mistaking the dull fire +of envy in Steptoe's glance, but Demorest received it with a +certain cold curiosity, and turned away as the sound of arriving +voices came from without. + +"Five hundred thousand's a big figger," said Steptoe, with a coarse +laugh, "and I don't wonder it makes you feel so d----d sassy. But +it WAS a fair question." + +Unfortunately it here occurred to the whiskey-stimulated brain of +Dick that the friend he had introduced was being treated with scant +courtesy, and he forgot his own treatment by Steptoe. Leaning +against the wall he waved a dignified rebuke. "I'm sashified my +ole frien' is akshuated by only businesh principles." He paused, +recollected himself, and added with great precision: "When I say he +himself has a valuable claim in Red Gulch, and to my shertain +knowledge has received offers--I have said enough." + +The laugh that broke from Stacy and Barker, to whom the infelicitous +reputation of Red Gulch was notorious, did not allay Steptoe's +irritation. He darted a vindictive glance at the unfortunate Dick, +but joined in the laugh. "And what was ye goin' to do with that?" +he said, pointing to the treasure. + +"Oh, we're taking that with us. There's a chunk for each of us as +a memento. We cast lots for the choice, and Demorest won,--that +one which you couldn't lift with one hand, you know," said Stacy. + +"Oh, couldn't I? I reckon you ain't goin' to give me the same +chance that they did at the Mint, eh?" + +Although the remark was accompanied with his usual coarse, familiar +laugh, there was a look in his eye so inconsequent in its +significance that Stacy would have made some reply, but at this +moment Demorest re-entered the cabin, ushering in a half dozen +miners from the Bar below. They were, although youngish men, some +of the older locators in the vicinity, yet, through years of +seclusion and uneventful labors, they had acquired a certain +childish simplicity of thought and manner that was alternately +amusing and pathetic. They had never intruded upon the reserve of +the three partners of Heavy Tree Hill before; nothing but an +infantine curiosity, a shy recognition of the partners' courtesy in +inviting them with the whole population of Heavy Tree to the dinner +the next day, and the never-to-be-resisted temptation of an evening +of "free liquor" and forgetfulness of the past had brought them +there now. Among them, and yet not of them, was a young man who, +although speaking English without accent, was distinctly of a +different nationality and race. This, with a certain neatness of +dress and artificial suavity of address, had gained him the +nickname of "the Count" and "Frenchy," although he was really of +Flemish extraction. He was the Union Ditch Company's agent on the +Bar, by virtue of his knowledge of languages. + +Barker uttered an exclamation of pleasure when he saw him. Himself +the incarnation of naturalness, he had always secretly admired this +young foreigner, with his lacquered smoothness, although a vague +consciousness that neither Stacy nor Demorest shared his feelings +had restricted their acquaintance. Nevertheless, he was proud now +to see the bow with which Paul Van Loo entered the cabin as if it +were a drawing-room, and perhaps did not reflect upon that want of +real feeling in an act which made the others uncomfortable. + +The slight awkwardness their entrance produced, however, was +quickly forgotten when the blanket was again lifted from the pan of +treasure. Singularly enough, too, the same feverish light came +into the eyes of each as they all gathered around this yellow +shrine. Even the polite Paul rudely elbowed his way between the +others, though his artificial "Pardon" seemed to Barker to condone +this act of brutal instinct. But it was more instructive to +observe the manner in which the older locators received this +confirmation of the fickle Fortune that had overlooked their weary +labors and years of waiting to lavish her favors on the new and +inexperienced amateurs. Yet as they turned their dazzled eyes upon +the three partners there was no envy or malice in their depths, no +reproach on their lips, no insincerity in their wondering +satisfaction. Rather there was a touching, almost childlike +resumption of hope as they gazed at this conclusive evidence of +Nature's bounty. The gold had been there--THEY had only missed it! +And if there, more could be found! Was it not a proof of the +richness of Heavy Tree Hill? So strongly was this reflected on +their faces that a casual observer, contrasting them with the +thoughtful countenances of the real owners, would have thought them +the lucky ones. It touched Barker's quick sympathies, it puzzled +Stacy, it made Demorest more serious, it aroused Steptoe's active +contempt. Whiskey Dick alone remained stolid and impassive in a +desperate attempt to pull himself once more together. Eventually +he succeeded, even to the ambitious achievement of mounting a chair +and lifting his tin cup with a dangerously unsteady hand, which did +not, however, affect his precision of utterance, and said:-- + +"Order, gentlemen! We'll drink success to--to"-- + +"The next strike!" said Barker, leaping impetuously on another +chair and beaming upon the old locators--"and may it come to those +who have so long deserved it!" + +His sincere and generous enthusiasm seemed to break the spell of +silence that had fallen upon them. Other toasts quickly followed. +In the general good feeling Barker attached himself to Van Loo with +his usual boyish effusion, and in a burst of confidence imparted +the secret of his engagement to Kitty Carter. Van Loo listened +with polite attention, formal congratulations, but inscrutable +eyes, that occasionally wandered to Stacy and again to the +treasure. A slight chill of disappointment came over Barker's +quick sensitiveness. Perhaps his enthusiasm had bored this +superior man of the world. Perhaps his confidences were in bad +taste! With a new sense of his inexperience he turned sadly away. +Van Loo took that opportunity to approach Stacy. + +"What's all this I hear of Barker being engaged to Miss Carter?" he +said, with a faintly superior smile. "Is it really true?" + +"Yes. Why shouldn't it be?" returned Stacy bluntly. + +Van Loo was instantly deprecating and smiling. "Why not, of +course? But isn't it sudden?" + +"They have known each other ever since he's been on Heavy Tree +Hill," responded Stacy. + +"Ah, yes! True," said Van Loo. "But now"-- + +"Well--he's got money enough to marry, and he's going to marry." + +"Rather young, isn't he?" said Van Loo, still deprecatingly. "And +she's got nothing. Used to wait on the table at her father's hotel +in Boomville, didn't she?" + +"Yes. What of that? We all know it." + +"Of course. It's an excellent thing for her--and her father. +He'll have a rich son-in-law. About two hundred thousand is his +share, isn't it? I suppose old Carter is delighted?" + +Stacy had thought this before, but did not care to have it +corroborated by this superfine young foreigner. "And I don't +reckon that Barker is offended if he is," he said curtly as he +turned away. Nevertheless, he felt irritated that one of the three +superior partners of Heavy Tree Hill should be thought a dupe. + +Suddenly the conversation dropped, the laughter ceased. Every one +turned round, and, by a common instinct, looked towards the door. +From the obscurity of the hill slope below came a wonderful tenor +voice, modulated by distance and spiritualized by the darkness:-- + + + "When at some future day + I shall be far away, + Thou wilt be weeping, + Thy lone watch keeping." + + +The men looked at one another. "That's Jack Hamlin," they said. +"What's he doing here?" + +"The wolves are gathering around fresh meat," said Steptoe, with +his coarse laugh and a glance at the treasure. "Didn't ye know he +came over from Red Dog yesterday?" + +"Well, give Jack a fair show and his own game," said one of the old +locators, "and he'd clean out that pile afore sunrise." + +"And lose it next day," added another. + +"But never turn a hair or change a muscle in either case," said a +third. "Lord! I've heard him sing away just like that when he's +been leaving the board with five thousand dollars in his pocket, or +going away stripped of his last red cent." + +Van Loo, who had been listening with a peculiar smile, here said in +his most deprecating manner, "Yes, but did you never consider the +influence that such a man has on the hard-working tunnelmen, who +are ready to gamble their whole week's earnings to him? Perhaps +not. But I know the difficulties of getting the Ditch rates from +these men when he has been in camp." + +He glanced around him with some importance, but only a laugh +followed his speech. "Come, Frenchy," said an old locator, "you +only say that because your little brother wanted to play with Jack +like a grown man, and when Jack ordered him off the board and he +became sassy, Jack scooted him outer the saloon." + +Van Loo's face reddened with an anger that had the apparent effect +of removing every trace of his former polished repose, and leaving +only a hard outline beneath. At which Demorest interfered:-- + +"I can't say that I see much difference in gambling by putting +money into a hole in the ground and expecting to take more from it +than by putting it on a card for the same purpose." + +Here the ravishing tenor voice, which had been approaching, ceased, +and was succeeded by a heart-breaking and equally melodious +whistling to finish the bar of the singer's song. And the next +moment Jack Hamlin appeared in the doorway. + +Whatever was his present financial condition, in perfect self- +possession and charming sang-froid he fully bore out his previous +description. He was as clean and refreshing looking as a madrono- +tree in the dust-blown forest. An odor of scented soap and freshly +ironed linen was wafted from him; there was scarcely a crease in +his white waistcoat, nor a speck upon his varnished shoes. He +might have been an auditor of the previous conversation, so quickly +and completely did he seem to take in the whole situation at a +glance. Perhaps there was an extra tilt to his black-ribboned +Panama hat, and a certain dancing devilry in his brown eyes--which +might also have been an answer to adverse criticism. + +"When I, his truth to prove, would trifle with my love," he warbled +in general continuance from the doorway. Then dropping cheerfully +into speech, he added, "Well, boys, I am here to welcome the little +stranger, and to trust that the family are doing as well as can be +expected. Ah! there it is! Bless it!" he went on, walking +leisurely to the treasure. "Triplets, too!--and plump at that. +Have you had 'em weighed?" + +Frankness was an essential quality of Heavy Tree Hill. "We were +just saying, Jack," said an old locator, "that, giving you a fair +show and your own game, you could manage to get away with that pile +before daybreak." + +"And I'm just thinking," said Jack cheerfully, "that there were +some of you here that could do that without any such useless +preliminary." His brown eyes rested for a moment on Steptoe, but +turning quite abruptly to Van Loo, he held out his hand. Startled +and embarrassed before the others, the young man at last advanced +his, when Jack coolly put his own, as if forgetfully, in his +pocket. "I thought you might like to know what that little brother +of yours is doing," he said to Van Loo, yet looking at Steptoe. "I +found him wandering about the Hill here quite drunk." + +"I have repeatedly warned him"--began Van Loo, reddening. + +"Against bad company--I know," suggested Jack gayly; "yet in spite +of all that, I think he owes some of his liquor to Steptoe yonder." + +"I never supposed the fool would get drunk over a glass of whiskey +offered in fun," said Steptoe harshly, yet evidently quite as much +disconcerted as angry. + +"The trouble with Steptoe," said Hamlin, thoughtfully spanning his +slim waist with both hands as he looked down at his polished shoes, +"is that he has such a soft-hearted liking for all weaknesses. +Always wanting to protect chaps that can't look after themselves, +whether it's Whiskey Dick there when he has a pull on, or some +nigger when he's made a little strike, or that straying lamb of Van +Loo's when he's puppy drunk. But you're wrong about me, boys. You +can't draw me in any game to-night. This is one of my nights off, +which I devote exclusively to contemplation and song. But," he +added, suddenly turning to his three hosts with a bewildering and +fascinating change of expression, "I couldn't resist coming up here +to see you and your pile, even if I never saw the one or the other +before, and am not likely to see either again. I believe in luck! +And it comes a mighty sight oftener than a fellow thinks it does. +But it doesn't come to stay. So I'd advise you to keep your eyes +skinned, and hang on to it while it's with you, like grim death. +So long!" + +Resisting all attempts of his hosts--who had apparently fallen as +suddenly and unaccountably under the magic of his manner--to detain +him longer, he stepped lightly away, his voice presently rising +again in melody as he descended the hill. Nor was it at all +remarkable that the others, apparently drawn by the same inevitable +magnetism, were impelled to follow him, naturally joining their +voices with his, leaving Steptoe and Van Loo so markedly behind +them alone that they were compelled at last in sheer embarrassment +to close up the rear of the procession. In another moment the +cabin and the three partners again relapsed into the peace and +quiet of the night. With the dying away of the last voices on the +hillside the old solitude reasserted itself. + +But since the irruption of the strangers they had lost their former +sluggish contemplation, and now busied themselves in preparation +for their early departure from the cabin the next morning. They +had arranged to spend the following day and night at Boomville and +Carter's Hotel, where they were to give their farewell dinner to +Heavy Tree Hill. They talked but little together: since the rebuff +his enthusiastic confidences had received from Van Loo, Barker had +been grave and thoughtful, and Stacy, with the irritating +recollection of Van Loo's criticisms in his mind, had refrained +from his usual rallying of Barker. Oddly enough, they spoke +chiefly of Jack Hamlin,--till then personally a stranger to them, +on account of his infelix reputation,--and even the critical +Demorest expressed a wish they had known him before. "But you +never know the real value of anything until you're quitting it or +it's quitting you," he added sententiously. + +Barker and Stacy both stared at their companion. It was unlike +Demorest to regret anything--particularly a mere social diversion. + +"They say," remarked Stacy, "that if you had known Jack Hamlin +earlier and professionally, a great deal of real value would have +quitted you before he did." + +"Don't repeat that rot flung out by men who have played Jack's game +and lost," returned Demorest derisively. "I'd rather trust him +than"-- He stopped, glanced at the meditative Barker, and then +concluded abruptly, "the whole caboodle of his critics." + +They were silent for a few moments, and then seemed to have fallen +into their former dreamy mood as they relapsed into their old seats +again. At last Stacy drew a long breath. "I wish we had sent +those nuggets off with the others this morning." + +"Why?" said Demorest suddenly. + +"Why? Well, d--n it all! they kind of oppress me, don't you see. +I seem to feel 'em here, on my chest--all the three," returned +Stacy only half jocularly. "It's their d----d specific gravity, I +suppose. I don't like the idea of sleeping in the same room with +'em. They're altogether too much for us three men to be left alone +with." + +"You don't mean that you think that anybody would attempt"--said +Demorest. + +Stacy curled a fighting lip rather superciliously. "No; I don't +think THAT--I rather wish I did. It's the blessed chunks of solid +gold that seem to have got US fast, don't you know, and are going +to stick to us for good or ill. A sort of Frankenstein monster +that we've picked out of a hole from below." + +"I know just what Stacy means," said Barker breathlessly, rounding +his gray eyes. "I've felt it, too. Couldn't we make a sort of +cache of it--bury it just outside the cabin for to-night? It would +be sort of putting it back into its old place, you know, for the +time being. IT might like it." + +The other two laughed. "Rather rough on Providence, Barker boy," +said Stacy, "handing back the Heaven-sent gift so soon! Besides, +what's to keep any prospector from coming along and making a strike +of it? You know that's mining law--if you haven't preempted the +spot as a claim." + +But Barker was too staggered by this material statement to make any +reply, and Demorest arose. "And I feel that you'd both better be +turning in, as we've got to get up early." He went to the corner +of the cabin, and threw the blanket back over the pan and its +treasure. "There that'll keep the chunks from getting up to ride +astride of you like a nightmare." He shut the door and gave a +momentary glance at its cheap hinges and the absence of bolt or +bar. Stacy caught his eye. "We'll miss this security in San +Francisco--perhaps even in Boomville," he sighed. + +It was scarcely ten o'clock, but Stacy and Barker had begun to +undress themselves with intervals of yawning and desultory talk, +Barker continuing an amusing story, with one stocking off and his +trousers hanging on his arm, until at last both men were snugly +curled up in their respective bunks. Presently Stacy's voice came +from under the blankets:-- + +"Hallo! aren't you going to turn in too?" + +"Not yet," said Demorest from his chair before the fire. "You see +it's the last night in the old shanty, and I reckon I'll see the +rest of it out." + +"That's so," said the impulsive Barker, struggling violently with +his blankets. "I tell you what, boys: we just ought to make a +watch-night of it--a regular vigil, you know--until twelve at +least. Hold on! I'll get up, too!" But here Demorest arose, +caught his youthful partner's bare foot which went searching +painfully for the ground in one hand, tucked it back under the +blankets, and heaping them on the top of him, patted the bulk with +an authoritative, paternal air. + +"You'll just say your prayers and go to sleep, sonny. You'll want +to be fresh as a daisy to appear before Miss Kitty to-morrow early, +and you can keep your vigils for to-morrow night, after dinner, in +the back drawing-room. I said 'Good-night,' and I mean it!" + +Protesting feebly, Barker finally yielded in a nestling shiver and +a sudden silence. Demorest walked back to his chair. A prolonged +snore came from Stacy's bunk; then everything was quiet. Demorest +stirred up the fire, cast a huge root upon it, and, leaning back in +his chair, sat with half-closed eyes and dreamed. + +It was an old dream that for the past three years had come to him +daily, sometimes even overtaking him under the shade of a buckeye +in his noontide rest on his claim,--a dream that had never yet +failed to wait for him at night by the fireside when his partners +were at rest; a dream of the past, but so real that it always made +the present seem the dream through which he was moving towards some +sure awakening. + +It was not strange that it should come to him to-night, as it had +often come before, slowly shaping itself out of the obscurity as +the vision of a fair young girl seated in one of the empty chairs +before him. Always the same pretty, childlike face, fraught with a +half-frightened, half-wondering trouble; always the same slender, +graceful figure, but always glimmering in diamonds and satin, or +spiritual in lace and pearls, against his own rude and sordid +surroundings; always silent with parted lips, until the night wind +smote some chord of recollection, and then mingled a remembered +voice with his own. For at those times he seemed to speak also, +albeit with closed lips, and an utterance inaudible to all but her. + +"Well?" he said sadly. + +"Well?" the voice repeated, like a gentle echo blending with his +own. + +"You know it all now," he went on. "You know that it has come at +last,--all that I had worked for, prayed for; all that would have +made us happy here; all that would have saved you to me has come at +last, and all too late!" + +"Too late!" echoed the voice with his. + +"You remember," he went on, "the last day we were together. You +remember your friends and family would have you give me up--a +penniless man. You remember when they reproached you with my +poverty, and told you that it was only your wealth that I was +seeking, that I then determined to go away and never to return to +claim you until that reproach could be removed. You remember, +dearest, how you clung to me and bade me stay with you, even fly +with you, but not to leave you alone with them. You wore the same +dress that day, darling; your eyes had the same wondering childlike +fear and trouble in them; your jewels glittered on you as you +trembled, and I refused. In my pride, or rather in my weakness and +cowardice, I refused. I came away and broke my heart among these +rocks and ledges, yet grew strong; and you, my love, YOU, sheltered +and guarded by those you loved, YOU"-- He stopped and buried his +face in his hands. The night wind breathed down the chimney, and +from the stirred ashes on the hearth came the soft whisper, "I +died." + +"And then," he went on, "I cared for nothing. Sometimes my heart +awoke for this young partner of mine in his innocent, trustful love +for a girl that even in her humble station was far beyond his +hopes, and I pitied myself in him. Home, fortune, friends, I no +longer cared for--all were forgotten. And now they are returning +to me--only that I may see the hollowness and vanity of them, and +taste the bitterness for which I have sacrificed you. And here, on +this last night of my exile, I am confronted with only the +jealousy, the doubt, the meanness and selfishness that is to come. +Too late! Too late!" + +The wondering, troubled eyes that had looked into his here appeared +to clear and brighten with a sweet prescience. Was it the wind +moaning in the chimney that seemed to whisper to him: "Too late, +beloved, for ME, but not for you. I died, but Love still lives. +Be happy, Philip. And in your happiness I too may live again"? + +He started. In the flickering firelight the chair was empty. The +wind that had swept down the chimney had stirred the ashes with a +sound like the passage of a rustling skirt. There was a chill in +the air and a smell like that of opened earth. A nervous shiver +passed over him. Then he sat upright. There was no mistake; it +was no superstitious fancy, but a faint, damp current of air was +actually flowing across his feet towards the fireplace. He was +about to rise when he stopped suddenly and became motionless. + +He was actively conscious now of a strange sound which had affected +him even in the preoccupation of his vision. It was a gentle +brushing of some yielding substance like that made by a soft broom +on sand, or the sweep of a gown. But to his mountain ears, attuned +to every woodland sound, it was not like the gnawing of gopher or +squirrel, the scratching of wildcat, nor the hairy rubbing of bear. +Nor was it human; the long, deep respirations of his sleeping +companions were distinct from that monotonous sound. He could not +even tell if it were IN the cabin or without. Suddenly his eye +fell upon the pile in the corner. The blanket that covered the +treasure was actually moving! + +He rose quickly, but silently, alert, self-contained, and menacing. +For this dreamer, this bereaved man, this scornful philosopher of +riches had disappeared with that midnight trespass upon the sacred +treasure. The movement of the blanket ceased; the soft, swishing +sound recommenced. He drew a glittering bowie-knife from his boot- +leg, and in three noiseless strides was beside the pile. There he +saw what he fully expected to see,--a narrow, horizontal gap +between the log walls of the cabin and the adobe floor, slowly +widening and deepening by the burrowing of unseen hands from +without. The cold outer air which he had felt before was now +plainly flowing into the heated cabin through the opening. The +swishing sound recommenced, and stopped. Then the four fingers of +a hand, palm downwards, were cautiously introduced between the +bottom log and the denuded floor. Upon that intruding hand the +bowie-knife of Demorest descended like a flash of lightning. There +was no outcry. Even in that supreme moment Demorest felt a pang of +admiration for the stoicism of the unseen trespasser. But the +maimed hand was quickly withdrawn, and as quickly Demorest rushed +to the door and dashed into the outer darkness. + +For an instant he was dazed and bewildered by the sudden change. +But the next moment he saw a dodging, doubling figure running +before him, and threw himself upon it. In the shock both men fell, +but even in that contact Demorest felt the tangled beard and +alcoholic fumes of Whiskey Dick, and felt also that the hands which +were thrown up against his breast, the palms turned outward with +the instinctive movement of a timid, defenseless man, were +unstained with soil or blood. With an oath he threw the drunkard +from him and dashed to the rear of the cabin. But too late! +There, indeed, was the scattered earth, there the widened burrow as +it had been excavated apparently by that mutilated hand--but +nothing else! + +He turned back to Whiskey Dick. But the miserable man, although +still retaining a look of dazed terror in his eyes, had recovered +his feet in a kind of angry confidence and a forced sense of +injury. What did Demorest mean by attacking "innoshent" gentlemen +on the trail outside his cabin? Yes! OUTSIDE his cabin, he would +swear it! + +"What were you doing here at midnight?" demanded Demorest. + +What was he doing? What was any gentleman doing? He wasn't any +molly-coddle to go to bed at ten o'clock! What was he doing? +Well--he'd been with men who didn't shut their doors and turn the +boys out just in the shank of the evening. He wasn't any Barker to +be wet-nursed by Demorest. + +"Some one else was here!" said Demorest sternly, with his eyes +fixed on Whiskey Dick. The dull glaze which seemed to veil the +outer world from the drunkard's pupils shifted suddenly with such a +look of direct horror that Demorest was fain to turn away his own. +But the veil mercifully returned, and with it Dick's worked-up +sense of injury. Nobody was there--not "a shole." Did Demorest +think if there had been any of his friends there they would have +stood by like "dogsh" and seen him insulted? + +Demorest turned away and re-entered the cabin as Dick lurched +heavily forward, still muttering, down the trail. The excitement +over, a sickening repugnance to the whole incident took the place +of Demorest's resentment and indignation. There had been a +cowardly attempt to rob them of their miserable treasure. He had +met it and frustrated it in almost as brutal a fashion: the gold +was already tarnished with blood. To his surprise, yet relief, he +found his partners unconscious of the outrage, still sleeping with +the physical immobility of over-excited and tired men. Should he +awaken them? No! He should have to awaken also their suspicions +and desire for revenge. There was no danger of a further attack; +there was no fear that the culprit would disclose himself, and to- +morrow they would be far away. Let oblivion rest upon that night's +stain on the honor of Heavy Tree Hill. + +He rolled a small barrel before the opening, smoothed the dislodged +earth, replaced the pan with its treasure, and trusted that in the +bustle of the early morning departure his partners might not notice +any change. Stopping before the bunk of Stacy he glanced at the +sleeping man. He was lying on his back, but breathing heavily, and +his hands were moving towards his chest as if, indeed, his strange +fancy of the golden incubus were being realized. Demorest would +have wakened him, but presently, with a sigh of relief, the sleeper +turned over on his side. It was pleasanter to look at Barker, +whose damp curls were matted over his smooth, boyish forehead, and +whose lips were parted in a smile under the silken wings of his +brown mustache. He, too, seemed to be trying to speak, and +remembering some previous revelations which had amused them, +Demorest leaned over him fraternally with an answering smile, +waiting for the beloved one's name to pass the young man's lips. +But he only murmured, "Three--hundred--thousand dollars!" The +elder man turned away with a grave face. The influence of the +treasure was paramount. + +When he had placed one of the chairs against the unprotected door +at an angle which would prevent any easy or noiseless intrusion, +Demorest threw himself on his bunk without undressing, and turned +his face towards the single window of the cabin that looked towards +the east. He did not apprehend another covert attempt against the +gold. He did not fear a robbery with force and arms, although he +was satisfied that there was more than one concerned in it, but +this he attributed only to the encumbering weight of their expected +booty. He simply waited for the dawn. It was some time before his +eyes were greeted with the vague opaline brightness of the +firmament which meant the vanishing of the pallid snow-line before +the coming day. A bird twittered on the roof. The air was chill; +he drew his blanket around him. Then he closed his eyes, he +fancied only for a moment, but when he opened them the door was +standing open in the strong daylight. He sprang to his feet, but +the next moment he saw it was only Stacy who had passed out, and +was returning fully dressed, bringing water from the spring to fill +the kettle. But Stacy's face was so grave that, recalling his +disturbed sleep, Demorest laughingly inquired if he had been +haunted by the treasure. But to his surprise Stacy put down the +kettle, and, with a hurried glance at the still sleeping Barker, +said in a low voice:-- + +"I want you to do something for me without asking why. Later I +will tell you." + +Demorest looked at him fixedly. "What is it?" he said. + +"The pack-mules will be here in a few moments. Don't wait to close +up or put away anything here, but clap that gold in the saddle- +bags, and take Barker with you and 'lite' out for Boomville AT +ONCE. I will overtake you later." + +"Is there no time to discuss this?" asked Demorest. + +"No," said Stacy bluntly. "Call me a crank, say I'm in a blue +funk"--his compressed lips and sharp black eyes did not lend +themselves much to that hypothesis--"only get out of this with that +stuff, and take Barker with you! I'm not responsible for myself +while it's here." + +Demorest knew Stacy to be combative, but practical. If he had not +been assured of his partner's last night slumbers he might have +thought he knew of the attempt. Or if he had discovered the +turned-up ground in the rear of the cabin his curiosity would have +demanded an explanation. Demorest paused only for a moment, and +said, "Very well, I will go." + +"Good! I'll rouse out Barker, but not a word to him--except that +he must go. + +The rousing out of Barker consisted of Stacy's lifting that young +gentleman bodily from his bunk and standing him upright in the open +doorway. But Barker was accustomed to this Spartan process, and +after a moment's balancing with closed lids like an unwrapped +mummy, he sat down in the doorway and began to dress. He at first +demurred to their departure except all together--it was so +unfraternal; but eventually he allowed himself to be persuaded out +of it and into his clothes. For Barker had also had HIS visions in +the night, one of which was that they should build a beautiful +villa on the site of the old cabin and solemnly agree to come every +year and pass a week in it together. "I thought at first," he +said, sliding along the floor in search of different articles of +his dress, or stopping gravely to catch them as they were thrown to +him by his partners, "that we'd have it at Boomville, as being +handier to get there; but I've concluded we'd better have it here, +a little higher up the hill, where it could be seen over the whole +Black Spur Range. When we weren't here we could use it as a Hut of +Refuge for broken-down or washed-out miners or weary travelers, +like those hospices in the Alps, you know, and have somebody to +keep it for us. You see I've thought even of THAT, and Van Loo is +the very man to take charge of it for us. You see he's got such +good manners and speaks two languages. Lord! if a German or +Frenchman came along, poor and distressed, Van Loo would just chip +in his own language. See? You've got to think of all these +details, you see, boys. And we might call it 'The Rest of the +Three Partners,' or 'Three Partners' Rest.'" + +"And you might begin by giving us one," said Stacy. "Dry up and +drink your coffee." + +"I'll draw out the plans. I've got it all in my head," continued +the enthusiastic Barker, unheeding the interruption. "I'll just +run out and take a look at the site, it's only right back of the +cabin." But here Stacy caught him by his dangling belt as he was +flying out of the door with one boot on, and thrust him down in a +chair with a tin cup of coffee in his hand. + +"Keep the plans in your head, Barker boy," said Demorest, "for here +are the pack mules and packer." This was quite enough to divert +the impressionable young man, who speedily finished his dressing, +as a mule bearing a large pack-saddle and two enormous saddle-bags +or pouches drove up before the door, led by a muleteer on a small +horse. The transfer of the treasure to the saddle-bags was quickly +made by their united efforts, as the first rays of the sun were +beginning to paint the hillside. Shading his keen eyes with his +hand, Stacy stood in the doorway and handed Demorest the two +rifles. Demorest hesitated. "Hadn't YOU better keep one?" he +said, looking in his partner's eyes with his first challenge of +curiosity. The sun seemed to put a humorous twinkle into Stacy's +glance as he returned, "Not much! And you'd better take my +revolver with you, too. I'm feeling a little better now," he said, +looking at the saddlebags, "but I'm not fit to be trusted yet with +carnal weapons. When the other mule comes and is packed I'll +overtake you on the horse." + +A little more satisfied, although still wondering and perplexed, +Demorest shouldered one rifle, and with Barker, who was carrying +the other, followed the muleteer and his equipage down the trail. +For a while he was a little ashamed of his part in this unusual +spectacle of two armed men convoying a laden mule in broad +daylight, but, luckily, it was too early for the Bar miners to be +going to work, and as the tunnelmen were now at breakfast the trail +was free of wayfarers. At the point where it crossed the main road +Demorest, however, saw Steptoe and Whiskey Dick emerge from the +thicket, apparently in earnest conversation. Demorest felt his +repugnance and half-restrained suspicions suddenly return. Yet he +did not wish to betray them before Barker, nor was he willing, in +case of an emergency, to allow the young man to be entirely +unprepared. Calling him to follow, he ran quickly ahead of the +laden mule, and was relieved to find that, looking back, his +companion had brought his rifle to a "ready," through some +instinctive feeling of defense. As Steptoe and Whiskey Dick, a +moment later discovering them, were evidently surprised, there +seemed, however, to be no reason for fearing an outbreak. +Suddenly, at a whisper from Steptoe, he and Whiskey Dick both +threw up their hands, and stood still on the trail a few yards +from them in a burlesque of the usual recognized attitude of +helplessness, while a hoarse laugh broke from Steptoe. + +"D----d if we didn't think you were road-agents! But we see you're +only guarding your treasure. Rather fancy style for Heavy Tree +Hill, ain't it? Things must be gettin' rough up thar to hev to +take out your guns like that!" + +Demorest had looked keenly at the four hands thus exhibited, and +was more concerned that they bore no trace of wounds or mutilation +than at the insult of the speech, particularly as he had a distinct +impression that the action was intended to show him the futility of +his suspicions. + +"I am glad to see that if you haven't any arms in your hands you're +not incapable of handling them," said Demorest coolly, as he passed +by them and again fell into the rear of the muleteer. + +But Barker had thought the incident very funny, and laughed +effusively at Whiskey Dick. "I didn't know that Steptoe was up to +that kind of fun," he said, "and I suppose we DID look rather rough +with these guns as we ran on ahead of the mule. But then you know +that when you called to me I really thought you were in for a +shindy. All the same, Whiskey Dick did that 'hands up' to +perfection: how he managed it I don't know, but his knees seemed to +knock together as if he was in a real funk." + +Demorest had thought so too, but he made no reply. How far that +miserable drunkard was a forced or willing accomplice of the events +of last night was part of a question that had become more and more +repugnant to him as he was leaving the scene of it forever. It had +come upon him, desecrating the dream he had dreamt that last night +and turning its hopeful climax to bitterness. Small wonder that +Barker, walking by his side, had his quick sympathies aroused, and +as he saw that shadow, which they were all familiar with, but had +never sought to penetrate, fall upon his companion's handsome face, +even his youthful spirits yielded to it. They were both relieved +when the clatter of hoofs behind them, as they reached the valley, +announced the approach of Stacy. "I started with the second mule +and the last load soon after you left," he explained, "and have +just passed them. I thought it better to join you and let the +other load follow. Nobody will interfere with THAT." + +"Then you are satisfied?" said Demorest, regarding him steadfastly. + +"You bet! Look!" + +He turned in his saddle and pointed to the crest of the hill they +had just descended. Above the pines circling the lower slope above +the bare ledges of rock and outcrop, a column of thick black smoke +was rising straight as a spire in the windless air. + +"That's the old shanty passing away," said Stacy complacently. "I +reckon there won't be much left of it before we get to Boomville." + +Demorest and Barker stared. "You fired it?" said Barker, trembling +with excitement. + +"Yes," said Stacy. "I couldn't bear to leave the old rookery for +coyotes and wild-cats to gather in, so I touched her off before I +left." + +"But"--said Barker. + +"But," repeated Stacy composedly. "Hallo! what's the matter with +that new plan of 'The Rest' that you're going to build, eh? You +don't want them BOTH." + +"And you did this rather than leave the dear old cabin to +strangers?" said Barker, with kindling eyes. "Stacy, I didn't +think you had that poetry in you!" + +"There's heaps in me, Barker boy, that you don't know, and I don't +exactly sabe myself." + +"Only," continued the young fellow eagerly, "we ought to have ALL +been there! We ought to have made a solemn rite of it, you know,-- +a kind of sacrifice. We ought to have poured a kind of libation on +the ground!" + +"I did sprinkle a little kerosene over it, I think," returned +Stacy, "just to help things along. But if you want to see her +flaming, Barker, you just run back to that last corner on the road +beyond the big red wood. That's the spot for a view." + +As Barker--always devoted to a spectacle--swiftly disappeared the +two men faced each other. "Well, what does it all mean?" said +Demorest gravely. + +"It means, old man," said Stacy suddenly, "that if we hadn't had +nigger luck, the same blind luck that sent us that strike, you and +I and that Barker over there would have been swirling in that smoke +up to the sky about two hours ago!" He stopped and added in a +lower, but earnest voice, "Look here, Phil! When I went out to +fetch water this morning I smelt something queer. I went round to +the back of the cabin and found a hole dug under the floor, and +piled against the corner wall a lot of brush-wood and a can of +kerosene. Some of the kerosene had been already poured on the +brush. Everything was ready to light, and only my coming out an +hour earlier had frightened the devils away. The idea was to set +the place on fire, suffocate us in the smoke of the kerosene poured +into the hole, and then to rush in and grab the treasure. It was a +systematic plan!" + +"No!" said Demorest quietly. + +"No?" repeated Stacy. "I told you I saw the whole thing and took +away the kerosene, which I hid, and after you had gone used it to +fire the cabin with, to see if the ones I suspected would gather to +watch their work." + +"It was no part of their FIRST plan"' said Demorest, "which was +only robbery. Listen!" He hurriedly recounted his experience of +the preceding night to the astonished Stacy. "No, the fire was an +afterthought and revenge," he added sternly. + +"But you say you cut the robber in the hand; there would be no +difficulty in identifying him by that." + +"I wounded only a HAND," said Demorest. "But there was a HEAD in +that attempt that I never saw." He then revealed his own half- +suspicions, but how they were apparently refuted by the bravado of +Steptoe and Whiskey Dick. + +"Then that was the reason THEY didn't gather at the fire," said +Stacy quickly. + +"Ah!" said Demorest, "then YOU too suspected them?" + +Stacy hesitated, and then said abruptly, "Yes." + +Demorest was silent for a moment. + +"Why didn't you tell me this this morning?" he said gently. + +Stacy pointed to the distant Barker. "I didn't want you to tell +him. I thought it better for one partner to keep a secret from two +than for the two to keep it from one. Why didn't you tell me of +your experience last night?" + +"I am afraid it was for the same reason," said Demorest, with a +faint smile. "And it sometimes seems to me, Jim, that we ought to +imitate Barker's frankness. In our dread of tainting him with our +own knowledge of evil we are sending him out into the world very +poorly equipped, for all his three hundred thousand dollars." + +"I reckon you're right," said Stacy briefly, extending his hand. +"Shake on that!" + +The two men grasped each other's hands. + +"And he's no fool, either," continued Demorest. "When we met +Steptoe on the road, without a word from me, he closed up +alongside, with his hand on the lock of his rifle. And I hadn't +the heart to praise him or laugh it off." + +Nevertheless they were both silent as the object of their criticism +bounded down the trail towards them. He had seen the funeral pyre. +It was awfully sad, it was awfully lovely, but there was something +grand in it! Who could have thought Stacy could be so poetic? But +he wanted to tell them something else that was mighty pretty. + +"What was it?" said Demorest. + +"Well," said Barker, "don't laugh! But you know that Jack Hamlin? +Well, boys, he's been hovering around us on his mustang, keeping us +and that pack-mule in sight ever since we left. Sometimes he's on +a side trail off to the right, sometimes off to the left, but +always at the same distance. I didn't like to tell you, boys, for +I thought you'd laugh at me; but I think, you know, he's taken a +sort of shine to us since he dropped in last night. And I fancy, +you see, he's sort of hanging round to see that we get along all +right. I'd have pointed him out before only I reckoned you and +Stacy would say he was making up to us for our money." + +"And we'd have been wrong, Barker boy," said Stacy, with a +heartiness that surprised Demorest, "for I reckon your instinct's +the right one." + +"There he is now," said the gratified Barker, "just abreast of us +on the cut-off. He started just after we did, and he's got a horse +that could have brought him into Boomville hours ago. It's just +his kindness." + +He pointed to a distant fringe of buckeye from which Jack Hamlin +had just emerged. Although evidently holding in a powerful +mustang, nothing could be more unconscious and utterly indifferent +than his attitude. He did not seem to know of the proximity of any +other traveler, and to care less. His handsome head was slightly +thrown back, as if he was caroling after his usual fashion, but the +distance was too great to make his melody audible to them, or to +allow Barker's shout of invitation to reach him. Suddenly he +lowered his tightened rein, the mustang sprang forward, and with a +flash of silver spurs and bridle fripperies he had disappeared. +But as the trail he was pursuing crossed theirs a mile beyond, it +seemed quite possible that they should again meet him. + +They were now fairly into the Boomville valley, and were entering a +narrow arroyo bordered with dusky willows which effectually +excluded the view on either side. It was the bed of a mountain +torrent that in winter descended the hillside over the trail by +which they had just come, but was now sunk into the thirsty plain +between banks that varied from two to five feet in height. The +muleteer had advanced into the narrow channel when he suddenly cast +a hurried glance behind him, uttered a "Madre de Dios!" and backed +his mule and his precious freight against the bank. The sound of +hoofs on the trail in their rear had caught his quicker ear, and as +the three partners turned they beheld three horsemen thundering +down the hill towards them. They were apparently Mexican vaqueros +of the usual common swarthy type, their faces made still darker by +the black silk handkerchief tied round their heads under their +stiff sombreros. Either they were unable or unwilling to restrain +their horses in their headlong speed, and a collision in that +narrow passage was imminent, but suddenly, before reaching its +entrance, they diverged with a volley of oaths, and dashing along +the left bank of the arroyo, disappeared in the intervening +willows. Divided between relief at their escape and indignation at +what seemed to be a drunken, feast-day freak of these roystering +vaqueros, the little party re-formed, when a cry from Barker +arrested them. He had just perceived a horseman motionless in the +arroyo who, although unnoticed by them, had evidently been seen by +the Mexicans. He had apparently leaped into it from the bank, and +had halted as if to witness this singular incident. As the clatter +of the vaqueros' hoofs died away he lightly leaped the bank again +and disappeared. But in that single glimpse of him they recognized +Jack Hamlin. When they reached the spot where he had halted, they +could see that he must have approached it from the trail where they +had previously seen him, but which they now found crossed it at +right angles. Barker was right. He had really kept them at easy +distance the whole length of the journey. + +But they were now reaching its end. When they issued at last from +the arroyo they came upon the outskirts of Boomville and the great +stage-road. Indeed, the six horses of the Pioneer coach were just +panting along the last half mile of the steep upgrade as they +approached. They halted mechanically as the heavy vehicle swayed +and creaked by them. In their ordinary working dress, sunburnt +with exposure, covered with dust, and carrying their rifles still +in their hands, they, perhaps, presented a sufficiently +characteristic appearance to draw a few faces--some of them pretty +and intelligent--to the windows of the coach as it passed. The +sensitive Barker was quickest to feel that resentment with which +the Pioneer usually met the wide-eyed criticism of the Eastern +tourist or "greenhorn," and reddened under the bold scrutiny of a +pair of black inquisitive eyes behind an eyeglass. That annoyance +was communicated, though in a lesser degree, even to the bearded +Demorest and Stacy. It was an unexpected contact with that great +world in which they were so soon to enter. They felt ashamed of +their appearance, and yet ashamed of that feeling. They felt a +secret satisfaction when Barker said, "They'd open their eyes wider +if they knew what was in that pack-saddle," and yet they corrected +him for what they were pleased to call his "snobbishness." They +hurried a little faster as the road became more frequented, as if +eager to shorten their distance to clean clothes and civilization. + +Only Demorest began to linger in the rear. This contact with the +stagecoach had again brought him face to face with his buried past. +He felt his old dream revive, and occasionally turned to look back +upon the dark outlines of Black Spur, under whose shadow it had +returned so often, and wondered if he had left it there forever, +and it were now slowly exhaling with the thinned and dying smoke of +their burning cabin. + +His companions, knowing his silent moods, had preceded him at some +distance, when he heard the soft sound of ambling hoofs on the +thick dust, and suddenly the light touch of Jack Hamlin's gauntlet +on his shoulder. The mustang Jack bestrode was reeking with grime +and sweat, but Jack himself was as immaculate and fresh as ever. +With a delightful affectation of embarrassment and timidity he +began flicking the side buttons of his velvet vaquero trousers with +the thong of his riata. "I reckoned to sling a word along with you +before you went," he said, looking down, "but I'm so shy that I +couldn't do it in company. So I thought I'd get it off on you +while you were alone." + +"We've seen you once or twice before, this morning," said Demorest +pleasantly, "and we were sorry you didn't join us." + +"I reckon I might have," said Jack gayly, "if my horse had only +made up his mind whether he was a bird or a squirrel, and hadn't +been so various and promiscuous about whether he wanted to climb a +tree or fly. He's not a bad horse for a Mexican plug, only when he +thinks there is any devilment around he wants to wade in and take a +hand. However, I reckoned to see the last of you and your pile +into Boomville. And I DID. When I meet three fellows like you +that are clean white all through I sort of cotton to 'em, even if +I'M a little of a brunette myself. And I've got something to give +you." + +He took from a fold of his scarlet sash a small parcel neatly +folded in white paper as fresh and spotless as himself. Holding it +in his fingers, he went on: "I happened to be at Heavy Tree Hill +early this morning before sun-up. In the darkness I struck your +cabin, and I reckon--I struck somebody else! At first I thought it +was one of you chaps down on your knees praying at the rear of the +cabin, but the way the fellow lit out when he smelt me coming made +me think it wasn't entirely fasting and prayer. However, I went to +the rear of the cabin, and then I reckoned some kind friend had +been bringing you kindlings and firewood for your early breakfast. +But that didn't satisfy me, so I knelt down as he had knelt, and +then I saw--well, Mr. Demorest, I reckon I saw JUST WHAT YOU HAVE +SEEN! But even then I wasn't quite satisfied, for that man had +been grubbing round as if searching for something. So I searched +too--and I found IT. I've got it here. I'm going to give it to +you, for it may some day come in handy, and you won't find anything +like it among the folks where you're going. It's something unique, +as those fine-art-collecting sharps in 'Frisco say--something quite +matchless, unless you try to match it one day yourself! Don't open +the paper until I run on and say 'So long' to your partners. Good- +by." + +He grasped Demorest's hand and then dropped the little packet into +his palm, and ambled away towards Stacy and Barker. Holding the +packet in his hand with an amused yet puzzled smile, Demorest +watched the gambler give Stacy's hand a hearty farewell shake and a +supplementary slap on the back to the delighted Barker, and then +vanish in a flash of red sash and silver buttons. At which +Demorest, walking slowly towards his partners, opened the packet, +and stood suddenly still. It contained the dried and bloodless +second finger of a human hand cut off at the first joint! + +For an instant he held it at arm's length, as if about to cast it +away. Then he grimly replaced it in the paper, put it carefully in +his pocket, and silently walked after his companions. + + +CHAPTER I + + +A strong southwester was beating against the windows and doors of +Stacy's Bank in San Francisco, and spreading a film of rain between +the regular splendors of its mahogany counters and sprucely dressed +clerks and the usual passing pedestrian. For Stacy's new banking- +house had long since received the epithet of "palatial" from an +enthusiastic local press fresh from the "opening" luncheon in its +richly decorated directors' rooms, and it was said that once a +homely would-be depositor from One Horse Gulch was so cowed by its +magnificence that his heart failed him at the last moment, and +mumbling an apology to the elegant receiving teller, fled with his +greasy chamois pouch of gold-dust to deposit his treasure in the +dingy Mint around the corner. Perhaps there was something of this +feeling, mingled with a certain simple-minded fascination, in the +hesitation of a stranger of a higher class who entered the bank +that rainy morning and finally tendered his card to the important +negro messenger. + +The card preceded him through noiselessly swinging doors and across +heavily carpeted passages until it reached the inner core of Mr. +James Stacy's private offices, and was respectfully laid before +him. He was not alone. At his side, in an attitude of polite and +studied expectancy, stood a correct-looking young man, for whom Mr. +Stacy was evidently writing a memorandum. The stranger glanced +furtively at the card with a curiosity hardly in keeping with his +suggested good breeding; but Stacy did not look at it until he had +finished his memorandum. + +"There," he said, with business decision, "you can tell your people +that if we carry their new debentures over our limit we will expect +a larger margin. Ditches are not what they were three years ago +when miners were willing to waste their money over your rates. +They don't gamble THAT WAY any more, and your company ought to know +it, and not gamble themselves over that prospect." He handed the +paper to the stranger, who bowed over it with studied politeness, +and backed towards the door. Stacy took up the waiting card, read +it, said to the messenger, "Show him in," and in the same breath +turned to his guest: "I say, Van Loo, it's George Barker! You know +him." + +"Yes," said Van Loo, with a polite hesitation as he halted at the +door. "He was--I think--er--in your employ at Heavy Tree Hill." + +"Nonsense! He was my partner. And you must have known him since +at Boomville. Come! He got forty shares of Ditch stock--through +you--at 110, which were worth about 80! SOMEBODY must have made +money enough by it to remember him." + +"I was only speaking of him socially," said Van Loo, with a +deprecating smile. "You know he married a young woman--the hotel- +keeper's daughter, who used to wait at the table--and after my +mother and sister came out to keep house for me at Boomville it was +quite impossible for me to see much of him, for he seldom went out +without his wife, you know." + +"Yes," said Stacy dryly, "I think you didn't like his marriage. +But I'm glad your disinclination to see him isn't on account of +that deal in stocks." + +"Oh no," said Van Loo. "Good-by." + +But, unfortunately, in the next passage he came upon Barker, who +with a cry of unfeigned pleasure, none the less sincere that he was +feeling a little alien in these impressive surroundings, recognized +him. Nothing could exceed Van Loo's protest of delight at the +meeting; nothing his equal desolation at the fact that he was +hastening to another engagement. "But your old partner," he added, +with a smile, "is waiting for you; he has just received your card, +and I should be only keeping you from him. So glad to see you; +you're looking so well. Good-by! Good-by!" + +Reassured, Barker no longer hesitated, but dashed with his old +impetuousness into his former partner's room. Stacy, already +deeply absorbed in other business, was sitting with his back +towards him, and Barker's arms were actually encircling his neck +before the astonished and half-angry man looked up. But when his +eyes met the laughing gray ones of Barker above him he gently +disengaged himself with a quick return of the caress, rose, shut +the door of an inner office, and returning pushed Barker into an +armchair in quite the old suppressive fashion of former days. Yes; +it was the same Stacy that Barker looked at, albeit his brown beard +was now closely cropped around his determined mouth and jaw in a +kind of grave decorum, and his energetic limbs already attuned to +the rigor of clothes of fashionable cut and still more rigorous +sombreness of color. + +"Barker boy," he began, with the familiar twinkle in his keen eyes +which the younger partner remembered, "I don't encourage stag +dancing among my young men during bank hours, and you'll please to +remember that we are not on Heavy Tree Hill"-- + +"Where," broke in Barker enthusiastically, "we were only overlooked +by the Black Spur Range and the Sierran snow-line; where the +nearest voice that came to you was quarter of a mile away as the +crow flies and nearly a mile by the trail." + +"And was generally an oath!" said Stacy. "But you're in San +Francisco NOW. Where are you stopping?" He took up a pencil and +held it over a memorandum pad awaitingly. + +"At the Brook House. It's"-- + +"Hold on! 'Brook House,'" Stacy repeated as he jotted it down. +"And for how long?" + +"Oh, a day or two. You see, Kitty"-- + +Stacy checked him with a movement of his pencil in the air, and +then wrote down, "'Day or two.' Wife with you?" + +"Yes; and oh, Stacy, our boy! Ah!" he went on, with a laugh, +knocking aside the remonstrating pencil, "you must listen! He's +just the sweetest, knowingest little chap living. Do you know what +we're going to christen him? Well, he'll be Stacy Demorest Barker. +Good names, aren't they? And then it perpetuates the dear old +friendship." + +Stacy picked up the pencil again, wrote "Wife and child S. D. B.," +and leaned back in his chair. "Now, Barker," he said briefly, "I'm +coming to dine with you tonight at 7.30 sharp. THEN we'll talk +Heavy Tree Hill, wife, baby, and S. D. B. But here I'm all for +business. Have you any with me?" + +Barker, who was easily amused, had extracted a certain entertainment +out of Stacy's memorandum, but he straightened himself with a look +of eager confidence and said, "Certainly; that's just what it is-- +business. Lord! Stacy, I'm ALL business now. I'm in everything. +And I bank with you, though perhaps you don't know it; it's in your +Branch at Marysville. I didn't want to say anything about it to you +before. But Lord! you don't suppose that I'd bank anywhere else +while you are in the business--checks, dividends, and all that; but +in this matter I felt you knew, old chap. I didn't want to talk to +a banker nor to a bank, but to Jim Stacy, my old partner." + +"Barker," said Stacy curtly, "how much money are you short of?" + +At this direct question Barker's always quick color rose, but, with +an equally quick smile, he said, "I don't know yet that I'm short +at all." + +"But I do!" + +"Look here, Jim: why, I'm just overloaded with shares and stocks," +said Barker, smiling. + +"Not one of which you could realize on without sacrifice. Barker, +three years ago you had three hundred thousand dollars put to your +account at San Francisco." + +"Yes," said Barker, with a quiet reminiscent laugh. "I remember I +wanted to draw it out in one check to see how it would look." + +"And you've drawn out all in three years, and it looks d----d bad." + +"How did you know it?" asked Barker, his face beaming only with +admiration of his companion's omniscience. + +"How did I know it?" retorted Stacy. "I know YOU, and I know the +kind of people who have unloaded to you." + +"Come, Stacy," said Barker, "I've only invested in shares and +stocks like everybody else, and then only on the best advice I +could get: like Van Loo's, for instance,--that man who was here +just now, the new manager of the Empire Ditch Company; and +Carter's, my own Kitty's father. And when I was offered fifty +thousand Wide West Extensions, and was hesitating over it, he told +me YOU were in it too--and that was enough for me to buy it." + +"Yes, but we didn't go into it at his figures." + +"No," said Barker, with an eager smile, "but you SOLD at his +figures, for I knew that when I found that YOU, my old partner, was +in it; don't you see, I preferred to buy it through your bank, and +did at 110. Of course, you wouldn't have sold it at that figure if +it wasn't worth it then, and neither I nor you are to blame if it +dropped the next week to 60, don't you see?" + +Stacy's eyes hardened for a moment as he looked keenly into his +former partner's bright gray ones, but there was no trace of irony +in Barker's. On the contrary, a slight shade of sadness came over +them. "No," he said reflectively, "I don't think I've ever been +foolish or followed out my OWN ideas, except once, and that was +extravagant, I admit. That was my idea of building a kind of +refuge, you know, on the site of our old cabin, where poor miners +and played-out prospectors waiting for a strike could stay without +paying anything. Well, I sunk twenty thousand dollars in that, and +might have lost more, only Carter--Kitty's father--persuaded me-- +he's an awful clever old fellow--into turning it into a kind of +branch hotel of Boomville, while using it as a hotel to take poor +chaps who couldn't pay, at half prices, or quarter prices, +PRIVATELY, don't you see, so as to spare their pride,--awfully +pretty, wasn't it?--and make the hotel profit by it." + +"Well?" said Stacy as Barker paused. + +"They didn't come," said Barker. + +"But," he added eagerly, "it shows that things were better than I +had imagined. Only the others did not come, either." + +"And you lost your twenty thousand dollars," said Stacy curtly. + +"FIFTY thousand," said Barker, "for of course it had to be a larger +hotel than the other. And I think that Carter wouldn't have gone +into it except to save me from losing money." + +"And yet made you lose fifty thousand instead of twenty. For I +don't suppose HE advanced anything." + +"He gave his time and experience," said Barker simply. + +"I don't think it worth thirty thousand dollars," said Stacy dryly. +"But all this doesn't tell me what your business is with me to-day." + +"No," said Barker, brightening up, "but it is business, you know. +Something in the old style--as between partner and partner--and +that's why I came to YOU, and not to the 'banker.' And it all +comes out of something that Demorest once told us; so you see it's +all us three again! Well, you know, of course, that the Excelsior +Ditch Company have abandoned the Bar and Heavy Tree Hill. It +didn't pay." + +"Yes; nor does the company pay any dividends now. You ought to +know, with fifty thousand of their stock on your hands." + +Barker laughed. "But listen. I found that I could buy up their +whole plant and all the ditching along the Black Spur Range for ten +thousand dollars." + +"And Great Scott! you don't think of taking up their business?" +said Stacy, aghast. + +Barker laughed more heartily. "No. Not their business. But I +remember that once Demorest told us, in the dear old days, that it +cost nearly as much to make a water ditch as a railroad, in the way +of surveying and engineering and levels, you know. And here's the +plant for a railroad. Don't you see?" + +"But a railroad from Black Spur to Heavy Tree Hill--what's the good +of that?" + +"Why, Black Spur will be in the line of the new Divide Railroad +they're trying to get a bill for in the legislature." + +"An infamous piece of wildcat jobbing that will never pass," said +Stacy decisively. + +"They said BECAUSE it was that, it would pass," said Barker simply. +"They say that Watson's Bank is in it, and is bound to get it +through. And as that is a rival bank of yours, don't you see, I +thought that if WE could get something real good or valuable out of +it,--something that would do the Black Spur good,--it would be all +right." + +"And was your business to consult me about it?" said Stacy bluntly. + +"No," said Barker, "it's too late to consult you now, though I wish +I had. I've given my word to take it, and I can't back out. But I +haven't the ten thousand dollars, and I came to you." + +Stacy slowly settled himself back in his chair, and put both hands +in his pockets. "Not a cent, Barker, not a cent." + +"I'm not asking it of the BANK," said Barker, with a smile, "for I +could have gone to the bank for it. But as this was something +between us, I am asking you, Stacy, as my old partner." + +"And I am answering you, Barker, as your old partner, but also as +the partner of a hundred other men, who have even a greater right +to ask me. And my answer is, not a cent!" + +Barker looked at him with a pale, astonished face and slightly +parted lips. Stacy rose, thrust his hands deeper in his pockets, +and standing before him went on:-- + +"Now look here! It's time you should understand me and yourself. +Three years ago, when our partnership was dissolved by accident, or +mutual consent, we will say, we started afresh, each on our own +hook. Through foolishness and bad advice you have in those three +years hopelessly involved yourself as you never would have done had +we been partners, and yet in your difficulty you ask me and my new +partners to help you out of a difficulty in which they have no +concern." + +"Your NEW partners?" stammered Barker. + +"Yes, my new partners; for every man who has a share, or a deposit, +or an interest, or a dollar in this bank is my PARTNER--even you, +with your securities at the Branch, are one; and you may say that +in THIS I am protecting you against yourself." + +"But you have money--you have private means." + +"None to speculate with as you wish me to--on account of my +position; none to give away foolishly as you expect me to--on +account of precedent and example. I am a soulless machine taking +care of capital intrusted to me and my brains, but decidedly NOT to +my heart nor my sentiment. So my answer is, not a cent!" + +Barker's face had changed; his color had come back, but with an +older expression. Presently, however, his beaming smile returned, +with the additional suggestion of an affectionate toleration which +puzzled Stacy. + +"I believe you're right, old chap," he said, extending his hand to +the banker, "and I wish I had talked to you before. But it's too +late now, and I've given my word." + +"Your WORD!" said Stacy. "Have you no written agreement?" + +"No. My word was accepted." He blushed slightly as if conscious +of a great weakness. + +"But that isn't legal nor business. And you couldn't even hold the +Ditch Company to it if THEY chose to back out." + +"But I don't think they will," said Barker simply. "And you see my +word wasn't given entirely to THEM. I bought the thing through my +wife's cousin, Henry Spring, a broker, and he makes something by +it, from the company, on commission. And I can't go back on HIM. +What did you say?" + +Stacy had only groaned through his set teeth. "Nothing," he said +briefly, "except that I'm coming, as I said before, to dine with +you to-night; but no more BUSINESS. I've enough of that with +others, and there are some waiting for me in the outer office now." + +Barker rose at once, but with the same affectionate smile and +tender gravity of countenance, and laid his hand caressingly on +Stacy's shoulder. "It's like you to give up so much of your time +to me and my foolishness and be so frank with me. And I know it's +mighty rough on you to have to be a mere machine instead of Jim +Stacy. Don't you bother about me. I'll sell some of my Wide West +Extension and pull the thing through myself. It's all right, but +I'm sorry for you, old chap." He glanced around the room at the +walls and rich paneling, and added, "I suppose that's what you have +to pay for all this sort of thing?" + +Before Stacy could reply, a waiting visitor was announced for the +second time, and Barker, with another hand-shake and a reassuring +smile to his old partner, passed into the hall, as if the onus of +any infelicity in the interview was upon himself alone. But Stacy +did not seem to be in a particularly accessible mood to the new +caller, who in his turn appeared to be slightly irritated by having +been kept waiting over some irksome business. "You don't seem to +follow me," he said to Stacy after reciting his business perplexity. +"Can't you suggest something?" + +"Well, why don't you get hold of one of your board of directors?" +said Stacy abstractedly. "There's Captain Drummond; you and he are +old friends. You were comrades in the Mexican War, weren't you?" + +"That be d----d!" said his visitor bitterly. "All his interests +are the other way, and in a trade of this kind, you know, Stacy, +that a man would sacrifice his own brother. Do you suppose that +he'd let up on a sure thing that he's got just because he and I +fought side by side at Cerro Gordo? Come! what are you giving us? +You're the last man I ever expected to hear that kind of flapdoodle +from. If it's because your bank has got some other interest and +you can't advise me, why don't you say so?" Nevertheless, in spite +of Stacy's abrupt disclaimer, he left a few minutes later, half +convinced that Stacy's lukewarmness was due to some adverse +influence. Other callers were almost as quickly disposed of, and +at the end of an hour Stacy found himself again alone. + +But not apparently in a very satisfied mood. After a few moments +of purely mechanical memoranda-making, he rose abruptly and opened +a small drawer in a cabinet, from which he took a letter still in +its envelope. It bore a foreign postmark. Glancing over it +hastily, his eyes at last became fixed on a concluding paragraph. +"I hope," wrote his correspondent, "that even in the rush of your +big business you will sometimes look after Barker. Not that I +think the dear old chap will ever go wrong--indeed, I often wish I +was as certain of myself as of him and his insight; but I am afraid +we were more inclined to be merely amused and tolerant of his +wonderful trust and simplicity than to really understand it for his +own good and ours. I know you did not like his marriage, and were +inclined to believe he was the victim of a rather unscrupulous +father and a foolish, unequal girl; but are you satisfied that he +would have been the happier without it, or lived his perfect life +under other and what you may think wiser conditions? If he WROTE +the poetry that he LIVES everybody would think him wonderful; for +being what he is we never give him sufficient credit." Stacy +smiled grimly, and penciled on his memorandum, "He wants it to the +amount of ten thousand dollars." "Anyhow," continued the writer, +"look after him, Jim, for his sake, your sake, and the sake of-- +PHIL DEMOREST." + +Stacy put the letter back in its envelope, and tossing it grimly +aside went on with his calculations. Presently he stopped, +restored the letter to his cabinet, and rang a bell on his table. +"Send Mr. North here," he said to the negro messenger. In a few +moments his chief book-keeper appeared in the doorway. + +"Turn to the Branch ledger and bring me a statement of Mr. George +Barker's account." + +"He was here a moment ago," said North, essaying a confidential +look towards his chief. + +"I know it," said Stacy coolly, without looking up. + +"He's been running a good deal on wildcat lately," suggested North. + +"I asked for his account, and not your opinion of it," said Stacy +shortly. + +The subordinate withdrew somewhat abashed but still curious, and +returned presently with a ledger which he laid before his chief. +Stacy ran his eyes over the list of Barker's securities; it seemed +to him that all the wildest schemes of the past year stared him in +the face. His finger, however, stopped on the Wide West Extension. +"Mr. Barker will be wanting to sell some of this stock. What is it +quoted at now?" + +"Sixty." + +"But I would prefer that Mr. Barker should not offer in the open +market at present. Give him seventy for it--private sale; that +will be ten thousand dollars paid to his credit. Advise the Branch +of this at once, and to keep the transaction quiet." + +"Yes, sir," responded the clerk as he moved towards the door. But +he hesitated, and with another essay at confidence said insinuatingly, +"I always thought, sir, that Wide West would recover." + +Stacy, perhaps not displeased to find what had evidently passed in +his subordinate's mind, looked at him and said dryly, "Then I would +advise you also to keep that opinion to yourself." But, clever as +he was, he had not anticipated the result. Mr. North, though a +trusted employee, was human. On arriving in the outer office he +beckoned to one of the lounging brokers, and in a low voice said, +"I'll take two shares of Wide West, if you can get it cheap." + +The broker's face became alert and eager. "Yes, but I say, is +anything up?" + +"I'm not here to give the business of the bank away," retorted +North severely; "take the order or leave it." + +The man hurried away. Having thus vindicated his humanity by also +passing the snub he had received from Stacy to an inferior, he +turned away to carry out his master's instructions, yet secure in +the belief that he had profited by his superior discernment of the +real reason of that master's singular conduct. But when he +returned to the private room, in hopes of further revelations, Mr. +Stacy was closeted with another financial magnate, and had +apparently divested his mind of the whole affair. + + +CHAPTER II. + + +When George Barker returned to the outer ward of the financial +stronghold he had penetrated, with its curving sweep of counters, +brass railings, and wirework screens defended by the spruce clerks +behind them, he was again impressed with the position of the man he +had just quitted, and for a moment hesitated, with an inclination +to go back. It was with no idea of making a further appeal to his +old comrade, but--what would have been odd in any other nature but +his--he was affected by a sense that HE might have been unfair and +selfish in his manner to the man panoplied by these defenses, and +who was in a measure forced to be a part of them. He would like to +have returned and condoled with him. The clerks, who were +heartlessly familiar with the anxious bearing of the men who sought +interviews with their chief, both before and after, smiled with the +whispered conviction that the fresh and ingenuous young stranger +had been "chucked" like others until they met his kindly, tolerant, +and even superior eyes, and were puzzled. Meanwhile Barker, who +had that sublime, natural quality of abstraction over small +impertinences which is more exasperating than studied indifference, +after his brief hesitation passed out unconcernedly through the +swinging mahogany doors into the blowy street. Here the wind and +rain revived him; the bank and its curt refusal were forgotten; he +walked onward with only a smiling memory of his partner as in the +old days. He remembered how Stacy had burned down their old cabin +rather than have it fall into sordid or unworthy hands--this Stacy +who was now condemned to sink his impulses and become a mere +machine. He had never known Stacy's real motive for that act,-- +both Demorest and Stacy had kept their knowledge of the attempted +robbery from their younger partner,--it always seemed to him to be +a precious revelation of Stacy's inner nature. Facing the wind and +rain, he recalled how Stacy, though never so enthusiastic about his +marriage as Demorest, had taken up Van Loo sharply for some foolish +sneer about his own youthfulness. He was affectionately tolerant +of even Stacy's dislike to his wife's relations, for Stacy did not +know them as he did. Indeed, Barker, whose own father and mother +had died in his infancy, had accepted his wife's relations with a +loving trust and confidence that was supreme, from the fact that he +had never known any other. + +At last he reached his hotel. It was a new one, the latest +creation of a feverish progress in hotel-building which had covered +five years and as many squares with large showy erections, utterly +beyond the needs of the community, yet each superior in size and +adornment to its predecessor. It struck him as being the one +evidence of an abiding faith in the future of the metropolis that +he had seen in nothing else. As he entered its frescoed hall that +afternoon he was suddenly reminded, by its challenging opulency, of +the bank he had just quitted, without knowing that the bank had +really furnished its capital and its original design. The gilded +bar-rooms, flashing with mirrors and cut glass; the saloons, with +their desert expanse of Turkey carpet and oasis of clustered divans +and gilded tables; the great dining-room, with porphyry columns, +and walls and ceilings shining with allegory--all these things +which had attracted his youthful wonder without distracting his +correct simplicity of taste he now began to comprehend. It was the +bank's money "at work." In the clatter of dishes in the dining- +room he even seemed to hear again the chinking of coin. + +It was a short cut to his apartments to pass through a smaller +public sitting-room popularly known as "Flirtation Camp," where +eight or ten couples generally found refuge on chairs and settees +by the windows, half concealed by heavy curtains. But the +occupants were by no means youthful spinsters or bachelors; they +were generally married women, guests of the hotel, receiving other +people's husbands whose wives were "in the States," or responsible +middle-aged leaders of the town. In the elaborate toilettes of the +women, as compared with the less formal business suits of the men, +there was an odd mingling of the social attitude with perhaps more +mysterious confidences. The idle gossip about them had never +affected Barker; rather he had that innate respect for the secrets +of others which is as inseparable from simplicity as it is from +high breeding, and he scarcely glanced at the different couples in +his progress through the room. He did not even notice a rather +striking and handsome woman, who, surrounded by two or three +admirers, yet looked up at Barker as he passed with self-conscious +lids as if seeking a return of her glance. But he moved on +abstractedly, and only stopped when he suddenly saw the familiar +skirt of his wife at a further window, and halted before it. + +"Oh, it's YOU," said Mrs. Barker, with a half-nervous, half- +impatient laugh. "Why, I thought you'd certainly stay half the +afternoon with your old partner, considering that you haven't met +for three years." + +There was no doubt she HAD thought so; there was equally no doubt +that the conversation she was carrying on with her companion--a +good-looking, portly business man--was effectually interrupted. +But Barker did not notice it. "Captain Heath, my husband," she +went on, carelessly rising and smoothing her skirts. The captain, +who had risen too, bowed vaguely at the introduction, but Barker +extended his hand frankly. "I found Stacy busy," he said in answer +to his wife, "but he is coming to dine with us to-night." + +"If you mean Jim Stacy, the banker," said Captain Heath, brightening +into greater ease, "he's the busiest man in California. I've seen +men standing in a queue outside his door as in the old days at the +post-office. And he only gives you five minutes and no extension. +So you and he were partners once?" he said, looking curiously at the +still youthful Barker. + +But it was Mrs. Barker who answered, "Oh yes! and always such good +friends. I was awfully jealous of him." Nevertheless, she did not +respond to the affectionate protest in Barker's eyes nor to the +laugh of Captain Heath, but glanced indifferently around the room +as if to leave further conversation to the two men. It was +possible that she was beginning to feel that Captain Heath was as +de trop now as her husband had been a moment before. Standing +there, however, between them both, idly tracing a pattern on the +carpet with the toe of her slipper, she looked prettier than she +had ever looked as Kitty Carter. Her slight figure was more fully +developed. That artificial severity covering a natural virgin +coyness with which she used to wait at table in her father's hotel +at Boomville had gone, and was replaced by a satisfied consciousness +of her power to please. Her glance was freer, but not as frank as +in those days. Her dress was undoubtedly richer and more stylish; +yet Barker's loyal heart often reverted fondly to the chintz gown, +coquettishly frilled apron, and spotless cuffs and collar in which +she had handed him his coffee with a faint color that left his own +face crimson. + +Captain Heath's tact being equal to her indifference, he had +excused himself, although he was becoming interested in this +youthful husband. But Mrs. Barker, after having asserted her +husband's distinction as the equal friend of the millionaire, was +by no means willing that the captain should be further interested +in Barker for himself alone, and did not urge him to stay. As he +departed she turned to her husband, and, indicating the group he +had passed the moment before, said:-- + +"That horrid woman has been staring at us all the time. I don't +see what you see in her to admire." + +Poor Barker's admiration had been limited to a few words of +civility in the enforced contact of that huge caravansary and in +his quiet, youthful recognition of her striking personality. But +he was just then too preoccupied with his interview with Stacy to +reply, and perhaps he did not quite understand his wife. It was +odd how many things he did not quite understand now about Kitty, +but that he knew must be HIS fault. But Mrs. Barker apparently did +not require, after the fashion of her sex, a reply. For the next +moment, as they moved towards their rooms, she said impatiently, +"Well, you don't tell what Stacy said. Did you get the money?" + +I grieve to say that this soul of truth and frankness lied--only to +his wife. Perhaps he considered it only lying to HIMSELF, a thing +of which he was at times miserably conscious. "It wasn't +necessary, dear," he said; "he advised me to sell my securities in +the bank; and if you only knew how dreadfully busy he is." + +Mrs. Barker curled her pretty lip. "It doesn't take very long to +lend ten thousand dollars!" she said. "But that's what I always +tell you. You have about made me sick by singing the praises of +those wonderful partners of yours, and here you ask a favor of one +of them and he tells you to sell your securities! And you know, +and he knows, they're worth next to nothing." + +"You don't understand, dear"--began Barker. + +"I understand that you've given your word to poor Harry," said Mrs. +Barker in pretty indignation, "who's responsible for the Ditch +purchase." + +"And I shall keep it. I always do," said Barker very quietly, but +with that same singular expression of face that had puzzled Stacy. +But Mrs. Barker, who, perhaps, knew her husband better, said in an +altered voice:-- + +"But HOW can you, dear?" + +"If I'm short a thousand or two I'll ask your father." + +Mrs. Barker was silent. "Father's so very much harried now, George. +Why don't you simply throw the whole thing up?" + +"But I've given my word to your cousin Henry." + +"Yes, but only your WORD. There was no written agreement. And you +couldn't even hold him to it." + +Barker opened his frank eyes in astonishment. Her own cousin, too! +And they were Stacy's very words! + +"Besides," added Mrs. Barker audaciously, "he could get rid of it +elsewhere. He had another offer, but he thought yours the best. +So don't be silly." + +By this time they had reached their rooms. Barker, apparently +dismissing the subject from his mind with characteristic buoyancy, +turned into the bedroom and walked smilingly towards a small crib +which stood in the corner. "Why, he's gone!" he said in some +dismay. + +"Well," said Mrs. Barker a little impatiently, "you didn't expect +me to take him into the public parlor, where I was seeing visitors, +did you? I sent him out with the nurse into the lower hall to play +with the other children." + +A shade momentarily passed over Barker's face. He always looked +forward to meeting the child when he came back. He had a belief, +based on no grounds whatever, that the little creature understood +him. And he had a father's doubt of the wholesomeness of other +people's children who were born into the world indiscriminately and +not under the exceptional conditions of his own. "I'll go and +fetch him," he said. + +"You haven't told me anything about your interview; what you did +and what your good friend Stacy said," said Mrs. Barker, dropping +languidly into a chair. "And really if you are simply running away +again after that child, I might just as well have asked Captain +Heath to stay longer." + +"Oh, as to Stacy," said Barker, dropping beside her and taking her +hand; "well, dear, he was awfully busy, you know, and shut up in +the innermost office like the agate in one of the Japanese nests of +boxes. But," he continued, brightening up, "just the same dear old +Jim Stacy of Heavy Tree Hill, when I first knew you. Lord! dear, +how it all came back to me! That day I proposed to you in the +belief that I was unexpectedly rich and even bought a claim for the +boys on the strength of it, and how I came back to them to find +that they had made a big strike on the very claim. Lord! I +remember how I was so afraid to tell them about you--and how they +guessed it--that dear old Stacy one of the first." + +"Yes," said Mrs. Barker, "and I hope your friend Stacy remembered +that but for ME, when you found out that you were not rich, you'd +have given up the claim, but that I really deceived my own father +to make you keep it. I've often worried over that, George," she +said pensively, turning a diamond bracelet around her pretty wrist, +"although I never said anything about it." + +"But, Kitty darling," said Barker, grasping his wife's hand, "I +gave my note for it; you know you said that was bargain enough, and +I had better wait until the note was due, and until I found I +couldn't pay, before I gave up the claim. It was very clever of +you, and the boys all said so, too. But you never deceived your +father, dear," he said, looking at her gravely, "for I should have +told him everything." + +"Of course, if you look at it in that way," said his wife +languidly, "it's nothing; only I think it ought to be remembered +when people go about saying papa ruined you with his hotel schemes." + +"Who dares say that?" said Barker