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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Free Air, by Sinclair Lewis
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Free Air
+
+Author: Sinclair Lewis
+
+Release Date: September 30, 2008 [EBook #26732]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FREE AIR ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by K Nordquist, Stephen Blundell and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+       FREE AIR
+
+
+          BY
+    SINCLAIR LEWIS
+
+      AUTHOR OF
+    THE JOB, ETC.
+
+
+       [Device]
+
+
+   GROSSET & DUNLAP
+ PUBLISHERS  NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+      COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY
+ HARCOURT, BRACE AND HOWE, INC.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+ CHAPTER                                                         PAGE
+       I  MISS BOLTWOOD OF BROOKLYN IS LOST IN THE MUD              3
+      II  CLAIRE ESCAPES FROM RESPECTABILITY                       10
+     III  A YOUNG MAN IN A RAINCOAT                                21
+      IV  A ROOM WITHOUT                                           36
+       V  RELEASE BRAKES--SHIFT TO THIRD                           49
+      VI  THE LAND OF BILLOWING CLOUDS                             66
+     VII  THE GREAT AMERICAN FRYING PAN                            74
+    VIII  THE DISCOVERY OF CANNED SHRIMPS AND HESPERIDES           85
+      IX  THE MAN WITH AGATE EYES                                 101
+       X  THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE HILLSIDE ROAD               112
+      XI  SAGEBRUSH TOURISTS OF THE GREAT HIGHWAY                 119
+     XII  THE WONDERS OF NATURE WITH ALL MODERN IMPROVEMENTS      129
+    XIII  ADVENTURERS BY FIRELIGHT                                138
+     XIV  THE BEAST OF THE CORRAL                                 149
+      XV  THE BLACK DAY OF THE VOYAGE                             154
+     XVI  THE SPECTACLES OF AUTHORITY                             165
+    XVII  THE VAGABOND IN GREEN                                   176
+   XVIII  THE FALLACY OF ROMANCE                                  188
+     XIX  THE NIGHT OF ENDLESS PINES                              194
+      XX  THE FREE WOMAN                                          205
+     XXI  THE MINE OF LOST SOULS                                  219
+    XXII  ACROSS THE ROOF OF THE WORLD                            228
+   XXIII  THE GRAEL IN A BACK YARD IN YAKIMA                      237
+    XXIV  HER OWN PEOPLE                                          242
+     XXV  THE ABYSSINIAN PRINCE                                   254
+    XXVI  A CLASS IN ENGINEERING AND OMELETS                      270
+   XXVII  THE VICIOUSNESS OF NICE THINGS                          279
+  XXVIII  THE MORNING COAT OF MR. HUDSON B. RIGGS                 290
+    XXIX  THE ENEMY LOVE                                          300
+     XXX  THE VIRTUOUS PLOTTERS                                   307
+    XXXI  THE KITCHEN INTIMATE                                    310
+   XXXII  THE CORNFIELD ARISTOCRAT                                331
+  XXXIII  TOOTH-MUG TEA                                           345
+   XXXIV  THE BEGINNING OF A STORY                                361
+
+
+
+
+FREE AIR
+
+
+
+
+FREE AIR
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+MISS BOLTWOOD OF BROOKLYN IS LOST IN THE MUD
+
+
+When the windshield was closed it became so filmed with rain that Claire
+fancied she was piloting a drowned car in dim spaces under the sea. When
+it was open, drops jabbed into her eyes and chilled her cheeks. She was
+excited and thoroughly miserable. She realized that these Minnesota
+country roads had no respect for her polite experience on Long Island
+parkways. She felt like a woman, not like a driver.
+
+But the Gomez-Dep roadster had seventy horsepower, and sang songs. Since
+she had left Minneapolis nothing had passed her. Back yonder a truck had
+tried to crowd her, and she had dropped into a ditch, climbed a bank,
+returned to the road, and after that the truck was not. Now she was
+regarding a view more splendid than mountains above a garden by the
+sea--a stretch of good road. To her passenger, her father, Claire
+chanted:
+
+"Heavenly! There's some gravel. We can make time. We'll hustle on to the
+next town and get dry."
+
+"Yes. But don't mind me. You're doing very well," her father sighed.
+
+Instantly, the dismay of it rushing at her, she saw the end of the patch
+of gravel. The road ahead was a wet black smear, criss-crossed with
+ruts. The car shot into a morass of prairie gumbo--which is mud mixed
+with tar, fly-paper, fish glue, and well-chewed, chocolate-covered
+caramels. When cattle get into gumbo, the farmers send for the
+stump-dynamite and try blasting.
+
+It was her first really bad stretch of road. She was frightened. Then
+she was too appallingly busy to be frightened, or to be Miss Claire
+Boltwood, or to comfort her uneasy father. She had to drive. Her frail
+graceful arms put into it a vicious vigor that was genius.
+
+When the wheels struck the slime, they slid, they wallowed. The car
+skidded. It was terrifyingly out of control. It began majestically to
+turn toward the ditch. She fought the steering wheel as though she were
+shadow-boxing, but the car kept contemptuously staggering till it was
+sideways, straight across the road. Somehow, it was back again, eating
+into a rut, going ahead. She didn't know how she had done it, but she
+had got it back. She longed to take time to retrace her own cleverness
+in steering. She didn't. She kept going.
+
+The car backfired, slowed. She yanked the gear from third into first.
+She sped up. The motor ran like a terrified pounding heart, while the
+car crept on by inches through filthy mud that stretched ahead of her
+without relief.
+
+She was battling to hold the car in the principal rut. She snatched the
+windshield open, and concentrated on that left rut. She felt that she
+was keeping the wheel from climbing those high sides of the rut, those
+six-inch walls of mud, sparkling with tiny grits. Her mind snarled at
+her arms, "Let the ruts do the steering. You're just fighting against
+them." It worked. Once she let the wheels alone they comfortably
+followed the furrows, and for three seconds she had that delightful
+belief of every motorist after every mishap, "Now that this particular
+disagreeableness is over, I'll never, never have any trouble again!"
+
+But suppose the engine overheated, ran out of water? Anxiety twanged at
+her nerves. And the deep distinctive ruts were changing to a complex
+pattern, like the rails in a city switchyard. She picked out the track
+of the one motor car that had been through here recently. It was marked
+with the swastika tread of the rear tires. That track was her friend;
+she knew and loved the driver of a car she had never seen in her life.
+
+She was very tired. She wondered if she might not stop for a moment.
+Then she came to an upslope. The car faltered; felt indecisive beneath
+her. She jabbed down the accelerator. Her hands pushed at the steering
+wheel as though she were pushing the car. The engine picked up, sulkily
+kept going. To the eye, there was merely a rise in the rolling ground,
+but to her anxiety it was a mountain up which she--not the engine, but
+herself--pulled this bulky mass, till she had reached the top, and was
+safe again--for a second. Still there was no visible end of the mud.
+
+In alarm she thought, "How long does it last? I can't keep this up.
+I--Oh!"
+
+The guiding tread of the previous car was suddenly lost in a mass of
+heaving, bubble-scattered mud, like a batter of black dough. She fairly
+picked up the car, and flung it into that welter, through it, and back
+into the reappearing swastika-marked trail.
+
+Her father spoke: "You're biting your lips. They'll bleed, if you don't
+look out. Better stop and rest."
+
+"Can't! No bottom to this mud. Once stop and lose momentum--stuck for
+keeps!"
+
+She had ten more minutes of it before she reached a combination of
+bridge and culvert, with a plank platform above a big tile drain. With
+this solid plank bottom, she could stop. Silence came roaring down as
+she turned the switch. The bubbling water in the radiator steamed about
+the cap. Claire was conscious of tautness of the cords of her neck in
+front; of a pain at the base of her brain. Her father glanced at her
+curiously. "I must be a wreck. I'm sure my hair is frightful," she
+thought, but forgot it as she looked at him. His face was unusually
+pale. In the tumult of activity he had been betrayed into letting the
+old despondent look blur his eyes and sag his mouth. "Must get on," she
+determined.
+
+Claire was dainty of habit. She detested untwisted hair, ripped gloves,
+muddy shoes. Hesitant as a cat by a puddle, she stepped down on the
+bridge. Even on these planks, the mud was three inches thick. It
+squidged about her low, spatted shoes. "Eeh!" she squeaked.
+
+She tiptoed to the tool-box and took out a folding canvas bucket. She
+edged down to the trickling stream below. She was miserably conscious of
+a pastoral scene all gone to mildew--cows beneath willows by the creek,
+milkweeds dripping, dried mullein weed stalks no longer dry. The bank of
+the stream was so slippery that she shot down two feet, and nearly went
+sprawling. Her knee did touch the bank, and the skirt of her gray
+sports-suit showed a smear of yellow earth.
+
+In less than two miles the racing motor had used up so much water that
+she had to make four trips to the creek before she had filled the
+radiator. When she had climbed back on the running-board she glared down
+at spats and shoes turned into gray lumps. She was not tearful. She was
+angry.
+
+"Idiot! Ought to have put on my rubbers. Well--too late now," she
+observed, as she started the engine.
+
+She again followed the swastika tread. To avoid a hole in the road
+ahead, the unknown driver had swung over to the side of the road, and
+taken to the intensely black earth of the edge of an unfenced cornfield.
+Flashing at Claire came the sight of a deep, water-filled hole,
+scattered straw and brush, débris of a battlefield, which made her
+gaspingly realize that her swastikaed leader had been stuck and--
+
+And instantly her own car was stuck.
+
+She had had to put the car at that hole. It dropped, far down, and it
+stayed down. The engine stalled. She started it, but the back wheels
+spun merrily round and round, without traction. She did not make one
+inch. When she again killed the blatting motor, she let it stay dead.
+She peered at her father.
+
+He was not a father, just now, but a passenger trying not to irritate
+the driver. He smiled in a waxy way, and said, "Hard luck! Well, you did
+the best you could. The other hole, there in the road, would have been
+just as bad. You're a fine driver, dolly."
+
+Her smile was warm and real. "No. I'm a fool. You told me to put on
+chains. I didn't. I deserve it."
+
+"Well, anyway, most men would be cussing. You acquire merit by not
+beating me. I believe that's done, in moments like this. If you'd like,
+I'll get out and crawl around in the mud, and play turtle for you."
+
+"No. I'm quite all right. I did feel frightfully strong-minded as long
+as there was any use of it. It kept me going. But now I might just as
+well be cheerful, because we're stuck, and we're probably going to stay
+stuck for the rest of this care-free summer day."
+
+The weariness of the long strain caught her, all at once. She slipped
+forward, sat huddled, her knees crossed under the edge of the steering
+wheel, her hands falling beside her, one of them making a faint brushing
+sound as it slid down the upholstery. Her eyes closed; as her head
+drooped farther, she fancied she could hear the vertebrae click in her
+tense neck.
+
+Her father was silent, a misty figure in a lap-robe. The rain streaked
+the mica lights in the side-curtains. A distant train whistled
+desolately across the sodden fields. The inside of the car smelled
+musty. The quiet was like a blanket over the ears. Claire was in a hazy
+drowse. She felt that she could never drive again.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+CLAIRE ESCAPES FROM RESPECTABILITY
+
+
+Claire Boltwood lived on the Heights, Brooklyn. Persons from New York
+and other parts of the Middlewest have been known to believe that
+Brooklyn is somehow humorous. In newspaper jokes and vaudeville it is so
+presented that people who are willing to take their philosophy from
+those sources believe that the leading citizens of Brooklyn are all
+deacons, undertakers, and obstetricians. The fact is that North
+Washington Square, at its reddest and whitest and fanlightedest,
+Gramercy Park at its most ivied, are not so aristocratic as the section
+of Brooklyn called the Heights. Here preached Henry Ward Beecher. Here,
+in mansions like mausoleums, on the ridge above docks where the good
+ships came sailing in from Sourabaya and Singapore, ruled the lords of a
+thousand sails. And still is it a place of wealth too solid to emulate
+the nimble self-advertising of Fifth Avenue. Here dwell the
+fifth-generation possessors of blocks of foundries and shipyards. Here,
+in a big brick house of much dignity, much ugliness, and much
+conservatory, lived Claire Boltwood, with her widower father.
+
+Henry B. Boltwood was vice-president of a firm dealing in railway
+supplies. He was neither wealthy nor at all poor. Every summer, despite
+Claire's delicate hints, they took the same cottage on the Jersey Coast,
+and Mr. Boltwood came down for Sunday. Claire had gone to a good school
+out of Philadelphia, on the Main Line. She was used to gracious leisure,
+attractive uselessness, nut-center chocolates, and a certain wonder as
+to why she was alive.
+
+She wanted to travel, but her father could not get away. He consistently
+spent his days in overworking, and his evenings in wishing he hadn't
+overworked. He was attractive, fresh, pink-cheeked, white-mustached, and
+nerve-twitching with years of detail.
+
+Claire's ambition had once been babies and a solid husband, but as
+various young males of the species appeared before her, sang their
+mating songs and preened their newly dry-cleaned plumage, she found that
+the trouble with solid young men was that they were solid. Though she
+liked to dance, the "dancing men" bored her. And she did not understand
+the district's quota of intellectuals very well; she was good at
+listening to symphony concerts, but she never had much luck in
+discussing the cleverness of the wood winds in taking up the main motif.
+It is history that she refused a master of arts with an old violin, a
+good taste in ties, and an income of eight thousand.
+
+The only man who disturbed her was Geoffrey Saxton, known throughout the
+interwoven sets of Brooklyn Heights as "Jeff." Jeff Saxton was
+thirty-nine to Claire's twenty-three. He was clean and busy; he had no
+signs of vice or humor. Especially for Jeff must have been invented the
+symbolic morning coat, the unwrinkable gray trousers, and the moral
+rimless spectacles. He was a graduate of a nice college, and he had a
+nice tenor and a nice family and nice hands and he was nicely successful
+in New York copper dealing. When he was asked questions by people who
+were impertinent, clever, or poor, Jeff looked them over coldly before
+he answered, and often they felt so uncomfortable that he didn't have to
+answer.
+
+The boys of Claire's own age, not long out of Yale and Princeton, doing
+well in business and jumping for their evening clothes daily at
+six-thirty, light o' loves and admirers of athletic heroes, these lads
+Claire found pleasant, but hard to tell apart. She didn't have to tell
+Jeff Saxton apart. He did his own telling. Jeff called--not too often.
+He sang--not too sentimentally. He took her father and herself to the
+theater--not too lavishly. He told Claire--in a voice not too
+serious--that she was his helmed Athena, his rose of all the world. He
+informed her of his substantial position--not too obviously. And he was
+so everlastingly, firmly, quietly, politely, immovably always there.
+
+She watched the hulk of marriage drifting down on her frail speed-boat
+of aspiration, and steered in desperate circles.
+
+Then her father got the nervous prostration he had richly earned. The
+doctor ordered rest. Claire took him in charge. He didn't want to
+travel. Certainly he didn't want the shore or the Adirondacks. As there
+was a branch of his company in Minneapolis, she lured him that far away.
+
+Being rootedly of Brooklyn Heights, Claire didn't know much about the
+West. She thought that Milwaukee was the capital of Minnesota. She was
+not so uninformed as some of her friends, however. She had heard that in
+Dakota wheat was to be viewed in vast tracts--maybe a hundred acres.
+
+Mr. Boltwood could not be coaxed to play with the people to whom his
+Minneapolis representative introduced him. He was overworking again, and
+perfectly happy. He was hoping to find something wrong with the branch
+house. Claire tried to tempt him out to the lakes. She failed. His
+nerve-fuse burnt out the second time, with much fireworks.
+
+Claire had often managed her circle of girls, but it had never occurred
+to her to manage her executive father save by indirect and pretty
+teasing. Now, in conspiracy with the doctor, she bullied her father. He
+saw gray death waiting as alternative, and he was meek. He agreed to
+everything. He consented to drive with her across two thousand miles of
+plains and mountains to Seattle, to drop in for a call on their
+cousins, the Eugene Gilsons.
+
+Back East they had a chauffeur and two cars--the limousine, and the
+Gomez-Deperdussin roadster, Claire's beloved. It would, she believed, be
+more of a change from everything that might whisper to Mr. Boltwood of
+the control of men, not to take a chauffeur. Her father never drove, but
+she could, she insisted. His easy agreeing was pathetic. He watched her
+with spaniel eyes. They had the Gomez roadster shipped to them from New
+York.
+
+On a July morning, they started out of Minneapolis in a mist, and as it
+has been hinted, they stopped sixty miles northward, in a rain, also in
+much gumbo. Apparently their nearest approach to the Pacific Ocean would
+be this oceanically moist edge of a cornfield, between Schoenstrom and
+Gopher Prairie, Minnesota.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Claire roused from her damp doze and sighed, "Well, I must get busy and
+get the car out of this."
+
+"Don't you think you'd better get somebody to help us?"
+
+"But get who?"
+
+"Whom!"
+
+"No! It's just 'who,' when you're in the mud. No. One of the good things
+about an adventure like this is that I must do things for myself. I've
+always had people to do things for me. Maids and nice teachers and you,
+old darling! I suppose it's made me soft. Soft--I would like a soft
+davenport and a novel and a pound of almond-brittle, and get all sick,
+and not feel so beastly virile as I do just now. But----"
+
+She turned up the collar of her gray tweed coat, painfully climbed
+out--the muscles of her back racking--and examined the state of the rear
+wheels. They were buried to the axle; in front of them the mud bulked in
+solid, shiny blackness. She took out her jack and chains. It was too
+late. There was no room to get the jack under the axle. She remembered
+from the narratives of motoring friends that brush in mud gave a firmer
+surface for the wheels to climb upon.
+
+She also remembered how jolly and agreeably heroic the accounts of their
+mishaps had sounded--a week after they were over.
+
+She waded down the road toward an old wood-lot. At first she tried to
+keep dry, but she gave it up, and there was pleasure in being defiantly
+dirty. She tramped straight through puddles; she wallowed in mud. In the
+wood-lot was long grass which soaked her stockings till her ankles felt
+itchy. Claire had never expected to be so very intimate with a
+brush-pile. She became so. As though she were a pioneer woman who had
+been toiling here for years, she came to know the brush stick by
+stick--the long valuable branch that she could never quite get out from
+under the others; the thorny bough that pricked her hands every time she
+tried to reach the curious bundle of switches.
+
+Seven trips she made, carrying armfuls of twigs and solemnly dragging
+large boughs behind her. She patted them down in front of all four
+wheels. Her crisp hands looked like the paws of a three-year-old boy
+making a mud fort. Her nails hurt from the mud wedged beneath them. Her
+mud-caked shoes were heavy to lift. It was with exquisite self-approval
+that she sat on the running-board, scraped a car-load of lignite off her
+soles, climbed back into the car, punched the starter.
+
+The car stirred, crept forward one inch, and settled back--one inch. The
+second time it heaved encouragingly but did not make quite so much
+headway. Then Claire did sob.
+
+She rubbed her cheek against the comfortable, rough, heather-smelling
+shoulder of her father's coat, while he patted her and smiled, "Good
+girl! I better get out and help."
+
+She sat straight, shook her head. "Nope. I'll do it. And I'm not going
+to insist on being heroic any longer. I'll get a farmer to pull us out."
+
+As she let herself down into the ooze, she reflected that all farmers
+have hearts of gold, anatomical phenomena never found among the snobs
+and hirelings of New York. The nearest heart of gold was presumably
+beating warmly in the house a quarter of a mile ahead.
+
+She came up a muddy lane to a muddy farmyard, with a muddy cur yapping
+at her wet legs, and geese hissing in a pool of purest mud serene. The
+house was small and rather old. It may have been painted once. The barn
+was large and new. It had been painted very much, and in a blinding red
+with white trimmings. There was no brass plate on the house, but on the
+barn, in huge white letters, was the legend, "Adolph Zolzac, 1913."
+
+She climbed by log steps to a narrow frame back porch littered with
+parts of a broken cream-separator. She told herself that she was simple
+and friendly in going to the back door instead of the front, and it was
+with gaiety that she knocked on the ill-jointed screen door, which
+flapped dismally in response.
+
+"_Ja?_" from within.
+
+She rapped again.
+
+"_Hinein!_"
+
+She opened the door on a kitchen, the highlight of which was a table
+heaped with dishes of dumplings and salt pork. A shirt-sleeved man, all
+covered with mustache and calm, sat by the table, and he kept right on
+sitting as he inquired:
+
+"Vell?"
+
+"My car--my automobile--has been stuck in the mud. A bad driver, I'm
+afraid! I wonder if you would be so good as to----"
+
+"I usually get t'ree dollars, but I dunno as I vant to do it for less
+than four. Today I ain'd feelin' very goot," grumbled the
+golden-hearted.
+
+Claire was aware that a woman whom she had not noticed--so much smaller
+than the dumplings, so much less vigorous than the salt pork was
+she--was speaking: "_Aber_, papa, dot's a shame you sharge de poor young
+lady dot, when she drive by _sei_ self. Vot she t'ink of de Sherman
+people?"
+
+The farmer merely grunted. To Claire, "Yuh, four dollars. Dot's what I
+usually charge sometimes."
+
+"Usually? Do you mean to say that you leave that hole there in the road
+right along--that people keep on trying to avoid it and get stuck as I
+was? Oh! If I were an official----"
+
+"Vell, I dunno, I don't guess I run my place to suit you smart
+alecks----"
+
+"Papa! How you talk on the young lady! Make shame!"
+
+"--from the city. If you don't like it, you stay _bei_ Mineapolis! I
+haul you out for t'ree dollars and a half. Everybody pay dot. Last mont'
+I make forty-five dollars. They vos all glad to pay. They say I help
+them fine. I don't see vot you're kickin' about! Oh, these vimmins!"
+
+"It's blackmail! I wouldn't pay it, if it weren't for my father sitting
+waiting out there. But--go ahead. Hurry!"
+
+She sat tapping her toe while Zolzac completed the stertorous task of
+hogging the dumplings, then stretched, yawned, scratched, and covered
+his merely dirty garments with overalls that were apparently woven of
+processed mud. When he had gone to the barn for his team, his wife came
+to Claire. On her drained face were the easy tears of the slave women.
+
+"Oh, miss, I don't know vot I should do. My boys go on the public
+school, and they speak American just so goot as you. Oh, I vant man lets
+me luff America. But papa he says it is an _Unsinn_; you got the money,
+he says, nobody should care if you are American or Old Country people. I
+should vish I could ride once in an automobile! But--I am so 'shamed, so
+'shamed that I must sit and see my _Mann_ make this. Forty years I been
+married to him, and pretty soon I die----"
+
+Claire patted her hand. There was nothing to say to tragedy that had
+outlived hope.
+
+Adolph Zolzac clumped out to the highroad behind his vast,
+rolling-flanked horses--so much cleaner and better fed than his wisp of
+a wife. Claire followed him, and in her heart she committed murder and
+was glad of it. While Mr. Boltwood looked out with mild wonder at
+Claire's new friend, Zolzac hitched his team to the axle. It did not
+seem possible that two horses could pull out the car where seventy
+horsepower had fainted. But, easily, yawning and thinking about dinner,
+the horses drew the wheels up on the mud-bank, out of the hole and----
+
+The harness broke, with a flying mess of straps and rope, and the car
+plumped with perfect exactness back into its bed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+A YOUNG MAN IN A RAINCOAT
+
+
+"Huh! Such an auto! Look, it break my harness a'ready! Two dollar that
+cost you to mend it. De auto iss too heavy!" stormed Zolzac.
+
+"All right! All right! Only for heaven's sake--go get another harness!"
+Claire shrieked.
+
+"Fife-fifty dot will be, in all." Zolzac grinned.
+
+Claire was standing in front of him. She was thinking of other drivers,
+poor people, in old cars, who had been at the mercy of this
+golden-hearted one. She stared past him, in the direction from which she
+had come. Another motor was in sight.
+
+It was a tin beetle of a car; that agile, cheerful, rut-jumping model
+known as a "bug"; with a home-tacked, home-painted tin cowl and tail
+covering the stripped chassis of a little cheap Teal car. The lone
+driver wore an old black raincoat with an atrocious corduroy collar, and
+a new plaid cap in the Harry Lauder tartan. The bug skipped through mud
+where the Boltwoods' Gomez had slogged and rolled. Its pilot drove up
+behind her car, and leaped out. He trotted forward to Claire and Zolzac.
+His eyes were twenty-seven or eight, but his pink cheeks were twenty,
+and when he smiled--shyly, radiantly--he was no age at all, but eternal
+boy. Claire had a blurred impression that she had seen him before, some
+place along the road.
+
+"Stuck?" he inquired, not very intelligently. "How much is Adolph
+charging you?"
+
+"He wants three-fifty, and his harness broke, and he wants two
+dollars----"
+
+"Oh! So he's still working that old gag! I've heard all about Adolph. He
+keeps that harness for pulling out cars, and it always busts. The last
+time, though, he only charged six bits to get it mended. Now let me
+reason with him."
+
+The young man turned with vicious quickness, and for the first time
+Claire heard pidgin German--German as it is spoken between Americans who
+have never learned it, and Germans who have forgotten it:
+
+"_Schon sex_ hundred times _Ich höre_ all about the way you been doing
+autos, Zolzac, you _verfluchter Schweinhund_, and I'll set the sheriff
+on you----"
+
+"Dot ain'd true, maybe _einmal die Woche kommt_ somebody and _Ich muss
+die Arbeit immer lassen und in die Regen ausgehen, und seh' mal_ how
+_die_ boots _sint mit_ mud covered, two dollars it don't pay for _die_
+boots----"
+
+"Now that's enough-plenty out of you, _seien die_ boots _verdammt_, and
+_mach' dass du fort gehst_--muddy boots, hell!--put _mal ein_ egg in
+_die_ boots and beat it, _verleicht_ maybe I'll by golly arrest you
+myself, _weiss du_! I'm a special deputy sheriff."
+
+The young man stood stockily. He seemed to swell as his somewhat muddy
+hand was shaken directly at, under, and about the circumference of,
+Adolph Zolzac's hairy nose. The farmer was stronger, but he retreated.
+He took up the reins. He whined, "Don't I get nothing I break de
+harness?"
+
+"Sure. You get ten--years! And you get out!"
+
+From thirty yards up the road, Zolzac flung back, "You t'ink you're
+pretty damn smart!" That was his last serious reprisal.
+
+Clumsily, as one not used to it, the young man lifted his cap to Claire,
+showing straight, wiry, rope-colored hair, brushed straight back from a
+rather fine forehead. "Gee, I was sorry to have to swear and holler like
+that, but it's all Adolph understands. Please don't think there's many
+of the folks around here like him. They say he's the meanest man in the
+county."
+
+"I'm immensely grateful to you, but--do you know much about motors? How
+can I get out of this mud?"
+
+She was surprised to see the youngster blush. His clear skin flooded.
+His engaging smile came again, and he hesitated, "Let me pull you out."
+
+She looked from her hulking car to his mechanical flea.
+
+He answered the look: "I can do it all right. I'm used to the
+gumbo--regular mud-hen. Just add my power to yours. Have you a
+tow-rope?"
+
+"No. I never thought of bringing one."
+
+"I'll get mine."
+
+She walked with him back toward his bug. It lacked not only top and
+side-curtains, but even windshield and running-board. It was a toy--a
+card-board box on toothpick axles. Strapped to the bulging back was a
+wicker suitcase partly covered by tarpaulin. From the seat peered a
+little furry face.
+
+"A cat?" she exclaimed, as he came up with a wire rope, extracted from
+the tin back.
+
+"Yes. She's the captain of the boat. I'm just the engineer."
+
+"What is her name?"
+
+Before he answered the young man strode ahead to the front of her car,
+Claire obediently trotting after him. He stooped to look at her front
+axle. He raised his head, glanced at her, and he was blushing again.
+
+"Her name is Vere de Vere!" he confessed. Then he fled back to his bug.
+He drove it in front of the Gomez-Dep. The hole in the road itself was
+as deep as the one on the edge of the cornfield, where she was stuck,
+but he charged it. She was fascinated by his skill. Where she would for
+a tenth of a second have hesitated while choosing the best course, he
+hurled the bug straight at the hole, plunged through with sheets of
+glassy black water arching on either side, then viciously twisted the
+car to the right, to the left, and straight again, as he followed the
+tracks with the solidest bottoms.
+
+Strapped above the tiny angle-iron step which replaced his running-board
+was an old spade. He dug channels in front of the four wheels of her
+car, so that they might go up inclines, instead of pushing against the
+straight walls of mud they had thrown up. On these inclines he strewed
+the brush she had brought, halting to ask, with head alertly lifted from
+his stooped huddle in the mud, "Did you have to get this brush
+yourself?"
+
+"Yes. Horrid wet!"
+
+He merely shook his head in commiseration.
+
+He fastened the tow-rope to the rear axle of his car, to the front of
+hers. "Now will you be ready to put on all your power as I begin to
+pull?" he said casually, rather respectfully.
+
+When the struggling bug had pulled the wire rope taut, she opened the
+throttle. The rope trembled. Her car seemed to draw sullenly back. Then
+it came out--out--really out, which is the most joyous sensation any
+motorist shall ever know. In excitement over actually moving again, as
+fast as any healthy young snail, she drove on, on, the young man ahead
+grinning back at her. Nor did she stop, nor he, till both cars were
+safe on merely thick mud, a quarter of a mile away.
+
+She switched off the power--and suddenly she was in a whirlwind of dizzy
+sickening tiredness. Even in her abandonment to exhaustion she noticed
+that the young man did not stare at her but, keeping his back to her,
+removed the tow-rope, and stowed it away in his bug. She wondered
+whether it was tact or yokelish indifference.
+
+Her father spoke for the first time since the Galahad of the tin bug had
+come: "How much do you think we ought to give this fellow?"
+
+Now of all the cosmic problems yet unsolved, not cancer nor the future
+of poverty are the flustering questions, but these twain: Which is
+worse, not to wear evening clothes at a party at which you find every
+one else dressed, or to come in evening clothes to a house where, it
+proves, they are never worn? And: Which is worse, not to tip when a tip
+has been expected; or to tip, when the tip is an insult?
+
+In discomfort of spirit and wetness of ankles Claire shuddered, "Oh
+dear, I don't believe he expects us to pay him. He seems like an awfully
+independent person. Maybe we'd offend him if we offered----"
+
+"The only reasonable thing to be offended at in this vale of tears is
+not being offered money!"
+
+"Just the same---- Oh dear, I'm so tired. But good little Claire will
+climb out and be diplomatic."
+
+She pinched her forehead, to hold in her cracking brain, and wabbled out
+into new scenes of mud and wetness, but she came up to the young man
+with the most rain-washed and careless of smiles. "Won't you come back
+and meet my father? He's terribly grateful to you--as I am. And may
+we---- You've worked so hard, and about saved our lives. May I pay you
+for that labor? We're really much indebted----"
+
+"Oh, it wasn't anything. Tickled to death if I could help you."
+
+He heartily shook hands with her father, and he droned, "Pleased to meet
+you, Mr. Uh."
+
+"Boltwood."
+
+"Mr. Boltwood. My name is Milt--Milton Daggett. See you have a New York
+license on your car. We don't see but mighty few of those through here.
+Glad I could help you."
+
+"Ah yes, Mr. Daggett." Mr. Boltwood was uninterestedly fumbling in his
+money pocket. Behind Milt Daggett, Claire shook her head wildly,
+rattling her hands as though she were playing castanets. Mr. Boltwood
+shrugged. He did not understand. His relations with young men in cheap
+raincoats were entirely monetary. They did something for you, and you
+paid them--preferably not too much--and they ceased to be. Whereas Milt
+Daggett respectfully but stolidly continued to be, and Mr. Henry
+Boltwood's own daughter was halting the march of affairs by asking
+irrelevant questions:
+
+"Didn't we see you back in--what was that village we came through back
+about twelve miles?"
+
+"Schoenstrom?" suggested Milt.
+
+"Yes, I think that was it. Didn't we pass you or something? We stopped
+at a garage there, to change a tire."
+
+"I don't think so. I was in town, though, this morning. Say, uh, did you
+and your father grab any eats----"
+
+"A----"
+
+"I mean, did you get dinner there?"
+
+"No. I wish we had!"
+
+"Well say, I didn't either, and--I'd be awfully glad if you folks would
+have something to eat with me now."
+
+Claire tried to give him a smile, but the best she could do was to lend
+him one. She could not associate interesting food with Milt and his
+mud-slobbered, tin-covered, dun-painted Teal bug. He seemed satisfied
+with her dubious grimace. By his suggestion they drove ahead to a spot
+where the cars could be parked on firm grass beneath oaks. On the way,
+Mr. Boltwood lifted his voice in dismay. His touch of nervous
+prostration had not made him queer or violent; he retained a touching
+faith in good food.
+
+"We might find some good little hotel and have some chops and just some
+mushrooms and peas," insisted the man from Brooklyn Heights.
+
+"Oh, I don't suppose the country hotels are really so awfully good," she
+speculated. "And look--that nice funny boy. We couldn't hurt his
+feelings. He's having so much fun out of being a Good Samaritan."
+
+From the mysterious rounded back of his car Milt Daggett drew a tiny
+stove, to be heated by a can of solidified alcohol, a frying pan that
+was rather large for dolls but rather small for square-fingered hands, a
+jar of bacon, eggs in a bag, a coffee pot, a can of condensed milk, and
+a litter of unsorted tin plates and china cups. While, by his request,
+Claire scoured the plates and cups, he made bacon and eggs and coffee,
+the little stove in the bottom of his car sheltered by the cook's
+bending over it. The smell of food made Claire forgiving toward the fact
+that she was wet through; that the rain continued to drizzle down her
+neck.
+
+He lifted his hand and demanded, "Take your shoes off!"
+
+"Uh?"
+
+He gulped. He stammered, "I mean--I mean your shoes are soaked through.
+If you'll sit in the car, I'll put your shoes up by the engine. It's
+pretty well heated from racing it in the mud. You can get your stockings
+dry under the cowl."
+
+She was amused by the elaborateness with which he didn't glance at her
+while she took off her low shoes and slipped her quite too thin black
+stockings under the protecting tin cowl. She reflected, "He has such a
+nice, awkward gentleness. But such bad taste! They're really quite good
+ankles. Apparently ankles are not done, in Teal bug circles. His sisters
+don't even have limbs. But do fairies have sisters? He is a fairy. When
+I'm out of the mud he'll turn his raincoat into a pair of lordly white
+wings, and vanish. But what will become of the cat?"
+
+Thus her tired brain, like a squirrel in a revolving cage, while she sat
+primly and scraped at a clot of rust on a tin plate and watched him put
+on the bacon and eggs. Wondering if cats were used for this purpose in
+the Daggett family, she put soaked, unhappy Vere de Vere on her feet, to
+her own great comfort and the cat's delight. It was an open car, and the
+rain still rained, and a strange young man was a foot from her tending
+the not very crackly fire, but rarely had Claire felt so domestic.
+
+Milt was apparently struggling to say something. After several bobs of
+his head he ventured, "You're so wet! I'd like for you to take my
+raincoat."
+
+"No! Really! I'm already soaked through. You keep dry."
+
+He was unhappy about it. He plucked at a button of the coat. She turned
+him from the subject. "I hope Lady Vere de Vere is getting warm, too."
+
+"Seems to be. She's kind of demanding. She wanted a little car of her
+own, but I didn't think she could keep up with me, not on a long hike."
+
+"A little car? With her paws on the tiny wheel? Oh--sweet! Are you going
+far, Mr. Daggett?"
+
+"Yes, quite a ways. To Seattle, Washington."
+
+"Oh, really? Extraordinary. We're going there, too."
+
+"Honest? You driving all the way? Oh, no, of course your father----"
+
+"No, he doesn't drive. By the way, I hope he isn't too miserable back
+there."
+
+"I'll be darned. Both of us going to Seattle. That's what they call a
+coincidence, isn't it! Hope I'll see you on the road, some time. But I
+don't suppose I will. Once you're out of the mud, your Gomez will simply
+lose my Teal."
+
+"Not necessarily. You're the better driver. And I shall take it easy.
+Are you going to stay long in Seattle?" It was not merely a polite
+dinner-payment question. She wondered; she could not place this
+fresh-cheeked, unworldly young man so far from his home.
+
+"Why, I kind of hope---- Government railroad, Alaska. I'm going to try
+to get in on that, somehow. I've never been out of Minnesota in my life,
+but there's couple mountains and oceans and things I thought I'd like
+to see, so I just put my suitcase and Vere de Vere in the machine, and
+started out. I burn distillate instead of gas, so it doesn't cost much.
+If I ever happen to have five whole dollars, why, I might go on to
+Japan!"
+
+"That would be jolly."
+
+"Though I s'pose I'd have to eat--what is it?--pickled fish? There's a
+woman from near my town went to the Orient as a missionary. From what
+she says, I guess all you need in Japan to make a house is a bottle of
+mucilage and a couple of old newspapers and some two-by-fours. And you
+can have the house on a purple mountain, with cherry trees down below,
+and----" He put his clenched hand to his lips. His head was bowed. "And
+the ocean! Lord! The ocean! And we'll see it at Seattle. Bay, anyway.
+And steamers there--just come from India! Huh! Getting pretty darn
+poetic here! Eggs are done."
+
+The young man did not again wander into visions. He was all briskness as
+he served her bacon and eggs, took a plate of them to Mr. Boltwood in
+the Gomez, gouged into his own. Having herself scoured the tin plates,
+Claire was not repulsed by their naked tinniness; and the coffee in the
+broken-handled china cup was tolerable. Milt drank from the top of a
+vacuum bottle. He was silent. Immediately after the lunch he stowed the
+things away. Claire expected a drawn-out, tact-demanding farewell, but
+he climbed into his bug, said "Good-by, Miss Boltwood. Good luck!" and
+was gone.
+
+The rainy road was bleakly empty without him.
+
+It did not seem possible that Claire's body could be nagged into going
+on any longer. Her muscles were relaxed, her nerves frayed. But the
+moment the Gomez started, she discovered that magic change which every
+long-distance motorist knows. Instantly she was alert, seemingly able to
+drive forever. The pilot's instinct ruled her; gave her tireless eyes
+and sturdy hands. Surely she had never been weary; never would be, so
+long as it was hers to keep the car going.
+
+She had driven perhaps six miles when she reached a hamlet called St.
+Klopstock. On the bedraggled mud-and-shanty main street a man was
+loading crushed rock into a truck. By him was a large person in a
+prosperous raincoat, who stepped out, held up his hand. Claire stopped.
+
+"You the young lady that got stuck in that hole by Adolph Zolzac's?"
+
+"Yes. And Mr. Zolzac wasn't very nice about it."
+
+"He's going to be just elegant about it, now, and there ain't going to
+be any more hole. I think Adolph has been keeping it muddy--throwing in
+soft dirt--and he made a good and plenty lot out of pulling out
+tourists. Bill and I are going down right now and fill it up with stone.
+Milt Daggett come through here--he's got a nerve, that fellow, but I
+did have to laugh--he says to me, 'Barney----' This was just now. He
+hasn't more than just drove out of town. He said to me, 'Barney,' he
+says, 'you're the richest man in this township, and the banker, and you
+got a big car y'self, and you think you're one whale of a political
+boss,' he says, 'and yet you let that Zolzac maintain a private ocean,
+against the peace and damn horrible inconvenience of the Commonwealth of
+Minnesota----' He's got a great line of talk, that fellow. He told me
+how you got stuck--made me so ashamed--I been to New York myself--and
+right away I got Bill, and we're going down and hold a donation and
+surprise party on Adolph and fill that hole."
+
+"But won't Adolph dig it out again?"
+
+The banker was puffy, but his eyes were of stone. From the truck he took
+a shotgun. He drawled, "In that case, the surprise party will include an
+elegant wake."
+
+"But how did---- Who is this extraordinary Milt Daggett?"
+
+"Him? Oh, nobody 'specially. He's just a fellow down here at
+Schoenstrom. But we all know him. Goes to all the dances, thirty miles
+around. Thing about him is: if he sees something wrong, he picks out
+some poor fellow like me, and says what he thinks."
+
+Claire drove on. She was aware that she was looking for Milt's bug. It
+was not in sight.
+
+"Father," she exclaimed, "do you realize that this lad didn't tell us he
+was going to have the hole filled? Just did it. He frightens me. I'm
+afraid that when we reach Gopher Prairie for the night, we'll find he
+has engaged for us the suite that Prince Collars and Cuffs once slept
+in."
+
+"Hhhhmm," yawned her father.
+
+"Curious young man. He said, 'Pleased to meet you.'"
+
+"Huuuuhhm! Fresh air makes me so sleepy."
+
+"And---- Fooled you! Got through that mudhole, anyway! And he said----
+Look! Fields stretch out so here, and not a tree except the
+willow-groves round those farmhouses. And he said 'Gee' so many times,
+and 'dinner' for the noon meal. And his nails---- No, I suppose he
+really is just a farm youngster."
+
+Mr. Boltwood did not answer. His machine-finish smile indicated an
+enormous lack of interest in young men in Teal bugs.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+A ROOM WITHOUT
+
+
+Gopher Prairie has all of five thousand people. Its commercial club
+asserts that it has at least a thousand more population and an
+infinitely better band than the ridiculously envious neighboring town of
+Joralemon. But there were few signs that a suite had been engaged for
+the Boltwoods, or that Prince Collars and Cuffs had on his royal tour of
+America spent much time in Gopher Prairie. Claire reached it somewhat
+before seven. She gaped at it in a hazy way. Though this was her first
+prairie town for a considerable stay, she could not pump up interest.
+
+The state of mind of the touring motorist entering a strange place at
+night is as peculiar and definite as that of a prospector. It is
+compounded of gratitude at having got safely in; of perception of a new
+town, yet with all eagerness about new things dulled by weariness; of
+hope that there is going to be a good hotel, but small expectation--and
+absolutely no probability--that there really will be one.
+
+Claire had only a blotched impression of peaked wooden buildings and
+squatty brick stores with faded awnings; of a red grain elevator and a
+crouching station and a lumberyard; then of the hopelessly muddy road
+leading on again into the country. She felt that if she didn't stop at
+once, she would miss the town entirely. The driving-instinct sustained
+her, made her take corners sharply, spot a garage, send the Gomez
+whirling in on the cement floor.
+
+The garage attendant looked at her and yawned.
+
+"Where do you want the car?" Claire asked sharply.
+
+"Oh, stick it in that stall," grunted the man, and turned his back.
+
+Claire glowered at him. She thought of a good line about rudeness.
+But--oh, she was too tired to fuss. She tried to run the car into the
+empty stall, which was not a stall, but a space, like a missing tooth,
+between two cars, and so narrow that she was afraid of crumpling the
+lordly fenders of the Gomez. She ran down the floor, returned with a
+flourish, thought she was going to back straight into the stall--and
+found she wasn't. While her nerves shrieked, and it did not seem
+possible that she could change gears, she managed to get the Gomez
+behind a truck and side-on to the stall.
+
+"Go forward again, and cramp your wheel--sharp!" ordered the garage man.
+
+Claire wanted to outline what she thought of him, but she merely
+demanded, "Will you kindly drive it in?"
+
+"Why, sure. You bet," said the man casually. His readiness ruined her
+inspired fury. She was somewhat disappointed.
+
+As she climbed out of the car and put a hand on the smart bags strapped
+on a running-board, the accumulated weariness struck her in a shock. She
+could have driven on for hours, but the instant the car was safe for the
+night, she went to pieces. Her ears rang, her eyes were soaked in fire,
+her mouth was dry, the back of her neck pinched. It was her father who
+took the lead as they rambled to the one tolerable hotel in the town.
+
+In the hotel Claire was conscious of the ugliness of the poison-green
+walls and brass cuspidors and insurance calendars and bare floor of the
+office; conscious of the interesting scientific fact that all air had
+been replaced by the essence of cigar smoke and cooking cabbage; of the
+stares of the traveling men lounging in bored lines; and of the lack of
+welcome on the part of the night clerk, an oldish, bleached man with
+whiskers instead of a collar.
+
+She tried to be important: "Two rooms with bath, please."
+
+The bleached man stared at her, and shoved forward the register and a
+pen clotted with ink. She signed. He took the bags, led the way to the
+stairs. Anxiously she asked, "Both rooms are with bath?"
+
+From the second step the night clerk looked down at her as though she
+were a specimen that ought to be pinned on the corks at once, and he
+said loudly, "No, ma'am. Neither of 'em. Got no rooms vacant with bawth,
+or bath either! Not but what we got 'em in the house. This is an
+up-to-date place. But one of 'm's took, and the other has kind of been
+out of order, the last three-four months."
+
+From the audience of drummers below, a delicate giggle.
+
+Claire was too angry to answer. And too tired. When, after miles of
+stairs, leagues of stuffy hall, she reached her coop, with its iron bed
+so loose-jointed that it rattled to a breath, its bureau with a list to
+port, and its anemic rocking-chair, she dropped on the bed, panting, her
+eyes closed but still brimming with fire. It did not seem that she could
+ever move again. She felt chloroformed. She couldn't even coax herself
+off the bed, to see if her father was any better off in the next room.
+
+She was certain that she was not going to drive to Seattle. She wasn't
+going to drive anywhere! She was going to freight the car back to
+Minneapolis, and herself go back by train--Pullman!--drawing-room!
+
+But for the thought of her father she would have fallen asleep, in her
+drenched tweeds. When she did force the energy to rise, she had to
+support herself by the bureau, by the foot of the bed, as she moved
+about the room, hanging up the wet suit, rubbing herself with a slippery
+towel, putting on a dark silk frock and pumps. She found her father
+sitting motionless in his room, staring at the wall. She made herself
+laugh at him for his gloomy emptiness. She paraded down the hall with
+him.
+
+As they reached the foot of the stairs, the old one, the night clerk
+leaned across the desk and, in a voice that took the whole office into
+the conversation, quizzed, "Come from New York, eh? Well, you're quite a
+ways from home."
+
+Claire nodded. She felt shyer before these solemnly staring traveling
+men than she ever had in a box at the opera. At the double door of the
+dining-room, from which the cabbage smell steamed with a lustiness
+undiminished by the sad passing of its youth, a man, one of the
+average-sized, average-mustached, average business-suited,
+average-brown-haired men who can never be remembered, stopped the
+Boltwoods and hawed, "Saw you coming into town. You've got a New York
+license?"
+
+She couldn't deny it.
+
+"Quite a ways from home, aren't you?"
+
+She had to admit it.
+
+She was escorted by a bouncing, black-eyed waitress to a table for four.
+The next table was a long one, at which seven traveling men, or local
+business men whose wives were at the lake for the summer, ceased trying
+to get nourishment out of the food, and gawped at her. Before the
+Boltwoods were seated, the waitress dabbed at non-existent spots on
+their napkins, ignored a genuine crumb on the cloth in front of Claire's
+plate, made motions at a cup and a formerly plated fork, and bubbled,
+"Autoing through?"
+
+Claire fumbled for her chair, oozed into it, and breathed, "Yes."
+
+"Going far?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Where do you live?"
+
+"New York."
+
+"My! You're quite a ways from home, aren't you?"
+
+"Apparently."
+
+"Hamnegs roasbeef roaspork thapplesauce frypickerel springlamintsauce."
+
+"I--I beg your pardon."
+
+The waitress repeated.
+
+"I--oh--oh, bring us ham and eggs. Is that all right, father?"
+
+"Oh--no--well----"
+
+"You wanted same?" the waitress inquired of Mr. Boltwood.
+
+He was intimidated. He said, "If you please," and feebly pawed at a
+fork.
+
+The waitress was instantly back with soup, and a collection of china
+gathered by a man of much travel, catholic interests, and no taste. One
+of the plates alleged itself to belong to a hotel in Omaha. She pushed
+a pitcher of condensed milk to the exact spot where it would catch Mr.
+Boltwood's sleeve, brushed the crumb from in front of Claire to a
+shelter beneath the pink and warty sugar bowl, recovered a toothpick
+which had been concealed behind her glowing lips, picked for a while,
+gave it up, put her hands on her hips, and addressed Claire:
+
+"How far you going?"
+
+"To Seattle."
+
+"Got any folks there?"
+
+"Any---- Oh, yes, I suppose so."
+
+"Going to stay there long?"
+
+"Really---- We haven't decided."
+
+"Come from New York, eh? Quite a ways from home, all right. Father in
+business there?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What's his line?"
+
+"I beg pardon?"
+
+"What's his line? Ouch! Jiminy, these shoes pinch my feet. I used to
+could dance all night, but I'm getting fat, I guess, ha! ha! Put on
+seven pounds last month. Ouch! Gee, they certainly do pinch my toes.
+What business you say your father's in?"
+
+"I didn't say, but---- Oh, railroad."
+
+"G. N. or N. P.?"
+
+"I don't think I quite understand----"
+
+Mr. Boltwood interposed, "Are the ham and eggs ready?"
+
+"I'll beat it out and see." When she brought them, she put a spoon in
+Claire's saucer of peas, and demanded, "Say, you don't wear that silk
+dress in the auto, do you?"
+
+"No."
+
+"I should think you'd put a pink sash on it. Seems like it's kind of
+plain--it's a real pretty piece of goods, though. A pink sash would be
+real pretty. You dark-complected ladies always looks better for a touch
+of color."
+
+Then was Claire certain that the waitress was baiting her, for the
+amusement of the men at the long table. She exploded. Probably the
+waitress did not know there had been an explosion when Claire looked
+coldly up, raised her brows, looked down, and poked the cold and salty
+slab of ham, for she was continuing:
+
+"A light-complected lady like me don't need so much color, you notice my
+hair is black, but I'm light, really, Pete Liverquist says I'm a blonde
+brunette, gee, he certainly is killing that fellow, oh, he's a case, he
+sure does like to hear himself talk, my! there's Old Man Walters, he
+runs the telephone exchange here, I heard he went down to St. Cloud on
+Number 2, but I guess he couldn't of, he'll be yodeling for friend soup
+and a couple slabs of moo, I better beat it, I'll say so, so long."
+
+Claire's comment was as acid as the pale beets before her, as bitter as
+the peas, as hard as the lumps in the watery mashed potatoes:
+
+"I don't know whether the woman is insane or ignorant. I wish I could
+tell whether she was trying to make me angry for the benefit of those
+horrid unshaven men, or merely for her private edification."
+
+"By me, dolly. So is this pie. Let's get some medium to levitate us up
+to bed. Uh--uh---- I think perhaps we'd better not try to drive clear to
+Seattle. If we just went through to Montana?--or even just to Bismarck?"
+
+"Drive through with the hotels like this? My dear man, if we have one
+more such day, we stop right there. I hope we get by the man at the
+desk. I have a feeling he's lurking there, trying to think up something
+insulting to say to us. Oh, my dear, I hope you aren't as beastly tired
+as I am. My bones are hot pokers."
+
+The man at the desk got in only one cynical question, "Driving far?"
+before Claire seized her father's arm and started him upstairs.
+
+For the first time since she had been ten--and in a state of naughtiness
+immediately following a pronounced state of grace induced by the pulpit
+oratory of the new rector of St. Chrysostom's--she permitted herself the
+luxury of not stopping to brush her teeth before she went to bed. Her
+sleep was drugged--it was not sleep, but an aching exhaustion of the
+body which did not prevent her mind from revisualizing the road, going
+stupidly over the muddy stretches and sharp corners, then becoming
+conscious of that bed, the lump under her shoulder blades, the slope to
+westward, and the creak that rose every time she tossed. For at least
+fifteen minutes she lay awake for hours.
+
+Thus Claire Boltwood's first voyage into democracy.
+
+It was not so much that the sun was shining, in the morning, as that a
+ripple of fresh breeze came through the window. She discovered that she
+again longed to go on--keep going on--see new places, conquer new roads.
+She didn't want all good road. She wanted something to struggle against.
+She'd try it for one more day. She was stiff as she crawled out of bed,
+but a rub with cold water left her feeling that she was stronger than
+she ever had been; that she was a woman, not a dependent girl. Already,
+in the beating prairie sun-glare, the wide main street of Gopher Prairie
+was drying; the mud ruts flattening out. Beyond the town hovered the
+note of a meadow lark--sunlight in sound.
+
+"Oh, it's a sweet morning! Sweet! We will go on! I'm terribly excited!"
+she laughed.
+
+She found her father dressed. He did not know whether or not he wanted
+to go on. "I seem to have lost my grip on things. I used to be rather
+decisive. But we'll try it one more day, if you like," he said.
+
+When she had gaily marched him downstairs, she suddenly and unhappily
+remembered the people she would have to face, the gibing questions she
+would have to answer.
+
+The night clerk was still at the desk, as though he had slept standing.
+He hailed them. "Well, well! Up bright and early! Hope you folks slept
+well. Beds aren't so good as they might be, but we're kind of planning
+to get some new mattresses. But you get pretty good air to sleep in.
+Hope you have a fine hike today."
+
+His voice was cordial; he was their old friend; faithful watcher of
+their progress. Claire found herself dimpling at him.
+
+In the dining-room their inquisitional acquaintance, the waitress,
+fairly ran to them. "Sit down, folks. Waffles this morning. You want to
+stock up for your drive. My, ain't it an elegant morning! I hope you
+have a swell drive today!"
+
+"Why!" Claire gasped, "why, they aren't rude. They care--about people
+they never saw before. That's why they ask questions! I never thought--I
+never thought! There's people in the world who want to know us without
+having looked us up in the Social Register! I'm so ashamed! Not that the
+sunshine changes my impression of this coffee. It's frightful! But that
+will improve. And the people--they were being friendly, all the time.
+Oh, Henry B., young Henry Boltwood, you and your godmother Claire have
+a lot to learn about the world!"
+
+As they came into the garage, their surly acquaintance of the night
+before looked just as surly, but Claire tried a boisterous "Good
+morning!"
+
+"Mornin'! Going north? Better take the left-hand road at Wakamin. Easier
+going. Drive your car out for you?"
+
+As the car stood outside taking on gas, a man flapped up, spelled out
+the New York license, looked at Claire and her father, and inquired,
+"Quite a ways from home, aren't you?"
+
+This time Claire did not say "Yes!" She experimented with, "Yes, quite a
+ways."
+
+"Well, hope you have a good trip. Good luck!"
+
+Claire leaned her head on her hand, thought hard. "It's I who wasn't
+friendly," she propounded to her father. "How much I've been losing.
+Though I still refuse to like that coffee!"
+
+She noticed the sign on the air-hose of the garage--"Free Air."
+
+"There's our motto for the pilgrimage!" she cried.
+
+She knew the exaltation of starting out in the fresh morning for places
+she had never seen, without the bond of having to return at night.
+
+Thus Claire's second voyage into democracy.
+
+While she was starting the young man who had pulled her out of the mud
+and given her lunch was folding up the tarpaulin and blankets on which
+he had slept beside his Teal bug, in the woods three miles north of
+Gopher Prairie. To the high-well-born cat, Vere de Vere, Milt Daggett
+mused aloud, "Your ladyship, as Shakespeare says, the man that gets cold
+feet never wins the girl. And I'm scared, cat, clean scared."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+RELEASE BRAKES--SHIFT TO THIRD
+
+
+Milt Daggett had not been accurate in his implication that he had not
+noticed Claire at a garage in Schoenstrom. For one thing, he owned the
+garage.
+
+Milt was the most prosperous young man in the village of Schoenstrom.
+Neither the village itself nor the nearby _Strom_ is really _schoen_.
+The entire business district of Schoenstrom consists of Heinie
+Rauskukle's general store, which is brick; the Leipzig House, which is
+frame; the Old Home Poolroom and Restaurant, which is of old logs
+concealed by a frame sheathing; the farm-machinery agency, which is
+galvanized iron, its roof like an enlarged washboard; the church; the
+three saloons; and the Red Trail Garage, which is also, according to
+various signs, the Agency for Teal Car Best at the Test, Stonewall Tire
+Service Station, Sewing Machines and Binders Repaired, Dr. Hostrum the
+Veterinarian every Thursday, Gas Today 27c.
+
+The Red Trail Garage is of cement and tapestry brick. In the office is a
+clean hardwood floor, a typewriter, and a picture of Elsie Ferguson. The
+establishment has an automatic rim-stretcher, a wheel jack, and a
+reputation for honesty.
+
+The father of Milt Daggett was the Old Doctor, born in Maine, coming to
+this frontier in the day when Chippewas camped in your dooryard, and
+came in to help themselves to coffee, which you made of roasted corn.
+The Old Doctor bucked northwest blizzards, read Dickens and Byron,
+pulled people through typhoid, and left to Milt his shabby old medicine
+case and thousands of dollars--in uncollectible accounts. Mrs. Daggett
+had long since folded her crinkly hands in quiet death.
+
+Milt had covered the first two years of high school by studying with the
+priest, and been sent to the city of St. Cloud for the last two years.
+His father had meant to send him to the state university. But Milt had
+been born to a talent for machinery. At twelve he had made a telephone
+that worked. At eighteen he was engineer in the tiny flour mill in
+Schoenstrom. At twenty-five, when Claire Boltwood chose to come tearing
+through his life in a Gomez-Dep, Milt was the owner, manager,
+bookkeeper, wrecking crew, ignition expert, thoroughly competent
+bill-collector, and all but one of the working force of the Red Trail
+Garage.
+
+There were two factions in Schoenstrom: the retired farmers who said
+that German was a good enough language for anybody, and that taxes for
+schools and sidewalks were yes something crazy; and the group who
+stated that a pig-pen is a fine place, but only for pigs. To this
+second, revolutionary wing belonged a few of the first generation, most
+of the second, and all of the third; and its leader was Milt Daggett. He
+did not talk much, normally, but when he thought things ought to be
+done, he was as annoying as a machine-gun test in the lot next to a
+Quaker meeting.
+
+If there had been a war, Milt would probably have been in it--rather
+casual, clearing his throat, reckoning and guessing that maybe his men
+might try going over and taking that hill ... then taking it. But all of
+this history concerns the year just before America spoke to Germany; and
+in this town buried among the cornfields and the wheat, men still
+thought more about the price of grain than about the souls of nations.
+
+On the evening before Claire Boltwood left Minneapolis and adventured
+into democracy, Milt was in the garage. He wore union overalls that were
+tan where they were not grease-black; a faded blue cotton shirt; and the
+crown of a derby, with the rim not too neatly hacked off with a dull
+toad-stabber jack-knife.
+
+Milt smiled at his assistant, Ben Sittka, and suggested, "Well, _wie
+geht 's mit_ the work, eh? Like to stay and get the prof's flivver out,
+so he can have it in the morning?"
+
+"You bet, boss."
+
+"Getting to be quite a mechanic, Ben."
+
+"I'll say so!"
+
+"If you get stuck, come yank me out of the Old Home."
+
+"Aw rats, boss. I'll finish it. You beat it." Ben grinned at Milt
+adoringly.
+
+Milt stripped off his overalls and derby-crown, and washed his big, firm
+hands with gritty soft soap. He cleaned his nails with a file which he
+carried in his upper vest pocket in a red imitation morocco case which
+contained a comb, a mirror, an indelible pencil, and a note-book with
+the smudged pencil addresses of five girls in St. Cloud, and a
+memorandum about Rauskukle's car.
+
+He put on a twisted brown tie, an old blue serge suit, and a hat which,
+being old and shabby, had become graceful. He ambled up the street. He
+couldn't have ambled more than three blocks and have remained on the
+street. Schoenstrom tended to leak off into jungles of tall corn.
+
+Two men waved at him, and one demanded, "Say, Milt, is whisky good for
+the toothache? What d' you think! The doc said it didn't do any good.
+But then, gosh, he's only just out of college."
+
+"I guess he's right."
+
+"Is that a fact! Well, I'll keep off it then."
+
+Two stores farther on, a bulky farmer hailed, "Say, Milt, should I get
+an ensilage cutter yet?"
+
+"Yuh," in the manner of a man who knows too much to be cocksure about
+anything, "I don't know but what I would, Julius."
+
+"I guess I vill then."
+
+Minnie Rauskukle, plump, hearty Minnie, heiress to the general store,
+gave evidence by bridling and straightening her pigeon-like body that
+she was aware of Milt behind her. He did not speak to her. He ducked
+into the door of the Old Home Poolroom and Restaurant.
+
+Milt ranged up to the short lunch counter, in front of the pool table
+where two brick-necked farm youngsters were furiously slamming balls and
+attacking cigarettes. Loose-jointedly Milt climbed a loose-jointed high
+stool and to the proprietor, Bill McGolwey, his best friend, he yawned,
+"You might poison me with a hamburger and a slab of apple, Mac."
+
+"I'll just do that little thing. Look kind of grouchy tonight, Milt."
+
+"Too much excitement in this burg. Saw three people on the streets all
+simultaneously to-once."
+
+"What's been eatin' you lately?"
+
+"Me? Nothing. Only I do get tired of this metropolis. One of these days
+I'm going to buck some bigger place."
+
+"Try Gopher Prairie maybe?" suggested Mac, through the hiss and steam of
+the frying hamburger sandwich.
+
+"Rats. Too small."
+
+"Small? Why, there's darn near five thousand people there!"
+
+"I know, but--I want to tackle some sure-nuff city. Like Duluth or New
+York."
+
+"But what'd you do?"
+
+"That's the devil of it. I don't know just what I do want to do. I could
+always land soft in a garage, but that's nothing new. Might hit Detroit,
+and learn the motor-factory end."
+
+"Aw, you're the limit, Milt. Always looking for something new."
+
+"That's the way to get on. The rest of this town is afraid of new
+things. 'Member when I suggested we all chip in on a dynamo with a gas
+engine and have electric lights? The hicks almost died of nervousness."
+
+"Yuh, that's true, but---- You stick here, Milt. You and me will just
+nachly run this burg."
+
+"I'll say! Only---- Gosh, Mac, I would like to go to a real show, once.
+And find out how radio works. And see 'em put in a big suspension
+bridge!"
+
+Milt left the Old Home rather aimlessly. He told himself that he
+positively would not go back and help Ben Sittka get out the prof's car.
+So he went back and helped Ben get out the prof's car, and drove the
+same to the prof's. The prof, otherwise professor, otherwise mister,
+James Martin Jones, B.A., and Mrs. James Martin Jones welcomed him
+almost as noisily as had Mac. They begged him to come in. With Mr.
+Jones he discussed--no, ye Claires of Brooklyn Heights, this garage man
+and this threadbare young superintendent of a paintbare school, talking
+in a town that was only a comma on the line, did not discuss
+corn-growing, nor did they reckon to guess that by heck the constabule
+was carryin' on with the Widdy Perkins. They spoke of fish-culture,
+Elihu Root, the spiritualistic evidences of immortality, government
+ownership, self-starters for flivvers, and the stories of Irvin Cobb.
+
+Milt went home earlier than he wanted to. Because Mr. Jones was the only
+man in town besides the priest who read books, because Mrs. Jones was
+the only woman who laughed about any topics other than children and
+family sickness, because he wanted to go to their house every night,
+Milt treasured his welcome as a sacred thing, and kept himself from
+calling on them more than once a week.
+
+He stopped on his way to the garage to pet Emil Baumschweiger's large
+gray cat, publicly known as Rags, but to Milt and to the lady herself
+recognized as the unfortunate Countess Vere de Vere--perhaps the only
+person of noble ancestry and mysterious past in Milt's acquaintance. The
+Baumschweigers did not treat their animals well; Emil kicked the bay
+mare, and threw pitchforks at Vere de Vere. Milt saluted her and
+sympathized:
+
+"You have a punk time, don't you, countess? Like to beat it to
+Minneapolis with me?"
+
+The countess said that she did indeed have an extraordinarily punk time,
+and she sang to Milt the hymn of the little gods of the warm hearth.
+Then Milt's evening dissipations were over. Schoenstrom has movies only
+once a week. He sat in the office of his garage ruffling through a
+weekly digest of events. Milt read much, though not too easily. He had
+no desire to be a poet, an Indo-Iranian etymologist, a lecturer to
+women's clubs, or the secretary of state. But he did rouse to the
+marvels hinted in books and magazines; to large crowds, the mechanism of
+submarines, palm trees, gracious women.
+
+He laid down the magazine. He stared at the wall. He thought about
+nothing. He seemed to be fumbling for something about which he could
+deliciously think if he could but grasp it. Without quite visualizing
+either wall or sea, he was yet recalling old dreams of a moonlit wall by
+a warm stirring southern sea. If there was a girl in the dream she was
+intangible as the scent of the night. Presently he was asleep, a not at
+all romantic figure, rather ludicrously tipped to one side in his office
+chair, his large solid shoes up on the desk.
+
+He half woke, and filtered to what he called home--one room in the
+cottage of an oldish woman who had prejudices against the perilous night
+air. He was too sleepy to go through any toilet save pulling off his
+shoes, and achieving an unconvincing wash at the little stand, whose
+crackly varnish was marked with white rings from the toothbrush mug.
+
+"I feel about due to pull off some fool stunt. Wonder what it will be?"
+he complained, as he flopped on the bed.
+
+He was up at six, and at a quarter to seven was at work in the garage.
+He spent a large part of the morning in trying to prove to a customer
+that even a Teal car, best at the test, would not give perfect service
+if the customer persisted in forgetting to fill the oil-well, the
+grease-cups, and the battery.
+
+At three minutes after twelve Milt left the garage to go to dinner. The
+fog of the morning had turned to rain. McGolwey was not at the Old Home.
+Sometimes Mac got tired of serving meals, and for a day or two he took
+to a pocket flask, and among his former customers the cans of prepared
+meat at Rauskukle's became popular. Milt found him standing under the
+tin awning of the general store. He had a troubled hope of keeping Mac
+from too long a vacation with the pocket flask. But Mac was already
+red-eyed. He seemed only half to recognize Milt.
+
+"Swell day!" said Milt.
+
+"Y' bet."
+
+"Road darn muddy."
+
+"I should worry. Yea, bo', I'm feelin' good!"
+
+At eleven minutes past twelve a Gomez-Dep roadster appeared down the
+road, stopped at the garage. To Milt it was as exciting as the
+appearance of a comet to a watching astronomer.
+
+"What kind of a car do you call that, Milt?" asked a loafer.
+
+"Gomez-Deperdussin."
+
+"Never heard of it. Looks too heavy."
+
+This was sacrilege. Milt stormed, "Why, you poor floof, it's one of the
+best cars in the world. Imported from France. That looks like a
+special-made American body, though. Trouble with you fellows is, you're
+always scared of anything that's new. Too--heavy! Huh! Always wanted to
+see a Gomez--never have, except in pictures. And I believe that's a New
+York license. Let me at it!"
+
+He forgot noon-hunger, and clumped through the rain to the garage. He
+saw a girl step from the car. He stopped, in the doorway of the Old
+Home, in uneasy shyness. He told himself he didn't "know just what it is
+about her--she isn't so darn unusually pretty and yet--gee---- Certainly
+isn't a girl to get fresh with. Let Ben take care of her. Like to talk
+to her, and yet I'd be afraid if I opened my mouth, I'd put my foot in
+it."
+
+He was for the first time seeing a smart woman. This dark, slender,
+fine-nerved girl, in her plain, rough, closely-belted, gray suit, her
+small black Glengarry cocked on one side of her smooth hair, her little
+kid gloves, her veil, was as delicately adjusted as an aeroplane engine.
+
+Milt wanted to trumpet her exquisiteness to the world, so he growled to
+a man standing beside him, "Swell car. Nice-lookin' girl, kind of."
+
+"Kind of skinny, though. I like 'em with some meat on 'em," yawned the
+man.
+
+No, Milt did not strike him to earth. He insisted feebly, "Nice clothes
+she's got, though."
+
+"Oh, not so muchamuch. I seen a woman come through here yesterday that
+was swell, though--had on a purple dress and white shoes and a hat big
+'s a bushel."
+
+"Well, I don't know, I kind of like those simple things," apologized
+Milt.
+
+He crept toward the garage. The girl was inside. He inspected the
+slope-topped, patent-leather motoring trunk on the rack at the rear of
+the Gomez-Dep. He noticed a middle-aged man waiting in the car. "Must be
+her father. Probably--maybe she isn't married then." He could not get
+himself to shout at the man, as he usually did. He entered the garage
+office; from the inner door he peeped at the girl, who was talking to
+his assistant about changing an inner tube.
+
+That Ben Sittka whom an hour ago he had cajoled as a promising child he
+now admired for the sniffing calmness with which he was demanding,
+"Want a red or gray tube?"
+
+"Really, I don't know. Which is the better?" The girl's voice was
+curiously clear.
+
+Milt passed Claire Boltwood as though he did not see her; stood at the
+rear of the garage kicking at the tires of a car, his back to her. Over
+and over he was grumbling, "If I just knew one girl like that---- Like a
+picture. Like--like a silver vase on a blue cloth!"
+
+Ben Sittka did not talk to the girl while he inserted the tube in the
+spare casing. Only, in the triumphant moment when the parted ends of the
+steel rim snapped back together, he piped, "Going far?"
+
+"Yes, rather. To Seattle."
+
+Milt stared at the cobweb-grayed window. "Now I know what I was planning
+to do. I'm going to Seattle," he said.
+
+The girl was gone at twenty-nine minutes after twelve. At twenty-nine
+and a half minutes after, Milt remarked to Ben Sittka, "I'm going to
+take a trip. Uh? Now don't ask questions. You take charge of the garage
+until you hear from me. Get somebody to help you. G'-by."
+
+He drove his Teal bug out of the garage. At thirty-two minutes after
+twelve he was in his room, packing his wicker suitcase by the method of
+throwing things in and stamping on the case till it closed. In it he
+had absolutely all of his toilet refinements and wardrobe except the
+important portion already in use. They consisted, according to faithful
+detailed report, of four extra pairs of thick yellow and white cotton
+socks; two shirts, five collars, five handkerchiefs; a pair of
+surprisingly vain dancing pumps; high tan laced boots; three suits of
+cheap cotton underclothes; his Sunday suit, which was dead black in
+color, and unimaginative in cut; four ties; a fagged toothbrush, a comb
+and hairbrush, a razor, a strop, shaving soap in a mug; a not very clean
+towel; and nothing else whatever.
+
+To this he added his entire library and private picture gallery,
+consisting of Ivanhoe, Ben-Hur, his father's copy of Byron, a wireless
+manual, and the 1916 edition of Motor Construction and Repairing: the
+art collection, one colored Sunday supplement picture of a princess
+lunching in a Provençe courtyard, and a half-tone of Colonel Paul Beck
+landing in an early military biplane. Under this last, in a pencil
+scrawl now blurred to grayness, Milt had once written, "This what Ill be
+aviator."
+
+What he was to wear was a piercing trouble. Till eleven minutes past
+twelve that day he had not cared. People accepted his overalls at
+anything except a dance, and at the dances he was the only one who wore
+pumps. But in his discovery of Claire Boltwood he had perceived that
+dressing is an art. Before he had packed, he had unhappily pawed at the
+prized black suit. It had become stupid. "Undertaker!" he growled.
+
+With a shrug which indicated that he had nothing else, he had exchanged
+his overalls for a tan flannel shirt, black bow tie, thick pigskin
+shoes, and the suit he had worn the evening before, his best suit of two
+years ago--baggy blue serge coat and trousers. He could not know it, but
+they were surprisingly graceful on his wiry, firm, white body.
+
+In his pockets were a roll of bills and an unexpectedly good gold watch.
+For warmth he had a winter ulster, an old-fashioned turtle-neck sweater,
+and a raincoat heavy as tarpaulin. He plunged into the raincoat, ran
+out, galloped to Rauskukle's store, bought the most vehement cap in the
+place--a plaid of cerise, orange, emerald green, ultramarine, and five
+other guaranteed fashionable colors. He stocked up with food for
+roadside camping.
+
+In the humping tin-covered tail of the bug was a good deal of room, and
+this he filled with motor extras, a shotgun and shells, a pair of
+skates, and all his camping kit as used on his annual duck-hunting trip
+to Man Trap Lake.
+
+"I'm a darned fool to take everything I own but---- Might be gone a
+whole month," he reflected.
+
+He had only one possession left--a check book, concealed from the
+interested eye of his too maternal landlady by sticking it under the
+stair carpet. This he retrieved. It showed a balance of two hundred
+dollars. There was ten dollars in the cash register in the office, for
+Ben Sittka. The garage would, with the mortgage deducted, be worth
+nearly two thousand. This was his fortune.
+
+He bolted into the kitchen and all in one shout he informed his
+landlady, "Called out of town, li'l trip, b'lieve I don't owe you
+an'thing, here's six dollars, two weeks' notice, dunno just when I be
+back."
+
+Before she could issue a questionnaire he was out in the bug. He ran
+through town. At his friend McGolwey; now loose-lipped and wabbly,
+sitting in the rain on a pile of ties behind the railroad station, he
+yelled, "So long, Mac. Take care yourself, old hoss. Off on li'l trip."
+
+He stopped in front of the "prof's," tooted till the heads of the
+Joneses appeared at the window, waved and shouted, "G'-by, folks. Goin'
+outa town."
+
+Then, while freedom and the distant Pacific seemed to rush at him over
+the hood, he whirled out of town. It was two minutes to one--forty-seven
+minutes since Claire Boltwood had entered Schoenstrom.
+
+He stopped only once. His friend Lady Vere de Vere was at the edge of
+town, on a scientific exploring trip in the matter of ethnology and
+field mice. She hailed him, "Mrwr? Me mrwr!"
+
+"You don't say so!" Milt answered in surprise. "Well, if I promised to
+take you, I'll keep my word." He vaulted out, tucked Vere de Vere into
+the seat, protecting her from the rain with the tarpaulin winter
+radiator-cover.
+
+His rut-skipping car overtook the mud-walloping Gomez-Dep in an hour,
+and pulled it out of the mud.
+
+Before Milt slept that night, in his camp three miles from Gopher
+Prairie, he went through religious rites.
+
+"Girl like her, she's darn particular about her looks. I'm a sloppy
+hound. Used to be snappier about my clothes when I was in high school.
+Getting lazy--too much like Mac. Think of me sleeping in my clothes last
+night!"
+
+"Mrwr!" rebuked the cat.
+
+"You're dead right. Fierce is the word. Nev' will sleep in my duds
+again, puss. That is, when I have a reg'lar human bed. Course camping,
+different. But still---- Let's see all the funny things we can do to
+us."
+
+He shaved--two complete shaves, from lather to towel. He brushed his
+hair. He sat down by a campfire sheltered between two rocks, and fought
+his nails, though they were discouragingly crammed with motor grease.
+Throughout this interesting but quite painful ceremony Milt kept up a
+conversation between himself as the World's Champion Dude, and his cat
+as Vallay. But when there was nothing more to do, and the fire was low,
+and Vere de Vere asleep in the sleeve of the winter ulster, his
+bumbling voice slackened; in something like agony he muttered:
+
+"But oh, what's the use? I can't ever be anything but a dub! Cleaning my
+nails, to make a hit with a girl that's got hands like hers! It's a long
+trail to Seattle, but it's a darn sight longer one to being--being--well,
+sophisticated. Oh! And incidentally, what the deuce am I going to do in
+Seattle if I do get there?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE LAND OF BILLOWING CLOUDS
+
+
+Never a tawny-beached ocean has the sweetness of the prairie slew.
+Rippling and blue, with long grass up to its edge, a spot of dancing
+light set in the miles of rustling wheat, it retains even in July, on an
+afternoon of glare and brazen locusts, the freshness of a spring
+morning. A thousand slews, a hundred lakes bordered with rippling barley
+or tinkling bells of the flax, Claire passed. She had left the
+occasional groves of oak and poplar and silver birch, and come out on
+the treeless Great Plains.
+
+She had learned to call the slews "pugholes," and to watch for ducks at
+twilight. She had learned that about the pugholes flutter choirs of
+crimson-winged blackbirds; that the ugly brown birds squatting on
+fence-rails were the divine-voiced meadow larks; that among the humble
+cowbird citizens of the pastures sometimes flaunted a scarlet tanager or
+an oriole; and that no rose garden has the quaint and hardy beauty of
+the Indian paint brushes and rag babies and orange milkweed in the
+prickly, burnt-over grass between roadside and railway line.
+
+She had learned that what had seemed rudeness in garage men and hotel
+clerks was often a resentful reflection of her own Eastern attitude
+that she was necessarily superior to a race she had been trained to call
+"common people." If she spoke up frankly, they made her one of their
+own, and gave her companionable aid.
+
+For two days of sunshine and drying mud she followed a road flung
+straight across flat wheatlands, then curving among low hills. Often
+there were no fences; she was so intimately in among the grain that the
+fenders of the car brushed wheat stalks, and she became no stranger, but
+a part of all this vast-horizoned land. She forgot that she was driving,
+as she let the car creep on, while she was transported by Armadas of
+clouds, prairie clouds, wisps of vapor like a ribbed beach, or mounts of
+cumulus swelling to gold-washed snowy peaks.
+
+The friendliness of the bearing earth gave her a calm that took no heed
+of passing hours. Even her father, the abstracted man of affairs, nodded
+to dusty people along the road; to a jolly old man whose bulk rolled and
+shook in a tiny, rhythmically creaking buggy, to women in the small
+abrupt towns with their huge red elevators and their long, flat-roofed
+stores.
+
+Claire had discovered America, and she felt stronger, and all her days
+were colored with the sun.
+
+She had discovered, too, that she could adventure. No longer was she
+haunted by the apprehension that had whispered to her as she had left
+Minneapolis. She knew a thrill when she hailed--as though it were a
+passing ship--an Illinois car across whose dust-caked back was a banner
+"Chicago to the Yellowstone." She experienced a new sensation of common
+humanness when, on a railway paralleling the wagon road for miles, the
+engineer of a freight waved his hand to her, and tooted the whistle in
+greeting.
+
+Her father was easily tired, but he drowsed through the early afternoons
+when a none-too-digestible small-town lunch was as lead within him.
+Despite the beauty of the land and the joy of pushing on, they both had
+things to endure.
+
+After lunch, it was sometimes an agony to Claire to keep awake. Her eyes
+felt greasy from the food, or smarted with the sun-glare. In the still
+air, after the morning breeze had been burnt out, the heat from the
+engine was a torment about her feet; and if there was another car ahead,
+the trail of dust sifted into her throat. Unless there was traffic to
+keep her awake, she nodded at the wheel; she was merely a part of a
+machine that ran on without seeming to make any impression on the
+prairie's endlessness.
+
+Over and over there were the same manipulations: slow for down hill,
+careful of sand at the bottom, letting her out on a smooth stretch,
+waving to a lonely farmwife in her small, baked dooryard, slow to pass a
+hay-wagon, gas for up the next hill, and repeat the round all over
+again. But she was joyous till noon; and with mid-afternoon a new
+strength came which, as rose crept above the golden haze of dust,
+deepened into serene meditation.
+
+And she was finding the one secret of long-distance driving--namely,
+driving; keeping on, thinking by fifty-mile units, not by the ten-mile
+stretches of Long Island runs; and not fretting over anything whatever.
+She seemed charmed; if she had a puncture--why, she put on the spare. If
+she ran out of gas--why, any passing driver would lend her a gallon.
+Nothing, it seemed, could halt her level flight across the giant land.
+
+She rarely lost her way. She was guided by the friendly trail
+signs--those big red R's and L's on fence post and telephone pole,
+magically telling the way from the Mississippi to the Pacific.
+
+Her father's occasional musing talk kept her from loneliness. He was a
+good touring companion. Motoring is not the best occasion for epigrams,
+satire, and the Good One You Got Off at the Lambs' Club last night. Such
+verbiage on motor trips invariably results in the mysterious finding of
+the corpse of a strange man, well dressed, hidden beside the road.
+Claire and her father mumbled, "Good farmhouse--brick," or "Nice view,"
+and smiled, and were for miles as silent as the companionable sky.
+
+She thought of the people she knew, especially of Jeff Saxton. But she
+could not clearly remember his lean earnest face. Between her and Jeff
+were sweeping sunny leagues. But she was not lonely. Certainly she was
+not lonely for a young man with a raincoat, a cat, and an interest in
+Japan.
+
+No singer after a first concert has felt more triumphant than Claire
+when she crossed her first state-line; rumbled over the bridge across
+the Red River into North Dakota. To see Dakota car licenses everywhere,
+instead of Minnesota, was like the sensation of street signs in a new
+language. And when she found a good hotel in Fargo and had a real bath,
+she felt that by her own efforts she had earned the right to enjoy it.
+
+Mr. Boltwood caught her enthusiasm. Dinner was a festival, and in iced
+tea the peaceful conquistadores drank the toast of the new Spanish Main;
+and afterward, arm in arm, went chattering to the movies.
+
+In front of the Royal Palace, Pictures, 4 Great Acts Vaudeville 4, was
+browsing a small, beetle-like, tin-covered car.
+
+"Dad! Look! I'm sure--yes, of course, there's his suitcase--that's the
+car of that nice boy--don't you remember?--the one that pulled us out of
+the mud at--I don't remember the name of the place. Apparently he's
+keeping going. I remember; he's headed for Seattle, too. We'll look for
+him in the theater. Oh, the darling, there's his cat! What was the funny
+name he gave her--the Marchioness Montmorency or something?"
+
+Lady Vere de Vere, afraid of Fargo and movie crowds, but trusting in her
+itinerant castle, the bug, was curled in Milt Daggett's ulster, in the
+bottom of the car. She twinkled her whiskers at Claire, and purred to a
+stroking hand.
+
+With the excitement of one trying to find the address of a friend in a
+strange land Claire looked over the audience when the lights came on
+before the vaudeville. In the second row she saw Milt's stiffish,
+rope-colored hair--surprisingly smooth above an astoundingly clean new
+tan shirt of mercerized silk.
+
+He laughed furiously at the dialogue between Pete-Rosenheim &
+Larose-Bettina, though it contained the cheese joke, the mother-in-law
+joke, and the joke about the wife rifling her husband's pockets.
+
+"Our young friend seems to have enviable youthful spirits," commented
+Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"Now, no superiority! He's probably never seen a real vaudeville show.
+Wouldn't it be fun to take him to the Winter Garden or the Follies for
+the first time!... Instead of being taken by Jeff Saxton, and having the
+humor, oh! so articulately explained!"
+
+The pictures were resumed; the film which, under ten or twelve different
+titles, Claire had already seen, even though Brooklyn Heights does not
+devote Saturday evening to the movies. The badman, the sheriff--an aged
+party with whiskers and boots--the holdup, the sad eyes of the sheriff's
+daughter--also an aged party, but with a sunbonnet and the most
+expensive rouge--the crook's reformation, and his violent adherence to
+law and order; this libel upon the portions of these United States lying
+west of longitude 101° Claire had seen too often. She dragged her father
+back to the hotel, sent him to bed, and entered her room--to find a
+telegram upon the bureau.