indignantly. + +"Well, if they don't SAY it they look it," said Mrs. Barker, with a +toss of her pretty head, "and I believe that's at the bottom of +Stacy's refusal." + +"But he never said a word, Kitty," said Barker, flushing. + +"There, don't excite yourself, George," said Mrs. Barker resignedly, +"but go for the baby. I know you're dying to go, and I suppose it's +time Norah brought it upstairs." + +At any other time Barker would have lingered with explanations, but +just then a deeper sense than usual of some misunderstanding made +him anxious to shorten this domestic colloquy. He rose, pressed +his wife's hand, and went out. But yet he was not entirely +satisfied with himself for leaving her. "I suppose it isn't right +my going off as soon as I come in," he murmured reproachfully to +himself, "but I think she wants the baby back as much as I; only, +womanlike, she didn't care to let me know it." + +He reached the lower hall, which he knew was a favorite promenade +for the nurses who were gathered at the farther end, where a large +window looked upon Montgomery Street. But Norah, the Irish nurse, +was not among them; he passed through several corridors in his +search, but in vain. At last, worried and a little anxious, he +turned to regain his rooms through the long saloon where he had +found his wife previously. It was deserted now; the last caller +had left--even frivolity had its prescribed limits. He was +consequently startled by a gentle murmur from one of the heavily +curtained window recesses. It was a woman's voice--low, sweet, +caressing, and filled with an almost pathetic tenderness. And it +was followed by a distinct gurgling satisfied crow. + +Barker turned instantly in that direction. A step brought him to +the curtain, where a singular spectacle presented itself. + +Seated on a lounge, completely absorbed and possessed by her +treasure, was the "horrid woman" whom his wife had indicated only a +little while ago, holding a baby--Kitty's sacred baby--in her +wanton lap! The child was feebly grasping the end of the slender +jeweled necklace which the woman held temptingly dangling from a +thin white jeweled finger above it. But its eyes were beaming with +an intense delight, as if trying to respond to the deep, +concentrated love in the handsome face that was bent above it. + +At the sudden intrusion of Barker she looked up. There was a faint +rise in her color, but no loss of sell-possession. + +"Please don't scold the nurse," she said, "nor say anything to Mrs. +Barker. It is all my fault. I thought that both the nurse and +child looked dreadfully bored with each other, and I borrowed the +little fellow for a while to try and amuse him. At least I haven't +made him cry, have I, dear?" The last epithet, it is needless to +say, was addressed to the little creature in her lap, but in its +tender modulation it touched the father's quick sympathies as if he +had shared it with the child. "You see," she said softly, +disengaging the baby fingers from her necklace, "that OUR sex is +not the only one tempted by jewelry and glitter." + +Barker hesitated; the Madonna-like devotion of a moment ago was +gone; it was only the woman of the world who laughingly looked up +at him. Nevertheless he was touched. "Have you--ever--had a +child, Mrs. Horncastle?" he asked gently and hesitatingly. He had +a vague recollection that she passed for a widow, and in his simple +eyes all women were virgins or married saints. + +"No," she said abruptly. Then she added with a laugh, "Or perhaps +I should not admire them so much. I suppose it's the same feeling +bachelors have for other people's wives. But I know you're dying +to take that boy from me. Take him, then, and don't be ashamed to +carry him yourself just because I'm here; you know you would +delight to do it if I weren't." + +Barker bent over the silken lap in which the child was comfortably +nestling, and in that attitude had a faint consciousness that Mrs. +Horncastle was mischievously breathing into his curls a silent +laugh. Barker lifted his firstborn with proud skillfulness, but +that sagacious infant evidently knew when he was comfortable, and +in a paroxysm of objection caught his father's curls with one fist, +while with the other he grasped Mrs. Horncastle's brown braids and +brought their heads into contact. Upon which humorous situation +Norah, the nurse, entered. + +"It's all right, Norah," said Mrs. Horncastle, laughing, as she +disengaged herself from the linking child. "Mr. Barker has claimed +the baby, and has agreed to forgive you and me and say nothing to +Mrs. Barker." Norah, with the inscrutable criticism of her sex on +her sex, thought it extremely probable, and halted with +exasperating discretion. "There," continued Mrs. Horncastle, +playfully evading the child's further advances, "go with papa, +that's a dear. Mr. Barker prefers to carry him back, Norah." + +"But," said the ingenuous and persistent Barker, still lingering in +hopes of recalling the woman's previous expression, "you DO love +children, and you think him a bright little chap for his age?" + +"Yes," said Mrs. Horncastle, putting back her loosened braid, "so +round and fat and soft. And such a discriminating eye for jewelry. +Really you ought to get a necklace like mine for Mrs. Barker--it +would please both, you know." She moved slowly away, the united +efforts of Norah and Barker scarcely sufficing to restrain the +struggling child from leaping after her as she turned at the door +and blew him a kiss. + +When Barker regained his room he found that Mrs. Barker had +dismissed Stacy from her mind except so far as to invoke Norah's +aid in laying out her smartest gown for dinner. "But why take all +this trouble, dear?" said her simple-minded husband; "we are going +to dine in a private room so that we can talk over old times all by +ourselves, and any dress would suit him. And, Lord, dear!" he +added, with a quick brightening at the fancy, "if you could only +just rig yourself up in that pretty lilac gown you used to wear at +Boomville--it would be too killing, and just like old times. I put +it away myself in one of our trunks--I couldn't bear to leave it +behind; I know just where it is. I'll"-- But Mrs. Barker's +restraining scorn withheld him. + +"George Barker, if you think I am going to let you throw away and +utterly WASTE Mr. Stacy on us, alone, in a private room with closed +doors--and I dare say you'd like to sit in your dressing-gown and +slippers--you are entirely mistaken. I know what is due, not to +your old partner, but to the great Mr. Stacy, the financier, and I +know what is due FROM HIM TO US! No! We dine in the great dining- +room, publicly, and, if possible, at the very next table to those +stuck-up Peterburys and their Eastern friends, including that +horrid woman, which, I'm sure, ought to satisfy you. Then you can +talk as much as you like, and as loud as you like, about old +times,--and the louder and the more the better,--but I don't think +HE'LL like it." + +"But the baby!" expostulated Barker. "Stacy's just wild to see +him--and we can't bring him down to the table--though we MIGHT," he +added, momentarily brightening. + +"After dinner," said Mrs. Barker severely, "we will walk through +the big drawing-rooms, and THEN Mr. Stacy may come upstairs and see +him in his crib; but not before. And now, George, I do wish that +to-night, FOR ONCE, you would not wear a turn-down collar, and that +you would go to the barber's and have him cut your hair and smooth +out the curls. And, for Heaven's sake! let him put some wax or gum +or SOMETHING on your mustache and twist it up on your cheek like +Captain Heath's, for it positively droops over your mouth like a +girl's ringlet. It's quite enough for me to hear people talk of +your inexperience, but really I don't want you to look as if I had +run away with a pretty schoolboy. And, considering the size of +that child, it's positively disgraceful. And, one thing more, +George. When I'm talking to anybody, please don't sit opposite to +me, beaming with delight, and your mouth open. And don't roar if +by chance I say something funny. And--whatever you do--don't make +eyes at me in company whenever I happen to allude to you, as I did +before Captain Heath. It is positively too ridiculous." + +Nothing could exceed the laughing good humor with which her husband +received these cautions, nor the evident sincerity with which he +promised amendment. Equally sincere was he, though a little more +thoughtful, in his severe self-examination of his deficiencies, +when, later, he seated himself at the window with one hand softly +encompassing his child's chubby fist in the crib beside him, and, +in the instinctive fashion of all loneliness, looked out of the +window. The southern trades were whipping the waves of the distant +bay and harbor into yeasty crests. Sheets of rain swept the +sidewalks with the regularity of a fusillade, against which a few +pedestrians struggled with flapping waterproofs and slanting +umbrellas. He could look along the deserted length of Montgomery +Street to the heights of Telegraph Hill and its long-disused +semaphore. It seemed lonelier to him than the mile-long sweep of +Heavy Tree Hill, writhing against the mountain wind and its aeolian +song. He had never felt so lonely THERE. In his rigid self- +examination he thought Kitty right in protesting against the effect +of his youthfulness and optimism. Yet he was also right in being +himself. There is an egoism in the highest simplicity; and Barker, +while willing to believe in others' methods, never abandoned his +own aims. He was right in loving Kitty as he did; he knew that she +was better and more lovable than she could believe herself to be; +but he was willing to believe it pained and discomposed her if he +showed it before company. He would not have her change even this +peculiarity--it was part of herself--no more than he would have +changed himself. And behind what he had conceived was her clear, +practical common sense, all this time had been her belief that she +had deceived her father! Poor dear, dear Kitty! And she had +suffered because stupid people had conceived that her father had +led him away in selfish speculations. As if he--Barker--would not +have first discovered it, and as if anybody--even dear Kitty +herself--was responsible for HIS convictions and actions but +himself. Nevertheless, this gentle egotist was unusually serious, +and when the child awoke at last, and with a fretful start and +vacant eyes pushed his caressing hand away, he felt lonelier than +before. It was with a slight sense of humiliation, too, that he +saw it stretch its hands to the mere hireling, Norah, who had never +given it the love that he had seen even in the frivolous Mrs. +Horncastle's eyes. Later, when his wife came in, looking very +pretty in her elaborate dinner toilette, he had the same +conflicting emotions. He knew that they had already passed that +phase of their married life when she no longer dressed to please +him, and that the dictates of fashion or the rivalry of another +woman she held superior to his tastes; yet he did not blame her. +But he was a little surprised to see that her dress was copied from +one of Mrs. Horncastle's most striking ones, and that it did not +suit her. That which adorned the maturer woman did not agree with +the demure and slightly austere prettiness of the young wife. + +But Barker forgot all this when Stacy--reserved and somewhat +severe-looking in evening dress--arrived with business punctuality. +He fancied that his old partner received the announcement that they +would dine in the public room with something of surprise, and he +saw him glance keenly at Kitty in her fine array, as if he had +suspected it was her choice, and understood her motives. Indeed, +the young husband had found himself somewhat nervous in regard to +Stacy's estimate of Kitty; he was conscious that she was not +looking and acting like the old Kitty that Stacy had known; it did +not enter his honest heart that Stacy had, perhaps, not appreciated +her then, and that her present quality might accord more with his +worldly tastes and experience. It was, therefore, with a kind of +timid delight that he saw Stacy apparently enter into her mood, and +with a still more timorous amusement to notice that he seemed to +sympathize not only with her, but with her half-rallying, half- +serious attitude towards his (Barker's) inexperience and +simplicity. He was glad that she had made a friend of Stacy, even +in this way. Stacy would understand, as he did, her pretty +willfulness at last; she would understand what a true friend Stacy +was to him. It was with unfeigned satisfaction that he followed +them in to dinner as she leaned upon his guest's arm, chatting +confidentially. He was only uneasy because her manner had a slight +ostentation. + +The entrance of the little party produced a quick sensation +throughout the dining-room. Whispers passed from table to table; +all heads were turned towards the great financier as towards a +magnet; a few guests even shamelessly faced round in their chairs +as he passed. Mrs. Barker was pink, pretty, and voluble with +excitement; Stacy had a slight mask of reserve; Barker was the only +one natural and unconscious. + +As the dinner progressed Barker found that there was little chance +for him to invoke his old partner's memories of the past. He +found, however, that Stacy had received a letter from Demorest, and +that he was coming home from Europe. His letters were still sad; +they both agreed upon that. And then for the first time that day +Stacy looked intently at Barker with the look that he had often +worn on Heavy Tree Hill. + +"Then you think it is the same old trouble that worries him?" said +Barker in an awed and sympathetic voice. + +"I believe it is," said Stacy, with an equal feeling. Mrs. Barker +pricked up her pretty ears; her husband's ready sympathy was +familiar enough; but that this cold, practical Stacy should be +moved at anything piqued her curiosity. + +"And you believe that he has never got over it?" continued Barker. + +"He had one chance, but he threw it away," said Stacy energetically. +"If, instead of going off to Europe by himself to brood over it, he +had joined me in business, he'd have been another man." + +"But not Demorest," said Barker quickly. + +"What dreadful secret is this about Demorest?" said Mrs. Barker +petulantly. "Is he ill?" + +Both men were silent by their old common instinct. But it was +Stacy who said "No" in a way that put any further questioning at an +end, and Barker was grateful and for the moment disloyal to his +Kitty. + +It was with delight that Mrs. Barker had seen that the attention of +the next table was directed to them, and that even Mrs. Horncastle +had glanced from time to time at Stacy. But she was not prepared +for the evident equal effect that Mrs. Horncastle had created upon +Stacy. His cold face warmed, his critical eye softened; he asked +her name. Mrs. Barker was voluble, prejudiced, and, it seemed, +misinformed. + +"I know it all," said Stacy, with didactic emphasis. "Her husband +was as bad as they make them. When her life had become intolerable +WITH HIM, he tried to make it shameful WITHOUT HIM by abandoning +her. She could get a divorce a dozen times over, but she won't." + +"I suppose that's what makes her so very attractive to gentlemen," +said Mrs. Barker ironically. + +"I have never seen her before," continued Stacy, with business +precision, "although I and two other men are guardians of her +property, and have saved it from the clutches of her husband. They +told me she was handsome--and so she is." + +Pleased with the sudden human weakness of Stacy, Barker glanced at +his wife for sympathy. But she was looking studiously another way, +and the young husband's eyes, still full of his gratification, fell +upon Mrs. Horncastle's. She looked away with a bright color. +Whereupon the sanguine Barker--perfectly convinced that she +returned Stacy's admiration--was seized with one of his old boyish +dreams of the future, and saw Stacy happily united to her, and was +only recalled to the dinner before him by its end. Then Stacy duly +promenaded the great saloon with Mrs. Barker on his arm, visited +the baby in her apartments, and took an easy leave. But he grasped +Barker's hand before parting in quite his old fashion, and said, +"Come to lunch with me at the bank any day, and we'll talk of Phil +Demorest," and left Barker as happy as if the appointment were to +confer the favor he had that morning refused. But Mrs. Barker, who +had overheard, was more dubious. + +"You don't suppose he asks you to talk with you about Demorest and +his stupid secret, do you?" she said scornfully. + +"Perhaps not only about that," said Barker, glad that she had not +demanded the secret. + +"Well," returned Mrs. Barker as she turned away, "he might just as +well lunch here and talk about HER--and see her, too." + +Meantime Stacy had dropped into his club, only a few squares +distant. His appearance created the same interest that it had +produced at the hotel, but with less reserve among his fellow +members. + +"Have you heard the news?" said a dozen voices. Stacy had not; he +had been dining out. + +"That infernal swindle of a Divide Railroad has passed the +legislature." + +Stacy instantly remembered Barker's absurd belief in it and his +reasons. He smiled and said carelessly, "Are you quite sure it's a +swindle?" + +There was a dead silence at the coolness of the man who had been +most outspoken against it. + +"But," said a voice hesitatingly, "you know it goes nowhere and to +no purpose." + +"But that does not prevent it, now that it's a fact, from going +anywhere and to some purpose," said Stacy, turning away. He passed +into the reading-room quietly, but in an instant turned and quickly +descended by another staircase into the hall, hurriedly put on his +overcoat, and slipping out was a moment later re-entering the +hotel. Here he hastily summoned Barker, who came down, flushed and +excited. Laying his hand on Barker's arm in his old dominant way, +he said:-- + +"Don't delay a single hour, but get a written agreement for that +Ditch property." + +Barker smiled. "But I have. Got it this afternoon." + +"Then you know?" ejaculated Stacy in surprise. + +"I only know," said Barker, coloring, "that you said I could back +out of it if it wasn't signed, and that's what Kitty said, too. +And I thought it looked awfully mean for me to hold a man to that +kind of a bargain. And so--you won't be mad, old fellow, will +you?--I thought I'd put it beyond any question of my own good faith +by having it in black and white." He stopped, laughing and +blushing, but still earnest and sincere. "You don't think me a +fool, do you?" he said pathetically. + +Stacy smiled grimly. "I think, Barker boy, that if you go to the +Branch you'll have no difficulty in paying for the Ditch property. +Good-night." + +In a few moments he was back at the club again before any one knew +he had even left the building. As he again re-entered the smoking- +room he found the members still in eager discussion about the new +railroad. One was saying, "If they could get an extension, and +carry the road through Heavy Tree Hill to Boomville they'd be all +right." + +"I quite agree with you," said Stacy. + + +CHAPTER III. + + +The swaying, creaking, Boomville coach had at last reached the +level ridge, and sank forward upon its springs with a sigh of +relief and the slow precipitation of the red dust which had hung in +clouds around it. The whole coach, inside and out, was covered +with this impalpable powder; it had poured into the windows that +gaped widely in the insufferable heat; it lay thick upon the novel +read by the passenger who had for the third or fourth time during +the ascent made a gutter of the half-opened book and blown the dust +away in a single puff, like the smoke from a pistol. It lay in +folds and creases over the yellow silk duster of the handsome woman +on the back seat, and when she endeavored to shake it off enveloped +her in a reddish nimbus. It grimed the handkerchiefs of others, +and left sanguinary streaks on their mopped foreheads. But as the +coach had slowly climbed the summit the sun was also sinking behind +the Black Spur Range, and with its ultimate disappearance a +delicious coolness spread itself like a wave across the ridge. The +passengers drew a long breath, the reader closed his book, the lady +lifted the edge of her veil and delicately wiped her forehead, over +which a few damp tendrils of hair were clinging. Even a +distinguished-looking man who had sat as impenetrable and remote as +a statue in one of the front seats moved and turned his abstracted +face to the window. His deeply tanned cheek and clearly cut +features harmonized with the red dust that lay in the curves of his +brown linen dust-cloak, and completed his resemblance to a bronze +figure. Yet it was Demorest, changed only in coloring. Now, as +five years ago, his abstraction had a certain quality which the +most familiar stranger shrank from disturbing. But in the general +relaxation of relief the novel-reader addressed him. + +"Well, we ain't far from Boomville now, and it's all down-grade the +rest of the way. I reckon you'll be as glad to get a 'wash up' and +a 'shake' as the rest of us." + +"I am afraid I won't have so early an opportunity," said Demorest, +with a faint, grave smile, "for I get off at the cross-road to +Heavy Tree Hill." + +"Heavy Tree Hill!" repeated the other in surprise. "You ain't +goin' to Heavy Tree Hill? Why, you might have gone there direct by +railroad, and have been there four hours ago. You know there's a +branch from the Divide Railroad goes there straight to the hotel at +Hymettus." + +"Where?" said Demorest, with a puzzled smile. + +"Hymettus. That's the fancy name they've given to the watering- +place on the slope. But I reckon you're a stranger here?" + +"For five years," said Demorest. "I fancy I've heard of the +railroad, although I prefer to go to Heavy Tree this way. But I +never heard of a watering-place there before." + +"Why, it's the biggest boom of the year. Folks that are tired of +the fogs of 'Frisco and the heat of Sacramento all go there. It's +four thousand feet up, with a hotel like Saratoga, dancing, and a +band plays every night. And it all sprang out of the Divide +Railroad and a crank named George Barker, who bought up some old +Ditch property and ran a branch line along its levels, and made a +junction with the Divide. You can come all the way from 'Frisco or +Sacramento by rail. It's a mighty big thing!" + +"Yet," said Demorest, with some animation, "you call the man who +originated this success a crank. I should say he was a genius." + +The other passenger shook his head. "All sheer nigger luck. He +bought the Ditch plant afore there was a ghost of a chance for the +Divide Railroad, just out o' pure d----d foolishness. He expected +so little from it that he hadn't even got the agreement done in +writin', and hadn't paid for it, when the Divide Railroad passed +the legislature, as it never oughter done! For, you see, the +blamedest cur'ous thing about the whole affair was that this +'straw' road of a Divide, all pure wildcat, was only gotten up to +frighten the Pacific Railroad sharps into buying it up. And the +road that nobody ever calculated would ever have a rail of it laid +was pushed on as soon as folks knew that the Ditch plant had been +bought up, for they thought there was a big thing behind it. Even +the hotel was, at first, simply a kind of genteel alms-house that +this yer Barker had built for broken-down miners!" + +"Nevertheless," continued Demorest, smiling, "you admit that it is +a great success?" + +"Yes," said the other, a little irritated by some complacency in +Demorest's smile, "but the success isn't HIS'N. Fools has ideas, +and wise men profit by them, for that hotel now has Jim Stacy's +bank behind it, and is even a kind of country branch of the Brook +House in 'Frisco. Barker's out of it, I reckon. Anyhow, HE +couldn't run a hotel, for all that his wife--she that's one of the +big 'Frisco swells now--used to help serve in her father's. No, +sir, it's just a fool's luck, gettin' the first taste and leavin' +the rest to others." + +"I'm not sure that it's the worst kind of luck," returned Demorest, +with persistent gravity; "and I suppose he's satisfied with it." +But so heterodox an opinion only irritated his antagonist the more, +especially as he noticed that the handsome woman in the back seat +appeared to be interested in the conversation, and even sympathetic +with Demorest. The man was in the main a good-natured fellow and +loyal to his friends; but this did not preclude any virulent +criticism of others, and for a moment he hated this bronze-faced +stranger, and even saw blemishes in the handsome woman's beauty. +"That may be YOUR idea of an Eastern man," he said bluntly, "but I +kin tell ye that Californy ain't run on those lines. No, sir." +Nevertheless, his curiosity got the better of his ill humor, and as +the coach at last pulled up at the cross-road for Demorest to +descend he smiled affably at his departing companion. + +"You allowed just now that you'd bin five years away. Whar mout ye +have bin?" + +"In Europe," said Demorest pleasantly. + +"I reckoned ez much," returned his interrogator, smiling +significantly at the other passengers. "But in what place?" + +"Oh, many," said Demorest, smiling also. + +"But what place war ye last livin' at?" + +"Well," said Demorest, descending the steps, but lingering for a +moment with his hand on the door of the coach, "oddly enough, now +you remind me of it--at Hymettus!" + +He closed the door, and the coach rolled on. The passenger +reddened, glanced indignantly after the departing figure of +Demorest and suspiciously at the others. The lady was looking from +the window with a faint smile on her face. + +"He might hev given me a civil answer," muttered the passenger, and +resumed his novel. + +When the coach drew up before Carter's Hotel the lady got down, and +the curiosity of her susceptible companions was gratified to the +extent of learning from the register that her name was Horncastle. + +She was shown to a private sitting-room, which chanced to be the +one which had belonged to Mrs. Barker in the days of her +maidenhood, and was the sacred, impenetrable bower to which she +retired when her daily duties of waiting upon her father's guests +were over. But the breath of custom had passed through it since +then, and but little remained of its former maiden glories, except +a few schoolgirl crayon drawings on the wall and an unrecognizable +portrait of herself in oil, done by a wandering artist and still +preserved as a receipt for his unpaid bill. Of these facts Mrs. +Horncastle knew nothing; she was evidently preoccupied, and after +she had removed her outer duster and entered the room, she glanced +at the clock on the mantel-shelf and threw herself with an air of +resigned abstraction in an armchair in the corner. Her traveling- +dress, although unostentatious, was tasteful and well-fitting; a +slight pallor from her fatiguing journey, and, perhaps, from some +absorbing thought, made her beauty still more striking. She gave +even an air of elegance to the faded, worn adornments of the room, +which it is to be feared it never possessed in Miss Kitty's +occupancy. Again she glanced at the clock. There was a tap at the +door. + +"Come in." + +The door opened to a Chinese servant bearing a piece of torn paper +with a name written on it in lieu of a card. + +Mrs. Horncastle took it, glanced at the name, and handed the paper +back. + +"There must be some mistake," she said. "it do not know Mr. +Steptoe." + +"No, but you know ME all the same," said a voice from the doorway +as a man entered, coolly took the Chinese servant by the elbows and +thrust him into the passage, closing the door upon him. "Steptoe +and Horncastle are the same man, only I prefer to call myself +Steptoe HERE. And I see YOU'RE down on the register as 'Horncastle.' +Well, it's plucky of you, and it's not a bad name to keep; you might +be thankful that I have always left it to you. And if I call myself +Steptoe here it's a good blind against any of your swell friends +knowing you met your HUSBAND here." + +In the half-scornful, half-resigned look she had given him when he +entered there was no doubt that she recognized him as the man she +had come to see. He had changed little in the five years that had +elapsed since he entered the three partners' cabin at Heavy Tree +Hill. His short hair and beard still clung to his head like curled +moss or the crisp flocculence of Astrakhan. He was dressed more +pretentiously, but still gave the same idea of vulgar strength. +She listened to him without emotion, but said, with even a +deepening of scorn in her manner:-- + +"What new shame is this?" + +"Nothing NEW," he replied. "Only five years ago I was livin' over +on the Bar at Heavy Tree Hill under the name of Steptoe, and folks +here might recognize me. I was here when your particular friend, +Jim Stacy, who only knew me as Steptoe, and doesn't know me as +Horncastle, your HUSBAND,--for all he's bound up my property for +you,--made his big strike with his two partners. I was in his +cabin that very night, and drank his whiskey. Oh, I'm all right +there! I left everything all right behind me--only it's just as +well he doesn't know I'm Horncastle. And as the boy happened to be +there with me"-- He stopped, and looked at her significantly. + +The expression of her face changed. Eagerness, anxiety, and even +fear came into it in turn, but always mingling with some scorn that +dominated her. "The boy!" she said in a voice that had changed +too; "well, what about him? You promised to tell me all,--all!" + +"Where's the money?" he said. "Husband and wife are ONE, I know," +he went on with a coarse laugh, "but I don't trust MYSELF in these +matters." + +She took from a traveling-reticule that lay beside her a roll of +notes and a chamois leather bag of coin, and laid them on the table +before him. He examined both carefully. + +"All right," he said. "I see you've got the checks made out 'to +bearer.' Your head's level, Conny. Pity you and me can't agree." + +"I went to the bank across the way as soon as I arrived," she said, +with contemptuous directness. "I told them I was going over to +Hymettus and might want money." + +He dropped into a chair before her with his broad heavy hands upon +his knees, and looked at her with an equal, though baser, contempt: +for his was mingled with a certain pride of mastery and possession. + +"And, of course, you'll go to Hymettus and cut a splurge as you +always do. The beautiful Mrs. Horncastle! The helpless victim of +a wretched, dissipated, disgraced, gambling husband. So dreadfully +sad, you know, and so interesting! Could get a divorce from the +brute if she wanted, but won't, on account of her religious +scruples. And so while the brute is gambling, swindling, +disgracing himself, and dodging a shot here and a lynch committee +there, two or three hundred miles away, you're splurging round in +first-class hotels and watering-places, doing the injured and +abused, and run after by a lot of men who are ready to take my +place, and, maybe, some of my reputation along with it." + +"Stop!" she said suddenly, in a voice that made the glass +chandelier ring. He had risen too, with a quick, uneasy glance +towards the door. But her outbreak passed as suddenly, and sinking +back into her chair, she said, with her previous scornful +resignation, "Never mind. Go on. You KNOW you're lying!" + +He sat down again and looked at her critically. "Yes, as far as +you're concerned I WAS lying! I know your style. But as you know, +too, that I'd kill you and the first man I suspected, and there +ain't a judge or a jury in all Californy that wouldn't let me go +free for it, and even consider, too, that it had wiped off the +whole slate agin me--it's to my credit!" + +"I know what you men call chivalry," she said coldly, "but I did +not come here to buy a knowledge of that. So now about the child?" +she ended abruptly, leaning forward again with the same look of +eager solicitude in her eyes. + +"Well, about the child--our child--though, perhaps, I prefer to say +MY child," he began, with a certain brutal frankness. "I'll tell +you. But first, I don't want you to talk about BUYING your +information of me. If I haven't told you anything before, it's +because I didn't think you oughter know. If I didn't trust the +child to YOU, it's because I didn't think you could go shashaying +about with a child that was three years old when I"--he stopped and +wiped his mouth with the back of his hand--"made an honest woman of +you--I think that's what they call it." + +"But," she said eagerly, ignoring the insult, "I could have hidden +it where no one but myself would have known it. I could have sent +it to school and visited it as a relation." + +"Yes," he said curtly, "like all women, and then blurted it out +some day and made it worse." + +"But," she said desperately, "even THEN, suppose I had been willing +to take the shame of it! I have taken more!" + +"But I didn't intend that you should," he said roughly. + +"You are very careful of my reputation," she returned scornfully. + +"Not by a d----d sight," he burst out; "but I care for HIS! I'm +not goin' to let any man call him a bastard!" + +Callous as she had become even under this last cruel blow, she +could not but see something in his coarse eyes she had never seen +before; could not but hear something in his brutal voice she had +never heard before! Was it possible that somewhere in the depths +of his sordid nature he had his own contemptible sense of honor? A +hysterical feeling came over her hitherto passive disgust and +scorn, but it disappeared with his next sentence in a haze of +anxiety. "No!" he said hoarsely, "he had enough wrong done him +already." + +"What do you mean?" she said imploringly. "Or are you again lying? +You said, four years ago, that he had 'got into trouble;' that was +your excuse for keeping him from me. Or was that a lie, too?" + +His manner changed and softened, but not for any pity for his +companion, but rather from some change in his own feelings. "Oh, +that," he said, with a rough laugh, "that was only a kind o' +trouble any sassy kid like him was likely to get into. You ain't +got no call to hear that, for," he added, with a momentary return +to his previous manner, "the wrong that was done him is MY lookout! +You want to know what I did with him, how he's been looked arter, +and where he is? You want the worth of your money. That's square +enough. But first I want you to know, though you mayn't believe +it, that every red cent you've given me to-night goes to HIM. And +don't you forget it." + +For all his vulgar frankness she knew he had lied to her many times +before,--maliciously, wantonly, complacently, but never evasively; +yet there was again that something in his manner which told her he +was now telling the truth. + +"Well," he began, settling himself back in his chair, "I told you I +brought him to Heavy Tree Hill. After I left you I wasn't going to +trust him to no school; he knew enough for me; but when I left +those parts where nobody knew you, and got a little nearer 'Frisco, +where people might have known us both, I thought it better not to +travel round with a kid o' that size as his FATHER. So I got a +young fellow here to pass him off as HIS little brother, and look +after him and board him; and I paid him a big price for it, too, +you bet! You wouldn't think it was a man who's now swelling around +here, the top o' the pile, that ever took money from a brute like +me, and for such schoolmaster work, too; but he did, and his name +was Van Loo, a clerk of the Ditch Company." + +"Van Loo!" said the woman, with a movement of disgust; "THAT man!" + +"What's the matter with Van Loo?" he said, with a coarse laugh, +enjoying his wife's discomfiture. "He speaks French and Spanish, +and you oughter hear the kid roll off the lingo he's got from him. +He's got style, and knows how to dress, and you ought to see the +kid bow and scrape, and how he carries himself. Now, Van Loo +wasn't exactly my style, and I reckon I don't hanker after him +much, but he served my purpose." + +"And this man knows"--she said, with a shudder. + +"He knows Steptoe and the boy, but he don't know Horncastle nor +YOU. Don't you be skeert. He's the last man in the world who +would hanker to see me or the kid again, or would dare to say that +he ever had! Lord! I'd like to see his fastidious mug if me and +Eddy walked in upon him and his high-toned mother and sister some +arternoon." He threw himself back and laughed a derisive, +spasmodic, choking laugh, which was so far from being genial that +it even seemed to indicate a lively appreciation of pain in others +rather than of pleasure in himself. He had often laughed at her in +the same way. + +"And where is he now?" she said, with a compressed lip. + +"At school. Where, I don't tell you. You know why. But he's +looked after by me, and d----d well looked after, too." + +She hesitated, composed her face with an effort, parted her lips, +and looked out of the window into the gathering darkness. Then +after a moment she said slowly, yet with a certain precision:-- + +"And his mother? Do you ever talk to him of HER? Does--does he +ever speak of ME?" + +"What do you think?" he said comfortably, changing his position in +the chair, and trying to read her face in the shadow. "Come, now. +You don't know, eh? Well--no! NO! You understand. No! He's MY +friend--MINE! He's stood by me through thick and thin. Run at my +heels when everybody else fled me. Dodged vigilance committees +with me, laid out in the brush with me with his hand in mine when +the sheriff's deputies were huntin' me; shut his jaw close when, if +he squealed, he'd have been called another victim of the brute +Horncastle, and been as petted and canoodled as you." + +It would have been difficult for any one but the woman who knew the +man before her to have separated his brutish delight in paining her +from another feeling she had never dreamt him capable of,--an +intense and fierce pride in his affection for his child. And it +was the more hopeless to her that it was not the mere sentiment of +reciprocation, but the material instinct of paternity in its most +animal form. And it seemed horrible to her that the only outcome +of what had been her own wild, youthful passion for this brute was +this love for the flesh of her flesh, for she was more and more +conscious as he spoke that her yearning for the boy was the +yearning of an equally dumb and unreasoning maternity. They had +met again as animals--in fear, contempt, and anger of each other; +but the animal had triumphed in both. + +When she spoke again it was as the woman of the world,--the woman +who had laughed two years ago at the irrepressible Barker. "It's a +new thing," she said, languidly turning her rings on her fingers, +"to see you in the role of a doting father. And may I ask how long +you have had this amiable weakness, and how long it is to last?" + +To her surprise and the keen retaliating delight of her sex, a +conscious flush covered his face to the crisp edges of his black +and matted beard. For a moment she hoped that he had lied. But, +to her greater surprise, he stammered in equal frankness: "It's +growed upon me for the last five years--ever since I was alone with +him." He stopped, cleared his throat, and then, standing up before +her, said in his former voice, but with a more settled and intense +deliberation: "You wanter know how long it will last, do ye? Well, +you know your special friend, Jim Stacy--the big millionaire--the +great Jim of the Stock Exchange--the man that pinches the money +market of Californy between his finger and thumb and makes it +squeal in New York--the man who shakes the stock market when he +sneezes? Well, it will go on until that man is a beggar; until he +has to borrow a dime for his breakfast, and slump out of his lunch +with a cent's worth of rat poison or a bullet in his head! It'll +go on until his old partner--that softy George Barker--comes to the +bottom of his d----d fool luck and is a penny-a-liner for the +papers and a hanger-round at free lunches, and his scatter-brained +wife runs away with another man! It'll go on until the high-toned +Demorest, the last of those three little tin gods of Heavy Tree +Hill, will have to climb down, and will know what I feel and what +he's made me feel, and will wish himself in hell before he ever +made the big strike on Heavy Tree! That's me! You hear me! I'm +shoutin'! It'll last till then! It may be next week, next month, +next year. But it'll come. And when it does come you'll see me +and Eddy just waltzin' in and takin' the chief seats in the +synagogue! And you'll have a free pass to the show!" + +Either he was too intoxicated with his vengeful vision, or the +shadows of the room had deepened, but he did not see the quick +flush that had risen to his wife's face with this allusion to +Barker, nor the after-settling of her handsome features into a +dogged determination equal to his own. His blind fury against the +three partners did not touch her curiosity; she was only struck +with the evident depth of his emotion. He had never been a +braggart; his hostility had always been lazy and cynical. +Remembering this, she had a faint stirring of respect for the +undoubted courage and consciousness of strength shown in this wild +but single-handed crusade against wealth and power; rather, +perhaps, it seemed to her to condone her own weakness in her +youthful and inexplicable passion for him. No wonder she had +submitted. + +"Then you have nothing more to tell me?" she said after a pause, +rising and going towards the mantel. + +"You needn't light up for me," he returned, rising also. "I am +going. Unless," he added, with his coarse laugh, "you think it +wouldn't look well for Mrs. Horncastle to have been sitting in the +dark with--a stranger!" He paused as she contemptuously put down +the candlestick and threw the unlit match into the grate. "No, +I've nothing more to tell. He's a fancy-looking pup. You'd take +him for twenty-one, though he's only sixteen--clean-limbed and +perfect--but for one thing"-- He stopped. He met her quick look +of interrogation, however, with a lowering silence that, +nevertheless, changed again as he surveyed her erect figure by the +faint light of the window with a sardonic smile. "He favors you, I +think, and in all but one thing, too." + +"And that?" she queried coldly, as he seemed to hesitate. + +"He ain't ashamed of ME," he returned, with a laugh. + +The door closed behind him; she heard his heavy step descend the +creaking stairs; he was gone. She went to the window and threw it +open, as if to get rid of the atmosphere charged with his +presence,--a presence still so potent that she now knew that for +the last five minutes she had been, to her horror, struggling +against its magnetism. She even recoiled now at the thought of her +child, as if, in these new confidences over it, it had revived the +old intimacy in this link of their common flesh. She looked down +from her window on the square shoulders, thick throat, and crisp +matted hair of her husband as he vanished in the darkness, and drew +a breath of freedom,--a freedom not so much from him as from her +own weakness that he was bearing away with him into the exonerating +night. + +She shut the window and sank down in her chair again, but in the +encompassing and compassionate obscurity of the room. And this was +the man she had loved and for whom she had wrecked her young life! +Or WAS it love? and, if NOT, how was she better than he? Worse; +for he was more loyal to that passion that had brought them +together and its responsibilities than she was. She had suffered +the perils and pangs of maternity, and yet had only the mere animal +yearning for her offspring, while he had taken over the toil and +duty, and even the devotion, of parentage himself. But then she +remembered also how he had fascinated her--a simple schoolgirl--by +his sheer domineering strength, and how the objections of her +parents to this coarse and common man had forced her into a +clandestine intimacy that ended in her complete subjection to him. +She remembered the birth of an infant whose concealment from her +parents and friends was compassed by his low cunning; she +remembered the late atonement of marriage preferred by the man she +had already begun to loathe and fear, and who she now believed was +eager only for her inheritance. She remembered her abject +compliance through the greater fear of the world, the stormy scenes +that followed their ill-omened union, her final abandonment of her +husband, and the efforts of her friends and family who had rescued +the last of her property from him. She was glad she remembered it; +she dwelt upon it, upon his cruelty, his coarseness and vulgarity, +until she saw, as she honestly believed, the hidden springs of his +affection for their child. It was HIS child in nature, however it +might have favored her in looks; it was HIS own brutal SELF he was +worshiping in his brutal progeny. How else could it have ignored +HER--its own mother? She never doubted the truth of what he had +told her--she had seen it in his own triumphant eyes. And yet she +would have made a kind mother; she remembered with a smile and a +slight rising of color the affection of Barker's baby for her; she +remembered with a deepening of that color the thrill of satisfaction +she had felt in her husband's fulmination against Mrs. Barker, and, +more than all, she felt in his blind and foolish hatred of Barker +himself a delicious condonation of the strange feeling that had +sprung up in her heart for Barker's simple, straightforward nature. +How could HE understand, how could THEY understand (by the plural +she meant Mrs. Barker and Horncastle), a character so innately +noble. In her strange attraction towards him she had felt a +charming sense of what she believed was a superior and even matronly +protection; in the utter isolation of her life now--and with her +husband's foolish abuse of him ringing in her ears--it seemed a +sacred duty. She had lost a son. Providence had sent her an ideal +friend to replace him. And this was quite consistent, too, with a +faint smile that began to play about her mouth as she recalled some +instances of Barker's delightful and irresistible youthfulness. + +There was a clatter of hoofs and the sound of many voices from the +street. Mrs. Horncastle knew it was the down coach changing +horses; it would be off again in a few moments, and, no doubt, +bearing her husband away with it. A new feeling of relief came +over her as she at last heard the warning "All aboard!" and the +great vehicle clattered and rolled into the darkness, trailing its +burning lights across her walls and ceiling. But now she heard +steps on the staircase, a pause before her room, a whisper of +voices, the opening of the door, the rustle of a skirt, and a +little feminine cry of protest as a man apparently tried to follow +the figure into the room. "No, no! I tell you NO!" remonstrated +the woman's voice in a hurried whisper. "It won't do. Everybody +knows me here. You must not come in now. You must wait to be +announced by the servant. Hush! Go!" + +There was a slight struggle, the sound of a kiss, and the woman +succeeded in finally shutting the door. Then she walked slowly, +but with a certain familiarity towards the mantel, struck a match +and lit the candle. The light shone upon the bright eyes and +slightly flushed face of Mrs. Barker. But the motionless woman in +the chair had recognized her voice and the voice of her companion +at once. And then their eyes met. + +Mrs. Barker drew back, but did not utter a cry. Mrs. Horncastle, +with eyes even brighter than her companion's, smiled. The red +deepened in Mrs. Barker's cheek. + +"This is my room!" she said indignantly, with a sweeping gesture +around the walls. + +"I should judge so," said Mrs. Horncastle, following the gesture; +"but," she added quietly, "they put ME into it. It appears, +however, they did not expect you." + +Mrs. Barker saw her mistake. "No, no," she said apologetically, +"of course not." Then she added, with nervous volubility, sitting +down and tugging at her gloves, "You see, I just ran down from +Marysville to take a look at my father's old house on my way to +Hymettus. I hope I haven't disturbed you. Perhaps," she said, +with sudden eagerness, "you were asleep when I came in!" + +"No," said Mrs. Horncastle, "I was not sleeping nor dreaming. I +heard you come in." + +"Some of these men are such idiots," said Mrs. Barker, with a half- +hysterical laugh. "They seem to think if a woman accepts the least +courtesy from them they've a right to be familiar. But I fancy +that fellow was a little astonished when I shut the door in his +face." + +"I fancy he WAS," returned Mrs. Horncastle dryly. "But I shouldn't +call Mr. Van Loo an idiot. He has the reputation of being a +cautious business man." + +Mrs. Barker bit her lip. Her companion had been recognized. She +rose with a slight flirt of her skirt. "I suppose I must go and +get a room; there was nobody in the office when I came. Everything +is badly managed here since my father took away the best servants +to Hymettus." She moved with affected carelessness towards the +door, when Mrs. Horncastle, without rising from her seat, said:-- + +"Why not stay here?" + +Mrs. Barker brightened for a moment. "Oh," she said, with polite +deprecation, "I couldn't think of turning you out." + +"I don't intend you shall," said Mrs. Horncastle. "We will stay +here together until you go with me to Hymettus, or until Mr. Van +Loo leaves the hotel. He will hardly attempt to come in here again +if I remain." + +Mrs. Barker, with a half-laugh, sat down irresolutely. Mrs. +Horncastle gazed at her curiously; she was evidently a novice in +this sort of thing. But, strange to say,--and I leave the ethics +of this for the sex to settle,--the fact did not soften Mrs. +Horncastle's heart, nor in the least qualify her attitude towards +the younger woman. After an awkward pause Mrs. Barker rose again. +"Well, it's very good of you, and--and---I'll just run out and wash +my hands and get the dust off me, and come back." + +"No, Mrs. Barker," said Mrs. Horncastle, rising and approaching +her, "you will first wash your hands of this Mr. Van Loo, and get +some of the dust of the rendezvous off you before you do anything +else. You CAN do it by simply telling him, SHOULD YOU MEET HIM IN +THE HALL, that I was sitting here when he came in, and heard +EVERYTHING! Depend upon it, he won't trouble you again." + +But Mrs. Barker, though inexperienced in love, was a good fighter. +The best of the sex are. She dropped into the rocking-chair, and +began rocking backwards and forwards while still tugging at her +gloves, and said, in a gradually warming voice, "I certainly shall +not magnify Mr. Van Loo's silliness to that importance. And I have +yet to learn what you mean by talking about a rendezvous! And I +want to know," she continued, suddenly stopping her rocking and +tilting the rockers impertinently behind her, as, with her elbows +squared on the chair arms, she tilted her own face defiantly up +into Mrs. Horncastle's, "how a woman in your position--who doesn't +live with her husband--dares to talk to ME!" + +There was a lull before the storm. Mrs. Horncastle approached +nearer, and, laying her hand on the back of the chair, leaned over +her, and, with a white face and a metallic ring in her voice, said: +"It is just because I am a woman IN MY POSITION that I do! It is +because I don't live with my husband that I can tell you what it +will be when you no longer live with yours--which will be the +inevitable result of what you are now doing. It is because I WAS +in this position that the very man who is pursuing you, because he +thinks you are discontented with YOUR husband, once thought he +could pursue me because I had left MINE. You are here with him +alone, without the knowledge of your husband; call it folly, +caprice, vanity, or what you like, it can have but one end--to put +you in my place at last, to be considered the fair game afterwards +for any man who may succeed him. You can test him and the truth of +what I say by telling him now that I heard all." + +"Suppose he doesn't care what you have heard," said Mrs. Barker +sharply. "Suppose he says nobody would believe you, if 'telling' +is your game. Suppose he is a friend of my husband and he thinks +him a much better guardian of my reputation than a woman like you. +Suppose he should be the first one to tell my husband of the foul +slander invented by you!" + +For an instant Mrs. Horncastle was taken aback by the audacity of +the woman before her. She knew the simple confidence and boyish +trust of Barker in his wife in spite of their sometimes strained +relations, and she knew how difficult it would be to shake it. And +she had no idea of betraying Mrs. Barker's secret to him, though +she had made this scene in his interest. She had wished to save +Mrs. Barker from a compromising situation, even if there was a +certain vindictiveness in her exposing her to herself. Yet she +knew it was quite possible now, if Mrs. Barker had immediate access +to her husband, that she would convince him of her perfect +innocence. Nevertheless, she had still great confidence in Van +Loo's fear of scandal and his utter unmanliness. She knew he was +not in love with Mrs. Barker, and this puzzled her when she +considered the evident risk he was running now. Her face, however, +betrayed nothing. She drew back from Mrs. Barker, and, with an +indifferent and graceful gesture towards the door, said, as she +leaned against the mantel, "Go, then, and see this much-abused +gentleman, and then go together with him and make peace with your +husband--even on those terms. If I have saved you from the +consequences of your folly I shall be willing to bear even HIS +blame." + +"Whatever I do," said Mrs. Barker, rising hotly, "I shall not stay +here any longer to be insulted." She flounced out of the room and +swept down the staircase into the office. Here she found an +overworked clerk, and with crimson cheeks and flashing eyes wanted +to know why in her own father's hotel she had found her own +sitting-room engaged, and had been obliged to wait half an hour +before she could be shown into a decent apartment to remove her hat +and cloak in; and how it was that even the gentleman who had kindly +escorted her had evidently been unable to procure her any +assistance. She said this in a somewhat high voice, which might +have reached the ears of that gentleman had he been in the +vicinity. But he was not, and she was forced to meet the somewhat +dazed apologies of the clerk alone, and to accompany the +chambermaid to a room only a few paces distant from the one she had +quitted. Here she hastily removed her outer duster and hat, washed +her hands, and consulted her excited face in the mirror, with the +door ajar and an ear sensitively attuned to any step in the +corridor. But all this was effected so rapidly that she was at +last obliged to sit down in a chair near the half-opened door, and +wait. She waited five minutes--ten--but still no footstep. Then +she went out into the corridor and listened, and then, smoothing +her face, she slipped downstairs, past the door of that hateful +room, and reappeared before the clerk with a smiling but somewhat +pale and languid face. She had found the room very comfortable, +but it was doubtful whether she would stay over night or go on to +Hymettus. Had anybody been inquiring for her? She expected to +meet friends. No! And her escort--the gentleman who came with +her--was possibly in the billiard-room or the bar? + +"Oh no! He was gone," said the clerk. + +"Gone!" echoed Mrs. Barker. "Impossible! He was--he was here only +a moment ago." + +The clerk rang a bell sharply. The stableman appeared. + +"That tall, smooth-faced man, in a high hat, who came with the +lady," said the clerk severely and concisely,--"didn't you tell me +he was gone?" + +"Yes, sir," said the stableman. + +"Are you sure?" interrupted Mrs. Barker, with a dazzling smile +that, however, masked a sudden tightening round her heart. + +"Quite sure, miss," said the stableman, "for he was in the yard +when Steptoe came, after missing the coach. He wanted a buggy to +take him over to the Divide. We hadn't one, so he went over to the +other stables, and he didn't come back, so I reckon he's gone. I +remember it, because Steptoe came by a minute after he'd gone, in +another buggy, and as he was going to the Divide, too, I wondered +why the gentleman hadn't gone with him." + +"And he left no message for me? He said nothing?" asked Mrs. +Barker, quite breathless, but still smiling. + +"He said nothin' to me but 'Isn't that Steptoe over there?' when +Steptoe came in. And I remember he said it kinder suddent--as if +he was reminded o' suthin' he'd forgot; and then he asked for a +buggy. Ye see, miss," added the man, with a certain rough +consideration for her disappointment, "that's mebbe why he clean +forgot to leave a message." + +Mrs. Barker turned away, and ascended the stairs. Selfishness is +quick to recognize selfishness, and she saw in a flash the reason +of Van Loo's abandonment of her. Some fear of discovery had +alarmed him; perhaps Steptoe knew her husband; perhaps he had heard +of Mrs. Horncastle's possession of the sitting-room; perhaps--for +she had not seen him since their playful struggle at the door--he +had recognized the woman who was there, and the selfish coward had +run away. Yes; Mrs. Horncastle was right: she had been only a +miserable dupe. + +Her cheeks blazed as she entered the room she had just quitted, and +threw herself in a chair by the window. She bit her lip as she +remembered how for the last three months she had been slowly +yielding to Van Loo's cautious but insinuating solicitation, from a +flirtation in the San Francisco hotel to a clandestine meeting in +the street; from a ride in the suburbs to a supper in a fast +restaurant after the theatre. Other women did it who were +fashionable and rich, as Van Loo had pointed out to her. Other +fashionable women also gambled in stocks, and had their private +broker in a "Charley" or a "Jack." Why should not Mrs. Barker have +business with a "Paul" Van Loo, particularly as this fast craze +permitted secret meetings?--for business of this kind could not be +conducted in public, and permitted the fair gambler to call at +private offices without fear and without reproach. Mrs. Barker's +vanity, Mrs. Barker's love of ceremony and form, Mrs. Barker's +snobbishness, were flattered by the attentions of this polished +gentleman with a foreign name, which even had the flavor of +nobility, who never picked up her fan and handed it to her without +bowing, and always rose when she entered the room. Mrs. Barker's +scant schoolgirl knowledge was touched by this gentleman, who spoke +French fluently, and delicately explained to her the libretto of a +risky opera bouffe. And now she had finally yielded to a meeting +out of San Francisco--and an ostensible visit--still as a +speculator--to one or two mining districts--with HER BROKER. This +was the boldest of her steps--an original idea of the fashionable +Van Loo--which, no doubt, in time would become a craze, too. But +it was a long step--and there was a streak of rustic decorum in +Mrs. Barker's nature--the instinct that made Kitty Carter keep a +perfectly secluded and distinct sitting-room in the days when she +served her father's guests--that now had impelled her to make it a +proviso that the first step of her journey should be from her old +home in her father's hotel. It was this instinct of the proprieties +that had revived in her suddenly at the door of the old sitting-room. + +Then a new phase of the situation flashed upon her. It was hard +for her vanity to accept Van Loo's desertion as voluntary and +final. What if that hateful woman had lured him away by some trick +or artfully designed message? She was capable of such meanness to +insure the fulfillment of her prophecy. Or, more dreadful thought, +what if she had some hold on his affections--she had said that he +had pursued her; or, more infamous still, there were some secret +understanding between them, and that she--Mrs. Barker--was the dupe +of them both! What was she doing in the hotel at such a moment? +What was her story of going to Hymettus but a lie as transparent as +her own? The tortures of jealousy, which is as often the incentive +as it is the result of passion, began to rack her. She had +probably yet known no real passion for this man; but with the +thought of his abandoning her, and the conception of his +faithlessness, came the wish to hold and keep him that was +dangerously near it. What if he were even then in that room, the +room where she had said she would not stay to be insulted, and +they, thus secured against her intrusion, were laughing at her now? +She half rose at the thought, but a sound of a horse's hoofs in the +stable-yard arrested her. She ran to the window which gave upon +it, and, crouching down beside it, listened eagerly. The clatter +of hoofs ceased; the stableman was talking to some one; suddenly +she heard the stableman say, "Mrs. Barker is here." Her heart +leaped,--Van Loo had returned. + +But here the voice of the other man which she had not yet heard +arose for the first time clear and distinct. "Are you quite sure? +I didn't know she left San Francisco." + +The room reeled around her. The voice was George Barker's, her +husband! "Very well," he continued. "You needn't put up my horse +for the night. I may take her back a little later in the buggy." + +In another moment she had swept down the passage, and burst into +the other room. Mrs. Horncastle was sitting by the table with a +book in her hand. She started as the half-maddened woman closed +the door, locked it behind her, and cast herself on her knees at +her feet. + +"My husband is here," she gasped. "What shall I do? In heaven's +name help me!" + +"Is Van Loo still here?" said Mrs. Horncastle quickly. + +"No; gone. He went when I came." + +Mrs. Horncastle caught her hand and looked intently into her +frightened face. "Then what have you to fear from your husband?" +she said abruptly. + +"You don't understand. He didn't know I was here. He thought me +in San Francisco." + +"Does he know it now?" + +"Yes. I heard the stableman tell him. Couldn't you say I came +here with you; that we were here together; that it was just a +little freak of ours? Oh, do!" + +Mrs. Horncastle thought a moment. "Yes," she said, "we'll see him +here together." + +"Oh no! no!" said Mrs. Barker suddenly, clinging to her dress and +looking fearfully towards the door. "I couldn't, COULDN'T see him +now. Say I'm sick, tired out, gone to my room." + +"But you'll have to see him later," said Mrs. Horncastle wonderingly. + +"Yes, but he may go first. I heard him tell them not to put up his +horse." + +"Good!" said Mrs. Horncastle suddenly. "Go to your room and lock +the door, and I'll come to you later. Stop! Would Mr. Barker be +likely to disturb you if I told him you would like to be alone?" + +"No, he never does. I often tell him that." + +Mrs. Horncastle smiled faintly. "Come, quick, then," she said, +"for he may come HERE first." + +Opening the door she passed into the half-dark and empty hall. +"Now run!" She heard the quick rustle of Mrs. Barker's skirt die +away in the distance, the opening and shutting of a door--silence-- +and then turned back into her own room. + +She was none too soon. Presently she heard Barker's voice saying, +"Thank you, I can find the way," his still buoyant step on the +staircase, and then saw his brown curls rising above the railing. +The light streaming through the open door of the sitting room into +the half-lit hall had partially dazzled him, and, already +bewildered, he was still more dazzled at the unexpected apparition +of the smiling face and bright eyes of Mrs. Horncastle standing in +the doorway. + +"You have fairly caught us," she said, with charming composure; +"but I had half a mind to let you wander round the hotel a little +longer. Come in." Barker followed her in mechanically, and she +closed the door. "Now, sit down," she said gayly, "and tell me how +you knew we were here, and what you mean by surprising us at this +hour." + +Barker's ready color always rose on meeting Mrs. Horncastle, for +whom he entertained a respectful admiration, not without some fear +of her worldly superiority. He flushed, bowed, and stared somewhat +blankly around the room, at the familiar walls, at the chair from +which Mrs. Horncastle had just risen, and finally at his wife's +glove, which Mrs. Horncastle had a moment before ostentatiously +thrown on the table. Seeing which she pounced upon it with assumed +archness, and pretended to conceal it. + +"I had no idea my wife was here," he said at last, "and I was quite +surprised when the man told me, for she had not written to me about +it." As his face was brightening, she for the first time noticed +that his frank gray eyes had an abstracted look, and there was a +faint line of contraction on his youthful forehead. "Still less," +he added, "did I look for the pleasure of meeting you. For I only +came here to inquire about my old partner, Demorest, who arrived +from Europe a few days ago, and who should have reached Hymettus +early this afternoon. But now I hear he came all the way by coach +instead of by rail, and got off at the cross-road, and we must have +passed each other on the different trails. So my journey would +have gone for nothing, only that I now shall have the pleasure of +going back with you and Kitty. It will be a lovely drive by +moonlight." + +Relieved by this revelation, it was easy work for Mrs. Horncastle +to launch out into a playful, tantalizing, witty--but, I grieve to +say, entirely imaginative--account of her escapade with Mrs. +Barker. How, left alone at the San Francisco hotel while their +gentlemen friends were enjoying themselves at Hymettus, they +resolved upon a little trip, partly for the purpose of looking into +some small investments of their own, and partly for the fun of the +thing. What funny experiences they had! How, in particular, one +horrid inquisitive, vulgar wretch had been boring a European fellow +passenger who was going to Hymettus, finally asking him where he +had come from last, and when he answered "Hymettus," thought the +man was insulting him-- + +"But," interrupted the laughing Barker, "that passenger may have +been Demorest, who has just come from Greece, and surely Kitty +would have recognized him." + +Mrs. Horncastle instantly saw her blunder, and not only retrieved +it, but turned it to account. Ah, yes! but by that time poor +Kitty, unused to long journeys and the heat, was utterly fagged +out, was asleep, and perfectly unrecognizable in veils and dusters +on the back seat of the coach. And this brought her to the point-- +which was, that she was sorry to say, on arriving, the poor child +was nearly wild with a headache from fatigue and had gone to bed, +and she had promised not to disturb her. + +The undisguised amusement, mingled with relief, that had overspread +Barker's face during this lively recital might have pricked the +conscience of Mrs. Horncastle, but for some reason I fear it did +not. But it emboldened her to go on. "I said I promised her that +I would see she wasn't disturbed; but, of course, now that YOU, her +HUSBAND, have come, if"-- + +"Not for worlds," interrupted Barker earnestly. "I know poor +Kitty's headaches, and I never disturb her, poor child, except when +I'm thoughtless." And here one of the most thoughtful men in the +world in his sensitive consideration of others beamed at her with +such frank and wonderful eyes that the arch hypocrite before him +with difficulty suppressed a hysterical desire to laugh, and felt +the conscious blood flush her to the root of her hair. "You know," +he went on, with a sigh, half of relief and half of reminiscence, +"that I often think I'm a great bother to a clear-headed, sensible +girl like Kitty. She knows people so much better than I do. She's +wonderfully equipped for the world, and, you see, I'm only 'lucky,' +as everybody says, and I dare say part of my luck was to have got +her. I'm very glad she's a friend of yours, you know, for somehow +I fancied always that you were not interested in her, or that you +didn't understand each other until now. It's odd that nice women +don't always like nice women, isn't it? I'm glad she was with you; +I was quite startled to learn she was here, and couldn't make it +out. I thought at first she might have got anxious about our +little Sta, who is with me and the nurse at Hymettus. But I'm glad +it was only a lark. I shouldn't wonder," he added, with a laugh, +"although she always declares she isn't one of those 'doting, +idiotic mothers,' that she found it a little dull without the boy, +for all she thought it was better for ME to take him somewhere for +a change of air." + +The situation was becoming more difficult for Mrs. Horncastle than +she had conceived. There had been a certain excitement in its +first direct appeal to her tact and courage, and even, she +believed, an unselfish desire to save the relations between husband +and wife if she could. But she had not calculated upon his +unconscious revelations, nor upon their effect upon herself. She +had concluded to believe that Kitty had, in a moment of folly, lent +herself to this hare-brained escapade, but it now might be possible +that it had been deliberately planned. Kitty had sent her husband +and child away three weeks before. Had she told the whole truth? +How long had this been going on? And if the soulless Van Loo had +deserted her now, was it not, perhaps, the miserable ending of an +intrigue rather than its beginning? Had she been as great a dupe +of this woman as the husband before her? A new and double +consciousness came over her that for a moment prevented her from +meeting his honest eyes. She felt the shame of being an accomplice +mingled with a fierce joy at the idea of a climax that might +separate him from his wife forever. + +Luckily he did not notice it, but with a continued sense of relief +threw himself back in his chair, and glancing familiarly round the +walls broke into his youthful laugh. "Lord! how I remember this +room in the old days. It was Kitty's own private sitting-room, you +know, and I used to think it looked just as fresh and pretty as +she. I used to think her crayon drawing wonderful, and still more +wonderful that she should have that unnecessary talent when it was +quite enough for her to be just 'Kitty.' You know, don't you, how +you feel at those times when you're quite happy in being inferior"-- +He stopped a moment with a sudden recollection that Mrs. Horncastle's +marriage had been notoriously unhappy. "I mean," he went on with a +shy little laugh and an innocent attempt at gallantry which the very +directness of his simple nature made atrociously obvious,--"I mean +what you've made lots of young fellows feel. There used to be a +picture of Colonel Brigg on the mantelpiece, in full uniform, and +signed by himself 'for Kitty;' and Lord! how jealous I was of it, +for Kitty never took presents from gentlemen, and nobody even was +allowed in here, though she helped her father all over the hotel. +She was awfully strict in those days," he interpolated, with a +thoughtful look and a half-sigh; "but then she wasn't married. I +proposed to her in this very room! Lord! I remember how frightened +I was." He stopped for an instant, and then said with a certain +timidity, "Do you mind my telling you something about it?" + +Mrs. Horncastle was hardly prepared to hear these ingenuous +domestic details, but she smiled vaguely, although she could not +suppress a somewhat impatient movement with her hands. Even Barker +noticed it, but to her surprise moved a little nearer to her, and +in a half-entreating way said, "I hope I don't bore you, but it's +something confidential. Do you know that she first REFUSED me?" + +Mrs. Horncastle smiled, but could not resist a slight toss of her +head. "I believe they all do when they are sure of a man." + +"No!" said Barker eagerly, "you don't understand. I proposed to +her because I thought I was rich. In a foolish moment I thought I +had discovered that some old stocks I had had acquired a fabulous +value. She believed it, too, but because she thought I was now a +rich man and she only a poor girl--a mere servant to her father's +guests--she refused me. Refused me because she thought I might +regret it in the future, because she would not have it said that +she had taken advantage of my proposal only when I was rich enough +to make it." + +"Well?" said Mrs. Horncastle incredulously, gazing straight before +her; "and then?" + +"In about an hour I discovered my error, that my stocks were +worthless, that I was still a poor man. I thought it only honest +to return to her and tell her, even though I had no hope. And then +she pitied me, and cried, and accepted me. I tell it to you as her +friend." He drew a little nearer and quite fraternally laid his +hand upon her own. "I know you won't betray me, though you may +think it wrong for me to have told it; but I wanted you to know how +good she was and true." + +For a moment Mrs. Horncastle was amazed and discomfited, although +she saw, with the inscrutable instinct of her sex, no inconsistency +between the Kitty of those days and the Kitty now shamefully hiding +from her husband in the same hotel. No doubt Kitty had some good +reason for her chivalrous act. But she could see the unmistakable +effect of that act upon the more logically reasoning husband, and +that it might lead him to be more merciful to the later wrong. And +there was a keener irony that his first movement of unconscious +kindliness towards her was the outcome of his affection for his +undeserving wife. + +"You said just now she was more practical than you," she said +dryly. "Apart from this evidence of it, what other reasons have +you for thinking so? Do you refer to her independence or her +dealings in the stock market?" she added, with a laugh. + +"No," said Barker seriously, "for I do not think her quite +practical there; indeed, I'm afraid she is about as bad as I am. +But I'm glad you have spoken, for I can now talk confidentially +with you, and as you and she are both in the same ventures, perhaps +she will feel less compunction in hearing from you--as your own +opinion--what I have to tell you than if I spoke to her myself. I +am afraid she trusts implicitly to Van Loo's judgment as her +broker. I believe he is strictly honorable, but the general +opinion of his business insight is not high. They--perhaps I ought +to say HE--have been at least so unlucky that they might have +learned prudence. The loss of twenty thousand dollars in three +months"-- + +"Twenty thousand!" echoed Mrs. Horncastle. + +"Yes. Why, you knew that; it was in the mine you and she visited; +or, perhaps," he added hastily, as he flushed at his indiscretion, +"she didn't tell you that." + +But Mrs. Horncastle as hastily said, "Yes--yes--of course, only I +had forgotten the amount;" and he continued:-- + +"That loss would have frightened any man; but you women are more +daring. Only Van Loo ought to have withdrawn. Don't you think so? +Of course I couldn't say anything to him without seeming to condemn +my own wife; I couldn't say anything to HER because it's her own +money." + +"I didn't know that Mrs. Barker had any money of her own," said +Mrs. Horncastle. + +"Well, I gave it to her," said Barker, with sublime simplicity, +"and that would make it all the worse for me to speak about it." + +Mrs. Horncastle was silent. A new theory flashed upon her which +seemed to reconcile all the previous inconsistencies of the +situation. Van Loo, under the guise of a lover, was really +possessing himself of Mrs. Barker's money. This accounted for the +risks he was running in this escapade, which were so incongruous to +the rascal's nature. He was calculating that the scandal of an +intrigue would relieve him of the perils of criminal defalcation. +It was compatible with Kitty's innocence, though it did not relieve +her vanity of the part it played in this despicable comedy of +passion. All that Mrs. Horncastle thought of now was the effect of +its eventful revelation upon the man before her. Of course, he +would overlook his wife's trustfulness and business ignorance--it +would seem so like his own unselfish faith! That was the fault of +all unselfish goodness; it even took the color of adjacent evil, +without altering the nature of either. Mrs. Horncastle set her +teeth tightly together, but her beautiful mouth smiled upon Barker, +though her eyes were bent upon the tablecloth before her. + +"I shall do all I can to impress your views upon her," she said at +last, "though I fear they will have little weight if given as my +own. And you overrate my general influence with her." + +Her handsome head drooped in such a thoughtful humility that Barker +instinctively drew nearer to her. Besides, she had not lifted her +dark lashes for some moments, and he had the still youthful habit +of looking frankly into the eyes of those he addressed. + +"No," he said eagerly; "how could I? She could not help but love +you and do as you would wish. I can't tell you how glad and +relieved I am to find that you and she have become such friends. +You know I always thought you beautiful, I always thought you so +clever--I was even a little frightened of you; but I never until +now knew you were so GOOD. No, stop! Yes, I DID know it. Do you +remember once in San Francisco, when I found you with Sta in your +lap in the drawing-room? I knew it then. You tried to make me +think it was a whim--the fancy of a bored and worried woman. But I +knew better. And I knew what you were thinking then. Shall I tell +you?" + +As her eyes were still cast down, although her mouth was still +smiling, in his endeavors to look into them his face was quite near +hers. He fancied that it bore the look she had worn once before. + +"You were thinking," he said in a voice which had grown suddenly +quite hesitating and tremulous,--he did not know why,--"that the +poor little baby was quite friendless and alone. You were pitying +it--you know you were--because there was no one to give it the +loving care that was its due, and because it was intrusted to that +hired nurse in that great hotel. You were thinking how you would +love it if it were yours, and how cruel it was that Love was sent +without an object to waste itself upon. You were: I saw it in your +face." + +She suddenly lifted her eyes and looked full into his with a look +that held and possessed him. For a moment his whole soul seemed to +tremble on the verge of their lustrous depths, and he drew back +dizzy and frightened. What he saw there he never clearly knew; +but, whatever it was, it seemed to suddenly change his relations to +her, to the room, to his wife, to the world without. It was a +glimpse of a world of which he knew nothing. He had looked frankly +and admiringly into the eyes of other pretty women; he had even +gazed into her own before, but never with this feeling. A sudden +sense that what he had seen there he had himself evoked, that it +was an answer to some question he had scarcely yet formulated, and +that they were both now linked by an understanding and consciousness +that was irretrievable, came over him. He rose awkwardly and went +to the window. She rose also, but more leisurely and easily, moved +one of the books on the table, smoothed out her skirts, and changed +her seat to a little sofa. It is the woman who always comes out of +these crucial moments unruffled. + +"I suppose you will be glad to see your friend Mr. Demorest when +you go back," she said pleasantly; "for of course he will be at +Hymettus awaiting you." + +He turned eagerly, as he always did at the name. But even then he +felt that Demorest was no longer of such importance to him. He +felt, too, that he was not yet quite sure of his voice or even what +to say. As he hesitated she went on half playfully: "It seems hard +that you had to come all the way here on such a bootless errand. +You haven't even seen your wife yet." + +The mention of his wife recalled him to himself, oddly enough, when +Demorest's name had failed. But very differently. Out of his +whirling consciousness came the instinctive feeling that he could +not see her now. He turned, crossed the room, sat down on the sofa +beside Mrs. Horncastle, and without, however, looking at her, said, +with his eyes on the floor, "No; and I've been thinking that it's +hardly worth while to disturb her so early to-morrow as I should +have to go. So I think it's a good deal better to let her have a +good night's rest, remain here quietly with you to-morrow until the +stage leaves, and that both of you come over together. My horse is +still saddled, and I will be back at Hymettus before Demorest has +gone to bed." + +He was obliged to look up at her as he rose. Mrs. Horncastle was +sitting erect, beautiful and dazzling as even he had never seen her +before. For his resolution had suddenly lifted a great weight from +her shoulders,--the dangerous meeting of husband and wife the next +morning, and its results, whatever they might be, had been quietly +averted. She felt, too, a half-frightened joy even in the +constrained manner in which he had imparted his determination. +That frankness which even she had sometimes found so crushing was +gone. + +"I really think you are quite right," she said, rising also, "and, +besides, you see, it will give me a chance to talk to her as you +wished." + +"To talk to her as I wished?" echoed Barker abstractedly. + +"Yes, about Van Loo, you know," said Mrs. Horncastle, smiling. + +"Oh, certainly--about Van Loo, of course," he returned hurriedly. + +"And then," said Mrs. Horncastle brightly, "I'll tell her. Stay!" +she interrupted herself hurriedly. "Why need I say anything about +your having been here AT ALL? It might only annoy her, as you +yourself suggest." She stopped breathlessly with parted lips. + +"Why, indeed?" said Barker vaguely. Yet all this was so unlike his +usual truthfulness that he slightly hesitated. + +"Besides," continued Mrs. Horncastle, noticing it, "you know you +can always tell her later, if necessary." And she added with a +charming mischievousness, "As she didn't tell you she was coming, I +really don't see why you are bound to tell her that you were here." + +The sophistry pleased Barker, even though it put him into a certain +retaliating attitude towards his wife which he was not aware of +feeling. But, as Mrs. Horncastle put it, it was only a playful +attitude. + +"Certainly," he said. "Don't say anything about it." + +He moved to the door with his soft, broad-brimmed hat swinging +between his fingers. She noticed for the first time that he looked +taller in his long black serape and riding-boots, and, oddly +enough, much more like the hero of an amorous tryst than Van Loo. +"I know," she said brightly, "you are eager to get back to your old +friend, and it would be selfish for me to try to keep you longer. +You have had a stupid evening, but you have made it pleasant to me +by telling me what you thought of me. And before you go I want you +to believe that I shall try to keep that good opinion." She spoke +frankly in contrast to the slight worldly constraint of Barker's +manner; it seemed as if they had changed characters. And then she +extended her hand. + +With a low bow, and without looking up, he took it. Again their +pulses seemed to leap together with one accord and the same +mysterious understanding. He could not tell if he had unconsciously +pressed her hand or if she had returned the pressure. But when their +hands unclasped it seemed as if it were the division of one flesh +and spirit. + +She remained standing by the open door until his footsteps passed +down the staircase. Then she suddenly closed and locked the door +with an instinct that Mrs. Barker might at once return now that he +was gone, and she wished to be a moment alone to recover herself. +But she presently opened it again and listened. There was a noise +in the courtyard, but it sounded like the rattle of wheels more +than the clatter of a horseman. Then she was overcome--a sudden +sense of pity for the unfortunate woman still hiding from her +husband--and felt a momentary chivalrous exaltation of spirit. +Certainly she had done "good" to that wretched "Kitty;" perhaps she +had earned the epithet that Barker had applied to her. Perhaps +that was the meaning of all this happiness to her, and the result +was to be only the happiness and reconciliation of the wife and +husband. This was to be her reward. I grieve to say that the +tears had come into her beautiful eyes at this satisfactory +conclusion, but she dashed them away and ran out into the hall. It +was quite dark, but there was a faint glimmer on the opposite wall +as if the door of Mrs. Barker's bedroom were ajar to an eager +listener. She flew towards the glimmer, and pushed the door open: +the room was empty. Empty of Mrs. Barker, empty of her dressing- +box, her reticule and shawl. She was gone. + +Still, Mrs. Horncastle lingered; the woman might have got frightened +and retreated to some further room at the opening of the door and +the coming out of her husband. She walked along the passage, +calling her name softly. She even penetrated the dreary, half-lit +public parlor, expecting to find her crouching there. Then a sudden +wild idea took possession of her: the miserable wife had repented of +her act and of her concealment, and had crept downstairs to await +her husband in the office. She had told him some new lie, had +begged him to take her with him, and Barker, of course, had +assented. Yes, she now knew why she had heard the rattling wheels +instead of the clattering hoofs she had listened for. They had gone +together, as he first proposed, in the buggy. + +She ran swiftly down the stairs and entered the office. The +overworked clerk was busy and querulously curt. These women were +always asking such idiotic questions. Yes, Mr. Barker had just +gone. + +"With Mrs. Barker in the buggy?" asked Mrs. Horncastle. + +"No, as he came--on horseback. Mrs. Barker left HALF AN HOUR AGO." + +"Alone?" + +This was apparently too much for the long-suffering clerk. He +lifted his eyes to the ceiling, and then, with painful precision, +and accenting every word with his pencil on the desk before him, +said deliberately, "Mrs. George Barker--left--here--with her-- +escort--the--man she--was--always--asking--for--in--the--buggy--at +exactly--9.35." And he plunged into his work again. + +Mrs. Horncastle turned, ran up the staircase, re-entered the +sitting-room, and slamming the door behind her, halted in the +centre of the room, panting, erect, beautiful, and menacing. And +she was alone in this empty room--this deserted