+
+She had sent her friends a list of the places at which she would be
+likely to stop. The message was from Jeff Saxton, in Brooklyn. It
+brought to her mind the steady shine of his glasses--the most expensive
+glasses, with the very best curved lenses--as it demanded:
+
+    "Received letter about trip surprised anxious will tire you out
+    fatigue prairie roads bad for your father mountain roads dangerous
+    strongly advise go only part way then take train.       GEOFFREY."
+
+She held the telegram, flipping her fingers against one end of it as she
+debated. She remembered how the wide world had flowed toward her over
+the hood of the Gomez all day. She wrote in answer:
+
+    "Awful perils of road, two punctures, split infinitive, eggs at
+    lunch questionable, but struggle on."
+
+Before she sent it she held council with her father. She sat on the foot
+of his bed and tried to sound dutiful. "I don't want to do anything
+that's bad for you, daddy. But isn't it taking your mind away from
+business?"
+
+"Ye-es, I think it is. Anyway, we'll try it a few days more."
+
+"I fancy we can stand up under the strain and perils. I think we can
+persuade some of these big farmers to come to the rescue if we encounter
+any walruses or crocodiles among the wheat. And I have a feeling that if
+we ever get stuck, our friend of the Teal bug will help us."
+
+"Probably never see him again. He'll skip on ahead of us."
+
+"Of course. We haven't laid an eye on him, along the road. He must have
+gotten into Fargo long before we did. Now tomorrow I think----"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE GREAT AMERICAN FRYING PAN
+
+
+It was Claire's first bad day since the hole in the mud. She had started
+gallantly, scooting along the level road that flies straight west of
+Fargo. But at noon she encountered a restaurant which made eating seem
+an evil.
+
+That they might have fair fame among motorists the commercial club of
+Reaper had set at the edge of town a sign "Welcome to Reaper, a Live
+Town--Speed Limit 8 Miles perhr." Being interpreted, that sign meant
+that if you went much over twenty miles an hour on the main street,
+people might glance at you; and that the real welcome, the only
+impression of Reaper that tourists were likely to carry away, was the
+welcome in the one restaurant. It was called the Eats Garden. As Claire
+and her father entered, they were stifled by a belch of smoke from the
+frying pan in the kitchen. The room was blocked by a huge lunch counter;
+there was only one table, covered with oil cloth decorated with
+venerable spots of dried egg yolk.
+
+The waiter-cook, whose apron was gravy-patterned, with a border and
+stomacher of plain gray dirt, grumbled, "Whadyuhwant?"
+
+Claire sufficiently recovered to pick out the type from the fly specks
+on the menu, and she ordered a small steak and coffee for her father;
+for herself tea, boiled eggs, toast.
+
+"Toast? We ain't got any toast!"
+
+"Well, can't you make it?"
+
+"Oh, I suppose I could----"
+
+When they came, the slices of toast were an inch thick, burnt on one
+side and raw on the other. The tea was bitter and the eggs watery. Her
+father reported that his steak was high-test rawhide, and his
+coffee--well, he wasn't sure just what substitute had been used for
+chicory, but he thought it was lukewarm quinine.
+
+Claire raged: "You know, this town really has aspirations. They're
+beginning to build such nice little bungalows, and there's a fine clean
+bank---- Then they permit this scoundrel to advertise the town among
+strangers, influential strangers, in motors, by serving food like this!
+I suppose they think that they arrest criminals here, yet this
+restaurant man is a thief, to charge real money for food like this----
+Yes, and he's a murderer!"
+
+"Oh, come now, dolly!"
+
+"Yes he is, literally. He must in his glorious career have given chronic
+indigestion to thousands of people--shortened their lives by years.
+That's wholesale murder. If I were the authorities here, I'd be
+indulgent to the people who only murder one or two people, but imprison
+this cook for life. Really! I mean it!"
+
+"Well, he probably does the best he----"
+
+"He does not! These eggs and this bread were perfectly good, before he
+did black magic over them. And did you see the contemptuous look he gave
+me when I was so eccentric as to order toast? Oh, Reaper, Reaper, you
+desire a modern town, yet I wonder if you know how many thousands of
+tourists go from coast to coast, cursing you? If I could only hang that
+restaurant man--and the others like him--in a rope of his own hempen
+griddle cakes! The Great American Frying Pan! I don't expect men
+building a new town to have time to read Hugh Walpole and James Branch
+Cabell, but I do expect them to afford a cook who can fry eggs!"
+
+As she paid the check, Claire tried to think of some protest which would
+have any effect on the obese wits of the restaurant man. In face of his
+pink puffiness she gave it up. Her failure as a Citizeness Fixit sent
+her out of the place in a fury, carried her on in a dusty whirl till the
+engine spat, sounded tired and reflective, and said it guessed it
+wouldn't go any farther that day.
+
+Now that she had something to do, Claire became patient. "Run out of
+gas. Isn't it lucky I got that can for an extra gallon?"
+
+But there was plenty of gas. There was no discernible reason why the
+car should not go. She started the engine. It ran for half a minute and
+quit. All the plugs showed sparks. No wires were detached in the
+distributor. There was plenty of water, and the oil was not clogged. And
+that ended Claire's knowledge of the inside of a motor.
+
+She stopped two motorists. The first was sure that there was dirt on the
+point of the needle valve, in the carburetor. While Claire shuddered
+lest he never get it back, he took out the needle valve, wiped it, put
+it back--and the engine was again started, and again, with great
+promptness, it stopped.
+
+The second Good Samaritan knew that one of the wires in the distributor
+must be detached and, though she assured him that she had inspected
+them, he looked pityingly at her smart sports-suit, said, "Well, I'll
+just take a look," and removed the distributor cover. He also scratched
+his head, felt of the fuses under the cowl, scratched his cheek, poked a
+finger at the carburetor, rubbed his ear, said, "Well, uh----" looked to
+see if there was water and gas, sighed, "Can't just seem to find out
+what's the trouble," shot at his own car, and escaped.
+
+Claire had been highly grateful and laudatory to both of them--but she
+remained here, ten miles from nowhere. It was a beautiful place. Down a
+hill the wheat swam toward a village whose elevator was a glistening
+tower. Mud-hens gabbled in a slew, alfalfa shone with unearthly green,
+and bees went junketing toward a field of red clover. But she had the
+motorist's fever to go on. The road behind and in front was very long,
+very white--and very empty.
+
+Her father, out of much thought and a solid ignorance about all of
+motoring beyond the hiring of chauffeurs and the payment of bills,
+suggested, "Uh, dolly, have you looked to see if these, uh---- Is the
+carburetor all right?"
+
+"Yes, dear; I've looked at it three times, so far," she said, just a
+little too smoothly.
+
+On the hill five miles to eastward, a line of dust, then a small car. As
+it approached, the driver must have sighted her and increased speed. He
+came up at thirty-five miles an hour.
+
+"Now we'll get something done! Look! It's a bug--a flivver or a Teal or
+something. I believe it's the young man that got us out of the mud."
+
+Milt Daggett stopped, casually greeted them: "Why, hello, Miss Boltwood.
+Thought you'd be way ahead of me some place!"
+
+"Mrwr," said Vere de Vere. What this meant the historian does not know.
+
+"No; I've been taking it easy. Mr., Uh--I can't quite remember your
+name----"
+
+"Milt Daggett."
+
+"There's something mysterious the matter with my car. The engine will
+start, after it's left alone a while, but then it stalls. Do you
+suppose you could tell what it is?"
+
+"I don't know. I'll see if I can find out."
+
+"Then you probably will. The other two men knew everything. One of them
+was the inventor of wheels, and the other discovered skidding. So of
+course they couldn't help me."
+
+Milt added nothing to her frivolity, but his smile was friendly. He
+lifted the round rubber cap of the distributor. Then Claire's faith
+tumbled in the dust. Twice had the wires been tested. Milt tested them
+again. She was too tired of botching to tell him he was wasting time.
+
+"Got an oil can?" he hesitated.
+
+Through a tiny hole in the plate of the distributor he dripped two drops
+of oil--only two drops. "I guess maybe that's what it needed. You might
+try her now, and see how she runs," he said mildly.
+
+Dubiously Claire started the engine. It sang jubilantly, and it did not
+stop. Again was the road open to her. Again was the settlement over
+there, to which it would have taken her an hour to walk, only six
+minutes away.
+
+She stopped the engine, beamed at him--there in the dust, on the quiet
+hilltop. He said as apologetically as though he had been at fault,
+"Distributor got dry. Might give it a little oil about once in six
+months."
+
+"We are so grateful to you! Twice now you've saved our lives."
+
+"Oh, I guess you'd have gone on living! And if drivers can't help each
+other, who can?"
+
+"That's a good start toward world-fellowship, I suppose. I wish we could
+do---- Return your lunch or---- Mr. Daggett! Do you read books? I
+mean----"
+
+"Yes I do, when I run across them."
+
+"Mayn't I gi--lend you these two that I happen to have along? I've
+finished them, and so has father, I think."
+
+From the folds of the strapped-down top she pulled out Compton
+Mackenzie's _Youth's Encounter_, and Vachel Lindsay's _Congo_. With a
+curious faint excitement she watched him turn the leaves. His blunt
+fingers flapped through them as though he was used to books. As he
+looked at _Congo_, he exclaimed, "Poetry! That's fine! Like it, but I
+don't hardly ever run across it. I---- Say---- I'm terribly obliged!"
+
+His clear face lifted, sun-brown and young and adoring. She had not
+often seen men look at her thus. Certainly Jeff Saxton's painless
+worship did not turn him into the likeness of a knight among banners.
+Yet the good Geoffrey loved her, while to Milt Daggett she could be
+nothing more than a strange young woman in a car with a New York
+license. If her tiny gift could so please him, how poor he must be. "He
+probably lives on some barren farm," she thought, "or he's a penniless
+mechanic hoping for a good job in Seattle. How white his forehead is!"
+
+But aloud she was saying, "I hope you're enjoying your trip."
+
+"Oh yes. I like it fine. You having a good time? Well---- Well, thanks
+for the books."
+
+She was off before him. Presently she exclaimed to Mr. Boltwood: "You
+know--just occurs to me--it's rather curious that our young friend
+should be so coincidental as to come along just when we needed him."
+
+"Oh, he just happened to, I suppose," hemmed her father.
+
+"I'm not so sure," she meditated, while she absently watched another
+member of the Poultry Suicide Club rush out of a safe ditch, prepare to
+take leave for immortality, change her fowlish mind, flutter up over the
+hood of the car, and come down squawking her indignities to the
+barnyard. "I'm not so sure about his happening---- No. I wonder if he
+could possibly---- Oh no. I hope not. Flattering, but---- You don't
+suppose he could be deliberately following us?"
+
+"Nonsense! He's a perfectly decent young chap."
+
+"I know. Of course. He probably works hard in a garage, and is terribly
+nice to his mother and sisters at home. I mean---- I wouldn't want the
+dear lamb to be a devoted knight, though. Too thankless a job."
+
+She slowed the car down to fifteen an hour. For the first time she began
+to watch the road behind her. In a few minutes a moving spot showed in
+the dust three miles back. Oh, naturally; he would still be behind her.
+Only---- If she stopped, just to look at the scenery, he would go on
+ahead of her. She stopped for a moment--for a time too brief to indicate
+that anything had gone wrong with her car. Staring back she saw that the
+bug stopped also, and she fancied that Milt was out standing beside it,
+peering with his palm over his eyes--a spy, unnatural and disturbing in
+the wide peace.
+
+She drove on a mile and halted again; again halted her attendant. He was
+keeping a consistent two to four miles behind, she estimated.
+
+"This won't do at all," she worried. "Flattering, but somehow----
+Whatever sort of a cocoon-wrapped hussy I am, I don't collect scalps. I
+won't have young men serving me--graft on them--get amusement out of
+their struggles. Besides--suppose he became just a little more friendly,
+each time he came up, all the way from here to Seattle?... Fresh.... No,
+it won't do."
+
+She ran the car to the side of the road.
+
+"More trouble?" groaned her father.
+
+"No. Just want to see scenery."
+
+"But---- There's a good deal of scenery on all sides, without stopping,
+seems to me!"
+
+"Yes, but----" She looked back. Milt had come into sight; had paused to
+take observations. Her father caught it:
+
+"Oh, I see. Pardon me. Our squire still following? Let him go on ahead?
+Wise lass."
+
+"Yes. I think perhaps it's better to avoid complications."
+
+"Of course." Mr. Boltwood's manner did not merely avoid Milt; it
+abolished him.
+
+She saw Milt, after five minutes of stationary watching, start forward.
+He came dustily rattling up with a hail of "Distributor on strike
+again?" so cheerful that it hurt her to dismiss him. But she had managed
+a household. She was able to say suavely:
+
+"No, everything is fine. I'm sure it will be, now. I'm afraid we are
+holding you back. You mustn't worry about us."
+
+"Oh, that's all right," breezily. "Something might go wrong. Say, is
+this poetry book----"
+
+"No, I'm sure nothing will go wrong now. You mustn't feel responsible
+for us. But, uh, you understand we're very grateful for what you have
+done and, uh, perhaps we shall see each other in Seattle?" She made it
+brightly interrogatory.
+
+"Oh, I see." His hands gripped the wheel. His cheeks had been too
+ruddily tinted by the Dakota sun to show a blush, but his teeth caught
+his lower lip. He had no starter on his bug; he had in his embarrassment
+to get out and crank. He did it quietly, not looking at her. She could
+see that his hand trembled on the crank. When he did glance at her, as
+he drove off, it was apologetically, miserably. His foot was shaking on
+the clutch pedal.
+
+The dust behind his car concealed him. For twenty miles she was silent,
+save when she burst out to her father, "I do hope you're enjoying the
+trip. It's so easy to make people unhappy. I wonder---- No. Had to be
+done."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE DISCOVERY OF CANNED SHRIMPS AND HESPERIDES
+
+
+On the morning when Milt Daggett had awakened to sunshine in the woods
+north of Gopher Prairie, he had discovered the golden age. As mile on
+mile he jogged over new hills, without having to worry about getting
+back to his garage in time to repair somebody's car, he realized that
+for the past two years he had forced himself to find contentment in
+building up a business that had no future.
+
+Now he laughed and whooped; he drove with one foot inelegantly and
+enchantingly up on the edge of the cowl; he made Lady Vere de Vere bow
+to astounded farmers; he went to the movies every evening--twice, in
+Fargo; and when the chariot of the young prince swept to the brow of a
+hill, he murmured, not in the manner of a bug-driver but with a stinging
+awe, "All that big country! Ours to see, puss! We'll settle down some
+day and be solid citizens and raise families and wheeze when we walk,
+but---- All those hills to sail over and---- Come on! Lez sail!"
+
+Milt attended the motion pictures every evening, and he saw them in a
+new way. As recently as one week before he had preferred those earnest
+depictions in which hard-working, moral actors shoot one another, or
+ride the most uncomfortable horses up mountainsides. But now, with a
+mental apology to that propagandist of lowbrowism, the absent Mac, he
+chose the films in which the leading men wore evening clothes, and no
+one ever did anything without being assisted by a "man." Aside from the
+pictures Milt's best tutors were traveling men. Though he measured every
+cent, and for his campfire dinners bought modest chuck steaks, he had at
+least one meal a day at a hotel, to watch the traveling men.
+
+To Claire, traveling men were merely commercial persons in hard-boiled
+suits. She identified them with the writing-up of order-slips on long
+littered writing-tables, and with hotels that reduced the delicate arts
+of dining and sleeping to gray greasiness. But Milt knew traveling men.
+He knew that not only were they the missionaries of business,
+supplementing the taking of orders by telling merchants how to build up
+trade, how to trim windows and treat customers like human beings; but
+also that they, as much as the local ministers and doctors and teachers
+and newspapermen, were the agents in spreading knowledge and justice. It
+was they who showed the young men how to have their hair cut--and to
+wash behind the ears and shave daily; they who encouraged villagers to
+rise from scandal and gossip to a perception of the Great World, of
+politics and sports, and some measure of art and science.
+
+Claire, and indeed her father and Mr. Jeff Saxton as well, had vaguely
+concluded that because drummers were always to be seen in soggy hotels
+and badly connecting trains and the headachy waiting-rooms of stations,
+they must like these places. Milt knew that the drummers were martyrs;
+that for months of a trip, all the while thinking of the children back
+home, they suffered from landlords and train schedules; that they were
+Claire's best allies in fighting the Great American Frying Pan; that
+they knew good things, and fought against the laziness and impositions
+of people who "kept hotel" because they had failed as farmers; and that
+when they did find a landlord who was cordial and efficient, they went
+forth mightily advertising that glorious man. The traveling men, he
+knew, were pioneers in spats.
+
+Hence it was to the traveling men, not to supercilious tourists in
+limousines, that Milt turned for suggestions as to how to perform the
+miracle of changing from an ambitious boy into what Claire would
+recognize as a charming man. He had not met enough traveling men at
+Schoenstrom. They scooped up what little business there was, and escaped
+from the Leipzig House to spend the night at St. Cloud or Sauk Centre.
+
+In the larger towns in Minnesota and Dakota, after evening movies,
+before slipping out to his roadside camp Milt inserted himself into a
+circle of traveling men in large leather chairs, and ventured, "Saw a
+Gomez-Dep with a New York license down the line today."
+
+"Oh. You driving through?"
+
+"Yes. Going to Seattle."
+
+That distinguished Milt from the ordinary young-men-loafers, and he was
+admitted as one of the assembly of men who traveled and saw things and
+wondered about the ways of men. It was good talk he heard; too much of
+hotels, and too many tight banal little phrases suggesting the solution
+of all economic complexities by hanging "agitators," but with this, an
+exciting accumulation of impressions of Vancouver and San Diego, Florida
+and K. C.
+
+"That's a wonderful work farm they have at Duluth," said one, and the
+next, "speaking of that, I was in Chicago last week, and I saw a
+play----"
+
+Milt had, in his two years of high school in St. Cloud, and in his
+boyhood under the genial but abstracted eye of the Old Doctor, learned
+that it was not well thought of to use the knife as a hod and to plaster
+mashed potatoes upon it, as was the custom in Mac's Old Home Lunch at
+Schoenstrom. But the arts of courteously approaching oysters, salad, and
+peas were rather unfamiliar to him. Now he studied forks as he had once
+studied carburetors, and he gave spiritual devotion to the nice eating
+of a canned-shrimp cocktail--a lost legion of shrimps, now two thousand
+miles and two years away from their ocean home.
+
+He peeped with equal earnestness at the socks and the shirts of the
+traveling men. Socks had been to him not an article of faith but a
+detail of economy. His attitude to socks had lacked in reverence and
+technique. He had not perceived that socks may be as sound a symbol of
+culture as the 'cello or even demountable rims. He had been able to
+think with respect of ties and damp piqué collars secured by gold
+safety-pins; and to the belted fawn overcoat that the St. Klopstock
+banker's son had brought back from St. Paul, he had given jealous
+attention. But now he graduated into differential socks.
+
+By his campfire, sighing to the rather somnolent Vere de Vere, he
+scornfully yanked his extra pairs of thick, white-streaked, yellow
+cotton socks from the wicker suitcase, and uttered anathema:
+
+"Begone, ye unworthy and punk-looking raiment. I know ye! Ye werst a
+bargain and two pairs for two bits. But even as Adolph Zolzac and an
+agent for flivver accessories are ye become in my eyes, ye generation of
+vipers, ye clumsy, bag-footed, wrinkle-sided gunny-sacking ye!"
+
+Next day, in the woods, a happy hobo found that the manna-bringing
+ravens had left him four pairs of good socks.
+
+Five quite expensive pairs of silk and lisle socks Milt purchased--all
+that the general merchant at Jeppe had in stock. What they lost in
+suitability to touring and to private laundering at creeks, they gained
+as symbols. Milt felt less shut out from the life of leisure. Now, in
+Seattle, say, he could go into a good hotel with less fear of the
+clerks.
+
+He added attractive outing shirts, ties neither too blackly dull nor too
+flashily crimson, and a vicious nail-brush which simply tore out the
+motor grease that had grown into the lines of his hands. Also he added a
+book.
+
+The book was a rhetoric. Milt knew perfectly that there was an
+impertinence called grammar, but it had never annoyed him much. He knew
+that many persons preferred "They were" to "They was," and were nervous
+in the presence of "ain't." One teacher in St. Cloud had buzzed
+frightfully about these minutiæ. But Milt discovered that grammar was
+only the beginning of woes. He learned that there were such mental
+mortgages as figures of speech and the choice of synonyms. He had always
+known, but he had never passionately felt that the invariable use of
+"hell," "doggone," and "You bet!" left certain subtleties unexpressed.
+Now he was finding subtleties which he had to express.
+
+As joyously adventurous as going on day after day was his
+experimentation in voicing his new observations. He gave far more
+eagerness to it than Claire Boltwood had. Gustily intoning to Vere de
+Vere, who was the perfect audience, inasmuch as she never had anything
+to say but "Mrwr," and didn't mind being interrupted in that, he
+clamored, "The prairies are the sea. In the distance they are kind of
+silvery--no--they are dim silver; and way off on the skyline are the
+Islands of the--of the---- Now what the devil was them, were those,
+islands in the mythology book in high school? Of the--Blessed? Great
+snakes' boots, you're an ignorant cat, Vere! Hesperyds? No! Hesperides!
+Yea, bo'! Now that man in the hotel: 'May I trouble you for the train
+guide? Thanks so much!' But how much is so much?"
+
+As Claire's days were set free by her consciousness of sun and brown
+earth, so Milt's odyssey was only the more valorous in his endeavor to
+criticize life. He saw that Mac's lunch room had not been an altogether
+satisfactory home; that Mac's habit of saying to dissatisfied customers,
+"If you don't like it, get out," had lacked something of courtesy.
+Staring at towns along the way, Milt saw that houses were not merely
+large and comfortable, or small and stingy; but that there was an
+interesting thing he remembered hearing his teachers call "good taste."
+
+He was not the preoccupied Milt of the garage but a gay-eyed gallant,
+the evening when he gave a lift to the school-teacher and drove her from
+the district school among the wild roses and the corn to her home in the
+next town. She was a neat, tripping, trim-sided school-teacher of
+nineteen or twenty.
+
+"You're going out to Seattle? My! That's a wonderful trip. Don't you get
+tired?" she adored.
+
+"Oh, no. And I'm seeing things. I used to think everything worth while
+was right near my own town."
+
+"You're so wise to go places. Most of the boys I know don't think there
+is any world beyond Jimtown and Fargo."
+
+She glowed at him. Milt was saying to himself, "Am I a fool? I probably
+could make this girl fall in love with me. And she's better than I am;
+so darn neat and clean and gentle. We'd be happy. She's a nice comfy
+fire, and here I go like a boob, chasing after a lone, cold star like
+Miss Boltwood, and probably I'll fall into all the slews from hell to
+breakfast on the way. But---- I'd get sleepy by a comfy fire."
+
+"Are you thinking hard? You're frowning so," ventured the
+school-teacher.
+
+"Didn't mean to. 'Scuse!" he laughed. One hand off the steering wheel,
+he took her hand--a fresh, cool, virginal hand, snuggling into his,
+suddenly stirring him. He wanted to hold it tighter. The lamenting
+historian of love's pilgrimage must set down the fact that the pilgrim
+for at least a second forgot the divine tread of the goddess Claire, and
+made rapid calculation that he could, in a pinch, drive from Schoenstrom
+to the teacher's town in two days and a night; that therefore courtship,
+and this sweet white hand resting in his, were not impossible. Milt
+himself did not know what it was that made him lay down the hand and
+say, so softly that he was but half audible through the rattle of the
+engine:
+
+"Isn't this a slick, mean to say glorious evening? Sky rose and then
+that funny lavender. And that new moon---- Makes me think of--the girl
+I'm in love with."
+
+"You're engaged?" wistfully.
+
+"Not exactly but---- Say, did you study rhetoric in Normal School? I
+have a rhetoric that's got all kind of poetic extracts, you know, and
+quotations and everything, from the big writers, Stevenson and all.
+Always been so practical, making a garage pay, never thought much about
+how I said things as long as I could say 'No!' and say it quick. 'Cept
+maybe when I was talking to the prof there. But it's great sport to see
+how musical you can make a thing sound. Words. Like Shenandoah. Gol-lee!
+Isn't that a wonderful word? Makes you see old white mansion, and
+mocking birds---- Wonder if a fellow could be a big engineer, you know,
+build bridges and so on, and still talk about, oh, beautiful things?
+What d' you think, girlie?"
+
+"Oh, I'm sure you could!"
+
+Her admiration, the proximity of her fragrant slightness, was pleasant
+in the dusk, but he did not press her hand again, even when she
+whispered, "Good night, and thank you--oh, thank you."
+
+If Milt had been driving at the rate at which he usually made his
+skipjack carom over the roads about Schoenstrom, he would by now have
+been through Dakota, into Montana. But he was deliberately holding down
+the speed. When he had been tempted by a smooth stretch to go too
+breathlessly, he halted, teased Vere de Vere, climbed out and, sitting
+on a hilltop, his hands about his knees, drenched his soul with the
+vision of amber distances.
+
+He tried so to time his progress that he might always be from three to
+five miles behind Claire--distant enough to be unnoticed, near enough to
+help in case of need. For behind poetic expression and the use of forks
+was the fact that his purpose in life was to know Claire.
+
+When he was caught, when Claire informed him that he "mustn't worry
+about her"; when, slowly, he understood that she wasn't being neighborly
+and interested in his making time, he wanted to escape, never to see her
+again.
+
+For thirty miles his cheeks were fiery. He, most considerate of roadmen,
+crowded a woman in a flivver, passed a laboring car on an upgrade with
+such a burst that the uneasy driver bumped off into a ditch. He hadn't
+really seen them. Only mechanically had he got past them. He was
+muttering:
+
+"She thought I was trying to butt in! Stung again! Like a small boy in
+love with teacher. And I thought I was so wise! Cussed out Mac--blamed
+Mac--no, damn all the fine words--cussed out Mac for being the village
+rumhound. Boozing is twice as sensible as me. See a girl, nice
+dress--start for Seattle! Two thousand miles away! Of course she bawled
+me out. She was dead right. Boob! Yahoo! Goat!"
+
+He caught up Vere de Vere, rubbed her fur against his cheek while he
+mourned, "Oh, puss, you got to be nice to me. I thought I'd do big
+things. And then the alarm clock went off. I'm back in Schoenstrom. For
+keeps, I guess. I didn't know I had feelings that could get hurt like
+this. Thought I had a rhinoceros hide. But---- Oh, it isn't just feeling
+ashamed over being a fool. It's that---- Won't ever see her again. Not
+once. Way I saw her through the window, at that hotel, in that blue
+silky dress--that funny long line of buttons, and her throat. Never have
+dinner--lunch--with her by the road----"
+
+In the reaction of anger he demanded of Vere de Vere, "What the deuce do
+I care? If she's chump enough to chase away a crack garage man that's
+gone batty and wants to work for nothing, let her go on and hit some
+crook garage and get stuck for an entire overhauling. What do I care?
+Had nice trip; that's all I wanted. Never did intend to go clear to
+Seattle, anyway. Go on to Butte, then back home. No more fussing about
+fool table-manners and books, and I certainly will cut out tagging
+behind her! No, sir! Nev-er again!"
+
+It was somewhat inconsistent to add, "There's a bully place--sneak in
+and let her get past me again. But she won't catch me following next
+time!"
+
+While he tried to keep up his virtuous anger, he was steering into an
+abandoned farmyard, parking the car behind cottonwoods and neglected
+tall currant bushes which would conceal it from the road.
+
+The windows of the deserted house stared at him; a splintered screen
+door banged in every breeze. Lichens leered from the cracks of the
+porch. The yard was filled with a litter of cottonwood twigs, and over
+the flower garden hulked ragged weeds. In the rank grass about the slimy
+green lip of the well, crickets piped derisively. The barn-door was
+open. Stray kernels of wheat had sprouted between the spokes of a rusty
+binder-wheel. A rat slipped across the edge of the shattered manger. As
+dusk came on, gray things seemed to slither past the upper windows of
+the house, and somewhere, under the roof, there was a moaning. Milt was
+sure that it was the wind in a knothole. He told himself that he was
+absolutely sure about it. And every time it came he stroked Vere de Vere
+carefully, and once, when the moaning ended in the slamming of the
+screen door, he said, "Jiminy!"
+
+This boy of the unghostly cylinders and tangible magnetos had never
+seen a haunted house. To toil of the harvest field and machine shop and
+to trudging the sun-beaten road he was accustomed, but he had never
+crouched watching the slinking spirits of old hopes and broken
+aspirations; feeble phantoms of the first eager bridegroom who had come
+to this place, and the mortgage-crushed, rust-wheat-ruined man who had
+left it. He wanted to leap into the bug and go on. Yet the haunt of
+murmurous memories dignified his unhappiness. In the soft, tree-dimmed
+dooryard among dry, blazing plains it seemed indecent to go on growling
+"Gee," and "Can you beat it?" It was a young poet, a poet rhymeless and
+inarticulate, who huddled behind the shield of untrimmed currant bushes,
+and thought of the girl he would never see again.
+
+He was hungry, but he did not eat. He was cramped, but he did not move.
+He picked up the books she had given him. He was quickened by the
+powdery beauty of _Youth's Encounter_; by the vision of laughter and
+dancing steps beneath a streaky gas-glow in the London fog; of youth not
+"roughhousing" and wanting to "be a sport," yet in frail beauty and
+faded crimson banners finding such exaltation as Schoenstrom had never
+known. But every page suggested Claire, and he tucked the book away.
+
+In Vachel Lindsay's _Congo_, in a poem called "The Santa Fe Trail," he
+found his own modern pilgrimage from another point of view. Here was
+the poet, disturbed by the honking hustle of passing cars. But Milt
+belonged to the honking and the hustle, and it was not the soul of the
+grass that he read in the poem, but his own sun-flickering flight:
+
+    Swiftly the brazen car comes on.
+    It burns in the East as the sunrise burns.
+    I see great flashes where the far trail turns.
+    Butting through the delicate mists of the morning,
+    It comes like lightning, goes past roaring,
+    It will hail all the windmills, taunting, ringing,
+    On through the ranges the prairie-dog tills--
+    Scooting past the cattle on the thousand hills.
+    Ho for the tear-horn, scare-horn, dare-horn,
+    Ho for the gay-horn, bark-horn, bay-horn.
+
+Milt did not reflect that if the poet had watched the Teal bug go by, he
+would not have recorded a scare-horn, a dare-horn, or anything mightier
+than a yip-horn. Milt saw himself a cross-continent racer, with the
+envious poet, left behind as a dot on the hill, celebrating his passing.
+
+"Lord!" he cried. "I didn't know there were books like these! Thought
+poetry was all like Longfellow and Byron. Old boys. Europe. And rhymed
+bellyachin' about hard luck. But these books--they're me." Very
+carefully: "No; they're I! And she gave 'em to me! I will see her again!
+But she won't know it. Now be sensible, son! What do you expect?
+Oh--nothing. I'll just go on, and sneak in one more glimpse of her to
+take back with me where I belong."
+
+Half an hour after Claire had innocently passed his ambush, he began to
+follow her. But not for days was he careless. If he saw her on the
+horizon he paused until she was out of sight. That he might not fail her
+in need, he bought a ridiculously expensive pair of field glasses, and
+watched her when she stopped by the road. Once, when both her right rear
+tire and the spare were punctured before she could make a town, Milt
+from afar saw her patch a tube, pump up the tire in the dust. He ached
+to go to her aid--though it cannot be said that hand-pumping was his
+favorite July afternoon sport.
+
+Lest he encounter her in the streets, he always camped to the eastward
+of the town at which she spent the night. After dusk, when she was
+likely to end the day's drive in the first sizable place, he hid his bug
+in an alley and, like a spy after the papers, sneaked into each garage
+to see if her car was there.
+
+He would stroll in, look about vacuously, and pipe to the suspicious
+night attendant, "Seen a traveling man named Smith?" Usually the garage
+man snarled, "No, I ain't seen nobody named Smith. An'thing else I can
+do for you?" But once he was so unlucky as to find the long-missing Mr.
+Smith!
+
+Mr. Smith was surprised and insistent. Milt had to do some quick lying.
+During that interview the cement floor felt very hard under his
+fidgeting feet, and he thought he heard the garage man in the office
+telephoning, "Don't think he knows Smith at all. I got a hunch he's that
+auto thief that was through here last summer."
+
+When Claire did not stop in the first town she reached after twilight,
+but drove on by dark, he had to do some perilous galloping to catch up.
+The lights of a Teal are excellent for adornment, but they have no
+relation to illumination. They are dependent upon a magneto which is
+dependent only upon faith.
+
+Once, skittering along by dark, he realized that the halted car which he
+had just passed was the Gomez. He thought he heard a shout behind him,
+but in a panic he kept going.
+
+To the burring motor he groaned, "Now I probably never will see her
+again. Except that she thinks I'm such a pest that I dassn't let her
+know I'm in the same state, I sure am one successful lover. As a Prince
+Charming I win the Vanderbilt Cup. I'm going ahead backwards so fast
+I'll probably drop off into the Atlantic over the next hill!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE MAN WITH AGATE EYES
+
+
+When her car had crossed the Missouri River on the swing-ferry between
+Bismarck and Mandan, Claire had passed from Middle West to Far West. She
+came out on an upland of virgin prairie, so treeless and houseless, so
+divinely dipping, so rough of grass, that she could imagine buffaloes
+still roving. In a hollow a real prairie schooner was camped, and the
+wandering homestead-seekers were cooking dinner beside it. From a quilt
+on the hay in the wagon a baby peeped, and Claire's heart leaped.
+
+Beyond was her first butte, its sharp-cut sides glittering yellow, and
+she fancied that on it the Sioux scout still sat sentinel, erect on his
+pony, the feather bonnet down his back.
+
+Now she seemed to breathe deeper, see farther. Again she came from
+unbroken prairie into wheat country and large towns.
+
+Her impression of the new land was not merely of sun-glaring breadth.
+Sometimes, on a cloudy day, the wash of wheatlands was as brown and
+lowering and mysterious as an English moor in the mist. It dwarfed the
+far-off houses by its giant enchantment; its brooding reaches changed
+her attitude of brisk, gas-driven efficiency into a melancholy that was
+full of hints of old dark beauty.
+
+Even when the sun came out, and the land was brazenly optimistic, she
+saw more than just prosperity. In a new home, house and barn and
+windmill square-cornered and prosaic, plumped down in a field with wheat
+coming up to the unporticoed door, a habitation unshadowed, unsheltered,
+unsoftened, she found a frank cleanness, as though the inhabitants
+looked squarely out at life, unafraid. She felt that the keen winds
+ought to blow away from such a prairie-fronting post of civilization all
+mildew and cowardice, all the mummy dust of ancient fears.
+
+These were not peasants, these farmers. Nor, she learned, were they the
+"hicks" of humor. She could never again encounter without fiery
+resentment the Broadway peddler's faith that farmers invariably say
+"Waal, by heck." For she had spent an hour talking to one Dakota farmer,
+genial-eyed, quiet of speech. He had explained the relation of alfalfa
+to soil-chemistry; had spoken of his daughter, who taught economics in a
+state university; and asked Mr. Boltwood how turbines were hitched up on
+liners.
+
+In fact, Claire learned that there may be an almost tolerable state of
+existence without gardenias or the news about the latest Parisian
+imagists.
+
+She dropped suddenly from the vast, smooth-swelling miles of wheatland
+into the tortured marvels of the Bad Lands, and the road twisted in the
+shadow of flying buttresses and the terraced tombs of maharajas. While
+she tried to pick her way through a herd of wild, arroyo-bred cattle,
+she forgot her maneuvering as she was startled by the stabbing scarlet
+of a column of rock marking the place where for months deep beds of
+lignite had burned.
+
+Claire had often given lifts to tramping harvesters and even hoboes
+along the road; had enjoyed the sight of their duffle-bags stuck up
+between the sleek fenders and the hood, and their talk about people and
+crops along the road, as they hung on the running-board. In the country
+of long hillslopes and sentinel buttes between the Dakota Bad Lands and
+Miles City she stopped to shout to a man whose plodding heavy back
+looked fagged, "Want a ride?"
+
+"Sure! You bet!"
+
+Usually her guests stepped on the right-hand running-board, beside Mr.
+Boltwood, and this man was far over on the right side of the road. But,
+while she waited, he sauntered in front of the car, round to her side,
+mounted beside her. Before the car had started, she was sorry to have
+invited him. He looked her over grinningly, almost contemptuously. His
+unabashed eyes were as bright and hard as agates. Below them, his nose
+was twisted a little, his mouth bent insolently up at one corner, and
+his square long chin bristled.
+
+Usually, too, her passengers waited for her to start the conversation,
+and talked at Mr. Boltwood rather than directly to her. But the bristly
+man spat at her as the car started, "Going far?"
+
+"Ye-es, some distance."
+
+"Expensive car?"
+
+"Why----"
+
+"'Fraid of getting held up?"
+
+"I hadn't thought about it."
+
+"Pack a cannon, don't you?"
+
+"I don't think I quite understand."
+
+"Cannon! Gun! Revolver! Got a revolver, of course?"
+
+"W-why, no." She spoke uncomfortably. She was aware that his twinkling
+eyes were on her throat. His look made her feel unclean. She tried to
+think of some question which would lead the conversation to the less
+exclamatory subject of crops. They were on a curving shelf road beside a
+shallow valley. The road was one side of a horseshoe ten miles long. The
+unprotected edge of it dropped sharply to fields forty or fifty feet
+below.
+
+"Prosperous-looking wheat down there," she said.
+
+"No. Not a bit!" His look seemed to add, "And you know it--unless you're
+a fool!"
+
+"Well, I didn't----"
+
+"Make Glendive tonight?"
+
+"At least that far."
+
+"Say, lady, how's the chance for borrowin' a couple of dollars? I was
+workin' for a Finnski back here a ways, and he did me dirt--holdin' out
+my wages on me till the end of the month."
+
+"Why, uh----"
+
+It was Claire, not the man, who was embarrassed.
+
+He was snickering, "Come on, don't be a tightwad. Swell car--poor man
+with no eats, not even a two-bits flop for tonight. Could yuh loosen up
+and slip me just a couple bones?"
+
+Mr. Boltwood intervened. He looked as uncomfortable as Claire. "We'll
+see. It's rather against my principles to give money to an able-bodied
+man like you, even though it is a pleasure to give you a ride----"
+
+"Sure! Don't cost you one red cent!"
+
+"--and if I could help you get a job, though of course---- Being a
+stranger out here---- Seems strange to me, though," Mr. Boltwood
+struggled on, "that a strong fellow like you should be utterly
+destitute, when I see all these farmers able to have cars----"
+
+Their guest instantly abandoned his attitude of supplication for one of
+boasting: "Destitute? Who the hell said I was destitute, heh?" He was
+snarling across Claire at Mr. Boltwood. His wet face was five inches
+from hers. She drew her head as far back as she could. She was sure that
+the man completely appreciated her distaste, for his eyes popped with
+amusement before he roared on:
+
+"I got plenty of money! Just 'cause I'm hoofin' it---- I don't want no
+charity from nobody! I could buy out half these Honyockers! I don't need
+none of no man's money!" He was efficiently working himself into a rage.
+"Who you calling destitute? All I wanted was an advance till pay day!
+Got a check coming. You high-tone, kid-glove Eastern towerists want to
+watch out who you go calling destitute. I bet I make a lot more money
+than a lot of your four-flushin' friends!"
+
+Claire wondered if she couldn't stop the car now, and tell him to get
+off. But--that snapping eye was too vicious. Before he got off he would
+say things--scarring, vile things, that would never heal in her brain.
+Her father was murmuring, "Let's drop him," but she softly lied, "No.
+His impertinence amuses me."
+
+She drove on, and prayed that he would of himself leave his uncharitable
+hosts at the next town.
+
+The man was storming--with a very meek ending: "I'm tellin' you! I can
+make money anywhere! I'm a crack machinist.... Give me two-bits for a
+meal, anyway."
+
+Mr. Boltwood reached in his change pocket. He had no quarter. He pulled
+out a plump bill-fold. Without looking at the man, Claire could vision
+his eyes glistening and his chops dripping as he stared at the hoard.
+Mr. Boltwood handed him a dollar bill. "There, take that, and let's
+change the subject," said Mr. Boltwood testily.
+
+"All right, boss. Say, you haven't got a cartwheel instead of this
+wrapping paper, have you? I like to feel my money in my pocket."
+
+"No, sir, I have not!"
+
+"All right, boss. No bad feelin's!"
+
+Then he ignored Mr. Boltwood. His eyes focused on Claire's face. To
+steady himself on the running-board he had placed his left hand on the
+side of the car, his right on the back of the seat. That right hand slid
+behind her. She could feel its warmth on her back.
+
+She burst out, flaring, "Kindly do not touch me!"
+
+"Gee, did I touch you, girlie? Why, that's a shame!" he drawled, his
+cracked broad lips turning up in a grin.
+
+An instant later, as they skipped round a bend of the long, high-hung
+shelf road, he pretended to sway dangerously on the running-board, and
+deliberately laid his filthy hand on her shoulder. Before she could say
+anything he yelped in mock-regret, "Love o' Mike! 'Scuse me, lady. I
+almost fell off."
+
+Quietly, seriously, Claire said, "No, that wasn't accidental. If you
+touch me again, I'll stop the car and ask you to walk."
+
+"Better do it now, dolly!" snapped Mr. Boltwood.
+
+The man hooked his left arm about the side-post of the open
+window-shield. It was a strong arm, a firm grip. He seized her left
+wrist with his free hand. Though all the while his eyes grotesquely kept
+their amused sparkle, and beside them writhed laughter-wrinkles, he
+shouted hoarsely, "You'll stop hell!" His hand slid from her wrist to
+the steering wheel. "I can drive this boat's well as you can. You make
+one move to stop, and I steer her over---- Blooie! Down the bank!"
+
+He did twist the front wheels dangerously near to the outer edge of the
+shelf road. Mr. Boltwood gazed at the hand on the wheel. With a quick
+breath Claire looked at the side of the road. If the car ran off, it
+would shoot down forty feet ... turning over and over.
+
+"Y-you wouldn't dare, because you'd g-go, too!" she panted.
+
+"Well, dearuh, you just try any monkey business and you'll find out how
+much I'll gggggggo-too! I'll start you down the joy-slope and jump off,
+savvy? Take your foot off that clutch."
+
+She obeyed.
+
+"Pretty lil feet, ain't they, cutie! Shoes cost about twelve bucks, I
+reckon. While a better man than you or old moldy-face there has to hit
+the pike in three-dollar brogans. Sit down, yuh fool!"
+
+This last to Mr. Boltwood, who had stood up, swaying with the car, and
+struck at him. With a huge arm the man swept Mr. Boltwood back into the
+seat, but without a word to her father, he continued to Claire:
+
+"And keep your hand where it belongs. Don't go trying to touch that
+switch. Aw, be sensible! What would you do if the car did stop? I could
+blackjack you both before this swell-elegant vehickle lost momentum,
+savvy? I don't want to pay out my good money to a lawyer on a charge
+of--murder. Get me? Better take it easy and not worry." His hand was
+constantly on the wheel. He had driven cars before. He was steering as
+much as she. "When I get you up the road a piece I'm going to drive all
+the cute lil boys and girls up a side trail, and take all of papa's
+gosh-what-a-wad in the cunnin' potet-book, and I guess we'll kiss lil
+daughter, and drive on, a-wavin' our hand politely, and let you suckers
+walk to the next burg."
+
+"You wouldn't dare! You wouldn't dare!"
+
+"Dare? Huh! Don't make the driver laugh!"
+
+"I'll get help!"
+
+"Yep. Sure. Fact, there's a car comin' toward us. 'Bout a mile away I'd
+make it, wouldn't you? Well, dollface, if you make one peep--over the
+bank you go, both of you dead as a couplin'-pin. Smeared all over those
+rocks. Get me? And me--I'll be sorry the regrettable accident was so
+naughty and went and happened--and I just got off in time meself. And
+I'll pinch papa's poke while I'm helping get out the bodies!"
+
+Till now she hadn't believed it. But she dared not glance at the
+approaching car. It was their interesting guest who steered the Gomez
+past the other; and he ran rather too near the edge of the road ... so
+that she looked over, down.
+
+Beaming, he went on, "I'd pull the rough stuff right here, instead of
+wastin' my time as a cap'n of industry by taking you up to see the
+scenery in that daisy little gully off the road; but the whole world can
+see us along here--the hicks in the valley and anybody that happens to
+sneak along in a car behind us. Shame the way this road curves--see too
+far along it. Fact, you're giving me a lot of trouble. But you'll give
+me a kiss, won't you, Gwendolyn?"
+
+He bent down, chuckling. She could feel his bristly chin touch her
+cheek. She sprang up, struck at him. He raised his hand from the wheel.
+For a second the car ran without control. He jabbed her back into the
+seat with his elbow. "Don't try any more monkey-shines, if you know
+what's good for you," he said, quite peacefully, as he resumed steering.
+
+She was in a haze, conscious only of her father's hand fondling hers.
+She heard a quick pit-pit-pit-pit behind them. Car going to pass? She'd
+have to let it go by. She'd concentrate on finding something she
+could----
+
+Then, "Hello, folks. Having a picnic? Who's your little friend in the
+rompers?" sang out a voice beside them. It was Milt Daggett--the Milt
+who must be scores of miles ahead. His bug had caught up with them, was
+running even with them on the broad road.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE HILLSIDE ROAD
+
+
+So unexpectedly, so genially, that Claire wondered if he realized what
+was happening, Milt chuckled to the tough on the running-board, as the
+two cars ran side by side, "Bound for some place, brother?"
+
+The unwelcome guest looked puzzled. For the first time his china eyes
+ceased twinkling; and he answered dubiously: "Just gettin' a lift." He
+sped up the car with the hand-throttle. Milt accelerated equally.
+
+Claire roused; wanted to shout. She was palsied afraid that Milt would
+leave them. The last time she had seen him, she had suggested that
+leaving them would be a favor.
+
+Her guest growled at her--the words coming through a slit at the corner
+of his rowdy mouth, "Sit still, or I'll run you over."
+
+Milt innocently babbled on, "Better come ride with me, bo'. More room in
+this-here handsome coupelet."
+
+Then was the rough relieved in his uneasy tender little heart, and his
+eyes flickered again as he shouted back, not looking at Milt, "Thanks,
+bub, I'll stick by me friends."
+
+"Oh no; can't lose pleasure of your company. I like your looks. You're a
+bloomin' little island way off on the dim silver skyline." Claire
+knitted her brows. She had not seen Milt's rhetoric. "You're an island
+of Hesperyds or Hesperides. Accent on the bezuzus. Oh, yes, moondream, I
+think you better come. Haven't decided"--Milt's tone was bland--"whether
+to kill you or just have you pinched. Miss Boltwood! Switch off your
+power!"
+
+"If she does," the tough shouted, "I'll run 'em off the bank."
+
+"No, you won't, sweetheart, 'cause why? 'Cause what'll I do to you
+afterwards?"
+
+"You won't do nothin', Jack, 'cause I'd gouge your eyes out."
+
+"Why, lovesoul, d' you suppose I'd be talking up as brash as this to a
+bid, stwong man like oo if I didn't have a gun handy?"
+
+"Yuh, I guess so, lil sunbeam. And before you could shoot, I'd crowd
+your tin liz into the bank, and jam right into it! I may get killed, but
+you won't even be a grease-spot!"
+
+He was turning the Gomez from its straight course, forcing Milt's bug
+toward the high bank of earth which walled in the road on the left.
+
+While Claire was very sick with fear, then more sick with contempt, Milt
+squealed, "You win!" And he had dropped back. The Gomez was going on
+alone.
+
+There was only one thing more for Claire--to jump. And that meant death.
+
+The tough was storming, "Your friend's a crack shot--with his mouth!"
+
+The thin pit-pit-pit was coming again. She looked back. She saw Milt's
+bug snap forward so fast that on a bump its light wheels were in the
+air. She saw Milt standing on the right side of the bug holding the
+wheel with one hand, and the other hand--firm, grim, broad-knuckled
+hand--outstretched toward the tough, then snatching at his collar.
+
+The tough's grip was torn from the steering wheel. He was yanked from
+the running-board. He crunched down on the road.
+
+She seized the wheel. She drove on at sixty miles an hour. She had gone
+a good mile before she got control of her fear and halted. She saw Milt
+turn his little car as though it were a prancing bronco. It seemed to
+paw the air with its front wheels. He shot back, pursuing the late
+guest. The man ran bobbing along the road. At this distance he was no
+longer formidable, but a comic, jerking, rabbity figure, humping himself
+over the back track.
+
+As the bug whirled down on him, the tough was to be seen throwing up his
+hands, leaping from the high bank.
+
+Milt turned again and came toward them, but slowly; and after he had
+drawn up even and switched off the engine, he snatched off his violent
+plaid cap and looked apologetic.
+
+"Sorry I had to kid him along. I was afraid he really would drive you
+off the bank. He was a bad actor. And he was right; he could have licked
+me. Thought maybe I could jolly him into getting off, and have him
+pinched, next town."
+
+"But you had a gun--a revolver--didn't you, lad?" panted Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"Um, wellllll---- I've got a shotgun. It wouldn't take me more 'n five
+or ten minutes to dig it out, and put it together. And there's some
+shells. They may be all right. Haven't looked at 'em since last fall.
+They didn't get so awful damp then."
+
+"But suppose he'd had a revolver himself?" wailed Claire.
+
+"Gee, you know, I thought he probably did have one. I was scared blue. I
+had a wrench to throw at him though," confided Milt.
+
+"How did you know we needed you?"
+
+"Why back there, couple miles behind you, maybe I saw your father get up
+and try to wrestle him, so I suspected there was kind of a disagreement.
+Say, Miss Boltwood, you know when you spoke to me--way back there--I
+hadn't meant to butt in. Honest. I thought maybe as we were going----"
+
+"Oh, I know!"
+
+"--the same way, you wouldn't mind my trailing, if I didn't sit in too
+often; and I thought maybe I could help you if----"
+
+"Oh, I know! I'm so ashamed! So bitterly ashamed! I just meant---- Will
+you forgive me? You were so good, taking care of us----"
+
+"Oh, sure, that's all right!"
+
+"I fancy you do know how grateful father and I are that you were behind
+us, this time! Wasn't it a lucky accident that we'd slipped past you
+some place!"
+
+"Yes," dryly, "quite an accident. Well, I'll skip on ahead again. May
+run into you again before we hit Seattle. Going to take the run through
+Yellowstone Park?"
+
+"Yes, but----" began Claire. Her father interrupted:
+
+"Uh, Mr., uh--Daggett, was it?--I wonder if you won't stay a little
+closer to us hereafter? I was getting rather a good change out of the
+trip, but I'm afraid that now---- If it wouldn't be an insult, I'd beg
+you to consider staying with us for a consideration, uh, you know,
+remuneration, and you could----"
+
+"Thanks, uh, thank you, sir, but I wouldn't like to do it. You see, it's
+kind of my vacation. If I've done anything I'm tickled----"
+
+"But perhaps," Mr. Boltwood ardently begged the young man recently so
+abysmally unimportant, "perhaps you would consent to being my guest,
+when you cared to--say at hotels in the Park."
+
+"'Fraid I couldn't. I'm kind of a lone wolf."
+
+"Please! Pretty please!" besought Claire. Her smile was appealing, her
+eyes on his.
+
+Milt bit his knuckles. He looked weak. But he persisted, "No, you'll get
+over this scrap with our friend. By the way, I'll put the deputy onto
+him, in the next town. He'll never get out of the county. When you
+forget him---- Oh no, you can go on fine. You're a good steady driver,
+and the road's perfectly safe--if you give people the once-over before
+you pick 'em up. Picking up badmen is no more dangerous here than it
+would be in New York. Fact, there's lot more hold-ups in any city than
+in the wildest country. I don't think you showed such awfully good taste
+in asking Terrible Tim, the two-gun man, right into the parlor. Gee,
+please don't do it again! Please!"
+
+"No," meekly. "I was an idiot. I'll be good, next time. But won't you
+stay somewhere near us?"
+
+"I'd like to, but I got to chase on. Don't want to wear out the welcome
+on the doormat, and I'm due in Seattle, and---- Say, Miss Boltwood." He
+swung out of the bug, cranked up, climbed back, went awkwardly on, "I
+read those books you gave me. They're slick--mean to say, interesting.
+Where that young fellow in _Youth's Encounter_ wanted to be a bishop and
+a soldier and everything---- Just like me, except Schoenstrom is
+different, from London, some ways! I always wanted to be a brakie, and
+then a yeggman. But I wasn't bright enough for either. I just became a
+garage man. And I---- Some day I'm going to stop using slang. But it'll
+take an operation!"
+
+He was streaking down the road, and Claire was sobbing, "Oh, the lamb,
+the darling thing! Fretting about his slang, when he wasn't afraid in
+that horrible nightmare. If we could just do something for him!"
+
+"Don't you worry about him, dolly. He's a very energetic chap. And----
+Uh---- Mightn't we drive on a little farther, perhaps? I confess that
+the thought of our recent guest still in this vicinity----"
+
+"Yes, and---- Oh, I'm shameless. If Mohammed Milton won't stay with our
+car mountain, we're going to tag after him."
+
+But when she reached the next hill, with its far shining outlook, there
+was no Milt and no Teal bug on the road ahead.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+SAGEBRUSH TOURISTS OF THE GREAT HIGHWAY
+
+
+She had rested for two days in Miles City; had seen the horse-market,
+with horse-wranglers in chaps; had taken dinner with army people at Fort
+Keogh, once the bulwark against the Sioux, now nodding over the dry
+grass on its parade ground.
+
+By the Yellowstone River, past the Crow reservation, Claire had driven
+on through the Real West, along the Great Highway. The Red Trail and the
+Yellowstone Trail had joined now and she was one of the new Canterbury
+Pilgrims. Even Mr. Boltwood caught the trick of looking for licenses,
+and cried, "There's a Connecticut car!"
+
+To the Easterner, a drive from New York to Cape Cod, over asphalt, is
+viewed as heroic, but here were cars that had casually started on
+thousand-mile vacations. She kept pace not only with large cars touring
+from St. Louis or Detroit to Glacier Park and Yellowstone, but also she
+found herself companionable with families of workmen, headed for a new
+town and a new job, and driving because a flivver, bought second-hand
+and soon to be sold again, was cheaper than trains.
+
+"Sagebrush Tourists" these camping adventurers were called. Claire
+became used to small cars, with curtain-lights broken, bearing
+wash-boilers or refrigerators on the back, pasteboard suitcases lashed
+by rope to the running-board, frying pans and canvas water bottles
+dangling from top-rods. And once baby's personal laundry was seen
+flapping on a line across a tonneau!
+
+In each car was what looked like the crowd at a large
+farm-auction--grandfather, father, mother, a couple of sons and two or
+three daughters, at least one baby in the arms of each grown-up, all
+jammed into two seats already filled with trunks and baby-carriages. And
+they were happy--incredibly happier than the smart people being conveyed
+in a bored way behind chauffeurs.
+
+The Sagebrush Tourists made camp; covered the hood with a quilt from
+which the cotton was oozing; brought out the wash-boiler, did a washing,
+had dinner, sang about the fire; granther and the youngest baby
+gamboling together, while the limousinvalids, insulated from life by
+plate glass, preserved by their steady forty an hour from the commonness
+of seeing anything along the road, looked out at the campers for a
+second, sniffed, rolled on, wearily wondering whether they would find a
+good hotel that night--and why the deuce they hadn't come by train.
+
+If Claire Boltwood had been protected by Jeff Saxton or by a chauffeur,
+she, too, would probably have marveled at cars gray with dust, the
+unshaved men in fleece-lined duck coats, and the women wind-burnt
+beneath the boudoir caps they wore as motoring bonnets. But Claire knew
+now that filling grease-cups does not tend to delicacy of hands; that
+when you wash with a cake of petrified pink soap and half a pitcher of
+cold hard water, you never quite get the stain off--you merely get
+through the dust stratum to the Laurentian grease formation, and mutter,
+"a nice clean grease doesn't hurt food," and go sleepily down to dinner.
+
+She saw a dozen camping devices unknown to the East: trailers, which by
+day bobbed along behind the car like coffins on two wheels, but at night
+opened into tents with beds, an ice-box, a table; tents covering a bed
+whose head rested on the running-board; beds made-up in the car, with
+the cushions as mattresses.
+
+The Great Transcontinental Highway was colored not by motors alone. It
+is true that the Old West of the stories is almost gone; that Billings,
+Miles City, Bismarck, are more given to Doric banks than to gambling
+hells. But still are there hints of frontier days. Still trudge the
+prairie schooners; cowpunchers in chaps still stand at the doors of log
+cabins--when they are tired of playing the automatic piano; and blanket
+Indians, Blackfeet and Crows, stare at five-story buildings--when they
+are not driving modern reapers on their farms.
+
+They all waved to Claire. Telephone linemen, lolling with pipes and
+climber-strapped legs in big trucks, sang out to her; traction engine
+crews shouted; and these she found to be her own people. Only once did
+she lose contentment--when, on the observation platform of a train bound
+for Seattle, she saw a Britisher in flannels and a monocle, headed
+perhaps for the Orient. As the train slipped silkenly away, the Gomez
+seemed slow and clumsy, and the strain of driving intolerable. And that
+Britisher must be charming---- Then a lonely, tight-haired woman in the
+doorway of a tar-paper shack waved to her, and in that wistful gesture
+Claire found friendship.
+
+And sometimes in the "desert" of yet unbroken land she paused by the
+Great Highway and forgot the passion to keep going----
+
+She sat on a rock, by a river so muddy that it was like yellow milk. The
+only trees were a bunch of cottonwoods untidily scattering shreds of
+cotton, and the only other vegetation left in the dead world was
+dusty green sagebrush with lumps of gray yet pregnant earth between,
+or a few exquisite green and white flashes of the herb called
+Snow-on-the-Mountain. The inhabitants were jackrabbits, or American
+magpies in sharp black and white livery, forever trying to balance their
+huge tails against the wind, and yelling in low-magpie their opinion of
+tourists.
+
+She did not desire gardens, then, nor the pettiness of plump terraced
+hills. She was in the Real West, and it was hers, since she had won to
+it by her own plodding. Her soul--if she hadn't had one, it would
+immediately have been provided, by special arrangement, the moment she
+sat there--sailed with the hawks in the high thin air, and when it came
+down it sang hallelujahs, because the sagebrush fragrance was more
+healing than piney woods, because the sharp-bitten edges of the buttes
+were coral and gold and basalt and turquoise, and because a real person,
+one Milt Daggett, though she would never see him again, had found her
+worthy of worship.
+
+She did not often think of Milt; she did not know whether he was ahead
+of her, or had again dropped behind. When she did recall him, it was
+with respect quite different from the titillation that dancing men had
+sometimes aroused, or the impression of manicured agreeableness and
+efficiency which Jeff Saxton carried about.
+
+She always supplicated the mythical Milt in moments of tight driving.
+Driving, just the actual getting on, was her purpose in life, and the
+routine of driving was her order of the day: Morning freshness, rolling
+up as many miles as possible before lunch, that she might loaf
+afterward. The invariable two P.M. discovery that her eyes ached, and
+the donning of huge amber glasses, which gave to her lithe smartness a
+counterfeit scholarliness. Toward night, the quarter-hour of level
+sun-glare which prevented her seeing the road. Dusk, and the discovery
+of how much light there was after all, once she remembered to take off
+her glasses. The worst quarter-hour when, though the roads were an
+amethyst rich to the artist, they were also a murkiness exasperating to
+the driver, yet still too light to be thrown into relief by the lamps.
+The mystic moment when night clicked tight, and the lamps made a fan of
+gold, and Claire and her father settled down to plodding content--and no
+longer had to take the trouble of admiring the scenery!
+
+The morning out of Billings, she wondered why a low cloud so
+persistently held its shape, and realized that it was a far-off
+mountain, her first sight of the Rockies. Then she cried out, and wished
+for Milt to share her exultation. Rather earnestly she said to Mr.
+Boltwood:
+
+"The mountains must be so wonderful to Mr. Daggett, after spending his
+life in a cornfield. Poor Milt! I hope----"
+
+"I don't think you need to worry about that young man. I fancy he's
+quite able to run about by himself, as jolly as a sand-dog. And---- Of
+course I'm extremely grateful to him for his daily rescue of us from the
+jaws of death, but he was right; if he had stayed with us, it would have
+been inconvenient to keep considering him. He isn't accustomed to the
+comedy of manners----"
+
+"He ought to be. He'd enjoy it so. He's the real American. He has
+imagination and adaptability. It's a shame: all the _petits fours_ and
+Bach recitals wasted on Jeff Saxton, when a Milt Dag----"
+
+"Yes, yes, quite so!"
+
+"No, honest! The dear honey-lamb, so ingenious, and really, rather
+good-looking. But so lonely and gregarious--like a little woolly dog
+that begs you to come and play; and I slapped him when he patted his
+paws and gamboled---- It was horrible. I'll never forgive myself. Making
+him drive on ahead in that nasty, patronizing way---- I feel as if we'd
+spoiled his holiday. I wonder if he had intended to make the Yellowstone
+Park trip? He didn't----"
+
+"Yes, yes. Let's forget the young man. Look! How very curious!"
+
+They were crossing a high bridge over a railroad track along which a
+circus train was bending. Mr. Boltwood offered judicious remarks upon
+the migratory habits of circuses, and the vision of the Galahad of the
+Teal bug was thoroughly befogged by parental observations, till Claire
+returned from youthful romance to being a sensible Boltwood, and decided
+that after all, Milt was not a lord of the sky-painted mountains.
+
+Before they bent south, at Livingston, Claire had her first mountain
+driving, and once she had to ford a stream, putting the car at it,
+watching the water curve up in a lovely silver veil. She felt that she
+was conquering the hills as she had the prairies.
+
+She pulled up on a plateau to look at her battery. She noted the edge of
+a brake-band peeping beyond the drum, in a ragged line of fabric and
+copper wire. Then she knew that she didn't know enough to conquer. "Do
+you suppose it's dangerous?" she asked her father, who said a lot of
+comforting things that didn't mean anything.
+
+She thought of Milt. She stopped a passing car. The driver "guessed"
+that the brake-band was all gone, and that it would be dangerous to
+continue with it along mountain roads. Claire dustily tramped two miles
+to a ranch house, and telephoned to the nearest garage, in a town called
+Saddle Back.
+
+Whenever a motorist has delirium he mutters those lamentable words,
+"Telephoned to the nearest garage."
+
+She had to wait a tedious hour before she saw a flivver rattling up with
+the garage man, who wasn't a man at all, but a fourteen-year-old boy. He
+snorted, "Rats, you didn't need to send for me. Could have made it
+perfectly safe. Come on."
+
+Never has the greatest boy pianist received such awe as Claire gave to
+this contemptuous young god, with grease on his peachy cheeks. She did
+come on. But she rather hoped that she was in great danger. It was
+humiliating to telephone to a garage for nothing. When she came into the
+gas-smelling garage in Saddle Back she said appealingly to the man in
+charge, a serious, lip-puffing person of forty-five, "Was it safe to
+come in with the brake-band like that?"
+
+"No. Pretty risky. Wa'n't it, Mike?"
+
+The Mike to whom he turned for authority was the same fourteen-year-old
+boy. He snapped, "Heh? That? Naw! Put in new band. Get busy. Bring me
+the jack. Hustle up, uncle."
+
+While the older man stood about and vainly tried to impress people who
+came in and asked questions which invariably had to be referred to his
+repair boy, the precocious expert stripped the wheel down to something
+that looked to Claire distressingly like an empty milk-pan. Then the boy
+didn't seem to know exactly what to do. He scratched his ear a good
+deal, and thought deeply. The older man could only scratch.
+
+So for two hours Claire and her father experienced that most distressing
+of motor experiences--waiting, while the afternoon that would have been
+so good for driving went by them. Every fifteen minutes they came in
+from sitting on a dry-goods box in front of the garage, and never did
+the repair appear to be any farther along. The boy seemed to be giving
+all his time to getting the wrong wrench, and scolding the older man for
+having hidden the right one.
+
+When she had left Brooklyn Heights, Claire had not expected to have such
+authoritative knowledge of the Kalifornia Kandy Kitchen, Saddle Back,
+Montana, across from Tubbs' Garage, that she could tell whether they
+were selling more Atharva Cigarettes or Polutropons. She prowled about
+the garage till she knew every pool of dripped water in the tin pail of
+soft soap in the iron sink.
+
+She was worried by an overheard remark of the boy wonder, "Gosh, we
+haven't any more of that decent brake lining. Have to use this piece of
+mush." But when the car was actually done, nothing like a dubious brake
+could have kept her from the glory of starting. The first miles seemed
+miracles of ease and speed.
+
+She came through the mountains into Livingston.
+
+Kicking his heels on a fence near town, and fondling a gray cat, sat
+Milt Daggett, and he yelped at her with earnestness and much noise.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE WONDERS OF NATURE WITH ALL MODERN IMPROVEMENTS
+
+
+"Hello!" said Milt.
+
+"Hel-lo!" said Claire.
+
+"How dee do," said Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"This is so nice! Where's your car? I hope nothing's happened," glowed
+Claire.
+
+"No. It's back here from the road a piece. Camp there tonight. Reason I
+stopped---- Struck me you've never done any mountain driving, and
+there's some pretty good climbs in the Park; slick road, but we go up to
+almost nine thousand feet. And cold mornings. Thought I'd tip you off to
+some driving tricks--if you'd like me to."
+
+"Oh, of course. Very grateful----"
+
+"Then I'll tag after you tomorrow, and speak my piece."
+
+"So jolly you're going through the Park."
+
+"Yes, thought might as well. What the guide books call 'Wonders of
+Nature.' Only wonder of nature I ever saw in Schoenstrom was my friend
+Mac trying to think he was soused after a case of near-beer. Well----
+See you tomorrow."
+
+Not once had he smiled. His tone had been impersonal. He vaulted the
+fence and tramped away.
+
+When they drove out of town, in the morning, they found Milt waiting by
+the road, and he followed them till noon. By urgent request, he shared a
+lunch, and lectured upon going down long grades in first or second
+speed, to save brakes; upon the use of the retarded spark and the
+slipped clutch in climbing. His bug was beside the Gomez in the line-up
+at the Park gate, when the United States Army came to seal one's
+firearms, and to inquire on which mountain one intended to be killed by
+defective brakes. He was just behind her all the climb up to Mammoth Hot
+Springs.
+
+When she paused for water to cool the boiling radiator, the bug panted
+up, and with the first grin she had seen on his face since Dakota Milt
+chuckled, "The Teal is a grand car for mountains. Aside from
+overheating, bum lights, thin upholstery, faulty ignition, tissue-paper
+brake-bands, and this-here special aviation engine, specially built for
+a bumble-bee, it's what the catalogues call a powerful brute!"
+
+Claire and her father stayed at the chain of hotels through the Park.
+Milt was always near them, but not at the hotels. He patronized one of
+the chains of permanent camps.
+
+The Boltwoods invited him to dinner at one hotel, but he refused and----
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Because he was afraid that Claire would find him intrusive, Milt was
+grave in her presence. He couldn't respond either to her enthusiasm
+about canyon and colored pool--or to her rage about the tourists who,
+she alleged, preferred freak museum pieces to plain beauty; who never
+admired a view unless it was labeled by a signpost and megaphoned by a
+guide as something they ought to admire--and tell the Folks Back Home
+about.
+
+When she tried to express this social rage to Milt he merely answered
+uneasily, "Yes, I guess there's something to that."
+
+She was, he pondered, so darn particular. How could he ever figure out
+what he ought to do? No thanks; much obliged, but guessed he'd better
+not accept her invitation to dinner. Darn sorry couldn't come but----
+Had promised a fellow down at the camp to have chow with him.
+
+If in this Milt was veracious, he was rather fickle to his newly
+discovered friend; for while Claire was finishing dinner, a solemn young
+man was watching her through a window.
+
+She was at a table for six. She was listening to a man of thirty in
+riding-breeches, a stock, and a pointed nose, who bowed to her every
+time he spoke, which was so frequently that his dining gave the
+impression of a man eating grape-fruit on a merry-go-round. Back in
+Schoenstrom, fortified by Mac and the bunch at the Old Home Lunch, Milt
+would have called the man a "dude," and--though less noisily than the
+others--would have yelped, "Get onto Percy's beer-bottle pants. What's
+he got his neck bandaged for? Bet he's got a boil."
+
+But now Milt yearned, "He does look swell. Wish I could get away with
+those things. Wouldn't I look like a fool with my knees buttoned up,
+though! And there's two other fellows in dress suits. Wouldn't mind
+those so much. Gee, it must be awful where you've got so many suits of
+trick clothes you don't know which one to wear.
+
+"That fellow and Claire are talking pretty swift. He doesn't need any
+piston rings, that lad. Wonder--wonder what they're talking about?
+Music, I guess, and books and pictures and scenery. He's saying that no
+tongue or pen can describe the glories of the Park, and then he's trying
+to describe 'em. And maybe they know the same folks in New York. Lord,
+how I'd be out of it. I wish----"
+
+Milt made a toothpick out of a match, decided that toothpicks were
+inelegant in his tragic mood, and longed: "Never did see her among her
+own kind of folks till now. I wish I could jabber about music and stuff.
+I'll learn it. I will! I can! I picked up autos in three months. I----
+Milt, you're a dub. I wonder can they be talking French, maybe, or Wop,
+or something? I could get onto the sedan styles in highbrow talk as long
+as it was in American.
+
+"I could probably spring linen-collar stuff about, 'Really a delightful
+book, so full of delightful characters,' if I stuck by the rhetoric
+books long enough. But once they begin the _parlez-vous, oui, oui_, I'm
+a gone goose. Still, by golly, didn't I pick up Dutch--German--like a
+mice? Back off, son! You did not! You can talk Plattdeutsch something
+grand, as long as you keep the verbs and nouns in American. You got a
+nice character, Milt, but you haven't got any parts of speech.
+
+"Now look at Percy! Taking a bath in a finger-bowl. I never could pull
+that finger-bowl stuff; pinning your ears back and jiu-jitsing the fried
+chicken, and then doing a high dive into a little dish that ain't--that
+isn't either a wash-bowl or real good lemonade. He's a perfect lady,
+Percy is. Dabs his mouth with his napkin like a watchmaker tinkering the
+carburetor in a wrist watch.
+
+"Lookit him bow and scrape--asking her something---- Rats, he's going
+out in the lobby with her. Walks like a cat on a wet ash-pile. But----
+Oh thunder, he's all right. Neat. I never could mingle with that bunch.
+I'd be web-footed and butter-fingered. And he seems to know all that
+bunch--bows to every maiden aunt in the shop. Now if I was following
+her, I'd never see anybody but her; rest of the folks could all bob
+their heads silly, and I'd never see one blame thing except that funny
+little soft spot at the back of her neck. Nope, you're kind to your
+cat, Milt, but you weren't cut out to be no parlor-organ duet."
+
+This same meditative young man might have been discovered walking past
+the porch of the hotel, his hands in his pockets, his eyes presumably on
+the stars--certainly he gave no signs of watching Claire and the man in
+riding-breeches as they leaned over the rail, looked at mountain-tops
+filmy in starlight, while in the cologne-atomized mode, Breeches quoted:
+
+    Ah, 'tis far heaven my awed heart seeks
+    When I behold those mighty peaks.
+
+Milt could hear him commenting, "Doesn't that just get the feeling of
+the great open, Miss Boltwood?"
+
+Milt did not catch her answer. Himself, he grunted, "I never could get
+much het up about this poetry that's full of Ah's and 'tises."
+
+Claire must have seen Milt just after he had sauntered past. She cried,
+"Oh, Mr. Daggett! Just a moment!" She left Breeches, ran down to Milt.
+He was frightened. Was he going to get what he deserved for
+eavesdropping?
+
+She was almost whispering. "Save me from our friend up on the porch,"
+she implored.
+
+He couldn't believe it. But he took a chance. "Won't you have a little
+walk?" he roared.
+
+"So nice of you--just a little way, perhaps?" she sang out.
+
+They were silent till he got up the nerve to admire, "Glad you found
+some people you knew in the hotel."
+
+"But I didn't."
+
+"Oh, I thought your friend in the riding-pants was chummy."
+
+"So did I!" She rather snorted.
+
+"Well, he's a nice-looking lad. I did admire those pants. I never could
+wear anything like that."
+
+"I should hope not--at dinner! The creepy jack-ass, I don't believe he's
+ever been on a horse in his life! He thinks riding-breeches are the----"
+
+"Oh, that's it. Breeches, not pants."
+
+"--last word in smartness. Overdressing is just ten degrees worse than
+underdressing."
+
+"Oh, I don't know. Take this sloppy old blue suit of mine----"
+
+"It's perfectly nice and simple, and quite well cut. You probably had a
+clever tailor."
+
+"I had. He lives in Chicago or New York, I believe."
+
+"Really? How did he come to Schoenstrom?"
+
+"Never been there. This tailor is a busy boy. He fitted about eleventeen
+thousand people, last year."
+
+"I see. Ready mades. Cheer up. That's where Henry B. Boltwood gets most
+of his clothes. Mr. Daggett, if ever I catch you in the
+Aren't-I-beautiful frame of mind of our friend back on the porch, I'll
+give up my trip to struggle for your soul."
+
+"He seemed to have soul in large chunks. He seemed to talk pretty
+painlessly. I had a hunch you and he were discussing sculpture, anyway.
+Maybe Rodin."
+
+"What do you know about Rodin?"
+
+"Articles in the magazines. Same place you learned about him!" But Milt
+did not sound rude. He said it chucklingly.
+
+"You're perfectly right. And we've probably read the very same articles.
+Well, our friend back there said to me at dinner, 'It must be dreadful
+for you to have to encounter so many common people along the road.' I
+said, 'It is,' in the most insulting tone I could, and he just rolled
+his eyes, and hadn't an idea I meant him. Then he slickered his hair at
+me, and mooed, 'Is it not wonderful to see all these strange
+manifestations of the secrets of Nature!' and I said, 'Is it?' and he
+went on, 'One feels that if one could but meet a sympathetic lady here,
+one's cup of rejoicing in untrammeled nature----' Honest, Milt, Mr.
+Daggett, I mean, he did talk like that. Been reading books by optimistic
+lady authors. And one looked at me, one did, as if one would be willing
+to hold my hand, if I let one.
+
+"He invited me to come out on the porch and give the double O. to
+handsome mountains as illuminated by terrestrial bodies, and I felt so
+weak in the presence of his conceit that I couldn't refuse. Then he
+insisted on introducing me to a woman from my own Brooklyn, who
+condoled with me for having to talk to Western persons while motoring.
+Oh, dear God, that such people should live ... that the sniffy little
+Claire should once have been permitted to live!... And then I saw you!"
+
+Through all her tirade they had stood close together, her face visibly
+eager in the glow from the hotel; and Milt had grown taller. But he
+responded, "I'm afraid I might have been just as bad. I haven't even
+reached the riding-breeches stage in evolution. Maybe never will."
+
+"No. You won't. You'll go right through it. By and by, when you're so
+rich that father and I won't be allowed to associate with you, you'll
+wear riding-breeches--but for riding, not as a donation to the beauties
+of nature."
+
+"Oh, I'm already rich. It shows. Waitress down at the camp asked me
+whose car I was driving through."
+
+"I know what I wanted to say. Since you won't be our guest, will you be
+our host--I mean, as far as welcoming us? I think it would be fun for
+father and me to stop at your camp, tomorrow night, at the canyon,
+instead of at the hotel. Will you guide me to the canyon, if I do?"
+
+"Oh--terribly--glad!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+ADVENTURERS BY FIRELIGHT
+
+
+Neither of the Boltwoods had seen the Grand Canyon of the Colorado. The
+Canyon of the Yellowstone was their first revelation of intimidating
+depth and color gone mad. When their car and Milt's had been parked in
+the palisaded corral back of the camp at which they were to stay, they
+three set out for the canyon's edge chattering, and stopped dumb.
+
+Mr. Boltwood declined to descend. He returned to the camp for a cigar.
+The boy and girl crept down seeming miles of damp steps to an outhanging
+pinnacle that still was miles of empty airy drop above the river bed.
+Claire had a quaking feeling that this rock pulpit was going to slide.
+She thrust out her hand, seized Milt's paw, and in its firm warmth found
+comfort. Clinging to its security she followed him by the crawling path
+to the river below. She looked up at columns of crimson and saffron and
+burning brown, up at the matronly falls, up at lone pines clinging to
+jutting rocks that must be already crashing toward her, and in the
+splendor she knew the Panic fear that is the deepest reaction to
+beauty.
+
+Milt merely shook his head as he stared up. He had neither gossiped nor
+coyly squeezed her hand as he had guided her. She fell to thinking that
+she preferred this American boy in this American scene to a nimble
+gentleman saluting the Alps in a dinky green hat with a little feather.
+
+It was Milt who, when they had labored back up again, when they had sat
+smiling at each other with comfortable weariness, made her see the
+canyon not as a freak, but as the miraculous work of a stream rolling
+grains of sand for millions of years, till it had cut this Jovian
+intaglio. He seemed to have read--whether in books, or in paragraphs in
+mechanical magazines--a good deal about geology. He made it real. Not
+that she paid much attention to what he actually said! She was too busy
+thinking of the fact that he should say it at all.
+
+Not condescendingly but very companionably she accompanied Milt in the
+exploration of their camp for the night--the big dining tent, the city
+of individual bedroom tents, canvas-sided and wooden-floored, each with
+a tiny stove for the cold mornings of these high altitudes. She was awed
+that evening by hearing her waitress discussing the novels of Ibanez.
+Jeff Saxton knew the names of at least six Russian novelists, but Jeff
+was not highly authoritative regarding Spanish literature.
+
+"I suppose she's a school-teacher, working here in vacation," Claire
+whispered to Milt, beside her at the long, busy, scenically
+conversational table.
+
+"Our waitress? Well, sort of. I understand she's professor of literature
+in some college," said Milt, in a matter of fact way. And he didn't at
+all see the sequence when she went on:
+
+"There is an America! I'm glad I've found it!"
+
+The camp's evening bonfire was made of logs on end about a stake of
+iron. As the logs blazed up, the guests on the circle of benches crooned
+"Suwanee River," and "Old Black Joe," and Claire crooned with them. She
+had been afraid that her father would be bored, but she saw that, above
+his carefully tended cigar, he was dreaming. She wondered if there had
+been a time when he had hummed old songs.
+
+The fire sank to coals. The crowd wandered off to their tents. Mr.
+Boltwood followed them after an apologetic, "Good night. Don't stay up
+too late." With a scattering of only half a dozen people on the benches,
+this huge circle seemed deserted; and Claire and Milt, leaning forward,
+chins on hands, were alone--by their own campfire, among the mountains.
+
+The stars stooped down to the hills; the pines were a wall of blackness;
+a coyote yammered to point the stillness; and the mighty pile of coals
+gave a warmth luxurious in the creeping mountain chill.
+
+The silence of large places awes the brisk intruder, and Claire's voice
+was unconsciously lowered as she begged, "Tell me something about
+yourself, Mr. Daggett. I don't really know anything at all."
+
+"Oh, you wouldn't be interested. Just Schoenstrom!"
+
+"But just Schoenstrom might be extremely interesting."
+
+"But honest, you'd think I was--edging in on you!"
+
+"I know what you are thinking. The time I suggested, way back there in
+Dakota, that you were sticking too close. You've never got over it. I've
+tried to make up for it, but---- I really don't blame you. I was horrid.
+I deserve being beaten. But you do keep on punishing ra----"
+
+"Punishing? Lord, I didn't mean to! No! Honest! It was nothing. You were
+right. Looked as though I was inviting myself---- But, oh, pleassssse,
+Miss Boltwood, don't ever think for a sec. that I meant to be a
+grouch----"
+
+"Then do tell me---- Who is this Milton Daggett that you know so much
+better than I ever can?"
+
+"Well," Milt crossed his knees, caught his chin in his hand, "I don't
+know as I really do know him so well. I thought I did. I was onto his
+evil ways. He was the son of the pioneer doctor, Maine folks."
+
+"Really? My mother came from Maine."
+
+Milt did not try to find out that they were cousins. He went on, "This
+kid, Milt, went to high school in St. Cloud--town twenty times as big
+as Schoenstrom--but he drifted back because his dad was old and needed
+him, after his mother's death----"
+
+"You have no brothers or sisters?"
+
+"No. Nobody. 'Cept Lady Vere de Vere--which animal she is going to get
+cuffed if she chews up any more of my overcoat out in my tent
+tonight!... Well, this kid worked 'round, machinery mostly, and got
+interested in cars, and started a garage---- Wee, that was an awful
+shop, first one I had! In Rauskukle's barn. Six wrenches and a
+screwdriver and a one-lung pump! And I didn't know a roller-bearing from
+three-point suspension! But---- Well, anyway, he worked along, and built
+a regular garage, and paid off practically all the mortgage on it----"
+
+"I remember stopping at a garage in Schoenstrom, I'm almost sure it was,
+for something. I seem to remember it was a good place. Do you own it?
+Really?"
+
+"Ye-es, what there is of it."
+
+"But there's a great deal of it. It's efficient. You've done your job.
+That's more than most high-born aides-de-camp could say."
+
+"Honestly? Well--I don't know----"
+
+"Who did you play with in Schoenstrom? Oh, I _wish_ I'd noticed that
+town. But I couldn't tell then that---- What, uh, which girl did you
+fall in love with?"
+
+"None! Honest! None! Not one! Never fell in love----"
+
+"You're unfortunate. I have, lots of times. I remember quite enjoying
+being kissed once, at a dance."
+
+When he answered, his voice was strange: "I suppose you're engaged to
+somebody."
+
+"No. And I don't know that I shall be. Once, I thought I liked a man,
+rather. He has nice eyes and the most correct spectacles, and he is
+polite to his mother at breakfast, and his name is Jeff, and he will
+undoubtedly be worth five or six hundred thousand dollars, some day, and
+his opinions on George Moore and commercial paper are equally sound and
+unoriginal---- Oh, I ought not to speak of him, and I certainly ought
+not to be spiteful. I'm not at all reticent and ladylike, am I! But----
+Somehow I can't see him out here, against a mountain of jagged rock."
+
+"Only you won't always be out here against mountains. Some day you'll be
+back in--where is it in New York State?"
+
+"I confess it's Brooklyn--but not what you'd mean by Brooklyn. Your
+remark shows you to have subtlety. I must remember that, mustn't I! I
+won't always be driving through this big land. But---- Will I get all
+fussy and ribbon-tied again, when I go back?"
+
+"No. You won't. You drive like a man."
+
+"What has that----"
+
+"It has a lot to do with it. A garage man can trail along behind another
+car and figger out, figure out, just about what kind of a person the
+driver is from the way he handles his boat. Now you bite into the job.
+You drive pretty neat--neatly. You don't either scoot too far out of the
+road in passing a car, or take corners too wide. You won't be fussy. But
+still, I suppose you'll be glad to be back among your own folks and
+you'll forget the wild Milt that tagged along----"
+
+"Milt--or Mr. Daggett--no, Milt! I shall never, in my oldest grayest
+year, in a ducky cap by the fireplace, forget the half-second when your
+hand came flashing along, and caught that man on the running-board. But
+it wasn't just that melodrama. If that hadn't happened, something else
+would have, to symbolize you. It's that you--oh, you took me in, a
+stranger, and watched over me, and taught me the customs of the country,
+and were never impatient. No, I shan't forget that; neither of the
+Boltwoods will."
+
+In the rose-haze of firelight he straightened up and stared at her, but
+he settled into shyness again as she added:
+
+"Perhaps others would have done the same thing. I don't know. If they
+had, I should have remembered them too. But it happened that it was you,
+and I, uh, my father and I, will always be grateful. We both hope we may
+see you in Seattle. What are you planning to do there? What is your
+ambition? Or is that a rude question?"
+
+"Why, uh----"
+
+"What I mean---- I mean, how did you happen to want to go there, with a
+garage at home? You still control it?"
+
+"Oh yes. Left my mechanic in charge. Why, I just kind of decided
+suddenly. I guess it was what they call an inspiration. Always wanted a
+long trip, anyway, and I thought maybe in Seattle I could hook up with
+something a little peppier than Schoenstrom. Maybe something in Alaska.
+Always wished I were a mechanical or civil engineer so----"
+
+"Then why don't you become one? You're young---- How old are you?"
+
+"Twenty-five."
+
+"We're both children, compared with Je--compared with some men who are
+my friends. You're quite young enough to go to engineering school. And
+take some academic courses on the side--English, so on. Why don't you?
+Have you ever thought of it?"
+
+"N-no, I hadn't thought of doing it, but---- All right. I will! In
+Seattle! B'lieve the University of Washington is there."
+
+"You mean it?"
+
+"Yes. I do. You're the boss."
+
+"That's--that's flattering, but---- Do you always make up your mind as
+quickly as this?"
+
+"When the boss gives orders!"
+
+He smiled, and she smiled back, but this time it was she who was
+embarrassed. "You're rather overwhelming. You change your life--if you
+really do mean it--because a _jeune fille_ from Brooklyn is so
+impertinent, from her Olympian height of finishing-school learning, as
+to suggest that you do so."
+
+"I don't know what a _jeune fille_ is, but I do know----" He sprang up.
+He did not look at her. He paraded back and forth, three steps to the
+right, three to the left, his hands in his pockets, his voice
+impersonal. "I know you're the finest person I ever met. You're the
+kind--I knew there must be people like you, because I knew the Joneses.
+They're the only friends I've got that have, oh, I suppose it's what
+they call culture."
+
+In a long monologue, uninterrupted by Claire, he told of his affection
+for the Schoenstrom "prof" and his wife. The practical, slangy Milt of
+the garage was lost in the enthusiastic undergraduate adoring his
+instructor in the university that exists as veritably in a teacher's or
+a doctor's sitting-room in every Schoenstrom as it does in certain
+lugubrious stone hulks recognized by a state legislature as magically
+empowered to paste on sacred labels lettered "Bachelor of Arts."
+
+He broke from his revelations to plump down on the bench beside her, to
+slap his palm with his fist, and sigh, "Lord, I've been gassing on!
+Guess I bored you!"
+
+"Oh, please, Milt, please! I see it all so---- It must have been
+wonderful, the evening when Mrs. Jones read Noyes's 'Highwayman' aloud.
+Tell me--long before that--were you terribly lonely as a little boy?"
+
+Now Milt had not been a terribly lonely little boy. He had been a leader
+in a gang devoted to fighting, swimming, pickerel-spearing,
+beggie-stealing, and catching rides on freights.
+
+But he believed that he was accurately presenting every afternoon of his
+childhood, as he mused, "Yes, I guess I was, pretty much. I remember I
+used to sit on dad's doorstep, all those long sleepy summer afternoons,
+and I'd think, 'Aw, geeeeee, I--wisht--I--had--somebody--to--play--with!'
+I always wanted to make-b'lieve Robin Hood, but none of the other
+kids--so many of them were German; they didn't know about Robin Hood; so
+I used to scout off alone."
+
+"If I could only have been there, to be Maid Marian for you! We'd have
+learned archery! Lonely little boy on the doorstep!" Her fingers just
+touched his sleeve. In her gesture, the ember-light caught the crystal
+of her wrist watch. She stooped to peer at it, and her pitying
+tenderness broke off in an agitated: "Heavings! Is it that late? To bed!
+Good night, Milt."
+
+"Good night, Cl---- Miss Boltwood."
+
+"No. 'Claire,' of course. I'm not normally a first-name-snatcher, but I
+do seem to have fallen into saying 'Milt.' Night!"
+
+As she undressed, in her tent, Claire reflected, "He won't take
+advantage of my being friendly, will he? Only thing is---- I sha'n't
+dare to look at Henry B. when Milt calls me 'Claire' in that sedate
+Brooklyn Heights presence. The dear lamb! Lonely afternoons----!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+THE BEAST OF THE CORRAL
+
+
+They met in the frost-shimmering mountain morning, on their way to the
+corral, to get their cars ready before breakfast. They were shy, hence
+they were boisterous, and tremendously unreferential to campfire
+confidences, and informative about distilled water for batteries, and
+the price of gas in the Park. On Milt's shoulder rode Vere de Vere who,
+in her original way, relieved one pause by observing "Mrwr."
+
+They came in through the corral gate before any of the other motor
+tourists had appeared--and they stupidly halted to watch a bear, a
+large, black, adipose and extremely unchained bear, stalk along the line
+of cars, sniff, cock an ear at the Gomez, lumber up on its
+running-board, and bundle into the seat. His stern filled the space
+between side and top, and he was to be heard snuffing.
+
+"Oh! Look! Milt! Left box of candy on seat---- Oh, please drive him
+away!"
+
+"Me? Drive--that?"
+
+"Frighten him away. Aren't animals afraid human eye----"
+
+"Not in this park. Guns forbidden. Animals protected by U. S. Army,
+President, Congress, Supreme Court, Department of Interior, Monroe
+Doctrine, W. C. T. U. But I'll try--cautiously."
+
+"Don't you want me think you're hero?"
+
+"Ye-es, providin' I don't have to go and be one."
+
+They edged toward the car. The bear flapped his hind legs, looked out at
+the intruders, said "Oofflll!" and returned to the candy.
+
+"Shoo!" Milt answered politely.
+
+"Llooffll!"
+
+From his own bug, beside the Gomez, Milt got a tool kit, and with
+considerable brilliance as a pitcher he sent a series of wrenches at the
+agitated stern of the bear. They offended the dignity of the ward of the
+Government. He finished the cover and ribbons of the candy box, and
+started for Milt ... who proceeded with haste toward Claire ... who was
+already at the gate.
+
+Lady Vere de Vere, cat of a thousand battles, gave one frightful squawl,
+shot from Milt's shoulder and at the bear, claws out, fur electric. The
+bear carelessly batted once with its paw, and the cat sailed into the
+air. The satisfied bear strolled to the fence, shinned up it and over.
+
+"Good old Vere! That wallop must of darn near stunned her, though!" Milt
+laughed to Claire, as they trotted back into the corral. The cat did not
+move, as they came up; did not give the gallant "Mrwr" with which she
+had saluted Milt on lonely morning after morning of forlorn driving
+behind the Gomez. He picked Vere up.
+
+"She's--she's dead," he said. He was crying.
+
+"Oh, Milt---- Last night you said Vere was all the family you had. You
+have the Boltwoods, now!"
+
+She did not touch his hand, nor did they speak as they walked soberly to
+the far side of the corral, and buried Lady Vere de Vere. At breakfast
+they talked of the coming day's run, from the canyon out of the Park,
+and northward. But they had the queer, quick casualness of intimates.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was at breakfast that her father heard one Milt Daggett address the
+daughter of the Boltwoods as "Claire." The father was surprised into
+clearing his throat, and attacking his oatmeal with a zealousness
+unnatural in a man who regarded breakfast-foods as moral rather than
+interesting.
+
+While he was lighting a cigar, and Claire was paying the bill, Mr.
+Boltwood stalked Milt, cleared his throat all over again, and said,
+"Nice morning."
+
+It was the first time the two men had talked unchaperoned by Claire.
+
+"Yes. We ought to have a good run, sir." The "sir" came hard. The
+historian puts forth a theory that Milt had got it out of fiction. "We
+might go up over Mount Washburn. Take us up to ten thousand feet."
+
+"Uh, you said--didn't Miss Boltwood tell me that you are going to
+Seattle, too?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Friends there, no doubt?"
+
+Milt grinned irresistibly. "Not a friend. But I'm going to make 'em. I'm
+going to take up engineering, and some French, I guess, at the
+university there."
+
+"Ah. Really?"
+
+"Yes. Been too limited in my ambition. Don't see why I shouldn't get out
+and build railroads and power plants and roads--Siberia, Africa, all
+sorts of interesting places."
+
+"Quite right. Quite right. Uh, ah, I, oh, I---- Have you seen Miss
+Boltwood?"
+
+"I saw Miss Boltwood in the office."
+
+"Oh yes. Quite so. Uh--ah, here she is."
+
+When the Gomez had started, Mr. Boltwood skirmished, "This young man----
+Do you think you better let him call you by your Christian name?"
+
+"Why not? I call him 'Milt.' 'Mr. Daggett' is too long a handle to use
+when a man is constantly rescuing you from the perils of the deep or
+hoboes or bears or something. Oh, I haven't told you. Poor old Milt, his
+cat was killed----"
+
+"Yes, yes, dolly, you may tell me about that in due time, but let's
+stick to this social problem for a moment. Do you think you ought to be
+too intimate with him?"
+
+"He's only too self-respecting. He wouldn't take advantage----"
+
+"I'm quite aware of that. I'm not speaking on your behalf, but on his.
+I'm sure he's a very amiable chap, and ambitious. In fact---- Did you
+know that he has saved up money to attend a university?"
+
+"When did he tell you that? How long has he been planning---- I thought
+that I----"
+
+"Just this morning; just now."
+
+"Oh! I'm relieved."
+
+"I don't quite follow you, dolly, but---- Where was I? Do you realize
+what a demure tyrant you are? If you can drag me from New York to the
+aboriginal wilds, and I did _not_ like that oatmeal, what will you do to
+this innocent? I want to protect him!"
+
+"You better! Because I'm going to carve him, and paint him, and possibly
+spoil him. The creating of a man--of one who knows how to handle
+life--is so much more wonderful than creating absurd pictures or statues
+or stories. I'll nag him into completing college. He'll learn
+dignity--or perhaps lose his simplicity and be ruined; and then I'll
+marry him off to some nice well-bred pink-face, like Jeff Saxton's
+pretty cousin--who may turn him into a beastly money-grubber; and I'm
+monkeying with destiny, and I ought to be slapped, and I realize it, and
+I can't help it, and all my latent instinct as a feminine meddler is
+aroused, and--golly, I almost went off that curve!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+THE BLACK DAY OF THE VOYAGE
+
+
+That was the one black day of her voyage--black stippled with crimson.
+
+It began with the bear's invasion of the car, resulting in long
+claw-marks across the upholstery, the loss of some particularly good
+candy bought at a Park hotel, and genuine grief abiding after the
+sentimental tragedy of Vere de Vere's death. The next act was the
+ingenious loss of all power of her engine. She forgot that, before
+breakfast, Milt had filled the oil-well for her. When she stopped for
+gasoline, and the seller inquired, "Quart of oil?"--she absently nodded.
+So the cylinders filled with surplus oil, the spark-plugs were fouled,
+and the engine had the power of a sewing machine.
+
+She could not make Mount Washburn--she could not make even the slopes of
+the lower road. Now she knew the agony of the feeble car in the
+mountains--most shameful and anxious of a driver's dolors: the brisk
+start up the hill, the belief that you will keep on going this time; the
+feeling of weariness through all the car; the mad shifting of gears, the
+slipping of the clutch, and more gas, and less gas, and wondering
+whether more gas or less is the better, and the appalling knocking when
+you finally give her a lot too much gas; the remembrance, when it's too
+late, to retard the spark; the safe crawling up to the last sharp pitch,
+just fifteen feet from the summit; the car's halting; the yelp at your
+passenger, "Jump out and push!"; the painful next five feet; and the
+final death of the power just as the front wheels creep up over the
+pitch. Then the anxious putting on of brakes--holding the car with both
+foot-brake and emergency, lest it run down backward, slip off the road.
+The calf of your leg begins to ache from the pressure on the foot-brake,
+and with an unsuccessful effort to be courteous you bellow at the
+passenger, who has been standing beside the car looking deprecatory,
+"Will you please block the back wheels with a stone--hustle up, will
+you!"
+
+All this routine Claire thoroughly learned. Always Milt bumbled up, said
+cheerful things, and either hauled the Gomez over the pitch by a towline
+to his bug, or getting out, pushing on a rear fender till his neck was
+red and bulgy, gave the extra impetus necessary to get the Gomez over.
+
+"Would you mind shoving on that side, just a little bit?" he suggested
+to Mr. Boltwood, who ceased the elaborate smoking of cigars, dusted his
+hands, and gravely obeyed, while Claire was awaiting the new captain's
+command to throw on the power.
+
+"I wish we weren't under so much obligation to this young man," said Mr.
+Boltwood, after one crisis.
+
+"I know but--what can we do?"
+
+"Don't you suppose we might pay him?"
+
+"Henry B. Boltwood, if you tried to do that---- I'm not sure. Your being
+my parent might save you, but even so, I think he'd probably chase you
+off the road, clear down into that chasm."
+
+"I suppose so. Shall we have to entertain him in Seattle?"
+
+"Have to? My dear parent, you can't keep me from it! Any of the Seattle
+friends of Gene Gilson who don't appreciate that straight, fine,
+aspiring boy may go---- Not overdo it, you understand. But---- Oh, take
+him to the theater. By the way; shall we try to climb Mount Rainier
+before----"
+
+"See here, my good dolly; you stop steering me away from my feeble
+parental efforts. Do you wish to be under obligations----"
+
+"Don't mind, with Milt. He wouldn't charge interest, as Jeff Saxton
+would. Milt is, oh, he's folks!"
+
+"Quite true. But are we? Are you?"
+
+"Learning to be!"
+
+Between discussions and not making hills, Claire cleaned the spark plugs
+as they accumulated carbon from the surplus oil--or she pretended to
+help Milt clean them. The plugs were always very hot, and when you were
+unscrewing the jacket from the core, you always burned your hand, and
+wished you could swear ... and sometimes you could.
+
+After noon, when they had left the Park and entered Gardiner, Milt
+announced, "I've got to stick around a while. The key in my
+steering-gear seems to be worn. May have to put in a new one. Get the
+stuff at a garage here. If you wouldn't mind waiting, be awful glad to
+tag, and try to give a few helping hands till the oil cleans itself
+out."
+
+"I'll just stroll on," she said, but she drove away as swiftly as she
+could. Her father's worry about obligations disturbed her, and she did
+not wish to seem too troublesome an amateur to Milt. She would see him
+in Livingston, and tell him how well she had driven. The spark plugs
+kept clean enough now so that she could command more power, but----
+
+Between the Park and the transcontinental road there are many climbs
+short but severely steep; up-shoots like the humps on a scenic railway.
+To tackle them with her uncertain motor was like charging a machine-gun
+nest. She spent her nerve-force lavishly, and after every wild rush to
+make a climb, she had to rest, to rub the suddenly aching back of her
+neck. Because she was so tired, she did not take the trouble to save her
+brakes by going down in gear. She let the brakes smoke while the river
+and railroad below rose up at her.
+
+There was a long drop. How long it was she did not guess, because it was
+concealed by a curve at the top. She seemed to plane down forever. The
+brakes squealed behind. She tried to shift to first but there was a
+jarring snarl, and she could neither get into first nor back into third.
+She was running in neutral, the great car coasting, while she tried to
+slow it by jamming down the foot-brake. The car halted--and started on
+again. The brake-lining which had been wished on her at Saddle Back was
+burnt out.
+
+She had the feeling of the car bursting out from under control ... ready
+to leap off the road, into a wash. She wanted to jump. It took all her
+courage to stay in the seat. She got what pressure she could from the
+remaining band. With one hand she kept the accelerating car in the
+middle of the road; with the other she tried to pull the handle of the
+emergency brake back farther. She couldn't. She was not strong enough.
+Faster, faster, rushing at the next curve so that she could scarce steer
+round it----
+
+As quietly as she could, she demanded of her father, "Pull back on this
+brake lever, far as you can. Take both hands."
+
+"I don't understand----"
+
+"Heavens! Y' don't haft un'stand! Yank back! Yank, I tell you!"
+
+Again the car slowed. She was able to get into second speed. Even that
+check did not keep the car from darting down at thirty miles an
+hour--which pace, to one who desires to saunter down at a dignified rate
+of eighteen, is equivalent in terms of mileage on level ground to
+seventy an hour, with a drunken driver, on a foggy evening, amid
+traffic.
+
+She got the car down and, in the midst of a valley of emptiness and
+quiet, she dropped her head on her father's knee and howled.
+
+"I just can't face going down another hill! I just can't face it!" she
+sobbed.
+
+"No, dolly. Mustn't. We better---- You're quite right. This young
+Daggett is a very gentlemanly fellow. I didn't think his
+table-manners---- But we'll sit here and regard the flora and fauna till
+he comes. He'll see us through."
+
+"Yes! He will! Honestly, dad----" She said it with the first touch of
+hero-worship since she had seen an aviator loop loops. "Isn't he, oh,
+effective! Aren't you glad he's here to help us, instead of somebody
+like Jeff Saxton?"
+
+"We-ul, you must remember that Geoffrey wouldn't have permitted the
+brake to burn out. He'd have foreseen it, and have had a branch office,
+with special leased wire, located back on that hill, ready to do
+business the instant the market broke. Enthusiasm is a nice quality,
+dolly, but don't misplace it. This lad, however trustworthy he may be,
+would scarcely even be allowed to work for a man like Geoffrey Saxton.
+It may be that later, with college----"
+
+"No. He'd work for Jeff two hours. Then Jeff would give him that 'You
+poor fish!' look, and Milt would hit him, and stroll out, and go to the
+North Pole or some place, and discover an oil-well, and hire Jeff as his
+nice, efficient general manager. And---- I do wish Milt would hurry,
+though!"
+
+It was dusk before they heard the pit-pit-pit chuckling down the hill.
+Milt's casual grin changed to bashfulness as Claire ran into the road,
+her arms wide in a lovely gesture of supplication, and cried, "We been
+waiting for you so long! One of my brake-bands is burnt out, and the
+other is punk."
+
+"Well, well. Let's try to figure out something to do."
+
+She waited reverently while the local prophet sat in his bug, stared at
+the wheels of the Gomez, and thought. The level-floored,
+sagebrush-sprinkled hollow had filled with mauve twilight and creeping
+stilly sounds. The knowable world of yellow lights and security was far
+away. Milt was her only means of ever getting back to it.
+
+"Tell you what we might try," he speculated. "I'll hitch on behind you,
+and hold back in going down hill."
+
+She did not even try to help him while he again cleaned the spark plugs
+and looked over brakes, oil, gas, water. She sat on the running-board,
+and it was pleasant to be relieved of responsibility. He said nothing at
+all. While he worked he whistled that recent refined ballad:
+
+    I wanta go back to Oregon
+    And sit on the lawn, and look at the dawn.
+    Oh motheruh dear, don't leavuh me here,
+    The leaves are so sere, in the fallothe year,
+    I wanta go back to Oregugon,
+    To dearuh old Oregugon.
+
+They started, shouting optimistically to each other, lights on, trouble
+seeming over--and they stopped after the next descent, and pools of
+tears were in the corners of Claire's eyes. The holdback had not
+succeeded. Her big car, with its quick-increasing momentum, had jerked
+at the bug as though it were a lard-can. The tow-rope had stretched,
+sung, snapped, and again, in fire-shot delirium, she had gone rocking
+down hill.
+
+He drove up beside her, got out, stood at her elbow. His "I'm a bum
+inventor. We'll try somethin' else" was so careless that, in her
+nerve-twanging exhaustion she wailed, "Oh, don't be so beastly cheerful!
+You don't care a bit!"
+
+In the dusk she could see him straighten, and his voice came sharp as he
+ignored the ever-present parental background and retorted, "Somebody has
+got to be cheerful. Matter fact, I worked out the right stunt, coming
+down."
+
+Like a man in the dentist's chair, recovering between bouts, she drowsed
+and ignored the fact that in a few minutes she would again have to
+reassemble herself, become wakeful and calm, and go through quite
+impossible maneuvers of driving. Milt was, with a hatchet from his
+camping-kit, cutting down a large scrub pine. He dragged it to the Gomez
+and hitched it to the back axle. The knuckles of the branches would dig
+into the earth, the foliage catch at every pebble.
+
+"There! That anchor would hold a truck!" he shouted.
+
+It held. She went down the next two hills easily. But she was through.
+Her forearms and brain were equally numb. She appealed to Milt, "I can't
+seem to go on any more. It's so dark, and I'm so tired----"
+
+"All right. No ranch houses anywheres near, so we'll camp here, if Mr.
+Boltwood doesn't mind."
+
+Claire stirred herself to help him prepare dinner. It wasn't much of a
+dinner to prepare. Both cars had let provisions run low. They had bacon
+and petrified ends of a loaf and something like coffee--not much like
+it. Scientists may be interested in their discovery that as a substitute
+for both cream and sugar in beverages strawberry jam is a fallacy.
+
+For Mr. Boltwood's bed Milt hauled out the springy seat-cushions of both
+cars. The Gomez cushion was three inches thicker than that of the bug,
+which resulted in a mattress two stories in front with a lean-to at the
+foot, and the entire edifice highly slippery. But with a blanket from
+Milt's kit, it was sufficient. To Claire, Milt gave another blanket,
+his collection of antique overcoats, and good advice. He spoke vaguely
+of a third blanket for himself. And he had one. Its dimensions were
+thirteen by twenty inches, it was of white wool, he had bought it in
+Dakota for Vere de Vere, and many times that day he had patted it and
+whispered, "Poor old cat."
+
+Under his blankets Mr. Boltwood thought of rattlesnakes, bears,
+rheumatism, Brooklyn, his debt to Milt, and the fact that--though he
+hadn't happened to mention it to Claire--he had expected to be killed
+when the brake had burned out.
+
+Claire was drowsily happy. She had got through. She was conscious of
+rustling sagebrush, of the rapids of the Yellowstone beside her, of open
+sky and sweet air and a scorn for people in stuffy rooms, and
+comfortably ever conscious of Milt, ten feet away. She had in him the
+interest that a young physician would have in a new X-ray machine, a
+printer in a new font of type, any creator in a new outlet for his
+power. She would see to it that her Seattle cousins, the Gilsons, helped
+him to know the right people, during his university work. She herself
+would be back in Brooklyn, but perhaps he would write to her,
+write--write letters--Brooklyn--she was in Brooklyn--no, no, where was
+she?--oh, yes, camping--bad day--brakes---- No, she would not marry Jeff
+Saxton! Brooklyn--river singing--stars----
+
+And when Milt wasn't unromantically thinking of his cold back, he
+exulted. "She won't be back among her own folks till Seattle. Probably
+forget me then. Don't blame her. But till we get there, she'll let me
+play in her yard. Gee! In the morning I'll be talking to her again, and
+she's right there, right now!"
+
+In the morning they were all very stiff, but glad of the sun on
+sagebrush and river, and the boy and girl sang over breakfast. While
+Milt was gathering fuel he looked up at Claire standing against a
+background of rugged hills, her skirt and shoes still smug, but her
+jacket off, her blouse turned in at the throat, her hair blowing, her
+sleeves rolled up, one hand on her hip, erect, charged with vigor--the
+spirit of adventure.
+
+When her brake had been relined, at Livingston, they sauntered
+companionably on to Butte. And the day after Butte, when Milt was half a
+mile behind the Gomez, a pink-haired man with a large, shiny revolver
+stepped out from certain bushes, and bowed politely, and at that point
+Milt stopped.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+THE SPECTACLES OF AUTHORITY
+
+
+Over the transcontinental divide and into Butte, diamond-glittering on
+its hills in the dark; into Missoula, where there are trees and a
+university, with a mountain in everybody's backyard; through the
+Flathead Agency, where scarlet-blanketed Indians stalk out of tepees and
+the papoose rides on mother's back as in forgotten days; down to St.
+Ignatius, that Italian Alp town with its old mission at the foot of
+mountains like the wall of Heaven, Claire had driven west, then north.
+She was sailing past Flathead Lake, where fifty miles of mountain glory
+are reflected in bright waters. Everywhere were sections of flat
+wheat-plains, stirring with threshing, with clattering machinery and the
+flash of blown straw. But these miniature prairies were encircled by
+abrupt mountains.
+
+Mr. Boltwood remarked, "I'd rather have one of these homesteads and look
+across my fields at those hills than be King of England." Not that he
+made any effort to buy one of the homesteads. But then, he made no
+appreciable effort to become King of England.
+
+Claire had not seen Milt for a day and a half; not since the morning
+when both cars had left Butte. She wondered, and was piqued, and
+slightly lonely. Toward evening, when she was speculating as to whether
+she would make Kalispell--almost up to the Canadian border--she saw a
+woman run into the road from a house on the shore of Flathead Lake. The
+woman held out her hand. Claire pulled up.
+
+"Are you Miss Boltwood?"
+
+It was as startling as the same question would have been in a Chinese
+village.
+
+"W-why, yes."
+
+"Somebody trying to get you on the long-distance 'phone."
+
+"Me? 'Phone?"
+
+She was trembling. "Something's happened to Milt. He needs me!" She
+could not manage her voice, as she got the operator on the farmers'-line
+wire, and croaked, "Was some one trying to get Miss Boltwood?"
+
+"Yes. This Boltwood? Hotel in Kalispell trying to locate you, for two
+hours. Been telephoning all along the line, from Butte to Somers."
+
+"W-well, w-will you g-get 'em for me?"
+
+It was not Milt's placid and slightly twangy voice but one smoother,
+more decisive, perplexingly familiar, that finally vibrated, "Hello!
+Hello! Miss Boltwood! Operator, I can't hear. Get me a better
+connection. Miss Boltwood?"
+
+"Yes! Yes! This is Miss Boltwood!" she kept beseeching, during a long
+and not unheated controversy between the unknown and the crisp operator,
+who knew nothing of the English language beyond, "Here's your party. Why
+don't you talk? Speak louder!"
+
+Then came clearly, "Hear me now?"
+
+"Yes! Yes!"
+
+"Miss Boltwood?"
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"Oh. Oh, hello, Claire. This is Jeff."
+
+"Jess who?"
+
+"Not Jess. Jeff! Geoffrey! J-e-f-f! Jeff Saxton!"
+
+"Oh!" It was like a sob. "Why--why--but you're in New York."
+
+"Not exactly, dear. I'm in Kalispell, Montana."
+
+"But that's right near here."
+
+"So am I!"
+
+"B-but----"
+
+"Out West to see copper interests. Traced you from Yellowstone Park but
+missed you at Butte. Thought I'd catch you on road. You talking from
+Barmberry's?"
+
+The woman who had hailed her was not missing a word of a telephone
+conversation which might be relative to death, fire, elopement, or any
+other dramatic event. Claire begged of her, "Where in the world am I
+talking from, anyway?"
+
+"This is Barmberry's Inn."
+
+"Yes," Claire answered on the telephone, "I seem to be. Shall I start on
+and----"
+
+"No. Got ripping plan. Stay right where you are. Got a fast car waiting.
+Be right down. We'll have dinner. By!"
+
+A click. No answer to Claire's urgent hellos. She hung up the receiver
+very, very carefully. She hated to turn and face her audience of Mr.
+Henry B. Boltwood, Mr. James Barmberry, Mrs. James Barmberry, and four
+Barmberry buds averaging five and a quarter in age. She tried to ignore
+the Barmberrys, but their silence was noisy and interested while she
+informed her father, "It's Jeff Saxton! Out here to see copper mines.
+Telephoned along road to catch us. Says we're to wait dinner till he
+comes."
+
+"Yessum," Mrs. Barmberry contributed, "he told me if I did catch you, I
+was to have some new-killed chickens ready to fry, and some whipped
+cream---- Jim Barmberry, you go right out and finish whipping that
+cream, and don't stand there gawping and gooping, and you children, you
+scat!"
+
+Claire seized the moment of Mr. Boltwood's lordly though bewildered bow
+to their hostess, and escaped outdoors. Round the original settler's
+log-cabin were nests of shacks and tents, for bedrooms, and on a
+screened porch, looking on Flathead Lake, was the dining-room. The few
+other guests had finished supper and gone to their tents.
+
+She ambled to the lake shore, feeling feebler, more slapped and sent
+back to be a good little girl, than she had when Milt had hitched a
+forest to the back axle, three days ago. A map of her thoughts about
+Jeff Saxton would have shown a labyrinth. Now, she was muttering, "Dear
+Jeff! So thoughtful! Clever of him to find me! So good to see him
+again!" Now: "It's still distinctly understood that I am not engaged to
+him, and I'm not going to be surprised into kissing him when he comes
+down like a wolf on the fold." Now: "Jeff Saxton! Here! Makes me
+homesick for the Heights. And nice shops in Manhattan, and a really good
+play--music just before the curtain goes up." Now: "Ohhhhhh geeeeee
+whizzzzzz! I wonder if he'll let us go any farther in the car? He's so
+managerial, and dad is sure to take his side. He tried to scare us off
+by that telegram to Fargo." Now: "He'd be horrified if he knew about
+that bum brake. Milt didn't mind. Milt likes his womenfolks to be
+daring. Jeff wants his harem admiring and very reliable."
+
+She crouched on the shore, a rather forlorn figure. The peaks of the
+Mission Range, across the violet-shadowed mirror of Flathead Lake, were
+a sudden pure rose, in reflection of sunset, then stony, forbidding.
+Across the road, on the Barmberry porch, she could hear her father
+saying "Ah?" and "Indeed?" to James's stories.
+
+Up the road, a blaring horn, great lights growing momently more
+dazzling, a roar, a rush, the halting car, and out of its blurred bulk,
+a trim figure darting--Jeff Saxton--home and the people she loved, and
+the ways and days she knew best of all. He had shouted only "Is
+Miss----" before she had rushed to him, into the comfort of his arms,
+and kissed him.
+
+She backed off and tried to sound as if it hadn't happened, but she was
+quavery: "I can't believe it! It's too ridiculously wonderful to see
+you!" She retreated toward the Barmberry porch, Jeff following, his two
+hands out. They came within the range of the house lights, and Mr.
+Boltwood hailed, "Ah! Geoffrey! Never had such a surprise--nor a more
+delightful one!"
+
+"Mr. Boltwood! Looking splendid, sir! New man! William Street better
+look to its laurels when you come back and get into the game!"
+
+Then, on the lamp-lighted porch, the two men shook hands, and looked for
+some other cordial thing to do. They thought about giving each other
+cigars. They smiled, and backed away, and smiled, in the foolish,
+indeterminate way males have, being unable to take it out in kissing.
+Mr. Boltwood solved the situation by hemming, "Must trot in and wash.
+See you very soon." Mr. James Barmberry and the squad of lesser
+Barmberrys regretfully followed. Claire was alone with Jeff, and she was
+frightened. Yet she was admitting that Jeff, in his English cap and
+flaring London top-coat, his keen smile and his extreme shavedness, was
+more attractive than she had remembered.
+
+"Glad to see me?" he demanded.
+
+"Oh, rather!"
+
+"You're looking----"
+
+"You're so----"
+
+"Nice trip? You know you've sent me nothing but postcards with 'Pretty
+town,' or something equally sentimental."
+
+"Yes, it's really been bully. These mountains and big spaces simply
+inspire me." She said it rather defiantly.
+
+"Of course they do! Trouble is, with you away, we've nothing to inspire
+us!"
+
+"Do you need anything, with your office and your club?"
+
+"Why, Claire!"
+
+"I'm sorry. That was horrid of me."
+
+"Yes, it was. Though I don't mind. I'm sure we've all become meek,
+missing you so. I'm quite willing to be bullied, and reminded that I'm a
+mere T.B.M."
+
+She had got herself into it; she had to tell him that he wasn't just a
+business man; that she had "just meant" he was so practical.
+
+"But Jeff is no longer the practical one," he declared. "Think of Claire
+driving over deserts and mountains. But---- Oh, it's been so lonely for
+us. Can you guess how much? A dozen times every evening, I've turned to
+the telephone to call you up and beg you to let me nip in and see you,
+and then realized you weren't there, and I've just sat looking at the
+'phone---- Oh, other people are so dull!"
+
+"You really miss----"
+
+"I wish I were a poet, so I could tell you adequately. But you haven't
+said you missed me, Claire. Didn't you, a teeny bit? Wouldn't it have
+been tolerable to have poor old Jeff along, to drive down dangerous
+hills----"
+
+"And fill grease-cups! Nasty and stickum on the fingers!"
+
+"Yes, I'd have done that, too. And invented surprises along the way. I'm
+a fine surpriser! I've arranged for a motor-boat so we can explore the
+lake here tomorrow. That's why I had you wait here instead of coming on
+to Kalispell. Tomorrow morning, unfortunately, I have to hustle back and
+catch a train--called to California, and possibly a northern trip. But
+meantime---- By now, my driver must have sneaked my s'prises into the
+kitchen."
+
+"What are they?"
+
+"Guess."
+
+"Food. Eats. Divine eats."
+
+"Maybe."
+
+"But what? Please, sir. Claire is so hungry."
+
+"We shall see in time, my child. Uncle Jeff is not to be hurried."
+
+"Ah--let--me--see--now! I'll kick and scream!"
+
+From New York Jeff had brought a mammoth picnic basket. To the fried
+chicken ordered for dinner he added sealed jars of purée of wood pigeon,
+of stuffed artichokes prepared by his club chef; caviar and anchovies; a
+marvelous nightmare-creating fruit cake to go with the whipped cream;
+two quarts of a famous sherry; candied fruits in a silver box. Dinner
+was served not on the dining-porch but before the fire in the
+Barmberrys' living-room. Claire looked at the candied fruits, stared at
+Jeff rather queerly--as though she was really thinking of some one
+else--and mused:
+
+"I didn't know I cared so much for these foolish luxuries. Tonight, I'd
+like a bath, just a tiny bit scented, and a real dressing-table with a
+triple mirror, and French talc, and come down in a dinner-gown---- Oh, I
+have enjoyed the trip, Jeff. But my poor body does get so tired and
+dusty, and then you treacherously come along with these things that
+you've magicked out of the mountains and---- I'm not a pioneer woman,
+after all. And Henry B. is not a caveman. See him act idolatrously
+toward his soup."
+
+"I feel idolatrous. I'd forgotten the supreme ethical importance of the
+soup. I'll never let myself forget it again," said Mr. Boltwood, in the
+tone of one who has come home.
+
+Claire was grateful to Jeff that he did not let her go on being
+grateful. He turned the talk to Brooklyn. He was neat and explicit--and
+almost funny--in his description of an outdoor presentation of
+_Midsummer Night's Dream_, in which a domestic and intellectual lady
+weighing a hundred and eighty-seven stageside had enacted Puck. As they
+sat after dinner, as Claire shivered, he produced a knitted robe, and
+pulled it about her shoulders, smiling at her in a lonely, hungry way.
+She caught his hand.
+
+"Nice Jeff!" she whispered.
+
+"Oh, my dear!" he implored. He shook his head in a wistful way that
+caught her heart, and dutifully went back to informing Mr. Boltwood of
+the true state of the markets.
+
+"Talk to Claire too!" she demanded. She stopped, stared. From outside
+she heard a nervous pit-pit-pit, a blurred dialogue between Mr. James
+Barmberry and another man. Into the room rambled Milt Daggett, dusty of
+unpressed blue suit, tired of eyes, and not too well shaved of chin,
+grumbling, "Thought I'd never catch up with you, Claire---- Why----"
+
+"Oh! Oh, Milt--Mr. Daggett---- Oh, Jeff, this is our good friend Milt
+Daggett, who has helped us along the road."
+
+Jeff's lucid rimless spectacles stared at Milt's wind-reddened eyes; his
+jaunty patch-pocket outing clothes sniffed at Milt's sweater; his even
+voice followed Milt's grunt of surprise with a curt "Ah. Mr. Daggett."
+
+"Pleased meet you," faltered Milt.
+
+Jeff nodded, turned his shoulder on Milt, and went on, "The fact is, Mr.
+Boltwood, the whole metal market----"
+
+Milt was looking from one to another. Claire was now over her first
+shocked comparison of candied fruits with motor grease. She rose, moved
+toward Milt, murmuring, "Have you had dinner?"
+
+The door opened again. A pink-haired, red-faced man in a preposterous
+green belted suit lunged in, swept his broad felt hat in greeting, and
+boomed like a cheap actor:
+
+"Friends of my friend Milt, we about to dine salute you. Let me
+introduce myself as Westlake Parrott, better known to the vulgar as
+Pinky Parrott, gentleman adventurer, born in the conjunction of Mars and
+Venus, with Saturn ascendant."
+
+Jeff had ignored Milt. But at this absurd second intrusion on his
+decidedly private dinner-party he flipped to the center of the room and
+said "I beg your pardon!" in such a head-office manner that the
+pink-locked Mystery halted in his bombast. Claire felt wabbly. She had
+no theories as to where Milt had acquired a private jester, nor as to
+what was about to happen to Milt--and possibly to her incautious self.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+THE VAGABOND IN GREEN
+
+
+As Milt had headed westward from Butte, as he rattled peacefully along
+the road, conscious of golden haze over all the land, and the
+unexpectedness of prairie threshing-crews on the sloping fields of
+mountainsides, a man had stepped out from bushes beside the road, and
+pointed a .44 navy revolver.
+
+The man was not a movie bandit. He wore a green imitation of a Norfolk
+jacket, he had a broad red smile, and as he flourished his hat in a bow,
+his hair was a bristly pompadour of gray-streaked red that was almost
+pink. He made oration:
+
+"Pardon my eccentric greeting, brother of the open road, but I wanted
+you to give ear to my obsequious query as to how's chances on gettin' a
+lift? I have learned that obsequiousness is best appreciated when it is
+backed up by prayer and ca'tridges."
+
+"What's the idea? I seem to gather you'd like a lift. Jump in."
+
+"You do not advocate the Ciceronian style, I take it," chuckled the man
+as he climbed aboard.
+
+Milt was not impressed. Claire might have been, but Milt had heard
+politics and religion argued about the stove in Rauskukle's store too
+often to be startled by polysyllabomania. He knew it was often the sign
+of a man who has read too loosely and too much by himself. He snorted.
+"Huh! What are you--newspaper, politics, law, preacher, or gambler?"
+
+"Well, a little of all those interesting occupations. And
+ten-twent-thirt trouping, and county-fair spieling, and selling Dr.
+Thunder Rapids' Choctaw Herbal Sensitizer. How far y' going?"
+
+"Seattle."
+
+"Honest? Say, kid, this is---- Muh boy, we shall have the rare privilege
+of pooling adventures as far as Blewett Pass, four to six days' run from
+here--a day this side of Seattle. I'm going to my gold-mine there. I'll
+split up on the grub--I note from your kit that you camp nights. Quite
+all right, my boy. Pinky Parrott is no man to fear night air."
+
+He patted Milt's shoulder with patronizing insolence. He filled a pipe
+and, though the car was making twenty-five, he lighted the pipe with
+distinguished ease, then settled down to his steady stride:
+
+"In the pride of youth, you feel that you have thoroughly categorized
+me, particularly since I am willing to admit that, though I shall have
+abundance of the clinking iron men to buy my share of our chow, I chance
+just for the leaden-footed second to lack the wherewithal to pay my
+railroad fare back to Blewett; and the bumpers and side-door Pullman of
+the argonauts like me not. Too damn dusty. But your analysis is
+unsynthetic, though you will scarce grasp my paradoxical metaphor."
+
+"The hell I won't. I've taken both chemistry and rhetoric," growled
+Milt, strictly attending to driving, and to the desire to get rid of his
+parasite.
+
+"Oh! Oh, I see. Well, anyway: I am no mere nimble knight of wits, as you
+may take it. In fact, I am lord of fair acres in Arcady."
+
+"Don't know the burg. Montana or Idaho?"
+
+"Neither! In the valley of dream!"
+
+"Oh! That one. Huh!"
+
+"But I happen to back them up with a perfectly undreamlike gold-mine.
+Prospected for it in a canyon near Blewett Pass and found it, b' gum,
+and my lady wife, erstwhile fairest among the society favorites of North
+Yakima, now guards it against her consort's return. Straight goods. Got
+the stuff. Been to Butte to get a raise on it, but the fell khedives of
+commerce are jealous. They would hearken not. Gee, those birds certainly
+did pull the frigid mitt! So I wend my way back to the demure Dolores,
+the houri of my heart, and the next time I'll take a crack at the big
+guns in Seattle. And I'll sure reward you for your generosity in taking
+me to Blewett, all the long, long, languid, languorous way----"
+
+"Too bad I got to stop couple of days at Spokane."
+
+"Well, then you shall have the pleasure of taking me that far."
+
+"And about a week in Kalispell!"
+
+"'Twill discommode me, but 'pon honor, I like your honest simple face,
+and I won't desert you. Besides! I know a guy in Kalispell, and I can
+panhandle the sordid necessary chuck while I wait for you. Little you
+know, my cockerel, how facile a brain your 'bus so lightly bears. When
+I've cashed in on the mine, I'll take my rightful place among the
+motored gentry. Not merely as actor and spieler, promoter and inventor
+and soldier and daring journalist, have I played my rôle, but also I am
+a mystic, an initiate, a clairaudient, a psychometrist, a Rosicrucian
+adept, and profoundly psychic--in fact, my guide is Hermes Trismegistus
+himself! I also hold a degree as doctor of mento-practic, and my studies
+in astro-biochemistry----"
+
+"Gonna stop. All off. Make little coffee," said Milt.
+
+He did not desire coffee, and he did not desire to stop, but he did
+desperately desire not to inflict Pinky Parrott upon the Boltwoods. It
+was in his creed as a lover of motors never to refuse a ride to any one,
+when he had room. He hoped to get around his creed by the hint implied
+in stopping. Pinky's reaction to the hint was not encouraging:
+
+"Why, you have a touch of the psychic's flare! I could do with coffee
+myself. But don't trouble to make a fire. I'll do that. You drive--I do
+the camp work. Not but that I probably drive better than you, if you
+will permit me to say so. I used to do a bit of racing, before I took up
+aviation."
+
+"Huh! Aviation! What machine d'you fly?"
+
+"Why, why--a biplane!"
+
+"Huh! What kind of motor?"
+
+"Why, a foreign one. The--the---- It was a French motor."
+
+"Huh! What track you race on?"
+
+"The---- Pardon me till I build a fire for our _al fresco_ collation,
+and I my driving history will unfold."
+
+But he didn't do either.
+
+After he had brought seven twigs, one piece of sagebrush, and a six-inch
+board, Pinky let Milt finish building the fire, while he told how much
+he knew about the mysteries of ancient Egyptian priests.
+
+Milt gave up hope that Pinky would become bored by waiting and tramp on.
+After one hour of conversational deluge, he decided to let Pinky
+drive--to make him admit that he couldn't. He was wrong. Pinky could
+drive. He could not drive well, he wabbled in his steering, and he
+killed the engine on a grade, but he showed something of the same
+dashing idiocy that characterized his talk. It was Milt not Pinky, who
+was afraid of their running off the road, and suggested resuming the
+wheel.
+
+Seven times that day Milt tried to lose him. Once he stopped without
+excuse, and merely stared up at rocks overhanging the hollowed road.
+Pinky was not embarrassed. He leaned back in the seat and sang two
+Spanish love songs. Once Milt deliberately took a wrong road, up a
+mountainside. They were lost, and took five hours getting back to the
+highway. Pinky loved the thrill and--in a brief address lasting fifteen
+minutes--he said so.
+
+Milt tried to bore him by driving at seven miles an hour. Pinky
+affectionately accepted this opportunity to study the strata of the
+hills. When they camped, that night, Pinky loved him like a brother, and
+was considering not stopping at Blewett Pass, to see his gold-mine and
+Dolores the lady-wife, but going clear on to Seattle with his playmate.
+
+The drafted host lay awake, and when Pinky awoke and delivered a few
+well-chosen words on the subject of bird-song at dawn, Milt burst out:
+
+"Pinky, I don't like to do it, but---- I've never refused a fellow a
+lift, but I'm afraid you'll have to hike on by yourself, the rest of the
+way."
+
+Pinky sat up in his blankets. "Afraid of me, eh? You better be! I'm a
+bad actor. I killed Dolores's husband, and took her along, see? I----"
+
+"Are you trying to scare me, you poor four-flusher?" Milt's right hand
+expanded, fingers arching, with the joyous tension of a man stretching.
+
+"No. I'm just reading your thoughts. I'm telling you you're scared of
+me! You think that if I went on, I might steal your car! You're afraid
+because I'm so suave. You aren't used to smooth ducks. You don't dare to
+let me stick with you, even for today! You're afraid I'd have your
+mis'able car by tonight! You don't dare!"
+
+"The hell I don't!" howled Milt. "If you think I'm afraid---- Just to
+show you I'm not, I'll let you go on today!"
+
+"That's sense, my boy. It would be a shame for two such born companions
+of the road to part!" Pinky had soared up from his blankets; was
+lovingly shaking Milt's hand.
+
+Milt knew that he had been tricked, but he felt hopeless. Was it
+impossible to insult Pinky? He tried again:
+
+"I'll be frank with you. You're the worst wind-jamming liar I ever met.
+Now don't reach for that gat of yours. I've got a hefty rock right here
+handy."
+
+"But, my dear, dear boy, I don't intend to reach for any crude lethal
+smoke-wagon. Besides, there isn't anything in it. I hocked the shells in
+Butte. I am not angry, merely grieved. We'll argue this out as we have
+breakfast and drive on. I can prove to you that, though occasionally I
+let my fancy color mere untutored fact with the pigments of a Robert J.
+Ingersoll---- By the way, do you know his spiel on whisky?"
+
+"Stick to the subject. We'll finish our arguing right now, and I'll
+give you breakfast, and we'll sadly part."
+
+"Merely because I am lighter of spirits than this lugubrious old world?
+No! I decline to be dropped. I'll forgive you and go on with you. Mind
+you, I am sensitive. I will not intrude where I am not welcome. Only you
+must give me a sounder reason than my diverting conversational powers
+for shucking me. My logic is even stronger than my hedonistic contempt
+for hitting the pike."
+
+"Well, hang it, if you must know---- Hate to say it, but I'd do almost
+anything to get rid of you. Fact is, I've been sort of touring with a
+lady and her father, and you would be in the way!"
+
+"Aaaaaaah! You see! Why, my boy, I will not only stick, but for you, I
+shall do the nimble John Alden and win the lady fair. I will so bedizen
+your virile, though somewhat crassly practical gifts---- Why, women are
+my long suit. They fall for----"
+
+"Tut, tut, tut! You're a fool. She's no beanery mistress, like you're
+used to. She really is a lady."
+
+"How blind you are, cruel friend. You do not even see that whatever my
+vices may be, my social standing----"
+
+"Oh--shut--up! Can't you see I'm trying to be kind to you? Have I simply
+got to beat you up before you begin to suspect you aren't welcome? Your
+social standing isn't even in the telephone book. And your
+vocabulary---- You let too many 'kids' slip in among the juicy words.
+Have I got to lick----"
+
+"Well. You're right. I'm a fliv. Shake hands, m' boy, and no hard
+feelings."
+
+"Good. Then I can drive on nice and alone, without having to pound your
+ears off?"
+
+"Certainly. That is--we'll compromise. You take me on just a few miles,
+into more settled country, and I'll leave you."
+
+So it chanced that Milt was still inescapably accompanied by Mr. Pinky
+Parrott, that evening, when he saw Claire's Gomez standing in the yard
+at Barmberry's and pulled up.
+
+Pinky had voluntarily promised not to use his eloquence on Claire, nor
+to try to borrow money from Mr. Boltwood. Without ever having quite won
+permission to stay, he had stayed. He had also carried out his promise
+to buy his half of the provisions by adding a five-cent bag of lemon
+drops to Milt's bacon and bread.
+
+When they had stopped, Milt warned, "There's their machine now. Seems to
+be kind of a hotel here. I'm going in and say howdy. Good-by, Pink. Glad
+to have met you, but I expect you to be gone when I come out here again.
+If you aren't---- Want granite or marble for the headstone? I mean it,
+now!"
+
+"I quite understand, my lad. I admire your chivalric delicacy. Farewell,
+old _compagnon de voyage_!"
+
+Milt inquired of Mr. Barmberry whether the Boltwoods were within, and
+burst into the parlor-living-room-library. As he cried to Claire, by the
+fire, "Thought I'd never catch up with you," he was conscious that
+standing up, talking to Mr. Boltwood, was an old-young man, very suave,
+very unfriendly of eye. He had an Oxford-gray suit, unwrinkled cordovan
+shoes; a pert, insultingly well-tied blue bow tie, and a superior narrow
+pink bald spot. As he heard Jeff Saxton murmur, "Ah. Mr. Daggett!" Milt
+felt the luxury in the room--the fleecy robe over Claire's shoulders,
+the silver box of candy by her elbow, the smell of expensive cigars, and
+the portly complacence of Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"Have you had any dinner?" Claire was asking, when a voice boomed, "Let
+me introduce myself as Westlake Parrott."
+
+Jeff abruptly took charge. He faced Pinky and demanded, "I beg pardon!"
+
+Claire's eyebrows asked questions of Milt.
+
+"This is a fellow I gave a lift to. Miner--I mean actor--well, kind of
+spiritualistic medium----"
+
+Mr. Boltwood, with the geniality of dinner and cigar, soothed, "Jeff,
+uh, Daggett here has saved our lives two distinct times, and given us a
+great deal of help. He is a motor expert. He has always refused to let
+us do anything in return but---- I noticed there was almost a whole
+fried chicken left. I wonder if he wouldn't share it with, uh, with his
+acquaintance here before--before they make camp for the night?"
+
+In civil and vicious tones Jeff began, "Very glad to reward any one who
+has been of service to----"
+
+He was drowned out by Pinky's effusive, "True hospitality is a virtue as
+delicate as it is rare. We accept your invitation. In fact I should be
+glad to have one of those cigarros elegantos that mine olfactory----"
+
+Milt cut in abruptly, "Pink! Shut up! Thanks, folks, but we'll go on.
+Just wanted to see if you had got in safe. See you tomorrow, some
+place."
+
+Claire was close to Milt, her fingers on his sleeve. "Please, Milt!
+Father! You didn't make your introduction very complete. You failed to
+tell Mr. Daggett that this is Mr. Saxton, a friend of ours in Brooklyn.
+Please, Milt, do stay and have dinner. I won't let you go on hungry. And
+I want you to know Jeff--Mr. Saxton.... Jeff, Mr. Daggett is an
+engineer, that is, in a way. He's going to take an engineering course in
+the University of Washington. Some day I shall make you bloated copper
+magnates become interested in him.... Mrs. Barmberry. Mrssssssss.
+Barrrrrrrmberrrrrry! Oh. Oh, Mrs. Barmberry, won't you please warm up
+that other chicken for----"
+
+"Oh, now, that's too bad. Me and Jim have et it all up!" wept the
+landlady, at the door.
+
+"I'll go on," stammered Milt.
+
+Jeff looked at him expressionlessly.
+
+"You will not go on!" Claire was insisting. "Mrs. Barmberry, won't you
+cook some eggs or steak or something for these boys?"
+
+"Perhaps," Jeff suggested, "they'd rather make their own dinner by a
+campfire. Must be very jolly, and that sort of thing."
+
+"Jeff, if you don't mind, this is my party, just for the moment!"
+
+"Quite right. Sorry!"
+
+"Milt, you sit here by the fire and get warm. I'm not going to be robbed
+of the egotistic pleasure of being hospitable. Everybody look happy
+now!"
+
+She got them all seated--all but Pinky. He had long since seated
+himself, by the fire, in Claire's chair, and he was smoking a cigar from
+the box which Jeff had brought for Mr. Boltwood.
+
+Milt sat farthest from the fire, by the dining-table. He was agonizing,
+"This Jeff person is the real thing. He's no Percy in riding-breeches.
+He's used to society and nastiness. If he looks at me once more--young
+garage man found froze stiff, near Flathead Lake, scared look in eyes,
+believed to have met a grizzly, no signs of vi'lence. And I thought I
+could learn to mingle with Claire's own crowd! I wish I was out in the
+bug. I wonder if I can't escape?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+THE FALLACY OF ROMANCE
+
+
+During dinner Milt watched Jeff Saxton's manner and manners. The hot day
+had turned into a cold night. Jeff tucked the knitted robe about
+Claire's shoulders, when she returned to the fire. He moved quietly and
+easily. He kept poking up the fire, smiling at Claire as he did so. He
+seemed without difficulty to maintain two conversations: one with Mr.
+Boltwood about finances, one with Claire about mysterious persons called
+Fannie and Alden and Chub and Bobbie and Dot, the mention of whom made
+Milt realize how much a stranger he was. Once, as he passed by Claire,
+Jeff said gently, "You _are_ lovely!" Only that, and he did not look at
+her. But Milt saw that Claire flushed, and her eyes dimmed.
+
+Pinky was silent till he had eaten about two-thirds of the total amount
+of fried eggs, cold lamb and ice-box curios. When Claire came over to
+see how they fared, Pinky removed himself, with smirking humility, and
+firmly joined himself to Jeff and Mr. Boltwood. He caught the subject of
+finance and, while Claire dropped down in the chair by Milt, Pinky was
+lecturing the two men from New York:
+
+"Ah, finance! Queen of the sociological pantheon! I don't know how come
+I am so graced by Fortune as to have encountered in these wilds two
+gentlemen so obviously versed in the stratagems of the great golden
+game, but I will take the opportunity to give you gentlemen some
+statistics about the gold-deposits still existent in the Cascades and
+other ranges that may be of benefit and certainly will be a surprise to
+you. It happens that I have at the present time a mine----"
+
+Claire was whispering to Milt, "If we can get rid of your dreadful
+passenger, I do want you to meet Mr. Saxton. He may be of use to you
+some day. He's terribly capable, and really quite nice. Think! He
+happened to be out here, and he traced me by telephone--oh, he treats
+long-distance 'phoning as I do a hair-pin. He brought down the duckiest
+presents--divertissements for dinner, and that knitted robe, and some
+real René Bleuzet perfume--I was all out of it---- And after the grime
+of the road----"
+
+"Do you really care for things like that, all those awfully expensive
+luxuries?" begged Milt.
+
+"Of course I do. Especially after small hotels."
+
+"Then you don't really like adventuring?"
+
+"Oh yes--in its place! For one thing, it makes a clever dinner seem so
+good by contrast!"
+
+"Well---- Afraid I don't know much about clever dinners," Milt was
+sighing, when he was aware of Jeff Saxton looming down on him,
+demanding:
+
+"Daggett, would you mind trying to inform your friend that neither Mr.
+Boltwood nor I care to invest in his gold-mine? We can't seem to get
+that into his head. I don't mind being annoyed myself, but I really feel
+I must protect Mr. Boltwood."
+
+"What can I do?"
+
+"My dear sir, since you brought him here----"
+
+It was the potassium cyanide and cracked ice and carpet tacks and TNT
+and castor oil in Jeff's "My dear sir" that did it. Milt discovered
+himself on his feet, bawling, "I am not your dear sir! Pinky is my
+guest, and---- Gee, sorry I lost my temper, Claire, terrible sorry. See
+you along the road. Good night. Pink! You take your hat! Git!"
+
+Milt followed Pinky out of the door, snarling, "Git in the car, and do
+it quick. I'll take you clear to Blewett Pass. We drive all night."
+
+Pinky was of great silence and tact. Milt lumped into the bug beside
+him. But he did not start the all-night drive. He wanted to crawl back,
+on his knees, to apologize to Claire--and to be slapped by Jeff Saxton.
+He compromised by slowly driving a quarter of a mile up the road, and
+camping there for the night.
+
+Pinky tried to speak words of philosophy and cheer--just once he tried
+it.
+
+For hours, by a small fire, Milt grieved that all his pride was gone in
+a weak longing to see Claire again. In the morning he did see
+her--putting off on the lake, in a motor-boat with Jeff and Mr.
+Barmberry. He saw the boat return, saw Jeff get into the car which had
+brought him from Kalispell, saw the farewell, the long handclasp, the
+stoop of Jeff's head, and Claire's quick step backward before Jeff could
+kiss her. But Claire waved to Jeff long after his car had started.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When Claire and her father came along in the Gomez, Milt was standing by
+the road. She stopped. She smiled. "Night of sadness and regrets? You
+were fairly rude, Milt. So was Mr. Saxton, but I've lectured him, and he
+sends his apologies."
+
+"I send him mine--'deed I do," said Milt gravely.
+
+"Then everything's all right. I'm sure we were all tired. We'll just
+forget it."
+
+"Morning, Daggett," Mr. Boltwood put in. "Hope you lose that dreadful
+red-headed person."
+
+"No, I can't, Mr. Boltwood. When Mr. Saxton turned on me, I swore I'd
+take Pinky clear through to Blewett Pass ... though not to Seattle, by
+golly!"
+
+"Foolish oaths should be broken," Claire platitudinized.
+
+"Claire--look---- You don't really care so terribly much about these
+little luxuries, food and fixin's and six-dollar-a-day-hotel junk, do
+you?"
+
+"Yes," stoutly, "I do."
+
+"But not compared with mountains and----"
+
+"Oh, it's all very well to talk, and be so superior about these dear old
+grandeurs of Nature, and the heroism of pioneers, and I do like a
+glimpse of them. But the niceties of life do mean something and even if
+it is weak and dependent, I shall always simply adore them!"
+
+"All these things are kind of softening." And he meant that she was
+still soft.
+
+"At least they're not rude!" And she meant that he was rude.
+
+"They're absolutely trivial. They shut off----"
+
+"They shut off rain and snow and dirt, and I still fail to see the
+picturesqueness of dirt! Good-by!"
+
+She had driven off, without looking back. She was heading for Seattle
+and the Pacific Ocean at forty miles an hour--and they had no engagement
+to meet either in Seattle or in the Pacific.
+
+Before Milt went on he completed a task on which he had decided the
+night before while he had meditated on the tailored impertinence of Jeff
+Saxton's gray suit. The task was to give away the Best Suit, that
+stolid, very black covering which at Schoenstrom had seemed suitable
+either to a dance or to the Y. P. S. C. E. The recipient was Mr. Pinky
+Parrott, who gave in return a history of charity and high souls.
+
+Milt did not listen. He was wondering, now that they had started, where
+they had started for. Certainly not for Seattle! Why not stop and see
+Pinky's gold-mine? Maybe he did have one. Even Pinky had to tell the
+truth sometimes. With a good popular gold-mine in his possession, Milt
+could buy quantities of clothes like Jeff Saxton's, and----
+
+"And," he reflected, "I can learn as good manners as his in one hour,
+with a dancing lesson thrown in. If I didn't, I'd sue the professor!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE NIGHT OF ENDLESS PINES
+
+
+On the edge of Kootenai Canyon, feeling more like an aviator than like
+an automobilist, Claire had driven, and now, nearing Idaho, she had
+entered a national forest. She was delayed for hours, while she tried to
+change a casing, after a blow-out when the spare tire was deflated. She
+wished for Milt. She would never see him again. She was sorry. He hadn't
+meant----
+
+But hang it, she panted, if he admired her at all, he'd be here now and
+get on this per-fect-ly beast-ly casing, over which she had been
+laboring for a dozen years; and she was simply too ridiculously tired;
+and was there any respectful way of keeping Henry B. from beaming in
+that benevolent manner while she was killing herself; and look at those
+fingernails; and--oh, drrrrrrat that casing!
+
+To make the next town, after this delay, she had to drive for hours by
+night through the hulking pines of the national forest. It was her first
+long night drive.
+
+A few claims, with log cabins of recent settlers, once or twice the
+shack of a forest-ranger, a telephone in a box by the road or a rough R.
+F. D. box nailed to a pine trunk, these indicated that civilization
+still existed, but they were only melancholy blurs. She was in a cold
+enchantment. All of her was dead save the ability to keep on driving,
+forever, with no hope of the tedium ending. She was bewildered. She
+passed six times what seemed to be precisely the same forest clearing,
+always with the road on a tiny ridge to the left of the clearing, always
+with a darkness-stilled house at one end and always, in the pasture at
+the other end, a horse which neighed. She was in a panorama stage-scene;
+things moved steadily by her, there was a sound of the engine, and a
+sensation of steering, but she was forever in the same place, among the
+same pines, with the same scowling blackness between their bare clean
+trunks. Only the road ahead was clear: a one-way track, the foot-high
+earthy bank and the pine-roots beside it, two distinct ruts, and a
+roughening of strewn brown bark and pine-needles, which, in the beating
+light of the car's lamps, made the sandy road scabrous with little
+incessant shadows.
+
+She had never known anything save this strained driving on. Jeff and
+Milt were old tales, and untrue. Was it ten hours before that she had
+cooked dinner beside the road? No matter. She wasn't hungry any longer.
+She would never reach the next town--and she didn't care. It wasn't she,
+but a grim spirit which had entered her dead body, that kept steering,
+feeding gas, watching the road.
+
+In the darkness outside the funnel of light from her lamps were shadows
+that leaped, and gray hands hastily jerked back out of sight behind tree
+trunks as she came up; things that followed her, and hidden men waiting
+for her to stop.
+
+As drivers will, she tried to exorcise the creeping fear by singing. She
+made up what she called her driving-song. It was intended to echo the
+hoofs of a fat old horse on a hard road:
+
+    The old horse trots with a jog, jog, jog,
+    And a jog, jog, jog; and a jog, jog, jog.
+    And the old road makes a little jog, jog, jog,
+    To the west, jog, jog; and the north, jog, jog.
+    While the farmer drinks some cider from his jug, jug, jug,
+    From his coy jug, jug; from his joy jug, jug.
+    Till he accumulates a little jag, jag, jag,
+    And he jigs, jigs, jigs, with his jug, jug, jug----
+
+The song was a comfort, at first--then a torment. She drove to it, and
+she steered to it, and when she tried to forget, it sang itself in her
+tired brain: "Jog, jog, jog--oh, _damn_!"
+
+Her father had had a chill. Miserable, weak as a small boy, he had
+curled up on the bottom of the car, his head on the seat, and gone to
+sleep. She was alone. The mile-posts went by slowly. The posts said
+there was a town ahead called Pellago, but it never came----
+
+And when it did come she was too tired to care. In a thick dream she
+drove through midnight streets of the town. In stupid paralysis she
+kicked at the door of the galvanized-iron-covered garage. No answer. She
+gave it up. She drove down the street and into the yard of a hotel
+marked by a swing sign out over the plank sidewalk. She got out the
+traveling bags, awakened her father, led him up on the porch.
+
+The Pellago Tavern was a transformed dwelling house. The pillars of the
+porch were aslant, and the rain-warped boards snapped beneath her feet.
+She hesitatingly opened the door. The hallway was dark and musty. A
+sound like a moan filtered down the unlighted stairs.
+
+There seemed to be light in the room on the right. Trying to assure
+herself that her father was a protection, she pushed open the door. She
+looked into an airless room, scattered with rubber boots, unsavory old
+corduroy caps, tattered magazines. By the stove nodded a wry-mouthed,
+squat old woman, and a tall, cheaply handsome man of forty. Tobacco
+juice stained the front of his stiff-bosomed, collarless shirt. His
+hands were white but huge.
+
+The old woman started. "Well?"
+
+"I want to get two rooms for the night, please."
+
+The man smirked at her. The woman creaked, "Well, I don't know. Where d'
+you come from, heh?"
+
+"We're motoring through."
+
+"Heh? Who's that man?"
+
+"He's my father, madam."
+
+"Needn't to be so hoity-toity about it, 'he's my father, madam!' F' that
+matter, that thing there is my husband!"
+
+The man had been dusting his shabby coat, stroking his mustache, smiling
+with sickly gallantry. He burbled, "Shut up, Teenie. This lady is all
+right. Give her a room. Number 2 is empty, and I guess Number 7 has been
+made up since Bill left--if 'tain't, the sheets ain't been slept on but
+one night."
+
+"Where d' you come----"
+
+"Now don't go shooting off a lot of questions at the lady, Teenie. I'll
+show her the rooms."
+
+The woman turned on her husband. He was perhaps twenty-five years
+younger; a quarter-century less soaked in hideousness. Her yellow,
+concave-sided teeth were bared at him, her mouth drew up on one side
+above the gums. "Pete, if I hear one word more out of you, out you go.
+Lady! Huh! Where d' you come from, young woman?"
+
+Claire was too weak to stagger away. She leaned against the door. Her
+father struggled to speak, but the woman hurled:
+
+"Wherdjuhcomfromised!"
+
+"From New York. Is there another hotel----"
+
+"Nah, there ain't another hotel! Oh! So you come from New York, do you?
+Snobs, that's what N' Yorkers are. I'll show you some rooms. They'll be
+two dollars apiece, and breakfast fifty cents extra."
+
+The woman led them upstairs. Claire wanted to flee, but---- Oh, she
+couldn't drive any farther! She couldn't!
+
+The floor of her room was the more bare in contrast to a two-foot-square
+splash of gritty ingrain carpet in front of the sway-backed bed. On the
+bed was a red comforter that was filthy beyond disguise. The yellow
+earthenware pitcher was cracked. The wall mirror was milky. Claire had
+been spoiled. She had found two excellent hotels since Yellowstone Park.
+She had forgotten how badly human beings can live. She protested:
+
+"Seems to me two dollars is a good deal to charge for this!"
+
+"I didn't say two dollars. I said three! Three each for you and your pa.
+If you don't like it you can drive on to the next town. It's only
+sixteen miles!"
+
+"Why the extra dollar--or extra two dollars?"
+
+"Don't you see that carpet? These is our best rooms. And three
+dollars---- I know you New Yorkers. I heard of a gent once, and they
+charged him five dollars--five dol-lars!--for a room in New York, and a
+boy grabbed his valise from him and wanted a short-bit and----"
+
+"Oh--all--right! Can we get something to eat?"
+
+"Now!?"
+
+"We haven't eaten since noon."
+
+"That ain't my fault! Some folks can go gadding around in automobuls,
+and some folks has to stay at home. If you think I'm going to sit up all
+night cooking for people that come chassayin' in here God knows what all
+hours of the day and night----! There's an all-night lunch down the
+street."
+
+When she was alone Claire cried a good deal.
+
+Her father declined to go out to the lunch room. The chill of the late
+ride was still on him, he croaked through his door; he was shivering; he
+was going right to bed.
+
+"Yes, do, dear. I'll bring you back a sandwich."
+
+"Safe to go out alone?"
+
+"Anything's safe after facing that horrible---- I do believe in witches,
+now. Listen, dear; I'll bring you a hot-water bag."
+
+She took the bag down to the office. The landlady was winding the clock,
+while her husband yawned. She glared.
+
+"I wonder if I may have some hot water for my father? He has a chill."
+
+"Stove's out. No hot water in the house."
+
+"Couldn't you heat some?"
+
+"Now look here, miss. You come in here, asking for meals and rooms at
+midnight, and you want a cut rate on everything, and I do what I can,
+but enough's enough!"
+
+The woman stalked out. Her husband popped up. "Mustn't mind the old
+girl, lady. Got a grouch. Well, you can't blame her, in a way; when Bill
+lit out, he done her out of four-bits! But I'll tell you!" he leered.
+"You leave me the hot-water biznai, and I'll heat you some water
+myself!"
+
+"Thank you, but I won't trouble you. Good night."
+
+Claire was surprised to find a warm, rather comfortable all-night lunch
+room, called the Alaska Café, with a bright-eyed man of twenty-five in
+charge. He nodded in a friendly way, and made haste with her order of
+two ham-and-egg sandwiches. She felt adventurous. She polished her knife
+and fork on a napkin, as she had seen people do in lunches along the
+way. A crowd of three rubbed their noses against the front window to
+stare at the strange girl in town, but she ignored them, and they
+drifted away.
+
+The lunchman was cordial: "At a hotel, ma'am? Which one? Gee, not the
+Tavern?"
+
+"Why yes. Is there another?"
+
+"Sure. First-rate one, two blocks over, one up."
+
+"The woman said the Tavern was the only hotel."
+
+"Oh, she's an old sour-face. Don't mind her. Just bawl her out. What's
+she charging you for a room?"
+
+"Three dollars."
+
+"Per each? Gee! Well, she sticks tourists anywheres from one buck to
+three. Natives get by for fifty cents. She's pretty fierce, but she
+ain't a patch on her husband. He comes from Spokane--nobody knows
+why--guess he was run out. He takes some kind of dope, and he cheats at
+rummy."
+
+"But why does the town stand either of them? Why do you let them torture
+innocent people? Why don't you put them in the insane hospital, where
+they belong?"
+
+"That's a good one!" her friend chuckled. But he saw it only as a joke.
+
+She thought of moving her father to the good hotel, but she hadn't the
+strength.
+
+Claire Boltwood, of Brooklyn Heights, went through the shanty streets of
+Pellago, Montana, at one A.M. carrying a sandwich in a paper bag which
+had recently been used for salted peanuts, and a red rubber hot-water
+bag filled with water at the Alaska Café. At the Tavern she hastened
+past the office door. She made her father eat his sandwich; she teased
+him and laughed at him till the hot-water bag had relieved his
+chill-pinched back; she kissed him boisterously, and started for her own
+room, at the far end of the hall.
+
+The lights were off. She had to feel her way, and she hesitated at the
+door of her room before she entered. She imagined voices, creeping
+footsteps, people watching her from a distance. She flung into the
+room, and when the kindled lamp showed her familiar traveling bag, she
+felt safer. But once she was in bed, with the sheet down as far as
+possible over the loathly red comforter, the quiet rustled and snapped
+about her, and she could not relax. Sinking into sleep seemed slipping
+into danger, and a dozen times she started awake.
+
+But only slowly did she admit to herself that she actually did hear a
+fumbling, hear the knob of her door turning.
+
+"W-who's there?"
+
+"It's me, lady. The landlord. Brought you the hot water."
+
+"Thanks so much, but I don't need it now."
+
+"Got something else for you. Come to the door. Don't want to holler and
+wake ev'body up."
+
+At the door she said timorously, "Nothing else I want, thank you.
+D-don't bother me."
+
+"Why, I've brought you up a sandwich, girlie, all nice and hot, and a
+nip of something to take the chill off."
+
+"I don't want it, I tell you!"
+
+"Be a sport now! You use Pete right, and he'll use you right. Shame to
+see a lady like you not gettin' no service here. Open the door. Dandy
+sandwich!" The knob rattled again. She said nothing. The heel of her
+palm pressed against the door till the molding ate into it. The man was
+snorting:
+
+"I ain't going to all this trouble and then throw away a good sandwich.
+You asked me----"
+
+"M-must I s-shout?"
+
+"S-shout your fool head off!" He kicked the door. "Good friends of mine,
+'long this end of the hall. Aw, listen. Just teasing. I'm not going to
+rob you, little honey bird. Laws, you could have a million dollars, and
+old Pete wouldn't take two-bits. I just get so darn lonely in this hick
+town. Like to chat to live ones from the big burg. I'm a city fella
+myself--Spokane and Cheyenne and everything."
+
+In her bare feet, Claire had run across the room, looked desperately out
+of the window. Could she climb out, reach her friend of the Alaska Café?
+If she had to----
+
+Then she grinned. The world was rose-colored and hung with tinkling
+bells. "I love even that Pinky person!" she said. In the yard of the
+hotel, beside her Gomez, was a Teal bug, and two men were sleeping in
+blankets on the ground.
+
+She marched over to the door. She flung it open. The man started back.
+He was holding an electric, torch. She could not see him, but to the
+hovering ball of light she remarked, "Two men, friends of mine, are
+below, by their car. You will go at once, or I'll call them. If you
+think I am bluffing, go down and look. Good night!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+THE FREE WOMAN
+
+
+Before breakfast, Claire darted down to the hotel yard. She beamed at
+Milt, who was lacing a rawhide patch on a tire, before she remembered
+that they were not on speaking terms. They both looked extremely
+sheepish and young. It was Pinky Parrott who was the social lubricant.
+Pinky was always on speaking terms with everybody. "Ah, here she is! The
+little lady of the mutinous eyes! Our colonel of the flivver hussars!"
+
+But he got no credit. Milt straightened up and lumbered, "Hel-lo!"
+
+She peeped at him and whispered, "Hel-lo!"
+
+"Say, oh please, Claire---- I didn't mean----"
+
+"Oh, I know! Let's--let's go have breakfast."
+
+"Was awfully afraid you'd think we were fresh, but when we came in last
+night, and saw your car--didn't like the looks of the hotel much, and
+thought we'd stick around."
+
+"I'm so glad. Oh, Milt--yes, and you, Mr. Parrott--will you
+whip--lick--beat up--however you want to say it--somebody for me?"
+
+With one glad communal smile Milt and Pinky curved up their wrists and
+made motions as of pulling up their sleeves.
+
+"But not unless I say so. I want to be a Citizeness Fixit. I've been
+good for so long. But now----"
+
+"Show him to me!" and "Up, lads, and atum!" responded her squad.
+
+"Not till after breakfast."
+
+It was a sufficiently vile breakfast, at the Tavern. The feature was
+curious cakes whose interior was raw creepy dough. A dozen skilled
+workmen were at the same long table with Claire, Milt, Pinky, and Mr.
+Boltwood--the last two of whom were polite and scenically descriptive to
+each other, but portentously silent about gold-mines. The landlady and a
+slavey waited on table; the landlord could be seen loafing in the
+kitchen.
+
+Toward the end of the meal Claire insultingly crooked her finger at the
+landlady and said, "Come here, woman."
+
+The landlady stared, then ignored her.
+
+"Very well. Then I'll say it publicly!" Claire swept the workmen with an
+affectionate smile. "Gentlemen of Pellago, I want you to know from one
+of the poor tourists who have been cheated at this nasty place that we
+depend on you to do something. This woman and her husband are criminals,
+in the way they overcharge for hideous food and----"
+
+The landlady had been petrified. Now she charged down. Behind her came
+her husband. Milt arose. The husband stopped. But it was Pinky who faced
+the landlady, tapped her shoulder, and launched into, "And what's more,
+you hag, if our new friends here have any sense, they'll run you out of
+town."
+
+That was only the beginning of Pinky's paper on corrections and
+charities. He enjoyed himself. Before he finished, the landlady was
+crying ... she voluntarily promised to give her boarders waffles, some
+morning, jus' soon as she could find the waffle-iron.
+
+With her guard about her, at the office desk, Claire paid one dollar
+apiece for the rooms, and discussion was not.
+
+Before they started, Milt had the chance to say to her, "I'm getting so
+I can handle Pinky now. Have to. Thinking of getting hold of his
+gold-mine. I just give him the eye, as your friend Mr. Saxton would, and
+he gets so meek----"
+
+"But don't! Please understand me, Milt; I do admire Mr. Saxton; he is
+fine and capable, and really generous; only---- He may be just a bit
+snippish at times, while you--you're a playmate--father's and
+mine--and---- I did face that landlady, didn't I! I'm not soft and
+trivial, am I! Praise!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+She had driven through the panhandle of Idaho into Washington, through
+Spokane, through the writhing lava deposits of Moses Coulee where fruit
+trees grow on volcanic ash. Beyond Wenatchee, with its rows of apple
+trees striping the climbing fields like corduroy in folds, she had come
+to the famous climb of Blewett Pass. Once over that pass, and
+Snoqualmie, she would romp into Seattle.
+
+She was sorry that she hadn't come to know Milt better, but perhaps she
+would see him in Seattle.
+
+Not adventure alone was she finding, but high intellectual benefit in
+studying the names of towns in the state of Washington. Not Kankakee nor
+Kalamazoo nor Oshkosh can rival the picturesque fancy of Washington, and
+Claire combined the town-names in a lyric so emotion-stirring that it
+ought, perhaps, to be the national anthem. It ran:
+
+    Humptulips, Tum Tum, Moclips, Yelm,
+    Satsop, Bucoda, Omak, Enumclaw,
+    Tillicum, Bossburg, Chettlo, Chattaroy,
+    Zillah, Selah, Cowiche, Keechelus,
+    Bluestem, Bluelight, Onion Creek, Sockeye,
+    Antwine, Chopaka, Startup, Kapowsin,
+      Skamokawa, Sixprong, Pysht!
+
+    Klickitat, Kittitas, Spangle, Cedonia,
+    Pe Ell, Cle Elum, Sallal, Chimacum,
+    Index, Taholah, Synarep, Puyallup,
+    Wallula, Wawawai, Wauconda, Washougal,
+    Walla Walla, Washtucna, Wahluke,
+    Solkulk, Newaukum, Wahkiakus,
+      Penawawa, Ohop, Ladd!
+
+    Harrah, Olalla, Umtanum, Chuckanut,
+    Soap Lake, Loon Lake, Addy, Ace, Usk,
+    Chillowist, Moxee City, Yellepit, Cashup,
+    Moonax, Mabton, Tolt, Mukilteo,
+    Poulsbo, Toppenish, Whetstone, Inchelium,
+    Fishtrap, Carnation, Shine, Monte Cristo,
+      Conconully, Roza, Maud!
+
+    China Bend, Zumwalt, Sapolil, Riffle,
+    Touchet, Chesaw, Chew, Klum, Bly,
+    Humorist, Hammer, Nooksack, Oso,
+    Samamish, Dusty, Tiger, Turk, Dot,
+    Scenic, Tekoa, Nellita, Attalia,
+    Steilacoom, Tweedle, Ruff, Lisabeula,
+    Latah, Peola, Towal, Eltopia,
+      Steptoe, Pluvius, Sol Duc, Twisp!
+
+"And then," complained Claire, "they talk about Amy Lowell! I leave it
+to you, Henry B., if any union poet has ever written as gay a refrain as
+'Ohop Ladd'!"
+
+She was not merely playing mental whist. She was trying to keep from
+worry. All the way she had heard of Blewett Pass; its fourteen miles of
+climbing, and the last half mile of stern pitch. On this eastern side of
+the pass, the new road was not open; there was a tortuous,
+flint-scattered trail, too narrow, in most places, for the passing of
+other cars. Claire was glad that Milt and Pinky were near her.
+
+If so many of the race of kind advisers of tourists had not warned her
+about it, doubtless she would have gone over the pass without
+difficulty. But their voluntary croaking sapped her nerve, and her
+father's. He kept worrying, "Do you think we better try it?" When they
+stopped at a ranch house at the foot of the climb, for the night, he
+seemed unusually tired. He complained of chill. He did not eat
+breakfast. They started out silent, depressed.
+
+He crouched in the corner of the seat. She looked at him and was
+anxious. She stopped on the first level space on the pass, crying, "You
+are perfectly miserable. I'm afraid of---- I think we ought to see a
+doctor."
+
+"Oh, I'll be all right."
+
+But she waited till Milt came pit-pattering up the slope. "Father feels
+rather sick. What shall I do? Turn round and drive to the nearest
+doctor--at Cashmere, I suppose?"
+
+"There's a magnolious medico ahead here on the pass," Pinky Parrott
+interrupted. "A young thing, but they say he's a graduate of Harvard.
+He's out here because he has some timber-claims. Look, Milt o' the
+Daggett, why don't you drive Miss Boltwood's 'bus--make better time, and
+hustle the old gent up to the doc, and I'll come on behind with your
+machine."
+
+"Why," Claire fretted, "I hate----"
+
+A new Milt, the boss, abrupt, almost bullying, snapped out of his bug.
+"Good idee. Jump in, Claire. I'll take your father up. Heh, whasat,
+Pink? Yes, I get it; second turn beyond grocery. Right. On we go. Huh?
+Oh, we'll think about the gold-mine later, Pink."
+
+With the three of them wedged into the seat of the Gomez, and Pinky
+recklessly skittering after them in the bug, they climbed again--and lo!
+there was no climb! Unconsciously Claire had hesitated before dashing at
+each sharp upsloping bend; had lost headway while she was wondering,
+"Suppose the car went off this curve?" Milt never sped up, but he never
+slackened. His driving was as rhythmical as music.
+
+They were so packed in that he could scarcely reach gear lever and
+hand-brake. He halted on a level, and curtly asked, "That trap-door in
+the back of the car--convertible extra seat?"
+
+"Yes, but we almost never use it, and it's stuck. Can't get it open."
+
+"I'll open it all right! Got a big screwdriver? Want you sit back there.
+Need elbow room."
+
+"Perhaps I'd better drive with Mr. Pinky."
+
+"Nope. Don't think better."
+
+With one yank he opened the trap-door, revealing a folding seat, which
+she meekly took. Back there, she reflected, "How strong his back looks.
+Funny how the little silvery hairs grow at the back of his neck."
+
+They came to a settlement and the red cedar bungalow of Dr. Hooker
+Beach. The moment Claire saw the doctor's thin demanding face, she
+trusted him. He spoke to Mr. Boltwood with assurance: "All you need is
+some rest, and your digestion is a little shaky. Been eating some pork?
+Might stay here a day or two. We're glad to have a glimpse of
+Easterners."
+
+Mr. Boltwood went to bed in the Beaches' guest-room. Mrs. Beach gave
+Claire and Milt lunch, with thin toast and thin china, on a porch from
+which an arroyo dropped down for a hundred feet. Fir trees scented the
+air, and a talking machine played the same Russian music that was
+popular that same moment in New York. And the Beaches knew people who
+knew Claire.
+
+Claire was thinking. These people were genuine aristocrats, while Jeff
+Saxton, for all his family and his assumptions about life, was the
+eternal climber. Milt, who had been uncomfortable with Jeff, was serene
+and un-self-conscious with the Beaches, and the doctor gratefully took
+his advice about his stationary gas engine. "He's rather like the
+Beaches in his simplicity--yes, and his ability to do anything if he
+considers it worth while," she decided.
+
+After lunch, when the doctor and his wife had to trot off to a patient,
+Claire proposed, "Let's walk up to that ledge of rock and see the view,
+shall we, Milt?"
+
+"Yes! And keep an eye on the road for Pinky. The poor nut, he hasn't
+showed up. So reckless; hope he hasn't driven the Teal off the road."
+
+She crouched at the edge of a rock, where she would have been
+frightened, a month before, and looked across the main road to a creek
+in a pine-laced gully. He sat beside her, elbows on knees.