hotel. From this +very room her husband had left her with a brutality on his lips. +From this room the fool and liar she had tried to warn had gone to +her ruin with a swindling hypocrite. And from this room the only +man in the world she ever cared for had gone forth bewildered, +wronged, and abused, and she knew now she could have kept and +comforted him. + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +When Philip Demorest left the stagecoach at the cross-roads he +turned into the only wayside house, the blacksmith's shop, and, +declaring his intention of walking over to Hymettus, asked +permission to leave his hand-bag and wraps until they could be sent +after him. The blacksmith was surprised that this "likely +mannered," distinguished-looking "city man" should WALK eight miles +when he could ride, and tried to dissuade him, offering his own +buggy. But he was still more surprised when Demorest, laying aside +his duster, took off his coat, and, slinging it on his arm, +prepared to set forth with the good-humored assurance that he would +do the distance in a couple of hours and get in in time for supper. +"I wouldn't be too sure of that," said the blacksmith grimly, "or +even of getting a room. They're a stuck-up lot over there, and +they ain't goin' to hump themselves over a chap who comes traipsin' +along the road like any tramp, with nary baggage." But Demorest +laughingly accepted the risk, and taking his stout stick in one +hand, pressed a gold coin into the blacksmith's palm, which was, +however, declined with such reddening promptness that Demorest as +promptly reddened and apologized. The habits of European travel +had been still strong on him, and he felt a slight patriotic thrill +as he said, with a grave smile, "Thank you, then; and thank you +still more for reminding me that I am among my own 'people,'" and +stepped lightly out into the road. + +The air was still deliciously cool, but warmer currents from the +heated pines began to alternate with the wind from the summit. He +found himself sometimes walking through a stratum of hot air which +seemed to exhale from the wood itself, while his head and breast +were swept by the mountain breeze. He felt the old intoxication of +the balmy-scented air again, and the five years of care and +hopelessness laid upon his shoulders since he had last breathed its +fragrance slipped from them like a burden. There had been but +little change here; perhaps the road was wider and the dust lay +thicker, but the great pines still mounted in serried ranks on the +slopes as before, with no gaps in their unending files. Here was +the spot where the stagecoach had passed them that eventful morning +when they were coming out of their camp-life into the world of +civilization; a little further back, the spot where Jack Hamlin had +forced upon him that grim memento of the attempted robbery of their +cabin, which he had kept ever since. He half smiled again at the +superstitious interest that had made him keep it, with the +intention of some day returning to bury it, with all recollections +of the deed, under the site of the old cabin. As he went on in the +vivifying influence of the air and scene, new life seemed to course +through his veins; his step seemed to grow as elastic as in the old +days of their bitter but hopeful struggle for fortune, when he had +gayly returned from his weekly tramp to Boomville laden with the +scant provision procured by their scant earnings and dying credit. +Those were the days when HER living image still inspired his heart +with faith and hope; when everything was yet possible to youth and +love, and before the irony of fate had given him fortune with one +hand only to withdraw HER with the other. It was strange and cruel +that coming back from his quest of rest and forgetfulness he should +find only these youthful and sanguine dreams revive with his +reviving vigor. He walked on more hurriedly as if to escape them, +and was glad to be diverted by one or two carryalls and char-a- +bancs filled with gayly dressed pleasure parties--evidently +visitors to Hymettus--which passed him on the road. Here were the +first signs of change. He recalled the train of pack-mules of the +old days, the file of pole-and-basket carrying Chinese, the squaw +with the papoose strapped to her shoulder, or the wandering and +foot-sore prospector, who were the only wayfarers he used to meet. +He contrasted their halts and friendly greetings with the insolent +curiosity or undisguised contempt of the carriage folk, and smiled +as he thought of the warning of the blacksmith. But this did not +long divert him; he found himself again returning to his previous +thought. Indeed, the face of a young girl in one of the carriages +had quite startled him with its resemblance to an old memory of his +lost love as he saw her,--her frail, pale elegance encompassed in +laces as she leaned back in her drive through Fifth Avenue, with +eyes that lit up and became transfigured only as he passed. He +tried to think of his useless quest in search of her last resting- +place abroad; how he had been baffled by the opposition of her +surviving relations, already incensed by the thought that her +decline had been the effect of her hopeless passion. He tried to +recall the few frigid lines that reconveyed to him the last letter +he had sent her, with the announcement of her death and the hope +that "his persecutions" would now cease. A wild idea had sometimes +come to him out of the very insufficiency of his knowledge of this +climax, but he had always put it aside as a precursor of that +madness which might end his ceaseless thought. And now it was +returning to him, here, thousands of miles away from where she was +peacefully sleeping, and even filling him with the vigor of +youthful hope. + +The brief mountain twilight was giving way now to the radiance of +the rising moon. He endeavored to fix his thoughts upon his +partners who were to meet him at Hymettus after these long years of +separation. + +Hymettus! He recalled now the odd coincidence that he had +mischievously used as a gag to his questioning fellow traveler; but +now he had really come from a villa near Athens to find his old +house thus classically rechristened after it, and thought of it +with a gravity he had not felt before. He wondered who had named +it. There was no suggestion of the soft, sensuous elegance of the +land he had left in those great heroics of nature before him. +Those enormous trees were no woods for fauns or dryads; they had +their own godlike majesty of bulk and height, and as he at last +climbed the summit and saw the dark-helmeted head of Black Spur +before him, and beyond it the pallid, spiritual cloud of the +Sierras, he did not think of Olympus. Yet for a moment he was +startled, as he turned to the right, by the Doric-columned facade +of a temple painted by the moonbeams and framed in an opening of +the dark woods before him. It was not until he had reached it that +he saw that it was the new wooden post-office of Heavy Tree Hill. + +And now the buildings of the new settlement began to faintly +appear. But the obscurity of the shadow and the equally disturbing +unreality of the moonlight confused him in his attempts to +recognize the old landmarks. A broad and well-kept winding road +had taken the place of the old steep, but direct trail to his +cabin. He had walked for some moments in uncertainty, when a +sudden sweep of the road brought the full crest of the hill above +and before him, crowned with a tiara of lights, overtopping a long +base of flashing windows. That was all that was left of Heavy Tree +Hill. The old foreground of buckeye and odorous ceanothus was +gone. Even the great grove of pines behind it had vanished. + +There was already a stir of life in the road, and he could see +figures moving slowly along a kind of sterile, formal terrace +spread with a few dreary marble vases and plaster statues which had +replaced the natural slope and the great quartz buttresses of +outcrop that supported it. Presently he entered a gate, and soon +found himself in the carriage drive leading to the hotel veranda. +A number of fair promenaders were facing the keen mountain night +wind in wraps and furs. Demorest had replaced his coat, but his +boots were red with dust, and as he ascended the steps he could see +that he was eyed with some superciliousness by the guests and with +considerable suspicion by the servants. One of the latter was +approaching him with an insolent smile when a figure darted from +the vestibule, and, brushing the waiter aside, seized Demorest's +two hands in his and held him at arm's length. + +"Demorest, old man!" + +"Stacy, old chap!" + +"But where's your team? I've had all the spare hostlers and hall- +boys listening for you at the gate. And where's Barker? When he +found you'd given the dead-cut to the railroad--HIS railroad, you +know--he loped over to Boomville after you." + +Demorest briefly explained that he had walked by the old road and +probably missed him. But by this time the waiters, crushed by the +spectacle of this travel-worn stranger's affectionate reception by +the great financial magnate, were wildly applying their brushes and +handkerchiefs to his trousers and boots until Stacy again swept +them away. + +"Get off, all of you! Now, Phil, you come with me. The house is +full, but I've made the manager give you a lady's drawing-room +suite. When you telegraphed you'd meet us HERE there was no chance +to get anything else. It's really Mrs. Van Loo's family suite; but +they were sent for to go to Marysville yesterday, and so we'll run +you in for the night." + +"But"--protested Demorest. + +"Nonsense!" said Stacy, dragging him away. "We'll pay for it; and +I reckon the old lady won't object to taking her share of the +damage either, or she isn't Van Loo's mother. Come." + +Demorest felt himself hurried forward by the energetic Stacy, +preceded by the obsequious manager, through a corridor to a +handsomely furnished suite, into whose bathroom Stacy incontinently +thrust him. + +"There! Wash up; and by the time you're ready Barker ought to be +back, and we'll have supper. It's waiting for us in the other +room." + +"But how about Barker, the dear boy?" persisted Demorest, holding +open the door. "Tell me, is he well and happy?" + +"About as well as we all are," said Stacy quickly, yet with a +certain dry significance. "Never mind now; wait until you see +him." + +The door closed. When Demorest had finished washing, and wiped +away the last red stain of the mountain road, he found Stacy seated +by the window of the larger sitting-room. In the centre a table +was spread for supper. A bright fire of hickory logs burnt on a +marble hearth between two large windows that gave upon the distant +outline of Black Spur. As Stacy turned towards him, by the light +of the shaded lamp and flickering fire, Demorest had a good look at +the face of his old friend and partner. It was as keen and +energetic as ever, with perhaps an even more hawk-like activity +visible in the eye and nostril; but it was more thoughtful and +reticent in the lines of the mouth under the closely clipped beard +and mustache, and when he looked up, at first there were two deep +lines or furrows across his low broad forehead. Demorest fancied, +too, that there was a little of the old fighting look in his eye, +but it softened quickly as his friend approached, and he burst out +with his curt but honest single-syllabled laugh. "Ha! You look a +little less like a roving Apache than you did when you came. I +really thought the waiters were going to chuck you. And you ARE +tanned! Darned if you don't look like the profile stamped on a +Continental penny! But here's luck and a welcome back, old man!" + +Demorest passed his arm around the neck of his seated partner, and +grasping his upraised hand said, looking down with a smile, "And +now about Barker." + +"Oh, Parker, d--n him! He's the same unshakable, unchangeable, +ungrow-upable Barker! With the devil's own luck, too! Waltzing +into risks and waltzing out of 'em. With fads enough to put him in +the insane asylum if people did not prefer to keep him out of it to +help 'em. Always believing in everybody, until they actually +believe in themselves, and shake him! And he's got a wife that's +making a fool of herself, and I shouldn't wonder in time--of him!" + +Demorest pressed his hand over his partner's mouth. "Come, Jim! +You know you never really liked that marriage, simply because you +thought that old man Carter made a good thing of it. And you never +seem to have taken into consideration the happiness Barker got out +of it, for he DID love the girl. And he still is happy, is he +not?" he added quickly, as Stacy uttered a grunt. + +"As happy as a man can be who has his child here with a nurse while +his wife is gallivanting in San Francisco, and throwing her money-- +and Lord knows what else--away at the bidding of a smooth-tongued, +shady operator." + +"Does HE complain of it?" asked Demorest. + +"Not he; the fool trusts her!" said Stacy curtly. + +Demorest laughed. "That is happiness! Come, Jim! don't let us +begrudge him that. But I've heard that his affairs have again +prospered." + +"He built this railroad and this hotel. The bank owns both now. +He didn't care to keep money in them after they were a success; +said he wasn't an engineer nor a hotel-keeper, and drew it out to +find something new. But here he comes," he added, as a horseman +dashed into the drive before the hotel. "Question him yourself. +You know you and he always get along best without me." + +In another moment Barker had burst into the room, and in his first +tempestuous greeting of Demorest the latter saw little change in +his younger partner as he held him at arm's length to look at him. +"Why, Barker boy, you haven't got a bit older since the day when-- +you remember--you went over to Boomville to cash your bonds, and +then came back and burst upon us like this to tell us you were a +beggar." + +"Yes," laughed Barker, "and all the while you fellows were holding +four aces up your sleeve in the shape of the big strike." + +"And you, Georgy, old boy," returned Demorest, swinging Barker's +two hands backwards and forwards, "were holding a royal flush up +yours in the shape of your engagement to Kitty." + +The fresh color died out of Barker's cheek even while the frank +laugh was still on his mouth. He turned his face for a moment +towards the window, and a swift and almost involuntary glance +passed between the others. But he almost as quickly turned his +glistening eyes back to Demorest again, and said eagerly, "Yes, +dear Kitty! You shall see her and the baby to-morrow." + +Then they fell upon the supper with the appetites of the Past, and +for some moments they all talked eagerly and even noisily together, +all at the same time, with even the spirits of the Past. They +recalled every detail of their old life; eagerly and impetuously +recounted the old struggles, hopes, and disappointments, gave the +strange importance of schoolboys to unimportant events, and a +mystic meaning to a shibboleth of their own; roared over old jokes +with a delight they had never since given to new; reawakened +idiotic nicknames and bywords with intense enjoyment; grew grave, +anxious, and agonized over forgotten names, trifling dates, useless +distances, ineffective records, and feeble chronicles of their +domestic economy. It was the thoughtful and melancholy Demorest +who remembered the exact color and price paid for a certain shirt +bought from a Greaser peddler amidst the envy of his companions; it +was the financial magnate, Stacy, who could inform them what were +the exact days they had saleratus bread and when flapjacks; it was +the thoughtless and mercurial Barker who recalled with unheard-of +accuracy, amidst the applause of the others, the full name of the +Indian squaw who assisted at their washing. Even then they were +almost feverishly loath to leave the subject, as if the Past, at +least, was secure to them still, and they were even doubtful of +their own free and full accord in the Present. Then they slipped +rather reluctantly into their later experiences, but with scarcely +the same freedom or spontaneity; and it was noticeable that these +records were elicited from Barker by Stacy or from Stacy by Barker +for the information of Demorest, often with chaffing and only under +good-humored protest. "Tell Demorest how you broke the 'Copper +Ring,'" from the admiring Barker, or, "Tell Demorest how your d----d +foolishness in buying up the right and plant of the Ditch Company +got you control of the railroad," from the mischievous Stacy, were +challenges in point. Presently they left the table, and, to the +astonishment of the waiters who removed the cloth, common brier- +wood pipes, thoughtfully provided by Barker in commemoration of the +Past, were lit, and they ranged themselves in armchairs before the +fire quite unconsciously in their old attitudes. The two windows +on either side of the hearth gave them the same view that the open +door of the old cabin had made familiar to them, the league-long +valley below the shadowy bulk of the Black Spur rising in the +distance, and, still more remote, the pallid snow-line that soared +even beyond its crest. + +As in the old time, they were for many moments silent; and then, as +in the old time, it was the irrepressible Barker who broke the +silence. "But Stacy does not tell you anything about his friend, +the beautiful Mrs. Horncastle. You know he's the guardian of one +of the finest women in California--a woman as noble and generous as +she is handsome. And think of it! He's protecting her from her +brute of a husband, and looking after her property. Isn't it good +and chivalrous of him?" + +The irrepressible laughter of the two men brought only wonder and +reproachful indignation into the widely opened eyes of Barker. HE +was perfectly sincere. He had been thinking of Stacy's admiration +for Mrs. Horncastle in his ride from Boomville, and, strange to +say, yet characteristic of his nature, it was equally the natural +outcome of his interview with her and the singular effect she had +upon him. That he (Barker) thoroughly sympathized with her only +convinced him that Stacy must feel the same for her, and that, no +doubt, she must respond to him equally. And how noble it was in +his old partner, with his advantages of position in the world and +his protecting relations to her, not to avail himself of this +influence upon her generous nature. If he himself--a married man +and the husband of Kitty--was so conscious of her charm, how much +greater it must be to the free and INEXPERIENCED Stacy. + +The italics were in Barker's thought; for in those matters he felt +that Stacy and even Demorest, occupied in other things, had not his +knowledge. There was no idea or consciousness of heroically +sacrificing himself or Mrs. Horncastle in this. I am afraid there +was not even an idea of a superior morality in himself in giving up +the possibility of loving her. Ever since Stacy had first seen her +he had fancied that Stacy liked her,--indeed, Kitty fancied it, +too,--and it seemed almost providential now that he should know how +to assist his old partner to happiness. For it was inconceivable +that Stacy should not be able to rescue this woman from her +shameful bonds, or that she should not consent to it through his +(Barker's) arguments and entreaties. To a "champion of dames" this +seemed only right and proper. In his unfailing optimism he +translated Stacy's laugh as embarrassment and Demorest's as only +ignorance of the real question. But Demorest had noticed, if he +had not, that Stacy's laugh was a little nervously prolonged for a +man of his temperament, and that he had cast a very keen glance at +Barker. A messenger arriving with a telegram brought from +Boomville called Stacy momentarily away, and Barker was not slow to +take advantage of his absence. + +"I wish, Phil," he said, hitching his chair closer to Demorest, +"that you would think seriously of this matter, and try to persuade +Stacy--who, I believe, is more interested in Mrs. Horncastle than +he cares to show--to put a little of that determination in love +that he has shown in business. She's an awfully fine woman, and in +every way suited to him, and he is letting an absurd sense of pride +and honor keep him from influencing her to get rid of her +impossible husband. There's no reason," continued Barker in a +burst of enthusiastic simplicity, "that BECAUSE she has found some +one she likes better, and who would treat her better, that she +should continue to stick to that beast whom all California would +gladly see her divorced from. I never could understand that kind +of argument, could you?" + +Demorest looked at his companion's glowing cheek and kindling eye +with a smile. "A good deal depends upon the side from which you +argue. But, frankly, Barker boy, though I think I know you in all +your phases, I am not prepared yet to accept you as a match-maker! +However, I'll think it over, and find out something more of this +from your goddess, who seems to have bewitched you both. But what +does Mistress Kitty say to your admiration?" + +Barker's face clouded, but instantly brightened. "Oh, they're the +best of friends; they're quite like us, you know, even to larks +they have together." He stopped and colored at his slip. But +Demorest, who had noticed his change of expression, was more +concerned at the look of half incredulity and half suspicion with +which Stacy, who had re-entered the room in time to hear Barker's +speech, was regarding his unconscious younger partner. + +"I didn't know that Mrs. Horncastle and Mrs. Barker were such +friends," he said dryly as he sat down again. But his face +presently became so abstracted that Demorest said gayly:-- + +"Well, Jim, I'm glad I'm not a Napoleon of Finance! I couldn't +stand it to have my privacy or my relaxation broken in upon at any +moment, as yours was just now. What confounded somersault in +stocks has put that face on you?" + +Stacy looked up quickly with his brief laugh. "I'm afraid you'd be +none the wiser if I told you. That was a pony express messenger +from New York. You remember how Barker, that night of the strike, +when we were sitting together here, or very near here, proposed +that we ought to have a password or a symbol to call us together in +case of emergency, for each other's help? Well, let us say I have +two partners, one in Europe and one in New York. That was my +password." + +"And, I hope, no more serious than ours," added Demorest. + +Stacy laughed his short laugh. Nevertheless, the conversation +dragged again. The feverish gayety of the early part of the +evening was gone, and they seemed to be suffering from the +reaction. They fell into their old attitudes, looking from the +firelight to the distant bulk of Black Spur without a word. The +occasional sound of the voices of promenaders on the veranda at +last ceased; there was the noise of the shutting of heavy doors +below, and Barker rose. + +"You'll excuse me, boys; but I must go and say good-night to little +Sta, and see that he's all right. I haven't seen him since I got +back. But"--to Demorest--"you'll see him to-morrow, when Kitty +comes. It is as much as my life is worth to show him before she +certifies him as being presentable." He paused, and then added: +"Don't wait up, you fellows, for me; sometimes the little chap +won't let me go. It's as if he thought, now Kitty's away, I was +all he had. But I'll be up early in the morning and see you. I +dare say you and Stacy have a heap to say to each other on +business, and you won't miss me. So I'll say good-night." He +laughed lightly, pressed the hands of his partners in his usual +hearty fashion, and went out of the room, leaving the gloom a +little deeper than before. It was so unusual for Barker to be the +first to leave anybody or anything in trouble that they both +noticed it. "But for that," said Demorest, turning to Stacy as the +door closed, "I should say the dear fellow was absolutely +unchanged. But he seemed a little anxious to-night." + +"I shouldn't wonder. He's got two women on his mind,--as if one +was not enough." + +"I don't understand. You say his wife is foolish, and this other"-- + +"Never mind that now," interrupted Stacy, getting up and putting +down his pipe. "Let's talk a little business. That other stuff +will keep." + +"By all means," said Demorest, with a smile, settling down into his +chair a little wearily, however. "I forgot business. And I +forgot, my dear Jim, to congratulate you. I've heard all about +you, even in New York. You're the man who, according to everybody, +now holds the finances of the Pacific Slope in his hands. And," he +added, leaning affectionately towards his old partner, "I don't +know any one better equipped in honesty, straightforwardness, and +courage for such a responsibility than you." + +"I only wish," said Stacy, looking thoughtfully at Demorest, "that +I didn't hold nearly a million of your money included in the +finances of the Pacific Slope." + +"Why," said the smiling Demorest, "as long as I am satisfied?" + +"Because I am not. If you're satisfied, I'm a wretched idiot and +not fit for my position. Now, look here, Phil. When you wrote me +to sell out your shares in the Wheat Trust I was a little +staggered. I knew your gait, my boy, and I knew, too, that, while +you didn't know enough to trust your own opinions or feeling, you +knew too much to trust any one's opinion that wasn't first-class. +So I reckoned you had the straight tip; but I didn't see it. Now, +I ought not to have been staggered if I was fit for your confidence, +or, if I was staggered, I ought to have had enough confidence in +myself not to mind you. See?" + +"I admit your logic, old man," said Demorest, with an amused face, +"but I don't see your premises. WHEN did I tell you to sell out?" + +"Two days ago. You wrote just after you arrived." + +"I have never written to you since I arrived. I only telegraphed +to you to know where we should meet, and received your message to +come here." + +"You never wrote me from San Francisco?" + +"Never." + +Stacy looked concernedly at his friend. Was he in his right mind? +He had heard of cases where melancholy brooding on a fixed idea had +affected the memory. He took from his pocket a letter-case, and +selecting a letter handed it to Demorest without speaking. + +Demorest glanced at it, turned it over, read its contents, and in a +grave voice said, "There is something wrong here. It is like my +handwriting, but I never wrote the letter, nor has it been in my +hand before." + +Stacy sprang to his side. "Then it's a forgery!" + +"Wait a moment." Demorest, who, although very grave, was the more +collected of the two, went to a writing-desk, selected a sheet of +paper, and took up a pen. "Now," he said, "dictate that letter to +me." + +Stacy began, Demorest's pen rapidly following him:-- + +"DEAR JIM,--On receipt of this get rid of my Wheat Trust shares at +whatever figure you can. From the way things pointed in New York"-- + +"Stop!" interrupted Demorest. + +"Well?" said Stacy impatiently. + +"Now, my dear Jim," said Demorest plaintively, "when did you ever +know me to write such a sentence as 'the way things pointed'?" + +"Let me finish reading," said Stacy. This literary sensitiveness +at such a moment seemed little short of puerility to the man of +business. + +"From the way things pointed in New York," continued Stacy, "and +from private advices received, this seems to be the only prudent +course before the feathers begin to fly. Longing to see you again +and the dear old stamping-ground at Heavy Tree. Love to Barker. +Has the dear old boy been at any fresh crank lately? + +"Yours, PHIL DEMOREST." + +The dictation and copy finished together. Demorest laid the +freshly written sheet beside the letter Stacy had produced. They +were very much alike and yet quite distinct from each other. Only +the signature seemed identical. + +"That's the invariable mistake with the forger," said Demorest; "he +always forgets that signatures ought to be identical with the text +rather than with each other." + +But Stacy did not seem to hear this or require further proof. His +face was quite gray and his lips compressed until lost in his +closely set beard as he gazed fixedly out of the window. For the +first time, really concerned and touched, Demorest laid his hand +gently on his shoulder. + +"Tell me, Jim, how much does this mean to you apart from me? Don't +think of me." + +"I don't know yet," said Stacy slowly. "That's the trouble. And I +won't know until I know who's at the bottom of it. Does anybody +know of your affairs with me?" + +"No one." + +"No confidential friend, eh?" + +"None." + +"No one who has access to your secrets? No--no--woman? Excuse me, +Phil," he said, as a peculiar look passed over Demorest's face, +"but this is business." + +"No," he returned, with that gentleness that used to frighten them +in the old days, "it's ignorance. You fellows always say 'Cherchez +la femme' when you can't say anything else. Come now," he went on +more brightly, "look at the letter. Here's a man, commercially +educated, for he has used the usual business formulas, 'on receipt +of this,' and 'advices received,' which I won't merely say I don't +use, but which few but commercial men use. Next, here's a man who +uses slang, not only ineptly, but artificially, to give the letter +the easy, familiar turn it hasn't from beginning to end. I need +only say, my dear Stacy, that I don't write slang to you, but that +nobody who understands slang ever writes it in that way. And then +the knowledge of my opinion of Barker is such as might be gained +from the reading of my letters by a person who couldn't comprehend +my feelings. Now, let me play inquisitor for a few moments. Has +anybody access to my letters to YOU?" + +"No one. I keep them locked up in a cabinet. I only make +memorandums of your instructions, which I give to my clerks, but +never your letters." + +"But your clerks sometimes see you make memorandums from them?" + +"Yes, but none of them have the ability to do this sort of thing, +nor the opportunity of profiting by it." + +"Has any woman--now this is not retaliation, my dear Jim, for I +fancy I detect a woman's cleverness and a woman's stupidity in this +forgery--any access to your secrets or my letters? A woman's +villainy is always effective for the moment, but always defective +when probed." + +The look of scorn which passed over Stacy's face was quite as +distinct as Demorest's previous protest, as he said contemptuously, +"I'm not such a fool as to mix up petticoats with my business, +whatever I do." + +"Well, one thing more. I have told you that in my opinion the +forger has a commercial education or style, that he doesn't know me +nor Barker, and don't understand slang. Now, I have to add what +must have occurred to you, Jim, that the forger is either a coward, +or his object is not altogether mercenary: for the same ability +displayed in this letter would on the signature alone--had it been +on a check or draft--have drawn from your bank twenty times the +amount concerned. Now, what is the actual loss by this forgery?" + +"Very little; for you've got a good price for your stocks, +considering the depreciation in realizing suddenly on so large an +amount. I told my broker to sell slowly and in small quantities to +avoid a panic. But the real loss is the control of the stock." + +"But the amount I had was not enough to affect that," said Demorest. + +"No, but I was carrying a large amount myself, and together we +controlled the market, and now I have unloaded, too." + +"You sold out! and with your doubts?" said Demorest. + +"That's just it," said Stacy, looking steadily at his companion's +face, "because I HAD doubts, and it won't do for me to have them. +I ought either to have disobeyed your letter and kept your stock +and my own, or have done just what I did. I might have hedged on +my own stock, but I don't believe in hedging. There is no middle +course to a man in my business if he wants to keep at the top. No +great success, no great power, was ever created by it." + +Demorest smiled. "Yet you accept the alternative also, which is +ruin?" + +"Precisely," said Stacy. "When you returned the other day you were +bound to find me what I was or a beggar. But nothing between. +However," he added, "this has nothing to do with the forgery, or," +he smiled grimly, "everything to do with it. Hush! Barker is +coming." + +There was a quick step along the corridor approaching the room. +The next moment the door flew open to the bounding step and +laughing face of Barker. Whatever of thoughtfulness or despondency +he had carried from the room with him was completely gone. With +his amazing buoyancy and power of reaction he was there again in +his usual frank, cheerful simplicity. + +"I thought I'd come in and say goodnight," he began, with a laugh. +"I got Sta asleep after some high jinks we had together, and then I +reckoned it wasn't the square thing to leave just you two together, +the first night you came. And I remembered I had some business to +talk over, too, so I thought I'd chip in again and take a hand. +It's only the shank of the evening yet," he continued gayly, "and +we ought to sit up at least long enough to see the old snow-line +vanish, as we did in old times. But I say," he added suddenly, as +he glanced from the one to the other, "you've been having it pretty +strong already. Why, you both look as you did that night the +backwater of the South Fork came into our cabin. What's up?" + +"Nothing," said Demorest hastily, as he caught a glance of Stacy's +impatient face. "Only all business is serious, Barker boy, though +you don't seem to feel it so." + +"I reckon you're right there," said Barker, with a chuckle. +"People always laugh, of course, when I talk business, so it might +make it a little livelier for you and more of a change if I chipped +in now. Only I don't know which you'll do. Hand me a pipe. +Well," he continued, filling the pipe Demorest shoved towards him, +"you see, I was in Sacramento yesterday, and I went into Van Loo's +branch office, as I heard he was there, and I wanted to find out +something about Kitty's investments, which I don't think he's +managing exactly right. He wasn't there, however, but as I was +waiting I heard his clerks talk about a drop in the Wheat Trust, +and that there was a lot of it put upon the market. They seemed to +think that something had happened, and it was going down still +further. Now I knew it was your pet scheme, and that Phil had a +lot of shares in it, too, so I just slipped out and went to a +broker's and told him to buy all he could of it. And, by Jove! I +was a little taken aback when I found what I was in for, for +everybody seemed to have unloaded, and I found I hadn't money +enough to pay margins, but I knew that Demorest was here, and I +reckoned on his seeing me through." He stopped and colored, but +added hopefully, "I reckon I'm safe, anyway, for just as the thing +was over those same clerks of Van Loo's came bounding into the +office to buy up everything. And offered to take it off my hands +and pay the margins." + +"And you?" said both men eagerly, and in a breath. + +Barker stared at them, and reddened and paled by turns. "I held +on," he stammered. "You see, boys"-- + +Both men had caught him by the arms. "How much have you got?" they +said, shaking him as if to precipitate the answer. + +"It's a heap!" said Barker. "It's a ghastly lot now I think of it. +I'm afraid I'm in for fifty thousand, if a cent." + +To his infinite astonishment and delight he was alternately hugged +and tossed backwards and forwards between the two men quite in the +fashion of the old days. Breathless but laughing, he at length +gasped out, "What does it all mean?" + +"Tell him everything, Jim,--EVERYTHING," said Demorest quickly. + +Stacy briefly related the story of the forgery, and then laid the +letter and its copy before him. But Barker only read the forgery. + +"How could YOU, Stacy--one of the three partners of Heavy Tree--be +deceived! Don't you see it's Phil's handwriting--but it isn't +PHIL!" + +"But have you any idea WHO it is?" said Stacy. + +"Not me," said Barker, with widely opened eyes. "You see it must +be somebody whom we are familiar with. I can't imagine such a +scoundrel." + +"How did YOU know that Demorest had stock?" asked Stacy. + +"He told me in one of his letters and advised me to go into it. +But just then Kitty wanted money, I think, and I didn't go in." + +"I remember it," struck in Demorest. "But surely it was no secret. +My name would be on the transfer books for any one to see." + +"Not so," said Stacy quickly. "You were one of the original +shareholders; there was no transfer, and the books as well as the +shares of the company were in my hands." + +"And your clerks?" added Demorest. + +Stacy was silent. After a pause he asked, "Did anybody ever see +that letter, Barker?" + +"No one but myself and Kitty." + +"And would she be likely to talk of it?" continued Stacy. + +"Of course not. Why should she? Whom could she talk to?" Yet he +stopped suddenly, and then with his characteristic reaction added, +with a laugh, "Why no, certainly not." + +"Of course, everybody knew that you had bought the shares at +Sacramento?" + +"Yes. Why, you know I told you the Van Loo clerks came to me and +wanted to take it off my hands." + +"Yes, I remember; the Van Loo clerks; they knew it, of course," +said Stacy with a grim smile. "Well, boys," he said, with sudden +alacrity, "I'm going to turn in, for by sun-up to-morrow I must be +on my way to catch the first train at the Divide for 'Frisco. +We'll hunt this thing down together, for I reckon we're all +concerned in it," he added, looking at the others, "and once more +we're partners as in the old times. Let us even say that I've +given Barker's signal or password," he added, with a laugh, "and +we'll stick together. Barker boy," he went on, grasping his +younger partner's hand, "your instinct has saved us this time; +d----d if I don't sometimes think it better than any other man's +sabe; only," he dropped his voice slightly, "I wish you had it in +other things than FINANCE. Phil, I've a word to say to you alone +before I go. I may want you to follow me." + +"But what can I do?" said Barker eagerly. "You're not going to +leave me out." + +"You've done quite enough for us, old man," said Stacy, laying his +hand on Barker's shoulder. "And it may be for US to do something +for YOU. Trot off to bed now, like a good boy. I'll keep you +posted when the time comes." + +Shoving the protesting and leave-taking Barker with paternal +familiarity from the room, he closed the door and faced Demorest. + +"He's the best fellow in the world," said Stacy quietly, "and has +saved the situation; but we mustn't trust too much to him for the +present--not even seem to." + +"Nonsense, man!" said Demorest impatiently. "You're letting your +prejudices go too far. Do you mean to say that you suspect his +wife." + +"D--n his wife!" said Stacy almost savagely. "Leave her out of +this. It's Van Loo that I suspect. It was Van Loo who I knew was +behind it, who expected to profit by it, and now we have lost him." + +"But how?" said Demorest, astonished. + +"How?" repeated Stacy impatiently. "You know what Barker said? +Van Loo, either through stupidity, fright, or the wish to get the +lowest prices, was too late to buy up the market. If he had, we +might have openly declared the forgery, and if it was known that he +or his friends had profited by it, even if we could not have proven +his actual complicity, we could at least have made it too hot for +him in California. But," said Stacy, looking intently at his +friend, "do you know how the case stands now?" + +"Well," said Demorest, a little uneasily under his friend's keen +eyes, "we've lost that chance, but we've kept control of the +stock." + +"You think so? Well, let me tell you how the case stands and the +price we pay for it," said Stacy deliberately, as he folded his +arms and gazed at Demorest. "You and I, well known as old friends +and former partners, for no apparent reason--for we cannot prove +the forgery now--have thrown upon the market all our stock, with +the usual effect of depreciating it. Another old friend and former +partner has bought it in and sent up the price. A common trick, a +vulgar trick, but not a trick worthy of James Stacy or Stacy's +Bank!" + +"But why not simply declare the forgery without making any specific +charge against Van Loo?" + +"Do you imagine, Phil, that any man would believe it, and the story +of a providentially appointed friend like Barker who saved us from +loss? Why, all California, from Cape Mendocino to Los Angeles, +would roar with laughter over it! No! We must swallow it and the +reputation of 'jockeying' with the Wheat Trust, too. That Trust's +as good as done for, for the present! Now you know why I didn't +want poor Barker to know it, nor have much to do with our search +for the forger." + +"It would break the dear fellow's heart if he knew it," said +Demorest. + +"Well, it's to save him from having his heart broken further that I +intend to find out this forger," said Stacy grimly. "Good-night, +Phil! I'll telegraph to you when I want you, and then COME!" + +With another grip of the hand he left Demorest to his thoughts. In +the first excitement of meeting his old partners, and in the later +discovery of the forgery, Demorest had been diverted from his old +sorrow, and for the time had forgotten it in sympathetic interest +with the present. But, to his horror, when alone again, he found +that interest growing as remote and vapid as the stories they had +laughed over at the table, and even the excitement of the forged +letter and its consequences began to be as unreal, as impotent, as +shadowy, as the memory of the attempted robbery in the old cabin on +that very spot. He was ashamed of that selfishness which still +made him cling to this past, so much his own, that he knew it +debarred him from the human sympathy of his comrades. And even +Barker, in whose courtship and marriage he had tried to resuscitate +his youthful emotions and condone his selfish errors--even the +suggestion of his unhappiness only touched him vaguely. He would +no longer be a slave to the Past, or the memory that had deluded +him a few hours ago. He walked to the window; alas, there was the +same prospect that had looked upon his dreams, had lent itself to +his old visions. There was the eternal outline of the hills; there +rose the steadfast pines; there was no change in THEM. It was this +surrounding constancy of nature that had affected him. He turned +away and entered the bedroom. Here he suddenly remembered that the +mother of this vague enemy, Van Loo,--for his feeling towards him +was still vague, as few men really hate the personality they don't +know,--had only momentarily vacated it, and to his distaste of his +own intrusion was now added the profound irony of his sleeping in +the same bed lately occupied by the mother of the man who was +suspected of having forged his name. He smiled faintly and looked +around the apartment. It was handsomely furnished, and although it +still had much of the characterlessness of the hotel room, it was +distinctly flavored by its last occupant, and still brightened by +that mysterious instinct of the sex which is inevitable. Where a +man would have simply left his forgotten slippers or collars there +was a glass of still unfaded flowers; the cold marble top of the +dressing-table was