+
+"Those Beaches--their kin are judges and senators and college
+Presidents, all over New England," she said. "This doctor must be the
+grandson of the ambassador, I fancy."
+
+"Honest? I thought they were just regular folks. Was I nice?"
+
+"Of course you were."
+
+"Did I--did I wash my paws and sit up and beg?"
+
+"No, you aren't a little dog. I'm that. You're the big mastiff that
+guards the house, while I run and yip." She was turned toward him,
+smiling. Her hand was beside him. He touched the back of it with his
+forefinger, as though he was afraid he might soil it.
+
+There seemed to be no reason, but he was trembling as he stammered,
+"I--I--I'm d-darn glad I didn't know they were anybody, or 'd have been
+as bad as a flivver driver the first time he tries a t-twelve-cylinder
+machine. G-gee your hand is little!"
+
+She took it back and inspected it. "I suppose it is. And pretty
+useless."
+
+"N-no, it isn't, but your shoes are. Why don't you wear boots when
+you're out like this?" A flicker of his earlier peremptoriness came into
+his voice. She resented it:
+
+"My shoes are perfectly sensible! I will not wear those horrible
+vegetarian uplift sacks on my feet!"
+
+"Your shoes may be all right for New York, but you're not going to New
+York for a while. You've simply got to see some of this country while
+you're out here--British Columbia and Alaska."
+
+"Would be nice, but I've had enough roughing----"
+
+"Chance to see the grandest mountains in the world, almost, and then you
+want to go back to tea and all that junk!"
+
+"Stop trying to bully me! You have been dictatorial ever since we
+started up----"
+
+"Have I? Didn't mean to be. Though I suppose I usually am bullying. At
+least I run things. There's two kinds of people; those that give orders,
+and those that naturally take them; and I belong to the first one,
+and----"
+
+"But my dear Milt, so do I, and really----"
+
+"And mostly I'd take them from you. But hang it, Seattle is just a day
+away, and you'll forget me. Wish I could kidnap you. Have half a mind
+to. Take you way up into the mountains, and when you got used to
+roughing it in sure-enough wilderness--say you'd helped me haul timber
+for a flume--then we'd be real pals. You have the stuff in you, but you
+still need toughening before----"
+
+"Listen to me, Milton. You have been reading fiction, about this
+man--sometimes he's a lumberjack, and sometimes a trapper or a miner,
+but always he's frightfully hairy--and he sees a charming woman in the
+city, and kidnaps her, and shuts her up in some unspeakable shanty, and
+makes her eat nice cold boiled potatoes, and so naturally, she simply
+adores him! A hundred men have written that story, and it's an example
+of their insane masculine conceit, which I, as a woman, resent.
+Shakespeare may have started it, with his silly _Taming of the Shrew_.
+Shakespeare's men may have been real, but his women were dolls, designed
+to please some majesty. You may not know it, but there are women today
+who don't live just to please majesties' fancies. If a woman like me
+were kidnapped, she would go on hating the brute, or if she did give in,
+then the man would lose anyway, because she would have degenerated;
+she'd have turned into a slave, and lost exactly the things he'd liked
+in her. Oh, you cavemen! With your belief that you can force women to
+like you! I have more courage than any of you!"
+
+"I admit you have courage, but you'd have still more, if you bucked the
+wilds."
+
+"Nonsense! In New York I face every day a hundred complicated problems
+you don't know I ever heard of!"
+
+"Let me remind you that Brer Julius Cæsar said he'd rather be mayor in a
+little Spanish town than police commissioner in Rome. I'm king in
+Schoenstrom, while you're just one of a couple hundred thousand bright
+people in New York----"
+
+"Really? Oh, at least a million. Thanks!"
+
+"Oh--gee--Claire, I didn't mean to be personal, and get in a row and
+all, but--can't you see--kind of desperate--Seattle so soon----"
+
+Her face was turned from him; its thin profile was firm as silver wire.
+He blundered off into silence and--they were at it again!
+
+"I didn't mean to make you angry," he gulped.
+
+"Well, you did! Bullying---- You and your men of granite, in mackinaws
+and a much-needed shave, trying to make a well-bred woman satisfied with
+a view consisting of rocks and stumps and socks on the line! Let me tell
+you that compared with a street canyon, a mountain canyon is simply
+dead, and yet these unlettered wild men----"
+
+"See here! I don't know if you're firing these adjectives at me, but I
+don't know that I'm so much more unlettered---- You talked about taking
+French in your finishing-school. Well, they taught American in mine!"
+
+"They would!"
+
+Then he was angry. "Yes, and chemistry and physics and Greek and Latin
+and history and mathematics and economics, and I took more or less of a
+whirl at all of them, while you were fiddling with ribbons, and then I
+had to buck mechanics and business methods."
+
+"I also 'fiddled' with manners--an unfortunate omission in your
+curriculum, I take it! You have been reasonably rude----"
+
+"So have you!"
+
+"I had to be! But I trust you begin to see that even your strong hand
+couldn't control a woman's taste. Kidnapping! As intelligent a boy as
+you wanting to imitate these boorish movie----"
+
+"Not a darn bit more boorish than your smart set, with its champagne and
+these orgies at country clubs----"
+
+"You know so much about country clubs, don't you! The worst orgy I ever
+saw at one was the golf champion reading the beauty department in
+_Boudoir_. Would you mind backing up your statements about the vices of
+myself and my friends----"
+
+"Oh, you. Oh, I didn't mean----"
+
+"Then why did you----"
+
+"Now you're bullying me, and you know that if the smart set isn't
+vicious, at least it's so snobbish that it can't see any----"
+
+"Then it's wise to be snobbish, because if it did condescend----"
+
+"I won't stand people talking about condescending----"
+
+"Would you mind not shouting so?"
+
+"Very well! I'll keep still!"
+
+Silence again, while both of them looked unhappy, and tried to remember
+just what they had been fighting about. They did not at first notice a
+small red car larruping gaily over the road beneath the ledge, though
+the driver was a pink-haired man in a green coat. He was almost gone
+before Milt choked, "It's Pinky!"
+
+"Pink! Pinky!" he bellowed.
+
+Pinky looked back but, instead of stopping, he sped up, and kept going.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+THE MINE OF LOST SOULS
+
+
+"That couldn't have been Pinky! Why! Why, the car he had was red," cried
+Claire.
+
+"Sure. The idiot's got hold of some barn paint somewhere, and tried to
+daub it over. He's trying to make a getaway with it!"
+
+"We'll chase him. In my car."
+
+"Don't you mind?"
+
+"Of course not. I do not give up my objections to the roughing
+philosophy, but---- You were right about these shoes---- Oh, don't leave
+me behind! Want to go along!"
+
+These sentences she broke, scattered, and totally lost as she scrambled
+after him, down the rocks. He halted. His lips trembled. He picked her
+up, carried her down, hesitated a second while his face--curiously
+foreshortened as she looked up at it from his big arms--twisted with
+emotion. He set her down gently, and she climbed into the Gomez.
+
+It seemed to her that he drove rather too carefully, too slowly. He took
+curves and corners evenly. His face was as empty of expression, as
+unmelodramatic, as that of a jitney driver. Then she looked at the
+speedometer. He was making forty-eight miles an hour down hill and forty
+to thirty on upgrades.
+
+They were in sight of the fleeing Pinky in two miles. Pinky looked back;
+instantly was to be seen pulling his hat low, stooping over--the demon
+driver. Milt merely sat more erect, looked more bland and white-browed
+and steady.
+
+The bug fled before them on a winding shelf road. It popped up a curve,
+then slowed down. "He took it too fast. Poor Pink!" said Milt.
+
+They gained on that upslope, but as the road dropped, the bug started
+forward desperately. Another car was headed toward them; was drawn to
+the side of the road, in one of the occasional widenings. Pinky passed
+it so carelessly that, with crawling spine, Claire saw the outer wheels
+of the bug on the very edge of the road--the edge of a fifty-foot drop.
+Milt went easily past the halted car--even waved his hand to the waiting
+driver.
+
+This did not seem to Claire at all like the chase of a thief. She looked
+casually ahead at Pinky, as he whirled round an S-shaped curve on the
+downslope, then---- It was too quick to see what happened. The bug
+headed directly toward the edge of the road, shot out, went down the
+embankment, over and over. It lay absurdly upside-down, its muffler and
+brake-rods showing in place of the seat and hood.
+
+Milt quite carefully stopped the Gomez. The day was still--just a
+breathing of running water in the deep gully. The topsy-turvy car below
+them was equally still; no sight of Pinky, no sound.
+
+The gauche boy gone from him, Milt took her hand, pressed it to his
+cheek. "Claire! You're here! You might have gone with him, to make
+room---- Oh, I was bullying you because I was bullying myself! Trying to
+make myself tell you--but oh, you know, you know! Can you stand going
+down there? I hate to have you, but you may be needed."
+
+"Yes. I'll come," she whispered.
+
+Their crawl down the rock-rolling embankment seemed desperately slow.
+
+"Wait here," bade Milt, at the bottom.
+
+She looked away from the grotesque car. She had seen that one side of it
+was crumpled like paper in an impatient hand.
+
+Milt was stooping, looking under; seemed to be saying something. When he
+came back, he did not speak. He wiped his forehead. "Come. We'll climb
+back up. Nothing to do, now. Guess you better not try to help, anyway.
+You might not sleep well."
+
+He gave her his hand up the embankment, drove to the nearest house,
+telephoned to Dr. Beach. Later she waited while Milt and the doctor,
+with two other men, were raising the car. As she waited she thought of
+the Teal bug as a human thing--as her old friend, to which she had often
+turned in need.
+
+Milt returned to her. "There is one thing for you to do. Before he died,
+Pinky asked me to go get his wife--Dolores, I think it is. She's up in a
+side canyon, few miles away. She may want a woman around. Beach will
+take care of--of him. Can you come?"
+
+"Of course. Oh, Milt, I didn't----"
+
+"I didn't----"
+
+"--mean you were a caveman! You're my big brother!"
+
+"--mean you were a snob!"
+
+They drove five miles along the highway, then up a trail where the Gomez
+brushed the undergrowth on each side as it desperately dug into moss,
+rain-gutted ruts, loose rocks, all on a vicious slant which seemed to
+push the car down again. Beside them, the mountain woods were sacredly
+quiet, with fern and lily and green-lit spaces. They came out in a
+clearing, before dusk. Beside the clearing was a brook, with a crude
+cradle--sign of a not very successful gold miner. Before a log cabin, in
+a sway-sided rocker, creaked a tall, white, flabby woman, once nearly
+beautiful, now rubbed at the edges. She rose, huddling her wrapper about
+her bosom, as they drove into the clearing and picked their way through
+stumps and briars.
+
+"Where you folks think you're going?" she whimpered.
+
+"Why, why just----"
+
+"I cer'nly am glad to see somebody! I been 'most scared to death. Been
+here alone two weeks now. Got a shotgun, but if anybody come, I guess
+they'd take it away from me. I was brought up nice, no rough-house
+or---- Say, did you folks come to see the gold-mine?"
+
+"M-mine?" babbled Milt.
+
+"Course not. Pinky said I was to show it, but I'm so sore on that
+low-life hound now, I swear I won't even take the trouble and lie about
+it. No more gold in that crick than there is in my eye. Or than there's
+flour or pork in the house!"
+
+The woman's voice was rising. Her gestures were furious. Claire and Milt
+stood close, their hands slipping together.
+
+"What d' you think of a man that'd go off and leave a lady without half
+enough to eat, while he gallivanted around, trying to raise money by
+gambling, when he was offered a good job up here? He's a gambler--told
+me he was a rich mine-owner, but never touched a mine in his life. Lying
+hound--worst talker in ten counties! Got a gambler's hand on him, too--I
+ought to seen it! Oh, wait till I get hold of him; just wait!"
+
+Claire thought of the still hand--so still--that she had seen under the
+edge of the upturned car. She tried to speak, while the woman raved on,
+wrath feeding wrath:
+
+"Thank God, I ain't really his wife! My husband is a fine man--Mr.
+Kloh--Dlorus Kloh, my name is. Mr. Kloh's got a fine job with the mill,
+at North Yakima. Oh, I was a fool! This gambler Pinky Parrott, he comes
+along with his elegant ways, and he hands me out a swell line of gab,
+and I ups and leaves poor Kloh, and the kid, and the nicest kid---- Say,
+please, could you folks take me wherever you're going? Maybe I could get
+a job again--used to was a good waitress, and I ain't going to wait here
+any longer for that lying, cheating, mean-talking----"
+
+"Oh, Mrs. Kloh, please don't! He's dead!" wailed Claire.
+
+"Dead? Pinky? Oh--my--God! And I won't ever see him, and he was so funny
+and----"
+
+She threw herself on the ground; she kicked her heels; she tore at her
+loosely caught, tarnished blonde hair.
+
+Claire knelt by her. "You mustn't--you mustn't--we'll----"
+
+"Damn you, with your smug-faced husband there, and your fine auto and
+all, butting into poor folks' troubles!" shrieked Dlorus.
+
+Claire stumbled to her feet, stood with her clenched right hand to her
+trembling lips, cupping it with her nervous left hand. Her shoulders
+were dejected. Milt pleaded, "Let's hike out. I don't mind decent honest
+grease, but this place--look in at table! Dirty dishes---- And gin
+bottles on the floor!"
+
+"Desert her? When she needs me so?" Claire started forward, but Milt
+caught her sleeve, and admired, "You were right! You've got more nerve
+than I have!"
+
+"No. I wouldn't dare if---- I'm glad you're here with me!"
+
+Claire calmed the woman; bound up her hair; washed her face--which
+needed it; and sat on the log doorstep, holding Dlorus's head in her
+lap, while Dlorus sobbed, "Pinky--dead! Him that was so lively! And he
+was so sweet a lover, oh, so sweet. He was a swell fellow; my, he could
+just make you laugh and cry, the way he talked; and he was so educated,
+and he played the vi'lin--he could do anything--and athaletic--he would
+have made me rich. Oh, let me alone. I just want to be alone and think
+of him. I was so bored with Kloh, and no nice dresses or nothin', and--I
+did love the kid, but he squalled so, just all the time, and Pinky come,
+and he was so funny---- Oh, let me alone!"
+
+Claire shivered, then, and the strength seemed to go from the steady
+arms that had supported Dlorus's head. Dusk had sneaked up on them; the
+clearing was full of swimming grayness, and between the woman's screams,
+the woods crackled. Each time Dlorus spoke, her screech was like that of
+an animal in the woods, and round about them crept such sinister echoes
+that Milt kept wanting to look back over his shoulder.
+
+"Yes," sighed Claire at last, "perhaps we'd better go."
+
+"If you go, I'll kill myself! Take me to Mr. Kloh! Oh, he was---- My
+husband, Mr. Kloh. Oh, so good. Only he didn't understand a lady has to
+have her good times, and Pink danced so well----"
+
+Dlorus sprang up, flung into the cabin, stood in the dimness of the
+doorway, holding a butcher knife and clamoring, "I will! I'll kill
+myself if you leave me! Take me down to Mr. Kloh, at North Yakima,
+tonight!"
+
+Milt sauntered toward her.
+
+"Don't you get flip, young man! I mean it! And I'll kill you----"
+
+Most unchivalrously, quite out of the picture of gray grief, Milt
+snapped, "That'll be about enough of you! Here! Gimme that knife!"
+
+She dropped the knife, sniveling, "Oh Gawd, somebody's always bullying
+me! And all I wanted was a good time!"
+
+Claire herded her into the cabin. "We'll take you to your
+husband--tonight. Come, let's wash up, and I'll help you put on your
+prettiest dress."
+
+"Honest, will you?" cried the woman, in high spirits, all grief put
+aside. "I got a dandy China silk dress, and some new white kid shoes!
+My, Mr. Kloh, he won't hardly know me. He'll take me back. I know how to
+handle him. That'll be swell, going back in an automobile. And I got a
+new hair-comb, with genuine Peruvian diamonds. Say, you aren't kidding
+me along?"
+
+In the light of the lantern Milt had kindled, Claire looked
+questioningly at him. Both of them shrugged. Claire promised, "Yes.
+Tonight. If we can make it."
+
+"And will you jolly Mr. Kloh for me? Gee, I'll be awfully scared of him.
+I swear, I'll wash his dishes and everything. He's a good man. He----
+Say, he ain't seen my new parasol, neither!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+ACROSS THE ROOF OF THE WORLD
+
+
+Claire dressed Dlorus, cooked a dinner of beet greens, potatoes, and
+trout; and by bullying and great sweetness kept Dlorus from too many
+trips to the gin bottle. Milt caught the trout, cut wood, locked in a
+log shed Pinky's forlorn mining-tools. They started for North Yakima at
+eight of the evening, with Dlorus, back in the spare seat, alternately
+sobbing and to inattentive ears announcing what she'd say to the Old
+Hens.
+
+Milt was devoted to persuading the huge cat of a car to tiptoe down the
+slippery gouged ruts of the road, and Claire's mind was driving with
+him. Every time he touched the foot-brake, she could feel the strain in
+the tendons of her own ankle.
+
+A mile down the main road they stopped at a store-post-office to
+telephone back to Mr. Boltwood and Dr. Beach. On the porch was a man in
+overalls and laced boots. He was lean and quick-moving. As he raised his
+head, and his spectacles flashed, Claire caught Milt's arm and gasped,
+"Oh, my dear, I'm in a beautiful state of nerves. For a moment I thought
+that was Jeff Saxton. I bet it is his astral body!"
+
+"And you thought he was going to forbid your running away on this fool
+expedition, and you were scared," chuckled Milt, as they sat in the car.
+
+"Of course I was! And I still am! I know what he'll say afterward! He
+_is_ here, reasoning with me. Oughtn't I to be sensible? Oughtn't I to
+have you leave me at the Beaches' before you start--jolly jaunt to take
+a strange woman to her presumably homicidal husband! Why am I totally
+lacking in sense? Just listen to what Jeff is saying!"
+
+"Of course you ought to go back, and let me drive alone. Absolutely
+insane, your----"
+
+"But you would like me to go along, wouldn't you!"
+
+"Like you to? It's our last ride together, and that bloomin' old
+Browning never thought of a ride together by midnight over the roof of
+the world! No, it's really our first ride together, and tomorrow--you're
+gone."
+
+"No, I sha'n't be gone, but----" Addressing herself to the astounded
+overalled man on the porch, she declared, "You're quite right, Jeff. And
+Milt is wrong. Insane adventure. Only, it's wonderful to be young enough
+to do insane adventures. Falling down abyssy places is so much more
+interesting than bridge. I'm going--going--going!... Milt, you
+telephone."
+
+"Don't you think you better?"
+
+"No, siree! Father would forbid me. Try not to get him--just tell Dr.
+Beach where we're going, and hang up, and scoot!"
+
+All night they drove; down the Pacific side of Blewett Pass; down the
+sweeping spirals to a valley. Dlorus drowsed in the extra seat. Claire's
+sleepy head was fantastically swaying. She was awakened by an
+approaching roar and, as though she sat at a play, she watched a big
+racing machine coming toward them, passing them with two wheels in the
+ditch. She had only a thunderous glimpse of the stolid driver; a dark,
+hooded, romantic figure, like a sailor at the helm in a storm.
+
+Milt cried, "Golly! May be a transcontinental racer! Be in New York in
+five days--going night and day--take mud at fifty an hour--crack
+mechanic right from the factory--change tires in three minutes--people
+waiting up all night to give him gasoline and a sandwich! That's my idea
+of fun!"
+
+Studying Milt's shadowed face, Claire considered, "He could do it, too.
+Sitting there at the wheel, taking danger and good road with the same
+steadiness. Oh, he's--well, anyway, he's a dear boy."
+
+But what she said was:
+
+"Less dramatic things for you, now, Milt. Trigonometry is going to be
+your idea of fun; blueprints and engineering books."
+
+"Yes. I know. I'm going to do it. Do four years' work in three--or two.
+I'll tack pages of formulas on the wall, in my bum hallroom, and study
+'em while I'm shaving. Oh, I'll be the grind! But learn to dance the
+fox-trot, though! If America gets into the war, I'll get into the
+engineering corps, and come back to school afterward."
+
+"Will the finances----"
+
+"I'll sell my garage, by mail. Rauskukle will take it. He won't rob me
+of more than a thousand dollars on price--not much more."
+
+"You're going to love Seattle. And we'll have some good tramps while I'm
+there, you and I."
+
+"Honestly? Will you want to?"
+
+"Do you suppose for one second I'd give up my feeling of free air? If
+you don't come and get me, I'll call on you and make you come!"
+
+"Warn you I'll probably be living over some beanery."
+
+"Probably. With dirty steps leading up to it. I'll sweep the steps. I'll
+cook supper for you. I can do things, can't I! I did manage Dlorus,
+didn't I!"
+
+He was murmuring, "Claire, dear!" when she changed her tone to the echo
+of Brooklyn Heights, and hurried on, "You do understand, don't you!
+We'll be, uh, good friends."
+
+"Yes." He drove with much speed and silence.
+
+Though they were devouring the dark road, though roadside rocks, caught
+by the headlights, seemed to fly up at them, though they went on
+forever, chased by a nightmare, Claire snuggled down in security. Her
+head drooped against his shoulder. He put his arm about her, his hand
+about her waist. She sleepily wondered if she ought to let him. She
+heard herself muttering, "Sorry I was so rude when you were so rude,"
+and her chilly cheek discovered that the smooth-worn shoulder of his old
+blue coat was warm, and she wondered some more about the questions of
+waists and hands and---- She was asleep.
+
+She awoke, bewildered to find that dawn was slipping into the air. While
+she had slept Milt had taken his arm from about her and fished out a
+lap-robe for her. Behind them, Dlorus was slumbering, with her soft
+mouth wide open. Claire felt the luxury of the pocket of warmth under
+the lap-robe; she comfortably stretched her legs while she pictured Milt
+driving on all the night, rigid, tireless, impersonal as the engineer of
+a night express.
+
+They came into North Yakima at breakfast time, and found the house of
+Mr. Kloh, a neat, bare, drab frame box, with tight small front and back
+yards. Dlorus was awake, and when she wasn't yawning, she was enjoying
+being hysterical.
+
+"Miss Boltwood," she whined, "you go in and jolly him up."
+
+Milt begged, "Better let me do it, Claire."
+
+They looked squarely at each other. "No, I think I'd better," she
+decided.
+
+"Right, Claire, but--I wish I could do more things for you."
+
+"I know!"
+
+He lifted her stiff, cold little body from the car. His hands under her
+arms, he held her on the running-board an instant, her eyes level with
+his. "Little sister--plucky little sister!" he sighed. He lowered her to
+the ground.
+
+Claire knocked at the back door. To it came a bald, tired man, in an
+apron wet at the knees. The kitchen floor was soaped, and a
+scrubbing-brush rode amid the seas. A rather dirty child clung to his
+hand. "Trying to clean up, ma'am. Not very good at it. I hope you ain't
+the Cruelty to Children lady. Willy looks mussed, but fact is, I just
+can't get time to wash the clothes, but he means a terrible lot to me.
+What was it? Will you step in?"
+
+Claire buttoned the child's rompers before she spoke. Then:
+
+"Mr. Kloh, I want to be perfectly honest with you. I've had word from
+your wife. She's unhappy, and she loves and admires you more than any
+other man in the world, and I think she would come back--misses the
+child so."
+
+The man wiped his reddened hands. "I don't know---- I don't wish her no
+harm. Trouble was, I'm kind of pokey. I guess I couldn't give her any
+good times. I used to try to go to dances with her, but when I'd worked
+late, I'd get sleepy and---- She's a beautiful woman, smart 's a whip,
+and I guess I was too slow for her. No, she wouldn't never come back to
+me."
+
+"She's out in front of the house now--waiting!"
+
+"Great Cæsar's ghost, and the floor not scrubbed!" With a squawk of
+anxiety he leaped on the scrubbing-brush, and when Milt and Dlorus
+appeared at the door, Mr. Kloh and Miss Claire Boltwood were wiping up
+the kitchen floor.
+
+Dlorus looked at them, arms akimbo, and sighed, "Hello, Johnny, my,
+ain't it nice to be back, oh, you had the sink painted, oh, forgive me,
+Johnny, I was a bad ungrateful woman, I don't care if you don't never
+take me to no more dances, hardly any, Willy come here, dear, oh, he is
+such a sweet child, my, his mouth is so dirty, will you forgive me,
+Johnny, is my overcoat in the moth-balls?"
+
+When Mr. Kloh had gone off to the mill--thrice returning from the gate
+to kiss Dlorus and to thank her rescuers--Claire sat down and yawningly
+lashed off every inch of Dlorus's fair white skin:
+
+"You're at it already; taking advantage of that good man's forgiveness,
+and getting lofty with him, and rather admiring yourself as a
+spectacular sinner. You are a lazy, ignorant, not very clean woman, and
+if you succeed in making Mr. Kloh and Willy happy, it will be almost too
+big a job for you. Now if I come back from Seattle and find you
+misbehaving again----"
+
+Dlorus broke down. "You won't, miss! And I will raise chickens, like he
+wanted, honest I will!"
+
+"Then you may let me have a room to take a nap in, and perhaps Mr.
+Daggett could sleep in there on the sofa, and we'll get rested before we
+start back."
+
+Both Milt and Dlorus meekly followed the boss.
+
+It was noon before Milt and Claire woke, and discovered that Dlorus had
+prepared for them scrambled eggs and store celery, served on an almost
+clean table-cloth. Mr. Kloh came home for lunch, and while Dlorus sat on
+his lap in the living-room, and repeated that she had been a "bad,
+naughty, 'ittle dirl--what did the fellows say at the mill?" Milt and
+Claire sat dumpily on the back porch, regarding scenery which featured
+of seven tin cans, a broken patent washing-machine, and a rheumatic pear
+tree.
+
+"I suppose we ought to start," groaned Claire.
+
+"I have about as much nerve as a rabbit, and as much punch as a bale of
+hay," Milt admitted.
+
+"We're like two children that have been playing too long."
+
+"But don't want to go home!"
+
+"Quite! Though I don't think much of your idea of a playhouse--those tin
+cans. But it's better than having to be grown-up."
+
+In the midst of which chatter they realized that Mr. Henry B. Boltwood
+and Dr. Hooker Beach had come round the corner of the house, and were
+gaping at them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+THE GRAEL IN A BACK YARD IN YAKIMA
+
+
+"I must say that you two have chosen a fine pastoral scene!" observed
+Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"Hhhhhhhhow did you get here?" gasped Claire.
+
+"Auto 'bus over Blewett Pass, train here from Ellensburg. That
+woman--everything all right?"
+
+"Yes, everything's fine. We were just starting back, sir," implored
+Milt.
+
+"Huh!"
+
+"Awfully sorry, sir, to take Claire on such a hike----"
+
+"I don't blame you particularly. When that young woman gets an idea into
+her head, the rest of us are pawns. Why, even me--she's dragged me all
+over the Rocky Mountains. And I will admit, Claire, that it's been good
+for me. But I begin to feel human again, and I think it's about time I
+took charge. We'll catch the afternoon train for Seattle, Claire. The
+trip has been extremely interesting, but I think perhaps we'll call it
+enough. Daggett, want to get you to drive the Gomez on to Seattle. Beach
+tells me your car is completely wrecked. Lose any money in it?"
+
+"No, sir. Had my roll in the bug. I'll have to go back to it and get
+some clothes out of it, though."
+
+"Well, then, will you drive my car in? Charge me anywhere up to fifty
+dollars, if you want to----"
+
+"I'd rather not----"
+
+"It's a perfectly honest job--I'd do it, too quick! Or if your
+confounded pride won't let you charge anything, bring the car on anyway.
+Come, dolly, I have a jitney here, please observe my graceful use of
+'jitney,' and I have the bags. We'll hustle to the station now. No! No
+arguments, chick!"
+
+On the station platform, Claire and Milt were under the surveillance of
+Mr. Boltwood, who was extremely irritable as every two minutes the train
+was reported to be two minutes later. They tramped up and down, speaking
+in lowered voices, very meek but in their joint naughtiness very
+intimate.
+
+"That was a nice place to end a transcontinental drive--in the back yard
+of Mr. Johnny Kloh, with an unrestricted view of tin cans!" lamented
+Claire.
+
+"Still, your drive didn't end at Kloh's; it ended way up in the
+mountains."
+
+Mr. Boltwood bumbled down on them: "Another minute late! Like to know
+what the matter is!"
+
+"Yes, father!"
+
+When Mr. Boltwood's impatiently waiting back was turned, Claire gripped
+Milt's hand, and whispered to him, "You see, I'm captured! I thought I
+was father's lord and chauffeur, but he sniffs the smoke of the ticker.
+In his mind, he's already back in the office, running things. He'll
+probably turn me over to Jeff, for disciplining! You won't let them
+change me back into a pink-face, will you? Come to tea, at the Gilsons',
+just as soon as you reach Seattle."
+
+"Tea---- Now we're so near your Gilsons, I begin to get scared. Wouldn't
+know what to do. Gee, I've heard you have to balance a tea-cup and a
+sandwich and a hunk o' cake and a lot of conversation all at once! I'd
+spill the tea, and drop crumbs, and probably have the butler set on me."
+
+"You will not! And if you did--can't you see?--it wouldn't matter! It
+just wouldn't matter!"
+
+"Honestly? Claire dear, do you know why I came on this trip? In
+Schoenstrom, I heard you say you were going to Seattle. That moment, I
+decided I would, too, and get acquainted with you, if murder would do
+it. But, oh, I'm clumsy."
+
+"You've seen me clumsy, in driving. You taught me to get over it. Perhaps
+I can teach you some things. And we'll study--together--evenings! I'm a
+thoroughly ignorant parasite woman. Make me become real! A real woman!"
+
+"Dear--dear----"
+
+Mr. Boltwood loomed on them. "The train's coming, at last. We'll have a
+decent sleep for once, at the Gilsons'. I've wired them to meet us." He
+departed.
+
+"Terribly glad your father keeps coming down on us, because it scares
+me so I get desperate," said Milt. "Golly, I think I can hear the train.
+I, uh, Claire, Claire dear----"
+
+"Milt, are you proposing to me? Please hurry, because that is the train.
+Isn't it absurd--some day you'll have to propose all over again
+formally, for the benefit of people like father, when you and I already
+know we're partners! We've done things together, not just danced
+together! When you're an engineer, you'll call me, and I'll come
+a-running up to Alaska. And sometimes you'll come with me to
+Brooklyn--we'll be a couple of bombs---- There's the train. Oh,
+playmate, hurry with your engineering course! Hurry, hurry, hurry!
+Because when it's done, then---- Whither thou goest, there I go also!
+And you did bully me, you did, you did, and I like it, and---- Yes,
+father, the bags are right here. Telephone me, minute you reach Seattle,
+dear, and we'll have a private lesson in balancing tea-cups---- Yes,
+father, I have the tickets. So glad, dear, the trip smashed up like
+this--shocked me into reality--made me realize I've been with you every
+hour since I dismissed you, back in Dakota, and you looked at me, big
+hurt eyes, like a child, and---- Yes, father, Pullman's at the back.
+Yes, I'm coming!"
+
+"W-wait! D-did you know I was going to propose?"
+
+"Yes. Ever since the Yellowstone. Been trying to think of a nice way to
+refuse you. But there isn't any. You're like Pinky--can't get rid of
+you--have t' adopt you. Besides, I've found out----"
+
+"You love me?"
+
+"I don't know! How can I tell? But I do like to drive with my head on
+your shoulder and---- Yesssss, father, coming!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+HER OWN PEOPLE
+
+
+Mr. Henry B. Boltwood was decorously asleep in a chair in the
+observation car, and Claire, on the wide back platform, sat unmoving,
+apparently devoted to agriculture and mountain scenery. But it might
+have been noted that her hand clenched one of the wooden supports of her
+camp-stool, and that her hunched back did not move.
+
+When she had turned to follow her father into the train, Milt had caught
+her shoulders and kissed her.
+
+For half an hour that kiss had remained, a perceptible warm pressure on
+her lips. And for half an hour she had felt the relief of gliding
+through the mountains without the strain of piloting, the comfort of
+having the unseen, mysterious engineer up ahead automatically drive for
+her. She had caroled to her father about nearing the Pacific. Her
+nervousness had expressed itself in jerky gaiety.
+
+But when he had sneaked away for a nap, and Claire could no longer hide
+from herself by a veil of chatter the big decision she had made on the
+station platform, then she was lonely and frightened--and very anxious
+to undecide the decision. She could not think clearly. She could see
+Milt Daggett only as a solemn young man in an inferior sweater,
+standing by the track in a melancholy autumnal light, waving to her as
+the train pulled out, disappearing in a dun obscurity, less significant
+than the station, the receding ties, or the porter who was, in places
+known only to his secretive self, concealing her baggage.
+
+She could only mutter in growing panic, "I'm crazy. In-sane! Pledging
+myself to this boy before I know how he will turn out. Will he learn
+anything besides engineering? I know it--I do want to stroke his cheek
+and--his kiss frightened me, but---- Will I hate him when I see him with
+nice people? Can I introduce him to the Gilsons? Oh, I was mad; so
+wrought up by that idiotic chase with Dlorus, and so sure I was a
+romantic heroine and---- And I'm simply an indecisive girl in a
+realistic muddle!"
+
+Threatened by darkness and the sinister evening chill of the mountains,
+with the train no longer cheerfully climbing the rocky ridge but
+rumbling and snorting in the defiles, and startling her with agitating
+forward leaps as though the brakes had let go, she could not endure the
+bleak platform, and even less could she endure sitting in the chair car,
+eyed by the smug tourists--people as empty of her romance as they were
+incapable of her sharp tragedy. She balanced forward to the vestibule.
+She stood in that cold, swaying, darkling place that was filled with the
+smell of rubber and metal and grease and the thunderous clash of steel
+on steel; she tried to look out into the fleeing darkness; she tried to
+imagine that the train was carrying her away from the pursuing
+enemy--from her own weak self.
+
+Her father came puffing and lip-pursing and jolly, to take her to
+dinner. Mr. Boltwood had no tearing meditations; he had a healthy
+interest in soup. But he glanced at her, across the bright, sleek
+dining-table; he seemed to study her; and suddenly Claire saw that he
+was a very wise man. His look hinted, "You're worried, my dear," but his
+voice ventured nothing beyond comfortable drawling stories to which she
+had only, from the depth of her gloomy brooding, to nod mechanically.
+
+She got a great deal of satisfaction and horror out of watching two
+traveling-men after dinner. Milt had praised the race, and one of the
+two traveling-men, a slender, clear-faced youngster, was rather like
+Milt, despite plastered hair, a watch-chain slung diagonally across his
+waistcoat, maroon silk socks, and shoes of pearl buttons, gray tops, and
+patent-leather bottoms. The other man was a butter-ball. Both of them
+had harshly pompous voices--the proudly unlettered voices of the smoking
+compartment. The slender man was roaring:
+
+"Yes, sir, he's got a great proposition there--believe me, he's got a
+great proposition--he's got one great little factory there, take it from
+me. He can turn out toothpicks to compete with Michigan. He's simply
+piling up the shekels--why say, he's got a house with eighteen
+rooms--every room done different."
+
+Claire wondered whether Milt, when the sting and faith of romance were
+blunted, would engage in Great Propositions, and fight for the
+recognition of his--toothpicks. Would his creations be favorites in the
+best lunch rooms? Would he pile up shekels?
+
+Then her fretting was lost in the excitement of approaching Seattle and
+their host--Claire's cousin, Eugene Gilson, an outrageously prosperous
+owner of shingle-mills. He came from an old Brooklyn Heights family. He
+had married Eva Gontz of Englewood. He liked music and wrote jokey
+little letters and knew the addresses of all the best New York shops. He
+was of Her Own People, and she was near now to the security of his
+friendship, the long journey done.
+
+Lights thicker and thicker--a factory illuminated by arc-lamps,--the
+baggage--the porter--the eager trail of people in the aisle--climbing
+down to the platform--red caps--passing the puffing engine which had
+brought them in--the procession to the gate--faces behind a
+grill--Eugene Gilson and Eva waving--kisses, cries of "How was the
+trip?" and "Oh! Had won-derful drive!"--the huge station, and curious
+waiting passengers, Jap coolies in a gang, lumbermen in corks--the
+Gilsons' quiet car, and baggage stowed away by the chauffeur instead of
+by their own tired hands--streets strangely silent after the tumult of
+the train--Seattle and the sunset coast at last attained.
+
+Claire had forgotten how many charming, most desirable things there were
+in the world. The Gilsons drove up Queen Anne Hill to a bay-fronting
+house on a breezy knob--a Georgian house of holly hedge, French windows,
+a terrace that suggested tea, and a great hall of mahogany and white
+enamel with the hint of roses somewhere, and a fire kindled in the
+paneled drawing-room to be seen beyond the hall. Warmth and softness and
+the Gilsons' confident affection wrapped her around; and in contented
+weariness she mounted to a bedroom of Bakst sketches, a four-poster, and
+a bedside table with a black and orange electric lamp and a collection
+of Arthur Symons' essays.
+
+She sank by the bed, pitifully rubbed her cheek against the silk
+comforter that was primly awaiting her commands at the foot of the bed,
+and cried, "Oh, four-posters _are_ necessary! I can't give them up! I
+won't! They---- No one has a right to ask me." She mentally stamped her
+foot. "I simply won't live in a shack and take in washing. It isn't
+worth it."
+
+A bath, faintly scented, in a built-in tub in her own marble bathroom. A
+preposterously and delightfully enormous Turkish towel. One of Eva
+Gilson's foamy negligées. Slow exquisite dressing--not the scratchy
+hopping over ingrown dirt, among ingrown smells, of a filthy
+small-hotel bedroom, but luxurious wandering over rugs velvety to her
+bare feet. A languid inspection of the frivolous colors and curves in
+the drawings by Bakst and George Plank and Helen Dryden. A glance at the
+richness of the toilet-table, at the velvet curtains that shut out the
+common world.
+
+Expanding to the comfort as an orchid to cloying tropic airs, she drew
+on her sheerest chemise, her most frivolous silk stockings. In a
+dreaming enervated joy she saw how smooth were her arms and legs; she
+sleepily resented the redness of her wrists and the callouses of the
+texture of corduroy that scored her palms from holding the steering
+wheel.
+
+Yes, she was glad that she had made the experiment--but gladder that she
+was safely in from the long dust-whitened way, back in her own world of
+beauty; and she couldn't imagine ever trying it again. To think of
+clumping out into that world of deliberate and brawling crudeness----
+
+Of one Milt Daggett she didn't think at all.
+
+Gorgeously sleepy--and gorgeously certain that by and by she would go,
+not to a stingy hotel bed, with hound-dog ribs to cut into her tired
+back, but to a feathery softness of slumber--she wavered down to the
+drawing-room, and on the davenport, by the fire, with Victoria
+chocolates by her elbow, and pillows behind her shoulders, she gossiped
+of her adventure, and asked for news of friends and kin back East.
+
+Eugene and Eva Gilson asked with pyrotechnic merriness about the "funny
+people she must have met along the road." With a subdued, hidden
+unhappiness, Claire found that she could not mention Milt--that she was
+afraid her father would mention Milt--to these people who took it for
+granted that all persons who did not live in large houses and play good
+games of bridge were either "queer" or "common"; who believed that their
+West was desirable in proportion as it became like the East; and that
+they, though Westerners, were as superior to workmen with hard hands as
+was Brooklyn Heights itself.
+
+Claire tried to wriggle out from under the thought of Milt while, with
+the Gilsons as the perfect audience, she improvised on the theme of
+wandering. With certain unintended exaggerations, and certain not quite
+accurate groupings of events, she described the farmers and cowpunchers,
+the incredible hotels and garages. Indeed they had become incredible to
+her own self. Obviously this silken girl couldn't possibly take
+seriously a Dlorus Kloh--or a young garage man who said "ain't."
+
+Eva Gilson had been in Brooklyn within the month, and in a passion of
+remembrance of home, Claire cried, "Oh, do tell me about everybody."
+
+"I had such a good time with Amy Dorrance," said Mrs. Gilson. "Of course
+Amy is a little dull, but she's such an awfully good sort and---- We did
+have the jolliest party one afternoon. We went to lunch at the Ritz,
+and a matinée, and we saw such an interesting man--Gene is frightfully
+jealous when I rave about him--I'm sure he was a violinist--simply an
+exquisite thing he was--I wanted to kiss him. Gene will now say, 'Why
+didn't you?'"
+
+And Gene said, "Well, why _didn't_ you?" and Claire laughed, and her
+toes felt warm and pink and good, and she was perfectly happy, and she
+murmured, "It would be good to hear a decent violinist again. Oh! What
+had George Worlicht been doing, when you were home?"
+
+"Don't you think Georgie is wonderful?" fluttered Mrs. Gilson. "He makes
+me rue my thirty-six sad years. I think I'll adopt him. You know, he
+almost won the tennis cup at Long Branch."
+
+Georgie had a little mustache and an income, just enough income to
+support the little mustache, and he sang inoffensively, and was always
+winning tennis cups--almost--and he always said, at least once at every
+party, "The basis of _savoir faire_ is knowing how to be rude to the
+right people." Fire-enamored and gliding into a perfumed haze of
+exquisite drowsiness, Claire saw Georgie as heroic and wise. But the
+firelight got into her eyes, and her lids wouldn't stay open, and in her
+ears was a soft humming as of a million bees in a distant meadow
+golden-spangled--and Gene was helping her upstairs; sleepiness submerged
+her like bathing in sweet waters; she fumbled at buttons and hooks and
+stays, let things lie where they fell--and of all that luxury nothing
+was more pleasant than the knowledge that she did not have to take
+precautions against the rats, mice, cockroaches, and all their obscene
+little brothers which--on some far-off fantastic voyaging when she had
+been young and foolish--she seemed to remember having found in her own
+room. Then she was sinking into a bed like a tide of rainbow-colored
+foam, sinking deep, deep, deep----
+
+And it was morning, and she perceived that the purpose of morning light
+was to pick out surfaces of mahogany and orange velvet and glass, and
+that only an idiot would ever leave this place and go about begging
+dirty garage men to fill her car with stinking gasoline and oil.
+
+The children were at breakfast--children surely not of the same species
+as the smeary-cheeked brats she had seen tumbling by roadsides along the
+way--sturdy Mason, with his cap of curls, and Virginia, with bobbed
+ash-blond hair prim about her delicate face. They curtsied, and in
+voices that actually had intonations they besought her, "Oh, Cousin
+Claire, would you pleasssssse tell us about drive-to-the-coast?"
+
+After breakfast, she went out on the terrace for the View.
+
+In Seattle, even millionaires, and the I. W. W., and men with red
+garters on their exposed shirt-sleeves who want to give you real estate,
+all talk about the View. The View is to Seattle what the car-service,
+the auditorium, the flivver-factory, or the price of coal is to other
+cities. At parties in Seattle, you discuss the question of whether the
+View of Lake Union or the View of the Olympics is the better, and polite
+office-managers say to their stenographers as they enter, "How's your
+View this morning?" All real-estate deeds include a patent on the View,
+and every native son has it as his soundest belief that no one in Tacoma
+gets a View of Mount Rainier.
+
+Mrs. Gilson informed Claire that they had the finest View in Seattle.
+
+Below Claire was the harbor, with docks thrust far out into the water,
+and steamers alive with smoke. Mrs. Gilson said they were Blue Funnel
+Liners, loading for Vladivostok and Japan. The names, just the names,
+shot into Claire's heart a wistful unexpressed desire that was somehow
+vaguely connected with a Milt Daggett who, back in the Middlewestern mud
+and rain, had longed for purple mountains and cherry blossoms and the
+sea. But she cast out the wish, and lifted her eyes to mountains across
+the sound--not purple mountains, but sheer silver streaked with black,
+like frozen surf on a desolate northern shore--the Olympics, two-score
+miles away.
+
+Up there, one could camp, with a boy in a deteriorated sweater singing
+as he watched the coffee----
+
+Hastily she looked to the left, across the city, with its bright new
+skyscrapers, its shining cornices and masses of ranked windows, and the
+exclamation-point of the "tallest building outside of New York"--far
+livelier than her own rusty Brooklyn. Beyond the city was a dun cloud,
+but as she stared, far up in the cloud something crept out of the vapor,
+and hung there like a dull full moon, aloof, majestic, overwhelming, and
+she realized that she was beholding the peak of Mount Rainier, with the
+city at its foot like white quartz pebbles at the base of a tower.
+
+A landing-stage for angels, she reflected.
+
+It did seem larger than dressing-tables and velvet hangings and scented
+baths.
+
+But she dragged herself from the enticing path of that thought, and
+sighed wretchedly, "Oh, yes, he would appreciate Rainier, but how--how
+would he manage a grape-fruit? I mustn't be a fool! I mustn't!" She saw
+that Mrs. Gilson was peeping at her, and she made herself say adequate
+things about the View before she fled inside--fled from her sputtering
+inquiring self.
+
+In the afternoon they drove to Capitol Hill; they dropped in at various
+pretty houses and met the sort of people Claire knew back home. Between
+people they had Views; and the sensible Miss Boltwood, making a
+philosophic discovery, announced to herself, "After all, I've seen just
+as much from this limousine as I would from a bone-breaking Teal bug.
+Silly to make yourself miserable to see things. Oh yes, I will go
+wandering some more, but not like a hobo. But---- What can I say to him?
+Good heavens, he may be here any time now, with our car. Oh,
+why--why--why was I insane on that station platform?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+THE ABYSSINIAN PRINCE
+
+
+Snoqualmie Pass lies among mountains prickly with rocks and burnt
+stumps, but the road is velvet, with broad saucer curves; and to Milt it
+was pure beauty, it was release from life, to soar up coaxing inclines
+and slip down easy grades in the powerful car. "No more Teals for me,"
+he cried, in the ecstasy of handling an engine that slowed to a demure
+whisper, then, at a touch of the accelerator, floated up a rise,
+effortless, joyous, humming the booming song of the joy in speed. He
+suddenly hated the bucking tediousness of the Teal. The Gomez-Dep
+symbolized his own new life.
+
+So he came to Lake Washington, and just across it was the city of his
+long dreams, the city of the Pacific--and of Claire. There was no ferry
+in sight, and he rounded the lake, struck a brick pavement, rolled
+through rough woods, suburban villas, and petty business streets, to a
+region of factories and mills, with the funnels of ships beyond.
+
+And every minute he drove more slowly and became more uneasy.
+
+The pavement--the miles of it; the ruthless lumbermills, with their
+thousands of workmen quite like himself; the agitation of realizing
+that every three minutes he was passing a settlement larger than
+Schoenstrom; the strangeness of ships and all the cynical ways of the
+sea--the whole scene depressed him as he perceived how little of the
+world he knew, and how big and contemptuous of Milt Daggetts that world
+must be.
+
+"Huh!" he growled. "Quite some folks living here. Don't suppose they
+spend such a whale of a lot of time thinking about Milt Daggett and Bill
+McGolwey and Prof Jones. I guess most of these people wouldn't think
+Heinie Rauskukle's store was so gosh-awful big. I wasn't scared of
+Minneapolis--much--but there they didn't ring in mountains and an ocean
+on you. And I didn't have to go up on the hill and meet folks like
+Claire's relations, and figure out whether you shake hands
+catch-as-catch-can or Corinthian. Look at that sawmill chimney--isn't it
+nice of 'em to put the fly-screen over it so the flies won't get down
+into the flames. No, they haven't got much more than a million feet of
+lumber in that one pile. And here's a bum little furniture store--it
+wouldn't cost more 'n about ten times all I've got to buy one of those
+Morris chairs. Oh Gooooooosh, won't these houses ever stop? Say, that
+must be a jitney. The driver snickered at me. Will the whole town be
+onto me? Milt, you're a kind young fellow, and you know what's the
+matter with Heinie's differential, but they don't need you here. Quite
+a few folks to carry on the business. Gosh, look at that building
+ahead--nine stories!"
+
+He had planned to stop at a hotel, to wash up, and to gallop to Claire.
+But--well--wouldn't it maybe be better to leave the car at a public
+garage, so the Boltwoods could get it when they wanted to? He'd better
+"just kind of look around before he tackled the watch-dog."
+
+It was the public garage which finally crushed him. It was a garage of
+enameled brick and colored tiles, with a plate-glass-enclosed office in
+which worked young men clad as the angels. One of them wore a carnation,
+Milt noted.
+
+"Huh! I'll write back and tell Ben Sittka that hereafter he's to wear
+his best-Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes and a milkweed blossom when he
+comes down to work at the Red Trail Garage!"
+
+Milt drove up the brick incline into a room thousands of miles long,
+with millions of new and recently polished cars standing in lines as
+straight as a running-board. He begged of a high-nosed colored
+functionary--not in khaki overalls but in maroon livery--"Where'll I put
+this boat?"
+
+The Abyssinian prince gave him a check, and in a tone of extreme lack of
+personal interest snapped, "Take it down the aisle to the elevator."
+
+Milt had followed the natural lines of traffic into the city; he had
+spoken to no one; the prince's snort was his welcome to Seattle.
+
+Meekly he drove past the cars so ebon and silvery, so smug and strong,
+that they would have regarded a Teal bug as an insult. Another attendant
+waved him into the elevator, and Milt tried not to look surprised when
+the car started, not forward, but upward, as though it had turned into
+an aeroplane.
+
+When these adventures were over, when he had had a shave and a shine,
+and washed his hands, and looked into a department-store window that
+contained ten billion yards of silk draped against polished satinwood,
+when he had felt unhappy over a movie theater large enough to contain
+ten times the population of Schoenstrom, and been cursed by a policeman
+for jaywalking, and had passed a hotel entirely full of diplomats and
+marble and caviare--then he could no longer put off telephoning to
+Claire, and humbly, in a booth meant for an umbrella-stand, he got the
+Eugene Gilson house, and to a female who said "Yes?" in a tone which
+made it mean "No!" he ventured, "May I speak to Miss Boltwood?"
+
+Miss Boltwood, it seemed, was out.
+
+He was not sorry. He was relieved. He ducked out of the telephone-booth
+with a sensation of escape.
+
+Milt was in love with Claire; she was to him the purpose of life; he
+thought of her deeply and tenderly and longingly. All the way into
+Seattle he had brooded about her; remembered her every word and
+gesture; recalled the curve of her chin, and the fresh feeling of her
+hands. But Claire had suddenly become too big. In her were all these
+stores, these office buildings for clever lawyers and surgeons, these
+contemptuous trolley cars, these careless people in beautiful clothes.
+They were too much for him. Desperately he was pushing them
+back--back--fighting for breath. And she belonged with them.
+
+He mailed the check for the stored car to her, with a note--written
+standing before a hacked wall-desk in a branch post-office--which said
+only, "Here's check for the boat. Did not know whether you would have
+room for it at house. Tried to get you on phone, phone again just as
+soon as rent room etc. Hope having happy time, M.D."
+
+He went out to the university. On the trolley he relaxed. But he did not
+exultantly feel that he had won to the Pacific; he could not regard
+Seattle now as a magic city, the Bagdad of modern caravans, with Alaska
+and the Orient on one hand, the forests to the north, and eastward the
+spacious Inland Empire of the wheat. He saw it as a place where you had
+to work hard just to live; where busy policemen despised you because you
+didn't know which trolley to take; where it was incredibly hard to
+remember even the names of the unceasing streets; where the conductors
+said "Step lively!" and there was no room to whistle, no time to swap
+stories with a Bill McGolwey at an Old Home lunch-counter.
+
+He found the university; he talked with the authorities about entering
+the engineering school; the Y. M. C. A. gave him a list of rooms; and,
+because it was cheap, he chose a cubbyhole in a flat over a candy
+store--a low room, which would probably keep out the rain, but had no
+other virtues. It had one bed, one table, one dissipated bureau, two
+straight bare chairs, and one venerable lithograph depicting a girl with
+ringlets shaking her irritating forefinger at a high-church kitten.
+
+The landlady consented to his importing an oil-stove for cooking his
+meals. He bought the stove, with a box of oatmeal, a jar of bacon, and
+half a dozen eggs. He bought a plane and solid geometry, and an algebra.
+At dinner time he laid the algebra beside his plate of anemic bacon and
+leaking eggs. The eggs grew cold. He did not stir. He was reviewing his
+high-school algebra. He went down the pages, word by word, steadily,
+quickly, absolutely concentrated--as concentrated as he would recently
+have been in a new problem of disordered transmission. Not once did he
+stop to consider how glorious it would be to marry Claire--or how
+terrifying it would be to marry Miss Boltwood.
+
+Three hours went by before he started up, bewildered, rubbed his eyes,
+picked at the chill bacon and altogether disgusting eggs, and rambled
+out into the street.
+
+Again he risked the scorn of conductors and jitney drivers. He found
+Queen Anne Hill, found the residence of Mr. Eugene Gilson. He sneaked
+about it, slipped into the gate, prowled toward the house. Flabby from
+the intensity of study, he longed for the stimulus of Claire's smile.
+But as he stared up at the great squares of the clear windows, at the
+flare of white columns in the porch-lights, that smile seemed
+unreachable. He felt like a rustic at court. From the shelter of the
+prickly holly hedge he watched the house. It was "some kind of a
+party?--or what would folks like these call a party?" Limousines were
+arriving; he had a glimpse of silken ankles, frothy underskirts; heard
+easy laughter; saw people moving through a big blue and silver room;
+caught a drifting tremor of music.
+
+At last he saw Claire. She was dancing with a young man as decorative as
+"that confounded Saxton fellow" he had met at Flathead Lake, but younger
+than Saxton, a laughing young man, with curly black hair. For the first
+time in his life Milt wanted to kill. He muttered, "Damn--damn--DAMN!"
+as he saw the young man carelessly embracing Claire.
+
+His fingers tingling, his whole body yearning till every cell seemed a
+beating hammer, Milt longed just once to slip his hand about Claire's
+waist like that. He could feel the satin of her bodice and its warmth.
+
+Then it seemed to him, as Claire again passed the window, that he did
+not know her at all. He had once talked to a girl who resembled her, but
+that was long ago. He could understand a Gomez-Dep and appreciate a
+brisk sports-suit, but this girl was of a world unintelligible to him.
+Her hair, in its dips and convolutions, was altogether a puzzle. "How
+did she ever fix it like that?" Her low evening dress--"what was it made
+of--some white stuff, but was it silk or muslin or what?" Her shoulders
+were startling in their bare powdery smoothness--"how dare that young
+pup dance with her?" And her face, that had seemed so jolly and
+friendly, floated past the window as pale and illusive as a wisp of fog.
+His longing for her passed into clumsy awe. He remembered, without
+resentment, that once on a hilltop in Dakota she had coldly forbidden
+him to follow her.
+
+With all the pleasure of martyrdom--to make quite sure that he should
+realize how complete a fool he had been to intrude on Miss Boltwood--he
+studied the other guests. He gave them, perhaps, a glory they did not
+have. There were girls sleek as ivory. There was a lean stooped man,
+very distinguished. There was a bulky man in a dinner coat, with a
+semi-circle of mustache, and eyes that even at a distance seemed to give
+impatient orders. He would be a big banker, or a lumberman.
+
+It was the easy friendliness of all of them that most made Milt feel
+like an outsider. If a servant had come out and ordered him away, he
+would have gone meekly ... he fancied.
+
+He straggled off, too solidly unhappy to think how unhappy he was. In
+his clammy room he picked up the algebra. For a quarter-hour he could
+not gather enough vigor to open it. In his lassitude, his elbows felt
+feeble, his fingers were ready to drop off. He slowly scratched the book
+open----
+
+At one o'clock he was reading algebra, his face still and grim. But
+already it seemed less heartily brick-red.
+
+He listlessly telephoned to Claire, in the morning.
+
+"Hello? Oh! Miss Boltwood? This is Milt Daggett."
+
+"Oh! Oh, how are you?"
+
+"Why, why I'm--I've got settled. I can get into the engineering school
+all right."
+
+"I'm glad."
+
+"Uh, enjoying Seattle?"
+
+"Oh! Oh yes. The mountains---- Do you like it?"
+
+"Oh! Oh yes. Sea and all---- Great town."
+
+"Uh, w-when are we going to see you? Daddy had to go East, left you his
+regards. W-when----?"
+
+"Why--why I suppose you're awful--awfully busy, meeting people and
+all----"
+
+"Yes, I am, rather, but----" Her hedging uncomfortable tone changed to a
+cry of distress. "Milt! I must see you. Come up at four this afternoon."
+
+"Yes!"
+
+He rushed to a small, hot tailor-shop. He panted "Press m' suit while I
+wait?" They gave him a pair of temporary trousers, an undesirable pair
+of trousers belonging to a short fat man with no taste in fabrics, and
+with these flapping about his lean legs, he sat behind a calico curtain,
+reading _The War Cry_ and looking at a "fashion-plate" depicting nine
+gentlemen yachtsmen each nine feet tall, while the Jugoslav in charge
+unfeelingly sprinkled and ironed and patted his suit.
+
+He spent ten minutes in blacking his shoes, in his room--and twenty
+minutes in getting the blacking off his fingers.
+
+He was walking through the gate in the Gilson hedge at one minute to
+four.
+
+But he had reached Queen Anne Hill at three. For an hour he had walked
+the crest road, staring at the steamers below, alternately gripping his
+hands with desire of Claire, and timorously finally deciding that he
+wouldn't go to her house--wouldn't ever see her again.
+
+He came into the hall tremblingly expecting some great thing, some
+rending scene, and she met him with a cool, "Oh, this is nice. Eva had
+some little white cakes made for us." He felt like a man who has asked
+for a drink of cold charged water and found it warm and flat.
+
+"How---- Dandy house," he muttered, limply shaking her limp hand.
+
+"Yes, isn't it a darling. They do themselves awfully well here. I'm
+afraid your bluff, plain, democratic Westerners are a fraud. I hear a
+lot more about 'society' here than I ever did in the East. The sets seem
+frightfully complicated." She was drifting into the drawing-room, to a
+tapestry stool, and Milt was awkwardly stalking a large wing chair,
+while she fidgeted:
+
+"Everybody tells me about how one poor dear soul, a charming lady who
+used to take in washing or salt gold-mines or something, and she came
+here a little while ago with billions and billions of dollars, and tried
+to buy her way in by shopping for all the charities in town, and
+apparently she's just as out of it here as she would be in London. You
+and I aren't exclusive like that, are we!"
+
+Somehow----
+
+Her "you and I" was too kindly, as though she was trying to put him at
+ease, as though she knew he couldn't possibly be at ease. With a
+horribly elaborate politeness, with a smile that felt hot on his
+twitching cheeks, he murmured, "Oh no. No, we---- No, I guess----"
+
+If he knew what it was he guessed, he couldn't get it out. While he was
+trying to find out what had become of all the things there were to say
+in the world, a maid came in with an astonishing object--a small, red,
+shelved table on wheels, laden with silver vessels, and cake, and
+sandwiches that were amazingly small and thin.
+
+The maid was so starched that she creaked. She glanced at Milt----
+Claire didn't make him so nervous that he thought of his clothes, but
+the maid did. He was certain that she knew that he had blacked his own
+shoes, knew how old were his clothes. He was urging himself, "Must get
+new suit tomorrow--ready-made--mustn't forget, now--be sure--get suit
+tomorrow." He wanted to apologize to the maid for existing.... He
+wouldn't dare to fall in love with the maid.... And he'd kill the man
+who said he could be fool enough to fall in love with Miss Boltwood.
+
+He sipped his tea, and dropped sandwich crumbs, and ached, and panted,
+and peeped at the crushing quantities of pictures and sconces and tables
+and chairs in the room, and wondered what they did with all of them,
+while Claire chattered:
+
+"Yes, we weren't exclusive out on the road. Didn't we meet funny people
+though! Oh, somehow that 'funny people' sounds familiar. But---- What
+fun that morning was at--Pellago, was it? Heavens, I'm forgetting those
+beastly little towns already--that place where we hazed the poor
+landlady who overcharged me."
+
+"Yes." He was thinking of how much Claire would forget, now. "Yes. We
+certainly fixed her, all right. Uh--did you get the storage check for
+your car?"
+
+"Oh yes, thank you. So nice of you to bother with it."
+
+"Oh, nothing at all, nothing---- Nothing at all. Uh---- Do you like
+Seattle?"
+
+"Oh yes. Such views--the mountains---- Do you like it?"
+
+"Oh yes. Always wanted to see the sea."
+
+"Yes, and---- Such a well-built town."
+
+"Yes, and---- They must do a lot of business here."
+
+"Yes, they---- Oh yes, I do like Seat----"
+
+He had darted from his chair, brushed by the tea-wagon, ignoring its
+rattle and the perilous tipping of cups. He put his hand on her
+shoulder, snorted, "Look here. We're both sparring for time. Stop it.
+It's--it's all right, Claire. I want you to like me, but I'm not--I'm
+not like that woman you were telling about that's trying to butt in. I
+know, Lord I know so well what you're thinking! You're thinking I'm not
+up to the people you've been seeing last couple of days--not up to 'em
+yet, anyway. Well---- We'll be good friends."
+
+Fearless, now, his awe gone in tenderness, he lifted her chin, looked
+straight into her eyes, smiled. But his courage was slipping. He wanted
+to run and hide.
+
+He turned abruptly, grumbling, "Well, better get back to work now, I
+guess."
+
+Her cry was hungry: "Oh, please don't go." She was beside him, shyly
+picking at his sleeve. "I know what you mean. I like you for being so
+understanding. But---- I do like you. You were the perfect companion.
+Let's---- Oh, let's have a walk--and try to laugh again."
+
+He definitely did not want to stay. At this moment he did not love her.
+He regarded her as an estimable young woman who, for a person so
+idiotically reared, had really shown a good deal of pluck out on the
+road--where he wanted to be. He stood in the hall disliking his old cap
+while she ran up to put on a top coat.
+
+Mute, casual, they tramped out of the house together, and down the hill
+to a region of shabby old brown houses like blisters on the hillside.
+They had little to say, and that little was a polite reminiscence of
+incidents in which neither was interested.
+
+When they came back to the Gilson hedge, he stopped at the gate, with
+terrific respectableness removed his cap.
+
+"Good night," she said cheerily. "Call me up soon again."
+
+He did not answer "Good night." He said "Good-by"; and he meant it to be
+his last farewell. He caught her hand, hastily dropped it, fled down the
+hill.
+
+He was, he told himself, going to leave Seattle that evening.
+
+That, doubtless, is the reason why he ran to a trolley, to get to a
+department-store before it closed; and why, precipitating himself upon a
+startled clerk, he purchased a new suit of chaste blue serge, a new pair
+of tan boots (curiously like some he had seen on the university campus
+that morning) and a new hat so gray and conservative and felty that it
+might have been worn by Woodrow Wilson.
+
+He spent the evening in reading algebra and geometry, and in telling
+himself that he was beautifully not thinking about Claire.
+
+In the midst of it, he caught himself at it, and laughed.
+
+"What you're doing, my friend, is pretending you don't like Claire, so
+that you can hide from your fool self the fact that you're going to
+sneak back to see her the first chance you get--first time the watch-dog
+is out. Seriously now, son, Claire is impossible for you. No can do. Now
+that you've been chump enough to leave home---- Oh Lord, I wish I
+hadn't promised to take this room for all winter. Wish I hadn't
+matriculated at the U. But I'm here now, and I'll stick it out. I'll
+stay here one year anyway, and go back home. Oh! And to---- By Golly!
+She liked me!"
+
+He was thinking of the wild-rose teacher to whom he had given a lift
+back in Dakota. He was remembering her daintiness, her admiration.
+
+"Now there's somebody who'd make me keep climbing, but wouldn't think I
+was a poor hick. If I were to drive back next spring, I could find
+her----"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+A CLASS IN ENGINEERING AND OMELETS
+
+
+The one thing of which Milt Daggett was certain was that now he had
+managed to crawl into the engineering school, he must get his degree in
+mechanical engineering. He was older than most of his classmates. He
+must hurry. He must do four years' work in two.
+
+There has never been a Freshman, not the most goggle-eyed and earnest of
+them, who has seen less of classmates, thought less about "outside
+activities," more grimly centered the universe about his work.
+
+Milt had sold his garage, by mail, to Ben Sittka and Heinie Rauskukle.
+He had enough money to get through two years, with economy. His life was
+as simple and dull as it had been in Schoenstrom. He studied while he
+cooked his scrappy meals; he pinned mathematical formulæ and mechanical
+diagrams on the wall, and pored over them while he was dressing--or
+while he was trying to break in the new shoes, which were beautiful,
+squeaky, and confoundedly tight.
+
+He was taking French and English and "composition-writing" in addition
+to engineering, and he made out a schedule of life as humorlessly as a
+girl grind who intends to be a Latin teacher. When he was not at work,
+or furiously running and yanking chest-weights in the gymnasium, he was
+attending concerts, lectures.
+
+Studying the life about him, he had discovered that the best way to save
+time was to avoid the lazy friendships of college; the pipe-smoking,
+yawning, comfortable, rather heavy, altogether pleasant wondering about
+"what'll we do next?" which occupies at least four hours a day for the
+average man in college. He would have liked it, as he had liked long
+talks about nothing with Bill McGolwey at the Old Home Lunch. But he
+couldn't afford it. He had to be ready to----
+
+That was the point at which his reflections always came up with a jolt.
+He was quite clear about the method of getting ready, but he hadn't the
+slightest idea of what he was getting ready for. The moment he had
+redecided to marry Claire, he saw that his only possible future would be
+celibate machinery-installing in Alaska; and the moment he was content
+with the prospect of an engineer's camp in Alaskan wilds, his thoughts
+went crazily fluttering after Claire.
+
+Despite his aloofness, Milt was not unpopular in his class. The
+engineers had few of them the interest in dances, athletics, college
+journalism, which distinguished the men in the academic course. They
+were older, and more conscious of a living to earn. And Milt's cheerful,
+"How's the boy?" his manner of waving his hand--as though to a good
+customer leaving the Red Trail Garage with the generator at last
+tamed--indicated that he was a "good fellow."
+
+One group of collegians Milt did seek. It is true that he had been
+genuine in scorning social climbers. But it is also true that the men
+whom he sought to know were the university smart set. Their satisfaction
+in his allegiance would have been lessened, however, had they known how
+little he cared for what they thought of him, and with what cruel
+directness he was using them as models for the one purpose of pleasing
+Miss Claire Boltwood.
+
+The American state universities admit, in a pleased way, that though
+Yale and Harvard and Princeton may be snobbish, the state universities
+are the refuge of a myth called "college democracy." But there is no
+university near a considerable city into which the inheritors of the
+wealth of that city do not carry all the local social distinctions.
+Their family rank, their place in the unwritten peerage, determines to
+which fraternity they shall be elected, and the fraternity determines
+with whom--men and girls--they shall be intimate. The sons and daughters
+of Seattle and Tacoma, the scions of old families running in an unbroken
+line clear back to 1880, were amiable to poor outsiders from the Yakima
+valley and the new claims of Idaho, but they did not often invite them
+to their homes on the two hills and the Boulevard.
+
+Yet it was these plutocrats whom Milt followed; they whose boots and
+table manners, cigarettes and lack of interest in theology, he studied.
+He met them in his English class. He remarked "Hello, Smith," and
+"Mornin', Jones," as though he liked them but didn't care a hang whether
+they liked him. And by and by he drifted into their fraternity
+dwelling-house, with a question about the next day's assignment, and met
+their friends. He sat pipe-smoking, silent, cheerful, and they seemed to
+accept him. Whenever one of them felt that Milt was intruding, and asked
+impertinent questions in the manner of a Pullman porter at a Darktown
+ball, Milt had a peculiar level look which had been known to generate
+courtesy even in the offspring of a million dollars. They found that he
+knew more about motor-cars than any of them, and as motor-cars were
+among their greater gods, they considered him wise. He was incomparably
+simple and unpretentious; they found his presence comfortable.
+
+But there is a question as to what they would have thought had they
+known that, lying awake in the morning, Milt unsmilingly repeated:
+
+"Hair always straight down at the back. Never rounded. Nix on clippers
+over the ears.
+
+"Matisse is a popular nut artist. Fashionable for the swells to laugh at
+him, and the fellows on the college papers to rave about him.
+
+"Blinx and Severan the swellest--the smartest haberdashery in the city.
+
+"The one way to get in Dutch is to mention labor leaders.
+
+"Never say 'Pleased to meet you.' Just look about halfway between bored
+and tol'able and say, 'How do you do?'"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+All these first three weeks of his life in Seattle, he had seen Claire
+only on his first call. Twice he had telephoned to her. On one of these
+high occasions she had invited him to accompany the family to the
+theater--which meant to the movies--and he had wretchedly refused; the
+other time she had said that she might stay in Seattle all winter, and
+she might go any day, and they "must be sure to have that good long
+walk"; and he had said "oh yes," ten or twelve unhappy times, and had
+felt very empty as he hung up the receiver.
+
+Then she wrote to invite him to late Sunday breakfast at the
+Gilsons'--they made a function of it, and called it bruncheon. The hour
+was given as ten-thirty; most people came at noon; but Milt arrived at
+ten-thirty-one, and found only a sleepy butler in sight.
+
+He waited in the drawing-room for five minutes, feeling like a
+bill-collector. Into the room vaulted a medium-sized, medium-looking,
+amiable man, Eugene Gilson, babbling, "Oh, I say, so sorry to keep you
+waiting, Mr. Daggett. Rotten shame, do come have a bun or something,
+frightfully informal these bruncheons, play auction?"
+
+"Zallright--no," said Milt.
+
+The host profusely led him to a dining-room where--in English fashion,
+or something like English fashion, or anyway a close approximation to
+the fictional pictures of English fashion--kidneys and sausages and
+omelets waited in dishes on the side-board. Mr. Gilson poured coffee,
+and chanted:
+
+"Do try the kidneys. They're usually very fair. Miss Boltwood tells me
+that you were very good to her on the trip. Must have been jolly trip.
+You going to be in town some time, oh yes, Claire said you were in the
+university, engineering, wasn't it? have you ever seen our lumbermills,
+do drop around some---- Try the omelet before the beastly thing gets
+cold, do you mind kicking that button, we'll have some more omelet
+in--any time at the mill and I'll be glad to have some one show you
+through, how did you find the roads along the Red Trail?"
+
+"Why, pretty fair," said Milt.
+
+Into the room precipitated Mrs. Gilson, in a smile, a super-sweater, and
+a sports skirt that would have been soiled by any variety of sport more
+violent than pinochle, and she was wailing as she came:
+
+"We're disgraced, Gene, is this Mr. Daggett? how do you do, so good of
+you to come, do try the kidneys, they're usually quite decent, are the
+omelets warm, you might ring for some more, Gene, for heaven's sake give
+me some coffee, Miss Boltwood will be right down, Mr. Daggett, she told
+us how fortunate they were that they met you on the road, did you like
+the trip, how were the roads?"
+
+"Why, they were pretty good," said Milt.
+
+Claire arrived, fresh and serene in white taffeta, and she cried
+prettily, "I ought to have known that you'd be prompt even if no one
+else in the world is, so glad you came, have you tried the kidneys, and
+do have an--oh, I see you have tried the omelets, how goes the work at
+the university?"
+
+"Why, fine," said Milt.
+
+He ate stolidly, and looked pleased, and sneaked in a glance at his new
+(and still tight and still squeaky) tan boots to make sure that they
+were as well polished as they had seemed at home.
+
+From nowhere appeared a bustling weighty woman, purring, "Hello, hello,
+hello, is it possible that you're all up---- Mr. Daggett. Yes, do lead
+me to the kidneys."
+
+And a man with the gray hair of a grandfather and the giggle of a
+cash-girl bounced in clamoring, "Mornin'--expected to have bruncheon
+alone--do we have some bridge? Oh, good morning, Mr. Daggett, how do
+you like Seattle? Oh, thanks so much, yes, just two."
+
+Then Milt ceased to keep track of the conversation, which bubbled over
+the omelets, and stewed over the kidneys, and foamed about the coffee,
+and clashed above a hastily erected bridge table, and altogether sounded
+curiously like four cars with four quite different things the matter
+with them all being tried out at once in a small garage. People flocked
+in, and nodded as though they knew one another too well to worry about
+it. They bowed to him charmingly, and instantly forgot him for the
+kidneys and sausages. He sat looking respectable and feeling lonely, by
+a cup of coffee, till Claire--dropping the highly unreal smile with
+which she had been listening to the elderly beau's account of a
+fishing-trip he hadn't quite got around to taking--slipped into a chair
+beside him and begged, "Are they looking out for you, Milt?"
+
+"Oh yes, thank you."
+
+"You haven't been to see me."
+
+"Oh no, but---- Working so darn hard."
+
+"What a strikingly original reason! But have you really?"
+
+"Honest."
+
+Suddenly he wanted--eternal man, forever playing confidential small boy
+to the beloved--to tell her about his classes and acquaintances; to get
+pity for his bare room and his home-cooking. But round them blared the
+brazen interest in kidneys, and as Claire glanced up with much
+brightness at another arrival, Milt lost momentum, and found that there
+was absolutely nothing in the world he could say to her.
+
+He made a grateful farewell to the omelets and kidneys, and escaped.
+
+He walked many miles that day, trying to remember how Claire looked.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+THE VICIOUSNESS OF NICE THINGS
+
+
+"What did you think of my nice Daggett boy?" Claire demanded of Eva
+Gilson, the moment bruncheon was over.
+
+"Which one was---- Oh, the boy you met on the road? Why, really, I
+didn't notice him particularly. I'd rather fancied from the way you
+referred to him that he was awfully jolly and forceful, but rather
+crude. But I didn't notice him at all. He seemed perfectly well-bred,
+but slightly heavy."
+
+"No, he isn't that---- He---- Why did you lead spades?" reflected
+Claire.
+
+They were in the drawing-room, resting after the tact and tumult of the
+bruncheon. Claire had been here long enough now for the Gilsons to
+forget her comfortably, and be affectionate and quarrelsome and natural,
+and to admit by their worrying that even in their exalted social
+position there were things to fuss about.
+
+"I do think we ought to have invited Belle Torrens," fretted Mrs.
+Gilson. "We've simply got to have her here soon."
+
+Mr. Gilson speculated intensely, "But she's the dullest soul on earth,
+and her husband spends all his spare time in trying to think up ways of
+doing me dirt in business. Oh, by the way, did you get the water tap in
+the blue room fixed? It's dripping all the time."
+
+"No, I forgot it."
+
+"Well, I _do_ wish you'd have it attended to. It simply drips all the
+time."
+
+"I know. I intended to 'phone the plumber---- Can't you 'phone him
+tomorrow, from the office?"
+
+"No, I haven't time to bother with it. But I do wish you would. It keeps
+on dripping----"
+
+"I know, it doesn't seem to stop. Well, you remind me of it in the
+morning."
+
+"I'm afraid I'll forget. You better make a note of it. If it keeps on
+dripping that way, it's likely to injure something. And I do wish you'd
+tell the Jap not to put so much parsley in the omelet. And I say, how
+would an omelet be with a butter sauce over it?"
+
+"Oh, no, I don't think so. An omelet ought to be nice and dry. Butter
+makes it so greasy--besides, with the price of butter----"
+
+"But there's a richness to butter---- You'd better make a note about the
+tap dripping in the blue room right now, before you forget it. Oh! Why
+in heaven's name did we have Johnny Martin here? He's dull as
+ditchwater----"
+
+"I know, but---- It is nice to go out to his place on the Point. Oh,
+Gene, I do wish you'd try and remember not to talk about your business
+so much. You and Mr. Martin were talking about the price of lumber for
+at least half an hour----"
+
+"Nothing of the kind. We scarcely mentioned it. Oh! What car are you
+going to use this afternoon? If we get out to the Barnetts', I thought
+we might use the limousine---- Or no, you'll probably go out before I
+do, I have to read over some specifications, and I promised to give Will
+a lift, couldn't you take the Loco, maybe you might drive yourself, no,
+I forgot, the clutch is slipping a little, well, you might drive out and
+send the car back for me--still, there wouldn't hardly be time----"
+
+Listening to them as to a play, Claire suddenly desired to scream, "Oh,
+for heaven's sake quit fussing! I'm going up and drown myself in the
+blue-room tap! What does it matter! Walk! Take a surface car! Don't fuss
+so!"
+
+Her wrath came from her feeling of guilt. Yes, Milt had been
+commonplace. Had she done this to him? Had she turned his cheerful
+ignorances into a careful stupor? And she felt stuffy and choking and
+overpacked with food. She wanted to be out on the road, clear-headed,
+forcing her way through, an independent human being--with Milt not too
+far behind.
+
+Mrs. Gilson was droning, "I do think Mattie Vincent is so nice."
+
+"Rather dull I'd call her," yawned Mr. Gilson.
+
+Mattie was the seventh of their recent guests whom he had called dull by
+now.
+
+"Not at all--oh, of course she doesn't dance on tables and quote
+Maeterlinck, but she does have an instinct for the niceties and the
+proprieties--her little house is so sweet--everything just exactly
+right--it may be only a single rose, but always chosen so carefully to
+melt into the background; and such adorable china--I simply die of envy
+every time I see her Lowestoft plates. And such a quiet way of reproving
+any bad taste--the time that crank university professor was out there,
+and spoke of the radical labor movement, and Mattie just smiled at him
+and said, 'If you don't mind, let's not drag filthy lumberjacks into the
+drawing-room--they'd hate it just as much as we would, don't you think,
+perhaps?'"
+
+"Oh, _damn_ nice china! Oh, let's hang all spinsters who are brightly
+reproving," Claire was silently raging. "And particularly and earnestly
+confound all nicety and discretion of living."
+
+She tried to break the spell of the Gilsons' fussing. She
+false-heartedly fawned upon Mr. Gilson, and inquired:
+
+"Is there anything very exciting going on at the mills, Gene?"
+
+"Exciting?" asked Mr. Gilson incredulously. "Why, how do you mean?"
+
+"Don't you find business exciting? Why do you do it then?"
+
+"Oh, wellllll---- Of course---- Oh, yes, exciting in a way. Well----
+Well, we've had a jolly interesting time making staves for candy
+pails--promises to be wonderfully profitable. We have a new way of
+cutting them. But you wouldn't be interested in the machinery."
+
+"Of course not. You don't bore Eva with your horrid, headachy
+business-problems, do you?" Claire cooed, with low cunning.
+
+"Indeed no. Don't think a chap ought to inflict his business on his
+wife. The home should be a place of peace."
+
+"Yes," said Claire.
+
+But she wasn't thinking "Yes." She was thinking, "Milt, what worries me
+now isn't how I can risk letting the 'nice people' meet you. It's how I
+can ever waste you on the 'nice people.' Oh, I'm spoiled for
+cut-glass-and-velvet afternoons. Eternal spiritual agony over blue-room
+taps is too high a price even for four-poster beds. I want to be
+driving! hiking! living!"
+
+That afternoon, after having agreed that Mr. Johnny Martin was a bore,
+Mr. and Mrs. Gilson decided to run out to the house of Mr. Johnny
+Martin. They bore along the lifeless Claire.
+
+Mr. Martin was an unentertaining bachelor who entertained. There were a
+dozen supercilious young married people at his bayside cottage when the
+Gilsons arrived. Among them were two eyebrow-arching young matrons whom
+Claire had not met--Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz.
+
+"We've all heard of you, Miss Boltwood," said Mrs. Betz. "You come from
+the East, don't you?"
+
+"Yes," fluttered Claire, trying to be cordial.
+
+Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz looked at each other in a motionless wink, and
+Mrs. Corey prodded:
+
+"From New York?"
+
+"No. Brooklyn." Claire tried not to make it too short.
+
+"Oh." The tacit wink was repeated. Mrs. Corey said brightly--much too
+brightly--"I was born in New York. I wonder if you know the Dudenants?"
+
+Now Claire knew the Dudenants. She had danced with that young ass Don
+Dudenant a dozen times. But the devil did enter into her and possess
+her, and, to Eva Gilson's horror, Claire said stupidly, "No-o, but I
+think I've heard of them."
+
+The condemning wink was repeated.
+
+"I hear you've been doing such interesting things--motoring and
+adventuring--you must have met some terrible people along the way,"
+fished Mrs. Betz.
+
+"Yes, everybody does seem to feel that way. But I'm afraid I found them
+terribly nice," flared Claire.
+
+"I always say that common people can be most agreeable," Mrs. Corey
+patronized. Before Claire could kill her--there wasn't any homicidal
+weapon in sight except a silver tea-strainer--Mrs. Corey had pirouetted
+on, "Though I do think that we're much too kind to workmen and all--the
+labor situation is getting to be abominable here in the West, and upon
+my word, to keep a maid nowadays, you have to treat her as though she
+were a countess."
+
+"Why shouldn't maids be like countesses? They're much more important,"
+said Claire sweetly.
+
+It cannot be stated that Claire had spent any large part of her time in
+reading Karl Marx, leading syndicalist demonstrations, or hemming red
+internationalist flags, but at this instant she was a complete
+revolutionist. She could have executed Mrs. Corey and pretty Mrs. Betz
+with zeal; she disliked the entire bourgeoisie; she looked around for a
+Jap boy to call "comrade" and she again thought about the possibilities
+of the tea-strainer for use in assassination. She stolidly wore through
+the combined and exclamatory explanations of Mrs. Corey, Mrs. Betz, Mrs.
+Gilson, and Mr. Johnny Martin about the inherent viciousness of all
+maids, and when the storm was over, she said in a manner of honey and
+syrup:
+
+"You were speaking of the Dudenants, weren't you, Mrs. Corey? I do
+remember them now. Poor Don Dudenant, isn't it a pity he's such a fool?
+His father is really a very decent old bore."
+
+"I," observed Mrs. Corey, in prim horror, "regard the Dudenants as
+extremely delightful people. I fancy we must be thinking of different
+families. I mean the Manhattan Dudenants, not the Brooklyn family."
+
+"Oh, yes, I meant the Manhattan family, too--the one that made its
+fortune selling shoddy woolens in the Civil War," caressed Claire.
+
+Right there, her welcome by Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz ceased; and without
+any of the unhappiness which the thought would have caused her three
+months before, Claire reflected, "How they hate me!"
+
+The Gilsons had a number of thoughts upon the subject of tact to express
+to Claire on the way home. But she, who had always smiled, who had been
+the obedient guest, shrugged and snapped, "They're idiots, those young
+women. They're impertinent shopgirls in good frocks. I like your
+Seattle. It's a glorious city. And I love so many of the fine, simple,
+real people I've met here. I admire your progress. I do know how
+miraculously you've changed it from a mining camp. But for heaven's sake
+don't forget the good common hardiness of the miners. Somehow, London
+social distinctions seem ludicrous in American cities that twenty years
+ago didn't have much but board sidewalks and saloons. I don't care
+whether it's Seattle or Minneapolis or Omaha or Denver, I refuse to
+worry about the Duchess of Corey and the Baroness Betz and all the other
+wonderful imitations of gilt. When a pair of finishing-school flappers
+like Betz and Corey try to impress me with their superiority to workmen,
+and their extreme aristocracy and Easternness, they make me tired. I
+_am_ the East!"
+
+She had made peace with the Gilsons by night; she had been reasonably
+repentant about not playing the game of her hosts; but inside her eager
+heart she snuggled a warm thought. She remembered how gaily she had once
+promised, out on the road, to come to Milt's room and cook for him. She
+thought of it with homesick desire. His room probably wasn't
+particularly decorative, and she doubted his having an electric range,
+but it would be fun to fry eggs again, to see him fumbling with the
+dish-washing, to chatter and plan golden futures, and not worry about
+the opinions of Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz.
+
+The next afternoon the limousine was not busy and she borrowed it, with
+the handsome Greek chauffeur.
+
+She gave him an address not far from the university.
+
+He complained, "Pardon me, miss, but I think you have the wrong number.
+That block is a low quarter."
+
+"Probably! But that's the right number!"
+
+He raised his Athenian eyebrows, and she realized what a mistake she had
+made in not bringing the lethal tea-strainer along. When they had
+stopped in front of a cheap candy-store, he opened the door of the car
+with such frigid reserve that she thought seriously about slapping him.
+
+She climbed the stingy, flapping stairs, and knocked at the first door
+in the upper hall. It was opened by a large apron, to which a sleepy
+woman was an unimportant attachment, and out of the mass of apron and
+woman came a yawning, "Mr. Daggett's room is down the hall on the
+right."
+
+Claire knocked at a door which had at various epochs been blue, yellow,
+and pink, and now was all three. No answer. She tried the knob, went in.
+
+She could not tell whether it was the barrenness of the room, or Milt's
+carefulness, that caught her. The uncarpeted boards of the floor were
+well swept. He had only one plate, one spoon, but they were scoured, and
+put away on newspaper-covered shelves in a cupboard made of a soap-box.
+Behind a calico curtain was his new suit, dismayingly neat on its
+hanger. On the edge of the iron sink primly washed and spread out to
+dry, was a tattered old rag. At the sight of it, at the thought of Milt
+solemnly washing dishes, the tears began to creep to her eyes.
+
+There was but one picture in the room--a half-tone of a girl, clipped
+from a magazine devoted to actresses. The name was cut off. As she
+wondered at it, Claire saw that the actress was very much like herself.
+
+The only other ornament was a papier-mâché figure of a cat, a cat
+reminiscent of the Lady Vere de Vere. Claire picked it up. On the
+bottom was the price-mark--three cents.
+
+It was the price-mark that pierced her. She flung across the room,
+dropped on his creaky cot-bed, howled, "Oh, I've been a beast--a
+beast--a beast! All the pretty things--limousines and marble
+baths--thinking so much of them, and not wanting them for _him_! And he
+with so little, with just nothing--he that would appreciate jolly things
+so much--here in this den, and making it as tolerable as he can--and me
+half ashamed of him instead of fighting for him---- I belong with Corey
+and Betz. Oh, I'm so ashamed, so bitterly ashamed."
+
+She patted his bed smooth with nervous eager fingers.
+
+She scraped a pin-point of egg-yolk off a platter.
+
+Before she had been home five minutes she had written a note asking him
+to tea for next day.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+THE MORNING COAT OF MR. HUDSON B. RIGGS
+
+
+Mr. Hudson B. Riggs now enters the tale--somewhat tardily, and making a
+quick exit, all in a morning coat too tight about the shoulders, and a
+smile of festivity too tight about the lips. He looked as improbable as
+an undertaker's rubber-plant. Yet in his brief course he had a mighty
+effect upon the progress of civilization as exemplified in the social
+career of Mr. Milton Daggett.
+
+Mr. Riggs had arrived at a golden position in Alaskan mining engineering
+by way of the farm, the section gang, the surveyor's chain, and
+prospecting; and his thick hands showed his evolution. His purpose in
+life was to please Mrs. Riggs, and he wasn't ever going to achieve his
+purpose in life. She wore spangles, and her corsets creaked, and she
+smiled nervously, and could tell in a glance quicker than the 1/100
+kodak shutter whether or not a new acquaintance was "worth cultivating."
+She had made Mr. Riggs thoroughly safe and thoroughly unhappy in the
+pursuit of society. He stood about keeping from doing anything he might
+want to, and he was profusely polite to young cubs whom he longed to
+have in his office--so that he could get even with them.
+
+What Mr. Riggs wanted to do, at the third large tea given by Mrs. Gilson
+for Miss Claire Boltwood, was to sneak out on the sun-porch and play
+over the new records on the phonograph; but the things he had heard from
+Mrs. Riggs the last time he'd done that had convinced him that it was
+not a wise method of escape. So he stood by the fireplace--safe on one
+side at least--and ate lettuce sandwiches, which he privately called
+"cow feed," and listened to a shining, largely feminine crowd rapidly
+uttering unintelligible epigrams from which he caught only the words,
+"Ripping hand--trained nurse--whipcord--really worth seeing--lost the
+ball near the second hole--most absurd person--new maid--thanks so
+much." He was hoping that some one would come around and let him be
+agreeable. He knew that he stood the ride home with Mrs. Riggs much
+better after he had been agreeable to people he didn't like.
+
+What Mr. Riggs did not know was that a young man in uninteresting blue,
+who looked like a good tennis-player, was watching him. It wasn't
+because he detected a fellow soul in purgatory but because he always was
+obsequious outside of his office that Mr. Riggs bowed so profusely that
+he almost lost his tea-cup, when the young man in blue drifted to him
+and suggested, "I hear you're in the Alaskan mining-game, Mr. Riggs."
+
+"Oh yes."
+
+"Do you get up there much now?"
+
+"No, not much."
+
+"I hope to hit Alaska some day--I'm taking engineering at the U."
+
+"Do you? Straight?" Mr. Riggs violently set his cup down on a
+table--Mrs. Riggs would later tell him that he'd put it down in the
+wrong place, but never mind. He leaned over Milt and snarled, "Offer me
+a cigarette. I don't know if they smoke here, and I dassn't be the first
+to try. Say, boy, Alaska---- I wish I was there now! Say, it beats all
+hell how good tea can taste in a tin cup, and how wishy-washy it is in
+china. Boy, I don't know anything about you, but you look all right, and
+when you get ready to go to Alaska, you come to me, and I'll see if I
+can't give you a chance to go up there. But don't ever come back!"
+
+When the crowd began bubblingly to move toward the door, Milt prepared
+to move--and bubble--with them. Though Claire's note had sounded as
+though she was really a little lonely, at the tea she had said nothing
+to him except, "So glad you came. Do you know Dolly Ransome? Dolly, this
+is my nice Mr. Daggett. Take him and make him happy."
+
+Dolly hadn't made him in the least happy. She had talked about tennis;
+she had with some detail described her remarkable luck in beating one
+Sally Saunders three sets. Now Milt was learning tennis. He was at the
+present period giving two hours a week to tennis, two to dancing, two to
+bridge. But he preferred cleaning oil-wells to any of these toilsome
+accomplishments, and it must sadly be admitted that all the while he was
+making his face bright at Dolly, he was wondering what would happen if
+he interrupted Dolly's gurgling, galloping, giggling multitudinousness
+by shouting, "Oh, shut up!"
+
+When it seemed safe to go, and he tried to look as though he too were
+oozing out to a Crane-Simplex, Claire slipped beside him, soft as a
+shadow, and whispered, "Please don't go. I want to talk to you.
+_Please!_" There was fluttering wistfulness in her voice, though
+instantly it was gone as she hastened to the door and was to be heard
+asserting that she did indeed love Seattle.
+
+Milt looked out into the hall. He studied a console with a curious black
+and white vase containing a single peacock feather, and a gold mirror
+shimmering against a gray wall.
+
+"Lovely stuff. I like that mirror. Like a slew in the evening. But it
+isn't worth being a slave for. I'm not going to be a Mr. Riggs. Poor
+devil, he's more of a servant than any of these maids. Certainly am
+sorry for that poor fish. He'll have a chance to take his coat off and
+sit down and smoke--when he's dead!"
+
+The guests were gone; the Gilsons upstairs. Claire came running, seized
+Milt's sleeve, coaxed him to the davenport in the drawing-room--then
+sighed, and rubbed her forehead, and looked so tired that he could say
+nothing but, "Hope you haven't been overdoing."
+
+"No, just--just talking too much."
+
+He got himself to say, "Miss Ransome--the one that's nuts about
+tennis--she's darn nice."
+
+"Is she?"
+
+"Yes, she's--she's---- What do you hear from your father?"
+
+"Oh, he's back at work."
+
+"Trip do him good?"
+
+"Oh, a lot."
+
+"Did he----"
+
+"Milt! Tell me about you. What are you doing? What are you studying? How
+do you live? Do you really cook your own meals? Do you begin to get your
+teeth into the engineering? Oh, do tell me everything. I want to know,
+so much!"
+
+"There isn't a whole lot to tell. Mostly I'm getting back into math.
+Been out of touch with it. I find that I know more about motors than
+most of the fellows. That helps. And about living--oh, I keep
+conservative. Did you know I'd sold my garage?"
+
+"Oh, I didn't, I didn't!"
+
+He wondered why she said it with such stooping shame, but he went on
+mildly, "Well, I got a pretty good price, but of course I don't want to
+take any chances on running short of coin, so I'm not splurging much.
+And----" He looked at his nails, and whistled a bar or two, and turned
+his head away, and looked back with a shy, "And I'm learning to play
+bridge and tennis and stuff!"
+
+"Oh, my dear!" It was a cry of pain. She beat her hands for a moment
+before she murmured, "When are we going to have our lessons in
+dancing--and in making an impression on sun-specks like Dolly Ransome?"
+
+"I don't know," he parried. Then, looking at her honestly, he confessed,
+"I don't believe we're ever going to. Claire, I can't do it. I'm no good
+for this tea game. You know how clumsy I was. I spilled some tea, and I
+darn near tripped over some woman's dress and---- Oh, I'm not afraid of
+them. Now that I get a good close look at this bunch, they seem pretty
+much like other folks, except maybe that one old dame says 'cawn't.' But
+I can't do the manners stunt. I can't get myself to give enough thought
+to how you ought to hold a tea-cup."
+
+"Oh, those things don't matter--they don't _matter_! Besides, everybody
+likes you--only you're so terribly cautious that you never let them see
+the force and courage and all that wonderful sweet dear goodness that's
+in you. And as for your manners--heaven knows I'm no P. G. Wodehouse
+valet. But I'll teach you all I know."
+
+"Claire, I appreciate it a lot but---- I'm not so darn sure I want to
+learn. I'm getting scared. I watched that bird named Riggs here today.
+He's a regular fellow, or he was, but now he's simply lost in the
+shuffle. I don't want to be one of the million ghosts in a city. Seattle
+is bad enough--it's so big that I feel like a no-see-um in a Norway pine
+reserve. But New York would be a lot worse. I don't want to be a Mr.
+Riggs."
+
+"Yes, but--I'm not a Mrs. Riggs!"
+
+"What do you----"
+
+He did not finish asking her what she meant. She was in his arms; she
+was whispering, "My heart is so lonely;" and the room was still. The low
+sun flooded the windows, swam in the mirror in the hall, but they did
+not heed, did not see its gliding glory.
+
+Not till there was a sound of footsteps did she burst from his arms,
+spring to her reflection in the glass of a picture, and shamefacedly
+murmur to him over her shoulder, "My hair--it's a terrible giveaway!"
+
+He had followed her; he stood with his arm circling her shoulder.
+
+She begged, "No. Please no. I'm frightened. Let's--oh, let's have a walk
+or something before you scamper home."
+
+"Look! My dear! Let's run away, and explore the town, and not come back
+till late evening."
+
+"Yes. Let's."
+
+They walked from Queen Anne Hill through the city to the docks. There
+was nothing in their excited, childish, "Oh, see that!" and "There's a
+dandy car!" and "Ohhhhh, that's a Minnesota license--wonder who it is?"
+to confess that they had been so closely, so hungrily together.
+
+They swung along a high walk overlooking the city wharf. They saw a
+steamer loading rails and food for the government railroad in Alaska.
+They exclaimed over a nest of little, tarry fishing-boats. They watched
+men working late to unload Alaska salmon.
+
+They crossed the city to Jap Town and its writhing streets, its dark
+alleys and stairways lost up the hillsides. They smiled at black-eyed
+children, and found a Japanese restaurant, and tried to dine on raw fish
+and huge shrimps and roots soaked in a very fair grade of light-medium
+motor oil.
+
+With Milt for guide, Claire discovered a Christianity that was not of
+candles and shifting lights and insinuating music, nor of carpets and
+large pews and sound oratory, but of hoboes blinking in rows, and girls
+in gospel bonnets, and little silver and crimson placards of Bible
+texts. They stopped on a corner to listen to a Pentecostal brother, to
+an I. W. W. speaker, to a magnificent negro who boomed in an operatic
+baritone that the Day of Judgment was coming on April 11, 1923, at three
+in the morning.
+
+In the streets of Jap Town, in cheap motion-picture theaters, in hotels
+for transient workmen, she found life, running swift and eager and
+many-colored; and it seemed to her that back in the house of
+four-posters and walls of subdued gray, life was smothered in the very
+best pink cotton-batting. Milt's delight in every picturesque dark
+corner, and the colloquial eloquence of the street-orators, stirred her.
+And when she saw a shopgirl caress the hand of a slouching beau in
+threadbare brown, her own hand slipped into Milt's and clung there.
+
+But they came shyly up to the Gilson hedge, and when Milt chuckled,
+"Bully walk; let's do it again," she said only, "Oh, yes, I did like it.
+Very much."
+
+He had abruptly dropped his beautiful new felt hat. He was clutching her
+arms, demanding, "Can you like me? Oh my God, Claire, I can't play at
+love. I'm mad--I just live in you. You're my blood and soul. Can I
+become--the kind of man you like?"
+
+"My dear!" She was fiercely addressing not him alone but the Betzes and
+Coreys and Gilsons and Jeff Saxtons, "don't you forget for one moment
+that all these people--here or Brooklyn either--that seem so aloof and
+amused, are secretly just plain people with enamel on, and you're to
+have the very best enamel, if it's worth while. I'm not sure that it
+is----"
+
+"You're going to kiss me!"
+
+"No! Please no! I don't--I don't understand us, even now. Can't we be
+just playmates a while yet? But--I do like you!"
+
+She fled. When she reached the hall she found her eyelids wet.
+
+It was the next afternoon----
+
+Claire was curled on the embroidered linen counterpane of her bed,
+thinking about chocolates and Brooklyn and driving through Yellowstone
+Park and corn fritters and satin petticoats versus _crêpe de chine_ and
+Mount Rainier and Milt and spiritualism and manicuring, when Mrs. Gilson
+prowled into her room and demanded "Busy?" so casually that Claire was
+suspicious.
+
+"No. Not very. Something up?"
+
+"A nice party. Come down and meet an amusing man from Alaska."
+
+Claire took her time powdering her nose, and ambled downstairs and into
+the drawing-room, to find----
+
+Jeff Saxton, Mr. Geoffrey Saxton, who is the height of Brooklyn Heights,
+standing by the fireplace, smiling at her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+THE ENEMY LOVE
+
+
+But at second glance--was it Jeff? This man was tanned to a thick even
+brown in which his eyes were startlingly white. His hands were burned
+red; there was a scar across one of them; and he was standing with them
+cockily at his hips, all unlike the sleekly, noisily quiet Jeff of
+Brooklyn. He was in corduroy trousers and belted corduroy jacket, with a
+khaki-colored flannel shirt.
+
+But his tranquilly commanding smile was Jeff's, and his lean grace; and
+Jeff's familiar amused voice greeted her paralyzed amazement with:
+
+"Hello, pard! Ain't I met you some place in Montana?"
+
+"Well--where--in--the----"
+
+"Just landed from Alaska. Had to run up there from California. How are
+you, little princess?"
+
+His hand was out to her, then both hands, beseechingly, but she did not
+run to him, as she had at Flathead Lake. She stalked him cautiously, and
+shook hands--much too heartily. She sought cover in the wing-chair
+and--much too cordially--she invited:
+
+"Tell me all about it."
+
+He was watching her. Already his old pursuing determination, his steady
+dignity, were beginning to frighten her. But he calmly dropped into a
+straight chair, and obliged:
+
+"It's really been quite a lively journey. Didn't know I could like
+roughing-it so well. And it was real roughing-it, pretty much. Oh, not
+dangerous at all, but rather vigorous. I had to canoe up three hundred
+miles of a shallow river, with one Indian guide, making a portage every
+ten miles or so, and we got tipped over in the rapids now and then--the
+Big Chief almost got drowned once--and we camped at night in the
+original place where they invented mosquitoes--and one morning I shot a
+black bear just in time to keep him from eating my boots."
+
+"Oh!" she sighed in admiration, and "Oh!" again, uneasily.
+
+Nothing had been said about it; Jeff was the last person in the world to
+spoil his triumph by commenting on it; but both of them knew that they
+had violently changed places; that now it was she who was the limp
+indoor-dweller, and he who was the ruddy ranger; that as he had admired
+her at Flathead Lake, so now it was hers to admire, and his to be
+serenely heroic.
+
+She was not far from the worshiping sub-deb in her sighing, "How _did_
+you get the scar?"
+
+"That? Oh, nothing."
+
+"Please tell me."
+
+"Really and truly. Nothing at all. Just a drunken fellow with a knife,
+playing the fool. I didn't have to touch him--quite sure he could have
+given me a frightful beating and all that sort of thing. It was the Big
+Chief who got rid of him."
+
+"He--cut you? With a kniiiiiife? Ohhhhhhh!"
+
+She ran to him, pityingly stroked the scar, looked down at him with
+filmy eyes. Then she tried to retreat, but he retained her hand, glanced
+up at her as though he knew her every thought. She felt weak. How could
+she escape him? "Please!" she begged flutteringly.
+
+If he held her hand another moment, she trembled, she'd be on his lap,
+in his arms--lost. And he was holding it. He was----
+
+Oh, he was too old for her. Yes, and too paternal. But still---- Life
+with Jeff would be protected, kindly, honorable.
+
+Yet all the time she wanted, and stormily knew she wanted, to be fleeing
+to the boy Milt, her mate; to run away with him, hand in hand,
+discovering all the colored world, laughing at life, not afraid of
+losing dignity. In fear of Jeff's very kindliness and honor, she jerked
+her hand free. Then she tried to smile like a clever fencer.
+
+As she retreated to her chair she stammered, "Did you---- Was Alaska
+interesting?"
+
+He did not let her go, this time. Easy, cat-like for all his dry
+gravity, he sauntered after her, and with a fine high seriousness
+pleaded his case:
+
+"Claire dear, those few weeks of fighting nature were a revelation to
+me. I'm going to have lots more of it. As it happens, they need me
+there. There's plenty of copper, but there's big transportation and
+employment problems that I seem better able to solve than the other
+chaps--though of course I'm an absolute muff when it comes to
+engineering problems. But I've had certain training and--I'm going to
+arrange things so that I get up there at least once a year. Next summer
+I'll make a much longer trip--see the mountains--oh, glorious
+mountains--and funny half-Russian towns, and have some fishing----
+Wandering. The really big thing. Even finer than your superb plucky trip
+through----"
+
+"Wasn't plucky! I'm a cry baby," she said, like a bad, contradictory
+little girl.
+
+He didn't argue it. He smiled and said "Tut!" and placidly catalogued
+her with, "You're the pluckiest girl I've ever seen, and it's all the
+more amazing because you're not a motion-picture Tomboy, but essentially
+exquisite----"
+
+"I'm a grub."
+
+"Very well, then. You're a grub. So am I. And I like it. And when I make
+the big Alaskan trip next year I want you to go along! Claire! Haven't
+you any idea how terribly close to me the thought of you has been these
+weeks? You've guided me through the wilderness----"
+
+"It's---- I'm glad." She sprang up, beseeching, "Jeff dear, you're going
+to stay for tea? I must run up and powder my nose."
+
+"Not until you say you're glad to see me. Child dear, we've been ambling
+along and---- No. You aren't a child any more. You're a woman. And if
+I've never been quite a man, but just a dusty office-machine, that's
+gone now. I've got the wind of the wilderness in my lungs. Man and
+woman! My woman! That's all I'm going to say now, but---- Oh my God,
+Claire, I do need you so!"
+
+He drew her head to his shoulder, and for an instant she rested there.
+But as she looked up, she saw coming age in the granulated skin of his
+throat.
+
+"He needs me--but he'd boss me. I'd be the cunning child-wife, even at
+fifty," she worried, and "Hang him, it's like his superiority to beat
+poor Milt even at adventuring--and to be such a confounded Modest
+Christian Gentleman about it!"
+
+"You'd--you're so dreadfully managing," she sighed aloud.
+
+For the first time in all their acquaintanceship, Jeff's pride broke,
+and he held her away from him, while his lips were pathetic, and he
+mourned, "Why do you always try to hurt me?"
+
+"Oh, my dear, I don't."
+
+"Is it because you resent the decent things I have managed to do?"
+
+"I don't understand."
+
+"If I have an idea for a party, you think I'm 'managing.' If I think
+things out deeply, you say I'm dull."
+
+"Oh, you aren't. I didn't mean----"
+
+"What are you? A real woman, or one of these flirts, that love to tease
+a man because he's foolish enough to be honestly in love?"
+
+"I'm not--hon-estly I'm not, Jeff. It's---- You don't quite make me----
+It's just that I'm not in love with you. I like you, and respect you
+terribly, but----"
+
+"I'm going to make you love me." His clutching fingers hurt her arm, and
+somehow she was not angry, but stirred. "But I'm not going to try now.
+Forget the Alaskan caveman. Remember, I haven't even used the word
+'love.' I've just chatted about fjords, or whatever they are, but one of
+these days---- No. I won't do it. I want to stay here in Seattle a few
+days, and take you on jolly picnics, but---- Would you rather I didn't
+even do that? I'm----" He dropped her arm, kneaded his forehead with the
+heel of his palm. "I can't stand being regarded as a bothersome puppy. I
+can't stand it! I can't!"
+
+"Please stay, Jeff! We'll have some darling drives and things. We'll go
+up Rainier as far as we can."
+
+He stayed. He was anecdotal and amusing at tea, that afternoon. Claire
+saw how the Gilsons, and two girls who dropped in, admired him. That
+made her uneasy. And when Mrs. Gilson begged him to leave his hotel and
+stay with them, he refused with a quick look at Claire that hurt her.
+
+"He wants me to be free. He's really so much more considerate than Milt.
+And I hurt him. Even his pride broke down. And I've spoiled Milt's life
+by meddling. And I've hurt the Gilsons' feelings. And I'm not much of a
+comfort to father. Oh, I'm absolutely no good," she agonized.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+THE VIRTUOUS PLOTTERS
+
+
+Mr. Geoffrey Saxton, in Alaskan tan and New York evening clothes and
+Piccadilly poise, was talking to the Eugene Gilsons while Claire
+finished dressing for the theater.
+
+Mrs. Gilson observed, "She's the dearest thing. We've become awfully
+fond of her. But I don't think she knows what she wants to do with life.
+She's rather at loose ends. Who is this Daggett boy--some university
+student--whom she seems to like?"
+
+"Well, since you speak of him---- I hadn't meant to, unless you did. I
+want to be fair to him. What did she tell you about him?" Jeff asked
+confidentially.
+
+"Nothing, except that he's a young engineer, and frightfully brave and
+all those uncomfortable virtues, and she met him in Yellowstone Park or
+somewhere, and he saved her from a bear--or was it a tramp?--from
+something unnecessary, at any rate."
+
+"Eva, I don't want to be supercilious, but the truth is that this young
+Daggett is a rather dreadful person. He's been here at the house, hasn't
+he? How did he strike you?"
+
+"Not at all. He's silent, and as dull as lukewarm tea, but perfectly
+inoffensive."
+
+"Then he's cleverer than I thought! Daggett is anything but dull and
+inoffensive, and if he can play that estimable rôle----! It seems that
+he is the son of some common workman in the Middlewest; he isn't an
+engineer at all; he's really a chauffeur or a taxi-driver or something;
+and he ran into Claire and Henry B. on the road, and somehow insinuated
+himself into their graces--far from being silent and commonplace, he
+appears to have some strange kind of charm which," Jeff sighed, "I don't
+understand at all. I simply don't understand it!
+
+"I met him in Montana with the most gorgeously atrocious person I've
+ever encountered--one Pinky Westlake, or some such a name--positively, a
+crook! He tried to get Boltwood and myself interested in the commonest
+kind of a mining swindle--hinted that we were to join him in cheating
+the public. And this Daggett was his partner--they actually traveled
+together. But I do want to be just. I'm not _sure_ that Daggett was
+aware of his partner's dishonesty. That isn't what worries me about the
+lad. It's his utter impossibility. He's as crude as iron-ore. When he's
+being careful, he may manage to be inconspicuous, but give him the
+chance----
+
+"Really, I'm not exaggerating when I say that at thirty-five he'll be
+dining in his shirt-sleeves, and sitting down to read the paper with his
+shoes off and feet up on the table. But Claire--you know what a dear
+Quixotic soul she is--she fancies that because this fellow repaired a
+puncture or something of the sort for her on the road, she's indebted
+to him, and the worse he is, the more she feels that she must help him.
+And affairs of that kind---- Oh, it's quite too horrible, but there have
+been cases, you know, where girls as splendid and fine and well-bred as
+Claire herself have been trapped into low marriages by their loyalty to
+cadging adventurers!"
+
+"Oh!" groaned Mrs. Gilson; and "Good Lord!" lamented Mr. Gilson,
+delighted by the possibility of tragedy; and "Really, I'm not
+exaggerating," said Jeff enthusiastically.
+
+"What are we going to do?" demanded Mrs. Gilson; while Mr. Gilson, being
+of a ready and inventive mind, exclaimed, "By Jove, you ought to kidnap
+her and marry her yourself, Jeff!"
+
+"I'd like to. But I'm too old."
+
+They beautifully assured him that he was a blithe young thing with milk
+teeth; and with a certain satisfaction Jeff suggested, "I tell you what
+we might do. Of course it's an ancient stunt, but it's good. I judge
+that Daggett hasn't been here at the house much. Why not have him here
+so often that Claire will awaken to his crudity, and get sick of him?"
+
+"We'll do it," thrilled Mrs. Gilson. "We'll have him for everything from
+nine-course dinners with Grandmother Eaton's napkins on view, to milk
+and cold ham out of the ice-box. When Claire doesn't invite him, I
+will!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+THE KITCHEN INTIMATE
+
+
+Milt had become used to the Gilson drawing-room. He was no longer
+uncomfortable in the presence of its sleek fatness, though at first (not
+knowing that there were such resources as interior decorators), he had
+been convinced that, to have created the room, the Gilsons must have
+known everything in the world. Now he glanced familiarly at its white
+paneling, its sconces like silver candlesticks, the inevitable davenport
+inevitably backed by an amethyst-shaded piano lamp and a table crowded
+with silver boxes and picture-frames. He liked the winsomeness of light
+upon velvet and polished wood.
+
+It was not the drawing-room but the kitchen that dismayed him.
+
+In Schoenstrom he had known that there must somewhere be beautiful
+"parlors," but he had trusted in his experience of kitchens. Kitchens,
+according to his philosophy, were small smelly rooms of bare floors, and
+provided with one oilcloth-covered table, one stove (the front draft
+always broken and propped up with the lid-lifter), one cupboard with
+panes of tin pierced in rosettes, and one stack of dirty dishes.
+
+But the Gilson kitchen had the efficiency of a laboratory and the
+superciliousness of a hair-dresser's booth. With awe Milt beheld walls
+of white tiles, a cork floor, a gas-range large as a hotel-stove, a
+ceiling-high refrigerator of enamel and nickel, zinc-topped tables, and
+a case of utensils like a surgeon's knives. It frightened him; it made
+more hopelessly unapproachable than ever the Alexandrian luxury of the
+great Gilsons.... The Vanderbilts' kitchen must be like this. And maybe
+King George's.
+
+He was viewing the kitchen upon the occasion of an intimate Sunday
+evening supper to which he had been yearningly invited by Mrs. Gilson.
+The maids were all out. The Gilsons and Claire, Milt and Jeff Saxton,
+shoutingly prepared their own supper. While Mrs. Gilson scrambled eggs
+and made coffee, the others set the table, and brought cold ham and a
+bowl of salad from the ice-box.
+
+Milt had intended to be a silent but deft servitor. When he had heard
+that he was to come to supper with the returned Mr. Geoffrey Saxton, he
+had first been panic-shaken, then resolved. He'd "let old iron-face
+Saxton do the high and mighty. Let him stand around and show off his
+clothes and adjectives, way he did at Flathead Lake." But he, Milt,
+would be "on the job." He'd help get supper, and calmly ignore Jeff's
+rudeness.
+
+Only--Jeff wasn't rude. He greeted Milt with, "Ah, Daggett! This is _so_
+nice!" And Milt had no chance to help. It was Jeff who anticipated him
+and with a pleasant, "Let me get that--I'm kitchen-broke," snatched up
+the cold ham and salad. It was Jeff who found the supper plates, while
+Milt was blunderingly wondering how any one family could use a "whole
+furniture-store-full of different kinds of china." It was Jeff who
+sprang to help Claire wheel in the tea-wagon, and so captured the chance
+to speak to her for which Milt had been maneuvering these five minutes.
+
+When they were settled, Jeff glowed at him, and respectfully offered, "I
+thought of you so often, Daggett, on a recent little jaunt of mine.
+You'd have been helpful."
+
+"Where was that?" asked Milt suspiciously (wondering, and waiting to
+see, whether you could take cold ham in your fingers).
+
+"Oh, in Alaska."
+
+"In--Alaska?" Milt was dismayed.
+
+"Yes, just a business trip there. There's something I wish you'd advise
+me about."
+
+He was humble. And Milt was uneasy. He grumbled, "What's that?"
+
+"I've been wondering whether it would be possible to use wireless
+telephony in Alaska. But I'm such a dub at electricity. Do you know----
+What would be the cost of installing a wireless telephone plant with a
+hundred-mile radius?"
+
+"Gee, I don't know!"
+
+"Oh, so sorry. Well, I wonder if you can tell me about wireless
+telegraphy, then?"
+
+"No, I don't know anything about that either."
+
+Milt had desperately tried to make his answer gracious but somehow----
+He hated this devil's obsequiousness more than he had his chilliness at
+Flathead Lake. He had a feeling that the Gilsons had delightedly kicked
+each other under the table; that, for all her unchanging smile, Claire
+was unhappy.... And she was so far off, a white wraith floating beyond
+his frantic grasp.
+
+"It doesn't matter, really. But I didn't know---- So you've started in
+the engineering school at the University of Washington," Saxton was
+purring. "Have you met Gid Childers there--son of old Senator
+Childers--charming people."
+
+"I've seen him. He has a Stutz--no, his is the Mercer," sighed Milt.
+
+He hated himself for it, but he couldn't quite keep the awe out of his
+voice. People with Mercers----
+
+Claire seemed to be trying to speak. She made a delicate, feminine,
+clairesque approximation to clearing her throat. But Jeff ignored her
+and with almost osculatory affection continued to Milt:
+
+"Do let me know if there's anything I can do to help you. We're
+acquainted with two or three of your engineering faculty at the Office.
+They write in about various things. Do you happen to know Dr.
+Philgren?"
+
+"Oh yes. Say! He's a wonder!" Milt was betrayed into exclaiming.
+
+"Yes. Good chap, I believe. He's been trying to get a job with us. We
+may give him one. Just tell him you're a friend of mine, and that he's
+to give you any help he can."
+
+Milt choked on a "Thanks."
+
+"And--now that we're just the family here together--how goes the
+financial side? Can I be of any assistance in introducing you to some
+engineering firm where you could do a little work on the side? You could
+make quite a little money----"
+
+So confoundedly affectionate and paternal----
+
+Milt said irritably, "Thanks, but I don't need to do any work. I've got
+plenty of money."
+
+"How pleasant!" Saxton's voice was smooth as marshmallow. "You're
+fortunate. I had quite a struggle to get through Princeton."
+
+Wasn't Mr. Gilson contrasting Saxton's silk shirt with Milt's darned
+cotton covering, and in light of that contrast chuckling at Milt's boast
+and Saxton's modesty? Milt became overheated. His scalp prickled and his
+shoulder-blades were damp. As Saxton turned from him, and crooned to
+Claire, "More ham, honey?" Milt hated himself. He was in much of the
+dramatic but undesirable position of a man in pajamas, not very good
+pajamas, who has been locked out in the hotel corridor by the slamming
+of his door. He was in the frame of mind of a mongrel, of a real
+Boys'-Dog, at a Madison Square dog-show. He had a faint shrewd suspicion
+of Saxton's game. But what could he do about it?
+
+He felt even more out of place when the family forgot him and talked
+about people of whom he had never heard.
+
+He sat alone on an extremely distant desert isle and ate cold ham and
+wished he were in Schoenstrom.
+
+Claire had recovered her power of speech. She seemed to be trying to
+bring him into the conversation, so that the family might appreciate
+him.
+
+She hesitated, and thought with creased brows, and brought out, "Uh, uh,
+oh---- Oh Milt: How much is gas selling at now?"...
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Milt left that charming and intimate supper-party at nine. He said, "Got
+to work on--on my analytical geometry," as though it was a lie; and he
+threw "Good night" at Saxton as though he hated his kind, good
+benefactor; and when he tried to be gracious to Mrs. Gilson the best he
+could get out was, "Thanks f' inviting me." They expansively saw him to
+the door. Just as he thought that he had escaped, Saxton begged, "Oh,
+Daggett, I was arguing with a chap---- What color are Holstein-Friesian
+cattle? Red?"
+
+"Black and white," Milt said eagerly.
+
+He heard Mrs. Gilson giggle.
+
+He stood on the terrace wiping his forehead and, without the least
+struggle, finally and irretrievably admitting that he would never see
+Claire Boltwood or any of her friends again. Not--never!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He had received from Mrs. Gilson a note inviting him to share their box
+at the first night of a three-night Opera Season. He had spent half a
+day in trying to think of a courteously rude way of declining.
+
+A straggly little girl came up from the candy-shop below his room,
+demanding, "Say, are you Mr. Daggett? Say, there's some woman wants to
+talk to you on our telephone. Say, tell them we ain't supposed to be no
+messenger-office. You ain't supposed to call no upstairs people on our
+telephone. We ain't supposed to leave the store and go trotting all over
+town to---- Gee, a nickel, gee, thank you, don't mind what ma says,
+she's always kicking."
+
+On the telephone, he heard Claire's voice in an agitated, "Milt! Meet me
+down-town, at the Imperial Motion Picture Theater, right away. Something
+I've got to tell you. I'll be in the lobby. Hurry!"
+
+When he bolted in she was already in the lobby, agitatedly looking over
+a frame of "stills." She ran to him, hooked her fingers in his lapel,
+poured out, "They've invited you to the opera? I want you to come and
+put it all over them. I'm almost sure there's a plot. They want to show
+me that you aren't used to tiaras and saxophones and creaking dowagers
+and tulle. Beat 'em! Beat 'em! Come to the opera and be awf'ly aloof and
+supercilious. You can! Yes, you can! And be sure--wear evening clothes.
+Now I've got to hurry."
+
+"B-but----"
+
+"Don't disappoint me. I depend on you. Oh, say you will!"
+
+"I will!"
+
+She was gone, whisking into the Gilson limousine. He was in a glow at
+her loyalty, in a tremor of anger at the meddlers.
+
+But he had never worn evening clothes.
+
+He called it "a dress-suit," and before the complications of that exotic
+garb, he was flabby with anxiety. To Milt and to Schoenstrom--to Bill
+McGolwey, even to Prof Jones and the greasily prosperous Heinie
+Rauskukle--the dress-suit was the symbol and proof, the indication and
+manner, of sophisticated wealth. In Schoenstrom even waiters do not wear
+dress-suits. For one thing there aren't any waiters. There is one
+waitress at the Leipzig House, Miss Annie Schweigenblat, but you
+wouldn't expect Miss Schweigenblat to deal them off the arm in black
+trousers with braid down the side.
+
+No; a dress-suit was what the hero wore in the movies; and the hero in
+the movies, when he wasn't a cowpuncher, was an ex-captain of the Yale
+football team, and had chambers and a valet. You could tell him from the
+valet because he wasn't so bald. It is true that Milt had heard that in
+St. Cloud there were people who wore dress-suits at parties, but then
+St. Cloud was a city, fifteen or sixteen thousand.
+
+"How could he get away with a dress-suit? How could he keep from feeling
+foolish in a low-cut vest, and what the deuce would he do with the
+tails? Did you part 'em or roll 'em up, when you sat down? And wouldn't
+everybody be able to tell from his foolish look that he didn't belong in
+one?" He could hear A.D.T. boys and loafers in front of pool rooms
+whispering, "Look at the piker in the rented soup and fish!"
+
+For of course he'd rent one. Nobody bought them--except plutes like
+Henry B. Boltwood.
+
+He agitatedly walked up and down for an hour, peering into haberdashery
+windows, looking for a kind-faced young man. He found him, in Ye Pall
+Mall Toggery Shoppe & Shoes; an open-faced young man who was gazing
+through the window as sparklingly as though he was thinking of going as
+a missionary to India--and liked curry. Milt ironed out his worried
+face, clumped in, demanded fraternally, "Say, old man, don't some of
+these gents' furnishings stores have kind of little charts that tell
+just what you wear with dress-suits and Prince Alberts and everything?"
+
+"You bet," said the kind-faced young man.
+
+West of Chicago, "You bet" means "Rather," and "Yes indeed," and "On the
+whole I should be inclined to fancy that there may be some vestiges of
+accuracy in your curious opinion," and "You're a liar but I can't afford
+to say so."
+
+The kind-faced young man brought from behind the counter a beautiful
+brochure illustrated with photographs of Phoebus Apollo in what were
+described as "American Beauty Garments--neat, natty, nobby, new." The
+center pages faithfully catalogued the ties, shirts, cuff-links, spats,
+boots, hats, to wear with evening clothes, morning clothes, riding
+clothes, tennis costumes, polite mourning.
+
+As he looked it over Milt felt that his wardrobe already contained all
+these gentlemanly possessions.
+
+With the aid of the clerk and the chart he purchased a tradition-haunted
+garment with a plate-armor bosom and an opening as crooked as the
+Missouri River; a white tie which in his strong red hands looked as
+silly as a dead fish; waistcoat, pearl links, and studs. For the first
+time, except for seizures of madness during two or three visits to
+Minneapolis motor accessory stores, he caught the shopping-fever. The
+long shining counter, the trim red-stained shelves, the glittering
+cases, the racks of flaunting ties, were beautiful to him and
+beckoning. He revolved a pleasantly clicking rack of ties, then turned
+and fought his way out.
+
+He bought pumps--which cost exactly twice as much as the largest sum
+which he had allowed himself. He bought a newspaper, and in the
+want-columns found the advertisement:
+
+ Silberfarb the Society Tailor
+      DRESS SUITS TO RENT
+     Snappiest in the City
+
+Despite the superlative snappiness of Mr. Silberfarb's dress-suits his
+establishment was a loft over a delicatessen, approached by a splintery
+stairway along which hung shabby signs announcing the upstairs offices
+of "J. L. & T. J. O'Regan, Private Detectives," "The Zenith Spiritualist
+Church, Messages by Rev. Lulu Paughouse," "The International Order of
+Live Ones, Seattle Wigwam," and "Mme. Lavourie, Sulphur Baths." The dead
+air of the hallway suggested petty crookedness. Milt felt that he ought
+to fight somebody but, there being no one to fight, he banged along the
+flapping boards of the second-floor hallway to the ground-glass door of
+Silberfarb the Society Tailor, who was also, as an afterthought on a
+straggly placard, "Pressng & Cleang While U Wait."
+
+He belligerently shouldered into a low room. The light from the one
+window was almost obscured by racks of musty-smelling black clothes
+which stretched away from him in two dismal aisles that resembled a
+morgue of unhappy dead men indecently hung up on hooks. On a long,
+clumsily carpentered table, a small Jew, collarless, sweaty, unshaven,
+was darning trousers under an evil mantle gaslight. The Jew wrung out
+his hands and tried to look benevolent.
+
+"Want to rent a dress-suit," said Milt.
+
+"I got just the t'ing for you!"
+
+The little man unfolded himself, galloped down the aisle, seized the
+first garment that came to hand, and came back to lay it against Milt's
+uncomfortable frame, bumbling, "Fine, mister, fy-en!"
+
+Milt studied the shiny-seamed, worn-buttonholed, limp object with
+dislike. Its personality was disintegrated. The only thing he liked
+about it was the good garage stink of gasoline.
+
+"That's almost worn out," he growled.
+
+At this sacrilege Mr. Silberfarb threw up his hands, with the dingy suit
+flapping in them like a bed-quilt shaken from a tenement window. He
+looked Milt all over, coldly. His red but shining eyes hinted that Milt
+was a clodhopper and no honest wearer of evening clothes. Milt felt
+humble, but he snapped, "No good. Want something with class."
+
+"Vell, that was good enough for a university professor at the big dance,
+but if you say so----"
+
+In the manner of one who is being put to an unfair amount of trouble,
+Mr. Silberfarb returned the paranoiac dress-suit to the rack, sighing
+patiently as he laboriously draped it on a hanger. He peered and pawed.
+He crowed with throaty triumph and brought back a rich ripe thing of
+velvet collar and cuffs. He fixed Milt with eyes that had become as
+sulky as the eyes of a dog in August dust.
+
+"Now that--you can't beat that, if you vant class, and it'll fit you
+like a glove. Oh, that's an ellllegant garment!"
+
+Shaking himself out of the spell of those contemptuous eyes Milt opened
+his brochure, studied the chart, and in a footnote found, "Never wear
+velvet collars or cuffs with evening coat."
+
+"Nope. Nix on the velvet," he remarked.
+
+Then the little man went mad and ran around in circles. He flung the
+ellllegant garment on the table. He flapped his arms, and wailed, "What
+do you vant? What do you vannnnt? That's a hundred-and-fifty-dollar
+dress-suit! That belonged to one of the richest men in the city. He sold
+it to me because he was going to Japan."
+
+"Well, you can send it to Japan after him. I want something decent. Have
+you got it--or shall I go some place else?"
+
+The tailor instantly became affectionate. "How about a nice Tuxedo?" he
+coaxed.
+
+"Nope. It says here--let me see--oh yes, here it is--it says here in the
+book that for the theater-with-ladies, should not wear 'dinner-coat or
+so-called Tuxedo, but----'"
+
+"Oh, dem fellows what writes books they don't know nothing. Absolute!
+They make it up."
+
+"Huh! Well, I guess I'll take my chance on them. The factory knows the
+ignition better 'n any repair-man."
+
+"Vell say, you're a hard fellow to please. I'll give you one of my
+reserve stock, but you got to leave me ten dollars deposit instead of
+five."
+
+Mr. Silberfarb quite cheerfully unlocked a glass case behind the racked
+and ghostly dead; he brought out a suit that seemed to Milt almost
+decent. And it almost fitted when, after changing clothes in a broiling,
+boiling, reeking, gasoline-pulsing hole behind the racks, he examined it
+before a pier-glass. But he caught the tailor assisting the fit by
+bunching up a roll of cloth at the shoulder. Again Milt snapped, and
+again the tailor suffered and died, and to a doubting heathen world
+maintained the true gospel of "What do you vannnnt? It ain't stylish to
+have the dress-suit too tight! All the gents is wearing 'em loose and
+graceful." But in the end, after Milt had gone as far as the door, Mr.
+Silberfarb admitted that one dress-coat wouldn't always fit all persons
+without some alterations.
+
+The coat did bag a little, and it was too long in the sleeves, but as
+Milt studied himself in his room--by placing his small melancholy mirror
+on the bureau, then on a chair, then on the floor, finally, to get a
+complete view, clear out in the hall--he admitted with stirring delight
+that he looked "pretty fair in the bloomin' outfit." His clear face, his
+shining hair, his straight shoulders, seemed to go with the costume.
+
+He wriggled into his top-coat and marched out of his room,
+theater-bound, with the well-fed satisfaction of a man who is certain
+that no one is giggling, "Look at the hand-me-downs." His pumps did
+alternately pinch his toes and rub his heels; the trousers cramped his
+waist; and he suspected that his tie had gone wandering. But he
+swaggered to the trolley, and sat as one rich and famous and very kind
+to the Common People, till----
+
+Another man in evening clothes got on the car, and Milt saw that he wore
+a silk hat, and a white knitted scarf; that he took out and examined a
+pair of white kid gloves.
+
+He'd forgotten the hat! He was wearing his gray felt. He could risk the
+gloves, but the hat--the "stovepipe"--and the chart had said to wear
+one--he was ruined----
+
+He turned up the collar of his top-coat to conceal his white tie, tried
+to hide each of his feet behind the other to cover up his pumps; sought
+to change his expression from that of a superior person in evening
+clothes to that of a decent fellow in honest Regular Clothes. Had the
+conductor or any of the passengers realized that he was a dub in a
+dress-suit without the hat?
+
+Once he thought that the real person in real evening clothes was looking
+at him. He turned his head and bore the probable insult in weak misery.
+
+Too feeble for anything but thick suffering he was dragged on toward the
+theater, the opera, people in silk hats--toward Jeff Saxton and
+exposure.
+
+But his success in bullying the tailor had taught him that dressing
+wasn't really a hidden lore to be known only by initiates; that some day
+he too might understand the black and white magic of clothes. His
+bruised self-consciousness healed. "I'll do--something," he determined.
+He waited, vacuously.
+
+The Gilson party was not in the lobby when he arrived. He tore off his
+top-coat. He draped it over his felt hat, so that no one could be sure
+what sort of hat it shamefully concealed. That unveiling did expose him
+to the stare of everybody waiting in the lobby. He was convinced that
+the entire ticket-buying cue was glumly resenting him. Peeping down at
+the unusual white glare of his shirt-front, he felt naked and
+indecent.... "Nice kind o' vest. Must make 'em out of old piqué
+collars."
+
+He endured his martyrdom till his party arrived--the Gilsons, Claire,
+Jeff Saxton, and a glittering young woman whose name, Milt thought, was
+Mrs. Corey.
+
+And Saxton wasn't wearing a high hat! He wore a soft one, and he didn't
+seem to care!
+
+Milt straightened up, followed them through the manifold dangers of the
+lobby, down a perilous aisle of uptilted scornful faces, to a red narrow
+corridor, winding stairs, a secret passage, a mysterious dark
+closet--and he walked out into a room with one side missing, and, on
+that side, ten trillion people in a well, and nine trillion of them
+staring at him and noticing that he'd rented his dress-suit. Hot about
+the neck, he stumbled over one or two chairs, and was permitted to rest
+in a foolish little gilt chair in the farthest corner.
+
+Once safe, he felt much better. Except that Jeff did put on white kid
+gloves, Milt couldn't see that they two looked so different. And neither
+of the two men in the next box wore gloves. Milt made sure of that
+comfort; he reveled in it; he looked at Claire, and in her loyal smile
+found ease.
+
+He snarled, "She trusts you. Forget you're a dub. Try to be human. Hang
+it, I'm no greener at the opera than old horsehair sofa there would be
+at a garage."
+
+There was something---- What was it he was trying to remember? Oh yes.
+When he'd worked in the Schoenstrom flour-mill, as engineer, at
+eighteen, the owner had tried to torment him (to "get his goat," Milt
+put it), and Milt had found that the one thing that would save him was
+to smile as though he knew more than he was telling. It did not, he
+remembered, make any difference whether or not the smile was real. If he
+merely looked the miller up and down, and smiled cynically, he was let
+alone.
+
+Why not----
+
+Saxton was bending toward him, asking in honeyed respectfulness:
+
+"Don't you think that the new school in music--audible pointillage, one
+might call it--mistakes cacophony for power?"
+
+Milt smiled, paternally.
+
+Saxton waited for something more. He dug the nail of his right middle
+finger into his thumb, looked thoughtful, and attacked again:
+
+"Which do you like better: the new Italian music, or the orthodox
+German?"
+
+Milt smiled like two uncles watching a clever baby, and patronized
+Saxton with, "They both have their points."
+
+He saw that Claire was angry; but that the Gilsons and Mrs. Corey,
+flap-eared, gape-mouthed, forward-bending, were very proud of their
+little Jeff. He saw that, except for their clothes and self-conscious
+coiffures, they were exactly like a gang of cracker-box loafers at
+Heinie Rauskukle's badgering a new boy in town.
+
+Saxton looked bad-tempered. Then Mrs. Corey bustled with her face and
+yearned at Milt, "Do tell me: what is the theme of the opera tonight.
+I've rather forgotten."
+
+Milt ceased to smile. While all of them regarded him with interest he
+said clearly, "I haven't got the slightest idea. I don't know anything
+about music. Some day I hope I can get a clever woman like you to help
+me, Mrs. Corey. It must be great to know all about all these arts, the
+way you do. I wish you'd explain that--overture they call it, don't
+they?"
+
+For some reason, Mr. Gilson was snickering, Mrs. Corey flushing, Claire
+looking well pleased. Milt had tried to be insulting, but had got lost
+in the intricacies of the insult. He felt that he'd better leave it in
+its apparently safe state, and he leaned back, and smiled again, as
+though he was waiting. Mrs. Corey did not explain the overture. She
+hastily explained her second maid, to Mrs. Gilson.
+
+The opera was _Il Amore dei Tre Re_. Milt was bewildered. To him, who
+had never seen an opera, the convention that a girl cannot hear a man
+who is bellowing ten feet away from her, was absurd; and he wished that
+the singers would do something besides making their arms swim.
+
+He discovered that by moving his chair forward, he could get within a
+foot of Claire. His hand slipped across, touched hers. She darted a
+startled backward glance. Her fingers closed tight about his, then
+restlessly snuggled inside his palm--and Milt was lost in enchantment.
+
+Stately kings of blood-red cloaks and chrysoberyls malevolent in crowns
+of ancient and massy gold--the quick dismaying roll of drums and the
+shadow of passing banners below a tower--a woman tall and misty-veiled
+and pale with dreams--a world of spirit where the soul had power over
+unseen dominions--this he saw and heard and tasted in the music. What
+the actual plot was, or the technique of the singing, he did not know,
+but it bore him beyond all reality save the sweet, sure happiness of
+Claire's nestling hand.
+
+He held her fingers so firmly that he could feel the pulse beat in them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the clamminess of his room, when the enchantment was gone, he said
+gravely:
+
+"How much longer can I keep this up? Sooner or later I bust loose and
+smash little Jeff one in the snoot, and he takes the count, and I'm
+never allowed to see Claire again. Turn the roughneck out on his ear. I
+s'pose I'm vulgar. I s'pose that fellow Michael in _Youth's Encounter_
+wouldn't talk about snoots. I don't care, I'll---- If I poke Saxton
+one---- I'm not afraid of the kid-glove precinct any more. My brain's
+as good as theirs, give it a chance. But oh, they're all against me. And
+they bust the Athletic Union's wrestling rule that 'striking, kicking,
+gouging, hair-pulling, butting, and strangling will not be allowed.' How
+long can I go on being good-natured? When I do break loose----"
+
+Slowly, beneath the moral cuff of his dress-shirt, Milt's fist closed in
+a brown, broad-knuckled lump, and came up in the gesture of a right to
+the jaw. But it came up only a foot. The hand opened, climbed to Milt's
+face, rubbed his temples, while he sighed:
+
+"Nope. Can't even do that. Bigger game now. Used to could--used to be
+able to settle things with a punch. But I've got to be more--oh, more
+diplomatic now. Oh Lord, how lonely I get for Bill McGolwey. No. That
+isn't true. I couldn't stand Bill now. Claire took all that out of me.
+Where am I, where am I? Why did I ever get a car that takes a 36 × 6?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+THE CORNFIELD ARISTOCRAT
+
+
+It was an innocent little note from Jeff Saxton; a polite, humble little
+note; it said that Jeff had a card to the Astoria Club, and wouldn't
+Milt please have lunch with him? But Milt dropped it on the table, and
+he walked round it as though it were a dictagraph which he'd discovered
+in the table drawer after happy, happy, hidden hours at counterfeiting.
+
+It seemed more dangerous to refuse than to go. He browned the celebrated
+new shoes; he pressed the distinguished new trousers, with a light and
+quite unsatisfactory flatiron; he re-re-retied his best spotted blue
+bow--it persisted in having the top flaps too short, but the retying
+gave him spiritual strength--and he modestly clumped into the aloof
+brick portal of the Astoria Club on time.
+
+He had never been in a club before.
+
+He looked at the red tiled floor of the entrance hall; he stared through
+the hall into an immense lounge with the largest and softest chairs in
+the world, with oil portraits of distinguished old bucks, and ninety per
+cent. of the wealth and power of Seattle pulling its several mustaches,
+reading the P.I., and ignoring the lone intruder out in the hall.
+
+A small Zulu in blue tights and brass buttons glared at Milt; and a
+large, soft, suave, insulting young man demanded, "Yes, sir?"
+
+"Mr. G-g-geoffrey Saxton?" ventured Milt.
+
+"Not in, sir." The "sir" sounded like "And you know it." The flaming
+guardian retired behind a narrow section of a bookkeeper's desk and
+ignored him.
+
+"I'm to meet him for lunch," Milt forlornly persisted.
+
+The young man looked up, hurt and annoyed at finding that the person was
+still to be dealt with.
+
+"If you will wait in there?" he groaned.
+
+Milt sat in there, which was a small blue tapestry room with hard chairs
+intended to discourage bill-collectors. He turned his hat round and
+round and round, till he saw Jeff Saxton, slim and straight and hard as
+the stick hooked over his arm, sailing into the hall. He plunged out
+after him, took refuge with him from the still unconvinced inspection of
+the hall-man. For twenty seconds, he loved Jeff Saxton.
+
+And Jeff seemed to adore him in turn. He solicitously led Milt to the
+hat-checking counter. He showed Milt the lounge and the billiard room,
+through which Milt crept with erect shoulders and easy eyes and a heart
+simply paralyzed with fear that one of these grizzled clubmen with
+clipped mustaches would look at him. He coaxed Milt into a grill that
+was a cross between the Chinese throne-room and a Viennese Weinstube,
+and he implored his friend Milt to do him the favor of trying the "very
+fair" English mutton chops and potatoes _au gratin_.
+
+"I did want to see you again before we go East, Daggett," he said
+pleasantly.
+
+"Th-thanks. When do you go?"
+
+"I'm trying to get Miss Boltwood to start soon now. The season is
+opening in the East. She does like your fine sturdy West, as I do, but
+still, when we think of the exciting new shows opening, and the dances,
+and the touch with the great world---- Oh, it does make one eager to get
+back."
+
+"That's so," risked Milt.
+
+"We, uh---- Daggett---- In fact, I'm going to call you Milt, as Claire
+does. You don't know what a pleasure it has been to have encountered
+you. There's a fine keen courage about you Western chaps that makes a
+cautious old fogy like me envious. I shall remember meeting you with a
+great deal of pleasure."
+
+"Th-thanks. Been pleasure meet you."
+
+"And I know Claire will, too."
+
+Milt felt that he was being dealt with foully. He wanted to object to
+Saxton's acting as agent for Claire as incompetent, irrelevant,
+immaterial, and no foundation laid. But he could not see just where he
+was being led, and with Saxton glowing at him as warmly and greasily as
+the mutton chops, Milt could only smile wanly, and reflectively feel
+the table leg to see if it was loose enough to jerk out in case of need.
+
+Saxton was being optimistic:
+
+"In fact, Claire and I both hope that some day when you've finished your
+engineering course, we'll see you in the East. I wonder---- As I say, my
+dear fellow, I've taken the greatest fancy to you, and I do hope you
+won't think I'm too intimate if I say that I imagine that even in your
+charming friendship with Miss Boltwood, you've probably never learned
+what important people the Boltwoods are. I thought I'd tell you so that
+you could realize the privilege both you and I have in knowing them.
+Henry B. is--while not a man of any enormous wealth--regarded as one of
+the keenest intellects in New York wholesale circles. But beyond that,
+he is a scholar, and a man of the broadest interests. Of course the
+Boltwoods are too modest to speak of it, but he was chiefly instrumental
+in the establishment of the famous Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra. And his
+ancestors clear through--his father was a federal judge, and his
+mother's brother was a general in the Civil War, and afterwards an
+ambassador. So you can guess something of the position Claire holds in
+that fine, quiet, solid old Brooklyn set. Henry Ward Beecher himself was
+complimented at being asked to dine with the Boltwoods of his day,
+and----"
+
+No, the table leg wouldn't come loose, so it was only verbally that the
+suddenly recovered Milt attacked:
+
+"Certainly is nice to have one of those old families. It's something
+like---- As you say, you and I have gotten pretty well acquainted along
+the line, so I guess I can say it to you---- My father and his folks
+came from that same kind of family. Father's dad was a judge, back in
+Maine, and in the war, grand-dad was quite friendly with Grant."
+
+This tribute of Milt to his grandsire was loyal but inaccurate. Judge
+Daggett, who wasn't a judge at all, but a J. P., had seen General Grant
+only once, and at the time the judge had been in company with all the
+other privates in the Fourteenth Maine.
+
+"Dad was a pioneer. He was a doctor. He had to give up all this
+easy-going stuff in order to help open up the West to civilization, but
+I guess it was worth it. He used to do the hardest kind of operations,
+on kitchen tables, with his driver giving the chloroform. I'm mighty
+proud of him. As you say, it's kind of what you might call inspiring to
+belong to the old Pilgrim aristocracy."
+
+Never before had Milt claimed relation to a group regarding which his
+only knowledge was the information derived from the red school-history
+to the effect that they all carried blunderbusses, put people in the
+stocks for whistling, and frequently said, "Why don't you speak for
+yourself, John?" But he had made his boast with a clear eye and a
+pleasant, superior, calm smile.
+
+"Oh! Very interesting," grunted Saxton.
+
+"Would you like to see grandfather's daguerreotype?"
+
+"Oh, yes, yes, uh, thanks, that would be very interesting---- Do let me
+see it, when---- Uh, as I was saying, Claire doubtless has a tremendous
+social career before her. So many people expecting her to marry well. Of
+course she has a rather unusual combination of charm and intelligence
+and---- In fact I think we may both be glad that----"
+
+"Yes. That's right. And the best thing about her is the way she can
+shake off all the social stuff and go camping and be a regular human
+being," Milt caressed.
+
+"Um, uh, no doubt, no doubt, though---- Of course, though, that isn't an
+inherent part of her. I fancy she's been rather tired by this long trip,
+poor child. Of course she isn't very strong."
+
+"That's right. Real pluck. And of course she'll get stronger by hiking.
+You've never seen her bucking a dangerous hill--I kind of feel that a
+person who hasn't seen her in the wilds doesn't know her."
+
+"I don't want to be contradictory, old man, but I feel on the other hand
+that no one who has failed to see her at the Junior League Dances, in a
+Poiret frock, can know her! Come, come! Don't know how we drifted into
+this chorus of praise of Claire! What I wanted to ask was your opinion
+of the Pierce-Arrow. I'm thinking of buying one. Do you think that----"
+
+All the way home Milt exulted, "I put it all over him. I wasn't scared
+by the 'Don't butt into the aristocracy, my young friend' stuff. I lied
+handsome. But---- Darn it, now I'll have to live up to my New England
+aristocracy.... Wonder if my grand-dad's dad was a hired man or a
+wood-sawyer?... Ne' mine; I'm Daggett of Daggett from now on." He
+bounded up to his room vaingloriously remarking, "I'm there with the
+ancestors. I was brought up in the handsome city of Schoenstrom, which
+was founded by a colony of Vermont Yankees, headed by Herman Skumautz. I
+was never allowed to play with the Dutch kids, and----" He opened the
+door. "--the Schoenstrom minister taught me Greek and was my bosom
+frien'----"
+
+He stopped with his heart in his ankles. Lolling on the bed, grinning,
+waving a cigarette, was Bill McGolwey, proprietor of the Old Home Lunch,
+of Schoenstrom, Minnesota.
+
+"Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwhy where the heck did you come from?"
+stammered the deposed aristocrat to his bosom friend Bill.
+
+"You old lemon-pie-faced, lollygagging, flap-footed, crab-nosed son of
+misery, gee, but it's good to see you, Milt!"
+
+Bill was off the bed, wringing Milt's hand with simple joy, with perfect
+faith that in finding his friend all the troubles of life were over. And
+Milt was gloomily discovering the art of diplomacy. Bill was his friend,
+yes, but----
+
+It was hard enough to carry his own self.
+
+He pictured Jeff Saxton leering at the door, and while he pounded Bill's
+shoulder, and called him the name which, west of Chicago, is the token
+of hatred and of extreme gladness at meeting, he discovered that some
+one had stolen his stomach and left a piece of ice in its place.
+
+They settled down on bed and chair, Bill's ears red with joy, while Milt
+demanded:
+
+"How the deuce did you get here?"
+
+"Well, tell you, old hoss. Schoenstrom got so darn lonely after you
+left, and when Ben and Heinie got your address and bought the garage,
+think's I, lez go off on a little bum."
+
+Milt was realizing--and hating himself for realizing--that Bill's face
+was dirty, his hair linty, the bottoms of his trousers frayed masses of
+mud, while Bill chuckled:
+
+"I figured out maybe I could get a job here in a restaurant, and you and
+me could room together. I sold out my good will in the Old Home Lunch
+for a hundred bucks. I was going to travel swell, riding the cushions.
+But Pete Swanson wanted me to go down to the Cities first, and we run
+into some pretty swift travelers in Minneapolis, and a couple of
+girls--saaaaaaay, kid, some class!"
+
+Bill winked, and Milt--Milt was rather sick. He knew Bill's conception
+of class in young women. Was this the fellow he had liked so well? These
+the ideas which a few months ago he had taken as natural and extremely
+amusing?
+
+"And I got held up in an alley off Washington Avenue, and they got the
+last twenty bones off'n me, and I was flatter 'n a pancake. So I says
+'ish kabibble,' and I sneaks onto the blind baggage, and bums my way
+West. You'd 'a' died laughing to seen me throwing my feet for grub. Oh,
+I'm some panhandler! There was one _Frau_ sicked her dog onto me, and I
+kicked him in the jaw and---- Oh, it was one swell hike."
+
+Milt was trying to ignore the voice that was raging, "And now he expects
+to live on me, after throwing his own money away. The waster! The hobo!
+He'll expect to meet Claire---- I'd kill him before I'd let him soil her
+by looking at her. Him and his classy girls!" Milt tried to hear only
+the other inner voice, which informed him, "He looks at you so
+trustingly. He'd give you his shirt, if you needed it--and he wouldn't
+make you ask for it!"
+
+Milt tried to be hearty: "What're you going to do, old kid?"
+
+"Well, the first thing I'm going to do is to borrow ten iron-men and a
+pair of pants."
+
+"You bet! Here she is. Haven't got any extra pants. Tell you: Here's
+another five, and you can get the pants at the store in the next block,
+this side of the street. Hustle along now and get 'em!" He chuckled at
+Bill; he patted his arm; he sought to hurry him out.... He had to be
+alone, to think.
+
+But Bill kissed the fifteen dollars, carelessly rammed it into his
+pocket, crawled back on the bed, yawned, "What's the rush? Gosh, I'm
+sleepy. Say, Milt, whadyuh think of me and you starting a lunch-room
+here together? You got enough money out of the garage----"
+
+"Oh no, noooo, gee, I'd like to, Bill, but you see, well, I've got to
+hold onto what little I've got so I can get through engineering school."
+
+"Sure, but you could cash in on a restaurant--you could work evenings in
+the dump, and there'd be a lot of city sports hanging around, and we'd
+have the time of our lives."
+
+"No, I---- I study, evenings. And I---- The fact is, Bill, I've met a
+lot of nice fellows at the university and I kind of go around with
+them."
+
+"Aw, how d'you get that way? Rats, you don't want to go tagging after
+them Willy-boys. Damn dirty snobs. And the girls are worse. I tell you,
+Milt, these hoop-te-doodle society Janes may look all right to hicks
+like us, but on the side they raise more hell than any milliner's
+trimmer from Chi that ever vamped a rube burg."
+
+"What do you know about them?"
+
+"Now don't get sore. I'm telling you. I don't like to see any friend of
+mine make a fool of himself hanging around with a bunch that despises
+him because he ain't rich, that's all. Met any of the high-toned
+skirts?"
+
+"Yes--I--_have_!"
+
+"Trot 'em up and lemme give 'em the once-over."
+
+"We--we'll see about it. Now I got to go to a mathematics recitation,
+Bill. You make yourself comfortable, and I'll be back at five."
+
+Milt did not have to go to a recitation. He marched out with briskness
+in his step, and a book under his arm; but when he reached the corner,
+the briskness proved to be spurious, and the mathematics book proved to
+be William Rose Benét's _Merchants of Cathay_, which Claire had given
+him in the Yellowstone, and which he had rescued from the wrecked bug.
+
+He stood staring at it. He opened it with unhappy tenderness. He had
+been snatched from the world of beautiful words and serene dignity, of
+soaring mountains and companionship with Claire in the radiant morning,
+back to the mud and dust of Schoenstrom, from the opera to "city sports"
+in a lunch-room! He hated Bill McGolwey and his sneering assumption that
+Milt belonged in the filth with him. And he hated himself for not being
+enough of a genius to combine Bill McGolwey and Claire Boltwood. But not
+once, in his maelstrom of worry on that street corner, did he expect
+Claire to like Bill. Through all his youthful agonizing, he had enough
+common sense to know that though Claire might conquer a mountain pass,
+she could never be equal to the social demands of Schoenstrom and Bill
+McGolwey.
+
+He wandered for an hour and came back to find that, in a "dry" city
+which he had never seen before, the crafty Bill had obtained a quart of
+Bourbon, and was in a state of unsteady beatitude. He wanted, he
+announced, to dance.
+
+Milt got him into the community bathtub, and soused him under, but
+Bill's wet body was slippery, and Bill's merry soul was all for
+frolicsome gamboling, and he slid out of Milt's grasp, he sloshed around
+in the tub, he sprinkled Milt's sacred good suit with soapy water, and
+escaped, and in the costume of Adam he danced orientally in Milt's room,
+till he was seized with sleepiness and cosmic grief, and retired to
+Milt's bed in tears and nothing else.
+
+The room dimmed, grew dark. The street lamps outside sent a wan, wavery
+gleam into the room. Evening crowds went by, and in a motion-picture
+theater a banging piano struck up. Bill breathed in choking snorts. Milt
+sat unmoving, feeling very old, very tired, too dumbly unhappy to be
+frightened of the dreadful coming hour when Claire and Jeff should hear
+of Bill, and discover Milt's real world.
+
+He was not so romantically loyal, not so inhumanly heroic, that it can
+truthfully be reported that he never thought of getting rid of Bill. He
+did think of it, again and again. But always he was touched by Bill's
+unsuspecting trust, and shook his head, and sank again into the fog.
+
+What was the use of trying to go ahead? Wasn't he, after all, merely a
+Bill McGolwey himself?
+
+If he was, he wouldn't inflict himself on Claire.
+
+For several minutes he gave up forever the zest of climbing.
+
+When Bill awoke, brightly solicitous about the rest of the quart of
+Bourbon, and bouncingly ready to "go out and have a time," Milt loafed
+about the streets with him, showing him the city. He dully cut his
+classes, next morning, and took Bill to the wharves.
+
+It was late in the afternoon, when they were lounging in the room, and
+Bill was admiring his new pants--he boasted of having bought them for
+three dollars, and pointed out that Milt had been a "galoot" to spend
+ten dollars for shoes--that some one knocked at the door. Sleepily
+expectant of his landlady, Milt opened it on Miss Claire Boltwood, Mr.
+and Mrs. Eugene Gilson, and Mr. Geoffrey Saxton.
+
+Saxton calmly looked past him, at Bill, smiled slightly, and
+condescended, "I thought we ought to call on you, so we've dropped in to
+beg for tea."
+
+Bill had stopped midway in scratching his head to gape at Claire. Claire
+returned the look, stared at Bill's frowsy hair, his red wrists, his
+wrinkled, grease-stained coat, his expression of impertinent stupidity.
+Then she glanced questioningly at Milt, who choked:
+
+"Oh yes, yes, sure, glad see you, come in, get some tea, so glad see
+you, come in----"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+TOOTH-MUG TEA
+
+
+"My friend Mr. McGolwey--I knew him in Schoenstrom--come on to Seattle
+for a while. Bill, these are some people I met along the road," Milt
+grumbled.
+
+"Glad to meet 'em. Have a chair. Have two chairs! Say, Milt, y'ought to
+have more chairs if you're going to have a bunch of swells coming to
+call on you. Ha, ha, ha! Say, I guess I better pike out and give the
+folks a chance to chin with you," Bill fondly offered.
+
+"Oh, sit down," Milt snapped at him.
+
+They all sat down, four on the bed; and Milt's inner ear heard a mute
+snicker from the Gilsons and Saxton. He tried to talk. He couldn't. Bill
+looked at him and, perceiving the dumbness, gallantly helped out:
+
+"So you met the kid on the road, eh? Good scout, Milt is. We always used
+to say at Schoenstrom that he was the best darn hand at fixing a flivver
+in seven townships."
+
+"So you knew Mr. Daggett at home? Now isn't that nice," said Mrs.
+Gilson.
+
+"_Knew_ him? Saaaaay, Milt and I was brung up together. Why, him and I
+have bummed around together, and worked on farms, summers, and fished
+for bull-heads---- Ever catch a bull-head? Damnedest slipperiest fish
+you ever saw, and got horns that sting the stuffin's out of you and----
+Say, I wonder if Milt's told you about the time we had at a barn-dance
+once? There was a bunch of hicks there, and I says, 'Say, kid, lez
+puncture their tires, and hide back of the manure pile, and watch the
+fun when they come out.' I guess maybe I was kind of stewed a little,
+tell the truth, but course Milt he don't drink much, hardly at all, nice
+straight kid if I do say so----"
+
+"Bill!" Milt ordered. "We must have some tea. Here's six-bits. You run
+down to the corner grocery and get some tea and a little cream. Oh, you
+better buy three-four cups, too. Hustle now, son!"
+
+"Attaboy! Yours to command, ladies and gents, like the fellow says!"
+Bill boomed delightedly. He winked at Jeff Saxton, airily spun his
+broken hat on his dirty forefinger, and sauntered out.
+
+"Charming fellow. A real original," crooned Mrs. Gilson.
+
+"Did he know your friend Mr. Pinky?" asked Saxton.
+
+Before Milt could answer, Claire rose from the bed, inspected the
+Gilsons and Jeff with cold dislike, and said quietly to Milt, "The poor
+dear thing--he was dreadfully embarrassed. It's so good of you to be
+nice to him. I believe in being loyal to your old friends."
+
+"Oh, so do I!" babbled Mrs. Gilson. "It's just too splendid. And _we_
+must do something for him. I'm going to invite Mr. Daggett and Mr.--Mr.
+McGollups, was it?--to dinner this evening. I do want to hear him tell
+about your boyhood. It must have been so interesting."
+
+"It was," mused Milt. "It was poor and miserable. We had to work
+hard--we had to fight for whatever education we got--we had no one to
+teach us courtesy."
+
+"Oh now, with your fine old doctor father? Surely he was an
+inspiration?" Jeff didn't, this time, trouble to hide the sneer.
+
+"Yes. He was. He gave up the chance to be a rich loafer in order to save
+farmers' babies for fees that he never got."
+
+"I'm sure he did. I wish I'd known him. We need to know men like that in
+this pink-frosting playing at living we have in cities," Claire said
+sweetly--not to Milt but to Jeff.
+
+Mrs. Gilson had ignored them, waiting with the patience of a cat at a
+mouse-hole, and she went on, "But you haven't said you'd come, this
+evening. Do say you will. I don't suppose Mr. McGollups will care to
+dress for dinner?"
+
+With saccharin devotion Milt yearned back, "No, Mrs. Gilson. No. Mr.
+McGolwey won't care to dress. He's eccentric."
+
+"But you'll make him come?"
+
+Milt was tactfully beginning to refuse when Gene Gilson at last
+exploded, turned purple, covered his dripping, too-red lips with his
+handkerchief.
+
+Then, abruptly, Milt hurled at Mrs. Gilson, "All right. We'll come.
+Bill'll be awfully funny. He's never been out of a jerkwater burg in his
+life, hardly. He's an amusing cuss. He thinks I'm smart! He loves me
+like a dog. Oh, he's rich! Ha, ha, ha!"
+
+Milt might have gone on ... if he had, Mr. and Mrs. Gilson would have
+gone away, much displeased. But Bill arrived, with some of the worst tea
+in the world, and four cups tastefully done in cupids' heads and much
+gilt.
+
+Milt made tea, ignoring them, while Bill entertained the Gilsons and
+Saxtons with Rabelaisian stories of threshing-time when shirts prickly
+with chaff and gritty with dust stuck to sweat-dripping backs; of the
+"funny thing" of Milt and Bill being hired to move a garbage-pile and
+"swiping" their employer's "mushmelons"; of knotting shirts at the
+swimming-hole so that the bawling youngsters had to "chaw beef"; of
+drinking beer in the livery-stable at Melrose; of dropping the
+water-pitcher from a St. Klopstock hotel window upon the head of the
+"constabule" and escaping from him across the lean-to roof.
+
+Mrs. Gilson encouraged him; Bill sat with almost closed eyes, glorying
+in the saga of small-town life; Saxton and Gilson did not conceal their
+contemptuous grins.
+
+But Claire---- After nervously rubbing the tips of her thumbs with
+flickering agitated fingers, she had paid no attention to Bill and the
+revelation of Milt's rustic life; she had quietly gone to Milt, to help
+him prepare the scanty tea.
+
+She whispered, "Never mind, dear. I don't care. It was all twice as much
+fun as being wheeled in lacy prams by cranky nurses, as Jeff and I were.
+But I know how you feel. Are you ashamed of having been a prairie
+pirate?"
+
+"No, I'm not! We were wild kids--we raised a lot of Cain--but I'm glad
+we did."
+
+"So am I. I couldn't stand it if you were ashamed. Listen to me, and
+remember little Claire's words of wisdom. These fools are trying--oh,
+they're so obvious!--they're trying to make me feel that the prim Miss
+Boltwood of Brooklyn Heights is a stranger to you. Well, they're
+succeeding in making me a stranger--to them!"
+
+"Claire! Dear! You don't mind Bill?"
+
+"Yes. I do. And so do you. You've grown away from him."
+
+"I don't know but---- Today has been quite a test."
+
+"Yes. It has. Because if I can stand your friend Mr. McGolwey----"
+
+"Then you do care!"
+
+"Perhaps. And if I think that he's, oh, not much good, and I remember
+that for a long time you just had him to play with, then I'm all the
+more anxious to make it up to you."
+
+"Don't be sorry for me! I can't stand that! After all, it was a good
+town, and good folks----"
+
+"No! No! I'm not sorry for you! I just mean, you couldn't have had so
+terribly much fun, after you were eighteen or so. Schoenstrom must have
+been a little dull, after very many years there. This stuff about the
+charm of backwoods villages--the people that write it seem to take jolly
+good care to stay in Long Island suburbs!"
+
+"Claire!" He was whispering desperately, "The tea's most done. Oh, my
+dear. I'm crazy with this puttering around, trying to woo you and having
+to woo the entire Gilson tribe. Let's run away!"
+
+"No; first I'm going to convince them that you are--what I know you
+are."
+
+"But you can't."
+
+"Huh! You wait! I've thought of the most beautiful, beastly cruel plan
+for the reduction of social obesity----"
+
+Then she was jauntily announcing, "Tea, my dears. Jeff, you get the
+tooth-mug. Isn't this jolly!"
+
+"Yes. Oh yes. Very jolly!" Jeff was thoroughly patronizing, but she
+didn't look offended. She made them drink the acid tea, and taste the
+chalk-like bread and butter sandwiches. She coaxed Bill to go on with
+his stories, and when the persistent Mrs. Gilson again asked the pariahs
+to come to dinner, Claire astonished Milt, and still more astonished
+Mrs. Gilson, by begging, "Oh yes, please do come, Milt."
+
+He consented, savagely.
+
+"But first," Claire added to Mrs. Gilson, "I want us to take the boys
+to---- Oh, I have the bulliest idea. Come, everybody. We're going
+riding."
+
+"Uh, where----?" hinted Mr. Gilson.
+
+"That's my secret. Come!"
+
+Claire pranced to the door, herded all of them down to the limousine,
+whispered an address to the chauffeur.
+
+Milt didn't care much for that ride. Bill was somewhat too evidently not
+accustomed to limousines. He wiped his shoes, caked with red mud, upon
+the seat-cushions, and apologized perspiringly. He said, "Gee
+whillikens, that's a dandy idee, telephone to bawl the shuffer out
+with," and "Are them flowers real, the bokay in the vase?"
+
+But the Gilsons and Jeff Saxton were happy about it all--till the car
+turned from a main thoroughfare upon a muddy street of shacks that clung
+like goats to the sides of a high cut, a street unchanged from the
+pioneer days of Seattle.
+
+"Good heavens, Claire, you aren't taking us to see Aunt Hatty, are you?"
+wailed Mrs. Gilson.
+
+"Oh yes, indeed. I knew the boys would like to meet her."
+
+"No, really, I don't think----"
+
+"Eva, my soul, Jeff and you planned our tea party today, and assured me
+I'd be so interested in Milt's bachelor apartment---- By the way, I'd
+been up there already, so it wasn't entirely a surprise. It's my turn to
+lead." She confided to Milt, "Dear old Aunt Hatty is related to all of
+us. She's Gene's aunt, and my fourth cousin, and I think she's distantly
+related to Jeff. She came West early, and had a hard time, but she's
+real Brooklyn Heights--and she belongs to Gramercy Park and North
+Washington Square and Rittenhouse Square and Back Bay, too, though she
+has got out of touch a little. So I wanted you to meet her."
+
+Milt wondered what unperceived bag of cement had hardened the faces of
+Saxton and the Gilsons.
+
+Silent save for polite observations of Claire upon tight skirts and
+lumbering, the merry company reached the foot of a lurching flight of
+steps that scrambled up a clay bank to a cottage like a hen that has set
+too long. Milt noticed that Mrs. Gilson made efforts to remain in the
+limousine when it stopped, and he caught Gilson's mutter to his wife,
+"No, it's Claire's turn. Be a sport, Eva."
+
+Claire led them up the badly listed steps to an unpainted porch on which
+sat a little old lady, very neat, very respectable, very interested, and
+reflectively holding in one ivory hand a dainty handkerchief and a black
+clay pipe.
+
+"Hello, Claire, my dear. You've broken the relatives' record--you've
+called twice in less than a year," said the little old lady.
+
+"How do you do, Aunt Harriet," remarked Mrs. Gilson, with great lack of
+warmth.
+
+"Hello, Eva. Sit down on the edge of the porch. Those chickens have made
+it awful dirty, though, haven't they? Bring out some chairs. There's two
+chairs that don't go down under you--often." Aunt Harriet was very
+cheerful.
+
+The group lugubriously settled in a circle upon an assemblage of
+wind-broken red velvet chairs and wooden stools. They resembled the
+aftermath of a funeral on a damp day.
+
+Claire was the cheerful undertaker, Mrs. Gilson the grief-stricken
+widow.
+
+Claire waved at Milt and conversed with Aunt Hatty in a high brisk
+voice: "This is the nice boy I met on the road that I think I told you
+about, Cousin Hatty."
+
+The little old lady screwed up the delicate skin about her eyes,
+examined Milt, and cackled, "Boy, there's something wrong here. You
+don't belong with my family. Why, you look like an American. You
+haven't got an imitation monocle, and I bet you can't talk with a New
+York-London accent. Why, Claire, I'm ashamed of you for bringing a human
+being into the Boltwood-Gilson-Saxton tomb and expecting----"
+
+Then was the smile of Mrs. Gilson lost forever. It was simultaneously
+torpedoed, mined, scuttled, and bombed. It went to the bottom without a
+ripple, while Mrs. Gilson snapped, "Aunt Hatty, please don't be vulgar."
+
+"Me?" croaked the little old lady. She puffed at her pipe, and dropped
+her elbows on her knees. "My, ain't it hard to please some folks."
+
+"Cousin Hatty, I want Milt to know about our families. I love the dear
+old stories," Claire begged prettily.
+
+Mrs. Gilson snarled. "Claire, really----"
+
+"Oh, do shut up, Eva, and don't be so bossy!" yelped the dear little old
+lady, in sudden and dismaying rage. "I'll talk if I want to. Have they
+been bullying you, Claire? Or your boy? I tell you, boy, these families
+are fierce. I was brought up in Brooklyn--went through all the
+schools--used to be able to misplay the piano and mispronounce French
+with the best of 'em. Then Gene's pa and I came West together--he had an
+idea he'd get rich robbing the Injuns of their land. And we went broke.
+I took in washing. I learned a lot. I learned a Gilson was just the
+same common stuff as a red-shirt miner, when he was up against it. But
+Gene's pa succeeded--there was something about practically stealing a
+fur schooner--but I never was one to tattle on my kin. Anyway, by the
+time Gene come along, his pa was rich, and that means aristocratic.
+
+"This aristocracy west of Pittsburgh is just twice as bad as the
+snobbery in Boston or New York, because back there, the families have
+had their wealth long enough--some of 'em got it by stealing real estate
+in 1820, and some by selling Jamaica rum and niggers way back before the
+Revolutionary War--they've been respectable so long that they know
+mighty well and good that nobody except a Britisher is going to question
+their blue blood--and oh my, what good blueing third-generation money
+does make. But out here in God's Country, the marquises of milling and
+the barons of beef are still uneasy. Even their pretty women, after
+going to the best hair-dressers and patronizing the best charities,
+sometimes get scared lest somebody think they haven't either brains or
+breeding.
+
+"So they're nasty to all low pussons like you and me, to make sure we
+understand how important they are. But lands, I know 'em, boy. I'm kept
+pensioned up here, out of the way, but I read the social notes in the
+papers and I chuckle---- When there's a big reception and I read about
+Mrs. Vogeland's pearls, and her beautiful daughter-in-law, I remember
+how she used to run a boarding-house for miners----
+
+"Well, I guess it's just as shoddy in the East if you go far enough
+back. Claire, you're a nice comforting body, and I hate to say it, but
+the truth is, your great-grandfather was an hostler, and made his first
+money betting on horses. Now, my, I oughtn't to tell that. Do you mind,
+dearie?"
+
+"Not a bit. Isn't it delightful that this is such a democratic country,
+with no castes," said Claire.
+
+At this, the first break in the little old lady's undammable flood, Mrs.
+Gilson sprang up, yammering, "The rest of you may stay as long as you
+like, but if I'm to be home in time to dress for dinner----"
+
+"Yes, and I must be going," babbled Saxton.