littered with a few linen and silk toilet +covers; and on the mantel-shelf was a sheaf of photographs. He +walked towards them mechanically, glanced at them abstractedly, and +then stopped suddenly with a beating heart. Before him was the +picture of his past, the photograph of the one woman who had filled +his life! + +He cast a hurried glance around the room as if he half expected to +see the original start up before him, and then eagerly seized it +and hurried with it to the light. Yes! yes! It was SHE,--she as +she had lived in his actual memory; she as she had lived in his +dream. He saw her sweet eyes, but the frightened, innocent trouble +had passed from them; there was the sensitive elegance of her +graceful figure in evening dress; but the figure was fuller and +maturer. Could he be mistaken by some wonderful resemblance acting +upon his too willing brain? He turned the photograph over. No; +there on the other side, written in her own childlike hand, +endeared and familiar to his recollection, was her own name, and +the date! It was surely she! + +How did it come there? Did the Van Loos know her? It was taken in +Venice; there was the address of the photographers. The Van Loos +were foreigners, he remembered; they had traveled; perhaps had met +her there in 1858: that was the date in her handwriting; that was +the date on the photographer's address--1858. Suddenly he laid the +photograph down, took with trembling fingers a letter-case from his +pocket, opened it, and laid his last letter to her, indorsed with +the cruel announcement of her death, before him on the table. He +passed his hand across his forehead and opened the letter. It was +dated 1856! The photograph must have been taken two years AFTER +her alleged death! + +He examined it again eagerly, fixedly, tremblingly. A wild impulse +to summon Barker or Stacy on the spot was restrained with +difficulty and only when he remembered that they could not help +him. Then he began to oscillate between a joy and a new fear, +which now, for the first time, began to dawn upon him. If the news +of her death had been a fiendish trick of her relations, why had +SHE never sought him? It was not ill health, restraint, nor fear; +there was nothing but happiness and the strength of youth and +beauty in that face and figure. HE had not disappeared from the +world; he was known of men; more, his memorable good fortune must +have reached her ears. Had he wasted all these miserable years to +find himself abandoned, forgotten, perhaps even a dupe? For the +first time the sting of jealousy entered his soul. Perhaps, +unconsciously to himself, his strange and varying feelings that +afternoon had been the gathering climax of his mental condition; at +all events, in the sudden revulsion there was a shaking off of his +apathetic thought; there was activity, even if it was the activity +of pain. Here was a mystery to be solved, a secret to be +discovered, a past wrong to be exposed, an enemy or, perhaps, even +a faithless love to be punished. Perhaps he had even saved his +reason at the expense of his love. He quickly replaced the +photograph on the mantel-shelf, returned the letter carefully to +his pocket-book,--no longer a souvenir of the past, but a proof of +treachery,--and began to mechanically undress himself. He was +quite calm now, and went to bed with a strange sense of relief, and +slept as he had not slept since he was a boy. + +The whole hotel had sunk to rest by this time, and then began the +usual slow, nightly invasion and investment of it by nature. For +all its broad verandas and glaring terraces, its long ranges of +windows and glittering crest of cupola and tower, it gradually +succumbed to the more potent influences around it, and became their +sport and playground. The mountain breezes from the distant summit +swept down upon its flimsy structure, shook the great glass windows +as with a strong hand, and sent the balm of bay and spruce through +every chink and cranny. In the great hall and corridors the +carpets billowed with the intruding blast along the floors; there +was the murmur of the pines in the passages, and the damp odor of +leaves in the dining-room. There was the cry of night birds in the +creaking cupola, and the swift rush of dark wings past bedroom +windows. Lissome shapes crept along the terraces between the +stolid wooden statues, or, bolder, scampered the whole length of +the great veranda. In the lulling of the wind the breath of the +woods was everywhere; even the aroma of swelling sap--as if the +ghastly stumps on the deforested slope behind the hotel were +bleeding afresh in the dewless night--stung the eyes and nostrils +of the sleepers. + +It was, perhaps, from such cause as this that Barker was awakened +suddenly by the voice of the boy from the crib beside him, crying, +"Mamma! mamma!" Taking the child in his arms, he comforted him, +saying she would come that morning, and showed him the faint dawn +already veiling with color the ghostly pallor of the Sierras. As +they looked at it a great star shot forth from its brethren and +fell. It did not fall perpendicularly, but seemed for some seconds +to slip along the slopes of Black Spur, gleaming through the trees +like a chariot of fire. It pleased the child to say that it was +the light of mamma's buggy that was fetching her home, and it +pleased the father to encourage the boy's fancy. And talking thus +in confidential whispers they fell asleep once more, the father-- +himself a child in so many things--holding the smaller and frailer +hand in his. + +They did not know that on the other side of the Divide the wife and +mother, scared, doubting, and desperate, by the side of her scared, +doubting, and desperate accomplice, was flying down the slope on +her night-long road to ruin. Still less did they know that, with +the early singing birds, a careless horseman, emerging from the +trail as the dust-stained buggy dashed past him, glanced at it with +a puzzled air, uttered a quiet whistle of surprise, and then, +wheeling his horse, gayly cantered after it. + + +CHAPTER V. + + +In the exercise of his arduous profession, Jack Hamlin had sat up +all night in the magnolia saloon of the Divide, and as it was +rather early to go to bed, he had, after his usual habit, shaken +off the sedentary attitude and prepared himself for sleep by a +fierce preliminary gallop in the woods. Besides, he had been a +large winner, and on those occasions he generally isolated himself +from his companions to avoid foolish altercations with inexperienced +players. Even in fighting Jack was fastidious, and did not like to +have his stomach for a real difficulty distended and vitiated by +small preliminary indulgences. + +He was just emerging from the wood into the highroad when a buggy +dashed past him, containing a man and a woman. The woman wore a +thick veil; the man was almost undistinguishable from dust. The +glimpse was momentary, but dislike has a keen eye, and in that +glimpse Mr. Hamlin recognized Van Loo. The situation was equally +clear. The bent heads and averted faces, the dust collected in the +heedlessness of haste, the early hour,--indicating a night-long +flight,--all made it plain to him that Van Loo was running away +with some woman. Mr. Hamlin had no moral scruples, but he had the +ethics of a sportsman, which he knew Mr. Van Loo was not. Whether +the woman was an innocent schoolgirl or an actress, he was +satisfied that Van Loo was doing a mean thing meanly. Mr. Hamlin +also had a taste for mischief, and whether the woman was or was not +fair game, he knew that for HIS purposes Van Loo was. With the +greatest cheerfulness in the world he wheeled his horse and +cantered after them. + +They were evidently making for the Divide and a fresh horse, or to +take the coach due an hour later. It was Mr. Hamlin's present +object to circumvent this, and, therefore, it was quite in his way +to return. Incidentally, however, the superior speed of his horse +gave him the opportunity of frequently lunging towards them at a +furious pace, which had the effect of frantically increasing their +own speed, when he would pull up with a silent laugh before he was +fairly discovered, and allow the sound of his rapid horse's hoofs +to die out. In this way he amused himself until the straggling +town of the Divide came in sight, when, putting his spurs to his +horse again, he managed, under pretense of the animal becoming +ungovernable, to twice "cross the bows" of the fugitives, +compelling them to slacken speed. At the second of these passages +Van Loo apparently lost prudence, and slashing out with his whip, +the lash caught slightly on the counter of Hamlin's horse. Mr. +Hamlin instantly acknowledged it by lifting his hat gravely, and +speeded on to the hotel, arriving at the steps and throwing himself +from the saddle exactly as the buggy drove up. With characteristic +audacity, he actually assisted the frightened and eager woman to +alight and run into the hotel. But in this action her veil was +accidentally lifted. Mr. Hamlin instantly recognized the pretty +woman who had been pointed out to him in San Francisco as Mrs. +Barker, the wife of one of the partners whose fortunes had +interested him five years ago. It struck him that this was an +additional reason for his interference on Barker's account, +although personally he could not conceive why a man should ever try +to prevent a woman from running away from him. But then Mr. +Hamlin's personal experiences had been quite the other way. + +It was enough, however, to cause him to lay his hand lightly on Van +Loo's arm as the latter, leaping down, was about to follow Mrs. +Barker into the hotel. "You'll have time enough now," said Hamlin. + +"Time for what?" said Van Loo savagely. + +"Time to apologize for having cut my horse with your whip," said +Jack sweetly. "We don't want to quarrel before a woman." + +"I've no time for fooling!" said Van Loo, endeavoring to pass. + +But Jack's hand had slipped to Van Loo's wrist, although he still +smiled cheerfully. "Ah! Then you DID mean it, and you propose to +give me satisfaction?" + +Van Loo paled slightly; he knew Jack's reputation as a duelist. +But he was desperate. "You see my position," he said hurriedly. +"I'm in a hurry; I have a lady with me. No man of honor"-- + +"You do me wrong," interrupted Jack, with a pained expression,-- +"you do, indeed. You are in a hurry--well, I have plenty of time. +If you cannot attend to me now, why I will be glad to accompany you +and the lady to the next station. Of course," he added, with a +smile, "at a proper distance, and without interfering with the +lady, whom I am pleased to recognize as the wife of an old friend. +It would be more sociable, perhaps, if we had some general +conversation on the road; it would prevent her being alarmed. I +might even be of some use to YOU. If we are overtaken by her +husband on the road, for instance, I should certainly claim the +right to have the first shot at you. Boy!" he called to the +hostler, "just sponge out Pancho's mouth, will you, to be ready +when the buggy goes?" And, loosening his grip of Van Loo's wrist, +he turned away as the other quickly entered the hotel. + +But Mr. Van Loo did not immediately seek Mrs. Barker. He had +already some experience of that lady's nerves and irascibility on +the drive, and had begun to see his error in taking so dangerous an +impediment to his flight from the country. And another idea had +come to him. He had already effected his purpose of compromising +her with him in that flight, but it was still known only to few. +If he left her behind for the foolish, doting husband, would not +that devoted man take her back to avoid a scandal, and even forbear +to pursue HIM for his financial irregularities? What were twenty +thousand dollars of Mrs. Barker's money to the scandal of Mrs. +Barker's elopement? Again, the failure to realize the forgery had +left him safe, and Barker was sufficiently potent with the bank and +Demorest to hush up that also. Hamlin was now the only obstacle to +his flight; but even he would scarcely pursue HIM if Mrs. Barker +were left behind. And it would be easier to elude him if he did. + +In his preoccupation Van Loo did not see that he had entered the +bar-room, but, finding himself there, he moved towards the bar; a +glass of spirits would revive him. As he drank it he saw that the +room was full of rough men, apparently miners or packers--some of +them Mexican, with here and there a Kanaka or Australian. Two men +more ostentatiously clad, though apparently on equal terms with the +others, were standing in the corner with their backs towards him. +From the general silence as he entered he imagined that he had been +the subject of conversation, and that his altercation with Hamlin +had been overheard. Suddenly one of the two men turned and +approached him. To his consternation he recognized Steptoe,-- +Steptoe, whom he had not seen for five years until last night, when +he had avoided him in the courtyard of the Boomville Hotel. His +first instinct was to retreat, but it was too late. And the +spirits had warmed him into temporary recklessness. + +"You ain't goin' to be backed down by a short-card gambler, are +yer?" said Steptoe, with coarse familiarity. + +"I have a lady with me, and am pressed for time," said Van Loo +quickly. "He knows it, otherwise he would not have dared"-- + +"Well, look here," said Steptoe roughly. "I ain't particularly +sweet on you, as you know; but I and these gentlemen," he added, +glancing around the room, "ain't particularly sweet on Mr. Jack +Hamlin neither, and we kalkilate to stand by you if you say so. +Now, I reckon you want to get away with the woman, and the quicker +the better, as you're afraid there'll be somebody after you afore +long. That's the way it pans out, don't it? Well, when you're +ready to go, and you just tip us the wink, we'll get in a circle +round Jack and cover him, and if he starts after you we'll send him +on a little longer journey!--eh, boys?" + +The men muttered their approval, and one or two drew their +revolvers from their belts. Van Loo's heart, which had leaped at +first at this proposal of help, sank at this failure of his little +plan of abandoning Mrs. Barker. He hesitated, and then stammered, +"Thank you! Haste is everything with us now; but I shouldn't mind +leaving the lady among CHIVALROUS GENTLEMEN like yourselves for a +few hours only, until I could communicate with my friends and +return to properly chastise this scoundrel." + +Steptoe drew in his breath with a slight whistle, and gazed at Van +Loo. He instantly understood him. But the plea did not suit +Steptoe, who, for purposes of his own, wished to put Mrs. Barker +beyond her husband's possible reach. He smiled grimly. "I think +you'd better take the woman with you," he said. "I don't think," +he added in a lower voice, "that the boys would like your leaving +her. They're very high-toned, they are!" he concluded ironically. + +"Then," said Van Loo, with another desperate idea, "could you not +let us have saddle-horses instead of the buggy? We could travel +faster, and in the event of pursuit and anything happening to ME," +he added loftily, "SHE at least could escape her pursuer's +vengeance." + +This suited Steptoe equally well, as long as the guilty couple fled +TOGETHER, and in the presence of witnesses. But he was not +deceived by Van Loo's heroic suggestion of self-sacrifice. "Quite +right," he said sarcastically, "it shall be done, and I've no doubt +ONE of you will escape. I'll send the horses round to the back +door and keep the buggy in front. That will keep Jack there, TOO,-- +with the boys handy." + +But Mr. Hamlin had quite as accurate an idea of Mr. Van Loo's +methods and of his OWN standing with Steptoe's gang of roughs as +Mr. Steptoe himself. More than that, he also had a hold on a +smaller but more devoted and loyal following than Steptoe's. The +employees and hostlers of the hotel worshiped him. A single word +of inquiry revealed to him the fact that the buggy was NOT going +on, but that Mr. Van Loo and Mrs. Barker WERE--on two horses, a +temporary side-saddle having been constructed out of a mule's pack- +tree. At which Mr. Hamlin, with his usual audacity, walked into +the bar-room, and going to the bar leaned carelessly against it. +Then turning to the lowering faces around him, he said, with a +flash of his white teeth, "Well, boys, I'm calculating to leave the +Divide in a few minutes to follow some friends in the buggy, and it +seems to me only the square thing to stand the liquor for the +crowd, without prejudice to any feeling or roughness there may be +against me. Everybody who knows me knows that I'm generally there +when the band plays, and I'm pretty sure to turn up for THAT sort +of thing. So you'll just consider that I've had a good game on the +Divide, and I'm reckoning it's only fair to leave a little of it +behind me here, to 'sweeten the pot' until I call again. I only +ask you, gentlemen, to drink success to my friends in the buggy as +early and as often as you can." He flung two gold pieces on the +counter and paused, smiling. + +He was right in his conjecture. Even the men who would have +willingly "held him up" a moment after, at the bidding of Steptoe, +saw no reason for declining a free drink "without prejudice." And +it was a part of the irony of the situation that Steptoe and Van +Loo were also obliged to participate to keep in with their +partisans. It was, however, an opportune diversion to Van Loo, who +managed to get nearer the door leading to the back entrance of the +hotel, and to Mr. Jack Hamlin, who was watching him, as the men +closed up to the bar. + +The toast was drunk with acclamation, followed by another and yet +another. Steptoe and Van Loo, who had kept their heads cool, were +both wondering if Hamlin's intention were to intoxicate and +incapacitate the crowd at the crucial moment, and Steptoe smiled +grimly over his superior knowledge of their alcoholic capacity. +But suddenly there was the greater diversion of a shout from the +road, the on-coming of a cloud of red dust, and the halt of another +vehicle before the door. This time it was no jaded single horse +and dust-stained buggy, but a double team of four spirited +trotters, whose coats were scarcely turned with foam, before a +light station wagon containing a single man. But that man was +instantly recognized by every one of the outside loungers and +stable-boys as well as the staring crowd within the saloon. It was +James Stacy, the millionaire and banker. No one but himself knew +that he had covered half the distance of a night-long ride from +Boomville in two hours. But before they could voice their +astonishment Stacy had thrown a letter to the obsequious landlord, +and then gathering up the reins had sped away to the railroad +station half a mile distant. + +"Looks as if the Boss of Creation was in a hurry," said one of the +eager gazers in the doorway. "Somebody goin' to get smashed, +sure." + +"More like as if he was just humpin' himself to keep from getting +smashed," said Steptoe. "The bank hasn't got over the effect of +their smart deal in the Wheat Trust. Everything they had in their +hands tumbled yesterday in Sacramento. Men like me and you ain't +goin' to trust their money to be 'jockeyed' with in that style. +Nobody but a man with a swelled head like Stacy would have even +dared to try it on. And now, by G-d! he's got to pay for it." + +The harsh, exultant tone of the speaker showed that he had quite +forgotten Van Loo and Hamlin in his superior hatred of the +millionaire, and both men noticed it. Van Loo edged still nearer +to the door, as Steptoe continued, "Ever since he made that big +strike on Heavy Tree five years ago, the country hasn't been big +enough to hold him. But mark my words, gentlemen, the time ain't +far off when he'll find a two-foot ditch again and a pick and grub +wages room enough and to spare for him and his kind of cattle." + +"You're not drinking," said Jack Hamlin cheerfully. + +Steptoe turned towards the bar, and then started. "Where's Van +Loo?" he demanded of Jack sharply. + +Jack jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "Gone to hurry up his +girl, I reckon. I calculate he ain't got much time to fool away +here." + +Steptoe glanced suspiciously at Jack. But at the same moment they +were all startled--even Jack himself--at the apparition of Mrs. +Barker passing hurriedly along the veranda before the windows in +the direction of the still waiting buggy. "D--n it!" said Steptoe +in a fierce whisper to the man next him. "Tell her not THERE--at +the back door!" But before the messenger reached the door there +was a sudden rattle of wheels, and with one accord all except +Hamlin rushed to the veranda, only to see Mrs. Barker driving +rapidly away alone. Steptoe turned back into the room, but Jack +also had disappeared. + +For in the confusion created at the sight of Mrs. Barker, he had +slipped to the back door and found, as he suspected, only one +horse, and that with a side-saddle on. His intuitions were right. +Van Loo, when he disappeared from the saloon, had instantly fled, +taking the other horse and abandoning the woman to her fate. Jack +as instantly leaped upon the remaining saddle and dashed after him. +Presently he caught a glimpse of the fugitive in the distance, +heard the half-angry, half-ironical shouts of the crowd at the back +door, and as he reached the hilltop saw, with a mingling of +satisfaction and perplexity, Mrs. Barker on the other road, still +driving frantically in the direction of the railroad station. At +which Mr. Hamlin halted, threw away his encumbering saddle, and, +good rider that he was, remounted the horse, barebacked but for his +blanket-pad, and thrusting his knees in the loose girths, again +dashed forwards,--with such good results that, as Van Loo galloped +up to the stagecoach office, at the next station, and was about to +enter the waiting coach for Marysville, the soft hand of Mr. Hamlin +was laid on his shoulder. + +"I told you," said Jack blandly, "that I had plenty of time. I +would have been here BEFORE and even overtaken you, only you had +the better horse and the only saddle." + +Van Loo recoiled. But he was now desperate and reckless. +Beckoning Jack out of earshot of the other passengers, he said with +tightened lips, "Why do you follow me? What is your purpose in +coming here?" + +"I thought," said Hamlin dryly, "that I was to have the pleasure of +getting satisfaction from you for the insult you gave me." + +"Well, and if I apologize for it, what then?" he said quickly. + +Hamlin looked at him quietly. "Well, I think I also said something +about the lady being the wife of a friend of mine." + +"And I have left her BEHIND. Her husband can take her back without +disgrace, for no one knows of her flight but you and me. Do you +think your shooting me will save her? It will spread the scandal +far and wide. For I warn you, that as I have apologized for what +you choose to call my personal insult, unless you murder me in cold +blood without witness, I shall let them know the REASON of your +quarrel. And I can tell you more: if you only succeed in STOPPING +me here, and make me lose my chance of getting away, the scandal to +your friend will be greater still." + +Mr. Hamlin looked at Van Loo curiously. There was a certain amount +of conviction in what he said. He had never met this kind of +creature before. He had surpassed even Hamlin's first intuition of +his character. He amused and interested him. But Mr. Hamlin was +also a man of the world, and knew that Van Loo's reasoning might be +good. He put his hands in his pockets, and said gravely, "What IS +your little game?" + +Van Loo had been seized with another inspiration of desperation. +Steptoe had been partly responsible for this situation. Van Loo +knew that Jack and Steptoe were not friends. He had certain +secrets of Steptoe's that might be of importance to Jack. Why +should he not try to make friends with this powerful free-lance and +half-outlaw? + +"It's a game," he said significantly, "that might be of interest to +your friends to hear." + +Hamlin took his hands out of his pockets, turned on his heel, and +said, "Come with me." + +"But I must go by that coach now," said Van Loo desperately, "or-- +I've told you what would happen." + +"Come with me," said Jack coolly. "If I'm satisfied with what you +tell me, I'll put you down at the next station an hour before that +coach gets there." + +"You swear it?" said Van Loo hesitatingly. + +"I've SAID it," returned Jack. "Come!" and Van Loo followed Mr. +Hamlin into the station hotel. + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +The abrupt disappearance of Jack Hamlin and the strange lady and +gentleman visitor was scarcely noticed by the other guests of the +Divide House, and beyond the circle of Steptoe and his friends, who +were a distinct party and strangers to the town, there was no +excitement. Indeed, the hotel proprietor might have confounded +them together, and, perhaps, Van Loo was not far wrong in his +belief that their identity had not been suspected. Nor were +Steptoe's followers very much concerned in an episode in which they +had taken part only at the suggestion of their leader, and which +had terminated so tamely. That they would have liked a "row," in +which Jack Hamlin would have been incidentally forced to disgorge +his winnings, there was no doubt, but that their interference was +asked solely to gratify some personal spite of Steptoe's against +Van Loo was equally plain to them. There was some grumbling and +outspoken criticism of his methods. + +This was later made more obvious by the arrival of another guest +for whom Steptoe and his party were evidently waiting. He was a +short, stout man, whose heavy red beard was trimmed a little more +carefully than when he was first known to Steptoe as Alky Hall, the +drunkard of Heavy Tree Hill. His dress, too, exhibited a marked +improvement in quality and style, although still characterized in +the waist and chest by the unbuttoned freedom of portly and +slovenly middle age. Civilization had restricted his potations or +limited them to certain festivals known as "sprees," and his face +was less puffy and sodden. But with the accession of sobriety he +had lost his good humor, and had the irritability and intolerance +of virtuous restraint. + +"Ye needn't ladle out any of your forty-rod whiskey to me," he said +querulously to Steptoe, as he filed out with the rest of the party +through the bar-room into the adjacent apartment. "I want to keep +my head level till our business is over, and I reckon it wouldn't +hurt you and your gang to do the same. They're less likely to +blab; and there are few doors that whiskey won't unlock," he added, +as Steptoe turned the key in the door after the party had entered. + +The room had evidently been used for meetings of directors or +political caucuses, and was roughly furnished with notched and +whittled armchairs and a single long deal table, on which were ink +and pens. The men sat down around it with a half-embarrassed, +half-contemptuous attitude of formality, their bent brows and +isolated looks showing little community of sentiment and scarcely +an attempt to veil that individual selfishness that was prominent. +Still less was there any essay of companionship or sympathy in the +manner of Steptoe as he suddenly rapped on the table with his +knuckles. + +"Gentlemen," he said, with a certain deliberation of utterance, as +if he enjoyed his own coarse directness, "I reckon you all have a +sort of general idea what you were picked up for, or you wouldn't +be here. But you may or may not know that for the present you are +honest, hard-working miners,--the backbone of the State of +Californy,--and that you have formed yourselves into a company +called the 'Blue Jay,' and you've settled yourselves on the Bar +below Heavy Tree Hill, on a deserted claim of the Marshall +Brothers, not half a mile from where the big strike was made five +years ago. That's what you ARE, gentlemen; that's what you'll +continue TO BE until the job's finished; and," he added, with a +sudden dominance that they all felt, "the man who forgets it will +have to reckon with me. Now," he continued, resuming his former +ironical manner, "now, what are the cold facts of the case? The +Marshalls worked this claim ever since '49, and never got anything +out of it; then they dropped off or died out, leaving only one +brother, Tom Marshall, to work what was left of it. Well, a few +days ago HE found indications of a big lead in the rock, and +instead of rushin' out and yellin' like an honest man, and callin' +in the boys to drink, he sneaks off to 'Frisco, and goes to the +bank to get 'em to take a hand in it. Well, you know, when Jim +Stacy takes a hand in anything, IT'S BOTH HANDS, and the bank +wouldn't see it until he promised to guarantee possession of the +whole abandoned claim,--'dips, spurs, and angles,'--and let them +work the whole thing, which the d----d fool DID, and the bank +agreed to send an expert down there to-morrow to report. But while +he was away some one on our side, who was an expert also, got wind +of it, and made an examination all by himself, and found it was a +vein sure enough and a big thing, and some one else on our side +found out, too, all that Marshall had promised the bank and what +the bank had promised him. Now, gentlemen, when the bank sends +down that expert to-morrow I expect that he will find YOU IN +POSSESSION of every part of the deserted claim except the spot +where Tom is still working." + +"And what good is that to us?" asked one of the men contemptuously. + +"Good?" repeated Steptoe harshly. "Well, if you're not as d----d a +fool as Marshall, you'll see that if he has struck a lead or vein +it's bound to run across OUR CLAIMS, and what's to keep us from +sinking for it as long as Marshall hasn't worked the other claims +for years nor pre-empted them for this lead?" + +"What'll keep him from pre-empting now?" + +"Our possession." + +"But if he can prove that the brothers left their claims to him to +keep, he'll just send the sheriff and his posse down upon us," +persisted the first speaker. + +"It will take him three months to do that by law, and the sheriff +and his posse can't do it before as long as we're in peaceable +possession of it. And by the time that expert and Marshall return +they'll find us in peaceful possession, unless we're such blasted +fools as to stay talking about it here!" + +"But what's to prevent Marshall from getting a gang of his own to +drive us off?" + +"Now your talkin' and not yelpin'," said Steptoe, with slow +insolence. "D----d if I didn't begin to think you kalkilated I was +goin' to employ you as lawyers! Nothing is to prevent him from +gettin' up HIS gang, and we hope he'll do it, for you see it puts +us both on the same level before the law, for we're both BREAKIN' +IT. And we kalkilate that we're as good as any roughs they can +pick up at Heavy Tree." + +"I reckon!" "Ye can count us in!" said half a dozen voices +eagerly. + +"But what's the job goin' to pay us?" persisted a Sydney man. "An' +arter we've beat off this other gang, are we going to scrub along +on grub wages until we're yanked out by process-sarvers three +months later? If that's the ticket I'm not in it. I aren't no +b--y quartz miner." + +"We ain't going to do no more MINING there than the bank," said +Steptoe fiercely. "And the bank ain't going to wait no three +months for the end of the lawsuit. They'll float the stock of that +mine for a couple of millions, and get out of it with a million +before a month. And they'll have to buy us off to do that. What +they'll pay will depend upon the lead; but we don't move off those +claims for less than five thousand dollars, which will be two +hundred and fifty dollars to each man. But," said Steptoe in a +lower but perfectly distinct voice, "if there should be a row,--and +they BEGIN it,--and in the scuffle Tom Marshall, their only +witness, should happen to get in the way of a revolver or have his +head caved in, there might be some difficulty in their holdin' ANY +OF THE MINE against honest, hardworking miners in possession. You +hear me?" + +There was a breathless silence for the moment, and a slight +movement of the men in their chairs, but never in fear or protest. +Every one had heard the speaker distinctly, and every man +distinctly understood him. Some of them were criminals, one or two +had already the stain of blood on their hands; but even the most +timid, who at other times might have shrunk from suggested +assassination, saw in the speaker's words only the fair removal of +a natural enemy. + +"All right, boys. I'm ready to wade in at once. Why ain't we on +the road now? We might have been but for foolin' our time away on +that man Van Loo." + +"Van Loo!" repeated Hall eagerly,--"Van Loo! Was he here?" + +"Yes," said Steptoe shortly, administering a kick under the table +to Hall, as he had no wish to revive the previous irritability of +his comrades. "He's gone, but," turning to the others, "you'd have +had to wait for Mr. Hall's arrival, anyhow. And now you've got +your order you can start. Go in two parties by different roads, +and meet on the other side of the hotel at Hymettus. I'll be there +before you. Pick up some shovels and drills as you go; remember +you're honest miners, but don't forget your shootin'-irons for all +that. Now scatter." + +It was well that they did, vacating the room more cheerfully and +sympathetically than they had entered it, or Hall's manifest +disturbance over Van Loo's visit would have been noticed. When the +last man had disappeared Hall turned quickly to Steptoe. "Well, +what did he say? Where has he gone?" + +"Don't know," said Steptoe, with uneasy curtness. "He was running +away with a woman--well, Mrs. Barker, if you want to know," he +added, with rising anger, "the wife of one of those cursed +partners. Jack Hamlin was here, and was jockeying to stop him, and +interfered. But what the devil has that job to do with our job?" +He was losing his temper; everything seemed to turn upon this +infernal Van Loo! + +"He wasn't running away with Mrs. Barker," gasped Hall,--"it was +with her MONEY! and the fear of being connected with the Wheat +Trust swindle which he organized, and with our money which I lent +him for the same purpose. And he knows all about that job, for I +wanted to get him to go into it with us. Your name and mine ain't +any too sweet-smelling for the bank, and we ought to have a +middleman who knows business to arrange with them. The bank +daren't object to him, for they've employed him in even shadier +transactions than this when THEY didn't wish to appear. I knew he +was in difficulties along with Mrs. Barker's speculations, but I +never thought him up to this. And," he added, with sudden +desperation, "YOU trusted him, too." + +In an instant Steptoe caught the frightened man by the shoulders +and was bearing him down on the table. "Are you a traitor, a liar, +or a besotted fool?" he said hoarsely. "Speak. WHEN and WHERE did +I trust him?" + +"You said in your note--I was--to--help him," gasped Hall. + +"My note," repeated Steptoe, releasing Hall with astonished eyes. + +"Yes," said Hall, tremblingly searching in his vest pocket. "I +brought it with me. It isn't much of a note, but there's your +signature plain enough." + +He handed Steptoe a torn piece of paper folded in a three-cornered +shape. Steptoe opened it. He instantly recognized the paper on +which he had written his name and sent up to his wife at the +Boomville Hotel. But, added to it, in apparently the same hand, in +smaller characters, were the words, "Help Van Loo all you can." + +The blood rushed into his face. But he quickly collected himself, +and said hurriedly, "All right, I had forgotten it. Let the d----d +sneak go. We've got what's a thousand times better in this claim +at Marshall's, and it's well that he isn't in it to scoop the +lion's share. Only we must not waste time getting there now. You +go there first, and at once, and set those rascals to work. I'll +follow you before Marshall comes up. Get; I'll settle up here." + +His face darkened once more as Hall hurried away, leaving him +alone. He drew out the piece of paper from his pocket and stared +at it again. Yes; it was the one he had sent to his wife. How did +Van Loo get hold of it? Was he at the hotel that night? Had he +picked it up in the hall or passage when the servant dropped it? +When Hall handed him the paper and he first recognized it a +fiendish thought, followed by a spasm of more fiendish rage, had +sent the blood to his face. But his crude common sense quickly +dismissed that suggestion of his wife's complicity with Van Loo. +But had she seen him passing through the hotel that night, and had +sought to draw from him some knowledge of his early intercourse +with the child, and confessed everything, and even produced the +paper with his signature as a proof of identity? Women had been +known to do such desperate things. Perhaps she disbelieved her +son's aversion to her, and was trying to sound Van Loo. As for the +forged words by Van Loo, and the use he had put them to, he cared +little. He believed the man was capable of forgery; indeed, he +suddenly remembered that in the old days his son had spoken +innocently, but admiringly, of Van Loo's wonderful chirographical +powers and his faculty of imitating the writings of others, and how +he had even offered to teach him. A new and exasperating thought +came into his feverish consciousness. What if Van Loo, in teaching +the boy, had even made use of him as an innocent accomplice to +cover up his own tricks! The suggestion was no question of moral +ethics to Steptoe, nor of his son's possible contamination, +although since the night of the big strike he had held different +views; it was simply a fierce, selfish jealousy that ANOTHER might +have profited by the lad's helplessness and inexperience. He had +been tormented by this jealousy before in his son's liking for Van +Loo. He had at first encouraged his admiration and imitative +regard for this smooth swindler's graces and accomplishments, +which, though he scorned them himself, he was, after the common +parental infatuation, willing that the boy should profit by. +Incapable, through his own consciousness, of distinguishing between +Van Loo's superficial polish and the true breeding of a gentleman, +he had only looked upon it as an equipment for his son which might +be serviceable to himself. He had told his wife the truth when he +informed her of Van Loo's fears of being reminded of their former +intimacy; but he had not told her how its discontinuance after they +had left Heavy Tree Hill had affected her son, and how he still +cherished his old admiration for that specious rascal. Nor had he +told her how this had stung him, through his own selfish greed of +the boy's affection. Yet now that it was possible that she had met +Van Loo that evening, she might have become aware of Van Loo's +power over her child. How she would exult, for all her pretended +hatred of Van Loo! How, perhaps, they had plotted together! How +Van Loo might have become aware of the place where his son was +kept, and have been bribed by the mother to tell her! He stopped +in a whirl of giddy fancies. His strong common sense in all other +things had been hitherto proof against such idle dreams or +suggestions; but the very strength of his parental love and +jealousy had awakened in him at last the terrors of imagination. + +His first impulse had been to seek his wife, regardless of +discovery or consequences, at Hymettus, where she had said she was +going. It was on his way to the rendezvous at Marshall's claim. +But this he as instantly set aside, it was his SON he must find; +SHE might not confess, or might deceive him--the boy would not; and +if his fears were correct, she could be arraigned afterwards. It +was possible for him to reach the little Mission church and school, +secluded in a remote valley by the old Franciscan fathers, where he +had placed the boy for the last few years unknown to his wife. It +would be a long ride, but he could still reach Heavy Tree Hill +afterwards before Marshall and the expert arrived. And he had a +feeling he had never felt before on the eve of a desperate +adventure,--that he must see the boy first. He remembered how the +child had often accompanied him in his flight, and how he had +gained strength, and, it seemed to him, a kind of luck, from the +touch of that small hand in his. Surely it was necessary now that +at least his mind should be at rest regarding HIM on the eve of an +affair of this moment. Perhaps he might never see him again. At +any other time, and under the influence of any other emotion, he +would have scorned such a sentimentalism--he who had never troubled +himself either with preparation for the future or consideration for +the past. But at that moment he felt both. He drew a long breath. +He could catch the next train to the Three Boulders and ride thence +to San Felipe. He hurriedly left the room, settled with the +landlord, and galloped to the station. By the irony of circumstances +the only horse available for that purpose was Mr. Hamlin's own. + +By two o'clock he was at the Three Boulders, where he got a fast +horse and galloped into San Felipe by four. As he descended the +last slope through the fastnesses of pines towards the little +valley overlooked in its remoteness and purely pastoral simplicity +by the gold-seeking immigrants,--its seclusion as one of the +furthest northern Californian missions still preserved through its +insignificance and the efforts of the remaining Brotherhood, who +used it as an infirmary and a school for the few remaining Spanish +families,--he remembered how he once blundered upon it with the boy +while hotly pursued by a hue and cry from one of the larger towns, +and how he found sanctuary there. He remembered how, when the +pursuit was over, he had placed the boy there under the padre's +charge. He had lied to his wife regarding the whereabouts of her +son, but he had spoken truly regarding his free expenditure for +the boy's maintenance, and the good fathers had accepted, equally +for the child's sake as for the Church's sake, the generous +"restitution" which this coarse, powerful, ruffianly looking father +was apparently seeking to make. He was quite aware of it at the +time, and had equally accepted it with grim cynicism; but it now +came back to him with a new and smarting significance. Might THEY, +too, not succeed in weaning the boy's affection from him, or if the +mother had interfered, would they not side with her in claiming an +equal right? He had sometimes laughed to himself over the security +of this hiding-place, so unknown and so unlikely to be discovered +by her, yet within easy reach of her friends and his enemies; he +now ground his teeth over the mistake which his doting desire to +keep his son accessible to him had caused him to make. He put +spurs to his horse, dashed down the little, narrow, ill-paved +street, through the deserted plaza, and pulled up in a cloud of +dust before the only remaining tower, with its cracked belfry, of +the half-ruined Mission church. A new dormitory and school- +building had been extended from its walls, but in a subdued, +harmonious, modest way, quite unlike the usual glaring white-pine +glories of provincial towns. Steptoe laughed to himself bitterly. +Some of his money had gone in it. + +He seized the horsehair rope dangling from a bell by the wall and +rang it sharply. A soft-footed