+
+Milt noted that his lower lip showed white tooth-marks.
+
+It must be admitted that all of them rather ignored the little old lady
+for a moment. Milt was apologetically hinting, "I don't really think
+Bill and I'd better come to dinner this evening, Mrs. Gilson. Thanks a
+lot but---- It's kind of sudden."
+
+Claire again took charge. "Not at all, Milt. Of course you're coming. It
+was Eva herself who invited you. I'm sure she'll be delighted."
+
+"Charmed," said Mrs. Gilson, with the expression of one who has
+swallowed castor oil and doubts the unity of the universe.
+
+There was a lack of ease about the farewells to Aunt Harriet. As they
+all turned away she beckoned Milt and murmured, "Did I raise the
+dickens? I tried to. It's the only solace besides smoking that a moral
+old lady can allow herself, after she gets to be eighty-two and begins
+to doubt everything they used to teach her. Come and see me, boy. Now
+get out, and, boy, beat up Gene Gilson. Don't be scared of his wife's
+hoity-toity ways. Just sail in."
+
+"I will," said Milt.
+
+He had one more surprise before he reached the limousine.
+
+Bill McGolwey, who had sat listening to everything and scratching his
+cheek in a puzzled way, seized Milt's sleeve and rumbled:
+
+"Good-by, old hoss. I'm not going to butt in on your game and get you in
+Dutch. Gosh, I never supposed you had enough class to mingle with
+elittys like this gang, but I know when I'm in wrong. You were too darn
+decent to kick me out. Do it myself. You're best friend I ever had
+and---- Good luck, old man! God bless you!"
+
+Bill was gone, running, stumbling, fleeing past Aunt Harriet's cottage,
+off into a sandy hilltop vacancy. The last Milt saw of him was when, on
+the skyline, Bill stopped for a glance back, and seemed to be digging
+his knuckles into his eyes.
+
+Then Milt turned resolutely, marched down the stairs, said to his hosts
+with a curious quietness, "Thank you for asking me to dinner, but I'm
+afraid I can't come. Claire, will you walk a few blocks with me?"
+
+During the half minute it had taken to descend the steps, Milt had
+reflected, with an intensity which forgot Bill, that he had been
+selfish; that he had thought only of the opinion of these "nice people"
+regarding himself, instead of understanding that it was his duty to save
+Claire from their enervating niceness. Not that he phrased it quite in
+this way. What he had been muttering was:
+
+"Rotten shame--me so scared of folks' clothes that I don't stand up to
+'em and keep 'em from smothering Claire. Lord, it would be awful if she
+settled down to being a Mrs. Jeff Saxton. Got to save her--not for
+myself--for her."
+
+It may have been Aunt Harriet, it may have been Milt's resolution, but
+Mrs. Gilson answered almost meekly, "Well, if you think---- Would you
+like to walk, Claire?"
+
+As he tramped off with Claire, Milt demanded, "Glad to escape?"
+
+"Yes, and I'm glad you refused dinner. It really has been wearing, this
+trial by food."
+
+"This is the last time I'll dare to meet the Gilsons."
+
+"And I'll have to be going back East. I hope the Gilsons will forgive
+me, some day."
+
+"I'm afraid you didn't win them over by Aunt Hatty!"
+
+"No. They're probably off me for life. Oh, these horrible social
+complications--worse than any real danger--fire or earthquake----"
+
+"Oh, these complications--they don't exist! We just make 'em, like we
+make rules for a card game. What the deuce do we care about the opinions
+of people we don't like? And who appointed these people to a fixed
+social position? Did the president make Saxton High Cockalorum of
+Dress-Suits or something? Why, these are just folks, the same as kings
+and coal-heavers. There's no army we've got to fight. There's just you
+and me--you and I--and if we stick together, then we have all society,
+we _are_ all society!"
+
+"Ye-es, but, Milt dear, I don't want to be an outcast."
+
+"You won't be. In the long run, if you don't take these aristocrats
+seriously, they'll be all the more impressed by you."
+
+"No. That sounds cheering, in stories and these optimistic editorials in
+the magazines, but it isn't true. And you don't know how pleasant it is
+to be In. I've always been more or less on the inside, and thought
+outsiders dreadful. But---- Oh, I don't care! I don't care! With
+you--I'm happy. That's all I know and all I want to know. I've just
+grown up. I've just learned the greatest wisdom--to know when I'm
+happy. But, Milt dear---- I say this because I love you. Yes, I do love
+you. No, don't kiss me. Yes, it is too---- It's _far_ too public. And I
+want to talk seriously. You can't have any idea how strong social
+distinctions are. Don't despise them just because you don't know them."
+
+"No. I won't. I'll learn. Probably America will get into the war. I'll
+be an engineering officer. I'll learn this social dope from the
+college-boy officers. And I'll come to Brooklyn with shoulder-straps and
+bells on and---- Will you be waiting?"
+
+"Oh--yes---- But, Milt! If the war comes, you must be very careful not
+to get shot!"
+
+"All right, if, you insist. Good Lord, Claire. I don't know what put it
+into my head but---- Do you realize that a miracle has happened? We're
+no longer Miss Boltwood and a fellow named Daggett. We have been, even
+when we've liked each other, up to today. Always there's been a kind of
+fence between us. We had to explain and defend ourselves and scrap----
+But now we're _us_, and the rest of the world has disappeared, and----"
+
+"And nothing else matters," said Claire.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+
+THE BEGINNING OF A STORY
+
+
+It was the farewell to Claire and Jeff Saxton, a picnic in the Cascades,
+near Snoqualmie Falls--a decent and decidedly Milt-less fiesta. Mrs.
+Gilson was going to show Claire that they were just as hardy adventurers
+as that horrid Daggett person. So she didn't take the limousine, but
+merely the seven-passenger Locomobile with the special body.
+
+They were ever so rough and wild. They had no maid. The chauffeur was
+absolutely the only help to the Gilsons, Claire, Jeff, and the
+temporarily and ejaculatorily nature-loving Mrs. Betz in the daring task
+of setting out two folding camp-tables, covering them with a linen
+cloth, and opening the picnic basket. Claire had to admit that she
+wished that she could steal the picnic basket for Milt. There were
+vacuum bottles of hot coffee. There were sandwiches of anchovy and _paté
+de foie gras_. There were cream cakes with almonds hidden in the suave
+cream, and there was a chicken salad with huge chunks of pure white meat
+wallowing in a sea of mayonnaise.
+
+When the gorging was done and the cigarettes brought out (the chauffeur
+passed a spirit lamp), they stretched on rubber blankets, and groaned a
+little, and spoke well of nature and the delights of roughing it.
+
+"What is it? What's wrong? They're so--oh, so polite. They don't mean
+what they say and they don't dare to say what they mean. Is that it?"
+worried Claire.
+
+She started. She discovered that she was looking at a bristle of
+rope-colored hair and a grin projected from the shelter of a manzanita
+bush.
+
+"For the----" she gasped. She was too startled to be able to decide what
+was for-the. She spoke judiciously to Jeff Saxton about Upper Montclair,
+the subway, and tennis. She rose to examine the mountains, strolled
+away, darted down a gully, and pounced on Milt Daggett with:
+
+"How in heaven's name----"
+
+"Found out where you-all were going. Look! Got a bug! Rented it. Come
+on! Let's duck! Drive back with me!" At the end of the gully was a new
+Teal bug, shinier than the ancient lost chariot, but equally gay and
+uncomfortable.
+
+"Can't. Like to, but---- Be awfully rude to them. Won't do that--not
+more than is good for their souls--even for you. Now don't be sulky."
+
+"I won't. Nev' be sulky again, because you're crazy about me, and I
+don't have to be sulky."
+
+"Oh, I am, am I! Good heavens, the inconceivable conceit of the child!"
+
+She turned her back. He darted to her, caught her hands behind her,
+kissed her hair, and whispered, "You are!"
+
+"I am not!"
+
+"Well then, you're not. Lord, you're sweet! Your hair smells like
+cinnamon and clean kittens. You'd rather go bumping off in my flivver
+than sailing in that big Loco they've got there."
+
+"Yes," defiantly, "I would, and I'm ashamed of myself. I'm a throw-back
+to my horrid ancestor, the betting hostler."
+
+"Probably. I'm a throw-back to my ancestor the judge. I'll train you to
+meet my fine friends."
+
+"Well--upon--my--word--I---- Oh, do stop being idiotic. We talk like
+children. You reduce me to the rank of a gibbering schoolgirl. And I
+like it! It's so--oh, I don't know--so darn human, I suppose. Now
+hurry--kiss me, and get out, before they suspect."
+
+"Listen."
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"I'll accidentally meet your car along the road. Invite you to ride. All
+right?"
+
+"Yes. Do. Oh, we _are_ two forlorn babes in the woods! G'-by."
+
+She sauntered back to the picnic, and observed, "What is that purple
+flower up on the mountain side?"
+
+The big car was sedately purring back when it was insulted by an
+intermediate host of a machine that came jumping out of a side road. The
+vulgar driver hailed them with uncouth howling. The Gilsons' chauffeur
+stopped, annoyed.
+
+"Why, hello folks," bawled the social bandit.
+
+"Oh. How do you do," refuted Mrs. Gilson.
+
+Jeff Saxton turned a ripe purple.
+
+"How do you like my new bug, Claire? Awful little object. But I can make
+fifty an hour. Come and try it, Claire, can't you?"
+
+"Why----" Claire was obviously shocked by the impropriety of the
+suggestion. She looked at Mrs. Gilson, who was breathing as though she
+was just going under the ether. Claire said doubtfully, "Well---- If you
+can get me right back to the house----"
+
+"Sure," agreed Milt.
+
+When the Loco was gone, Milt drove the bug to the side of the road,
+yanked up the emergency brake, and carefully kissed the girl who was
+snuggled down into the absurd low tin-sided seat.
+
+"Do we have to get back soon?" he begged.
+
+"Oh, I don't care if we never get back. Let's shoot up into the
+mountains. Side road. Let's pretend we're driving across the continent
+again."
+
+Firs dashing by--rocks in the sunshine--clouds jaunty beyond the
+inviting mouth of a mountain pass--even the ruts and bumps and
+culverts--she seemed a part of them all. In the Gilsons' huge cars she
+had been shut off from the road, but in this tiny bug, so close to
+earth, she recovered the feeling of struggle, of triumph over
+difficulties, of freedom unbounded. And she could be herself, good or
+bad, ignorant or wise, with this boy beside her. All of which she
+expressed in the most eloquent speech she had ever uttered, namely:
+
+"Oh, _Milt_----!"
+
+And, to herself, "Golly, it's such a relief not to have to try to be
+gracious and aphoristic and repartistic and everything with Jeff."
+
+And, "But I wonder if I am aphoristic and subtle? I wonder if when she
+gets the rice-powder off, Claire isn't a lot more like Milt than she
+thought?"
+
+And, aloud again, "Oh, this is----"
+
+"Yump. It sure is," Milt agreed.
+
+They had turned from a side-road into a side-side-road. They crossed an
+upland valley. The fall rains had flooded a creek till it had cut across
+the road, washed through the thin gravel, left across the road a shallow
+violent stream. Milt stopped abruptly at its margin.
+
+"Here's where we turn back, I guess," he sighed.
+
+"Oh no! Can't we get across? It's only a couple of feet deep, and gravel
+bottom," insisted the restored adventurer.
+
+"Yes, but look at the steep bank. Never get up it."
+
+"I don't care. Let's try it! We can woggle around and dig it out
+somehow. I bet you two-bits we can," said the delicate young woman whom
+Mrs. Gilson was protecting.
+
+"All right. In she goes!"
+
+The bug went in--shot over the bank, dipped down till the little hood
+sloped below them as though they were looping the loop, struck the
+rushing water with a splash which hurled yellow drops over Claire's rose
+jersey suit, lumbered ahead, struck the farther bank, pawed at it
+feebly, rose two inches, slipped back, and sat there with the gurgling
+water all around it, turned into a motor-boat.
+
+"No can do," grunted Milt. "Scared?"
+
+"Nope. Love it! This is a real camp--the brush on the bank, and the
+stream--listen to it chuckle under the running-board."
+
+"Do you like to camp with me?"
+
+"Love it."
+
+"Say! Gee! Never thought---- Claire! Got your transportation back East?"
+
+"My ticket? Yes. Why?"
+
+"Well, I'm sure you can turn it in and get a refund. So that's all
+right."
+
+"Are you going to let me in on the secret?"
+
+"Oh yes, might's well. I was just wondering---- I don't think much of
+wasting all our youth waiting---- Two-three years in engineering school,
+and maybe going to war, and starting in on an engineering job, and me
+lonely as a turkey in a chicken yard, and you doing the faithful young
+lady in Brooklyn---- I think perhaps we might get married tomorrow
+and----"
+
+"Good heavens, what do you----?"
+
+"Do you want to go back to Brooklyn Gilsonses?"
+
+"No, but----"
+
+"Dear, can't we be crazy once, while we're youngsters?"
+
+"Don't bombard me so! Let me think. One must be practical, even in
+craziness."
+
+"I am. I have over a thousand dollars from the garage, and I can work
+evenings--as dear Jeff suggested! We'd have a two-by-four flat----
+Claire----"
+
+"Oh, let me think. I suppose I could go to the university, too, and
+learn a little about food and babies and building houses and government.
+I need to go to school a lot more than you do. Besides auction and the
+piano--which I play very badly--and clothes and how to get hold of
+tickets for successful plays, I don't know one single thing."
+
+"Will you marry me, tomorrow?"
+
+"Well, uh----"
+
+"Think of Mrs. Gilson's face when she learns it! And Saxton, and that
+Mrs. Betz!"
+
+It was to no spoken sentence but to her kiss that she added, "Providing
+we ever get the car out of this river, that is!"
+
+"Oh, my dear, my dear, and all the romantic ways I was going to propose!
+I had the best line about roses and stars and angels and everything----"
+
+"They always use those, but nobody ever proposed to me in a bug in a
+flood before! Oh! Milt! Life is fun! I never knew it till you kidnapped
+me. If you kiss me again like that, we'll both topple overboard. By the
+way, _can_ we get the car out?"
+
+"I think so, if we put on the chains. We'll have to take off our shoes
+and stockings."
+
+Shyly, turning from him a little, she stripped off her stockings and
+pumps, while he changed from a flivver-driver into a young viking, with
+bare white neck, pale hair ruffled about his head, trousers rolled up
+above his straight knees--a young seaman of the crew of Eric the Red.
+
+They swung out on the running-board, now awash. With slight squeals they
+dropped into the cold stream. Dripping, laughing, his clothes clinging
+to him, he ducked down behind the car to get the jack under the back
+axle, and with the water gurgling about her and splashing its
+exhilarating coldness into her face, she stooped beside him to yank the
+stiff new chains over the rear wheels.
+
+They climbed back into the car, joyously raffish as a pair of gipsies.
+She wiped a dab of mud from her cheek, and remarked with an earnestness
+and a naturalness which that Jeff Saxton who knew her so well would
+never have recognized as hers:
+
+"Gee, I hope the old bird crawls out now."
+
+Milt let in the reverse, raced the engine, started backward with a burst
+of muddy water churned up by the whirling wheels. They struck the bank,
+sickeningly hung there for two seconds, began to crawl up, up, with a
+feeling that at any second they would drop back again.
+
+Then, instantly, they were out on the shore and it was absurd to think
+that they had ever been boating down there in the stream. They washed
+each other's muddy faces, and laughed a great deal, and rubbed their
+legs with their stockings, and resumed something of a dull and civilized
+aspect and, singing sentimental ballads, turned back, found another
+road, and started toward a peak.
+
+"I wonder what lies beyond the top of this climb?" said Claire.
+
+"More mountains, and more, and more, and we're going to keep on climbing
+them forever. At dawn, we'll still be going on. And that's our life."
+
+"Ye-es, providing we can still buy gas."
+
+"Lord, that's so."
+
+"Speaking of which, did you know that I have a tiny bit of money--it's
+about five thousand dollars--of my own?"
+
+"But---- That makes it impossible. Young tramp marrying lady of huge
+wealth----"
+
+"No, you don't! I've accepted you. Do you think I'm going to lose the
+one real playmate I've ever had? It was so lonely on the Boltwoods'
+brown stoop till Milt came along and whistled impertinently and made the
+solemn little girl in frills play marbles and---- Watch out for that
+turn! Heavens, how I have to look after you! Is there a class in cooking
+at your university? No--do--not--kiss--me--on--a--turn!"
+
+This is the beginning of the story of Milt and Claire Daggett.
+
+The prelude over and the curtain risen on the actual play, they face the
+anxieties and glories of a changing world. Not without quarrels and
+barren hours, not free from ignorance and the discomfort of finding that
+between the mountain peaks they must for long gray periods dwell in the
+dusty valleys, they yet start their drama with the distinction of being
+able to laugh together, with the advantage of having discovered that
+neither Schoenstrom nor Brooklyn Heights is quite all of life, with the
+cosmic importance to the tedious world of believing in the romance that
+makes youth unquenchable.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+B. M. BOWER'S NOVELS
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+CHIP OF THE FLYING U. Wherein the love affairs of Chip and Delia Whitman
+are charmingly and humorously told.
+
+THE HAPPY FAMILY. A lively and amusing story, dealing with the
+adventures of eighteen jovial, big-hearted Montana cowboys.
+
+HER PRAIRIE KNIGHT. Describing a gay party of Easterners who exchange a
+cottage at Newport for a Montana ranch-house.
+
+THE RANGE DWELLERS. Spirited action, a range feud between two families,
+and a Romeo and Juliet courtship make this a bright, jolly story.
+
+THE LURE OF THE DIM TRAILS. A vivid portrayal of the experience of an
+Eastern author among the cowboys.
+
+THE LONESOME TRAIL. A little branch of sage brush and the recollection
+of a pair of large brown eyes upset "Weary" Davidson's plans.
+
+THE LONG SHADOW. A vigorous Western story, sparkling with the free
+outdoor life of a mountain ranch. It is a fine love story.
+
+GOOD INDIAN. A stirring romance of life on an Idaho ranch.
+
+FLYING U RANCH. Another delightful story about Chip and his pals.
+
+THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND. An amusing account of Chip and the other boys
+opposing a party of school teachers.
+
+THE UPHILL CLIMB. A story of a mountain ranch and of a man's hard fight
+on the uphill road to manliness.
+
+THE PHANTOM HERD. The title of a moving-picture staged in New Mexico by
+the "Flying U" boys.
+
+THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX. The "Flying U" boys stage a fake bank robbery
+for film purposes which precedes a real one for lust of gold.
+
+THE GRINGOS. A story of love and adventure on a ranch in California.
+
+STARR OF THE DESERT. A New Mexico ranch story of mystery and adventure.
+
+THE LOOKOUT MAN. A Northern California story full of action, excitement
+and love.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+STORIES OF RARE CHARM BY GENE STRATTON-PORTER
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+MICHAEL O'HALLORAN. Illustrated by Frances Rogers.
+
+Michael is a quick-witted little Irish newsboy, living in Northern
+Indiana. He adopts a deserted little girl, a cripple. He also assumes
+the responsibility of leading the entire rural community upward and
+onward.
+
+LADDIE. Illustrated by Herman Pfeifer.
+
+This is a bright, cheery tale with the scenes laid in Indiana. The story
+is told by Little Sister, the youngest member of a large family, but it
+is concerned not so much with childish doings as with the love affairs
+of older members of the family. Chief among them is that of Laddie and
+the Princess, an English girl who has come to live in the neighborhood
+and about whose family there hangs a mystery.
+
+THE HARVESTER. Illustrated by W. L. Jacobs.
+
+"The Harvester," is a man of the woods and fields, and if the book had
+nothing in it but the splendid figure of this man it would be notable.
+But when the Girl comes to his "Medicine Woods," there begins a romance
+of the rarest idyllic quality.
+
+FRECKLES. Illustrated.
+
+Freckles is a nameless waif when the tale opens, but the way in which he
+takes hold of life; the nature friendships he forms in the great
+Limberlost Swamp; the manner in which everyone who meets him succumbs to
+the charm of his engaging personality; and his love-story with "The
+Angel" are full of real sentiment.
+
+A GIRL OF THE LIMBERLOST. Illustrated.
+
+The story of a girl of the Michigan woods; a buoyant, loveable type of
+the self-reliant American. Her philosophy is one of love and kindness
+towards all things; her hope is never dimmed. And by the sheer beauty of
+her soul, and the purity of her vision, she wins from barren and
+unpromising surroundings those rewards of high courage.
+
+AT THE FOOT OF THE RAINBOW. Illustrations in colors.
+
+The scene of this charming love story is laid in Central Indiana. The
+story is one of devoted friendship, and tender self-sacrificing love.
+The novel is brimful of the most beautiful word painting of nature, and
+its pathos and tender sentiment will endear it to all.
+
+THE SONG OF THE CARDINAL. Profusely illustrated.
+
+A love ideal of the Cardinal bird and his mate, told with delicacy and
+humor.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+ZANE GREY'S NOVELS
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+THE LIGHT OF WESTERN STARS
+
+A New York society girl buys a ranch which becomes the center of
+frontier warfare. Her loyal superintendent rescues her when she is
+captured by bandits. A surprising climax brings the story to a
+delightful close.
+
+THE RAINBOW TRAIL
+
+The story of a young clergyman who becomes a wanderer in the great
+western uplands--until at last love and faith awake.
+
+DESERT GOLD
+
+The story describes the recent uprising along the border, and ends with
+the finding of the gold which two prospectors had willed to the girl who
+is the story's heroine.
+
+RIDERS OF THE PURPLE SAGE
+
+A picturesque romance of Utah of some forty years ago when Mormon
+authority ruled. The prosecution of Jane Withersteen is the theme of the
+story.
+
+THE LAST OF THE PLAINSMEN
+
+This is the record of a trip which the author took with Buffalo Jones,
+known as the preserver of the American bison, across the Arizona desert
+and of a hunt in "that wonderful country of deep cañons and giant
+pines."
+
+THE HERITAGE OF THE DESERT
+
+A lovely girl, who has been reared among Mormons, learns to love a young
+New Englander. The Mormon religion, however, demands that the girl shall
+become the second wife of one of the Mormons--Well, that's the problem
+of this great story.
+
+THE SHORT STOP
+
+The young hero, tiring of his factory grind, starts out to win fame and
+fortune as a professional ball player. His hard knocks at the start are
+followed by such success as clean sportsmanship, courage and honesty
+ought to win.
+
+BETTY ZANE
+
+This story tells of the bravery and heroism of Betty, the beautiful
+young sister of old Colonel Zane, one of the bravest pioneers.
+
+THE LONE STAR RANGER
+
+After killing a man in self defense, Buck Duane becomes an outlaw along
+the Texas border. In a camp on the Mexican side of the river, he finds a
+young girl held prisoner, and in attempting to rescue her, brings down
+upon himself the wrath of her captors and henceforth is hunted on one
+side by honest men, on the other by outlaws.
+
+THE BORDER LEGION
+
+Joan Randle, in a spirit of anger, sent Jim Cleve out to a lawless
+Western mining camp, to prove his mettle. Then realizing that she loved
+him--she followed him out. On her way, she is captured by a bandit band,
+and trouble begins when she shoots Kells, the leader--and nurses him to
+health again. Here enters another romance--when Joan, disguised as an
+outlaw, observes Jim, in the throes of dissipation. A gold strike, a
+thrilling robbery--gambling and gun play carry you along breathlessly.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE LAST OF THE GREAT SCOUTS,
+
+By Helen Cody Wetmore and Zane Grey
+
+The life story of Colonel William F. Cody, "Buffalo Bill" as told by his
+sister and Zane Grey. It begins with his boyhood in Iowa and his first
+encounter with an Indian. We see "Bill" as a pony express rider, then
+near Fort Sumter as Chief of the Scouts, and later engaged in the most
+dangerous Indian campaigns. There is also a very interesting account of
+the travels of "The Wild West" Show. No character in public life makes a
+stronger appeal to the imagination of America than "Buffalo Bill," whose
+daring and bravery made him famous.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+NOVELS OF FRONTIER LIFE BY WILLIAM MACLEOD RAINE
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+MAVERICKS
+
+A tale of the western frontier, where the "rustler" abounds. One of the
+sweetest love stories ever told.
+
+A TEXAS RANGER
+
+How a member of the border police saved the life of an innocent man,
+followed a fugitive to Wyoming, and then passed through deadly peril to
+ultimate happiness.
+
+WYOMING
+
+In this vivid story the author brings out the turbid life of the
+frontier with all its engaging dash and vigor.
+
+RIDGWAY OF MONTANA
+
+The scene is laid in the mining centers of Montana, where politics and
+mining industries are the religion of the country.
+
+BUCKY O'CONNOR
+
+Every chapter teems with wholesome, stirring adventures, replete with
+the dashing spirit of the border.
+
+CROOKED TRAILS AND STRAIGHT
+
+A story of Arizona; of swift-riding men and daring outlaws; of a bitter
+feud between cattle-men and sheep-herders.
+
+BRAND BLOTTERS
+
+A story of the turbid life of the frontier with a charming love interest
+running through its pages.
+
+STEVE YEAGER
+
+A story brimful of excitement, with enough gun-play and adventure to
+suit anyone.
+
+A DAUGHTER OF THE DONS
+
+A Western story of romance and adventure, comprising a vivacious and
+stirring tale.
+
+THE HIGHGRADER
+
+A breezy, pleasant and amusing love story of Western mining life.
+
+THE PIRATE OF PANAMA
+
+A tale of old-time pirates and of modern love, hate and adventure.
+
+THE YUKON TRAIL
+
+A crisply entertaining love story in the land where might makes right.
+
+THE VISION SPLENDID
+
+In which two cousins are contestants for the same prizes; political
+honors and the hand of a girl.
+
+THE SHERIFF'S SON
+
+The hero finally conquers both himself and his enemies and wins the love
+of a wonderful girl.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD'S STORIES OF ADVENTURE
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+KAZAN
+
+The tale of a "quarter-strain wolf and three-quarters husky" torn
+between the call of the human and his wild mate.
+
+BAREE, SON OF KAZAN
+
+The story of the son of the blind Grey Wolf and the gallant part he
+played in the lives of a man and a woman.
+
+THE COURAGE OF CAPTAIN PLUM
+
+The story of the King of Beaver Island, a Mormon colony, and his battle
+with Captain Plum.
+
+THE DANGER TRAIL
+
+A tale of snow, of love, of Indian vengeance, and a mystery of the
+North.
+
+THE HUNTED WOMAN
+
+A tale of the "end of the line," and of a great fight in the "valley of
+gold" for a woman.
+
+THE FLOWER OF THE NORTH
+
+The story of Fort o' God, where the wild flavor of the wilderness is
+blended with the courtly atmosphere of France.
+
+THE GRIZZLY KING
+
+The story of Thor, the big grizzly who lived in a valley where man had
+never come.
+
+ISOBEL
+
+A love story of the Far North.
+
+THE WOLF HUNTERS
+
+A thrilling tale of adventure in the Canadian wilderness.
+
+THE GOLD HUNTERS
+
+The story of adventure in the Hudson Bay wilds.
+
+THE COURAGE OF MARGE O'DOONE
+
+Filled with exciting incidents in the land of strong men and women.
+
+BACK TO GOD'S COUNTRY
+
+A thrilling story of the Far North. The great Photoplay was made from
+this book.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+RALPH CONNOR'S STORIES OF THE NORTHWEST
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+THE SKY PILOT IN NO MAN'S LAND
+
+The clean-hearted, strong-limbed man of the West leaves his hills and
+forests to fight the battle for freedom in the old world.
+
+BLACK ROCK
+
+A story of strong men in the mountains of the West.
+
+THE SKY PILOT
+
+A story of cowboy life, abounding in the freshest humor, the truest
+tenderness and the finest courage.
+
+THE PROSPECTOR
+
+A tale of the foothills and of the man who came to them to lend a hand
+to the lonely men and women who needed a protector.
+
+THE MAN FROM GLENGARRY
+
+This narrative brings us into contact with elemental and volcanic human
+nature and with a hero whose power breathes from every word.
+
+GLENGARRY SCHOOL DAYS
+
+In this rough country of Glengarry, Ralph Connor has found human nature
+in the rough.
+
+THE DOCTOR
+
+The story of a "preacher-doctor" whom big men and reckless men loved for
+his unselfish life among them.
+
+THE FOREIGNER
+
+A tale of the Saskatchewan and of a "foreigner" who made a brave and
+winning fight for manhood and love.
+
+CORPORAL CAMERON
+
+This splendid type of the upright, out-of-door man about which Ralph
+Connor builds all his stories, appears again in this book.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+BOOTH TARKINGTON'S NOVELS
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+SEVENTEEN. Illustrated by Arthur William Brown.
+
+No one but the creator of Penrod could have portrayed the immortal young
+people of this story. Its humor is irresistible and reminiscent of the
+time when the reader was Seventeen.
+
+PENROD. Illustrated by Gordon Grant.
+
+This is a picture of a boy's heart, full of the lovable, humorous,
+tragic things which are locked secrets to most older folks. It is a
+finished, exquisite work.
+
+PENROD AND SAM. Illustrated by Worth Brehm.
+
+Like "Penrod" and "Seventeen," this book contains some remarkable phases
+of real boyhood and some of the best stories of juvenile prankishness
+that have ever been written.
+
+THE TURMOIL. Illustrated by C. E. Chambers.
+
+Bibbs Sheridan is a dreamy, imaginative youth, who revolts against his
+father's plans for him to be a servitor of big business. The love of a
+fine girl turns Bibbs's life from failure to success.
+
+THE GENTLEMAN FROM INDIANA. Frontispiece.
+
+A story of love and politics,--more especially a picture of a country
+editor's life in Indiana, but the charm of the book lies in the love
+interest.
+
+THE FLIRT. Illustrated by Clarence F. Underwood.
+
+The "Flirt," the younger of two sisters, breaks one girl's engagement,
+drives one man to suicide, causes the murder of another, leads another
+to lose his fortune, and in the end marries a stupid and unpromising
+suitor, leaving the really worthy one to marry her sister.
+
+
+_Ask for Complete free list of G. & D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction_
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+ELEANOR H. PORTER'S NOVELS
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+JUST DAVID
+
+The tale of a loveable boy and the place he comes to fill in the hearts
+of the gruff farmer folk to whose care he is left.
+
+THE ROAD TO UNDERSTANDING
+
+A compelling romance of love and marriage.
+
+OH, MONEY! MONEY!
+
+Stanley Fulton, a wealthy bachelor, to test the dispositions of his
+relatives, sends them each a check for $100,000, and then as plain John
+Smith comes among them to watch the result of his experiment.
+
+SIX STAR RANCH
+
+A wholesome story of a club of six girls and their summer on Six Star
+Ranch.
+
+DAWN
+
+The story of a blind boy whose courage leads him through the gulf of
+despair into a final victory gained by dedicating his life to the
+service of blind soldiers.
+
+ACROSS THE YEARS
+
+Short stories of our own kind and of our own people. Contains some of
+the best writing Mrs. Porter has done.
+
+THE TANGLED THREADS
+
+In these stories we find the concentrated charm and tenderness of all
+her other books.
+
+THE TIE THAT BINDS
+
+Intensely human stories told with Mrs. Porter's wonderful talent for
+warm and vivid character drawing.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note:
+
+    Dialect spellings have been retained. Inconsistent hyphenation,
+    except when used for emphasis, has been standardised. Minor
+    typographical errors have been corrected without note.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Free Air, by Sinclair Lewis
+
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Free Air, by Sinclair Lewis
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Free Air
+
+Author: Sinclair Lewis
+
+Release Date: September 30, 2008 [EBook #26732]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FREE AIR ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by K Nordquist, Stephen Blundell and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<div class="bk1"><h1><big>FREE AIR</big></h1>
+
+<h2><small>BY</small><br />
+SINCLAIR LEWIS</h2>
+
+<p class="hd1"><small>AUTHOR OF</small><br />
+THE JOB, <span class="smcap">Etc</span>.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/001.png" width="75" height="68" alt="" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="center"><span class="fxl"><small>GROSSET &amp; DUNLAP</small></span><br />
+PUBLISHERS <span class="sp2">NEW YORK</span></p>
+</div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p class="center"><small><span class="smcap">Copyright, 1919, by</span><br />
+HARCOURT, BRACE AND HOWE, <span class="smcap">Inc.</span></small></p>
+
+<hr />
+<h2>CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary="">
+<tr><td class="rgt"><small>CHAPTER</small></td><td class="rgt" colspan="2"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">I</td><td class="td1">MISS BOLTWOOD OF BROOKLYN IS LOST IN THE MUD</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_3">3</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">II</td><td class="td1">CLAIRE ESCAPES FROM RESPECTABILITY</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_10">10</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">III</td><td class="td1">A YOUNG MAN IN A RAINCOAT</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_21">21</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">IV</td><td class="td1">A ROOM WITHOUT</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_36">36</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">V</td><td class="td1">RELEASE BRAKES&mdash;SHIFT TO THIRD</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_49">49</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">VI</td><td class="td1">THE LAND OF BILLOWING CLOUDS</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_66">66</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">VII</td><td class="td1">THE GREAT AMERICAN FRYING PAN</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_74">74</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">VIII</td><td class="td1">THE DISCOVERY OF CANNED SHRIMPS AND HESPERIDES</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_85">85</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">IX</td><td class="td1">THE MAN WITH AGATE EYES</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_101">101</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">X</td><td class="td1">THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE HILLSIDE ROAD</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_112">112</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XI</td><td class="td1">SAGEBRUSH TOURISTS OF THE GREAT HIGHWAY</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_119">119</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XII</td><td class="td1">THE WONDERS OF NATURE WITH ALL MODERN IMPROVEMENTS</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_129">129</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XIII</td><td class="td1">ADVENTURERS BY FIRELIGHT</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_138">138</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XIV</td><td class="td1">THE BEAST OF THE CORRAL</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_149">149</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XV</td><td class="td1">THE BLACK DAY OF THE VOYAGE</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_154">154</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XVI</td><td class="td1">THE SPECTACLES OF AUTHORITY</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_165">165</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XVII</td><td class="td1">THE VAGABOND IN GREEN</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_176">176</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XVIII</td><td class="td1">THE FALLACY OF ROMANCE</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_188">188</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XIX</td><td class="td1">THE NIGHT OF ENDLESS PINES</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_194">194</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XX</td><td class="td1">THE FREE WOMAN</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXI</td><td class="td1">THE MINE OF LOST SOULS</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_219">219</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXII</td><td class="td1">ACROSS THE ROOF OF THE WORLD</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_228">228</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXIII</td><td class="td1">THE GRAEL IN A BACK YARD IN YAKIMA</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_237">237</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXIV</td><td class="td1">HER OWN PEOPLE</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_242">242</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXV</td><td class="td1">THE ABYSSINIAN PRINCE</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_254">254</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXVI</td><td class="td1">A CLASS IN ENGINEERING AND OMELETS</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_270">270</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXVII</td><td class="td1">THE VICIOUSNESS OF NICE THINGS</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_279">279</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXVIII</td><td class="td1">THE MORNING COAT OF MR. HUDSON B. RIGGS</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_290">290</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXIX</td><td class="td1">THE ENEMY LOVE</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_300">300</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXX</td><td class="td1">THE VIRTUOUS PLOTTERS</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_307">307</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXXI</td><td class="td1">THE KITCHEN INTIMATE</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_310">310</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXXII</td><td class="td1">THE CORNFIELD ARISTOCRAT</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_331">331</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXXIII</td><td class="td1">TOOTH-MUG TEA</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_345">345</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="rgt">XXXIV</td><td class="td1">THE BEGINNING OF A STORY</td><td class="rgt"><a href="#Page_361">361</a></td></tr>
+</table></div>
+
+<hr />
+<h1>FREE AIR</h1>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span></p>
+<h1>FREE AIR</h1>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER I<br />
+MISS BOLTWOOD OF BROOKLYN IS LOST IN THE MUD</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">When</span> the windshield was closed it became so
+filmed with rain that Claire fancied she was
+piloting a drowned car in dim spaces under the sea.
+When it was open, drops jabbed into her eyes and
+chilled her cheeks. She was excited and thoroughly
+miserable. She realized that these Minnesota country
+roads had no respect for her polite experience on Long
+Island parkways. She felt like a woman, not like a
+driver.</p>
+
+<p>But the Gomez-Dep roadster had seventy horsepower,
+and sang songs. Since she had left Minneapolis
+nothing had passed her. Back yonder a truck
+had tried to crowd her, and she had dropped into a
+ditch, climbed a bank, returned to the road, and after
+that the truck was not. Now she was regarding a
+view more splendid than mountains above a garden
+by the sea&mdash;a stretch of good road. To her passenger,
+her father, Claire chanted:</p>
+
+<p>"Heavenly! There's some gravel. We can make
+time. We'll hustle on to the next town and get dry."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>"Yes. But don't mind me. You're doing very
+well," her father sighed.</p>
+
+<p>Instantly, the dismay of it rushing at her, she saw
+the end of the patch of gravel. The road ahead was
+a wet black smear, criss-crossed with ruts. The car
+shot into a morass of prairie gumbo&mdash;which is mud
+mixed with tar, fly-paper, fish glue, and well-chewed,
+chocolate-covered caramels. When cattle get into
+gumbo, the farmers send for the stump-dynamite and
+try blasting.</p>
+
+<p>It was her first really bad stretch of road. She
+was frightened. Then she was too appallingly busy
+to be frightened, or to be Miss Claire Boltwood, or
+to comfort her uneasy father. She had to drive.
+Her frail graceful arms put into it a vicious vigor
+that was genius.</p>
+
+<p>When the wheels struck the slime, they slid, they
+wallowed. The car skidded. It was terrifyingly out
+of control. It began majestically to turn toward the
+ditch. She fought the steering wheel as though she
+were shadow-boxing, but the car kept contemptuously
+staggering till it was sideways, straight across the
+road. Somehow, it was back again, eating into a
+rut, going ahead. She didn't know how she had
+done it, but she had got it back. She longed to take
+time to retrace her own cleverness in steering. She
+didn't. She kept going.</p>
+
+<p>The car backfired, slowed. She yanked the gear
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>from third into first. She sped up. The motor ran
+like a terrified pounding heart, while the car crept
+on by inches through filthy mud that stretched ahead
+of her without relief.</p>
+
+<p>She was battling to hold the car in the principal
+rut. She snatched the windshield open, and concentrated
+on that left rut. She felt that she was keeping
+the wheel from climbing those high sides of the rut,
+those six-inch walls of mud, sparkling with tiny grits.
+Her mind snarled at her arms, "Let the ruts do the
+steering. You're just fighting against them." It
+worked. Once she let the wheels alone they comfortably
+followed the furrows, and for three seconds
+she had that delightful belief of every motorist after
+every mishap, "Now that this particular disagreeableness
+is over, I'll never, never have any trouble again!"</p>
+
+<p>But suppose the engine overheated, ran out of
+water? Anxiety twanged at her nerves. And the deep
+distinctive ruts were changing to a complex pattern,
+like the rails in a city switchyard. She picked out
+the track of the one motor car that had been through
+here recently. It was marked with the swastika tread
+of the rear tires. That track was her friend; she
+knew and loved the driver of a car she had never seen
+in her life.</p>
+
+<p>She was very tired. She wondered if she might
+not stop for a moment. Then she came to an upslope.
+The car faltered; felt indecisive beneath her. She<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>
+jabbed down the accelerator. Her hands pushed at
+the steering wheel as though she were pushing the
+car. The engine picked up, sulkily kept going. To
+the eye, there was merely a rise in the rolling ground,
+but to her anxiety it was a mountain up which she&mdash;not
+the engine, but herself&mdash;pulled this bulky mass,
+till she had reached the top, and was safe again&mdash;for a
+second. Still there was no visible end of the mud.</p>
+
+<p>In alarm she thought, "How long does it last? I
+can't keep this up. I&mdash;Oh!"</p>
+
+<p>The guiding tread of the previous car was suddenly
+lost in a mass of heaving, bubble-scattered mud, like
+a batter of black dough. She fairly picked up the car,
+and flung it into that welter, through it, and back into
+the reappearing swastika-marked trail.</p>
+
+<p>Her father spoke: "You're biting your lips. They'll
+bleed, if you don't look out. Better stop and rest."</p>
+
+<p>"Can't! No bottom to this mud. Once stop and
+lose momentum&mdash;stuck for keeps!"</p>
+
+<p>She had ten more minutes of it before she reached
+a combination of bridge and culvert, with a plank platform
+above a big tile drain. With this solid plank
+bottom, she could stop. Silence came roaring down as
+she turned the switch. The bubbling water in the
+radiator steamed about the cap. Claire was conscious
+of tautness of the cords of her neck in front; of a pain
+at the base of her brain. Her father glanced at her
+curiously. "I must be a wreck. I'm sure my hair<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span>
+is frightful," she thought, but forgot it as she looked
+at him. His face was unusually pale. In the tumult
+of activity he had been betrayed into letting the old
+despondent look blur his eyes and sag his mouth.
+"Must get on," she determined.</p>
+
+<p>Claire was dainty of habit. She detested untwisted
+hair, ripped gloves, muddy shoes. Hesitant as a cat
+by a puddle, she stepped down on the bridge. Even on
+these planks, the mud was three inches thick. It
+squidged about her low, spatted shoes. "Eeh!" she
+squeaked.</p>
+
+<p>She tiptoed to the tool-box and took out a folding
+canvas bucket. She edged down to the trickling stream
+below. She was miserably conscious of a pastoral
+scene all gone to mildew&mdash;cows beneath willows by
+the creek, milkweeds dripping, dried mullein weed
+stalks no longer dry. The bank of the stream was so
+slippery that she shot down two feet, and nearly went
+sprawling. Her knee did touch the bank, and the
+skirt of her gray sports-suit showed a smear of yellow
+earth.</p>
+
+<p>In less than two miles the racing motor had used
+up so much water that she had to make four trips to
+the creek before she had filled the radiator. When she
+had climbed back on the running-board she glared
+down at spats and shoes turned into gray lumps. She
+was not tearful. She was angry.</p>
+
+<p>"Idiot! Ought to have put on my rubbers. Well&mdash;too<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>
+late now," she observed, as she started the
+engine.</p>
+
+<p>She again followed the swastika tread. To avoid
+a hole in the road ahead, the unknown driver had
+swung over to the side of the road, and taken to the
+intensely black earth of the edge of an unfenced cornfield.
+Flashing at Claire came the sight of a deep,
+water-filled hole, scattered straw and brush, d&eacute;bris of
+a battlefield, which made her gaspingly realize that her
+swastikaed leader had been stuck and&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>And instantly her own car was stuck.</p>
+
+<p>She had had to put the car at that hole. It dropped,
+far down, and it stayed down. The engine stalled.
+She started it, but the back wheels spun merrily round
+and round, without traction. She did not make one
+inch. When she again killed the blatting motor, she
+let it stay dead. She peered at her father.</p>
+
+<p>He was not a father, just now, but a passenger trying
+not to irritate the driver. He smiled in a waxy
+way, and said, "Hard luck! Well, you did the best
+you could. The other hole, there in the road, would
+have been just as bad. You're a fine driver, dolly."</p>
+
+<p>Her smile was warm and real. "No. I'm a fool.
+You told me to put on chains. I didn't. I deserve it."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, anyway, most men would be cussing. You
+acquire merit by not beating me. I believe that's
+done, in moments like this. If you'd like, I'll get out
+and crawl around in the mud, and play turtle for you."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>"No. I'm quite all right. I did feel frightfully
+strong-minded as long as there was any use of it. It
+kept me going. But now I might just as well be
+cheerful, because we're stuck, and we're probably going
+to stay stuck for the rest of this care-free summer
+day."</p>
+
+<p>The weariness of the long strain caught her, all at
+once. She slipped forward, sat huddled, her knees
+crossed under the edge of the steering wheel, her
+hands falling beside her, one of them making a faint
+brushing sound as it slid down the upholstery. Her
+eyes closed; as her head drooped farther, she fancied
+she could hear the vertebrae click in her tense neck.</p>
+
+<p>Her father was silent, a misty figure in a lap-robe.
+The rain streaked the mica lights in the side-curtains.
+A distant train whistled desolately across the sodden
+fields. The inside of the car smelled musty. The
+quiet was like a blanket over the ears. Claire was in
+a hazy drowse. She felt that she could never drive
+again.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER II<br />
+CLAIRE ESCAPES FROM RESPECTABILITY</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Claire Boltwood</span> lived on the Heights,
+Brooklyn. Persons from New York and other
+parts of the Middlewest have been known to believe
+that Brooklyn is somehow humorous. In newspaper
+jokes and vaudeville it is so presented that people
+who are willing to take their philosophy from those
+sources believe that the leading citizens of Brooklyn
+are all deacons, undertakers, and obstetricians. The
+fact is that North Washington Square, at its reddest
+and whitest and fanlightedest, Gramercy Park at its
+most ivied, are not so aristocratic as the section of
+Brooklyn called the Heights. Here preached Henry
+Ward Beecher. Here, in mansions like mausoleums,
+on the ridge above docks where the good ships came
+sailing in from Sourabaya and Singapore, ruled the
+lords of a thousand sails. And still is it a place of
+wealth too solid to emulate the nimble self-advertising
+of Fifth Avenue. Here dwell the fifth-generation
+possessors of blocks of foundries and shipyards.
+Here, in a big brick house of much dignity, much
+ugliness, and much conservatory, lived Claire Boltwood,
+with her widower father.</p>
+
+<p>Henry B. Boltwood was vice-president of a firm<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>
+dealing in railway supplies. He was neither wealthy
+nor at all poor. Every summer, despite Claire's delicate
+hints, they took the same cottage on the Jersey
+Coast, and Mr. Boltwood came down for Sunday.
+Claire had gone to a good school out of Philadelphia,
+on the Main Line. She was used to gracious leisure,
+attractive uselessness, nut-center chocolates, and a
+certain wonder as to why she was alive.</p>
+
+<p>She wanted to travel, but her father could not get
+away. He consistently spent his days in overworking,
+and his evenings in wishing he hadn't overworked.
+He was attractive, fresh, pink-cheeked, white-mustached,
+and nerve-twitching with years of detail.</p>
+
+<p>Claire's ambition had once been babies and a solid
+husband, but as various young males of the species
+appeared before her, sang their mating songs and
+preened their newly dry-cleaned plumage, she found
+that the trouble with solid young men was that they
+were solid. Though she liked to dance, the "dancing
+men" bored her. And she did not understand the
+district's quota of intellectuals very well; she was
+good at listening to symphony concerts, but she never
+had much luck in discussing the cleverness of the
+wood winds in taking up the main motif. It is history
+that she refused a master of arts with an old violin,
+a good taste in ties, and an income of eight thousand.</p>
+
+<p>The only man who disturbed her was Geoffrey
+Saxton, known throughout the interwoven sets of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>
+Brooklyn Heights as "Jeff." Jeff Saxton was thirty-nine
+to Claire's twenty-three. He was clean and
+busy; he had no signs of vice or humor. Especially
+for Jeff must have been invented the symbolic morning
+coat, the unwrinkable gray trousers, and the moral
+rimless spectacles. He was a graduate of a nice college,
+and he had a nice tenor and a nice family and
+nice hands and he was nicely successful in New York
+copper dealing. When he was asked questions by
+people who were impertinent, clever, or poor, Jeff
+looked them over coldly before he answered, and often
+they felt so uncomfortable that he didn't have to
+answer.</p>
+
+<p>The boys of Claire's own age, not long out of Yale
+and Princeton, doing well in business and jumping for
+their evening clothes daily at six-thirty, light o' loves
+and admirers of athletic heroes, these lads Claire
+found pleasant, but hard to tell apart. She didn't
+have to tell Jeff Saxton apart. He did his own telling.
+Jeff called&mdash;not too often. He sang&mdash;not too sentimentally.
+He took her father and herself to the
+theater&mdash;not too lavishly. He told Claire&mdash;in a voice
+not too serious&mdash;that she was his helmed Athena, his
+rose of all the world. He informed her of his substantial
+position&mdash;not too obviously. And he was so
+everlastingly, firmly, quietly, politely, immovably
+always there.</p>
+
+<p>She watched the hulk of marriage drifting down<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span>
+on her frail speed-boat of aspiration, and steered in
+desperate circles.</p>
+
+<p>Then her father got the nervous prostration he had
+richly earned. The doctor ordered rest. Claire took
+him in charge. He didn't want to travel. Certainly
+he didn't want the shore or the Adirondacks. As
+there was a branch of his company in Minneapolis, she
+lured him that far away.</p>
+
+<p>Being rootedly of Brooklyn Heights, Claire didn't
+know much about the West. She thought that Milwaukee
+was the capital of Minnesota. She was not so
+uninformed as some of her friends, however. She had
+heard that in Dakota wheat was to be viewed in vast
+tracts&mdash;maybe a hundred acres.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood could not be coaxed to play with the
+people to whom his Minneapolis representative introduced
+him. He was overworking again, and perfectly
+happy. He was hoping to find something wrong with
+the branch house. Claire tried to tempt him out to
+the lakes. She failed. His nerve-fuse burnt out the
+second time, with much fireworks.</p>
+
+<p>Claire had often managed her circle of girls, but it
+had never occurred to her to manage her executive
+father save by indirect and pretty teasing. Now, in
+conspiracy with the doctor, she bullied her father.
+He saw gray death waiting as alternative, and he was
+meek. He agreed to everything. He consented to
+drive with her across two thousand miles of plains<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>
+and mountains to Seattle, to drop in for a call on their
+cousins, the Eugene Gilsons.</p>
+
+<p>Back East they had a chauffeur and two cars&mdash;the
+limousine, and the Gomez-Deperdussin roadster,
+Claire's beloved. It would, she believed, be more of a
+change from everything that might whisper to Mr.
+Boltwood of the control of men, not to take a chauffeur.
+Her father never drove, but she could, she insisted.
+His easy agreeing was pathetic. He watched
+her with spaniel eyes. They had the Gomez roadster
+shipped to them from New York.</p>
+
+<p>On a July morning, they started out of Minneapolis
+in a mist, and as it has been hinted, they stopped sixty
+miles northward, in a rain, also in much gumbo. Apparently
+their nearest approach to the Pacific Ocean
+would be this oceanically moist edge of a cornfield,
+between Schoenstrom and Gopher Prairie, Minnesota.</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>Claire roused from her damp doze and sighed,
+"Well, I must get busy and get the car out of this."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you think you'd better get somebody to
+help us?"</p>
+
+<p>"But get who?"</p>
+
+<p>"Whom!"</p>
+
+<p>"No! It's just 'who,' when you're in the mud.
+No. One of the good things about an adventure like
+this is that I must do things for myself. I've always
+had people to do things for me. Maids and nice<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>
+teachers and you, old darling! I suppose it's made
+me soft. Soft&mdash;I would like a soft davenport and
+a novel and a pound of almond-brittle, and get all sick,
+and not feel so beastly virile as I do just now.
+But&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She turned up the collar of her gray tweed coat,
+painfully climbed out&mdash;the muscles of her back racking&mdash;and
+examined the state of the rear wheels.
+They were buried to the axle; in front of them the
+mud bulked in solid, shiny blackness. She took out
+her jack and chains. It was too late. There was no
+room to get the jack under the axle. She remembered
+from the narratives of motoring friends that brush
+in mud gave a firmer surface for the wheels to climb
+upon.</p>
+
+<p>She also remembered how jolly and agreeably
+heroic the accounts of their mishaps had sounded&mdash;a
+week after they were over.</p>
+
+<p>She waded down the road toward an old wood-lot.
+At first she tried to keep dry, but she gave it up, and
+there was pleasure in being defiantly dirty. She
+tramped straight through puddles; she wallowed in
+mud. In the wood-lot was long grass which soaked
+her stockings till her ankles felt itchy. Claire had
+never expected to be so very intimate with a brush-pile.
+She became so. As though she were a pioneer
+woman who had been toiling here for years, she came
+to know the brush stick by stick&mdash;the long valuable<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>
+branch that she could never quite get out from under
+the others; the thorny bough that pricked her hands
+every time she tried to reach the curious bundle of
+switches.</p>
+
+<p>Seven trips she made, carrying armfuls of twigs
+and solemnly dragging large boughs behind her. She
+patted them down in front of all four wheels. Her
+crisp hands looked like the paws of a three-year-old
+boy making a mud fort. Her nails hurt from the mud
+wedged beneath them. Her mud-caked shoes were
+heavy to lift. It was with exquisite self-approval that
+she sat on the running-board, scraped a car-load of
+lignite off her soles, climbed back into the car, punched
+the starter.</p>
+
+<p>The car stirred, crept forward one inch, and settled
+back&mdash;one inch. The second time it heaved encouragingly
+but did not make quite so much headway.
+Then Claire did sob.</p>
+
+<p>She rubbed her cheek against the comfortable,
+rough, heather-smelling shoulder of her father's coat,
+while he patted her and smiled, "Good girl! I better
+get out and help."</p>
+
+<p>She sat straight, shook her head. "Nope. I'll do
+it. And I'm not going to insist on being heroic any
+longer. I'll get a farmer to pull us out."</p>
+
+<p>As she let herself down into the ooze, she reflected
+that all farmers have hearts of gold, anatomical
+phenomena never found among the snobs and hirelings<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>
+of New York. The nearest heart of gold was presumably
+beating warmly in the house a quarter of a
+mile ahead.</p>
+
+<p>She came up a muddy lane to a muddy farmyard,
+with a muddy cur yapping at her wet legs, and geese
+hissing in a pool of purest mud serene. The house
+was small and rather old. It may have been painted
+once. The barn was large and new. It had been
+painted very much, and in a blinding red with white
+trimmings. There was no brass plate on the house,
+but on the barn, in huge white letters, was the legend,
+"Adolph Zolzac, 1913."</p>
+
+<p>She climbed by log steps to a narrow frame back
+porch littered with parts of a broken cream-separator.
+She told herself that she was simple and friendly in
+going to the back door instead of the front, and it was
+with gaiety that she knocked on the ill-jointed screen
+door, which flapped dismally in response.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Ja?</i>" from within.</p>
+
+<p>She rapped again.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Hinein!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>She opened the door on a kitchen, the highlight of
+which was a table heaped with dishes of dumplings
+and salt pork. A shirt-sleeved man, all covered with
+mustache and calm, sat by the table, and he kept right
+on sitting as he inquired:</p>
+
+<p>"Vell?"</p>
+
+<p>"My car&mdash;my automobile&mdash;has been stuck in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>
+mud. A bad driver, I'm afraid! I wonder if you
+would be so good as to&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I usually get t'ree dollars, but I dunno as I vant
+to do it for less than four. Today I ain'd feelin' very
+goot," grumbled the golden-hearted.</p>
+
+<p>Claire was aware that a woman whom she had not
+noticed&mdash;so much smaller than the dumplings, so much
+less vigorous than the salt pork was she&mdash;was speaking:
+"<i>Aber</i>, papa, dot's a shame you sharge de poor
+young lady dot, when she drive by <i>sei</i> self. Vot she
+t'ink of de Sherman people?"</p>
+
+<p>The farmer merely grunted. To Claire, "Yuh,
+four dollars. Dot's what I usually charge sometimes."</p>
+
+<p>"Usually? Do you mean to say that you leave
+that hole there in the road right along&mdash;that people
+keep on trying to avoid it and get stuck as I was?
+Oh! If I were an official&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Vell, I dunno, I don't guess I run my place to
+suit you smart alecks&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Papa! How you talk on the young lady! Make
+shame!"</p>
+
+<p>"&mdash;from the city. If you don't like it, you stay
+<i>bei</i> Mineapolis! I haul you out for t'ree dollars and
+a half. Everybody pay dot. Last mont' I make forty-five
+dollars. They vos all glad to pay. They say I
+help them fine. I don't see vot you're kickin' about!
+Oh, these vimmins!"</p>
+
+<p>"It's blackmail! I wouldn't pay it, if it weren't<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>
+for my father sitting waiting out there. But&mdash;go
+ahead. Hurry!"</p>
+
+<p>She sat tapping her toe while Zolzac completed the
+stertorous task of hogging the dumplings, then
+stretched, yawned, scratched, and covered his merely
+dirty garments with overalls that were apparently
+woven of processed mud. When he had gone to the
+barn for his team, his wife came to Claire. On her
+drained face were the easy tears of the slave women.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, miss, I don't know vot I should do. My boys
+go on the public school, and they speak American just
+so goot as you. Oh, I vant man lets me luff America.
+But papa he says it is an <i>Unsinn</i>; you got the money,
+he says, nobody should care if you are American or
+Old Country people. I should vish I could ride once
+in an automobile! But&mdash;I am so 'shamed, so 'shamed
+that I must sit and see my <i>Mann</i> make this. Forty
+years I been married to him, and pretty soon I
+die&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Claire patted her hand. There was nothing to say
+to tragedy that had outlived hope.</p>
+
+<p>Adolph Zolzac clumped out to the highroad behind
+his vast, rolling-flanked horses&mdash;so much cleaner and
+better fed than his wisp of a wife. Claire followed
+him, and in her heart she committed murder and was
+glad of it. While Mr. Boltwood looked out with mild
+wonder at Claire's new friend, Zolzac hitched his team
+to the axle. It did not seem possible that two horses<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>
+could pull out the car where seventy horsepower had
+fainted. But, easily, yawning and thinking about dinner,
+the horses drew the wheels up on the mud-bank,
+out of the hole and&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>The harness broke, with a flying mess of straps and
+rope, and the car plumped with perfect exactness back
+into its bed.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER III<br />
+A YOUNG MAN IN A RAINCOAT</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">"Huh</span>! Such an auto! Look, it break my harness
+a'ready! Two dollar that cost you to
+mend it. De auto iss too heavy!" stormed Zolzac.</p>
+
+<p>"All right! All right! Only for heaven's sake&mdash;go
+get another harness!" Claire shrieked.</p>
+
+<p>"Fife-fifty dot will be, in all." Zolzac grinned.</p>
+
+<p>Claire was standing in front of him. She was
+thinking of other drivers, poor people, in old cars,
+who had been at the mercy of this golden-hearted one.
+She stared past him, in the direction from which she
+had come. Another motor was in sight.</p>
+
+<p>It was a tin beetle of a car; that agile, cheerful, rut-jumping
+model known as a "bug"; with a home-tacked,
+home-painted tin cowl and tail covering the
+stripped chassis of a little cheap Teal car. The lone
+driver wore an old black raincoat with an atrocious
+corduroy collar, and a new plaid cap in the Harry
+Lauder tartan. The bug skipped through mud where
+the Boltwoods' Gomez had slogged and rolled. Its
+pilot drove up behind her car, and leaped out. He
+trotted forward to Claire and Zolzac. His eyes were
+twenty-seven or eight, but his pink cheeks were twenty,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>
+and when he smiled&mdash;shyly, radiantly&mdash;he was no age
+at all, but eternal boy. Claire had a blurred impression
+that she had seen him before, some place along
+the road.</p>
+
+<p>"Stuck?" he inquired, not very intelligently.
+"How much is Adolph charging you?"</p>
+
+<p>"He wants three-fifty, and his harness broke, and
+he wants two dollars&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! So he's still working that old gag! I've
+heard all about Adolph. He keeps that harness for
+pulling out cars, and it always busts. The last time,
+though, he only charged six bits to get it mended.
+Now let me reason with him."</p>
+
+<p>The young man turned with vicious quickness, and
+for the first time Claire heard pidgin German&mdash;German
+as it is spoken between Americans who have
+never learned it, and Germans who have forgotten it:</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Schon sex</i> hundred times <i>Ich h&ouml;re</i> all about the
+way you been doing autos, Zolzac, you <i>verfluchter
+Schweinhund</i>, and I'll set the sheriff on you&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Dot ain'd true, maybe <i>einmal die Woche kommt</i>
+somebody and <i>Ich muss die Arbeit immer lassen und
+in die Regen ausgehen, und seh' mal</i> how <i>die</i> boots
+<i>sint mit</i> mud covered, two dollars it don't pay for <i>die</i>
+boots&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Now that's enough-plenty out of you, <i>seien die</i>
+boots <i>verdammt</i>, and <i>mach' dass du fort gehst</i>&mdash;muddy
+boots, hell!&mdash;put <i>mal ein</i> egg in <i>die</i> boots and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>
+beat it, <i>verleicht</i> maybe I'll by golly arrest you myself,
+<i>weiss du</i>! I'm a special deputy sheriff."</p>
+
+<p>The young man stood stockily. He seemed to
+swell as his somewhat muddy hand was shaken directly
+at, under, and about the circumference of, Adolph
+Zolzac's hairy nose. The farmer was stronger, but
+he retreated. He took up the reins. He whined,
+"Don't I get nothing I break de harness?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure. You get ten&mdash;years! And you get out!"</p>
+
+<p>From thirty yards up the road, Zolzac flung back,
+"You t'ink you're pretty damn smart!" That was
+his last serious reprisal.</p>
+
+<p>Clumsily, as one not used to it, the young man
+lifted his cap to Claire, showing straight, wiry, rope-colored
+hair, brushed straight back from a rather fine
+forehead. "Gee, I was sorry to have to swear and
+holler like that, but it's all Adolph understands.
+Please don't think there's many of the folks around
+here like him. They say he's the meanest man in the
+county."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm immensely grateful to you, but&mdash;do you know
+much about motors? How can I get out of this
+mud?"</p>
+
+<p>She was surprised to see the youngster blush. His
+clear skin flooded. His engaging smile came again,
+and he hesitated, "Let me pull you out."</p>
+
+<p>She looked from her hulking car to his mechanical
+flea.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>He answered the look: "I can do it all right. I'm
+used to the gumbo&mdash;regular mud-hen. Just add my
+power to yours. Have you a tow-rope?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. I never thought of bringing one."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll get mine."</p>
+
+<p>She walked with him back toward his bug. It
+lacked not only top and side-curtains, but even windshield
+and running-board. It was a toy&mdash;a card-board
+box on toothpick axles. Strapped to the bulging back
+was a wicker suitcase partly covered by tarpaulin.
+From the seat peered a little furry face.</p>
+
+<p>"A cat?" she exclaimed, as he came up with a
+wire rope, extracted from the tin back.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. She's the captain of the boat. I'm just the
+engineer."</p>
+
+<p>"What is her name?"</p>
+
+<p>Before he answered the young man strode ahead to
+the front of her car, Claire obediently trotting after
+him. He stooped to look at her front axle. He
+raised his head, glanced at her, and he was blushing again.</p>
+
+<p>"Her name is Vere de Vere!" he confessed. Then
+he fled back to his bug. He drove it in front of the
+Gomez-Dep. The hole in the road itself was as deep
+as the one on the edge of the cornfield, where she
+was stuck, but he charged it. She was fascinated by
+his skill. Where she would for a tenth of a second
+have hesitated while choosing the best course, he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>
+hurled the bug straight at the hole, plunged through
+with sheets of glassy black water arching on either
+side, then viciously twisted the car to the right, to
+the left, and straight again, as he followed the tracks
+with the solidest bottoms.</p>
+
+<p>Strapped above the tiny angle-iron step which replaced
+his running-board was an old spade. He dug
+channels in front of the four wheels of her car, so
+that they might go up inclines, instead of pushing
+against the straight walls of mud they had thrown up.
+On these inclines he strewed the brush she had brought,
+halting to ask, with head alertly lifted from his
+stooped huddle in the mud, "Did you have to get this
+brush yourself?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Horrid wet!"</p>
+
+<p>He merely shook his head in commiseration.</p>
+
+<p>He fastened the tow-rope to the rear axle of his
+car, to the front of hers. "Now will you be ready to
+put on all your power as I begin to pull?" he said
+casually, rather respectfully.</p>
+
+<p>When the struggling bug had pulled the wire rope
+taut, she opened the throttle. The rope trembled. Her
+car seemed to draw sullenly back. Then it came out&mdash;out&mdash;really
+out, which is the most joyous sensation
+any motorist shall ever know. In excitement over
+actually moving again, as fast as any healthy young
+snail, she drove on, on, the young man ahead grinning
+back at her. Nor did she stop, nor he, till both cars<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>
+were safe on merely thick mud, a quarter of a mile
+away.</p>
+
+<p>She switched off the power&mdash;and suddenly she was
+in a whirlwind of dizzy sickening tiredness. Even
+in her abandonment to exhaustion she noticed that the
+young man did not stare at her but, keeping his back
+to her, removed the tow-rope, and stowed it away in
+his bug. She wondered whether it was tact or yokelish
+indifference.</p>
+
+<p>Her father spoke for the first time since the Galahad
+of the tin bug had come: "How much do you think
+we ought to give this fellow?"</p>
+
+<p>Now of all the cosmic problems yet unsolved, not
+cancer nor the future of poverty are the flustering
+questions, but these twain: Which is worse, not to
+wear evening clothes at a party at which you find
+every one else dressed, or to come in evening clothes
+to a house where, it proves, they are never worn?
+And: Which is worse, not to tip when a tip has been
+expected; or to tip, when the tip is an insult?</p>
+
+<p>In discomfort of spirit and wetness of ankles Claire
+shuddered, "Oh dear, I don't believe he expects us
+to pay him. He seems like an awfully independent
+person. Maybe we'd offend him if we offered&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"The only reasonable thing to be offended at in this
+vale of tears is not being offered money!"</p>
+
+<p>"Just the same&mdash;&mdash; Oh dear, I'm so tired. But
+good little Claire will climb out and be diplomatic."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>She pinched her forehead, to hold in her cracking
+brain, and wabbled out into new scenes of mud and
+wetness, but she came up to the young man with the
+most rain-washed and careless of smiles. "Won't
+you come back and meet my father? He's terribly
+grateful to you&mdash;as I am. And may we&mdash;&mdash; You've
+worked so hard, and about saved our lives. May I
+pay you for that labor? We're really much indebted&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it wasn't anything. Tickled to death if I
+could help you."</p>
+
+<p>He heartily shook hands with her father, and he
+droned, "Pleased to meet you, Mr. Uh."</p>
+
+<p>"Boltwood."</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Boltwood. My name is Milt&mdash;Milton Daggett.
+See you have a New York license on your car.
+We don't see but mighty few of those through here.
+Glad I could help you."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah yes, Mr. Daggett." Mr. Boltwood was uninterestedly
+fumbling in his money pocket. Behind
+Milt Daggett, Claire shook her head wildly, rattling
+her hands as though she were playing castanets. Mr.
+Boltwood shrugged. He did not understand. His
+relations with young men in cheap raincoats were
+entirely monetary. They did something for you, and
+you paid them&mdash;preferably not too much&mdash;and they
+ceased to be. Whereas Milt Daggett respectfully but
+stolidly continued to be, and Mr. Henry Boltwood's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>
+own daughter was halting the march of affairs by asking
+irrelevant questions:</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't we see you back in&mdash;what was that village
+we came through back about twelve miles?"</p>
+
+<p>"Schoenstrom?" suggested Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I think that was it. Didn't we pass you or
+something? We stopped at a garage there, to change
+a tire."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think so. I was in town, though, this
+morning. Say, uh, did you and your father grab any
+eats&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"A&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I mean, did you get dinner there?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. I wish we had!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well say, I didn't either, and&mdash;I'd be awfully glad
+if you folks would have something to eat with me
+now."</p>
+
+<p>Claire tried to give him a smile, but the best she
+could do was to lend him one. She could not associate
+interesting food with Milt and his mud-slobbered, tin-covered,
+dun-painted Teal bug. He seemed satisfied
+with her dubious grimace. By his suggestion they
+drove ahead to a spot where the cars could be parked
+on firm grass beneath oaks. On the way, Mr. Boltwood
+lifted his voice in dismay. His touch of nervous
+prostration had not made him queer or violent; he
+retained a touching faith in good food.</p>
+
+<p>"We might find some good little hotel and have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>
+some chops and just some mushrooms and peas,"
+insisted the man from Brooklyn Heights.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't suppose the country hotels are really
+so awfully good," she speculated. "And look&mdash;that
+nice funny boy. We couldn't hurt his feelings. He's
+having so much fun out of being a Good Samaritan."</p>
+
+<p>From the mysterious rounded back of his car Milt
+Daggett drew a tiny stove, to be heated by a can of
+solidified alcohol, a frying pan that was rather large
+for dolls but rather small for square-fingered hands,
+a jar of bacon, eggs in a bag, a coffee pot, a can of
+condensed milk, and a litter of unsorted tin plates
+and china cups. While, by his request, Claire scoured
+the plates and cups, he made bacon and eggs and coffee,
+the little stove in the bottom of his car sheltered
+by the cook's bending over it. The smell of food made
+Claire forgiving toward the fact that she was wet
+through; that the rain continued to drizzle down her
+neck.</p>
+
+<p>He lifted his hand and demanded, "Take your
+shoes off!"</p>
+
+<p>"Uh?"</p>
+
+<p>He gulped. He stammered, "I mean&mdash;I mean your
+shoes are soaked through. If you'll sit in the car, I'll
+put your shoes up by the engine. It's pretty well
+heated from racing it in the mud. You can get your
+stockings dry under the cowl."</p>
+
+<p>She was amused by the elaborateness with which he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>
+didn't glance at her while she took off her low shoes
+and slipped her quite too thin black stockings under
+the protecting tin cowl. She reflected, "He has such
+a nice, awkward gentleness. But such bad taste!
+They're really quite good ankles. Apparently ankles
+are not done, in Teal bug circles. His sisters don't
+even have limbs. But do fairies have sisters? He is
+a fairy. When I'm out of the mud he'll turn his raincoat
+into a pair of lordly white wings, and vanish.
+But what will become of the cat?"</p>
+
+<p>Thus her tired brain, like a squirrel in a revolving
+cage, while she sat primly and scraped at a clot of rust
+on a tin plate and watched him put on the bacon and
+eggs. Wondering if cats were used for this purpose
+in the Daggett family, she put soaked, unhappy Vere
+de Vere on her feet, to her own great comfort and the
+cat's delight. It was an open car, and the rain still
+rained, and a strange young man was a foot from her
+tending the not very crackly fire, but rarely had Claire
+felt so domestic.</p>
+
+<p>Milt was apparently struggling to say something.
+After several bobs of his head he ventured, "You're
+so wet! I'd like for you to take my raincoat."</p>
+
+<p>"No! Really! I'm already soaked through. You
+keep dry."</p>
+
+<p>He was unhappy about it. He plucked at a button
+of the coat. She turned him from the subject. "I
+hope Lady Vere de Vere is getting warm, too."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>"Seems to be. She's kind of demanding. She
+wanted a little car of her own, but I didn't think
+she could keep up with me, not on a long
+hike."</p>
+
+<p>"A little car? With her paws on the tiny wheel?
+Oh&mdash;sweet! Are you going far, Mr. Daggett?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, quite a ways. To Seattle, Washington."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, really? Extraordinary. We're going there,
+too."</p>
+
+<p>"Honest? You driving all the way? Oh, no, of
+course your father&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No, he doesn't drive. By the way, I hope he isn't
+too miserable back there."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll be darned. Both of us going to Seattle.
+That's what they call a coincidence, isn't it! Hope
+I'll see you on the road, some time. But I don't suppose
+I will. Once you're out of the mud, your Gomez
+will simply lose my Teal."</p>
+
+<p>"Not necessarily. You're the better driver. And
+I shall take it easy. Are you going to stay long in
+Seattle?" It was not merely a polite dinner-payment
+question. She wondered; she could not place this
+fresh-cheeked, unworldly young man so far from his
+home.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, I kind of hope&mdash;&mdash; Government railroad,
+Alaska. I'm going to try to get in on that, somehow.
+I've never been out of Minnesota in my life, but there's
+couple mountains and oceans and things I thought I'd<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>
+like to see, so I just put my suitcase and Vere de Vere
+in the machine, and started out. I burn distillate
+instead of gas, so it doesn't cost much. If I ever happen
+to have five whole dollars, why, I might go on to
+Japan!"</p>
+
+<p>"That would be jolly."</p>
+
+<p>"Though I s'pose I'd have to eat&mdash;what is it?&mdash;pickled
+fish? There's a woman from near my town
+went to the Orient as a missionary. From what she
+says, I guess all you need in Japan to make a house
+is a bottle of mucilage and a couple of old newspapers
+and some two-by-fours. And you can have the house
+on a purple mountain, with cherry trees down below,
+and&mdash;&mdash;" He put his clenched hand to his lips. His
+head was bowed. "And the ocean! Lord! The
+ocean! And we'll see it at Seattle. Bay, anyway.
+And steamers there&mdash;just come from India! Huh!
+Getting pretty darn poetic here! Eggs are done."</p>
+
+<p>The young man did not again wander into visions.
+He was all briskness as he served her bacon and eggs,
+took a plate of them to Mr. Boltwood in the Gomez,
+gouged into his own. Having herself scoured the tin
+plates, Claire was not repulsed by their naked tinniness;
+and the coffee in the broken-handled china cup
+was tolerable. Milt drank from the top of a vacuum
+bottle. He was silent. Immediately after the lunch
+he stowed the things away. Claire expected a drawn-out,
+tact-demanding farewell, but he climbed into his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>
+bug, said "Good-by, Miss Boltwood. Good luck!"
+and was gone.</p>
+
+<p>The rainy road was bleakly empty without him.</p>
+
+<p>It did not seem possible that Claire's body could be
+nagged into going on any longer. Her muscles were
+relaxed, her nerves frayed. But the moment the
+Gomez started, she discovered that magic change
+which every long-distance motorist knows. Instantly
+she was alert, seemingly able to drive forever. The
+pilot's instinct ruled her; gave her tireless eyes and
+sturdy hands. Surely she had never been weary;
+never would be, so long as it was hers to keep the car
+going.</p>
+
+<p>She had driven perhaps six miles when she reached
+a hamlet called St. Klopstock. On the bedraggled
+mud-and-shanty main street a man was loading
+crushed rock into a truck. By him was a large person
+in a prosperous raincoat, who stepped out, held up his
+hand. Claire stopped.</p>
+
+<p>"You the young lady that got stuck in that hole by
+Adolph Zolzac's?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. And Mr. Zolzac wasn't very nice about it."</p>
+
+<p>"He's going to be just elegant about it, now, and
+there ain't going to be any more hole. I think Adolph
+has been keeping it muddy&mdash;throwing in soft dirt&mdash;and
+he made a good and plenty lot out of pulling out
+tourists. Bill and I are going down right now and
+fill it up with stone. Milt Daggett come through here&mdash;he's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>
+got a nerve, that fellow, but I did have to laugh&mdash;he
+says to me, 'Barney&mdash;&mdash;' This was just now.
+He hasn't more than just drove out of town. He
+said to me, 'Barney,' he says, 'you're the richest
+man in this township, and the banker, and you got
+a big car y'self, and you think you're one whale of
+a political boss,' he says, 'and yet you let that Zolzac
+maintain a private ocean, against the peace and damn
+horrible inconvenience of the Commonwealth of Minnesota&mdash;&mdash;'
+He's got a great line of talk, that fellow.
+He told me how you got stuck&mdash;made me so ashamed&mdash;I
+been to New York myself&mdash;and right away I got
+Bill, and we're going down and hold a donation and
+surprise party on Adolph and fill that hole."</p>
+
+<p>"But won't Adolph dig it out again?"</p>
+
+<p>The banker was puffy, but his eyes were of stone.
+From the truck he took a shotgun. He drawled, "In
+that case, the surprise party will include an elegant
+wake."</p>
+
+<p>"But how did&mdash;&mdash; Who is this extraordinary Milt
+Daggett?"</p>
+
+<p>"Him? Oh, nobody 'specially. He's just a fellow
+down here at Schoenstrom. But we all know him.
+Goes to all the dances, thirty miles around. Thing
+about him is: if he sees something wrong, he picks out
+some poor fellow like me, and says what he thinks."</p>
+
+<p>Claire drove on. She was aware that she was looking
+for Milt's bug. It was not in sight.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>"Father," she exclaimed, "do you realize that this
+lad didn't tell us he was going to have the hole filled?
+Just did it. He frightens me. I'm afraid that when
+we reach Gopher Prairie for the night, we'll find he
+has engaged for us the suite that Prince Collars and
+Cuffs once slept in."</p>
+
+<p>"Hhhhmm," yawned her father.</p>
+
+<p>"Curious young man. He said, 'Pleased to meet
+you.'"</p>
+
+<p>"Huuuuhhm! Fresh air makes me so sleepy."</p>
+
+<p>"And&mdash;&mdash; Fooled you! Got through that mudhole,
+anyway! And he said&mdash;&mdash; Look! Fields stretch out
+so here, and not a tree except the willow-groves round
+those farmhouses. And he said 'Gee' so many times,
+and 'dinner' for the noon meal. And his nails&mdash;&mdash; No,
+I suppose he really is just a farm youngster."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood did not answer. His machine-finish
+smile indicated an enormous lack of interest in young
+men in Teal bugs.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV<br />
+A ROOM WITHOUT</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Gopher Prairie</span> has all of five thousand
+people. Its commercial club asserts that it has
+at least a thousand more population and an infinitely
+better band than the ridiculously envious neighboring
+town of Joralemon. But there were few signs that
+a suite had been engaged for the Boltwoods, or that
+Prince Collars and Cuffs had on his royal tour of
+America spent much time in Gopher Prairie. Claire
+reached it somewhat before seven. She gaped at it in
+a hazy way. Though this was her first prairie town
+for a considerable stay, she could not pump up interest.</p>
+
+<p>The state of mind of the touring motorist entering
+a strange place at night is as peculiar and definite as
+that of a prospector. It is compounded of gratitude
+at having got safely in; of perception of a new town,
+yet with all eagerness about new things dulled by
+weariness; of hope that there is going to be a good
+hotel, but small expectation&mdash;and absolutely no probability&mdash;that
+there really will be one.</p>
+
+<p>Claire had only a blotched impression of peaked
+wooden buildings and squatty brick stores with faded
+awnings; of a red grain elevator and a crouching station
+and a lumberyard; then of the hopelessly muddy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span>
+road leading on again into the country. She felt that
+if she didn't stop at once, she would miss the town
+entirely. The driving-instinct sustained her, made
+her take corners sharply, spot a garage, send the
+Gomez whirling in on the cement floor.</p>
+
+<p>The garage attendant looked at her and yawned.</p>
+
+<p>"Where do you want the car?" Claire asked
+sharply.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, stick it in that stall," grunted the man, and
+turned his back.</p>
+
+<p>Claire glowered at him. She thought of a good
+line about rudeness. But&mdash;oh, she was too tired to
+fuss. She tried to run the car into the empty stall,
+which was not a stall, but a space, like a missing
+tooth, between two cars, and so narrow that she was
+afraid of crumpling the lordly fenders of the Gomez.
+She ran down the floor, returned with a flourish,
+thought she was going to back straight into the stall&mdash;and
+found she wasn't. While her nerves shrieked, and
+it did not seem possible that she could change gears,
+she managed to get the Gomez behind a truck and
+side-on to the stall.</p>
+
+<p>"Go forward again, and cramp your wheel&mdash;sharp!"
+ordered the garage man.</p>
+
+<p>Claire wanted to outline what she thought of him,
+but she merely demanded, "Will you kindly drive
+it in?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, sure. You bet," said the man casually.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>
+His readiness ruined her inspired fury. She was
+somewhat disappointed.</p>
+
+<p>As she climbed out of the car and put a hand on
+the smart bags strapped on a running-board, the accumulated
+weariness struck her in a shock. She could
+have driven on for hours, but the instant the car was
+safe for the night, she went to pieces. Her ears rang,
+her eyes were soaked in fire, her mouth was dry, the
+back of her neck pinched. It was her father who took
+the lead as they rambled to the one tolerable hotel in
+the town.</p>
+
+<p>In the hotel Claire was conscious of the ugliness
+of the poison-green walls and brass cuspidors and
+insurance calendars and bare floor of the office; conscious
+of the interesting scientific fact that all air had
+been replaced by the essence of cigar smoke and cooking
+cabbage; of the stares of the traveling men lounging
+in bored lines; and of the lack of welcome on the
+part of the night clerk, an oldish, bleached man with
+whiskers instead of a collar.</p>
+
+<p>She tried to be important: "Two rooms with bath,
+please."</p>
+
+<p>The bleached man stared at her, and shoved forward
+the register and a pen clotted with ink. She signed.
+He took the bags, led the way to the stairs. Anxiously
+she asked, "Both rooms are with bath?"</p>
+
+<p>From the second step the night clerk looked down
+at her as though she were a specimen that ought to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>
+be pinned on the corks at once, and he said loudly,
+"No, ma'am. Neither of 'em. Got no rooms vacant
+with bawth, or bath either! Not but what we got 'em
+in the house. This is an up-to-date place. But one of
+'m's took, and the other has kind of been out of order,
+the last three-four months."</p>
+
+<p>From the audience of drummers below, a delicate
+giggle.</p>
+
+<p>Claire was too angry to answer. And too tired.
+When, after miles of stairs, leagues of stuffy hall, she
+reached her coop, with its iron bed so loose-jointed
+that it rattled to a breath, its bureau with a list to
+port, and its anemic rocking-chair, she dropped on the
+bed, panting, her eyes closed but still brimming with
+fire. It did not seem that she could ever move again.
+She felt chloroformed. She couldn't even coax herself
+off the bed, to see if her father was any better off
+in the next room.</p>
+
+<p>She was certain that she was not going to drive to
+Seattle. She wasn't going to drive anywhere! She
+was going to freight the car back to Minneapolis, and
+herself go back by train&mdash;Pullman!&mdash;drawing-room!</p>
+
+<p>But for the thought of her father she would have
+fallen asleep, in her drenched tweeds. When she did
+force the energy to rise, she had to support herself
+by the bureau, by the foot of the bed, as she moved
+about the room, hanging up the wet suit, rubbing
+herself with a slippery towel, putting on a dark silk<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>
+frock and pumps. She found her father sitting motionless
+in his room, staring at the wall. She made
+herself laugh at him for his gloomy emptiness. She
+paraded down the hall with him.</p>
+
+<p>As they reached the foot of the stairs, the old
+one, the night clerk leaned across the desk and, in a
+voice that took the whole office into the conversation,
+quizzed, "Come from New York, eh? Well, you're
+quite a ways from home."</p>
+
+<p>Claire nodded. She felt shyer before these solemnly
+staring traveling men than she ever had in a box at
+the opera. At the double door of the dining-room,
+from which the cabbage smell steamed with a lustiness
+undiminished by the sad passing of its youth, a
+man, one of the average-sized, average-mustached,
+average business-suited, average-brown-haired men
+who can never be remembered, stopped the Boltwoods
+and hawed, "Saw you coming into town. You've got
+a New York license?"</p>
+
+<p>She couldn't deny it.</p>
+
+<p>"Quite a ways from home, aren't you?"</p>
+
+<p>She had to admit it.</p>
+
+<p>She was escorted by a bouncing, black-eyed waitress
+to a table for four. The next table was a long one,
+at which seven traveling men, or local business men
+whose wives were at the lake for the summer, ceased
+trying to get nourishment out of the food, and gawped
+at her. Before the Boltwoods were seated, the waitress<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>
+dabbed at non-existent spots on their napkins,
+ignored a genuine crumb on the cloth in front of
+Claire's plate, made motions at a cup and a formerly
+plated fork, and bubbled, "Autoing through?"</p>
+
+<p>Claire fumbled for her chair, oozed into it, and
+breathed, "Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Going far?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Where do you live?"</p>
+
+<p>"New York."</p>
+
+<p>"My! You're quite a ways from home, aren't
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Apparently."</p>
+
+<p>"Hamnegs roasbeef roaspork thapplesauce frypickerel
+springlamintsauce."</p>
+
+<p>"I&mdash;I beg your pardon."</p>
+
+<p>The waitress repeated.</p>
+
+<p>"I&mdash;oh&mdash;oh, bring us ham and eggs. Is that all
+right, father?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh&mdash;no&mdash;well&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You wanted same?" the waitress inquired of Mr.
+Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>He was intimidated. He said, "If you please," and
+feebly pawed at a fork.</p>
+
+<p>The waitress was instantly back with soup, and a
+collection of china gathered by a man of much
+travel, catholic interests, and no taste. One of the
+plates alleged itself to belong to a hotel in Omaha.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>
+She pushed a pitcher of condensed milk to the exact
+spot where it would catch Mr. Boltwood's sleeve,
+brushed the crumb from in front of Claire to a shelter
+beneath the pink and warty sugar bowl, recovered a
+toothpick which had been concealed behind her glowing
+lips, picked for a while, gave it up, put her hands
+on her hips, and addressed Claire:</p>
+
+<p>"How far you going?"</p>
+
+<p>"To Seattle."</p>
+
+<p>"Got any folks there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Any&mdash;&mdash; Oh, yes, I suppose so."</p>
+
+<p>"Going to stay there long?"</p>
+
+<p>"Really&mdash;&mdash; We haven't decided."</p>
+
+<p>"Come from New York, eh? Quite a ways from
+home, all right. Father in business there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"What's his line?"</p>
+
+<p>"I beg pardon?"</p>
+
+<p>"What's his line? Ouch! Jiminy, these shoes
+pinch my feet. I used to could dance all night, but
+I'm getting fat, I guess, ha! ha! Put on seven pounds
+last month. Ouch! Gee, they certainly do pinch my
+toes. What business you say your father's in?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't say, but&mdash;&mdash; Oh, railroad."</p>
+
+<p>"G. N. or N. P.?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think I quite understand&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood interposed, "Are the ham and eggs
+ready?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>"I'll beat it out and see." When she brought them,
+she put a spoon in Claire's saucer of peas, and demanded,
+"Say, you don't wear that silk dress in the
+auto, do you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>"I should think you'd put a pink sash on it. Seems
+like it's kind of plain&mdash;it's a real pretty piece of goods,
+though. A pink sash would be real pretty. You
+dark-complected ladies always looks better for a touch
+of color."</p>
+
+<p>Then was Claire certain that the waitress was baiting
+her, for the amusement of the men at the long
+table. She exploded. Probably the waitress did not
+know there had been an explosion when Claire looked
+coldly up, raised her brows, looked down, and poked
+the cold and salty slab of ham, for she was continuing:</p>
+
+<p>"A light-complected lady like me don't need so much
+color, you notice my hair is black, but I'm light, really,
+Pete Liverquist says I'm a blonde brunette, gee, he
+certainly is killing that fellow, oh, he's a case, he sure
+does like to hear himself talk, my! there's Old Man
+Walters, he runs the telephone exchange here, I heard
+he went down to St. Cloud on Number 2, but I guess
+he couldn't of, he'll be yodeling for friend soup and
+a couple slabs of moo, I better beat it, I'll say so, so
+long."</p>
+
+<p>Claire's comment was as acid as the pale beets<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>
+before her, as bitter as the peas, as hard as the lumps
+in the watery mashed potatoes:</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know whether the woman is insane or
+ignorant. I wish I could tell whether she was trying
+to make me angry for the benefit of those horrid unshaven
+men, or merely for her private edification."</p>
+
+<p>"By me, dolly. So is this pie. Let's get some medium
+to levitate us up to bed. Uh&mdash;uh&mdash;&mdash; I think
+perhaps we'd better not try to drive clear to Seattle.
+If we just went through to Montana?&mdash;or even just
+to Bismarck?"</p>
+
+<p>"Drive through with the hotels like this? My
+dear man, if we have one more such day, we stop
+right there. I hope we get by the man at the desk. I
+have a feeling he's lurking there, trying to think up
+something insulting to say to us. Oh, my dear, I hope
+you aren't as beastly tired as I am. My bones are hot
+pokers."</p>
+
+<p>The man at the desk got in only one cynical question,
+"Driving far?" before Claire seized her father's arm
+and started him upstairs.</p>
+
+<p>For the first time since she had been ten&mdash;and in a
+state of naughtiness immediately following a pronounced
+state of grace induced by the pulpit oratory of
+the new rector of St. Chrysostom's&mdash;she permitted
+herself the luxury of not stopping to brush her teeth
+before she went to bed. Her sleep was drugged&mdash;it
+was not sleep, but an aching exhaustion of the body<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>
+which did not prevent her mind from revisualizing
+the road, going stupidly over the muddy stretches
+and sharp corners, then becoming conscious of that
+bed, the lump under her shoulder blades, the slope to
+westward, and the creak that rose every time she
+tossed. For at least fifteen minutes she lay awake
+for hours.</p>
+
+<p>Thus Claire Boltwood's first voyage into democracy.</p>
+
+<p>It was not so much that the sun was shining, in the
+morning, as that a ripple of fresh breeze came through
+the window. She discovered that she again longed to
+go on&mdash;keep going on&mdash;see new places, conquer new
+roads. She didn't want all good road. She wanted
+something to struggle against. She'd try it for one
+more day. She was stiff as she crawled out of bed,
+but a rub with cold water left her feeling that she
+was stronger than she ever had been; that she was a
+woman, not a dependent girl. Already, in the beating
+prairie sun-glare, the wide main street of Gopher
+Prairie was drying; the mud ruts flattening out. Beyond
+the town hovered the note of a meadow lark&mdash;sunlight
+in sound.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it's a sweet morning! Sweet! We will go
+on! I'm terribly excited!" she laughed.</p>
+
+<p>She found her father dressed. He did not know
+whether or not he wanted to go on. "I seem to have
+lost my grip on things. I used to be rather decisive.
+But we'll try it one more day, if you like," he said.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>When she had gaily marched him downstairs, she
+suddenly and unhappily remembered the people she
+would have to face, the gibing questions she would
+have to answer.</p>
+
+<p>The night clerk was still at the desk, as though he
+had slept standing. He hailed them. "Well, well!
+Up bright and early! Hope you folks slept well.
+Beds aren't so good as they might be, but we're kind
+of planning to get some new mattresses. But you get
+pretty good air to sleep in. Hope you have a fine hike
+today."</p>
+
+<p>His voice was cordial; he was their old friend;
+faithful watcher of their progress. Claire found herself
+dimpling at him.</p>
+
+<p>In the dining-room their inquisitional acquaintance,
+the waitress, fairly ran to them. "Sit down, folks.
+Waffles this morning. You want to stock up for your
+drive. My, ain't it an elegant morning! I hope you
+have a swell drive today!"</p>
+
+<p>"Why!" Claire gasped, "why, they aren't rude.
+They care&mdash;about people they never saw before.
+That's why they ask questions! I never thought&mdash;I
+never thought! There's people in the world who want
+to know us without having looked us up in the Social
+Register! I'm so ashamed! Not that the sunshine
+changes my impression of this coffee. It's frightful!
+But that will improve. And the people&mdash;they were
+being friendly, all the time. Oh, Henry B., young<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>
+Henry Boltwood, you and your godmother Claire have
+a lot to learn about the world!"</p>
+
+<p>As they came into the garage, their surly acquaintance
+of the night before looked just as surly, but
+Claire tried a boisterous "Good morning!"</p>
+
+<p>"Mornin'! Going north? Better take the left-hand
+road at Wakamin. Easier going. Drive your
+car out for you?"</p>
+
+<p>As the car stood outside taking on gas, a man
+flapped up, spelled out the New York license, looked
+at Claire and her father, and inquired, "Quite a ways
+from home, aren't you?"</p>
+
+<p>This time Claire did not say "Yes!" She experimented
+with, "Yes, quite a ways."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, hope you have a good trip. Good luck!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire leaned her head on her hand, thought hard.
+"It's I who wasn't friendly," she propounded to her
+father. "How much I've been losing. Though I still
+refuse to like that coffee!"</p>
+
+<p>She noticed the sign on the air-hose of the garage&mdash;"Free
+Air."</p>
+
+<p>"There's our motto for the pilgrimage!" she cried.</p>
+
+<p>She knew the exaltation of starting out in the fresh
+morning for places she had never seen, without the
+bond of having to return at night.</p>
+
+<p>Thus Claire's second voyage into democracy.</p>
+
+<p>While she was starting the young man who had
+pulled her out of the mud and given her lunch was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>
+folding up the tarpaulin and blankets on which he had
+slept beside his Teal bug, in the woods three miles
+north of Gopher Prairie. To the high-well-born cat,
+Vere de Vere, Milt Daggett mused aloud, "Your ladyship,
+as Shakespeare says, the man that gets cold feet
+never wins the girl. And I'm scared, cat, clean
+scared."</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER V<br />
+RELEASE BRAKES&mdash;SHIFT TO THIRD</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Milt Daggett</span> had not been accurate in his
+implication that he had not noticed Claire at a
+garage in Schoenstrom. For one thing, he owned the
+garage.</p>
+
+<p>Milt was the most prosperous young man in the
+village of Schoenstrom. Neither the village itself nor
+the nearby <i>Strom</i> is really <i>schoen</i>. The entire business
+district of Schoenstrom consists of Heinie Rauskukle's
+general store, which is brick; the Leipzig
+House, which is frame; the Old Home Poolroom and
+Restaurant, which is of old logs concealed by a frame
+sheathing; the farm-machinery agency, which is galvanized
+iron, its roof like an enlarged washboard;
+the church; the three saloons; and the Red Trail Garage,
+which is also, according to various signs, the
+Agency for Teal Car Best at the Test, Stonewall Tire
+Service Station, Sewing Machines and Binders Repaired,
+Dr. Hostrum the Veterinarian every Thursday,
+Gas Today 27c.</p>
+
+<p>The Red Trail Garage is of cement and tapestry
+brick. In the office is a clean hardwood floor, a typewriter,
+and a picture of Elsie Ferguson. The establishment<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>
+has an automatic rim-stretcher, a wheel
+jack, and a reputation for honesty.</p>
+
+<p>The father of Milt Daggett was the Old Doctor,
+born in Maine, coming to this frontier in the day
+when Chippewas camped in your dooryard, and came
+in to help themselves to coffee, which you made of
+roasted corn. The Old Doctor bucked northwest blizzards,
+read Dickens and Byron, pulled people through
+typhoid, and left to Milt his shabby old medicine case
+and thousands of dollars&mdash;in uncollectible accounts.
+Mrs. Daggett had long since folded her crinkly hands
+in quiet death.</p>
+
+<p>Milt had covered the first two years of high school
+by studying with the priest, and been sent to the city
+of St. Cloud for the last two years. His father had
+meant to send him to the state university. But Milt
+had been born to a talent for machinery. At twelve he
+had made a telephone that worked. At eighteen he
+was engineer in the tiny flour mill in Schoenstrom.
+At twenty-five, when Claire Boltwood chose to come
+tearing through his life in a Gomez-Dep, Milt was the
+owner, manager, bookkeeper, wrecking crew, ignition
+expert, thoroughly competent bill-collector, and all but
+one of the working force of the Red Trail Garage.</p>
+
+<p>There were two factions in Schoenstrom: the retired
+farmers who said that German was a good enough language
+for anybody, and that taxes for schools and
+sidewalks were yes something crazy; and the group<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>
+who stated that a pig-pen is a fine place, but only for
+pigs. To this second, revolutionary wing belonged a
+few of the first generation, most of the second, and
+all of the third; and its leader was Milt Daggett. He
+did not talk much, normally, but when he thought
+things ought to be done, he was as annoying as a machine-gun
+test in the lot next to a Quaker meeting.</p>
+
+<p>If there had been a war, Milt would probably have
+been in it&mdash;rather casual, clearing his throat, reckoning
+and guessing that maybe his men might try going
+over and taking that hill ... then taking it.
+But all of this history concerns the year just before
+America spoke to Germany; and in this town buried
+among the cornfields and the wheat, men still thought
+more about the price of grain than about the souls of
+nations.</p>
+
+<p>On the evening before Claire Boltwood left Minneapolis
+and adventured into democracy, Milt was in the
+garage. He wore union overalls that were tan where
+they were not grease-black; a faded blue cotton shirt;
+and the crown of a derby, with the rim not too neatly
+hacked off with a dull toad-stabber jack-knife.</p>
+
+<p>Milt smiled at his assistant, Ben Sittka, and suggested,
+"Well, <i>wie geht 's mit</i> the work, eh? Like to
+stay and get the prof's flivver out, so he can have it
+in the morning?"</p>
+
+<p>"You bet, boss."</p>
+
+<p>"Getting to be quite a mechanic, Ben."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>"I'll say so!"</p>
+
+<p>"If you get stuck, come yank me out of the Old
+Home."</p>
+
+<p>"Aw rats, boss. I'll finish it. You beat it." Ben
+grinned at Milt adoringly.</p>
+
+<p>Milt stripped off his overalls and derby-crown, and
+washed his big, firm hands with gritty soft soap. He
+cleaned his nails with a file which he carried in his
+upper vest pocket in a red imitation morocco case
+which contained a comb, a mirror, an indelible pencil,
+and a note-book with the smudged pencil addresses of
+five girls in St. Cloud, and a memorandum about
+Rauskukle's car.</p>
+
+<p>He put on a twisted brown tie, an old blue serge
+suit, and a hat which, being old and shabby, had become
+graceful. He ambled up the street. He couldn't
+have ambled more than three blocks and have remained
+on the street. Schoenstrom tended to leak off into jungles
+of tall corn.</p>
+
+<p>Two men waved at him, and one demanded, "Say,
+Milt, is whisky good for the toothache? What d' you
+think! The doc said it didn't do any good. But then,
+gosh, he's only just out of college."</p>
+
+<p>"I guess he's right."</p>
+
+<p>"Is that a fact! Well, I'll keep off it then."</p>
+
+<p>Two stores farther on, a bulky farmer hailed, "Say,
+Milt, should I get an ensilage cutter yet?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yuh," in the manner of a man who knows too<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>
+much to be cocksure about anything, "I don't know
+but what I would, Julius."</p>
+
+<p>"I guess I vill then."</p>
+
+<p>Minnie Rauskukle, plump, hearty Minnie, heiress
+to the general store, gave evidence by bridling and
+straightening her pigeon-like body that she was aware
+of Milt behind her. He did not speak to her. He
+ducked into the door of the Old Home Poolroom and
+Restaurant.</p>
+
+<p>Milt ranged up to the short lunch counter, in front
+of the pool table where two brick-necked farm youngsters
+were furiously slamming balls and attacking
+cigarettes. Loose-jointedly Milt climbed a loose-jointed
+high stool and to the proprietor, Bill McGolwey,
+his best friend, he yawned, "You might poison
+me with a hamburger and a slab of apple, Mac."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll just do that little thing. Look kind of grouchy
+tonight, Milt."</p>
+
+<p>"Too much excitement in this burg. Saw three
+people on the streets all simultaneously to-once."</p>
+
+<p>"What's been eatin' you lately?"</p>
+
+<p>"Me? Nothing. Only I do get tired of this metropolis.
+One of these days I'm going to buck some
+bigger place."</p>
+
+<p>"Try Gopher Prairie maybe?" suggested Mac,
+through the hiss and steam of the frying hamburger
+sandwich.</p>
+
+<p>"Rats. Too small."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>"Small? Why, there's darn near five thousand
+people there!"</p>
+
+<p>"I know, but&mdash;I want to tackle some sure-nuff
+city. Like Duluth or New York."</p>
+
+<p>"But what'd you do?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's the devil of it. I don't know just what I
+do want to do. I could always land soft in a garage,
+but that's nothing new. Might hit Detroit, and learn
+the motor-factory end."</p>
+
+<p>"Aw, you're the limit, Milt. Always looking for
+something new."</p>
+
+<p>"That's the way to get on. The rest of this town
+is afraid of new things. 'Member when I suggested
+we all chip in on a dynamo with a gas engine and
+have electric lights? The hicks almost died of nervousness."</p>
+
+<p>"Yuh, that's true, but&mdash;&mdash; You stick here, Milt.
+You and me will just nachly run this burg."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll say! Only&mdash;&mdash; Gosh, Mac, I would like to
+go to a real show, once. And find out how radio
+works. And see 'em put in a big suspension bridge!"</p>
+
+<p>Milt left the Old Home rather aimlessly. He told
+himself that he positively would not go back and help
+Ben Sittka get out the prof's car. So he went back
+and helped Ben get out the prof's car, and drove the
+same to the prof's. The prof, otherwise professor,
+otherwise mister, James Martin Jones, B.A., and Mrs.
+James Martin Jones welcomed him almost as noisily<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>
+as had Mac. They begged him to come in. With Mr.
+Jones he discussed&mdash;no, ye Claires of Brooklyn
+Heights, this garage man and this threadbare young
+superintendent of a paintbare school, talking in a town
+that was only a comma on the line, did not discuss
+corn-growing, nor did they reckon to guess that by
+heck the constabule was carryin' on with the Widdy
+Perkins. They spoke of fish-culture, Elihu Root, the
+spiritualistic evidences of immortality, government
+ownership, self-starters for flivvers, and the stories
+of Irvin Cobb.</p>
+
+<p>Milt went home earlier than he wanted to. Because
+Mr. Jones was the only man in town besides the priest
+who read books, because Mrs. Jones was the only
+woman who laughed about any topics other than children
+and family sickness, because he wanted to go to
+their house every night, Milt treasured his welcome as
+a sacred thing, and kept himself from calling on them
+more than once a week.</p>
+
+<p>He stopped on his way to the garage to pet Emil
+Baumschweiger's large gray cat, publicly known as
+Rags, but to Milt and to the lady herself recognized
+as the unfortunate Countess Vere de Vere&mdash;perhaps
+the only person of noble ancestry and mysterious past
+in Milt's acquaintance. The Baumschweigers did not
+treat their animals well; Emil kicked the bay mare,
+and threw pitchforks at Vere de Vere. Milt saluted
+her and sympathized:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>"You have a punk time, don't you, countess?
+Like to beat it to Minneapolis with me?"</p>
+
+<p>The countess said that she did indeed have an
+extraordinarily punk time, and she sang to Milt the
+hymn of the little gods of the warm hearth. Then
+Milt's evening dissipations were over. Schoenstrom
+has movies only once a week. He sat in the office of
+his garage ruffling through a weekly digest of events.
+Milt read much, though not too easily. He had no
+desire to be a poet, an Indo-Iranian etymologist, a lecturer
+to women's clubs, or the secretary of state. But
+he did rouse to the marvels hinted in books and magazines;
+to large crowds, the mechanism of submarines,
+palm trees, gracious women.</p>
+
+<p>He laid down the magazine. He stared at the wall.
+He thought about nothing. He seemed to be fumbling
+for something about which he could deliciously think
+if he could but grasp it. Without quite visualizing
+either wall or sea, he was yet recalling old dreams of a
+moonlit wall by a warm stirring southern sea. If
+there was a girl in the dream she was intangible as
+the scent of the night. Presently he was asleep, a
+not at all romantic figure, rather ludicrously tipped
+to one side in his office chair, his large solid shoes up
+on the desk.</p>
+
+<p>He half woke, and filtered to what he called home&mdash;one
+room in the cottage of an oldish woman who had
+prejudices against the perilous night air. He was too<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>
+sleepy to go through any toilet save pulling off his
+shoes, and achieving an unconvincing wash at the
+little stand, whose crackly varnish was marked with
+white rings from the toothbrush mug.</p>
+
+<p>"I feel about due to pull off some fool stunt. Wonder
+what it will be?" he complained, as he flopped on
+the bed.</p>
+
+<p>He was up at six, and at a quarter to seven was at
+work in the garage. He spent a large part of the
+morning in trying to prove to a customer that even a
+Teal car, best at the test, would not give perfect service
+if the customer persisted in forgetting to fill the oil-well,
+the grease-cups, and the battery.</p>
+
+<p>At three minutes after twelve Milt left the garage
+to go to dinner. The fog of the morning had turned
+to rain. McGolwey was not at the Old Home. Sometimes
+Mac got tired of serving meals, and for a day or
+two he took to a pocket flask, and among his former
+customers the cans of prepared meat at Rauskukle's
+became popular. Milt found him standing under the
+tin awning of the general store. He had a troubled
+hope of keeping Mac from too long a vacation with
+the pocket flask. But Mac was already red-eyed. He
+seemed only half to recognize Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"Swell day!" said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"Y' bet."</p>
+
+<p>"Road darn muddy."</p>
+
+<p>"I should worry. Yea, bo', I'm feelin' good!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>At eleven minutes past twelve a Gomez-Dep roadster
+appeared down the road, stopped at the garage.
+To Milt it was as exciting as the appearance of a
+comet to a watching astronomer.</p>
+
+<p>"What kind of a car do you call that, Milt?"
+asked a loafer.</p>
+
+<p>"Gomez-Deperdussin."</p>
+
+<p>"Never heard of it. Looks too heavy."</p>
+
+<p>This was sacrilege. Milt stormed, "Why, you poor
+floof, it's one of the best cars in the world. Imported
+from France. That looks like a special-made American
+body, though. Trouble with you fellows is, you're
+always scared of anything that's new. Too&mdash;heavy!
+Huh! Always wanted to see a Gomez&mdash;never have,
+except in pictures. And I believe that's a New York
+license. Let me at it!"</p>
+
+<p>He forgot noon-hunger, and clumped through the
+rain to the garage. He saw a girl step from the car.
+He stopped, in the doorway of the Old Home, in uneasy
+shyness. He told himself he didn't "know just
+what it is about her&mdash;she isn't so darn unusually
+pretty and yet&mdash;gee&mdash;&mdash; Certainly isn't a girl to get
+fresh with. Let Ben take care of her. Like to talk
+to her, and yet I'd be afraid if I opened my mouth,
+I'd put my foot in it."</p>
+
+<p>He was for the first time seeing a smart woman.
+This dark, slender, fine-nerved girl, in her plain, rough,
+closely-belted, gray suit, her small black Glengarry<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>
+cocked on one side of her smooth hair, her little kid
+gloves, her veil, was as delicately adjusted as an aeroplane
+engine.</p>
+
+<p>Milt wanted to trumpet her exquisiteness to the
+world, so he growled to a man standing beside him,
+"Swell car. Nice-lookin' girl, kind of."</p>
+
+<p>"Kind of skinny, though. I like 'em with some
+meat on 'em," yawned the man.</p>
+
+<p>No, Milt did not strike him to earth. He insisted
+feebly, "Nice clothes she's got, though."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, not so muchamuch. I seen a woman come
+through here yesterday that was swell, though&mdash;had
+on a purple dress and white shoes and a hat big 's a
+bushel."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I don't know, I kind of like those simple
+things," apologized Milt.</p>
+
+<p>He crept toward the garage. The girl was inside.
+He inspected the slope-topped, patent-leather motoring
+trunk on the rack at the rear of the Gomez-Dep.
+He noticed a middle-aged man waiting in the car.
+"Must be her father. Probably&mdash;maybe she isn't
+married then." He could not get himself to shout at
+the man, as he usually did. He entered the garage
+office; from the inner door he peeped at the girl, who
+was talking to his assistant about changing an inner
+tube.</p>
+
+<p>That Ben Sittka whom an hour ago he had cajoled
+as a promising child he now admired for the sniffing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>
+calmness with which he was demanding, "Want a red
+or gray tube?"</p>
+
+<p>"Really, I don't know. Which is the better?" The
+girl's voice was curiously clear.</p>
+
+<p>Milt passed Claire Boltwood as though he did not
+see her; stood at the rear of the garage kicking at the
+tires of a car, his back to her. Over and over he was
+grumbling, "If I just knew one girl like that&mdash;&mdash; Like
+a picture. Like&mdash;like a silver vase on a blue
+cloth!"</p>
+
+<p>Ben Sittka did not talk to the girl while he inserted
+the tube in the spare casing. Only, in the triumphant
+moment when the parted ends of the steel rim snapped
+back together, he piped, "Going far?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, rather. To Seattle."</p>
+
+<p>Milt stared at the cobweb-grayed window. "Now
+I know what I was planning to do. I'm going to
+Seattle," he said.</p>
+
+<p>The girl was gone at twenty-nine minutes after
+twelve. At twenty-nine and a half minutes after,
+Milt remarked to Ben Sittka, "I'm going to take a
+trip. Uh? Now don't ask questions. You take
+charge of the garage until you hear from me. Get
+somebody to help you. G'-by."</p>
+
+<p>He drove his Teal bug out of the garage. At
+thirty-two minutes after twelve he was in his room,
+packing his wicker suitcase by the method of throwing
+things in and stamping on the case till it closed. In<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>
+it he had absolutely all of his toilet refinements and
+wardrobe except the important portion already in use.
+They consisted, according to faithful detailed report,
+of four extra pairs of thick yellow and white cotton
+socks; two shirts, five collars, five handkerchiefs; a
+pair of surprisingly vain dancing pumps; high tan
+laced boots; three suits of cheap cotton underclothes;
+his Sunday suit, which was dead black in color, and
+unimaginative in cut; four ties; a fagged toothbrush,
+a comb and hairbrush, a razor, a strop, shaving soap
+in a mug; a not very clean towel; and nothing else
+whatever.</p>
+
+<p>To this he added his entire library and private picture
+gallery, consisting of Ivanhoe, Ben-Hur, his
+father's copy of Byron, a wireless manual, and the
+1916 edition of Motor Construction and Repairing:
+the art collection, one colored Sunday supplement picture
+of a princess lunching in a Proven&ccedil;e courtyard,
+and a half-tone of Colonel Paul Beck landing in an
+early military biplane. Under this last, in a pencil
+scrawl now blurred to grayness, Milt had once written,
+"This what Ill be aviator."</p>
+
+<p>What he was to wear was a piercing trouble. Till
+eleven minutes past twelve that day he had not cared.
+People accepted his overalls at anything except a
+dance, and at the dances he was the only one who
+wore pumps. But in his discovery of Claire Boltwood
+he had perceived that dressing is an art. Before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>
+he had packed, he had unhappily pawed at the prized
+black suit. It had become stupid. "Undertaker!"
+he growled.</p>
+
+<p>With a shrug which indicated that he had nothing
+else, he had exchanged his overalls for a tan flannel
+shirt, black bow tie, thick pigskin shoes, and the suit
+he had worn the evening before, his best suit of two
+years ago&mdash;baggy blue serge coat and trousers. He
+could not know it, but they were surprisingly graceful
+on his wiry, firm, white body.</p>
+
+<p>In his pockets were a roll of bills and an unexpectedly
+good gold watch. For warmth he had a
+winter ulster, an old-fashioned turtle-neck sweater,
+and a raincoat heavy as tarpaulin. He plunged into
+the raincoat, ran out, galloped to Rauskukle's store,
+bought the most vehement cap in the place&mdash;a plaid
+of cerise, orange, emerald green, ultramarine, and five
+other guaranteed fashionable colors. He stocked up
+with food for roadside camping.</p>
+
+<p>In the humping tin-covered tail of the bug was a
+good deal of room, and this he filled with motor
+extras, a shotgun and shells, a pair of skates, and all
+his camping kit as used on his annual duck-hunting
+trip to Man Trap Lake.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a darned fool to take everything I own
+but&mdash;&mdash; Might be gone a whole month," he reflected.</p>
+
+<p>He had only one possession left&mdash;a check book, concealed
+from the interested eye of his too maternal<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>
+landlady by sticking it under the stair carpet. This
+he retrieved. It showed a balance of two hundred
+dollars. There was ten dollars in the cash register in
+the office, for Ben Sittka. The garage would, with the
+mortgage deducted, be worth nearly two thousand.
+This was his fortune.</p>
+
+<p>He bolted into the kitchen and all in one shout he
+informed his landlady, "Called out of town, li'l trip,
+b'lieve I don't owe you an'thing, here's six dollars, two
+weeks' notice, dunno just when I be back."</p>
+
+<p>Before she could issue a questionnaire he was out
+in the bug. He ran through town. At his friend
+McGolwey; now loose-lipped and wabbly, sitting in
+the rain on a pile of ties behind the railroad station,
+he yelled, "So long, Mac. Take care yourself, old
+hoss. Off on li'l trip."</p>
+
+<p>He stopped in front of the "prof's," tooted till the
+heads of the Joneses appeared at the window, waved
+and shouted, "G'-by, folks. Goin' outa town."</p>
+
+<p>Then, while freedom and the distant Pacific seemed
+to rush at him over the hood, he whirled out of town.
+It was two minutes to one&mdash;forty-seven minutes since
+Claire Boltwood had entered Schoenstrom.</p>
+
+<p>He stopped only once. His friend Lady Vere de
+Vere was at the edge of town, on a scientific exploring
+trip in the matter of ethnology and field mice. She
+hailed him, "Mrwr? Me mrwr!"</p>
+
+<p>"You don't say so!" Milt answered in surprise.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>
+"Well, if I promised to take you, I'll keep my word."
+He vaulted out, tucked Vere de Vere into the seat,
+protecting her from the rain with the tarpaulin winter
+radiator-cover.</p>
+
+<p>His rut-skipping car overtook the mud-walloping
+Gomez-Dep in an hour, and pulled it out of the mud.</p>
+
+<p>Before Milt slept that night, in his camp three miles
+from Gopher Prairie, he went through religious rites.</p>
+
+<p>"Girl like her, she's darn particular about her looks.
+I'm a sloppy hound. Used to be snappier about my
+clothes when I was in high school. Getting lazy&mdash;too
+much like Mac. Think of me sleeping in my
+clothes last night!"</p>
+
+<p>"Mrwr!" rebuked the cat.</p>
+
+<p>"You're dead right. Fierce is the word. Nev'
+will sleep in my duds again, puss. That is, when I
+have a reg'lar human bed. Course camping, different.
+But still&mdash;&mdash; Let's see all the funny things we can
+do to us."</p>
+
+<p>He shaved&mdash;two complete shaves, from lather to
+towel. He brushed his hair. He sat down by a campfire
+sheltered between two rocks, and fought his nails,
+though they were discouragingly crammed with motor
+grease. Throughout this interesting but quite painful
+ceremony Milt kept up a conversation between himself
+as the World's Champion Dude, and his cat
+as Vallay. But when there was nothing more to do,
+and the fire was low, and Vere de Vere asleep in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>
+sleeve of the winter ulster, his bumbling voice slackened;
+in something like agony he muttered:</p>
+
+<p>"But oh, what's the use? I can't ever be anything
+but a dub! Cleaning my nails, to make a hit with
+a girl that's got hands like hers! It's a long trail to
+Seattle, but it's a darn sight longer one to being&mdash;being&mdash;well,
+sophisticated. Oh! And incidentally,
+what the deuce am I going to do in Seattle if I do get
+there?"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI<br />
+THE LAND OF BILLOWING CLOUDS</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Never</span> a tawny-beached ocean has the sweetness
+of the prairie slew. Rippling and blue, with
+long grass up to its edge, a spot of dancing light set
+in the miles of rustling wheat, it retains even in July,
+on an afternoon of glare and brazen locusts, the freshness
+of a spring morning. A thousand slews, a hundred
+lakes bordered with rippling barley or tinkling
+bells of the flax, Claire passed. She had left the
+occasional groves of oak and poplar and silver birch,
+and come out on the treeless Great Plains.</p>
+
+<p>She had learned to call the slews "pugholes," and
+to watch for ducks at twilight. She had learned that
+about the pugholes flutter choirs of crimson-winged
+blackbirds; that the ugly brown birds squatting on
+fence-rails were the divine-voiced meadow larks; that
+among the humble cowbird citizens of the pastures
+sometimes flaunted a scarlet tanager or an oriole; and
+that no rose garden has the quaint and hardy beauty of
+the Indian paint brushes and rag babies and orange
+milkweed in the prickly, burnt-over grass between
+roadside and railway line.</p>
+
+<p>She had learned that what had seemed rudeness in
+garage men and hotel clerks was often a resentful reflection<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>
+of her own Eastern attitude that she was necessarily
+superior to a race she had been trained to call
+"common people." If she spoke up frankly, they
+made her one of their own, and gave her companionable
+aid.</p>
+
+<p>For two days of sunshine and drying mud she followed
+a road flung straight across flat wheatlands, then
+curving among low hills. Often there were no fences;
+she was so intimately in among the grain that the
+fenders of the car brushed wheat stalks, and she became
+no stranger, but a part of all this vast-horizoned
+land. She forgot that she was driving, as she let the
+car creep on, while she was transported by Armadas
+of clouds, prairie clouds, wisps of vapor like a ribbed
+beach, or mounts of cumulus swelling to gold-washed
+snowy peaks.</p>
+
+<p>The friendliness of the bearing earth gave her a
+calm that took no heed of passing hours. Even her
+father, the abstracted man of affairs, nodded to dusty
+people along the road; to a jolly old man whose bulk
+rolled and shook in a tiny, rhythmically creaking
+buggy, to women in the small abrupt towns with their
+huge red elevators and their long, flat-roofed stores.</p>
+
+<p>Claire had discovered America, and she felt stronger,
+and all her days were colored with the sun.</p>
+
+<p>She had discovered, too, that she could adventure.
+No longer was she haunted by the apprehension that
+had whispered to her as she had left Minneapolis.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>
+She knew a thrill when she hailed&mdash;as though it were
+a passing ship&mdash;an Illinois car across whose dust-caked
+back was a banner "Chicago to the Yellowstone."
+She experienced a new sensation of common
+humanness when, on a railway paralleling the wagon
+road for miles, the engineer of a freight waved his
+hand to her, and tooted the whistle in greeting.</p>
+
+<p>Her father was easily tired, but he drowsed through
+the early afternoons when a none-too-digestible small-town
+lunch was as lead within him. Despite the beauty
+of the land and the joy of pushing on, they both had
+things to endure.</p>
+
+<p>After lunch, it was sometimes an agony to Claire
+to keep awake. Her eyes felt greasy from the food,
+or smarted with the sun-glare. In the still air, after
+the morning breeze had been burnt out, the heat from
+the engine was a torment about her feet; and if there
+was another car ahead, the trail of dust sifted into
+her throat. Unless there was traffic to keep her awake,
+she nodded at the wheel; she was merely a part of a
+machine that ran on without seeming to make any
+impression on the prairie's endlessness.</p>
+
+<p>Over and over there were the same manipulations:
+slow for down hill, careful of sand at the bottom, letting
+her out on a smooth stretch, waving to a lonely
+farmwife in her small, baked dooryard, slow to pass a
+hay-wagon, gas for up the next hill, and repeat the
+round all over again. But she was joyous till noon;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>
+and with mid-afternoon a new strength came which,
+as rose crept above the golden haze of dust, deepened
+into serene meditation.</p>
+
+<p>And she was finding the one secret of long-distance
+driving&mdash;namely, driving; keeping on, thinking by
+fifty-mile units, not by the ten-mile stretches of Long
+Island runs; and not fretting over anything whatever.
+She seemed charmed; if she had a puncture&mdash;why,
+she put on the spare. If she ran out of gas&mdash;why, any
+passing driver would lend her a gallon. Nothing, it
+seemed, could halt her level flight across the giant
+land.</p>
+
+<p>She rarely lost her way. She was guided by the
+friendly trail signs&mdash;those big red R's and L's on fence
+post and telephone pole, magically telling the way from
+the Mississippi to the Pacific.</p>
+
+<p>Her father's occasional musing talk kept her from
+loneliness. He was a good touring companion.
+Motoring is not the best occasion for epigrams, satire,
+and the Good One You Got Off at the Lambs' Club
+last night. Such verbiage on motor trips invariably
+results in the mysterious finding of the corpse of a
+strange man, well dressed, hidden beside the road.
+Claire and her father mumbled, "Good farmhouse&mdash;brick,"
+or "Nice view," and smiled, and were for
+miles as silent as the companionable sky.</p>
+
+<p>She thought of the people she knew, especially of
+Jeff Saxton. But she could not clearly remember his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>
+lean earnest face. Between her and Jeff were sweeping
+sunny leagues. But she was not lonely. Certainly
+she was not lonely for a young man with a raincoat, a
+cat, and an interest in Japan.</p>
+
+<p>No singer after a first concert has felt more triumphant
+than Claire when she crossed her first state-line;
+rumbled over the bridge across the Red River into
+North Dakota. To see Dakota car licenses everywhere,
+instead of Minnesota, was like the sensation of
+street signs in a new language. And when she found
+a good hotel in Fargo and had a real bath, she felt that
+by her own efforts she had earned the right to enjoy it.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood caught her enthusiasm. Dinner was
+a festival, and in iced tea the peaceful conquistadores
+drank the toast of the new Spanish Main; and afterward,
+arm in arm, went chattering to the movies.</p>
+
+<p>In front of the Royal Palace, Pictures, 4 Great Acts
+Vaudeville 4, was browsing a small, beetle-like, tin-covered
+car.</p>
+
+<p>"Dad! Look! I'm sure&mdash;yes, of course, there's
+his suitcase&mdash;that's the car of that nice boy&mdash;don't
+you remember?&mdash;the one that pulled us out of the mud
+at&mdash;I don't remember the name of the place. Apparently
+he's keeping going. I remember; he's headed for
+Seattle, too. We'll look for him in the theater. Oh,
+the darling, there's his cat! What was the funny name
+he gave her&mdash;the Marchioness Montmorency or something?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>Lady Vere de Vere, afraid of Fargo and movie
+crowds, but trusting in her itinerant castle, the bug,
+was curled in Milt Daggett's ulster, in the bottom of
+the car. She twinkled her whiskers at Claire, and
+purred to a stroking hand.</p>
+
+<p>With the excitement of one trying to find the address
+of a friend in a strange land Claire looked over
+the audience when the lights came on before the vaudeville.
+In the second row she saw Milt's stiffish, rope-colored
+hair&mdash;surprisingly smooth above an astoundingly
+clean new tan shirt of mercerized silk.</p>
+
+<p>He laughed furiously at the dialogue between Pete-Rosenheim
+&amp; Larose-Bettina, though it contained the
+cheese joke, the mother-in-law joke, and the joke about
+the wife rifling her husband's pockets.</p>
+
+<p>"Our young friend seems to have enviable youthful
+spirits," commented Mr. Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, no superiority! He's probably never seen
+a real vaudeville show. Wouldn't it be fun to take
+him to the Winter Garden or the Follies for the first
+time!... Instead of being taken by Jeff Saxton,
+and having the humor, oh! so articulately explained!"</p>
+
+<p>The pictures were resumed; the film which, under
+ten or twelve different titles, Claire had already seen,
+even though Brooklyn Heights does not devote Saturday
+evening to the movies. The badman, the sheriff&mdash;an
+aged party with whiskers and boots&mdash;the holdup,
+the sad eyes of the sheriff's daughter&mdash;also an aged<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>
+party, but with a sunbonnet and the most expensive
+rouge&mdash;the crook's reformation, and his violent adherence
+to law and order; this libel upon the portions
+of these United States lying west of longitude 101&deg;
+Claire had seen too often. She dragged her father
+back to the hotel, sent him to bed, and entered her
+room&mdash;to find a telegram upon the bureau.</p>
+
+<p>She had sent her friends a list of the places at which
+she would be likely to stop. The message was from
+Jeff Saxton, in Brooklyn. It brought to her mind the
+steady shine of his glasses&mdash;the most expensive glasses,
+with the very best curved lenses&mdash;as it demanded:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Received letter about trip surprised anxious will
+tire you out fatigue prairie roads bad for your father
+mountain roads dangerous strongly advise go only
+part way then take train.</p>
+
+<p class="rgt"><span class="smcap">Geoffrey.</span>"</p></div>
+
+<p>She held the telegram, flipping her fingers against
+one end of it as she debated. She remembered how
+the wide world had flowed toward her over the hood
+of the Gomez all day. She wrote in answer:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Awful perils of road, two punctures, split infinitive,
+eggs at lunch questionable, but struggle on."</p></div>
+
+<p>Before she sent it she held council with her father.
+She sat on the foot of his bed and tried to sound dutiful.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>
+"I don't want to do anything that's bad for
+you, daddy. But isn't it taking your mind away from
+business?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ye-es, I think it is. Anyway, we'll try it a few
+days more."</p>
+
+<p>"I fancy we can stand up under the strain and
+perils. I think we can persuade some of these big
+farmers to come to the rescue if we encounter any
+walruses or crocodiles among the wheat. And I have
+a feeling that if we ever get stuck, our friend of the
+Teal bug will help us."</p>
+
+<p>"Probably never see him again. He'll skip on ahead
+of us."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course. We haven't laid an eye on him, along
+the road. He must have gotten into Fargo long before
+we did. Now tomorrow I think&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII<br />
+THE GREAT AMERICAN FRYING PAN</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">It</span> was Claire's first bad day since the hole in the
+mud. She had started gallantly, scooting along
+the level road that flies straight west of Fargo. But
+at noon she encountered a restaurant which made eating
+seem an evil.</p>
+
+<p>That they might have fair fame among motorists
+the commercial club of Reaper had set at the edge
+of town a sign "Welcome to Reaper, a Live Town&mdash;Speed
+Limit 8 Miles perhr." Being interpreted, that
+sign meant that if you went much over twenty miles an
+hour on the main street, people might glance at you;
+and that the real welcome, the only impression of
+Reaper that tourists were likely to carry away, was the
+welcome in the one restaurant. It was called the Eats
+Garden. As Claire and her father entered, they were
+stifled by a belch of smoke from the frying pan in the
+kitchen. The room was blocked by a huge lunch
+counter; there was only one table, covered with oil
+cloth decorated with venerable spots of dried egg yolk.</p>
+
+<p>The waiter-cook, whose apron was gravy-patterned,
+with a border and stomacher of plain gray dirt, grumbled,
+"Whadyuhwant?"</p>
+
+<p>Claire sufficiently recovered to pick out the type<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>
+from the fly specks on the menu, and she ordered a
+small steak and coffee for her father; for herself tea,
+boiled eggs, toast.</p>
+
+<p>"Toast? We ain't got any toast!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, can't you make it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I suppose I could&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>When they came, the slices of toast were an inch
+thick, burnt on one side and raw on the other. The
+tea was bitter and the eggs watery. Her father reported
+that his steak was high-test rawhide, and his
+coffee&mdash;well, he wasn't sure just what substitute had
+been used for chicory, but he thought it was lukewarm
+quinine.</p>
+
+<p>Claire raged: "You know, this town really has
+aspirations. They're beginning to build such nice
+little bungalows, and there's a fine clean bank&mdash;&mdash; Then
+they permit this scoundrel to advertise the town
+among strangers, influential strangers, in motors, by
+serving food like this! I suppose they think that they
+arrest criminals here, yet this restaurant man is a thief,
+to charge real money for food like this&mdash;&mdash; Yes, and
+he's a murderer!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, come now, dolly!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes he is, literally. He must in his glorious career
+have given chronic indigestion to thousands of people&mdash;shortened
+their lives by years. That's wholesale
+murder. If I were the authorities here, I'd be indulgent
+to the people who only murder one or two<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>
+people, but imprison this cook for life. Really! I
+mean it!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, he probably does the best he&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"He does not! These eggs and this bread were
+perfectly good, before he did black magic over them.
+And did you see the contemptuous look he gave me
+when I was so eccentric as to order toast? Oh, Reaper,
+Reaper, you desire a modern town, yet I wonder if you
+know how many thousands of tourists go from coast
+to coast, cursing you? If I could only hang that
+restaurant man&mdash;and the others like him&mdash;in a rope
+of his own hempen griddle cakes! The Great American
+Frying Pan! I don't expect men building a new
+town to have time to read Hugh Walpole and James
+Branch Cabell, but I do expect them to afford a cook
+who can fry eggs!"</p>
+
+<p>As she paid the check, Claire tried to think of some
+protest which would have any effect on the obese wits
+of the restaurant man. In face of his pink puffiness
+she gave it up. Her failure as a Citizeness Fixit sent
+her out of the place in a fury, carried her on in a dusty
+whirl till the engine spat, sounded tired and reflective,
+and said it guessed it wouldn't go any farther that
+day.</p>
+
+<p>Now that she had something to do, Claire became
+patient. "Run out of gas. Isn't it lucky I got that
+can for an extra gallon?"</p>
+
+<p>But there was plenty of gas. There was no discernible<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>
+reason why the car should not go. She started
+the engine. It ran for half a minute and quit. All
+the plugs showed sparks. No wires were detached in
+the distributor. There was plenty of water, and the
+oil was not clogged. And that ended Claire's knowledge
+of the inside of a motor.</p>
+
+<p>She stopped two motorists. The first was sure that
+there was dirt on the point of the needle valve, in the
+carburetor. While Claire shuddered lest he never get
+it back, he took out the needle valve, wiped it, put it
+back&mdash;and the engine was again started, and again,
+with great promptness, it stopped.</p>
+
+<p>The second Good Samaritan knew that one of the
+wires in the distributor must be detached and, though
+she assured him that she had inspected them, he looked
+pityingly at her smart sports-suit, said, "Well, I'll
+just take a look," and removed the distributor cover.
+He also scratched his head, felt of the fuses under the
+cowl, scratched his cheek, poked a finger at the carburetor,
+rubbed his ear, said, "Well, uh&mdash;&mdash;" looked to
+see if there was water and gas, sighed, "Can't just
+seem to find out what's the trouble," shot at his own
+car, and escaped.</p>
+
+<p>Claire had been highly grateful and laudatory to
+both of them&mdash;but she remained here, ten miles from
+nowhere. It was a beautiful place. Down a hill the
+wheat swam toward a village whose elevator was a
+glistening tower. Mud-hens gabbled in a slew, alfalfa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>
+shone with unearthly green, and bees went junketing
+toward a field of red clover. But she had the motorist's
+fever to go on. The road behind and in front
+was very long, very white&mdash;and very empty.</p>
+
+<p>Her father, out of much thought and a solid ignorance
+about all of motoring beyond the hiring of
+chauffeurs and the payment of bills, suggested, "Uh,
+dolly, have you looked to see if these, uh&mdash;&mdash; Is the
+carburetor all right?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, dear; I've looked at it three times, so far,"
+she said, just a little too smoothly.</p>
+
+<p>On the hill five miles to eastward, a line of dust, then
+a small car. As it approached, the driver must have
+sighted her and increased speed. He came up at
+thirty-five miles an hour.</p>
+
+<p>"Now we'll get something done! Look! It's a
+bug&mdash;a flivver or a Teal or something. I believe it's
+the young man that got us out of the mud."</p>
+
+<p>Milt Daggett stopped, casually greeted them: "Why,
+hello, Miss Boltwood. Thought you'd be way ahead
+of me some place!"</p>
+
+<p>"Mrwr," said Vere de Vere. What this meant the
+historian does not know.</p>
+
+<p>"No; I've been taking it easy. Mr., Uh&mdash;I can't
+quite remember your name&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Milt Daggett."</p>
+
+<p>"There's something mysterious the matter with my
+car. The engine will start, after it's left alone a while,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>
+but then it stalls. Do you suppose you could tell what
+it is?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. I'll see if I can find out."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you probably will. The other two men knew
+everything. One of them was the inventor of wheels,
+and the other discovered skidding. So of course they
+couldn't help me."</p>
+
+<p>Milt added nothing to her frivolity, but his smile
+was friendly. He lifted the round rubber cap of the
+distributor. Then Claire's faith tumbled in the dust.
+Twice had the wires been tested. Milt tested them
+again. She was too tired of botching to tell him he
+was wasting time.</p>
+
+<p>"Got an oil can?" he hesitated.</p>
+
+<p>Through a tiny hole in the plate of the distributor he
+dripped two drops of oil&mdash;only two drops. "I guess
+maybe that's what it needed. You might try her now,
+and see how she runs," he said mildly.</p>
+
+<p>Dubiously Claire started the engine. It sang jubilantly,
+and it did not stop. Again was the road open
+to her. Again was the settlement over there, to which
+it would have taken her an hour to walk, only six minutes
+away.</p>
+
+<p>She stopped the engine, beamed at him&mdash;there in the
+dust, on the quiet hilltop. He said as apologetically
+as though he had been at fault, "Distributor got
+dry. Might give it a little oil about once in six
+months."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>"We are so grateful to you! Twice now you've
+saved our lives."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I guess you'd have gone on living! And if
+drivers can't help each other, who can?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's a good start toward world-fellowship, I
+suppose. I wish we could do&mdash;&mdash; Return your lunch
+or&mdash;&mdash; Mr. Daggett! Do you read books? I
+mean&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes I do, when I run across them."</p>
+
+<p>"Mayn't I gi&mdash;lend you these two that I happen
+to have along? I've finished them, and so has father,
+I think."</p>
+
+<p>From the folds of the strapped-down top she pulled
+out Compton Mackenzie's <i>Youth's Encounter</i>, and
+Vachel Lindsay's <i>Congo</i>. With a curious faint excitement
+she watched him turn the leaves. His blunt
+fingers flapped through them as though he was used
+to books. As he looked at <i>Congo</i>, he exclaimed,
+"Poetry! That's fine! Like it, but I don't hardly
+ever run across it. I&mdash;&mdash; Say&mdash;&mdash; I'm terribly
+obliged!"</p>
+
+<p>His clear face lifted, sun-brown and young and
+adoring. She had not often seen men look at her
+thus. Certainly Jeff Saxton's painless worship did
+not turn him into the likeness of a knight among banners.
+Yet the good Geoffrey loved her, while to Milt
+Daggett she could be nothing more than a strange
+young woman in a car with a New York license. If<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>
+her tiny gift could so please him, how poor he must
+be. "He probably lives on some barren farm," she
+thought, "or he's a penniless mechanic hoping for a
+good job in Seattle. How white his forehead is!"</p>
+
+<p>But aloud she was saying, "I hope you're enjoying
+your trip."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes. I like it fine. You having a good time?
+Well&mdash;&mdash; Well, thanks for the books."</p>
+
+<p>She was off before him. Presently she exclaimed
+to Mr. Boltwood: "You know&mdash;just occurs to me&mdash;it's
+rather curious that our young friend should be so
+coincidental as to come along just when we needed
+him."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, he just happened to, I suppose," hemmed her
+father.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not so sure," she meditated, while she absently
+watched another member of the Poultry Suicide
+Club rush out of a safe ditch, prepare to take leave
+for immortality, change her fowlish mind, flutter up
+over the hood of the car, and come down squawking
+her indignities to the barnyard. "I'm not so sure
+about his happening&mdash;&mdash; No. I wonder if he could
+possibly&mdash;&mdash; Oh no. I hope not. Flattering, but&mdash;&mdash; You
+don't suppose he could be deliberately following
+us?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nonsense! He's a perfectly decent young chap."</p>
+
+<p>"I know. Of course. He probably works hard in
+a garage, and is terribly nice to his mother and sisters<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>
+at home. I mean&mdash;&mdash; I wouldn't want the dear lamb
+to be a devoted knight, though. Too thankless a job."</p>
+
+<p>She slowed the car down to fifteen an hour. For
+the first time she began to watch the road behind her.
+In a few minutes a moving spot showed in the dust
+three miles back. Oh, naturally; he would still be
+behind her. Only&mdash;&mdash; If she stopped, just to look at
+the scenery, he would go on ahead of her. She
+stopped for a moment&mdash;for a time too brief to indicate
+that anything had gone wrong with her car. Staring
+back she saw that the bug stopped also, and she fancied
+that Milt was out standing beside it, peering with his
+palm over his eyes&mdash;a spy, unnatural and disturbing
+in the wide peace.</p>
+
+<p>She drove on a mile and halted again; again halted
+her attendant. He was keeping a consistent two to
+four miles behind, she estimated.</p>
+
+<p>"This won't do at all," she worried. "Flattering,
+but somehow&mdash;&mdash; Whatever sort of a cocoon-wrapped
+hussy I am, I don't collect scalps. I won't
+have young men serving me&mdash;graft on them&mdash;get
+amusement out of their struggles. Besides&mdash;suppose
+he became just a little more friendly, each time he
+came up, all the way from here to Seattle?... Fresh.... No,
+it won't do."</p>
+
+<p>She ran the car to the side of the road.</p>
+
+<p>"More trouble?" groaned her father.</p>
+
+<p>"No. Just want to see scenery."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>"But&mdash;&mdash; There's a good deal of scenery on all
+sides, without stopping, seems to me!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but&mdash;&mdash;" She looked back. Milt had come
+into sight; had paused to take observations. Her
+father caught it:</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I see. Pardon me. Our squire still following?
+Let him go on ahead? Wise lass."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I think perhaps it's better to avoid complications."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course." Mr. Boltwood's manner did not
+merely avoid Milt; it abolished him.</p>
+
+<p>She saw Milt, after five minutes of stationary watching,
+start forward. He came dustily rattling up with
+a hail of "Distributor on strike again?" so cheerful
+that it hurt her to dismiss him. But she had managed
+a household. She was able to say suavely:</p>
+
+<p>"No, everything is fine. I'm sure it will be, now.
+I'm afraid we are holding you back. You mustn't
+worry about us."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that's all right," breezily. "Something might
+go wrong. Say, is this poetry book&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I'm sure nothing will go wrong now. You
+mustn't feel responsible for us. But, uh, you understand
+we're very grateful for what you have done
+and, uh, perhaps we shall see each other in Seattle?"
+She made it brightly interrogatory.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I see." His hands gripped the wheel. His
+cheeks had been too ruddily tinted by the Dakota sun<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>
+to show a blush, but his teeth caught his lower lip.
+He had no starter on his bug; he had in his embarrassment
+to get out and crank. He did it quietly, not
+looking at her. She could see that his hand trembled
+on the crank. When he did glance at her, as he drove
+off, it was apologetically, miserably. His foot was
+shaking on the clutch pedal.</p>
+
+<p>The dust behind his car concealed him. For twenty
+miles she was silent, save when she burst out to her
+father, "I do hope you're enjoying the trip. It's so
+easy to make people unhappy. I wonder&mdash;&mdash; No.
+Had to be done."</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII<br />
+THE DISCOVERY OF CANNED SHRIMPS AND HESPERIDES</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">On</span> the morning when Milt Daggett had awakened
+to sunshine in the woods north of Gopher
+Prairie, he had discovered the golden age. As mile
+on mile he jogged over new hills, without having to
+worry about getting back to his garage in time to
+repair somebody's car, he realized that for the past
+two years he had forced himself to find contentment in
+building up a business that had no future.</p>
+
+<p>Now he laughed and whooped; he drove with one
+foot inelegantly and enchantingly up on the edge of
+the cowl; he made Lady Vere de Vere bow to
+astounded farmers; he went to the movies every
+evening&mdash;twice, in Fargo; and when the chariot of the
+young prince swept to the brow of a hill, he murmured,
+not in the manner of a bug-driver but with a stinging
+awe, "All that big country! Ours to see, puss! We'll
+settle down some day and be solid citizens and raise
+families and wheeze when we walk, but&mdash;&mdash; All those
+hills to sail over and&mdash;&mdash; Come on! Lez sail!"</p>
+
+<p>Milt attended the motion pictures every evening,
+and he saw them in a new way. As recently as one
+week before he had preferred those earnest depictions
+in which hard-working, moral actors shoot one another,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>
+or ride the most uncomfortable horses up mountainsides.
+But now, with a mental apology to that
+propagandist of lowbrowism, the absent Mac, he chose
+the films in which the leading men wore evening
+clothes, and no one ever did anything without being
+assisted by a "man." Aside from the pictures Milt's
+best tutors were traveling men. Though he measured
+every cent, and for his campfire dinners bought modest
+chuck steaks, he had at least one meal a day at a hotel,
+to watch the traveling men.</p>
+
+<p>To Claire, traveling men were merely commercial
+persons in hard-boiled suits. She identified them with
+the writing-up of order-slips on long littered writing-tables,
+and with hotels that reduced the delicate arts
+of dining and sleeping to gray greasiness. But Milt
+knew traveling men. He knew that not only were
+they the missionaries of business, supplementing the
+taking of orders by telling merchants how to build up
+trade, how to trim windows and treat customers like
+human beings; but also that they, as much as the local
+ministers and doctors and teachers and newspapermen,
+were the agents in spreading knowledge and
+justice. It was they who showed the young men how
+to have their hair cut&mdash;and to wash behind the ears
+and shave daily; they who encouraged villagers to rise
+from scandal and gossip to a perception of the Great
+World, of politics and sports, and some measure of art
+and science.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>Claire, and indeed her father and Mr. Jeff Saxton as
+well, had vaguely concluded that because drummers
+were always to be seen in soggy hotels and badly connecting
+trains and the headachy waiting-rooms of
+stations, they must like these places. Milt knew that
+the drummers were martyrs; that for months of a
+trip, all the while thinking of the children back home,
+they suffered from landlords and train schedules; that
+they were Claire's best allies in fighting the Great
+American Frying Pan; that they knew good things,
+and fought against the laziness and impositions of
+people who "kept hotel" because they had failed as
+farmers; and that when they did find a landlord who
+was cordial and efficient, they went forth mightily
+advertising that glorious man. The traveling men, he
+knew, were pioneers in spats.</p>
+
+<p>Hence it was to the traveling men, not to supercilious
+tourists in limousines, that Milt turned for
+suggestions as to how to perform the miracle of changing
+from an ambitious boy into what Claire would
+recognize as a charming man. He had not met enough
+traveling men at Schoenstrom. They scooped up what
+little business there was, and escaped from the Leipzig
+House to spend the night at St. Cloud or Sauk Centre.</p>
+
+<p>In the larger towns in Minnesota and Dakota, after
+evening movies, before slipping out to his roadside
+camp Milt inserted himself into a circle of traveling
+men in large leather chairs, and ventured, "Saw a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>
+Gomez-Dep with a New York license down the line
+today."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh. You driving through?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Going to Seattle."</p>
+
+<p>That distinguished Milt from the ordinary young-men-loafers,
+and he was admitted as one of the assembly
+of men who traveled and saw things and
+wondered about the ways of men. It was good talk
+he heard; too much of hotels, and too many tight
+banal little phrases suggesting the solution of all
+economic complexities by hanging "agitators," but
+with this, an exciting accumulation of impressions of
+Vancouver and San Diego, Florida and K. C.</p>
+
+<p>"That's a wonderful work farm they have at
+Duluth," said one, and the next, "speaking of that,
+I was in Chicago last week, and I saw a play&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Milt had, in his two years of high school in St.
+Cloud, and in his boyhood under the genial but
+abstracted eye of the Old Doctor, learned that it was
+not well thought of to use the knife as a hod and to
+plaster mashed potatoes upon it, as was the custom in
+Mac's Old Home Lunch at Schoenstrom. But the
+arts of courteously approaching oysters, salad, and
+peas were rather unfamiliar to him. Now he studied
+forks as he had once studied carburetors, and he gave
+spiritual devotion to the nice eating of a canned-shrimp
+cocktail&mdash;a lost legion of shrimps, now two thousand
+miles and two years away from their ocean home.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>He peeped with equal earnestness at the socks and
+the shirts of the traveling men. Socks had been to
+him not an article of faith but a detail of economy.
+His attitude to socks had lacked in reverence and
+technique. He had not perceived that socks may be
+as sound a symbol of culture as the 'cello or even demountable
+rims. He had been able to think with
+respect of ties and damp piqu&eacute; collars secured by gold
+safety-pins; and to the belted fawn overcoat that the
+St. Klopstock banker's son had brought back from St.
+Paul, he had given jealous attention. But now he
+graduated into differential socks.</p>
+
+<p>By his campfire, sighing to the rather somnolent
+Vere de Vere, he scornfully yanked his extra pairs of
+thick, white-streaked, yellow cotton socks from the
+wicker suitcase, and uttered anathema:</p>
+
+<p>"Begone, ye unworthy and punk-looking raiment.
+I know ye! Ye werst a bargain and two pairs for two
+bits. But even as Adolph Zolzac and an agent for flivver
+accessories are ye become in my eyes, ye generation
+of vipers, ye clumsy, bag-footed, wrinkle-sided
+gunny-sacking ye!"</p>
+
+<p>Next day, in the woods, a happy hobo found that
+the manna-bringing ravens had left him four pairs of
+good socks.</p>
+
+<p>Five quite expensive pairs of silk and lisle socks
+Milt purchased&mdash;all that the general merchant at Jeppe
+had in stock. What they lost in suitability to touring<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>
+and to private laundering at creeks, they gained
+as symbols. Milt felt less shut out from the life of
+leisure. Now, in Seattle, say, he could go into a good
+hotel with less fear of the clerks.</p>
+
+<p>He added attractive outing shirts, ties neither too
+blackly dull nor too flashily crimson, and a vicious
+nail-brush which simply tore out the motor grease
+that had grown into the lines of his hands. Also
+he added a book.</p>
+
+<p>The book was a rhetoric. Milt knew perfectly that
+there was an impertinence called grammar, but it had
+never annoyed him much. He knew that many persons
+preferred "They were" to "They was," and were
+nervous in the presence of "ain't." One teacher in St.
+Cloud had buzzed frightfully about these minuti&aelig;.
+But Milt discovered that grammar was only the beginning
+of woes. He learned that there were such mental
+mortgages as figures of speech and the choice of synonyms.
+He had always known, but he had never passionately
+felt that the invariable use of "hell," "doggone,"
+and "You bet!" left certain subtleties unexpressed.
+Now he was finding subtleties which he
+had to express.</p>
+
+<p>As joyously adventurous as going on day after day
+was his experimentation in voicing his new observations.
+He gave far more eagerness to it than Claire
+Boltwood had. Gustily intoning to Vere de Vere,
+who was the perfect audience, inasmuch as she never<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span>
+had anything to say but "Mrwr," and didn't mind
+being interrupted in that, he clamored, "The prairies
+are the sea. In the distance they are kind of silvery&mdash;no&mdash;they
+are dim silver; and way off on the skyline
+are the Islands of the&mdash;of the&mdash;&mdash; Now what the devil
+was them, were those, islands in the mythology book
+in high school? Of the&mdash;Blessed? Great snakes'
+boots, you're an ignorant cat, Vere! Hesperyds? No!
+Hesperides! Yea, bo'! Now that man in the hotel:
+'May I trouble you for the train guide? Thanks so
+much!' But how much is so much?"</p>
+
+<p>As Claire's days were set free by her consciousness
+of sun and brown earth, so Milt's odyssey was only
+the more valorous in his endeavor to criticize life. He
+saw that Mac's lunch room had not been an altogether
+satisfactory home; that Mac's habit of saying to dissatisfied
+customers, "If you don't like it, get out," had
+lacked something of courtesy. Staring at towns along
+the way, Milt saw that houses were not merely large
+and comfortable, or small and stingy; but that there
+was an interesting thing he remembered hearing his
+teachers call "good taste."</p>
+
+<p>He was not the preoccupied Milt of the garage but
+a gay-eyed gallant, the evening when he gave a lift to
+the school-teacher and drove her from the district
+school among the wild roses and the corn to her home
+in the next town. She was a neat, tripping, trim-sided
+school-teacher of nineteen or twenty.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>"You're going out to Seattle? My! That's a wonderful
+trip. Don't you get tired?" she adored.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no. And I'm seeing things. I used to think
+everything worth while was right near my own town."</p>
+
+<p>"You're so wise to go places. Most of the boys I
+know don't think there is any world beyond Jimtown
+and Fargo."</p>
+
+<p>She glowed at him. Milt was saying to himself,
+"Am I a fool? I probably could make this girl fall
+in love with me. And she's better than I am; so darn
+neat and clean and gentle. We'd be happy. She's a
+nice comfy fire, and here I go like a boob, chasing after
+a lone, cold star like Miss Boltwood, and probably I'll
+fall into all the slews from hell to breakfast on the
+way. But&mdash;&mdash; I'd get sleepy by a comfy fire."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you thinking hard? You're frowning so,"
+ventured the school-teacher.</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't mean to. 'Scuse!" he laughed. One hand
+off the steering wheel, he took her hand&mdash;a fresh,
+cool, virginal hand, snuggling into his, suddenly stirring
+him. He wanted to hold it tighter. The lamenting
+historian of love's pilgrimage must set down the
+fact that the pilgrim for at least a second forgot the
+divine tread of the goddess Claire, and made rapid
+calculation that he could, in a pinch, drive from
+Schoenstrom to the teacher's town in two days and a
+night; that therefore courtship, and this sweet white
+hand resting in his, were not impossible. Milt himself<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>
+did not know what it was that made him lay down the
+hand and say, so softly that he was but half audible
+through the rattle of the engine:</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't this a slick, mean to say glorious evening?
+Sky rose and then that funny lavender. And that new
+moon&mdash;&mdash; Makes me think of&mdash;the girl I'm in love
+with."</p>
+
+<p>"You're engaged?" wistfully.</p>
+
+<p>"Not exactly but&mdash;&mdash; Say, did you study rhetoric in
+Normal School? I have a rhetoric that's got all kind
+of poetic extracts, you know, and quotations and
+everything, from the big writers, Stevenson and all.
+Always been so practical, making a garage pay, never
+thought much about how I said things as long as I
+could say 'No!' and say it quick. 'Cept maybe when
+I was talking to the prof there. But it's great sport to
+see how musical you can make a thing sound. Words.
+Like Shenandoah. Gol-lee! Isn't that a wonderful
+word? Makes you see old white mansion, and mocking
+birds&mdash;&mdash; Wonder if a fellow could be a big
+engineer, you know, build bridges and so on, and still
+talk about, oh, beautiful things? What d' you think,
+girlie?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I'm sure you could!"</p>
+
+<p>Her admiration, the proximity of her fragrant
+slightness, was pleasant in the dusk, but he did not
+press her hand again, even when she whispered, "Good
+night, and thank you&mdash;oh, thank you."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>If Milt had been driving at the rate at which he
+usually made his skipjack carom over the roads about
+Schoenstrom, he would by now have been through
+Dakota, into Montana. But he was deliberately holding
+down the speed. When he had been tempted by a
+smooth stretch to go too breathlessly, he halted, teased
+Vere de Vere, climbed out and, sitting on a hilltop, his
+hands about his knees, drenched his soul with the
+vision of amber distances.</p>
+
+<p>He tried so to time his progress that he might always
+be from three to five miles behind Claire&mdash;distant
+enough to be unnoticed, near enough to help in case
+of need. For behind poetic expression and the use of
+forks was the fact that his purpose in life was to know
+Claire.</p>
+
+<p>When he was caught, when Claire informed him
+that he "mustn't worry about her"; when, slowly, he
+understood that she wasn't being neighborly and interested
+in his making time, he wanted to escape, never
+to see her again.</p>
+
+<p>For thirty miles his cheeks were fiery. He, most
+considerate of roadmen, crowded a woman in a flivver,
+passed a laboring car on an upgrade with such a burst
+that the uneasy driver bumped off into a ditch. He
+hadn't really seen them. Only mechanically had he
+got past them. He was muttering:</p>
+
+<p>"She thought I was trying to butt in! Stung
+again! Like a small boy in love with teacher. And I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>
+thought I was so wise! Cussed out Mac&mdash;blamed
+Mac&mdash;no, damn all the fine words&mdash;cussed out Mac
+for being the village rumhound. Boozing is twice as
+sensible as me. See a girl, nice dress&mdash;start for
+Seattle! Two thousand miles away! Of course she
+bawled me out. She was dead right. Boob! Yahoo!
+Goat!"</p>
+
+<p>He caught up Vere de Vere, rubbed her fur against
+his cheek while he mourned, "Oh, puss, you got to be
+nice to me. I thought I'd do big things. And then the
+alarm clock went off. I'm back in Schoenstrom. For
+keeps, I guess. I didn't know I had feelings that could
+get hurt like this. Thought I had a rhinoceros
+hide. But&mdash;&mdash; Oh, it isn't just feeling ashamed
+over being a fool. It's that&mdash;&mdash; Won't ever see her
+again. Not once. Way I saw her through the window,
+at that hotel, in that blue silky dress&mdash;that
+funny long line of buttons, and her throat. Never
+have dinner&mdash;lunch&mdash;with her by the road&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>In the reaction of anger he demanded of Vere de
+Vere, "What the deuce do I care? If she's chump
+enough to chase away a crack garage man that's gone
+batty and wants to work for nothing, let her go on
+and hit some crook garage and get stuck for an entire
+overhauling. What do I care? Had nice trip; that's
+all I wanted. Never did intend to go clear to Seattle,
+anyway. Go on to Butte, then back home. No more
+fussing about fool table-manners and books, and I certainly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>
+will cut out tagging behind her! No, sir!
+Nev-er again!"</p>
+
+<p>It was somewhat inconsistent to add, "There's a
+bully place&mdash;sneak in and let her get past me again.
+But she won't catch me following next time!"</p>
+
+<p>While he tried to keep up his virtuous anger, he
+was steering into an abandoned farmyard, parking
+the car behind cottonwoods and neglected tall currant
+bushes which would conceal it from the road.</p>
+
+<p>The windows of the deserted house stared at him;
+a splintered screen door banged in every breeze.
+Lichens leered from the cracks of the porch. The
+yard was filled with a litter of cottonwood twigs, and
+over the flower garden hulked ragged weeds. In the
+rank grass about the slimy green lip of the well,
+crickets piped derisively. The barn-door was open.
+Stray kernels of wheat had sprouted between the
+spokes of a rusty binder-wheel. A rat slipped across
+the edge of the shattered manger. As dusk came on,
+gray things seemed to slither past the upper windows
+of the house, and somewhere, under the roof, there
+was a moaning. Milt was sure that it was the wind
+in a knothole. He told himself that he was absolutely
+sure about it. And every time it came he stroked
+Vere de Vere carefully, and once, when the moaning
+ended in the slamming of the screen door, he said,
+"Jiminy!"</p>
+
+<p>This boy of the unghostly cylinders and tangible<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>
+magnetos had never seen a haunted house. To toil of
+the harvest field and machine shop and to trudging
+the sun-beaten road he was accustomed, but he had
+never crouched watching the slinking spirits of old
+hopes and broken aspirations; feeble phantoms of the
+first eager bridegroom who had come to this place, and
+the mortgage-crushed, rust-wheat-ruined man who
+had left it. He wanted to leap into the bug and go on.
+Yet the haunt of murmurous memories dignified his
+unhappiness. In the soft, tree-dimmed dooryard
+among dry, blazing plains it seemed indecent to go on
+growling "Gee," and "Can you beat it?" It was a
+young poet, a poet rhymeless and inarticulate, who
+huddled behind the shield of untrimmed currant
+bushes, and thought of the girl he would never see
+again.</p>
+
+<p>He was hungry, but he did not eat. He was
+cramped, but he did not move. He picked up the books
+she had given him. He was quickened by the powdery
+beauty of <i>Youth's Encounter</i>; by the vision of laughter
+and dancing steps beneath a streaky gas-glow in the
+London fog; of youth not "roughhousing" and wanting
+to "be a sport," yet in frail beauty and faded
+crimson banners finding such exaltation as Schoenstrom
+had never known. But every page suggested
+Claire, and he tucked the book away.</p>
+
+<p>In Vachel Lindsay's <i>Congo</i>, in a poem called "The
+Santa Fe Trail," he found his own modern pilgrimage<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>
+from another point of view. Here was the poet, disturbed
+by the honking hustle of passing cars. But
+Milt belonged to the honking and the hustle, and it
+was not the soul of the grass that he read in the poem,
+but his own sun-flickering flight:</p>
+
+<div class="poem" style="width: 21em;"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Swiftly the brazen car comes on.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">It burns in the East as the sunrise burns.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I see great flashes where the far trail turns.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Butting through the delicate mists of the morning,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">It comes like lightning, goes past roaring,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">It will hail all the windmills, taunting, ringing,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">On through the ranges the prairie-dog tills&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Scooting past the cattle on the thousand hills.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Ho for the tear-horn, scare-horn, dare-horn,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Ho for the gay-horn, bark-horn, bay-horn.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Milt did not reflect that if the poet had watched the
+Teal bug go by, he would not have recorded a scare-horn,
+a dare-horn, or anything mightier than a yip-horn.
+Milt saw himself a cross-continent racer, with
+the envious poet, left behind as a dot on the hill, celebrating
+his passing.</p>
+
+<p>"Lord!" he cried. "I didn't know there were
+books like these! Thought poetry was all like Longfellow
+and Byron. Old boys. Europe. And rhymed
+bellyachin' about hard luck. But these books&mdash;they're
+me." Very carefully: "No; they're I! And she gave
+'em to me! I will see her again! But she won't know<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>
+it. Now be sensible, son! What do you expect? Oh&mdash;nothing.
+I'll just go on, and sneak in one more
+glimpse of her to take back with me where I belong."</p>
+
+<p>Half an hour after Claire had innocently passed his
+ambush, he began to follow her. But not for days was
+he careless. If he saw her on the horizon he paused
+until she was out of sight. That he might not fail her
+in need, he bought a ridiculously expensive pair of
+field glasses, and watched her when she stopped by the
+road. Once, when both her right rear tire and the
+spare were punctured before she could make a town,
+Milt from afar saw her patch a tube, pump up the tire
+in the dust. He ached to go to her aid&mdash;though it
+cannot be said that hand-pumping was his favorite
+July afternoon sport.</p>
+
+<p>Lest he encounter her in the streets, he always
+camped to the eastward of the town at which she spent
+the night. After dusk, when she was likely to end the
+day's drive in the first sizable place, he hid his bug in
+an alley and, like a spy after the papers, sneaked into
+each garage to see if her car was there.</p>
+
+<p>He would stroll in, look about vacuously, and pipe
+to the suspicious night attendant, "Seen a traveling
+man named Smith?" Usually the garage man snarled,
+"No, I ain't seen nobody named Smith. An'thing
+else I can do for you?" But once he was so unlucky
+as to find the long-missing Mr. Smith!</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Smith was surprised and insistent. Milt had to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>
+do some quick lying. During that interview the cement
+floor felt very hard under his fidgeting feet, and he
+thought he heard the garage man in the office telephoning,
+"Don't think he knows Smith at all. I got a
+hunch he's that auto thief that was through here last
+summer."</p>
+
+<p>When Claire did not stop in the first town she
+reached after twilight, but drove on by dark, he had
+to do some perilous galloping to catch up. The lights
+of a Teal are excellent for adornment, but they have
+no relation to illumination. They are dependent upon
+a magneto which is dependent only upon faith.</p>
+
+<p>Once, skittering along by dark, he realized that the
+halted car which he had just passed was the Gomez.
+He thought he heard a shout behind him, but in a
+panic he kept going.</p>
+
+<p>To the burring motor he groaned, "Now I probably
+never will see her again. Except that she thinks I'm
+such a pest that I dassn't let her know I'm in the same
+state, I sure am one successful lover. As a Prince
+Charming I win the Vanderbilt Cup. I'm going ahead
+backwards so fast I'll probably drop off into the
+Atlantic over the next hill!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IX<br />
+THE MAN WITH AGATE EYES</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">When</span> her car had crossed the Missouri River
+on the swing-ferry between Bismarck and
+Mandan, Claire had passed from Middle West to Far
+West. She came out on an upland of virgin prairie,
+so treeless and houseless, so divinely dipping, so rough
+of grass, that she could imagine buffaloes still roving.
+In a hollow a real prairie schooner was camped, and
+the wandering homestead-seekers were cooking dinner
+beside it. From a quilt on the hay in the wagon a
+baby peeped, and Claire's heart leaped.</p>
+
+<p>Beyond was her first butte, its sharp-cut sides glittering
+yellow, and she fancied that on it the Sioux
+scout still sat sentinel, erect on his pony, the feather
+bonnet down his back.</p>
+
+<p>Now she seemed to breathe deeper, see farther.
+Again she came from unbroken prairie into wheat
+country and large towns.</p>
+
+<p>Her impression of the new land was not merely of
+sun-glaring breadth. Sometimes, on a cloudy day, the
+wash of wheatlands was as brown and lowering and
+mysterious as an English moor in the mist. It dwarfed
+the far-off houses by its giant enchantment; its brooding
+reaches changed her attitude of brisk, gas-driven<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>
+efficiency into a melancholy that was full of hints of
+old dark beauty.</p>
+
+<p>Even when the sun came out, and the land was
+brazenly optimistic, she saw more than just prosperity.
+In a new home, house and barn and windmill square-cornered
+and prosaic, plumped down in a field with
+wheat coming up to the unporticoed door, a habitation
+unshadowed, unsheltered, unsoftened, she found a
+frank cleanness, as though the inhabitants looked
+squarely out at life, unafraid. She felt that the keen
+winds ought to blow away from such a prairie-fronting
+post of civilization all mildew and cowardice, all
+the mummy dust of ancient fears.</p>
+
+<p>These were not peasants, these farmers. Nor, she
+learned, were they the "hicks" of humor. She could
+never again encounter without fiery resentment the
+Broadway peddler's faith that farmers invariably say
+"Waal, by heck." For she had spent an hour talking
+to one Dakota farmer, genial-eyed, quiet of speech.
+He had explained the relation of alfalfa to soil-chemistry;
+had spoken of his daughter, who taught economics
+in a state university; and asked Mr. Boltwood
+how turbines were hitched up on liners.</p>
+
+<p>In fact, Claire learned that there may be an almost
+tolerable state of existence without gardenias or the
+news about the latest Parisian imagists.</p>
+
+<p>She dropped suddenly from the vast, smooth-swelling
+miles of wheatland into the tortured marvels of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>
+the Bad Lands, and the road twisted in the shadow of
+flying buttresses and the terraced tombs of maharajas.
+While she tried to pick her way through a herd of
+wild, arroyo-bred cattle, she forgot her maneuvering
+as she was startled by the stabbing scarlet of a column
+of rock marking the place where for months deep
+beds of lignite had burned.</p>
+
+<p>Claire had often given lifts to tramping harvesters
+and even hoboes along the road; had enjoyed the sight
+of their duffle-bags stuck up between the sleek fenders
+and the hood, and their talk about people and crops
+along the road, as they hung on the running-board.
+In the country of long hillslopes and sentinel buttes
+between the Dakota Bad Lands and Miles City she
+stopped to shout to a man whose plodding heavy back
+looked fagged, "Want a ride?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure! You bet!"</p>
+
+<p>Usually her guests stepped on the right-hand running-board,
+beside Mr. Boltwood, and this man was
+far over on the right side of the road. But, while she
+waited, he sauntered in front of the car, round to her
+side, mounted beside her. Before the car had started,
+she was sorry to have invited him. He looked her
+over grinningly, almost contemptuously. His unabashed
+eyes were as bright and hard as agates. Below
+them, his nose was twisted a little, his mouth bent
+insolently up at one corner, and his square long chin
+bristled.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>Usually, too, her passengers waited for her to start
+the conversation, and talked at Mr. Boltwood rather
+than directly to her. But the bristly man spat at her as
+the car started, "Going far?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ye-es, some distance."</p>
+
+<p>"Expensive car?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"'Fraid of getting held up?"</p>
+
+<p>"I hadn't thought about it."</p>
+
+<p>"Pack a cannon, don't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think I quite understand."</p>
+
+<p>"Cannon! Gun! Revolver! Got a revolver, of
+course?"</p>
+
+<p>"W-why, no." She spoke uncomfortably. She was
+aware that his twinkling eyes were on her throat. His
+look made her feel unclean. She tried to think of some
+question which would lead the conversation to the
+less exclamatory subject of crops. They were on a
+curving shelf road beside a shallow valley. The road
+was one side of a horseshoe ten miles long. The unprotected
+edge of it dropped sharply to fields forty or
+fifty feet below.</p>
+
+<p>"Prosperous-looking wheat down there," she said.</p>
+
+<p>"No. Not a bit!" His look seemed to add,
+"And you know it&mdash;unless you're a fool!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I didn't&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Make Glendive tonight?"</p>
+
+<p>"At least that far."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>"Say, lady, how's the chance for borrowin' a couple
+of dollars? I was workin' for a Finnski back here a
+ways, and he did me dirt&mdash;holdin' out my wages on
+me till the end of the month."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, uh&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>It was Claire, not the man, who was embarrassed.</p>
+
+<p>He was snickering, "Come on, don't be a tightwad.
+Swell car&mdash;poor man with no eats, not even a two-bits
+flop for tonight. Could yuh loosen up and slip
+me just a couple bones?"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood intervened. He looked as uncomfortable
+as Claire. "We'll see. It's rather against my
+principles to give money to an able-bodied man like
+you, even though it is a pleasure to give you a
+ride&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure! Don't cost you one red cent!"</p>
+
+<p>"&mdash;and if I could help you get a job, though of
+course&mdash;&mdash; Being a stranger out here&mdash;&mdash; Seems
+strange to me, though," Mr. Boltwood struggled on,
+"that a strong fellow like you should be utterly
+destitute, when I see all these farmers able to have
+cars&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Their guest instantly abandoned his attitude of
+supplication for one of boasting: "Destitute? Who
+the hell said I was destitute, heh?" He was snarling
+across Claire at Mr. Boltwood. His wet face was
+five inches from hers. She drew her head as far back
+as she could. She was sure that the man completely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>
+appreciated her distaste, for his eyes popped with
+amusement before he roared on:</p>
+
+<p>"I got plenty of money! Just 'cause I'm hoofin'
+it&mdash;&mdash; I don't want no charity from nobody! I could
+buy out half these Honyockers! I don't need none of
+no man's money!" He was efficiently working himself
+into a rage. "Who you calling destitute? All I
+wanted was an advance till pay day! Got a check
+coming. You high-tone, kid-glove Eastern towerists
+want to watch out who you go calling destitute. I bet
+I make a lot more money than a lot of your four-flushin'
+friends!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire wondered if she couldn't stop the car now,
+and tell him to get off. But&mdash;that snapping eye was
+too vicious. Before he got off he would say things&mdash;scarring,
+vile things, that would never heal in her
+brain. Her father was murmuring, "Let's drop him,"
+but she softly lied, "No. His impertinence amuses
+me."</p>
+
+<p>She drove on, and prayed that he would of himself
+leave his uncharitable hosts at the next town.</p>
+
+<p>The man was storming&mdash;with a very meek ending:
+"I'm tellin' you! I can make money anywhere! I'm
+a crack machinist.... Give me two-bits for a
+meal, anyway."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood reached in his change pocket. He had
+no quarter. He pulled out a plump bill-fold. Without
+looking at the man, Claire could vision his eyes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>
+glistening and his chops dripping as he stared at the
+hoard. Mr. Boltwood handed him a dollar bill.