priest appeared,--Father Dominico. +"Eddy Horncastle? Ah! yes. Eddy, dear child, is gone." + +"Gone!" shouted Steptoe in a voice that startled the padre. +"Where? When? With whom?" + +"Pardon, senor, but for a time--only a pasear to the next village. +It is his saint's day--he has half-holiday. He is a good boy. It +is a little pleasure for him and for us." + +"Oh!" said Steptoe, softened into a rough apology. "I forgot. All +right. Has he had any visitors lately--lady, for instance?" + +Father Dominico cast a look half of fright, half of reproval upon +his guest. + +"A lady HERE!" + +In his relief Steptoe burst into a coarse laugh. "Of course; you +see I forgot that, too. I was thinking of one of his woman folks, +you know--relatives--aunts. Was there any other visitor?" + +"Only one. Ah! we know the senor's rules regarding his son." + +"One?" repeated Steptoe. "Who was it?" + +"Oh, quite an hidalgo--an old friend of the child's--most polite, +most accomplished, fluent in Spanish, perfect in deportment. The +Senor Horncastle surely could find nothing to object to. Father +Pedro was charmed with him. A man of affairs, and yet a good +Catholic, too. It was a Senor Van Loo--Don Paul the boy called +him, and they talked of the boy's studies in the old days as if-- +indeed, but for the stranger being a caballero and man of the +world--as if he had been his teacher." + +It was a proof of the intensity of the father's feelings that they +had passed beyond the power of his usual coarse, brutal expression, +and he only stared at the priest with a dull red face in which the +blood seemed to have stagnated. Presently he said thickly, "When +did he come?" + +"A few days ago." + +"Which way did Eddy go?" + +"To Brown's Mills, scarcely a league away. He will be here--even +now--on the instant. But the senor will come into the refectory +and take some of the old Mission wine from the Catalan grape, +planted one hundred and fifty years ago, until the dear child +returns. He will be so happy." + +"No! I'm in a hurry. I will go on and meet him." He took off his +hat, mopped his crisp, wet hair with his handkerchief, and in a +thick, slow, impeded voice, more suggestive than the outburst he +restrained, said, "And as long as my son remains here that man, Van +Loo, must not pass this gate, speak to him, or even see him. You +hear me? See to it, you and all the others. See to it, I say, +or"-- He stopped abruptly, clapped his hat on the swollen veins of +his forehead, turned quickly, passed out without another word +through the archway into the road, and before the good priest could +cross himself or recover from his astonishment the thud of his +horse's hoofs came from the dusty road. + +It was ten minutes before his face resumed its usual color. But in +that ten minutes, as if some of the struggle of his rider had +passed into him, his horse was sweating with exhaustion and fear. +For in that ten minutes, in this new imagination with which he was +cursed, he had killed both Van Loo and his son, and burned the +refectory over the heads of the treacherous priests. Then, quite +himself again, a voice came to him from the rocky trail above the +road with the hail of "Father!" He started quickly as a lad of +fifteen or sixteen came bounding down the hillside, and ran towards +him. + +"You passed me and I called to you, but you did not seem to hear," +said the boy breathlessly. "Then I ran after you. Have you been +to the Mission?" + +Steptoe looked at him quite as breathlessly, but from a deeper +emotion. He was, even at first sight, a handsome lad, glowing with +youth and the excitement of his run, and, as the father looked at +him, he could see the likeness to his mother in his clear-cut +features, and even a resemblance to himself in his square, compact +chest and shoulders and crisp, black curls. A thrill of purely +animal paternity passed over him, the fierce joy of his flesh over +his own flesh! His own son, by God! They could not take THAT from +him; they might plot, swindle, fawn, cheat, lie, and steal away his +affections, but there he was, plain to all eyes, his own son, his +very son! + +"Come here," he said in a singular, half-weary and half-protesting +voice, which the boy instantly recognized as his father's accents +of affection. + +The boy hesitated as he stood on the edge of the road and pointed +with mingled mischief and fastidiousness to the depths of impalpable +red dust that lay between him and the horseman. Steptoe saw that he +was very smartly attired in holiday guise, with white duck trousers +and patent leather shoes, and, after the Spanish fashion, wore black +kid gloves. He certainly was a bit of a dandy, as he had said. The +father's whole face changed as he wheeled and came before the lad, +who lifted up his arms expectantly. They had often ridden together +on the same horse. + +"No rides to-day in that toggery, Eddy," he said in the same voice. +"But I'll get down and we'll go and sit somewhere under a tree and +have some talk. I've got a bit of a job that's hurrying me, and I +can't waste time." + +"Not one of your old jobs, father? I thought you had quite given +that up?" + +The boy spoke more carelessly than reproachfully, or even +wonderingly; yet, as he dismounted and tethered his horse, Steptoe +answered evasively, "It's a big thing, sonny; maybe we'll make our +eternal fortune, and then we'll light out from this hole and have a +gay time elsewhere. Come along." + +He took the boy's gloved right hand in his own powerful grasp, and +together they clambered up the steep hillside to a rocky ledge on +which a fallen pine from above had crashed, snapped itself in +twain, and then left its withered crown to hang half down the +slope, while the other half rested on the ledge. On this they sat, +looking down upon the road and the tethered horse. A gentle breeze +moved the treetops above their heads, and the westering sun played +hide-and-seek with the shifting shadows. The boy's face was quick +and alert with all that moved round him, but without thought the +father's face was heavy, except for the eyes that were fixed upon +his son. + +"Van Loo came to the Mission," he said suddenly. + +The boy's eyes glittered quickly, like a steel that pierced the +father's heart. "Oh," he said simply, "then it was the padre told +you?" + +"How did he know you were here?" asked Steptoe. + +"I don't know," said the boy quietly. "I think he said something, +but I've forgotten it. But it was mighty good of him to come, for +I thought, you know, that he did not care to see me after Heavy +Tree, and that he'd gone back on us." + +"What did he tell you?" continued Steptoe. "Did he talk of me or +of your mother?" + +"No," said the boy, but without any show of interest or sympathy; +"we talked mostly about old times." + +"Tell ME about those old times, Eddy. You never told me anything +about them." + +The boy, momentarily arrested more by something in the tone of his +father's voice--a weakness he had never noticed before--than by any +suggestion of his words, said with a laugh, "Oh, only about what we +used to do when I was very little and used to call myself his +'little brother,'--don't you remember, long before the big strike +on Heavy Tree? They were gay times we had then." + +"And how he used to teach you to imitate other people's +handwriting?" said Steptoe. + +"What made you think of that, pop?" said the boy, with a slight +wonder in his eyes. "Why, that's the very thing we DID talk +about." + +"But you didn't do it again; you ain't done it since," said Steptoe +quickly. + +"Lord! no," said the boy contemptuously. "There ain't no chance +now, and there wouldn't be any fun in it. It isn't like the old +times when him and me were all alone, and we used to write letters +as coming from other people to all the boys round Heavy Tree and +the Bar, and sometimes as far as Boomville, to get them to do +things, and they'd think the letters were real, and they'd do 'em. +And there'd be the biggest kind of a row, and nobody ever knew who +did it." + +Steptoe stared at this flesh of his own flesh half in relief, half +in frightened admiration. Sitting astride the log, his elbows on +his knees and his gloved hands supporting his round cheeks, the +boy's handsome face became illuminated with an impish devilry which +the father had never seen before. With dancing eyes he went on. +"It was one of those very games we played so long ago that he +wanted to see me about and wanted me to keep mum about, for some of +the folks that he played it on were around here now. It was a game +we got off on one of the big strike partners long before the +strike. I'll tell YOU, dad, for you know what happened afterwards, +and you'll be glad. Well, that partner--Demorest--was a kind of +silly, you remember--a sort of Miss Nancyish fellow--always gloomy +and lovesick after his girl in the States. Well, we'd written lots +of letters to girls from their chaps before, and got lots of fun +out of it; but we had even a better show for a game here, for it +happened that Van Loo knew all about the girl--things that even the +man's own partners didn't, for Van Loo's mother was a sort of a +friend of the girl's family, and traveled about with her, and knew +that the girl was spoony over this Demorest, and that they +corresponded. So, knowing that Van Loo was employed at Heavy Tree, +she wrote to him to find out all about Demorest and how to stop +their foolish nonsense, for the girl's parents didn't want her to +marry a broken-down miner like him. So we thought we'd do it our +own way, and write a letter to her as if it was from him, don't you +see? I wanted to make him call her awful names, and say that he +hated her, that he was a murderer and a horse-thief, and that he +had killed a policeman, and that he was thinking of becoming a +Digger Injin, and having a Digger squaw for a wife, which he liked +better than her. Lord! dad, you ought to have seen what stuff I +made up." The boy burst into a shrill, half-feminine laugh, and +Steptoe, catching the infection, laughed loudly in his own coarse, +brutal fashion. + +For some moments they sat there looking in each other's faces, +shaking with sympathetic emotion, the father forgetting the purpose +of his coming there, his rage over Van Loo's visit, and even the +rendezvous to which his horse in the road below was waiting to +bring him; the son forgetting their retreat from Heavy Tree Hill +and his shameful vagabond wanderings with that father in the years +that followed. The sinking sun stared blankly in their faces; the +protecting pines above them moved by a stronger gust shook a few +cones upon them; an enormous crow mockingly repeated the father's +coarse laugh, and a squirrel scampered away from the strangely +assorted pair as Steptoe, wiping his eyes and forehead with his +pocket-handkerchief, said:-- + +"And did you send it?" + +"Oh! Van Loo thought it too strong. Said that those sort of love- +sick fools made more fuss over little things than they did over big +things, and he sort of toned it down, and fixed it up himself. But +it told. For there were never any more letters in the post-office +in her handwriting, and there wasn't any posted to her in his." + +They both laughed again, and then Steptoe rose. "I must be getting +along," he said, looking curiously at the boy. "I've got to catch +a train at Three Boulders Station." + +"Three Boulders!" repeated the boy. "I'm going there, too, on +Friday, to meet Father Cipriano." + +"I reckon my work will be all done by Friday," said Steptoe +musingly. Standing thus, holding his boy's hand, he was thinking +that the real fight at Marshall's would not take place at once, for +it might take a day or two for Marshall to gather forces. But he +only pressed his son's hand gently. + +"I wish you would sometimes take me with you as you used to," said +the boy curiously. "I'm bigger now, and wouldn't be in your way. + +Steptoe looked at the boy with a choking sense of satisfaction and +pride. But he said, "No;" and then suddenly with simulated humor, +"Don't you be taken in by any letters from ME, such as you and Van +Loo used to write. You hear?" + +The boy laughed. + +"And," continued Steptoe, "if anybody says I sent for you, don't +you believe them." + +"No," said the boy, smiling. + +"And don't you even believe I'm dead till you see me so. You +understand. By the way, Father Pedro has some money of mine kept +for you. Now hurry back to school and say you met me, but that I +was in a great hurry. I reckon I may have been rather rough to the +priests." + +They had reached the lower road again, and Steptoe silently +unhitched his horse. "Good-by," he said, as he laid his hand on +the boy's arm. + +"Good-by, dad." + +He mounted his horse slowly. "Well," he said smilingly, looking +down the road, "you ain't got anything more to say to me, have +you?" + +"No, dad." + +"Nothin' you want?" + +"Nothin', dad." + +"All right. Good-by." + +He put spurs to his horse and cantered down the road without +looking back. The boy watched him with idle curiosity until he +disappeared from sight, and then went on his way, whistling and +striking off the heads of the wayside weeds with his walking-stick. + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +The sun arose so brightly over Hymettus on the morning after the +meeting of the three partners that it was small wonder that +Barker's impressionable nature quickly responded to it, and, +without awakening the still sleeping child, he dressed hurriedly, +and was the first to greet it in the keen air of the slope behind +the hotel. To his pantheistic spirit it had always seemed as +natural for him to early welcome his returning brothers of the +woods and hills as to say good-morning to his fellow mortals. And, +in the joy of seeing Black Spur rising again to his level in the +distance before him, he doffed his hat to it with a return of his +old boyish habit, laid his arm caressingly around the great girth +of the nearest pine, clapped his hands to the scampering squirrels +in his path, and whistled to the dipping jays. In this way he +quite forgot the more serious affairs of the preceding night, or, +rather, saw them only in the gilding of the morning, until, looking +up, he perceived the tall figure of Demorest approaching him; and +then it struck him with his first glance at his old partner's face +that his usual suave, gentle melancholy had been succeeded by a +critical cynicism of look and a restrained bitterness of accent. +Barker's loyal heart smote him for his own selfishness; Demorest +had been hard hit by the discovery of the forgery and Stacy's +concern in it, and had doubtless passed a restless night, while he +(Barker) had forgotten all about it. "I thought of knocking at +your door, as I passed," he said, with sympathetic apology, "but I +was afraid I might disturb you. Isn't it glorious here? Quite +like the old hill. Look at that lizard; he hasn't moved since he +first saw me. Do you remember the one who used to steal our sugar, +and then stiffen himself into stone on the edge of the bowl until +he looked like an ornamental handle to it?" he continued, +rebounding again into spirits. + +"Barker," said Demorest abruptly, "what sort of woman is this Mrs. +Van Loo, whose rooms I occupy?" + +"Oh," said Barker, with optimistic innocence, "a most proper woman, +old chap. White-haired, well-dressed, with a little foreign accent +and a still more foreign courtesy. Why, you don't suppose we'd"-- + +"But what is she like?" said Demorest impatiently. + +"Well," said Barker thoughtfully, "she's the kind of woman who +might be Van Loo's mother, I suppose." + +"You mean the mother of a forger and a swindler?" asked Demorest +sharply. + +"There are no mothers of swindlers and forgers," said Barker +gravely, "in the way you mean. It's only those poor devils," he +said, pointing, nevertheless, with a certain admiration to a +circling sparrow-hawk above him, "who have inherited instincts. +What I mean is that she might be Van Loo's mother, because he +didn't SELECT her." + +"Where did she come from? and how long has she been here?" asked +Demorest. + +"She came from abroad, I believe. And she came here just after you +left. Van Loo, after he became secretary of the Ditch Company, +sent for her and her daughter to keep house for him. But you'll +see her to-day or to-morrow probably, when she returns. I'll +introduce you; she'll be rather glad to meet some one from abroad, +and all the more if he happens to be rich and distinguished, and +eligible for her daughter." He stopped suddenly in his smile, +remembering Demorest's lifelong secret. But to his surprise his +companion's face, instead of darkening as it was wont to do at any +such allusion, brightened suddenly with a singular excitement as he +answered dryly, "Ah well, if the girl is pretty, who knows!" + +Indeed, his spirits seemed to have returned with strange vivacity +as they walked back to the hotel, and he asked many other questions +regarding Mrs. Van Loo and her daughter, and particularly if the +daughter had also been abroad. When they reached the veranda they +found a few early risers eagerly reading the Sacramento papers, +which had just arrived, or, in little knots, discussing the news. +Indeed, they would probably have stopped Barker and his companion +had not Barker, anxious to relieve his friend's curiosity, hurried +with him at once to the manager's office. + +"Can you tell me exactly when you expect Mrs. Van Loo to return?" +asked Barker quickly. + +The manager with difficulty detached himself from the newspaper +which he, too, was anxiously perusing, and said, with a peculiar +smile, "Well no! she WAS to return to-day, but if you're wanting +to keep her rooms, I should say there wouldn't be any trouble about +it, as she'll hardly be coming back here NOW. She's rather high +and mighty in style, I know, and a determined sort of critter, but +I reckon she and her daughter wouldn't care much to be waltzing +round in public after what has happened." + +"I don't understand you," said Demorest impatiently. "WHAT has +happened?" + +"Haven't you heard the news?" said the manager in surprise. "It's +in all the Sacramento papers. Van Loo is a defaulter--has +hypothecated everything he had and skedaddled." + +Barker started. He was not thinking of the loss of his wife's +money--only of HER disappointment and mortification over it. Poor +girl! Perhaps she was also worrying over his resentment,--as if +she did not know him! He would go to her at once at Boomville. +Then he remembered that she was coming with Mrs. Horncastle, and +might be already on her way here by rail or coach, and he would +miss her. Demorest in the meantime had seized a paper, and was +intently reading it. + +"There's bad news, too, for your friend, your old partner," said +the manager half sympathetically, half interrogatively. "There has +been a drop out in everything the bank is carrying, and everybody +is unloading. Two firms failed in 'Frisco yesterday that were +carrying things for the bank, and have thrown everything back on +it. There was an awful panic last night, and they say none of the +big speculators know where they stand. Three of our best customers +in the hotel rushed off to the bay this morning, but Stacy himself +started before daylight, and got the through night express to stop +for him on the Divide on signal. Shall I send any telegrams that +may come to your room?" + +Demorest knew that the manager suspected him of being interested in +the bank, and understood the purport of the question. He answered, +with calm surprise, that he was expecting no telegrams, and added, +"But if Mrs. Van Loo returns I beg you to at once let me know," and +taking Barker's arm he went in to breakfast. Seated by themselves, +Demorest looked at his companion. "I'm afraid, Barker boy, that +this thing is more serious to Jim than we expected last night, or +than he cared to tell us. And you, old man, I fear are hurt a +little by Van Loo's flight. He had some money of your wife's, +hadn't he?" + +Barker, who knew that the bulk of Demorest's fortune was in Stacy's +hands, was touched at this proof of his unselfish thought, and +answered with equal unselfishness that he was concerned only by the +fear of Mrs. Barker's disappointment. "Why, Lord! Phil, whether +she's lost or saved her money it's nothing to me. I gave it to her +to do what she liked with it, but I'm afraid she'll be worrying +over what I think of it,--as if she did not know me! And I'm half +a mind, if it were not for missing her, to go over to Boomville, +where she's stopping." + +"I thought you said she was in San Francisco?" said Demorest +abstractedly. + +Barker colored. "Yes," he answered quickly. "But I've heard since +that she stopped at Boomville on the way." + +"Then don't let ME keep you here," returned Demorest. "For if Jim +telegraphs to me I shall start for San Francisco at once, and I +rather think he will. I did not like to say so before those panic- +mongers outside who are stampeding everything; so run along, Barker +boy, and ease your mind about the wife. We may have other things +to think about soon." + +Thus adjured, Barker rose from his half-finished breakfast and +slipped away. Yet he was not quite certain what to do. His wife +must have heard the news at Boomville as quickly as he had, and, if +so, would be on her way with Mrs. Horncastle; or she might be +waiting for him--knowing, too, that he had heard the news--in fear +and trembling. For it was Barker's custom to endow all those he +cared for with his own sensitiveness, and it was not like him to +reflect that the woman who had so recklessly speculated against his +opinion would scarcely fear his reproaches in her defeat. In the +fullness of his heart he telegraphed to her in case she had not yet +left Boomville: "All right. Have heard news. Understand perfectly. +Don't worry. Come to me." Then he left the hotel by the stable +entrance in order to evade the guests who had congregated on the +veranda, and made his way to a little wooded crest which he knew +commanded a view of the two roads from Boomville. Here he +determined to wait and intercept her before she reached the hotel. +He knew that many of the guests were aware of his wife's +speculations with Van Loo, and that he was her broker. He wished to +spare her running the gauntlet of their curious stares and comments +as she drove up alone. As he was climbing the slope the coach from +Sacramento dashed past him on the road below, but he knew that it +had changed horses at Boomville at four o'clock, and that his tired +wife would not have availed herself of it at that hour, particularly +as she could not have yet received the fateful news. He threw +himself under a large pine, and watched the stagecoach disappear as +it swept round into the courtyard of the hotel. + +He sat there for some moments with his eyes bent upon the two forks +of the red road that diverged below him, but which appeared to +become whiter and more dazzling as he searched their distance. +There was nothing to be seen except an occasional puff of dust +which eventually revealed a horseman or a long trailing cloud out +of which a solitary mule, one of a pack-train of six or eight, +would momentarily emerge and be lost again. Then he suddenly heard +his name called, and, looking up, saw Mrs. Horncastle, who had +halted a few paces from him between two columns of the long-drawn +aisle of pines. + +In that mysterious half-light she seemed such a beautiful and +goddess-like figure that his consciousness at first was unable to +grasp anything else. She was always wonderfully well dressed, but +the warmth and seclusion of this mountain morning had enabled her +to wear a light gown of some delicate fabric which set off the +grace of her figure, and even pardoned the rural coquetry of a +silken sash around her still slender waist. An open white parasol +thrown over her shoulder made a nimbus for her charming head and +the thick coils of hair under her lace-edged hat. He had never +seen her look so beautiful before. And that thought was so plainly +in his frank face and eyes as he sprang to his feet that it brought +a slight rise of color to her own cheek. + +"I saw you climbing up here as I passed in the coach a few minutes +ago," she said, with a smile, "and as soon as I had shaken the dust +off I followed you." + +"Where's Kitty?" he stammered. + +The color faded from her face as it had come, and a shade of +something like reproach crept into her dark eyes. And whatever it +had been her purpose to say, or however carefully she might have +prepared herself for this interview, she was evidently taken aback +by the sudden directness of the inquiry. Barker saw this as +quickly, and as quickly referred it to his own rudeness. His whole +soul rushed in apology to his face as he said, "Oh, forgive me! I +was anxious about Kitty; indeed, I had thought of coming again to +Boomville, for you've heard the news, of course? Van Loo is a +defaulter, and has run away with the poor child's money." + +Mrs. Horncastle had heard the news at the hotel. She paused a +moment to collect herself, and then said slowly and tentatively, +with a watchful intensity in her eyes, "Mrs. Barker went, I think, +to the Divide"-- + +But she was instantly interrupted by the eager Barker. "I see. I +thought of that at once. She went directly to the company's +offices to see if she could save anything from the wreck before she +saw me. It was like her, poor girl! And you--you," he went on +eagerly, his whole face beaming with gratitude,--"you, out of your +goodness, came here to tell me." He held out both hands and took +hers in his. + +For a moment Mrs. Horncastle was speechless and vacillating. She +had often noticed before that it was part of the irony of the +creation of such a simple nature as Barker's that he was not only +open to deceit, but absolutely seemed to invite it. Instead of +making others franker, people were inclined to rebuke his credulity +by restraint and equivocation on their own part. But the evasion +thus offered to her, although only temporary, was a temptation she +could not resist. And it prolonged an interview that a ruthless +revelation of the truth might have shortened. + +"She did not tell me she was going there," she replied still +evasively; "and, indeed," she added, with a burst of candor still +more dangerous, "I only learned it from the hotel clerk after she +was gone. But I want to talk to you about her relations to Van +Loo," she said, with a return of her former intensity of gaze, "and +I thought we would be less subject to interruption here than at the +hotel. Only I suppose everybody knows this place, and any of those +flirting couples are likely to come here. Besides," she added, +with a little half-hysterical laugh and a slight shiver, as she +looked up at the high interlacing boughs above her head, "it's as +public as the aisles of a church, and really one feels as if one +were 'speaking out' in meeting. Isn't there some other spot a +little more secluded, where we could sit down," she went on, as she +poked her parasol into the usual black gunpowdery deposit of earth +which mingled with the carpet of pine-needles beneath her feet, +"and not get all sticky and dirty?" + +Barker's eyes sparkled. "I know every foot of this hill, Mrs. +Horncastle," he said, "and if you will follow me I'll take you to +one of the loveliest nooks you ever dreamed of. It's an old Indian +spring now forgotten, and I think known only to me and the birds. +It's not more than ten minutes from here; only"--he hesitated as he +caught sight of the smart French bronze buckled shoe and silken +ankle which Mrs. Horncastle's gathering up of her dainty skirts +around her had disclosed--"it may be a little rough and dusty going +to your feet." + +But Mrs. Horncastle pointed out that she had already irretrievably +ruined her shoes and stockings in climbing up to him,--although +Barker could really distinguish no diminution of their freshness,-- +and that she might as well go on. Whereat they both passed down +the long aisle of slope to a little hollow of manzanita, which +again opened to a view of Black Spur, but left the hotel hidden. + +"What time did Kitty go?" began Barker eagerly, when they were half +down the slope. + +But here Mrs. Horncastle's foot slipped upon the glassy pine- +needles, and not only stopped an answer, but obliged Barker to give +all his attention to keep his companion from falling again until +they reached the open. Then came the plunge through the manzanita +thicket, then a cool wade through waist-deep ferns, and then they +emerged, holding each other's hand, breathless and panting before +the spring. + +It did not belie his enthusiastic description. A triangular +hollow, niched in a shelf of the mountain-side, narrowed to a point +from which the overflow of the spring percolated through a fringe +of alder, to fall in what seemed from the valley to be a green +furrow down the whole length of the mountain-side. Overhung by +pines above, which met and mingled with the willows that everywhere +fringed it, it made the one cooling shade in the whole basking +expanse of the mountain, and yet was penetrated throughout by the +intoxicating spice of the heated pines. Flowering reeds and long +lush grasses drew a magic circle round an open bowl-like pool in +the centre, that was always replenished to the slow murmur of an +unseen rivulet that trickled from a white-quartz cavern in the +mountain-side like a vein opened in its flank. Shadows of timid +wings crossed it, quick rustlings disturbed the reeds, but nothing +more. It was silent, but breathing; it was hidden to everything +but the sky and the illimitable distance. + +They threaded their way around it on the spongy carpet, covered by +delicate lace-like vines that seemed to caress rather than trammel +their moving feet, until they reached an open space before the +pool. It was cushioned and matted with disintegrated pine bark, +and here they sat down. Mrs. Horncastle furled her parasol and +laid it aside; raised both hands to the back of her head and took +two hat-pins out, which she placed in her smiling mouth; removed +her hat, stuck the hat-pins in it, and handed it to Barker, who +gently placed it on the top of a tall reed, where during the rest +of that momentous meeting it swung and drooped like a flower; +removed her gloves slowly; drank still smilingly and gratefully +nearly a wineglassful of the water which Barker brought her in the +green twisted chalice of a lily leaf; looked the picture of +happiness, and then burst into tears. + +Barker was astounded, dismayed, even terror-stricken. Mrs. +Horncastle crying! Mrs. Horncastle, the imperious, the collected, +the coldly critical, the cynical, smiling woman of the world, +actually crying! Other women might cry--Kitty had cried often--but +Mrs. Horncastle! Yet, there she was, sobbing; actually sobbing +like a schoolgirl, her beautiful shoulders rising and falling with +her grief; crying unmistakably through her long white fingers, +through a lace pocket-handkerchief which she had hurriedly produced +and shaken from behind her like a conjurer's trick; her beautiful +eyes a thousand times more lustrous for the sparkling beads that +brimmed her lashes and welled over like the pool before her. + +"Don't mind me," she murmured behind her handkerchief. "It's very +foolish, I know. I was nervous--worried, I suppose; I'll be better +in a moment. Don't notice me, please." + +But Barker had drawn beside her and was trying, after the fashion +of his sex, to take her handkerchief away in apparently the firm +belief that this action would stop her tears. "But tell me what it +is. Do Mrs. Horncastle, please," he pleaded in his boyish fashion. +"Is it anything I can do? Only say the word; only tell me +SOMETHING!" + +But he had succeeded in partially removing the handkerchief, and so +caught a glimpse of her wet eyes, in which a faint smile struggled +out like sunshine through rain. But they clouded again, although +she didn't cry, and her breath came and went with the action of a +sob, and her hands still remained against her flushed face. + +"I was only going to talk to you of Kitty" (sob)--"but I suppose +I'm weak" (sob)--"and such a fool" (sob) "and I got to thinking of +myself and my own sorrows when I ought to be thinking only of you +and Kitty." + +"Never mind Kitty," said Barker impulsively. "Tell me about +yourself--your own sorrows. I am a brute to have bothered you +about her at such a moment; and now until you have told me what is +paining you so I shall not let you speak of her." He was perfectly +sincere. What were Kitty's possible and easy tears over the loss +of her money to the unknown agony that could wrench a sob from a +woman like this? "Dear Mrs. Horncastle," he went on as +breathlessly, "think of me now not as Kitty's husband, but as your +true friend. Yes, as your BEST and TRUEST friend, and speak to me +as you would speak to him." + +"You will be my friend?" she said suddenly and passionately, +grasping his hand, "my best and truest friend? and if I tell you +all,--everything, you will not cast me from you and hate me?" + +Barker felt the same thrill from her warm hand slowly possess his +whole being as it had the evening before, but this time he was +prepared and answered the grasp and her eyes together as he said +breathlessly, "I will be--I AM your friend." + +She withdrew her hand and passed it over her eyes. After a moment +she caught his hand again, and, holding it tightly as if she feared +he might fly from her, bit her lip, and then slowly, without +looking at him, said, "I lied to you about myself and Kitty that +night; I did not come with her. I came alone and secretly to +Boomville to see--to see the man who is my husband." + +"Your husband!" said Barker in surprise. He had believed, with the +rest of the world, that there had been no communication between +them for years. Yet so intense was his interest in her that he did +not notice that this revelation was leaving now no excuse for his +wife's presence at Boomville. + +Mrs. Horncastle went on with dogged bitterness, "Yes, my husband. +I went to him to beg and bribe him to let me see my child. Yes, MY +child," she said frantically, tightening her hold upon his hand, +"for I lied to you when I once told you I had none. I had a child, +and, more than that, a child who at his birth I did not dare to +openly claim." + +She stopped breathlessly, stared at his face with her former +intensity as if she would pluck the thought that followed from his +brain. But he only moved closer to her, passed his arm over her +shoulders with a movement so natural and protecting that it had a +certain dignity in it, and, looking down upon her bent head with +eyes brimming with sympathy, whispered, "Poor, poor child!" + +Whereat Mrs. Horncastle again burst into tears. And then, with her +head half drawn towards his shoulder, she told him all,--all that +had passed between her and her husband,--even all that they had +then but hinted at. It was as if she felt she could now, for the +first time, voice all these terrible memories of the past which had +come back to her last night when her husband had left her. She +concealed nothing, she veiled nothing; there were intervals when +her tears no longer flowed, and a cruel hardness and return of her +old imperiousness of voice and manner took their place, as if she +was doing a rigid penance and took a bitter satisfaction in laying +bare her whole soul to him. "I never had a friend," she whispered; +"there were women who persecuted me with their jealous sneers; +there were men who persecuted me with their selfish affections. +When I first saw YOU, you seemed something so apart and different +from all other men that, although I scarcely knew you, I wanted to +tell you, even then, all that I have told you now. I wanted you to +be my friend; something told me that you could,--that you could +separate me from my past; that you could tell me what to do; that +you could make me think as you thought, see life as YOU saw it, and +trust always to some goodness in people as YOU did. And in this +faith I thought that you would understand me now, and even forgive +me all." + +She made a slight movement as if to disengage his arm, and, +possibly, to look into his eyes, which she knew instinctively were +bent upon her downcast head. But he only held her the more tightly +until her cheek was close against his breast. "What could I do?" +she murmured. "A man in sorrow and trouble may go to a woman for +sympathy and support and the world will not gainsay or misunderstand +him. But a woman--weaker, more helpless, credulous, ignorant, and +craving for light--must not in her agony go to a man for succor and +sympathy." + +"Why should she not?" burst out Barker passionately, releasing her +in his attempt to gaze into her face. "What man dare refuse her?" + +"Not THAT," she said slowly, but with still averted eyes, "but +because the world would say she LOVED him." + +"And what should she care for the opinion of a world that stands +aside and lets her suffer? Why should she heed its wretched +babble?" he went on in flashing indignation. + +"Because," she said faintly, lifting her moist eyes and moist and +parted lips towards him,--"because it would be TRUE!" + +There was a silence so profound that even the spring seemed to +withhold its song as their eyes and lips met. When the spring +recommenced its murmur, and they could hear the droning of a bee +above them and the rustling of the reed, she was murmuring, too, +with her face against his breast: "You did not think it strange +that I should follow you--that I should risk everything to tell you +what I have told you before I told you anything else? You will +never hate me for it, George?" + +There was another silence still more prolonged, and when he looked +again into the flushed face and glistening eyes he was saying, "I +have ALWAYS loved you. I know now I loved you from the first, from +the day when I leaned over you to take little Sta from your lap and +saw your tenderness for him in your eyes. I could have kissed you +THEN, dearest, as I do now." + +"And," she said, when she had gained her smiling breath again, "you +will always remember, George, that you told me this BEFORE I told +you anything of her." + +"HER? Of whom, dearest?" he asked, leaning over her tenderly. + +"Of Kitty--of your wife," she said impatiently, as she drew back +shyly with her former intense gaze. + +He did not seem to grasp her meaning, but said gravely, "Let us not +talk of her NOW. Later we shall have MUCH to say of her. For," he +added quietly, "you know I must tell her all." + +The color faded from her cheek. "Tell her all!" she repeated +vacantly; then suddenly she turned upon him eagerly, and said, "But +what if she is gone?" + +"Gone?" he repeated. + +"Yes; gone. What if she has run away with Van Loo? What if she +has disgraced you and her child?" + +"What do you mean?" he said, seizing both her hands and gazing at +her fixedly. + +"I mean," she said, with a half-frightened eagerness, "that she has +already gone with Van Loo. George! George!" she burst out +suddenly and passionately, falling upon her knees before him, "do +you think that I would have followed you here and told you what I +did if I thought that she had now the slightest claim upon your +love or honor? Don't you understand me? I came to tell you of her +flight to Boomville with that man; how I accidentally intercepted +them there; how I tried to save her from him, and even lied to you +to try to save her from your indignation; but how she deceived me +as she has you, and even escaped and joined her lover while you +were with me. I came to tell you that and nothing more, George, I +swear it. But when you were kind to me and pitied me, I was mad-- +wild! I wanted to win you first out of your own love. I wanted +you to respond to MINE before you knew your wife was faithless. +Yet I would have saved her if I could. Listen, George! A moment +more before you speak!" + +Then she hurriedly told him all; the whole story of his wife's +dishonor, from her entrance into the sitting-room with Van Loo, her +later appeal for concealment from her husband's unexpected +presence, to the use she made of that concealment to fly with her +lover. She spared no detail, and even repeated the insult Mrs. +Barker had cast upon her with the triumphant reproach that her +husband would not believe her. "Perhaps," she added bitterly, "you +may not believe me now. I could even stand that from you, George, +if it could make you happier; but you would still have to believe +it from others. The people at the Boomville Hotel saw them leave +it together." + +"I do believe you," be said slowly, but with downcast eyes, "and if +I did not love you before you told me this I could love you now for +the part you have taken; but"-- He stopped. + +"You love her still," she burst out, "and I might have known it. +Perhaps," she went on distractedly, "you love her the more that you +have lost her. It is the way of men--and women." + +"If I had loved her truly," said Barker, lifting his frank eyes to +hers, "I could not have touched YOUR lips. I could not even have +wished to--as I did three years ago--as I did last night. Then I +feared it was my weakness, now I know it was my love. I have +thought of it ever since, even while waiting my wife's return here, +knowing that I did not and never could have loved her. But for +that very reason I must try to save her for her own sake, if I +cannot save her for mine; and if I fail, dearest, it shall not be +said that we climbed to happiness over her back bent with the +burden of her shame. If I loved you and told you so, thinking her +still guiltless and innocent, how could I profit now by her fault?" + +Mrs. Horncastle saw too late her mistake. "Then you would take her +back?" she said frenziedly. + +"To my home--which is hers--yes. To my heart--no. She never was +there." + +"And I," said Mrs. Horncastle, with a quivering lip,--"where do I +go when you have settled this? Back to my past again? Back to my +husbandless, childless life?" + +She was turning away, but Barker caught her in his arms again. +"No!" he said, his whole face suddenly radiating with hope and +youthful enthusiasm. "No! Kitty will help us; we will tell her +all. You do not know her, dearest, as I do--how good and kind she +is, in spite of all. We will appeal to her; she will devise some +means by which, without the scandal of a divorce, she and I may be +separated. She will take dear little Sta with her--it is only +right, poor girl; but she will let me come and see him. She will +be a sister to us, dearest. Courage! All will come right yet. +Trust to me." + +An hysterical laugh came to Mrs. Horncastle's lips and then +stopped. For as she looked up at him in his supreme hopefulness, +his divine confidence in himself and others--at his handsome face +beaming with love and happiness, and his clear gray eyes glittering +with an almost spiritual prescience--she, woman of the world and +bitter experience, and perfectly cognizant of her own and Kitty's +possibilities, was, nevertheless, completely carried away by her +lover's optimism. For of all optimism that of love is the most +convincing. Dear boy!--for he was but a boy in experience--only +his love for her could work this magic. So she gave him kiss for +kiss, largely believing, largely hoping, that Mrs. Barker was in +love with Van Loo and would NOT return. And in this hope an +invincible belief in the folly of her own sex soothed and sustained +her. + +"We must go now, dearest," said Barker, pointing to the sun already +near the meridian. Three hours had fled, they knew not how. "I +will bring you back to the hill again, but there we had better +separate, you taking your way alone to the hotel as you came, and I +will go a little way on the road to the Divide and return later. +Keep your own counsel about Kitty for her sake and ours; perhaps no +one else may know the truth yet." With a farewell kiss they +plunged again hand in hand through the cool bracken and again +through the hot manzanita bushes, and so parted on the hilltop, as +they had never parted before, leaving their whole world behind +them. + +Barker walked slowly along the road under the flickering shade of +wayside sycamore, his sensitive face also alternating with his +thought in lights and shadows. Presently there crept towards him +out of the distance a halting, vacillating, deviating buggy, +trailing a cloud of dust after it like a broken wing. As it came +nearer he could see that the horse was spent and exhausted, and +that the buggy's sole occupant--a woman--was equally exhausted in +her monotonous attempt to urge it forward with whip and reins that +rose and fell at intervals with feeble reiteration. Then he +stepped out of the shadow and stood in the middle of the sunlit +road to await it. For he recognized his wife. + +The buggy came nearer. And then the most exquisite pang he had +ever felt before at his wife's hands shot through him. For as she +recognized him she made a wild but impotent attempt to dash past +him, and then as suddenly pulled up in the ditch. + +He went up to her. She was dirty, she was disheveled, she was +haggard, she was plain. There were rings of dust round her tear- +swept eyes and smudges of dust-dried perspiration over her fair +cheek. He thought of the beauty, freshness, and elegance of the +woman he had just left, and an infinite pity swept the soul of this +weak-minded gentleman. He ran towards her, and tenderly lifting +her in her shame-stained garments from the buggy, said hurriedly, +"I know it all, poor Kitty! You heard the news of Van Loo's +flight, and you ran over to the Divide to try and save some of your +money. Why didn't you wait? Why didn't you tell me?" + +There was no mistaking the reality of his words, the genuine pity +and tenderness of his action; but the woman saw before her only the +familiar dupe of her life, and felt an infinite relief mingled with +a certain contempt for his weakness and anger at her previous fears +of him. + +"You might have driven over, then, yourself," she said in a high, +querulous voice, "if you knew it so well, and have spared ME this +horrid, dirty, filthy, hopeless expedition, for I have not saved +anything--there! And I have had all this disgusting bother!" + +For an instant he was sorely tempted to lift his eyes to her face, +but he checked himself; then he gently took her dust-coat from her +shoulders and shook it out, wiped the dust from her face and eyes +with his own handkerchief, held her hat and blew the dust from it +with a vivid memory of performing the same service for Mrs. +Horncastle only an hour before, while she arranged her hair; and +then, lifting her again into the buggy, said quietly, as he took +his seat beside her and grasped the reins:-- + +"I will drive you to the hotel by way of the stables, and you can +go at once to your room and change your clothes. You are tired, +you are nervous and worried, and want rest. Don't tell me anything +now until you feel quite yourself again." + +He whipped up the horse, who, recognizing another hand at the +reins, lunged forward in a final effort, and in a few minutes they +were at the hotel. + +As Mrs. Horncastle sat at luncheon in the great dining-room, a +little pale and abstracted, she saw Mrs. Barker sweep confidently +into the room, fresh, rosy, and in a new and ravishing toilette. +With a swift glance of conscious power towards the other guests she +walked towards Mrs. Horncastle. "Ah, here you are, dear," she said +in a voice that could easily reach all ears, "and you've arrived +only a little before me, after all. And I've had such an AWFUL +drive to the Divide! And only think! poor George telegraphed to me +at Boomville not to worry, and his dispatch has only just come back +here." + +And with a glance of complacency she laid Barker's gentle and +forgiving dispatch before the astonished Mrs. Horncastle. + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +As the day advanced the excitement over the financial crisis +increased at Hymettus, until, in spite of its remote and peaceful +isolation, it seemed to throb through all its verandas and +corridors with some pulsation from the outer world. Besides the +letters and dispatches brought by hurried messengers and by coach +from the Divide, there was a crowd of guests and servants around +the branch telegraph at the new Heavy Tree post-office which was +constantly augmenting. Added to the natural anxiety of the deeply +interested was the stimulated fever of the few who wished to be "in +the fashion." It was early rumored that a heavy operator, a guest +of the hotel, who was also a director in the telegraph company, had +bought up the wires for his sole use, that the dispatches were +doctored in his interests as a "bear," and there was wild talk of +lynching by the indignant mob. Passengers from Sacramento, San +Francisco, and Marysville brought incredible news and the wildest +sensations. Firm after firm had failed in the great cities. Old +established houses that dated back to the "spring of '49," and had +weathered the fires and inundations of their perilous Californian +infancy, collapsed before this mysterious, invisible, impalpable +breath of panic. Companies rooted in respectability and sneered at +for old-fashioned ways were discovered to have shamelessly +speculated with trusts! An eminent deacon and pillar of the church +was found dead in his room with a bullet in his heart and a damning +confession on the desk before him! Foreign bankers were sending +their gold out of the country; government would be appealed to to +open the vaults of the Mint; there would be an embargo on all +bullion shipment! Nothing was too wild or preposterous to be +repeated or credited. + +And with this fever of sordid passion the summer temperature had +increased. For the last two weeks the thermometer had stood +abnormally high during the day-long sunshine; and the metallic dust +in the roads over mineral ranges pricked the skin like red-hot +needles. In the deepest woods the aromatic sap stood in beads on +felled logs and splintered tree-shafts; even the mountain night +breeze failed to cool these baked and heated fastnesses. There +were ominous clouds of smoke by day that were pillars of fire by +night along the distant valleys. Some of the nearer crests were +etched against the midnight sky by dull red creeping lines like a +dying firework. The great hotel itself creaked and crackled and +warped though all its painted, blistered, and veneered expanse, and +was filled with the stifling breath of desiccation. The stucco +cracked and crumbled away from the cornices; there were yawning +gaps in the boarded floors beneath the Turkey carpets. Plate-glass +windows became hopelessly fixed in their warped and twisted sashes, +and added to the heat; there was a warm incense of pine sap in the +dining-room that flavored all the cuisine. And yet the babble of +stocks and shares went on, and people pricked their ears over their +soup to catch the gossip of the last arrival. + +Demorest, loathing it all in his new-found bitterness, was +nevertheless impatient in his inaction, and was eagerly awaiting a +telegram from Stacy; Barker had disappeared since luncheon. +Suddenly there was a commotion on the veranda as a carriage drove +up with a handsome, gray-haired woman. In the buzzing of voices +around him Demorest heard the name of Mrs. Van Loo. In further +comments, made in more smothered accents, he heard that Van Loo had +been stopped at Canyon Station, but that no warrant had yet been +issued against him; that it was generally believed that the bank +dared not hold him; that others openly averred that he had been +used as a scapegoat to avert suspicion from higher guilt. And +certainly Mrs. Van Loo's calm, confident air seemed to corroborate +these assertions. + +He was still wondering if the strange coincidence which had brought +both mother and son into his own life was not merely a fancy, as +far as SHE was concerned, when a waiter brought a message from Mrs. +Van Loo that she would be glad to see him for a few moments in her +room. Last night he could scarcely have restrained his eagerness +to meet her and elucidate the mystery of the photograph; now he was +conscious of an equally strong revulsion of feeling, and a dull +premonition of evil. However, it was no doubt possible that the +man had told her of his previous inquiries, and she had merely +acknowledged them by that message. + +Demorest found Mrs. Van Loo in the private sitting-room where he +and his old partners had supped on the preceding night. She +received him with unmistakable courtesy and even a certain dignity +that might or might not have been assumed. He had no difficulty in +recognizing the son's mechanical politeness in the first, but he +was puzzled at the second. + +"The manager of this hotel," she began, with a foreigner's +precision of English, "has just told me that you were at present +occupying my rooms at his invitation, but that you wished to see me +at once on my return, and I believe that I was not wrong in +apprehending that you preferred to hear my wishes from my own lips +rather than from an innkeeper. I had intended to keep these rooms +for some weeks, but, unfortunately for me, though fortunately for +you, the present terrible financial crisis, which has most unjustly +brought my son into such scandalous prominence, will oblige me to +return to San Francisco until his reputation is fully cleared of +these foul aspersions. I shall only ask you to allow me the +undisturbed possession of these rooms for a couple of hours until I +can pack my trunks and gather up a few souvenirs that I almost +always keep with me." + +"Pray, consider that your wishes are my own in respect to that, my +dear madam," returned Demorest gravely, "and that, indeed, I +protested against even this temporary intrusion upon your +apartments; but I confess that now that you have spoken of your +souvenirs I have the greatest curiosity about one of them, and that +even my object in seeking this interview was to gratify it. It is +in regard to a photograph which I saw on the chimney-piece in your +bedroom, which I think I recognized as that of some one whom I +formerly knew." + +There was a sudden look of sharp suspicion and even hard +aggressiveness that quite changed the lady's face as he mentioned +the word "souvenir," but it quickly changed to a smile as she put +up her fan with a gesture of arch deprecation, and said: + +"Ah! I see. Of course, a lady's photograph." + +The reply irritated Demorest. More than that, he felt a sudden +sense of the absolute sentimentality of his request, and the +consciousness that he was about to invite the familiar confidence +of this strange woman--whose son had forged his name--in regard to +HER! + +"It was a Venetian picture," he began, and stopped, a singular +disgust keeping him from voicing the name. + +But Mrs. Van Loo was less reticent. "Oh, you mean my dearest +friend--a lovely picture, and you know her? Why, yes, surely. You +are THE Mr. Demorest who-- Of course, that old love-affair. Well, +you are a marvel! Five years ago, at least, and you have not +forgotten! I really must write and tell her." + +"Write and tell her!" Then it was all a lie about her death! He +felt not only his faith, his hope, his future leaving him, but even +his self-control. With an effort he said.-- + +"I think you have already satisfied my curiosity. I was told five +years ago that she was dead. It was because of the date of the +photograph--two years later--that I ventured to intrude upon you. +I was anxious only to know the truth." + +"She certainly was very much living and of the world when I saw her +last, two years ago," said Mrs. Van Loo, with an easy smile. "I +dare say that was a ruse of her relatives--a very stupid one--to +break off the affair, for I think they had other plans. But, dear +me! now I remember, was there not some little quarrel between you +before? Some letter from you that was not very kind? My +impression is that there was something of the sort, and that the +young lady was indignant. But only for a time, you know. She very +soon forgot it. I dare say if you wrote something very charming to +her it might not be too late. We women are very forgiving, Mr. +Demorest, and although she is very much sought after, as are all +young American girls whose fathers can give them a comfortable +'dot', her parents might be persuaded to throw over a poor prince +for a rich countryman in the end. Of course, you know, to you +Republicans there is always something fascinating in titles and +blood, and our dear friend is like other girls. Still, it is worth +the risk. And five years of waiting and devotion really ought to +tell. It's quite a romance! Shall I write to her and tell her I +have seen you, looking well and prosperous? Nothing more. Do let +me! I should be delighted." + +"I think it hardly worth while for you to give yourself that +trouble," said Demorest quietly, looking in Mrs. Van Loo's smiling +eyes, "now that I know the story of the young lady's death was a +forgery. And I will not intrude further on your time. Pray give +yourself no needless hurry over your packing. I may go to San +Francisco this afternoon, and not even require the rooms to-night." + +"At least, let me make you a present of the souvenir as an +acknowledgment of your courtesy," said Mrs. Van Loo, passing into +her bedroom and returning with the photograph. "I feel that with +your five years of constancy it is more yours than mine." As a +gentleman Demorest knew he could not refuse, and taking the +photograph from her with a low bow, with another final salutation +he withdrew. + +Alone by himself in a corner of the veranda he was surprised that +the interview had made so little impression on him, and had so +little altered his conviction. His discovery that the announcement +of his betrothed's death was a fiction did not affect the fact that +though living she was yet dead to him, and apparently by her own +consent. The contrast between her life and his during those five +years had been covertly accented by Mrs. Van Loo, whether +intentionally or not, and he saw again as last night the full +extent of his sentimental folly. He could not even condole with +himself that he was the victim of miserable falsehoods that others +had invented. SHE had accepted them, and had even excused her +desertion of him by that last deceit of the letter. + +He drew out her photograph and again examined it, but not as a +lover. Had she really grown stouter and more self-complacent? Was +the spirituality and delicacy he had worshiped in her purely his +own idiotic fancy? Had she always been like this? Yes. There was +the girl who could weakly strive, weakly revenge herself, and +weakly forget. There was the figure that he had expected to find +carved upon the tomb which he had long sought that he might weep +over. He laughed aloud. + +It was very hot, and he was stifling with inaction. What was +Barker doing, and why had not Stacy telegraphed to him? And what +were those people in the courtyard doing? Were they discussing +news of further disaster and ruin? Perhaps he was even now a +beggar. Well, his fortune might go with his faith. + +But the crowd was simply looking at the roof of the hotel, and he +now saw that a black smoke was drifting across the courtyard, and +was conscious of a smell of soot and burning. He stepped down from +the veranda among the mingled guests and servants, and saw that the +smoke was only pouring from a chimney. He heard, too, that the +chimney had been on fire, and that it was Mrs. Van Loo's bedroom +chimney, and that when the startled servants had knocked at the +locked door she had told them that she was only burning some old +letters and newspapers, the refuse of her trunks. There was +naturally some indignation that the hotel had been so foolishly +endangered, in such scorching weather, and the manager had had a +scene with her which resulted in her leaving the hotel indignantly +with her half-packed boxes. But even after the smoke had died away +and the fire been extinguished in the chimney and hearth, there was +an acrid smell of smouldering pine penetrating the upper floors of +the hotel all that afternoon. + +When Mrs. Van Loo drove away, the manager returned with Demorest to +the rooms. The marble hearth was smoked and discolored and still +littered with charred ashes of burnt paper. "My belief is," said +the manager darkly, "that the old hag came here just to burn up a +lot of incriminating papers that her son had intrusted to her +keeping. It looks mighty suspicious. You see she got up an awful +lot of side when I told her I didn't reckon to run a smelting +furnace in a wooden hotel with the thermometer at one hundred in +the office, and I reckon it was just an excuse for getting off in a +hurry." + +But the continued delay in Stacy's promised telegram had begun to +work upon Demorest's usual equanimity, and he scarcely listened in +his anxiety for his old partner. He knew that Stacy should have +arrived in San Francisco by noon. He had almost determined to take +the next train from the Divide when two horsemen dashed into the +courtyard. There was the usual stir on the veranda and rush for +news, but the two new arrivals turned out to be Barker, on a horse +covered with foam, and a dashing, elegantly dressed stranger on a +mustang as carefully groomed and as spotless as himself. Demorest +instantly recognized Jack Hamlin. + +He had not seen Hamlin since that day, five years before, when the +latter had accompanied the three partners with their treasure to +Boomville, and had handed him the mysterious packet. As the two +men dismounted hurriedly and moved towards him, he felt a +premonition of something as fateful and important as then. In +obedience to a sign from Barker he led them to a more secluded +angle of the veranda. He could not help noticing that his younger +partner's face was mobile as ever, but more thoughtful and older; +yet his voice rang with the old freemasonry of the camp, as he +said, with a laugh, "The signal has been given, and it's boot and +saddle and away." + +"But I have had no dispatch from Stacy," said Demorest in surprise. +"He was to telegraph to me from San Francisco in any emergency." + +"He never got there at all," said Barker. "Jack ran slap into Van +Loo at the Divide, and sent a dispatch to Jim, which stopped him +halfway until Jack could reach him, which he nearly broke his neck +to do; and then Jack finished up by bringing a message from Stacy +to us that we should all meet together on the slope of Heavy Tree, +near the Bar. I met Jack just as I was riding into the Divide, and +came back with him. He will tell you the rest, and you can swear +by what Jack says, for he's white all through," he added, laying +his hand affectionately on Hamlin's shoulder. + +Hamlin winced slightly. For he had NOT told Barker that his wife +was with Van Loo, nor his first reason for interfering. But he +related how he had finally overtaken Van Loo at Canyon Station, and +how the fugitive had disclosed the conspiracy of Steptoe and Hall +against the bank and Marshall as the price of his own release. On +this news, remembering that Stacy had passed the Divide on his way +to the station, he had first sent a dispatch to him, and then met +him at the first station on the road. "I reckon, gentlemen," said +Hamlin, with an unusual earnestness in his voice, "that he'd not +only got my telegram, but ALL THE NEWS that had been flying around +this morning, for he looked like a man to whom it was just a 'toss- +up' whether he took his own life then and there or was willing to +have somebody else take it for him, for he said, 'I'll go myself,' +and telegraphed to have the surveyor stopped from coming. Then he +told me to tell you fellows, and ask you to come too." Jack +paused, and added half mischievously, "He sort of asked ME what I +would take to stand by him in the row, if there was one, and I told +him I'd take--whiskey! You see, boys, it's a kind of off-night +with me, and I wouldn't mind for the sake of old times to finish +the game with old Steptoe that I began a matter of five years ago." + +"All right," said Demorest, with a kindling eye; "I suppose we'd +better start at once. One moment," he added. "Barker boy, will +you excuse me if I speak a word to Hamlin?" As Barker nodded and +walked to the rails of the veranda, Demorest took Hamlin aside, +"You and I," he said hurriedly, "are SINGLE men; Barker has a wife +and child. This is likely to be no child's play." + +But Jack Hamlin was no fool, and from certain leading questions +which Barker had already put, but which he had skillfully evaded, +he surmised that Barker knew something of his wife's escapade. He +answered a little more seriously than his wont, "I don't think as +regards HIS WIFE that would make much difference to him or her how +stiff the work was." + +Demorest turned away with his last pang of bitterness. It needed +only this confirmation of all that Stacy had hinted, of what he +himself had seen in his brief interview with Mrs. Barker since his +return, to shake his last remaining faith. "We'll all go together, +then," he said, with a laugh, "as in the old times, and perhaps +it's as well that we have no woman in our confidence." + +An hour later the three men passed quietly out of the hotel, +scarcely noticed by the other guests, who were also oblivious of +their absence during the evening. For Mrs. Barker, quite recovered +from her fatiguing ride, was in high spirits and the most beautiful +and spotless of summer gowns, and was considered quite a heroine by +the other ladies as she dwelt upon the terrible heat of her return +journey. "Only I knew Mr. Barker would be worried--and the poor +man actually walked a mile down the Divide road to meet me--I +believe I should have stayed there all day." She glanced round the +other groups for Mrs. Horncastle, but that lady had retired early. +Possibly she alone had noticed the absence of the two partners. + +The guests sat up until quite late, for the heat seemed to grow +still more oppressive, and the strange smell of burning wood +revived the gossip about Mrs. Van Loo and her stupidity in setting +fire to her chimney. Some averred that it would be days before the +smell could be got out of the house; others referred it to the +fires in the woods, which were now dangerously near. One spoke of +the isolated position of the hotel as affording the greatest +security, but was met by the assertion of a famous mountaineer that +the forest fires were wont to leap from crest to crest mysteriously, +without any apparent continuous contact. This led to more or less +light-hearted conjecture of present danger and some amusing stories +of hotel fires and their ludicrous revelations. There were also some +entertaining speculations as to what they would do and what they +would try to save in such an emergency. + +"For myself," said Mrs. Barker audaciously, "I should certainly let +Mr. Barker look after Sta and confine myself entirely to getting +away with my diamonds. I know the wretch would never think of +them." + +It was still later when, exhausted by the heat and some reaction +from the excitement of the day, they at last deserted the veranda +for their rooms, and for a while the shadowy bulk of the whole +building was picked out with regularly spaced lights from its open +windows, until now these finally faded and went out one by one. An +hour later the whole building had sunk to rest. It was said that +it was only four in the morning when a yawning porter, having put +out the light in a dark, upper corridor, was amazed by a dull glow +from the top of the wall, and awoke to the fact that a red fire, as +yet smokeless and flameless, was creeping along the cornice. He +ran to the office and gave the alarm; but on returning with +assistance was stopped in the corridor by an impenetrable wall of +smoke veined with murky flashes. The alarm was given in all the +lower floors, and the occupants rushed from their beds half dressed +to the courtyard, only to see, as they afterwards averred, the +flames burst like cannon discharges from the upper windows and +unite above the crackling roof. So sudden and complete was the +catastrophe, although slowly prepared by a leak in the overheated +chimney between the floors, that even the excitement of fear and +exertion was spared the survivors. There was bewilderment and +stupor, but neither uproar nor confusion. People found themselves +wandering in the woods, half awake and half dressed, having +descended from the balconies and leaped from the windows,--they +knew not how. Others on the upper floor neither awoke nor moved +from their beds, but were suffocated without a cry. From the first +an instinctive idea of the hopelessness of combating the +conflagration possessed them all; to a blind, automatic feeling to +flee the building was added the slow mechanism of the somnambulist; +delicate women walked speechlessly, but securely, along ledges and +roofs from which they would have fallen by the mere light of reason +and of day. There was no crowding or impeding haste in their dumb +exodus. It was only when Mrs. Barker awoke disheveled in the +courtyard, and with an hysterical outcry rushed back into the +hotel, that there was any sign of panic. + +Mrs. Horncastle, who was standing near, fully dressed as from some +night-long vigil, quickly followed her. The half-frantic woman was +making directly for her own apartments, whose windows those in the +courtyard could see were already belching smoke. Suddenly Mrs. +Horncastle stopped with a bitter cry and clasped her forehead. It +had just flashed upon her that Mrs. Barker had told her only a few +hours before that Sta had been removed with the nurse to the UPPER +FLOOR! It was not the forgotten child that Mrs. Barker was +returning for, but her diamonds! Mrs. Horncastle called her; she +did not reply. The smoke was already pouring down the staircase. +Mrs. Horncastle hesitated for a moment only, and then, drawing a +long breath, dashed up the stairs. On the first landing she +stumbled over something--the prostrate figure of the nurse. But +this saved her, for she found that near the floor she could breathe +more freely. Before her appeared to be an open door. She crept +along towards it on her hands and knees. The frightened cry of a +child, awakened from its sleep in the dark, gave her nerve to rise, +enter the room, and dash open the window. By the flashing light +she could see a little figure rising from a bed. It was Sta. +There was not a moment to be lost, for the open window was +beginning to draw the smoke from the passage. Luckily, the boy, by +some childish instinct, threw his arms round her neck and left her +hands free. Whispering him to hold tight, she clambered out of the +window. A narrow ledge of cornice scarcely wide enough for her +feet ran along the house to a distant balcony. With her back to +the house she zigzagged her feet along the cornice to get away from +the smoke, which now poured directly from the window. Then she +grew dizzy; the weight of the child on her bosom seemed to be +toppling her forward towards the abyss below. She closed her eyes, +frantically grasping the child with crossed arms on her breast as +she stood on the ledge, until, as seen from below through the +twisting smoke, they might have seemed a figure of the Madonna and +Child niched in the wall. Then a voice from above called to her, +"Courage!" and she felt the flap of a twisted sheet lowered from an +upper window against her face. She grasped it eagerly; it held +firmly. Then she heard a cry from below, saw them carrying a +ladder, and at last was lifted with her burden from the ledge by +powerful hands. Then only did she raise her eyes to the upper +window whence had come her help. Smoke and flame were pouring from +it. The unknown hero who had sacrificed his only chance of escape +to her remained forever unknown. + + . . . . . . + +Only four miles away that night a group of men were waiting for the +dawn in the shadow of a pine near Heavy Tree Bar. As the sky +glowed redly over the crest between them and Hymettus, Hamlin +said:-- + +"Another one of those forest fires. It's this side of Black Spur, +and a big one, I reckon." + +"Do you know," said Barker thoughtfully, "I was thinking of the +time the old cabin burnt up on Heavy Tree. It looks to be about in +the same place." + +"Hush!" said Stacy sharply. + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +An abandoned tunnel--an irregular orifice in the mountain flank +which looked like a dried-up sewer that had disgorged through its +opening the refuse of the mountain in red slime, gravel, and a +peculiar clay known as "cement," in a foul streak down its side; a +narrow ledge on either side, broken up by heaps of quartz, +tailings, and rock, and half hidden in scrub, oak, and myrtle; a +decaying cabin of logs, bark, and cobblestones--these made up the +exterior of the Marshall claim. To this defacement of the +mountain, the rude clearing of thicket and underbrush by fire or +blasting, the lopping of tree-boughs and the decapitation of +saplings, might be added the debris and ruins of half-civilized +occupancy. The ground before the cabin was covered with broken +boxes, tin cans, the staves and broken hoops of casks, and the +cast-off rags of blankets and clothing. The whole claim in its +unsavory, unpicturesque details, and its vulgar story of sordid, +reckless, and selfish occupancy and abandonment, was a foul blot +on the landscape, which the first rosy dawn only made the more +offending. Surely the last spot in the world that men should +quarrel and fight for! + +So thought George Barker, as with his companions they moved in +single file slowly towards it. The little party consisted only of +himself, Demorest, and Stacy; Marshall and Hamlin--according to a +prearranged plan--were still in ambush to join them at the first +appearance of Steptoe and his gang. The claim was yet unoccupied; +they had secured their first success. Steptoe's followers, unaware +that his design had been discovered, and confident that they could +easily reach the claim before Marshall and the surveyor, had +lingered. Some of them had held a drunken carouse at their +rendezvous at Heavy Tree. Others were still engaged in procuring +shovels and picks and pans for their mock equipment as miners, and +this, again, gave Marshall's adherents the advantage. THEY knew +that their opponents would probably first approach the empty claim +encumbered only with their peaceful implements, while they +themselves had brought their rifles with them. + +Stacy, who by tacit consent led the party, on reaching the claim at +once posted Demorest and Barker each behind a separate heap of +quartz tailings on the ledge, which afforded them a capital +breastwork, and stationed himself at the mouth of the tunnel which +was nearest the trail. It had already been arranged what each man +was to do. They were in possession. For the rest they must wait. +What they thought at that moment no one knew. Their characteristic +appearance had slightly changed. The melancholy and philosophic +Demorest was alert and bitter. Barker's changeful face had become +fixed and steadfast. Stacy alone wore his "fighting look," which +the others had remembered. + +They had not long to wait. The sounds of rude laughter, coarse +skylarking, and voices more or less still confused with half-spent +liquor came from the rocky trail. And then Steptoe appeared with +part of his straggling followers, who were celebrating their easy +invasion by clattering their picks and shovels and beating loudly +upon their tins and prospecting-pans. The three partners quickly +recognized the stamp of the strangers, in spite of their peaceful +implements. They were the waifs and strays of San Francisco +wharves, of Sacramento dens, of dissolute mountain towns; and there +was not, probably, a single actual miner among them. A raging +scorn and contempt took possession of Barker and Demorest, but +Stacy knew their exact value. As Steptoe passed before the opening +of the tunnel he heard the cry of "Halt! + +He looked up. He saw Stacy not thirty yards before him with his +rifle at half-cock. He saw Barker and Demorest, fully armed, rise +from behind their breastworks of rock along the ledge and thus +fully occupy the claim. But he saw more. He saw that his plot was +known. Outlaw and desperado as he was, he saw that he had lost his +moral power in this actual possession, and that from that moment he +must be the aggressor. He saw he was fighting no irresponsible +hirelings like his own, but men of position and importance, whose +loss would make a stir. Against their rifles the few revolvers +that his men chanced to have slung to them were of little avail. +But he was not cowed, although his few followers stumbled together +at this momentary check, half angrily, half timorously like wolves +without a leader. "Bring up the other men and their guns," he +whispered fiercely to the nearest. Then he faced Stacy. + +"Who are YOU to stop peaceful miners going to work on their own +claim?" he said coarsely. "I'll tell you WHO, boys," he added, +suddenly turning to his men with a hoarse laugh. "It ain't even +the bank! It's only Jim Stacy, that the bank kicked out yesterday +to save itself,--Jim Stacy and his broken-down pals. And what's +the thief doing here--in Marshall's tunnel--the only spot that +Marshall can claim? We ain't no particular friends o' Marshall's, +though we're neighbors on the same claim; but we ain't going to see +Marshall ousted by tramps. Are we, boys?" + +"No, by G-d!" said his followers, dropping the pans and seizing +their picks and revolvers. They understood the appeal to arms if +not to their reason. For an instant the fight seemed imminent. +Then a voice from behind them said:-- + +"You needn't trouble yourselves about that! I'M Marshall! I sent +these gentlemen to occupy the claim until I came here with the +surveyor," and two men stepped from a thicket of myrtle in the rear +of Steptoe and his followers. The speaker, Marshall, was a thin, +slight, overworked, over-aged man; his companion, the surveyor, was +equally slight, but red-bearded, spectacled, and professional- +looking, with a long traveling-duster that made him appear even +clerical. They were scarcely a physical addition to Stacy's party, +whatever might have been their moral and legal support. + +But it was just this support that Steptoe strangely clung to in his +designs for the future, and a wild idea seized him. The surveyor +was really the only disinterested witness between the two parties. +If Steptoe could confuse his mind before the actual fighting--from +which he would, of course, escape as a non-combatant--it would go +far afterwards to rehabilitate Steptoe's party. "Very well, then," +he said to Marshall, "I shall call this gentleman to witness that +we have been attacked here in peaceable possession of our part of +the claim by these armed strangers, and whether they are acting on +your order or not, their blood will be on your head." + +"Then I reckon," said the surveyor, as he tore away his beard, wig, +spectacles, and mustache, and revealed the figure of Jack Hamlin, +"that I'm about the last witness that Mr. Steptoe-Horncastle ought +to call, and about the last witness that he ever WILL call!" + +But he had not calculated upon the desperation of Steptoe over the +failure of this last hope. For there sprang up in the outlaw's +brain the same hideous idea that he voiced to his companions at the +Divide. With a hoarse cry to his followers, he crashed his pickaxe +into the brain of Marshall, who stood near him, and sprang forward. +Three or four shots were exchanged. Two of his men fell, a bullet +from Stacy's rifle pierced Steptoe's leg, and he dropped forward on +one knee. He heard the steps of his reinforcements with their +weapons coming close behind him, and rolled aside on the sloping +ledge to let them pass. But he rolled too far. He felt himself +slipping down the mountain-side in the slimy shoot of the tunnel. +He made a desperate attempt to recover himself, but the treacherous +drift of the loose debris rolled with him, as if he were part of +its refuse, and, carrying him down, left him unconscious, but +otherwise uninjured, in the bushes of the second ledge five hundred +feet below. + +When he recovered his senses the shouts and outcries above him had +ceased. He knew he was safe. The ledge could only be reached by a +circuitous route three miles away. He knew, too, that if he could +only reach a point of outcrop a hundred yards away he could easily +descend to the stage road, down the gentle slope of the mountain +hidden in a growth of hazel-brush. He bound up his wounded leg, +and dragged himself on his hands and knees laboriously to the +outcrop. He did not look up; since his pick had crashed into +Marshall's brain he had but one blind thought before him--to escape +at once! That his revenge and compensation would come later he +never doubted. He limped and crept, rolled and fell, from bush to +bush through the sloping thickets, until he saw the red road a few +feet below him. + +If he only had a horse he could put miles between him and any +present pursuit! Why should he not have one? The road was +frequented by solitary horsemen--miners and Mexicans. He had his +revolver with him; what mattered the life of another man if he +escaped from the consequences of the one he had just taken? He +heard the clatter of hoofs; two priests on mules rode slowly by; he +ground his teeth with disappointment. But they had scarcely passed +before another and more rapid clatter came from their rear. It was +a lad on horseback. He started. It was his own son! + +He remembered in a flash how the boy had said he was coming to meet +the padre at the station on that day. His first impulse was to +hide himself, his wound, and his defeat from the lad, but the blind +idea of escape was still paramount. He leaned over the bank and +called to him. The astonished lad cantered eagerly to his side. + +"Give me your horse, Eddy," said the father; "I'm in bad luck, and +must get." + +The boy glanced at his father's face, at his tattered garments and +bandaged leg, and read the whole story. It was a familiar page to +him. He paled first and then flushed, and then, with an odd +glitter in his eyes, said, "Take me with you, father. Do! You +always did before. I'll bring you luck." + +Desperation is superstitious. Why not take him? They had been +lucky before, and the two together might confound any description +of their identity to the pursuers. "Help me up, Eddy, and then get +up before me." + +"BEHIND, you mean," said the boy, with a laugh, as he helped his +father into the saddle. + +"No," said Steptoe harshly. "BEFORE me,--do you hear? And if +anything happens BEHIND you, don't look! If I drop off, don't +stop! Don't get down, but go on and leave me. Do you understand?" +he repeated almost savagely. + +"Yes," said the boy tremulously. + +"All right," said the father, with a softer voice, as he passed his +one arm round the boy's body and lifted the reins. "Hold tight +when we come to the cross-roads, for we'll take the first turn, for +old luck's sake, to the Mission." + +They were the last words exchanged between them, for as they +wheeled rapidly to the left at the cross-roads, Jack Hamlin and +Demorest swung as quickly out of another road to the right +immediately behind them. Jack's challenge to "Halt!" was only +answered by Steptoe's horse springing forward under the sharp lash +of the riata. + +"Hold up!" said Jack suddenly, laying his hand upon the rifle which +Demorest had lifted to his shoulder. "He's carrying some one,--a +wounded comrade, I reckon. We don't want HIM. Swing out and go +for the horse; well forward, in the neck or shoulder." + +Demorest swung far out to the right of the road and raised his +rifle. As it cracked Steptoe's horse seemed to have suddenly +struck some obstacle ahead of him rather than to have been hit +himself, for his head went down with his fore feet under him, and +he turned a half-somersault on the road, flinging his two riders a +dozen feet away. + +Steptoe scrambled to his knees, revolver in hand, but the other +figure never moved. "Hands up!" said Jack, sighting his own +weapon. The reports seemed simultaneous, but Jack's bullet had +pierced Steptoe's brain even before the outlaw's pistol exploded +harmlessly in the air. + +The two men dismounted, but by a common instinct they both ran to +the prostrate figure that had never moved. + +"By God! it's a boy!" said Jack, leaning over the body and lifting +the shoulders from which the head hung loosely. "Neck broken and +dead as his pal." Suddenly he started, and, to Demorest's +astonishment, began hurriedly pulling off the glove from the boy's +limp right hand. + +"What are you doing?" demanded Demorest in creeping horror. + +"Look!" said Jack, as he laid bare the small white hand. The first +two fingers were merely unsightly stumps that had been hidden in +the padded glove. + +"Good God! Van Loo's brother!" said Demorest, recoiling. + +"No!" said Jack, with a grim face, "it's what I have long +suspected,--it's Steptoe's son!" + +"His son?" repeated Demorest. + +"Yes," said Jack; and he added, after looking at the two bodies +with a long-drawn whistle of concern, "and I wouldn't, if I were +you, say anything of this to Barker." + +"Why?" said Demorest. + +"Well," returned Jack, "when our scrimmage was over down there, and +they brought the news to Barker that his wife and her diamonds were +burnt up at the hotel, you remember that they said that Mrs. +Horncastle had saved his boy." + +"Yes," said Demorest; "but what has that to do with it?" + +"Nothing, I reckon," said Jack, with a slight shrug of his +shoulders, "only Mrs. Horncastle was the mother of the boy that's +lying there." + + . . . . . . + +Two years later as Demorest and Stacy sat before the fire in the +old cabin on Marshall's claim--now legally their own--they looked +from the door beyond the great bulk of Black Spur to the pallid +snow-line of the Sierras, still as remote and unchanged to them as +when they had gazed upon it from Heavy Tree Hill. And, for the +matter of that, they themselves seemed to have been left so +unchanged that even now, as in the old days, it was Barker's voice +as he greeted them from the darkening trail that alone broke their +reverie. + +"Well," said Demorest cheerfully, "your usual luck, Barker boy!" +for they already saw in his face the happy light they had once seen +there on an eventful night seven years ago. + +"I'm to be married to Mrs. Horncastle next month," he said +breathlessly, "and little Sta loves her already as if she was his +own mother. Wish me joy." + +A slight shadow passed over Stacy's face; but his hand was the +first to grasp Barker's, and his voice the first to say "Amen!" + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Three Partners, by Bret Harte + diff --git a/old/tpart10.zip b/old/tpart10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..c45a279 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/tpart10.zip |