+"There, take that, and let's change the subject," said
+Mr. Boltwood testily.</p>
+
+<p>"All right, boss. Say, you haven't got a cartwheel
+instead of this wrapping paper, have you? I like to
+feel my money in my pocket."</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir, I have not!"</p>
+
+<p>"All right, boss. No bad feelin's!"</p>
+
+<p>Then he ignored Mr. Boltwood. His eyes focused
+on Claire's face. To steady himself on the running-board
+he had placed his left hand on the side of the
+car, his right on the back of the seat. That right
+hand slid behind her. She could feel its warmth on
+her back.</p>
+
+<p>She burst out, flaring, "Kindly do not touch me!"</p>
+
+<p>"Gee, did I touch you, girlie? Why, that's a
+shame!" he drawled, his cracked broad lips turning
+up in a grin.</p>
+
+<p>An instant later, as they skipped round a bend of
+the long, high-hung shelf road, he pretended to sway
+dangerously on the running-board, and deliberately
+laid his filthy hand on her shoulder. Before she could
+say anything he yelped in mock-regret, "Love o'
+Mike! 'Scuse me, lady. I almost fell off."</p>
+
+<p>Quietly, seriously, Claire said, "No, that wasn't
+accidental. If you touch me again, I'll stop the car
+and ask you to walk."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>"Better do it now, dolly!" snapped Mr. Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>The man hooked his left arm about the side-post of
+the open window-shield. It was a strong arm, a firm
+grip. He seized her left wrist with his free hand.
+Though all the while his eyes grotesquely kept their
+amused sparkle, and beside them writhed laughter-wrinkles,
+he shouted hoarsely, "You'll stop hell!"
+His hand slid from her wrist to the steering wheel. "I
+can drive this boat's well as you can. You make one
+move to stop, and I steer her over&mdash;&mdash; Blooie! Down
+the bank!"</p>
+
+<p>He did twist the front wheels dangerously near to
+the outer edge of the shelf road. Mr. Boltwood gazed
+at the hand on the wheel. With a quick breath Claire
+looked at the side of the road. If the car ran off, it
+would shoot down forty feet ... turning over and
+over.</p>
+
+<p>"Y-you wouldn't dare, because you'd g-go, too!"
+she panted.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, dearuh, you just try any monkey business
+and you'll find out how much I'll gggggggo-too! I'll
+start you down the joy-slope and jump off, savvy?
+Take your foot off that clutch."</p>
+
+<p>She obeyed.</p>
+
+<p>"Pretty lil feet, ain't they, cutie! Shoes cost
+about twelve bucks, I reckon. While a better man
+than you or old moldy-face there has to hit the pike
+in three-dollar brogans. Sit down, yuh fool!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>This last to Mr. Boltwood, who had stood up,
+swaying with the car, and struck at him. With a
+huge arm the man swept Mr. Boltwood back into the
+seat, but without a word to her father, he continued
+to Claire:</p>
+
+<p>"And keep your hand where it belongs. Don't go
+trying to touch that switch. Aw, be sensible! What
+would you do if the car did stop? I could blackjack
+you both before this swell-elegant vehickle lost momentum,
+savvy? I don't want to pay out my good
+money to a lawyer on a charge of&mdash;murder. Get me?
+Better take it easy and not worry." His hand was
+constantly on the wheel. He had driven cars before.
+He was steering as much as she. "When I get you up
+the road a piece I'm going to drive all the cute lil
+boys and girls up a side trail, and take all of papa's
+gosh-what-a-wad in the cunnin' potet-book, and I guess
+we'll kiss lil daughter, and drive on, a-wavin' our
+hand politely, and let you suckers walk to the next
+burg."</p>
+
+<p>"You wouldn't dare! You wouldn't dare!"</p>
+
+<p>"Dare? Huh! Don't make the driver laugh!"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll get help!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yep. Sure. Fact, there's a car comin' toward
+us. 'Bout a mile away I'd make it, wouldn't you?
+Well, dollface, if you make one peep&mdash;over the bank
+you go, both of you dead as a couplin'-pin. Smeared
+all over those rocks. Get me? And me&mdash;I'll be sorry<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>
+the regrettable accident was so naughty and went and
+happened&mdash;and I just got off in time meself. And I'll
+pinch papa's poke while I'm helping get out the
+bodies!"</p>
+
+<p>Till now she hadn't believed it. But she dared not
+glance at the approaching car. It was their interesting
+guest who steered the Gomez past the other; and he
+ran rather too near the edge of the road ... so
+that she looked over, down.</p>
+
+<p>Beaming, he went on, "I'd pull the rough stuff right
+here, instead of wastin' my time as a cap'n of industry
+by taking you up to see the scenery in that daisy little
+gully off the road; but the whole world can see us
+along here&mdash;the hicks in the valley and anybody that
+happens to sneak along in a car behind us. Shame the
+way this road curves&mdash;see too far along it. Fact,
+you're giving me a lot of trouble. But you'll give me
+a kiss, won't you, Gwendolyn?"</p>
+
+<p>He bent down, chuckling. She could feel his bristly
+chin touch her cheek. She sprang up, struck at him.
+He raised his hand from the wheel. For a second the
+car ran without control. He jabbed her back into the
+seat with his elbow. "Don't try any more monkey-shines,
+if you know what's good for you," he said,
+quite peacefully, as he resumed steering.</p>
+
+<p>She was in a haze, conscious only of her father's
+hand fondling hers. She heard a quick pit-pit-pit-pit
+behind them. Car going to pass? She'd have to let it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>
+go by. She'd concentrate on finding something she
+could&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Then, "Hello, folks. Having a picnic? Who's
+your little friend in the rompers?" sang out a voice
+beside them. It was Milt Daggett&mdash;the Milt who
+must be scores of miles ahead. His bug had caught
+up with them, was running even with them on the
+broad road.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER X<br />
+THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE HILLSIDE ROAD</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">So</span> unexpectedly, so genially, that Claire wondered
+if he realized what was happening, Milt chuckled
+to the tough on the running-board, as the two cars
+ran side by side, "Bound for some place, brother?"</p>
+
+<p>The unwelcome guest looked puzzled. For the
+first time his china eyes ceased twinkling; and he
+answered dubiously: "Just gettin' a lift." He sped up
+the car with the hand-throttle. Milt accelerated
+equally.</p>
+
+<p>Claire roused; wanted to shout. She was palsied
+afraid that Milt would leave them. The last time she
+had seen him, she had suggested that leaving them
+would be a favor.</p>
+
+<p>Her guest growled at her&mdash;the words coming
+through a slit at the corner of his rowdy mouth, "Sit
+still, or I'll run you over."</p>
+
+<p>Milt innocently babbled on, "Better come ride with
+me, bo'. More room in this-here handsome coupelet."</p>
+
+<p>Then was the rough relieved in his uneasy tender
+little heart, and his eyes flickered again as he shouted
+back, not looking at Milt, "Thanks, bub, I'll stick by
+me friends."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span>"Oh no; can't lose pleasure of your company. I
+like your looks. You're a bloomin' little island
+way off on the dim silver skyline." Claire knitted
+her brows. She had not seen Milt's rhetoric. "You're
+an island of Hesperyds or Hesperides. Accent on the
+bezuzus. Oh, yes, moondream, I think you better
+come. Haven't decided"&mdash;Milt's tone was bland&mdash;"whether
+to kill you or just have you pinched. Miss
+Boltwood! Switch off your power!"</p>
+
+<p>"If she does," the tough shouted, "I'll run 'em off
+the bank."</p>
+
+<p>"No, you won't, sweetheart, 'cause why? 'Cause
+what'll I do to you afterwards?"</p>
+
+<p>"You won't do nothin', Jack, 'cause I'd gouge your
+eyes out."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, lovesoul, d' you suppose I'd be talking up
+as brash as this to a bid, stwong man like oo if I
+didn't have a gun handy?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yuh, I guess so, lil sunbeam. And before you
+could shoot, I'd crowd your tin liz into the bank, and
+jam right into it! I may get killed, but you won't
+even be a grease-spot!"</p>
+
+<p>He was turning the Gomez from its straight course,
+forcing Milt's bug toward the high bank of earth
+which walled in the road on the left.</p>
+
+<p>While Claire was very sick with fear, then more
+sick with contempt, Milt squealed, "You win!" And
+he had dropped back. The Gomez was going on alone.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>There was only one thing more for Claire&mdash;to jump.
+And that meant death.</p>
+
+<p>The tough was storming, "Your friend's a crack
+shot&mdash;with his mouth!"</p>
+
+<p>The thin pit-pit-pit was coming again. She looked
+back. She saw Milt's bug snap forward so fast that
+on a bump its light wheels were in the air. She saw
+Milt standing on the right side of the bug holding the
+wheel with one hand, and the other hand&mdash;firm, grim,
+broad-knuckled hand&mdash;outstretched toward the tough,
+then snatching at his collar.</p>
+
+<p>The tough's grip was torn from the steering wheel.
+He was yanked from the running-board. He crunched
+down on the road.</p>
+
+<p>She seized the wheel. She drove on at sixty miles
+an hour. She had gone a good mile before she got
+control of her fear and halted. She saw Milt turn
+his little car as though it were a prancing bronco. It
+seemed to paw the air with its front wheels. He shot
+back, pursuing the late guest. The man ran bobbing
+along the road. At this distance he was no longer
+formidable, but a comic, jerking, rabbity figure, humping
+himself over the back track.</p>
+
+<p>As the bug whirled down on him, the tough was to
+be seen throwing up his hands, leaping from the high
+bank.</p>
+
+<p>Milt turned again and came toward them, but
+slowly; and after he had drawn up even and switched<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>
+off the engine, he snatched off his violent plaid cap
+and looked apologetic.</p>
+
+<p>"Sorry I had to kid him along. I was afraid he
+really would drive you off the bank. He was a bad
+actor. And he was right; he could have licked me.
+Thought maybe I could jolly him into getting off, and
+have him pinched, next town."</p>
+
+<p>"But you had a gun&mdash;a revolver&mdash;didn't you,
+lad?" panted Mr. Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>"Um, wellllll&mdash;&mdash; I've got a shotgun. It wouldn't
+take me more 'n five or ten minutes to dig it out, and
+put it together. And there's some shells. They may
+be all right. Haven't looked at 'em since last fall.
+They didn't get so awful damp then."</p>
+
+<p>"But suppose he'd had a revolver himself?" wailed
+Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"Gee, you know, I thought he probably did have
+one. I was scared blue. I had a wrench to throw at
+him though," confided Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"How did you know we needed you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why back there, couple miles behind you, maybe I
+saw your father get up and try to wrestle him, so I
+suspected there was kind of a disagreement. Say,
+Miss Boltwood, you know when you spoke to me&mdash;way
+back there&mdash;I hadn't meant to butt in. Honest.
+I thought maybe as we were going&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I know!"</p>
+
+<p>"&mdash;the same way, you wouldn't mind my trailing,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span>
+if I didn't sit in too often; and I thought maybe I
+could help you if&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I know! I'm so ashamed! So bitterly
+ashamed! I just meant&mdash;&mdash; Will you forgive me?
+You were so good, taking care of us&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, sure, that's all right!"</p>
+
+<p>"I fancy you do know how grateful father and I
+are that you were behind us, this time! Wasn't it a
+lucky accident that we'd slipped past you some place!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," dryly, "quite an accident. Well, I'll skip
+on ahead again. May run into you again before we
+hit Seattle. Going to take the run through Yellowstone
+Park?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but&mdash;&mdash;" began Claire. Her father interrupted:</p>
+
+<p>"Uh, Mr., uh&mdash;Daggett, was it?&mdash;I wonder if you
+won't stay a little closer to us hereafter? I was getting
+rather a good change out of the trip, but I'm
+afraid that now&mdash;&mdash; If it wouldn't be an insult, I'd
+beg you to consider staying with us for a consideration,
+uh, you know, remuneration, and you could&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks, uh, thank you, sir, but I wouldn't like to
+do it. You see, it's kind of my vacation. If I've done
+anything I'm tickled&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But perhaps," Mr. Boltwood ardently begged the
+young man recently so abysmally unimportant, "perhaps
+you would consent to being my guest, when you
+cared to&mdash;say at hotels in the Park."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>"'Fraid I couldn't. I'm kind of a lone wolf."</p>
+
+<p>"Please! Pretty please!" besought Claire. Her
+smile was appealing, her eyes on his.</p>
+
+<p>Milt bit his knuckles. He looked weak. But he
+persisted, "No, you'll get over this scrap with our
+friend. By the way, I'll put the deputy onto him, in
+the next town. He'll never get out of the county.
+When you forget him&mdash;&mdash; Oh no, you can go on fine.
+You're a good steady driver, and the road's perfectly
+safe&mdash;if you give people the once-over before you pick
+'em up. Picking up badmen is no more dangerous
+here than it would be in New York. Fact, there's lot
+more hold-ups in any city than in the wildest country.
+I don't think you showed such awfully good taste in
+asking Terrible Tim, the two-gun man, right into the
+parlor. Gee, please don't do it again! Please!"</p>
+
+<p>"No," meekly. "I was an idiot. I'll be good,
+next time. But won't you stay somewhere near us?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'd like to, but I got to chase on. Don't want to
+wear out the welcome on the doormat, and I'm due in
+Seattle, and&mdash;&mdash; Say, Miss Boltwood." He swung
+out of the bug, cranked up, climbed back, went awkwardly
+on, "I read those books you gave me. They're
+slick&mdash;mean to say, interesting. Where that young
+fellow in <i>Youth's Encounter</i> wanted to be a bishop
+and a soldier and everything&mdash;&mdash; Just like me, except
+Schoenstrom is different, from London, some ways!
+I always wanted to be a brakie, and then a yeggman.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>
+But I wasn't bright enough for either. I just became
+a garage man. And I&mdash;&mdash; Some day I'm going to
+stop using slang. But it'll take an operation!"</p>
+
+<p>He was streaking down the road, and Claire was
+sobbing, "Oh, the lamb, the darling thing! Fretting
+about his slang, when he wasn't afraid in that horrible
+nightmare. If we could just do something for him!"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you worry about him, dolly. He's a very
+energetic chap. And&mdash;&mdash; Uh&mdash;&mdash; Mightn't we
+drive on a little farther, perhaps? I confess that the
+thought of our recent guest still in this vicinity&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, and&mdash;&mdash; Oh, I'm shameless. If Mohammed
+Milton won't stay with our car mountain, we're going
+to tag after him."</p>
+
+<p>But when she reached the next hill, with its far
+shining outlook, there was no Milt and no Teal bug
+on the road ahead.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XI<br />
+SAGEBRUSH TOURISTS OF THE GREAT HIGHWAY</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">She</span> had rested for two days in Miles City; had
+seen the horse-market, with horse-wranglers in
+chaps; had taken dinner with army people at Fort
+Keogh, once the bulwark against the Sioux, now nodding
+over the dry grass on its parade ground.</p>
+
+<p>By the Yellowstone River, past the Crow reservation,
+Claire had driven on through the Real West,
+along the Great Highway. The Red Trail and the
+Yellowstone Trail had joined now and she was one of
+the new Canterbury Pilgrims. Even Mr. Boltwood
+caught the trick of looking for licenses, and cried,
+"There's a Connecticut car!"</p>
+
+<p>To the Easterner, a drive from New York to Cape
+Cod, over asphalt, is viewed as heroic, but here were
+cars that had casually started on thousand-mile vacations.
+She kept pace not only with large cars touring
+from St. Louis or Detroit to Glacier Park and Yellowstone,
+but also she found herself companionable with
+families of workmen, headed for a new town and a
+new job, and driving because a flivver, bought second-hand
+and soon to be sold again, was cheaper than
+trains.</p>
+
+<p>"Sagebrush Tourists" these camping adventurers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span>
+were called. Claire became used to small cars, with
+curtain-lights broken, bearing wash-boilers or refrigerators
+on the back, pasteboard suitcases lashed by
+rope to the running-board, frying pans and canvas
+water bottles dangling from top-rods. And once
+baby's personal laundry was seen flapping on a line
+across a tonneau!</p>
+
+<p>In each car was what looked like the crowd at a
+large farm-auction&mdash;grandfather, father, mother, a
+couple of sons and two or three daughters, at least
+one baby in the arms of each grown-up, all jammed
+into two seats already filled with trunks and baby-carriages.
+And they were happy&mdash;incredibly happier
+than the smart people being conveyed in a bored way
+behind chauffeurs.</p>
+
+<p>The Sagebrush Tourists made camp; covered the
+hood with a quilt from which the cotton was oozing;
+brought out the wash-boiler, did a washing, had dinner,
+sang about the fire; granther and the youngest
+baby gamboling together, while the limousinvalids, insulated
+from life by plate glass, preserved by their
+steady forty an hour from the commonness of seeing
+anything along the road, looked out at the campers
+for a second, sniffed, rolled on, wearily wondering
+whether they would find a good hotel that night&mdash;and
+why the deuce they hadn't come by train.</p>
+
+<p>If Claire Boltwood had been protected by Jeff
+Saxton or by a chauffeur, she, too, would probably<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>
+have marveled at cars gray with dust, the unshaved
+men in fleece-lined duck coats, and the women wind-burnt
+beneath the boudoir caps they wore as motoring
+bonnets. But Claire knew now that filling grease-cups
+does not tend to delicacy of hands; that when you
+wash with a cake of petrified pink soap and half a
+pitcher of cold hard water, you never quite get the
+stain off&mdash;you merely get through the dust stratum
+to the Laurentian grease formation, and mutter, "a
+nice clean grease doesn't hurt food," and go sleepily
+down to dinner.</p>
+
+<p>She saw a dozen camping devices unknown to the
+East: trailers, which by day bobbed along behind the
+car like coffins on two wheels, but at night opened into
+tents with beds, an ice-box, a table; tents covering a
+bed whose head rested on the running-board; beds
+made-up in the car, with the cushions as mattresses.</p>
+
+<p>The Great Transcontinental Highway was colored
+not by motors alone. It is true that the Old West of
+the stories is almost gone; that Billings, Miles City,
+Bismarck, are more given to Doric banks than to
+gambling hells. But still are there hints of frontier
+days. Still trudge the prairie schooners; cowpunchers
+in chaps still stand at the doors of log cabins&mdash;when
+they are tired of playing the automatic piano; and
+blanket Indians, Blackfeet and Crows, stare at five-story
+buildings&mdash;when they are not driving modern
+reapers on their farms.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span>They all waved to Claire. Telephone linemen, lolling
+with pipes and climber-strapped legs in big trucks,
+sang out to her; traction engine crews shouted; and
+these she found to be her own people. Only once did
+she lose contentment&mdash;when, on the observation platform
+of a train bound for Seattle, she saw a Britisher
+in flannels and a monocle, headed perhaps for the
+Orient. As the train slipped silkenly away, the Gomez
+seemed slow and clumsy, and the strain of driving
+intolerable. And that Britisher must be charming&mdash;&mdash; Then
+a lonely, tight-haired woman in the doorway of
+a tar-paper shack waved to her, and in that wistful
+gesture Claire found friendship.</p>
+
+<p>And sometimes in the "desert" of yet unbroken
+land she paused by the Great Highway and forgot
+the passion to keep going&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>She sat on a rock, by a river so muddy that it was
+like yellow milk. The only trees were a bunch of cottonwoods
+untidily scattering shreds of cotton, and
+the only other vegetation left in the dead world was
+dusty green sagebrush with lumps of gray yet pregnant
+earth between, or a few exquisite green and white
+flashes of the herb called Snow-on-the-Mountain. The
+inhabitants were jackrabbits, or American magpies in
+sharp black and white livery, forever trying to balance
+their huge tails against the wind, and yelling in low-magpie
+their opinion of tourists.</p>
+
+<p>She did not desire gardens, then, nor the pettiness<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span>
+of plump terraced hills. She was in the Real West,
+and it was hers, since she had won to it by her own
+plodding. Her soul&mdash;if she hadn't had one, it would
+immediately have been provided, by special arrangement,
+the moment she sat there&mdash;sailed with the hawks
+in the high thin air, and when it came down it sang
+hallelujahs, because the sagebrush fragrance was more
+healing than piney woods, because the sharp-bitten
+edges of the buttes were coral and gold and basalt and
+turquoise, and because a real person, one Milt Daggett,
+though she would never see him again, had found her
+worthy of worship.</p>
+
+<p>She did not often think of Milt; she did not know
+whether he was ahead of her, or had again dropped
+behind. When she did recall him, it was with respect
+quite different from the titillation that dancing men
+had sometimes aroused, or the impression of manicured
+agreeableness and efficiency which Jeff Saxton
+carried about.</p>
+
+<p>She always supplicated the mythical Milt in moments
+of tight driving. Driving, just the actual getting on,
+was her purpose in life, and the routine of driving was
+her order of the day: Morning freshness, rolling up
+as many miles as possible before lunch, that she might
+loaf afterward. The invariable two <span class="smcapl">P.M.</span> discovery
+that her eyes ached, and the donning of huge amber
+glasses, which gave to her lithe smartness a counterfeit
+scholarliness. Toward night, the quarter-hour of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>
+level sun-glare which prevented her seeing the road.
+Dusk, and the discovery of how much light there was
+after all, once she remembered to take off her glasses.
+The worst quarter-hour when, though the roads were
+an amethyst rich to the artist, they were also a murkiness
+exasperating to the driver, yet still too light to be
+thrown into relief by the lamps. The mystic moment
+when night clicked tight, and the lamps made a fan
+of gold, and Claire and her father settled down to
+plodding content&mdash;and no longer had to take the
+trouble of admiring the scenery!</p>
+
+<p>The morning out of Billings, she wondered why a
+low cloud so persistently held its shape, and realized
+that it was a far-off mountain, her first sight of the
+Rockies. Then she cried out, and wished for Milt to
+share her exultation. Rather earnestly she said to
+Mr. Boltwood:</p>
+
+<p>"The mountains must be so wonderful to Mr. Daggett,
+after spending his life in a cornfield. Poor Milt!
+I hope&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think you need to worry about that young
+man. I fancy he's quite able to run about by himself,
+as jolly as a sand-dog. And&mdash;&mdash; Of course I'm extremely
+grateful to him for his daily rescue of us from
+the jaws of death, but he was right; if he had stayed
+with us, it would have been inconvenient to keep
+considering him. He isn't accustomed to the comedy
+of manners&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>"He ought to be. He'd enjoy it so. He's the real
+American. He has imagination and adaptability. It's
+a shame: all the <i>petits fours</i> and Bach recitals wasted
+on Jeff Saxton, when a Milt Dag&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, yes, quite so!"</p>
+
+<p>"No, honest! The dear honey-lamb, so ingenious,
+and really, rather good-looking. But so lonely and
+gregarious&mdash;like a little woolly dog that begs you to
+come and play; and I slapped him when he patted his
+paws and gamboled&mdash;&mdash; It was horrible. I'll never
+forgive myself. Making him drive on ahead in that
+nasty, patronizing way&mdash;&mdash; I feel as if we'd spoiled
+his holiday. I wonder if he had intended to make the
+Yellowstone Park trip? He didn't&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, yes. Let's forget the young man. Look!
+How very curious!"</p>
+
+<p>They were crossing a high bridge over a railroad
+track along which a circus train was bending. Mr.
+Boltwood offered judicious remarks upon the migratory
+habits of circuses, and the vision of the Galahad
+of the Teal bug was thoroughly befogged by parental
+observations, till Claire returned from youthful
+romance to being a sensible Boltwood, and decided that
+after all, Milt was not a lord of the sky-painted mountains.</p>
+
+<p>Before they bent south, at Livingston, Claire had
+her first mountain driving, and once she had to ford a
+stream, putting the car at it, watching the water curve<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>
+up in a lovely silver veil. She felt that she was conquering
+the hills as she had the prairies.</p>
+
+<p>She pulled up on a plateau to look at her battery.
+She noted the edge of a brake-band peeping beyond the
+drum, in a ragged line of fabric and copper wire.
+Then she knew that she didn't know enough to conquer.
+"Do you suppose it's dangerous?" she asked
+her father, who said a lot of comforting things that
+didn't mean anything.</p>
+
+<p>She thought of Milt. She stopped a passing car.
+The driver "guessed" that the brake-band was all
+gone, and that it would be dangerous to continue with
+it along mountain roads. Claire dustily tramped two
+miles to a ranch house, and telephoned to the nearest
+garage, in a town called Saddle Back.</p>
+
+<p>Whenever a motorist has delirium he mutters those
+lamentable words, "Telephoned to the nearest garage."</p>
+
+<p>She had to wait a tedious hour before she saw a
+flivver rattling up with the garage man, who wasn't a
+man at all, but a fourteen-year-old boy. He snorted,
+"Rats, you didn't need to send for me. Could have
+made it perfectly safe. Come on."</p>
+
+<p>Never has the greatest boy pianist received such awe
+as Claire gave to this contemptuous young god, with
+grease on his peachy cheeks. She did come on. But
+she rather hoped that she was in great danger. It
+was humiliating to telephone to a garage for nothing.
+When she came into the gas-smelling garage in Saddle<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>
+Back she said appealingly to the man in charge, a serious,
+lip-puffing person of forty-five, "Was it safe to
+come in with the brake-band like that?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. Pretty risky. Wa'n't it, Mike?"</p>
+
+<p>The Mike to whom he turned for authority was the
+same fourteen-year-old boy. He snapped, "Heh?
+That? Naw! Put in new band. Get busy. Bring
+me the jack. Hustle up, uncle."</p>
+
+<p>While the older man stood about and vainly tried
+to impress people who came in and asked questions
+which invariably had to be referred to his repair boy,
+the precocious expert stripped the wheel down to
+something that looked to Claire distressingly like an
+empty milk-pan. Then the boy didn't seem to know
+exactly what to do. He scratched his ear a good deal,
+and thought deeply. The older man could only scratch.</p>
+
+<p>So for two hours Claire and her father experienced
+that most distressing of motor experiences&mdash;waiting,
+while the afternoon that would have been so good for
+driving went by them. Every fifteen minutes they
+came in from sitting on a dry-goods box in front of
+the garage, and never did the repair appear to be any
+farther along. The boy seemed to be giving all his
+time to getting the wrong wrench, and scolding the
+older man for having hidden the right one.</p>
+
+<p>When she had left Brooklyn Heights, Claire had
+not expected to have such authoritative knowledge of
+the Kalifornia Kandy Kitchen, Saddle Back, Montana,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>
+across from Tubbs' Garage, that she could tell whether
+they were selling more Atharva Cigarettes or Polutropons.
+She prowled about the garage till she knew
+every pool of dripped water in the tin pail of soft
+soap in the iron sink.</p>
+
+<p>She was worried by an overheard remark of the
+boy wonder, "Gosh, we haven't any more of that
+decent brake lining. Have to use this piece of mush."
+But when the car was actually done, nothing like a
+dubious brake could have kept her from the glory
+of starting. The first miles seemed miracles of ease
+and speed.</p>
+
+<p>She came through the mountains into Livingston.</p>
+
+<p>Kicking his heels on a fence near town, and
+fondling a gray cat, sat Milt Daggett, and he yelped
+at her with earnestness and much noise.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XII<br />
+THE WONDERS OF NATURE WITH ALL MODERN IMPROVEMENTS</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">"Hello</span>!" said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"Hel-lo!" said Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"How dee do," said Mr. Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>"This is so nice! Where's your car? I hope
+nothing's happened," glowed Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"No. It's back here from the road a piece. Camp
+there tonight. Reason I stopped&mdash;&mdash; Struck me
+you've never done any mountain driving, and there's
+some pretty good climbs in the Park; slick road, but
+we go up to almost nine thousand feet. And cold
+mornings. Thought I'd tip you off to some driving
+tricks&mdash;if you'd like me to."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, of course. Very grateful&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Then I'll tag after you tomorrow, and speak my
+piece."</p>
+
+<p>"So jolly you're going through the Park."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, thought might as well. What the guide
+books call 'Wonders of Nature.' Only wonder of
+nature I ever saw in Schoenstrom was my friend Mac
+trying to think he was soused after a case of near-beer.
+Well&mdash;&mdash; See you tomorrow."</p>
+
+<p>Not once had he smiled. His tone had been impersonal.
+He vaulted the fence and tramped away.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>When they drove out of town, in the morning, they
+found Milt waiting by the road, and he followed them
+till noon. By urgent request, he shared a lunch, and
+lectured upon going down long grades in first or second
+speed, to save brakes; upon the use of the retarded
+spark and the slipped clutch in climbing. His bug was
+beside the Gomez in the line-up at the Park gate, when
+the United States Army came to seal one's firearms,
+and to inquire on which mountain one intended to be
+killed by defective brakes. He was just behind her all
+the climb up to Mammoth Hot Springs.</p>
+
+<p>When she paused for water to cool the boiling radiator,
+the bug panted up, and with the first grin she had
+seen on his face since Dakota Milt chuckled, "The
+Teal is a grand car for mountains. Aside from overheating,
+bum lights, thin upholstery, faulty ignition,
+tissue-paper brake-bands, and this-here special aviation
+engine, specially built for a bumble-bee, it's what the
+catalogues call a powerful brute!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire and her father stayed at the chain of hotels
+through the Park. Milt was always near them, but
+not at the hotels. He patronized one of the chains of
+permanent camps.</p>
+
+<p>The Boltwoods invited him to dinner at one hotel,
+but he refused and&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>Because he was afraid that Claire would find him
+intrusive, Milt was grave in her presence. He couldn't<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>
+respond either to her enthusiasm about canyon and
+colored pool&mdash;or to her rage about the tourists who,
+she alleged, preferred freak museum pieces to plain
+beauty; who never admired a view unless it was labeled
+by a signpost and megaphoned by a guide as something
+they ought to admire&mdash;and tell the Folks Back Home
+about.</p>
+
+<p>When she tried to express this social rage to Milt he
+merely answered uneasily, "Yes, I guess there's something
+to that."</p>
+
+<p>She was, he pondered, so darn particular. How
+could he ever figure out what he ought to do? No
+thanks; much obliged, but guessed he'd better not accept
+her invitation to dinner. Darn sorry couldn't
+come but&mdash;&mdash; Had promised a fellow down at the
+camp to have chow with him.</p>
+
+<p>If in this Milt was veracious, he was rather fickle
+to his newly discovered friend; for while Claire was
+finishing dinner, a solemn young man was watching
+her through a window.</p>
+
+<p>She was at a table for six. She was listening to a
+man of thirty in riding-breeches, a stock, and a pointed
+nose, who bowed to her every time he spoke, which
+was so frequently that his dining gave the impression
+of a man eating grape-fruit on a merry-go-round.
+Back in Schoenstrom, fortified by Mac and the bunch
+at the Old Home Lunch, Milt would have called the
+man a "dude," and&mdash;though less noisily than the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>
+others&mdash;would have yelped, "Get onto Percy's beer-bottle
+pants. What's he got his neck bandaged for?
+Bet he's got a boil."</p>
+
+<p>But now Milt yearned, "He does look swell. Wish
+I could get away with those things. Wouldn't I look
+like a fool with my knees buttoned up, though! And
+there's two other fellows in dress suits. Wouldn't
+mind those so much. Gee, it must be awful where
+you've got so many suits of trick clothes you don't
+know which one to wear.</p>
+
+<p>"That fellow and Claire are talking pretty swift.
+He doesn't need any piston rings, that lad. Wonder&mdash;wonder
+what they're talking about? Music, I guess,
+and books and pictures and scenery. He's saying that
+no tongue or pen can describe the glories of the Park,
+and then he's trying to describe 'em. And maybe they
+know the same folks in New York. Lord, how I'd
+be out of it. I wish&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Milt made a toothpick out of a match, decided that
+toothpicks were inelegant in his tragic mood, and
+longed: "Never did see her among her own kind of
+folks till now. I wish I could jabber about music and
+stuff. I'll learn it. I will! I can! I picked up autos
+in three months. I&mdash;&mdash; Milt, you're a dub. I wonder
+can they be talking French, maybe, or Wop, or something?
+I could get onto the sedan styles in highbrow
+talk as long as it was in American.</p>
+
+<p>"I could probably spring linen-collar stuff about,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>
+'Really a delightful book, so full of delightful characters,'
+if I stuck by the rhetoric books long enough.
+But once they begin the <i>parlez-vous, oui, oui</i>, I'm a
+gone goose. Still, by golly, didn't I pick up Dutch&mdash;German&mdash;like
+a mice? Back off, son! You did
+not! You can talk Plattdeutsch something grand, as
+long as you keep the verbs and nouns in American.
+You got a nice character, Milt, but you haven't got any
+parts of speech.</p>
+
+<p>"Now look at Percy! Taking a bath in a finger-bowl.
+I never could pull that finger-bowl stuff; pinning
+your ears back and jiu-jitsing the fried chicken,
+and then doing a high dive into a little dish that ain't&mdash;that
+isn't either a wash-bowl or real good lemonade.
+He's a perfect lady, Percy is. Dabs his mouth with
+his napkin like a watchmaker tinkering the carburetor
+in a wrist watch.</p>
+
+<p>"Lookit him bow and scrape&mdash;asking her something&mdash;&mdash; Rats,
+he's going out in the lobby with her.
+Walks like a cat on a wet ash-pile. But&mdash;&mdash; Oh
+thunder, he's all right. Neat. I never could mingle
+with that bunch. I'd be web-footed and butter-fingered.
+And he seems to know all that bunch&mdash;bows
+to every maiden aunt in the shop. Now if I was
+following her, I'd never see anybody but her; rest of
+the folks could all bob their heads silly, and I'd never
+see one blame thing except that funny little soft spot
+at the back of her neck. Nope, you're kind to your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>
+cat, Milt, but you weren't cut out to be no parlor-organ
+duet."</p>
+
+<p>This same meditative young man might have been
+discovered walking past the porch of the hotel, his
+hands in his pockets, his eyes presumably on the stars&mdash;certainly
+he gave no signs of watching Claire and
+the man in riding-breeches as they leaned over the
+rail, looked at mountain-tops filmy in starlight, while
+in the cologne-atomized mode, Breeches quoted:</p>
+
+<div class="poem" style="width: 17em;"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Ah, 'tis far heaven my awed heart seeks<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">When I behold those mighty peaks.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Milt could hear him commenting, "Doesn't that
+just get the feeling of the great open, Miss Boltwood?"</p>
+
+<p>Milt did not catch her answer. Himself, he
+grunted, "I never could get much het up about this
+poetry that's full of Ah's and 'tises."</p>
+
+<p>Claire must have seen Milt just after he had sauntered
+past. She cried, "Oh, Mr. Daggett! Just a
+moment!" She left Breeches, ran down to Milt. He
+was frightened. Was he going to get what he deserved
+for eavesdropping?</p>
+
+<p>She was almost whispering. "Save me from our
+friend up on the porch," she implored.</p>
+
+<p>He couldn't believe it. But he took a chance.
+"Won't you have a little walk?" he roared.</p>
+
+<p>"So nice of you&mdash;just a little way, perhaps?" she
+sang out.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>They were silent till he got up the nerve to admire,
+"Glad you found some people you knew in the
+hotel."</p>
+
+<p>"But I didn't."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I thought your friend in the riding-pants was
+chummy."</p>
+
+<p>"So did I!" She rather snorted.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, he's a nice-looking lad. I did admire those
+pants. I never could wear anything like that."</p>
+
+<p>"I should hope not&mdash;at dinner! The creepy jack-ass,
+I don't believe he's ever been on a horse in his
+life! He thinks riding-breeches are the&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that's it. Breeches, not pants."</p>
+
+<p>"&mdash;last word in smartness. Overdressing is just
+ten degrees worse than underdressing."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't know. Take this sloppy old blue suit
+of mine&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"It's perfectly nice and simple, and quite well cut.
+You probably had a clever tailor."</p>
+
+<p>"I had. He lives in Chicago or New York, I believe."</p>
+
+<p>"Really? How did he come to Schoenstrom?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never been there. This tailor is a busy boy. He
+fitted about eleventeen thousand people, last year."</p>
+
+<p>"I see. Ready mades. Cheer up. That's where
+Henry B. Boltwood gets most of his clothes. Mr.
+Daggett, if ever I catch you in the Aren't-I-beautiful
+frame of mind of our friend back on the porch, I'll
+give up my trip to struggle for your soul."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>"He seemed to have soul in large chunks. He
+seemed to talk pretty painlessly. I had a hunch you
+and he were discussing sculpture, anyway. Maybe
+Rodin."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you know about Rodin?"</p>
+
+<p>"Articles in the magazines. Same place you learned
+about him!" But Milt did not sound rude. He said
+it chucklingly.</p>
+
+<p>"You're perfectly right. And we've probably read
+the very same articles. Well, our friend back there
+said to me at dinner, 'It must be dreadful for you
+to have to encounter so many common people along
+the road.' I said, 'It is,' in the most insulting tone I
+could, and he just rolled his eyes, and hadn't an idea
+I meant him. Then he slickered his hair at me, and
+mooed, 'Is it not wonderful to see all these strange
+manifestations of the secrets of Nature!' and I said,
+'Is it?' and he went on, 'One feels that if one could
+but meet a sympathetic lady here, one's cup of rejoicing
+in untrammeled nature&mdash;&mdash;' Honest, Milt, Mr.
+Daggett, I mean, he did talk like that. Been reading
+books by optimistic lady authors. And one looked at
+me, one did, as if one would be willing to hold my
+hand, if I let one.</p>
+
+<p>"He invited me to come out on the porch and give
+the double O. to handsome mountains as illuminated
+by terrestrial bodies, and I felt so weak in the presence
+of his conceit that I couldn't refuse. Then he insisted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>
+on introducing me to a woman from my own Brooklyn,
+who condoled with me for having to talk to Western
+persons while motoring. Oh, dear God, that such
+people should live ... that the sniffy little Claire
+should once have been permitted to live!... And
+then I saw you!"</p>
+
+<p>Through all her tirade they had stood close together,
+her face visibly eager in the glow from the
+hotel; and Milt had grown taller. But he responded,
+"I'm afraid I might have been just as bad. I haven't
+even reached the riding-breeches stage in evolution.
+Maybe never will."</p>
+
+<p>"No. You won't. You'll go right through it.
+By and by, when you're so rich that father and I
+won't be allowed to associate with you, you'll wear
+riding-breeches&mdash;but for riding, not as a donation to
+the beauties of nature."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I'm already rich. It shows. Waitress down
+at the camp asked me whose car I was driving
+through."</p>
+
+<p>"I know what I wanted to say. Since you won't
+be our guest, will you be our host&mdash;I mean, as far
+as welcoming us? I think it would be fun for father
+and me to stop at your camp, tomorrow night, at the
+canyon, instead of at the hotel. Will you guide me
+to the canyon, if I do?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh&mdash;terribly&mdash;glad!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIII<br />
+ADVENTURERS BY FIRELIGHT</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Neither</span> of the Boltwoods had seen the Grand
+Canyon of the Colorado. The Canyon of the
+Yellowstone was their first revelation of intimidating
+depth and color gone mad. When their car and
+Milt's had been parked in the palisaded corral back
+of the camp at which they were to stay, they three set
+out for the canyon's edge chattering, and stopped
+dumb.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood declined to descend. He returned to
+the camp for a cigar. The boy and girl crept down
+seeming miles of damp steps to an outhanging pinnacle
+that still was miles of empty airy drop above the river
+bed. Claire had a quaking feeling that this rock pulpit
+was going to slide. She thrust out her hand, seized
+Milt's paw, and in its firm warmth found comfort.
+Clinging to its security she followed him by the crawling
+path to the river below. She looked up at columns
+of crimson and saffron and burning brown, up at the
+matronly falls, up at lone pines clinging to jutting
+rocks that must be already crashing toward her, and
+in the splendor she knew the Panic fear that is the
+deepest reaction to beauty.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span>Milt merely shook his head as he stared up. He had
+neither gossiped nor coyly squeezed her hand as he
+had guided her. She fell to thinking that she preferred
+this American boy in this American scene to a
+nimble gentleman saluting the Alps in a dinky green
+hat with a little feather.</p>
+
+<p>It was Milt who, when they had labored back up
+again, when they had sat smiling at each other with
+comfortable weariness, made her see the canyon not
+as a freak, but as the miraculous work of a stream
+rolling grains of sand for millions of years, till it
+had cut this Jovian intaglio. He seemed to have read&mdash;whether
+in books, or in paragraphs in mechanical
+magazines&mdash;a good deal about geology. He made it
+real. Not that she paid much attention to what he
+actually said! She was too busy thinking of the fact
+that he should say it at all.</p>
+
+<p>Not condescendingly but very companionably she
+accompanied Milt in the exploration of their camp
+for the night&mdash;the big dining tent, the city of individual
+bedroom tents, canvas-sided and wooden-floored, each
+with a tiny stove for the cold mornings of these high
+altitudes. She was awed that evening by hearing her
+waitress discussing the novels of Ibanez. Jeff Saxton
+knew the names of at least six Russian novelists, but
+Jeff was not highly authoritative regarding Spanish
+literature.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose she's a school-teacher, working here in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>
+vacation," Claire whispered to Milt, beside her at the
+long, busy, scenically conversational table.</p>
+
+<p>"Our waitress? Well, sort of. I understand she's
+professor of literature in some college," said Milt, in a
+matter of fact way. And he didn't at all see the sequence
+when she went on:</p>
+
+<p>"There is an America! I'm glad I've found it!"</p>
+
+<p>The camp's evening bonfire was made of logs on end
+about a stake of iron. As the logs blazed up, the
+guests on the circle of benches crooned "Suwanee
+River," and "Old Black Joe," and Claire crooned
+with them. She had been afraid that her father would
+be bored, but she saw that, above his carefully tended
+cigar, he was dreaming. She wondered if there had
+been a time when he had hummed old songs.</p>
+
+<p>The fire sank to coals. The crowd wandered off
+to their tents. Mr. Boltwood followed them after an
+apologetic, "Good night. Don't stay up too late."
+With a scattering of only half a dozen people on the
+benches, this huge circle seemed deserted; and Claire
+and Milt, leaning forward, chins on hands, were alone&mdash;by
+their own campfire, among the mountains.</p>
+
+<p>The stars stooped down to the hills; the pines were
+a wall of blackness; a coyote yammered to point the
+stillness; and the mighty pile of coals gave a warmth
+luxurious in the creeping mountain chill.</p>
+
+<p>The silence of large places awes the brisk intruder,
+and Claire's voice was unconsciously lowered as she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>
+begged, "Tell me something about yourself, Mr. Daggett.
+I don't really know anything at all."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you wouldn't be interested. Just Schoenstrom!"</p>
+
+<p>"But just Schoenstrom might be extremely interesting."</p>
+
+<p>"But honest, you'd think I was&mdash;edging in on
+you!"</p>
+
+<p>"I know what you are thinking. The time I suggested,
+way back there in Dakota, that you were sticking
+too close. You've never got over it. I've tried
+to make up for it, but&mdash;&mdash; I really don't blame you.
+I was horrid. I deserve being beaten. But you do
+keep on punishing ra&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Punishing? Lord, I didn't mean to! No!
+Honest! It was nothing. You were right. Looked
+as though I was inviting myself&mdash;&mdash; But, oh,
+pleassssse, Miss Boltwood, don't ever think for a sec.
+that I meant to be a grouch&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Then do tell me&mdash;&mdash; Who is this Milton Daggett
+that you know so much better than I ever can?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well," Milt crossed his knees, caught his chin
+in his hand, "I don't know as I really do know him so
+well. I thought I did. I was onto his evil ways. He
+was the son of the pioneer doctor, Maine folks."</p>
+
+<p>"Really? My mother came from Maine."</p>
+
+<p>Milt did not try to find out that they were cousins.
+He went on, "This kid, Milt, went to high school in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>
+St. Cloud&mdash;town twenty times as big as Schoenstrom&mdash;but
+he drifted back because his dad was old and
+needed him, after his mother's death&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You have no brothers or sisters?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. Nobody. 'Cept Lady Vere de Vere&mdash;which
+animal she is going to get cuffed if she chews up any
+more of my overcoat out in my tent tonight!...
+Well, this kid worked 'round, machinery mostly, and
+got interested in cars, and started a garage&mdash;&mdash; Wee,
+that was an awful shop, first one I had! In
+Rauskukle's barn. Six wrenches and a screwdriver
+and a one-lung pump! And I didn't know a roller-bearing
+from three-point suspension! But&mdash;&mdash; Well,
+anyway, he worked along, and built a regular garage,
+and paid off practically all the mortgage on it&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I remember stopping at a garage in Schoenstrom,
+I'm almost sure it was, for something. I seem to remember
+it was a good place. Do you own it?
+Really?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ye-es, what there is of it."</p>
+
+<p>"But there's a great deal of it. It's efficient.
+You've done your job. That's more than most high-born
+aides-de-camp could say."</p>
+
+<p>"Honestly? Well&mdash;I don't know&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Who did you play with in Schoenstrom? Oh, I
+<i>wish</i> I'd noticed that town. But I couldn't tell then
+that&mdash;&mdash; What, uh, which girl did you fall in love
+with?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>"None! Honest! None! Not one! Never fell
+in love&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You're unfortunate. I have, lots of times. I
+remember quite enjoying being kissed once, at a
+dance."</p>
+
+<p>When he answered, his voice was strange: "I suppose
+you're engaged to somebody."</p>
+
+<p>"No. And I don't know that I shall be. Once, I
+thought I liked a man, rather. He has nice eyes and
+the most correct spectacles, and he is polite to his
+mother at breakfast, and his name is Jeff, and he will
+undoubtedly be worth five or six hundred thousand
+dollars, some day, and his opinions on George Moore
+and commercial paper are equally sound and unoriginal&mdash;&mdash; Oh,
+I ought not to speak of him, and I certainly
+ought not to be spiteful. I'm not at all reticent
+and ladylike, am I! But&mdash;&mdash; Somehow I can't see
+him out here, against a mountain of jagged rock."</p>
+
+<p>"Only you won't always be out here against mountains.
+Some day you'll be back in&mdash;where is it in
+New York State?"</p>
+
+<p>"I confess it's Brooklyn&mdash;but not what you'd mean
+by Brooklyn. Your remark shows you to have subtlety.
+I must remember that, mustn't I! I won't always
+be driving through this big land. But&mdash;&mdash; Will
+I get all fussy and ribbon-tied again, when I go back?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. You won't. You drive like a man."</p>
+
+<p>"What has that&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span>"It has a lot to do with it. A garage man can trail
+along behind another car and figger out, figure out, just
+about what kind of a person the driver is from the way
+he handles his boat. Now you bite into the job. You
+drive pretty neat&mdash;neatly. You don't either scoot too
+far out of the road in passing a car, or take corners
+too wide. You won't be fussy. But still, I suppose
+you'll be glad to be back among your own folks and
+you'll forget the wild Milt that tagged along&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Milt&mdash;or Mr. Daggett&mdash;no, Milt! I shall never,
+in my oldest grayest year, in a ducky cap by the fireplace,
+forget the half-second when your hand came
+flashing along, and caught that man on the running-board.
+But it wasn't just that melodrama. If that
+hadn't happened, something else would have, to symbolize
+you. It's that you&mdash;oh, you took me in, a
+stranger, and watched over me, and taught me the
+customs of the country, and were never impatient.
+No, I shan't forget that; neither of the Boltwoods
+will."</p>
+
+<p>In the rose-haze of firelight he straightened up and
+stared at her, but he settled into shyness again as she
+added:</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps others would have done the same thing.
+I don't know. If they had, I should have remembered
+them too. But it happened that it was you, and I, uh,
+my father and I, will always be grateful. We both
+hope we may see you in Seattle. What are you planning<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span>
+to do there? What is your ambition? Or is
+that a rude question?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, uh&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"What I mean&mdash;&mdash; I mean, how did you happen
+to want to go there, with a garage at home? You still
+control it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes. Left my mechanic in charge. Why, I
+just kind of decided suddenly. I guess it was what
+they call an inspiration. Always wanted a long trip,
+anyway, and I thought maybe in Seattle I could hook
+up with something a little peppier than Schoenstrom.
+Maybe something in Alaska. Always wished I were
+a mechanical or civil engineer so&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Then why don't you become one? You're
+young&mdash;&mdash; How old are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Twenty-five."</p>
+
+<p>"We're both children, compared with Je&mdash;compared
+with some men who are my friends. You're
+quite young enough to go to engineering school. And
+take some academic courses on the side&mdash;English, so
+on. Why don't you? Have you ever thought of it?"</p>
+
+<p>"N-no, I hadn't thought of doing it, but&mdash;&mdash; All
+right. I will! In Seattle! B'lieve the University
+of Washington is there."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I do. You're the boss."</p>
+
+<p>"That's&mdash;that's flattering, but&mdash;&mdash; Do you always
+make up your mind as quickly as this?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>"When the boss gives orders!"</p>
+
+<p>He smiled, and she smiled back, but this time it was
+she who was embarrassed. "You're rather overwhelming.
+You change your life&mdash;if you really do
+mean it&mdash;because a <i>jeune fille</i> from Brooklyn is so impertinent,
+from her Olympian height of finishing-school
+learning, as to suggest that you do so."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know what a <i>jeune fille</i> is, but I do
+know&mdash;&mdash;" He sprang up. He did not look at her.
+He paraded back and forth, three steps to the right,
+three to the left, his hands in his pockets, his voice impersonal.
+"I know you're the finest person I ever
+met. You're the kind&mdash;I knew there must be people
+like you, because I knew the Joneses. They're the only
+friends I've got that have, oh, I suppose it's what they
+call culture."</p>
+
+<p>In a long monologue, uninterrupted by Claire, he
+told of his affection for the Schoenstrom "prof" and
+his wife. The practical, slangy Milt of the garage was
+lost in the enthusiastic undergraduate adoring his
+instructor in the university that exists as veritably
+in a teacher's or a doctor's sitting-room in every
+Schoenstrom as it does in certain lugubrious stone
+hulks recognized by a state legislature as magically empowered
+to paste on sacred labels lettered "Bachelor
+of Arts."</p>
+
+<p>He broke from his revelations to plump down on
+the bench beside her, to slap his palm with his fist,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>
+and sigh, "Lord, I've been gassing on! Guess I bored
+you!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, please, Milt, please! I see it all so&mdash;&mdash; It
+must have been wonderful, the evening when Mrs.
+Jones read Noyes's 'Highwayman' aloud. Tell me&mdash;long
+before that&mdash;were you terribly lonely as a little
+boy?"</p>
+
+<p>Now Milt had not been a terribly lonely little boy.
+He had been a leader in a gang devoted to fighting,
+swimming, pickerel-spearing, beggie-stealing, and
+catching rides on freights.</p>
+
+<p>But he believed that he was accurately presenting
+every afternoon of his childhood, as he mused, "Yes,
+I guess I was, pretty much. I remember I used to sit
+on dad's doorstep, all those long sleepy summer afternoons,
+and I'd think, 'Aw, geeeeee, I&mdash;wisht&mdash;I&mdash;had&mdash;somebody&mdash;to&mdash;play&mdash;with!'
+I always wanted to
+make-b'lieve Robin Hood, but none of the other kids&mdash;so
+many of them were German; they didn't know
+about Robin Hood; so I used to scout off alone."</p>
+
+<p>"If I could only have been there, to be Maid
+Marian for you! We'd have learned archery! Lonely
+little boy on the doorstep!" Her fingers just touched
+his sleeve. In her gesture, the ember-light caught the
+crystal of her wrist watch. She stooped to peer at it,
+and her pitying tenderness broke off in an agitated:
+"Heavings! Is it that late? To bed! Good night,
+Milt."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>"Good night, Cl&mdash;&mdash; Miss Boltwood."</p>
+
+<p>"No. 'Claire,' of course. I'm not normally a first-name-snatcher,
+but I do seem to have fallen into saying
+'Milt.' Night!"</p>
+
+<p>As she undressed, in her tent, Claire reflected, "He
+won't take advantage of my being friendly, will he?
+Only thing is&mdash;&mdash; I sha'n't dare to look at Henry B.
+when Milt calls me 'Claire' in that sedate Brooklyn
+Heights presence. The dear lamb! Lonely afternoons&mdash;&mdash;!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIV<br />
+THE BEAST OF THE CORRAL</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">They</span> met in the frost-shimmering mountain
+morning, on their way to the corral, to get their
+cars ready before breakfast. They were shy, hence
+they were boisterous, and tremendously unreferential
+to campfire confidences, and informative about distilled
+water for batteries, and the price of gas in the Park.
+On Milt's shoulder rode Vere de Vere who, in her
+original way, relieved one pause by observing "Mrwr."</p>
+
+<p>They came in through the corral gate before any
+of the other motor tourists had appeared&mdash;and they
+stupidly halted to watch a bear, a large, black, adipose
+and extremely unchained bear, stalk along the line of
+cars, sniff, cock an ear at the Gomez, lumber up on its
+running-board, and bundle into the seat. His stern
+filled the space between side and top, and he was to be
+heard snuffing.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Look! Milt! Left box of candy on
+seat&mdash;&mdash; Oh, please drive him away!"</p>
+
+<p>"Me? Drive&mdash;that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Frighten him away. Aren't animals afraid human
+eye&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Not in this park. Guns forbidden. Animals protected
+by U. S. Army, President, Congress, Supreme<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>
+Court, Department of Interior, Monroe Doctrine, W.
+C. T. U. But I'll try&mdash;cautiously."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you want me think you're hero?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ye-es, providin' I don't have to go and be one."</p>
+
+<p>They edged toward the car. The bear flapped his
+hind legs, looked out at the intruders, said "Oofflll!"
+and returned to the candy.</p>
+
+<p>"Shoo!" Milt answered politely.</p>
+
+<p>"Llooffll!"</p>
+
+<p>From his own bug, beside the Gomez, Milt got a
+tool kit, and with considerable brilliance as a pitcher
+he sent a series of wrenches at the agitated stern of
+the bear. They offended the dignity of the ward of
+the Government. He finished the cover and ribbons
+of the candy box, and started for Milt ... who proceeded
+with haste toward Claire ... who was already
+at the gate.</p>
+
+<p>Lady Vere de Vere, cat of a thousand battles, gave
+one frightful squawl, shot from Milt's shoulder and at
+the bear, claws out, fur electric. The bear carelessly
+batted once with its paw, and the cat sailed into the
+air. The satisfied bear strolled to the fence, shinned
+up it and over.</p>
+
+<p>"Good old Vere! That wallop must of darn near
+stunned her, though!" Milt laughed to Claire, as they
+trotted back into the corral. The cat did not move,
+as they came up; did not give the gallant "Mrwr"
+with which she had saluted Milt on lonely morning<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>
+after morning of forlorn driving behind the Gomez.
+He picked Vere up.</p>
+
+<p>"She's&mdash;she's dead," he said. He was crying.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Milt&mdash;&mdash; Last night you said Vere was all
+the family you had. You have the Boltwoods, now!"</p>
+
+<p>She did not touch his hand, nor did they speak as
+they walked soberly to the far side of the corral, and
+buried Lady Vere de Vere. At breakfast they talked
+of the coming day's run, from the canyon out of the
+Park, and northward. But they had the queer, quick
+casualness of intimates.</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>It was at breakfast that her father heard one Milt
+Daggett address the daughter of the Boltwoods as
+"Claire." The father was surprised into clearing his
+throat, and attacking his oatmeal with a zealousness
+unnatural in a man who regarded breakfast-foods as
+moral rather than interesting.</p>
+
+<p>While he was lighting a cigar, and Claire was paying
+the bill, Mr. Boltwood stalked Milt, cleared his
+throat all over again, and said, "Nice morning."</p>
+
+<p>It was the first time the two men had talked unchaperoned
+by Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. We ought to have a good run, sir." The
+"sir" came hard. The historian puts forth a theory
+that Milt had got it out of fiction. "We might go up
+over Mount Washburn. Take us up to ten thousand
+feet."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>"Uh, you said&mdash;didn't Miss Boltwood tell me that
+you are going to Seattle, too?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Friends there, no doubt?"</p>
+
+<p>Milt grinned irresistibly. "Not a friend. But I'm
+going to make 'em. I'm going to take up engineering,
+and some French, I guess, at the university there."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah. Really?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Been too limited in my ambition. Don't see
+why I shouldn't get out and build railroads and
+power plants and roads&mdash;Siberia, Africa, all sorts of
+interesting places."</p>
+
+<p>"Quite right. Quite right. Uh, ah, I, oh, I&mdash;&mdash; Have
+you seen Miss Boltwood?"</p>
+
+<p>"I saw Miss Boltwood in the office."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes. Quite so. Uh&mdash;ah, here she is."</p>
+
+<p>When the Gomez had started, Mr. Boltwood skirmished,
+"This young man&mdash;&mdash; Do you think you better
+let him call you by your Christian name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why not? I call him 'Milt.' 'Mr. Daggett' is
+too long a handle to use when a man is constantly
+rescuing you from the perils of the deep or hoboes or
+bears or something. Oh, I haven't told you. Poor
+old Milt, his cat was killed&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, yes, dolly, you may tell me about that in
+due time, but let's stick to this social problem for a
+moment. Do you think you ought to be too intimate
+with him?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span>"He's only too self-respecting. He wouldn't take
+advantage&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm quite aware of that. I'm not speaking on your
+behalf, but on his. I'm sure he's a very amiable chap,
+and ambitious. In fact&mdash;&mdash; Did you know that he
+has saved up money to attend a university?"</p>
+
+<p>"When did he tell you that? How long has he
+been planning&mdash;&mdash; I thought that I&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Just this morning; just now."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! I'm relieved."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't quite follow you, dolly, but&mdash;&mdash; Where
+was I? Do you realize what a demure tyrant you are?
+If you can drag me from New York to the aboriginal
+wilds, and I did <i>not</i> like that oatmeal, what will you do
+to this innocent? I want to protect him!"</p>
+
+<p>"You better! Because I'm going to carve him, and
+paint him, and possibly spoil him. The creating of a
+man&mdash;of one who knows how to handle life&mdash;is so
+much more wonderful than creating absurd pictures or
+statues or stories. I'll nag him into completing college.
+He'll learn dignity&mdash;or perhaps lose his simplicity
+and be ruined; and then I'll marry him off to
+some nice well-bred pink-face, like Jeff Saxton's pretty
+cousin&mdash;who may turn him into a beastly money-grubber;
+and I'm monkeying with destiny, and I ought
+to be slapped, and I realize it, and I can't help it, and
+all my latent instinct as a feminine meddler is aroused,
+and&mdash;golly, I almost went off that curve!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XV<br />
+THE BLACK DAY OF THE VOYAGE</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">That</span> was the one black day of her voyage&mdash;black
+stippled with crimson.</p>
+
+<p>It began with the bear's invasion of the car, resulting
+in long claw-marks across the upholstery, the
+loss of some particularly good candy bought at a Park
+hotel, and genuine grief abiding after the sentimental
+tragedy of Vere de Vere's death. The next act was
+the ingenious loss of all power of her engine. She
+forgot that, before breakfast, Milt had filled the oil-well
+for her. When she stopped for gasoline, and the
+seller inquired, "Quart of oil?"&mdash;she absently nodded.
+So the cylinders filled with surplus oil, the spark-plugs
+were fouled, and the engine had the power of a sewing
+machine.</p>
+
+<p>She could not make Mount Washburn&mdash;she could
+not make even the slopes of the lower road. Now she
+knew the agony of the feeble car in the mountains&mdash;most
+shameful and anxious of a driver's dolors: the
+brisk start up the hill, the belief that you will keep
+on going this time; the feeling of weariness through
+all the car; the mad shifting of gears, the slipping of
+the clutch, and more gas, and less gas, and wondering
+whether more gas or less is the better, and the appalling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>
+knocking when you finally give her a lot too much
+gas; the remembrance, when it's too late, to retard the
+spark; the safe crawling up to the last sharp pitch, just
+fifteen feet from the summit; the car's halting; the
+yelp at your passenger, "Jump out and push!"; the
+painful next five feet; and the final death of the power
+just as the front wheels creep up over the pitch. Then
+the anxious putting on of brakes&mdash;holding the car with
+both foot-brake and emergency, lest it run down backward,
+slip off the road. The calf of your leg begins to
+ache from the pressure on the foot-brake, and with an
+unsuccessful effort to be courteous you bellow at the
+passenger, who has been standing beside the car looking
+deprecatory, "Will you please block the back
+wheels with a stone&mdash;hustle up, will you!"</p>
+
+<p>All this routine Claire thoroughly learned. Always
+Milt bumbled up, said cheerful things, and either
+hauled the Gomez over the pitch by a towline to his
+bug, or getting out, pushing on a rear fender till his
+neck was red and bulgy, gave the extra impetus necessary
+to get the Gomez over.</p>
+
+<p>"Would you mind shoving on that side, just a little
+bit?" he suggested to Mr. Boltwood, who ceased the
+elaborate smoking of cigars, dusted his hands, and
+gravely obeyed, while Claire was awaiting the new captain's
+command to throw on the power.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish we weren't under so much obligation to
+this young man," said Mr. Boltwood, after one crisis.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>"I know but&mdash;what can we do?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you suppose we might pay him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Henry B. Boltwood, if you tried to do that&mdash;&mdash; I'm
+not sure. Your being my parent might save you,
+but even so, I think he'd probably chase you off the
+road, clear down into that chasm."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose so. Shall we have to entertain him in
+Seattle?"</p>
+
+<p>"Have to? My dear parent, you can't keep me from
+it! Any of the Seattle friends of Gene Gilson who
+don't appreciate that straight, fine, aspiring boy may
+go&mdash;&mdash; Not overdo it, you understand. But&mdash;&mdash; Oh,
+take him to the theater. By the way; shall we
+try to climb Mount Rainier before&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"See here, my good dolly; you stop steering me
+away from my feeble parental efforts. Do you wish
+to be under obligations&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't mind, with Milt. He wouldn't charge interest,
+as Jeff Saxton would. Milt is, oh, he's folks!"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite true. But are we? Are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Learning to be!"</p>
+
+<p>Between discussions and not making hills, Claire
+cleaned the spark plugs as they accumulated carbon
+from the surplus oil&mdash;or she pretended to help Milt
+clean them. The plugs were always very hot, and
+when you were unscrewing the jacket from the core,
+you always burned your hand, and wished you could
+swear ... and sometimes you could.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>After noon, when they had left the Park and entered
+Gardiner, Milt announced, "I've got to stick
+around a while. The key in my steering-gear seems to
+be worn. May have to put in a new one. Get the
+stuff at a garage here. If you wouldn't mind waiting,
+be awful glad to tag, and try to give a few helping
+hands till the oil cleans itself out."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll just stroll on," she said, but she drove away
+as swiftly as she could. Her father's worry about
+obligations disturbed her, and she did not wish to
+seem too troublesome an amateur to Milt. She would
+see him in Livingston, and tell him how well she had
+driven. The spark plugs kept clean enough now so
+that she could command more power, but&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Between the Park and the transcontinental road
+there are many climbs short but severely steep; up-shoots
+like the humps on a scenic railway. To tackle
+them with her uncertain motor was like charging a
+machine-gun nest. She spent her nerve-force lavishly,
+and after every wild rush to make a climb, she had to
+rest, to rub the suddenly aching back of her neck.
+Because she was so tired, she did not take the trouble
+to save her brakes by going down in gear. She let
+the brakes smoke while the river and railroad below
+rose up at her.</p>
+
+<p>There was a long drop. How long it was she did
+not guess, because it was concealed by a curve at the
+top. She seemed to plane down forever. The brakes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>
+squealed behind. She tried to shift to first but there
+was a jarring snarl, and she could neither get into
+first nor back into third. She was running in neutral,
+the great car coasting, while she tried to slow it by
+jamming down the foot-brake. The car halted&mdash;and
+started on again. The brake-lining which had been
+wished on her at Saddle Back was burnt out.</p>
+
+<p>She had the feeling of the car bursting out from
+under control ... ready to leap off the road, into a
+wash. She wanted to jump. It took all her courage to
+stay in the seat. She got what pressure she could
+from the remaining band. With one hand she kept
+the accelerating car in the middle of the road; with
+the other she tried to pull the handle of the emergency
+brake back farther. She couldn't. She was
+not strong enough. Faster, faster, rushing at the
+next curve so that she could scarce steer round it&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>As quietly as she could, she demanded of her father,
+"Pull back on this brake lever, far as you can. Take
+both hands."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't understand&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Heavens! Y' don't haft un'stand! Yank back!
+Yank, I tell you!"</p>
+
+<p>Again the car slowed. She was able to get into
+second speed. Even that check did not keep the car
+from darting down at thirty miles an hour&mdash;which
+pace, to one who desires to saunter down at a dignified
+rate of eighteen, is equivalent in terms of mileage on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>
+level ground to seventy an hour, with a drunken driver,
+on a foggy evening, amid traffic.</p>
+
+<p>She got the car down and, in the midst of a valley
+of emptiness and quiet, she dropped her head on her
+father's knee and howled.</p>
+
+<p>"I just can't face going down another hill! I just
+can't face it!" she sobbed.</p>
+
+<p>"No, dolly. Mustn't. We better&mdash;&mdash; You're
+quite right. This young Daggett is a very gentlemanly
+fellow. I didn't think his table-manners&mdash;&mdash; But
+we'll sit here and regard the flora and fauna till he
+comes. He'll see us through."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes! He will! Honestly, dad&mdash;&mdash;" She said it
+with the first touch of hero-worship since she had seen
+an aviator loop loops. "Isn't he, oh, effective! Aren't
+you glad he's here to help us, instead of somebody like
+Jeff Saxton?"</p>
+
+<p>"We-ul, you must remember that Geoffrey wouldn't
+have permitted the brake to burn out. He'd have foreseen
+it, and have had a branch office, with special
+leased wire, located back on that hill, ready to do business
+the instant the market broke. Enthusiasm is a
+nice quality, dolly, but don't misplace it. This lad,
+however trustworthy he may be, would scarcely even
+be allowed to work for a man like Geoffrey Saxton.
+It may be that later, with college&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No. He'd work for Jeff two hours. Then Jeff
+would give him that 'You poor fish!' look, and Milt<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>
+would hit him, and stroll out, and go to the North
+Pole or some place, and discover an oil-well, and hire
+Jeff as his nice, efficient general manager. And&mdash;&mdash; I
+do wish Milt would hurry, though!"</p>
+
+<p>It was dusk before they heard the pit-pit-pit chuckling
+down the hill. Milt's casual grin changed to
+bashfulness as Claire ran into the road, her arms wide
+in a lovely gesture of supplication, and cried, "We
+been waiting for you so long! One of my brake-bands
+is burnt out, and the other is punk."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, well. Let's try to figure out something
+to do."</p>
+
+<p>She waited reverently while the local prophet sat in
+his bug, stared at the wheels of the Gomez, and
+thought. The level-floored, sagebrush-sprinkled hollow
+had filled with mauve twilight and creeping stilly
+sounds. The knowable world of yellow lights and
+security was far away. Milt was her only means of
+ever getting back to it.</p>
+
+<p>"Tell you what we might try," he speculated. "I'll
+hitch on behind you, and hold back in going down
+hill."</p>
+
+<p>She did not even try to help him while he again
+cleaned the spark plugs and looked over brakes, oil,
+gas, water. She sat on the running-board, and it was
+pleasant to be relieved of responsibility. He said
+nothing at all. While he worked he whistled that recent
+refined ballad:</p>
+
+<div class="poem" style="width: 18em;"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">I wanta go back to Oregon<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And sit on the lawn, and look at the dawn.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Oh motheruh dear, don't leavuh me here,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The leaves are so sere, in the fallothe year,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I wanta go back to Oregugon,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To dearuh old Oregugon.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>They started, shouting optimistically to each other,
+lights on, trouble seeming over&mdash;and they stopped
+after the next descent, and pools of tears were in the
+corners of Claire's eyes. The holdback had not succeeded.
+Her big car, with its quick-increasing momentum,
+had jerked at the bug as though it were a
+lard-can. The tow-rope had stretched, sung, snapped,
+and again, in fire-shot delirium, she had gone rocking
+down hill.</p>
+
+<p>He drove up beside her, got out, stood at her elbow.
+His "I'm a bum inventor. We'll try somethin' else"
+was so careless that, in her nerve-twanging exhaustion
+she wailed, "Oh, don't be so beastly cheerful! You
+don't care a bit!"</p>
+
+<p>In the dusk she could see him straighten, and his
+voice came sharp as he ignored the ever-present
+parental background and retorted, "Somebody has got
+to be cheerful. Matter fact, I worked out the right
+stunt, coming down."</p>
+
+<p>Like a man in the dentist's chair, recovering between
+bouts, she drowsed and ignored the fact that in a few
+minutes she would again have to reassemble herself,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>
+become wakeful and calm, and go through quite impossible
+maneuvers of driving. Milt was, with a
+hatchet from his camping-kit, cutting down a large
+scrub pine. He dragged it to the Gomez and hitched
+it to the back axle. The knuckles of the branches
+would dig into the earth, the foliage catch at every
+pebble.</p>
+
+<p>"There! That anchor would hold a truck!" he
+shouted.</p>
+
+<p>It held. She went down the next two hills easily.
+But she was through. Her forearms and brain were
+equally numb. She appealed to Milt, "I can't seem to
+go on any more. It's so dark, and I'm so tired&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"All right. No ranch houses anywheres near, so
+we'll camp here, if Mr. Boltwood doesn't mind."</p>
+
+<p>Claire stirred herself to help him prepare dinner.
+It wasn't much of a dinner to prepare. Both cars had
+let provisions run low. They had bacon and petrified
+ends of a loaf and something like coffee&mdash;not much
+like it. Scientists may be interested in their discovery
+that as a substitute for both cream and sugar in beverages
+strawberry jam is a fallacy.</p>
+
+<p>For Mr. Boltwood's bed Milt hauled out the springy
+seat-cushions of both cars. The Gomez cushion was
+three inches thicker than that of the bug, which
+resulted in a mattress two stories in front with a lean-to
+at the foot, and the entire edifice highly slippery.
+But with a blanket from Milt's kit, it was sufficient.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>
+To Claire, Milt gave another blanket, his collection of
+antique overcoats, and good advice. He spoke vaguely
+of a third blanket for himself. And he had one. Its
+dimensions were thirteen by twenty inches, it was of
+white wool, he had bought it in Dakota for Vere de
+Vere, and many times that day he had patted it and
+whispered, "Poor old cat."</p>
+
+<p>Under his blankets Mr. Boltwood thought of rattlesnakes,
+bears, rheumatism, Brooklyn, his debt to Milt,
+and the fact that&mdash;though he hadn't happened to mention
+it to Claire&mdash;he had expected to be killed when
+the brake had burned out.</p>
+
+<p>Claire was drowsily happy. She had got through.
+She was conscious of rustling sagebrush, of the rapids
+of the Yellowstone beside her, of open sky and sweet
+air and a scorn for people in stuffy rooms, and comfortably
+ever conscious of Milt, ten feet away. She
+had in him the interest that a young physician would
+have in a new X-ray machine, a printer in a new font
+of type, any creator in a new outlet for his power.
+She would see to it that her Seattle cousins, the Gilsons,
+helped him to know the right people, during his
+university work. She herself would be back in Brooklyn,
+but perhaps he would write to her, write&mdash;write
+letters&mdash;Brooklyn&mdash;she was in Brooklyn&mdash;no,
+no, where was she?&mdash;oh, yes, camping&mdash;bad day&mdash;brakes&mdash;&mdash; No,
+she would not marry Jeff Saxton!
+Brooklyn&mdash;river singing&mdash;stars&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>And when Milt wasn't unromantically thinking of
+his cold back, he exulted. "She won't be back among
+her own folks till Seattle. Probably forget me then.
+Don't blame her. But till we get there, she'll let me
+play in her yard. Gee! In the morning I'll be talking
+to her again, and she's right there, right now!"</p>
+
+<p>In the morning they were all very stiff, but glad of
+the sun on sagebrush and river, and the boy and girl
+sang over breakfast. While Milt was gathering fuel he
+looked up at Claire standing against a background of
+rugged hills, her skirt and shoes still smug, but her
+jacket off, her blouse turned in at the throat, her hair
+blowing, her sleeves rolled up, one hand on her hip,
+erect, charged with vigor&mdash;the spirit of adventure.</p>
+
+<p>When her brake had been relined, at Livingston,
+they sauntered companionably on to Butte. And the
+day after Butte, when Milt was half a mile behind the
+Gomez, a pink-haired man with a large, shiny revolver
+stepped out from certain bushes, and bowed politely,
+and at that point Milt stopped.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVI<br />
+THE SPECTACLES OF AUTHORITY</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Over</span> the transcontinental divide and into Butte,
+diamond-glittering on its hills in the dark; into
+Missoula, where there are trees and a university, with
+a mountain in everybody's backyard; through the
+Flathead Agency, where scarlet-blanketed Indians
+stalk out of tepees and the papoose rides on mother's
+back as in forgotten days; down to St. Ignatius, that
+Italian Alp town with its old mission at the foot of
+mountains like the wall of Heaven, Claire had driven
+west, then north. She was sailing past Flathead Lake,
+where fifty miles of mountain glory are reflected in
+bright waters. Everywhere were sections of flat
+wheat-plains, stirring with threshing, with clattering
+machinery and the flash of blown straw. But these
+miniature prairies were encircled by abrupt mountains.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood remarked, "I'd rather have one of
+these homesteads and look across my fields at those
+hills than be King of England." Not that he made
+any effort to buy one of the homesteads. But then,
+he made no appreciable effort to become King of
+England.</p>
+
+<p>Claire had not seen Milt for a day and a half; not
+since the morning when both cars had left Butte. She<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>
+wondered, and was piqued, and slightly lonely. Toward
+evening, when she was speculating as to whether
+she would make Kalispell&mdash;almost up to the Canadian
+border&mdash;she saw a woman run into the road from a
+house on the shore of Flathead Lake. The woman
+held out her hand. Claire pulled up.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you Miss Boltwood?"</p>
+
+<p>It was as startling as the same question would
+have been in a Chinese village.</p>
+
+<p>"W-why, yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Somebody trying to get you on the long-distance
+'phone."</p>
+
+<p>"Me? 'Phone?"</p>
+
+<p>She was trembling. "Something's happened to
+Milt. He needs me!" She could not manage her
+voice, as she got the operator on the farmers'-line wire,
+and croaked, "Was some one trying to get Miss Boltwood?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. This Boltwood? Hotel in Kalispell trying
+to locate you, for two hours. Been telephoning all
+along the line, from Butte to Somers."</p>
+
+<p>"W-well, w-will you g-get 'em for me?"</p>
+
+<p>It was not Milt's placid and slightly twangy voice
+but one smoother, more decisive, perplexingly familiar,
+that finally vibrated, "Hello! Hello! Miss Boltwood!
+Operator, I can't hear. Get me a better connection.
+Miss Boltwood?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes! Yes! This is Miss Boltwood!" she kept<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>
+beseeching, during a long and not unheated controversy
+between the unknown and the crisp operator,
+who knew nothing of the English language beyond,
+"Here's your party. Why don't you talk? Speak
+louder!"</p>
+
+<p>Then came clearly, "Hear me now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes! Yes!"</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Boltwood?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh. Oh, hello, Claire. This is Jeff."</p>
+
+<p>"Jess who?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not Jess. Jeff! Geoffrey! J-e-f-f! Jeff Saxton!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh!" It was like a sob. "Why&mdash;why&mdash;but
+you're in New York."</p>
+
+<p>"Not exactly, dear. I'm in Kalispell, Montana."</p>
+
+<p>"But that's right near here."</p>
+
+<p>"So am I!"</p>
+
+<p>"B-but&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Out West to see copper interests. Traced you
+from Yellowstone Park but missed you at Butte.
+Thought I'd catch you on road. You talking from
+Barmberry's?"</p>
+
+<p>The woman who had hailed her was not missing a
+word of a telephone conversation which might be relative
+to death, fire, elopement, or any other dramatic
+event. Claire begged of her, "Where in the world
+am I talking from, anyway?"</p>
+
+<p>"This is Barmberry's Inn."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>"Yes," Claire answered on the telephone, "I seem
+to be. Shall I start on and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No. Got ripping plan. Stay right where you are.
+Got a fast car waiting. Be right down. We'll have
+dinner. By!"</p>
+
+<p>A click. No answer to Claire's urgent hellos. She
+hung up the receiver very, very carefully. She hated
+to turn and face her audience of Mr. Henry B. Boltwood,
+Mr. James Barmberry, Mrs. James Barmberry,
+and four Barmberry buds averaging five and a quarter
+in age. She tried to ignore the Barmberrys, but their
+silence was noisy and interested while she informed
+her father, "It's Jeff Saxton! Out here to see copper
+mines. Telephoned along road to catch us. Says
+we're to wait dinner till he comes."</p>
+
+<p>"Yessum," Mrs. Barmberry contributed, "he told
+me if I did catch you, I was to have some new-killed
+chickens ready to fry, and some whipped cream&mdash;&mdash; Jim
+Barmberry, you go right out and finish whipping
+that cream, and don't stand there gawping and gooping,
+and you children, you scat!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire seized the moment of Mr. Boltwood's lordly
+though bewildered bow to their hostess, and escaped
+outdoors. Round the original settler's log-cabin were
+nests of shacks and tents, for bedrooms, and on a
+screened porch, looking on Flathead Lake, was the
+dining-room. The few other guests had finished supper
+and gone to their tents.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span>She ambled to the lake shore, feeling feebler, more
+slapped and sent back to be a good little girl, than she
+had when Milt had hitched a forest to the back axle,
+three days ago. A map of her thoughts about Jeff Saxton
+would have shown a labyrinth. Now, she was muttering,
+"Dear Jeff! So thoughtful! Clever of him
+to find me! So good to see him again!" Now: "It's
+still distinctly understood that I am not engaged to
+him, and I'm not going to be surprised into kissing him
+when he comes down like a wolf on the fold." Now:
+"Jeff Saxton! Here! Makes me homesick for the
+Heights. And nice shops in Manhattan, and a really
+good play&mdash;music just before the curtain goes up."
+Now: "Ohhhhhh geeeeee whizzzzzz! I wonder if
+he'll let us go any farther in the car? He's so managerial,
+and dad is sure to take his side. He tried to
+scare us off by that telegram to Fargo." Now: "He'd
+be horrified if he knew about that bum brake. Milt
+didn't mind. Milt likes his womenfolks to be daring.
+Jeff wants his harem admiring and very reliable."</p>
+
+<p>She crouched on the shore, a rather forlorn
+figure. The peaks of the Mission Range, across the
+violet-shadowed mirror of Flathead Lake, were a
+sudden pure rose, in reflection of sunset, then stony,
+forbidding. Across the road, on the Barmberry porch,
+she could hear her father saying "Ah?" and "Indeed?"
+to James's stories.</p>
+
+<p>Up the road, a blaring horn, great lights growing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>
+momently more dazzling, a roar, a rush, the halting
+car, and out of its blurred bulk, a trim figure darting&mdash;Jeff
+Saxton&mdash;home and the people she loved, and the
+ways and days she knew best of all. He had shouted
+only "Is Miss&mdash;&mdash;" before she had rushed to him,
+into the comfort of his arms, and kissed him.</p>
+
+<p>She backed off and tried to sound as if it hadn't
+happened, but she was quavery: "I can't believe it!
+It's too ridiculously wonderful to see you!" She
+retreated toward the Barmberry porch, Jeff following,
+his two hands out. They came within the range of
+the house lights, and Mr. Boltwood hailed, "Ah!
+Geoffrey! Never had such a surprise&mdash;nor a more
+delightful one!"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Boltwood! Looking splendid, sir! New
+man! William Street better look to its laurels when
+you come back and get into the game!"</p>
+
+<p>Then, on the lamp-lighted porch, the two men
+shook hands, and looked for some other cordial thing
+to do. They thought about giving each other cigars.
+They smiled, and backed away, and smiled, in the
+foolish, indeterminate way males have, being unable
+to take it out in kissing. Mr. Boltwood solved the
+situation by hemming, "Must trot in and wash. See
+you very soon." Mr. James Barmberry and the squad
+of lesser Barmberrys regretfully followed. Claire
+was alone with Jeff, and she was frightened. Yet she
+was admitting that Jeff, in his English cap and flaring<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>
+London top-coat, his keen smile and his extreme
+shavedness, was more attractive than she had remembered.</p>
+
+<p>"Glad to see me?" he demanded.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, rather!"</p>
+
+<p>"You're looking&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You're so&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Nice trip? You know you've sent me nothing but
+postcards with 'Pretty town,' or something equally
+sentimental."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it's really been bully. These mountains and
+big spaces simply inspire me." She said it rather defiantly.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course they do! Trouble is, with you away,
+we've nothing to inspire us!"</p>
+
+<p>"Do you need anything, with your office and your
+club?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, Claire!"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sorry. That was horrid of me."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it was. Though I don't mind. I'm sure
+we've all become meek, missing you so. I'm quite
+willing to be bullied, and reminded that I'm a mere
+T.B.M."</p>
+
+<p>She had got herself into it; she had to tell him that
+he wasn't just a business man; that she had "just
+meant" he was so practical.</p>
+
+<p>"But Jeff is no longer the practical one," he declared.
+"Think of Claire driving over deserts and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>
+mountains. But&mdash;&mdash; Oh, it's been so lonely for us.
+Can you guess how much? A dozen times every evening,
+I've turned to the telephone to call you up and
+beg you to let me nip in and see you, and then realized
+you weren't there, and I've just sat looking at the
+'phone&mdash;&mdash; Oh, other people are so dull!"</p>
+
+<p>"You really miss&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I wish I were a poet, so I could tell you adequately.
+But you haven't said you missed me, Claire. Didn't
+you, a teeny bit? Wouldn't it have been tolerable to
+have poor old Jeff along, to drive down dangerous
+hills&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And fill grease-cups! Nasty and stickum on the
+fingers!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I'd have done that, too. And invented surprises
+along the way. I'm a fine surpriser! I've
+arranged for a motor-boat so we can explore the lake
+here tomorrow. That's why I had you wait here instead
+of coming on to Kalispell. Tomorrow morning,
+unfortunately, I have to hustle back and catch a train&mdash;called
+to California, and possibly a northern trip.
+But meantime&mdash;&mdash; By now, my driver must have
+sneaked my s'prises into the kitchen."</p>
+
+<p>"What are they?"</p>
+
+<p>"Guess."</p>
+
+<p>"Food. Eats. Divine eats."</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe."</p>
+
+<p>"But what? Please, sir. Claire is so hungry."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>"We shall see in time, my child. Uncle Jeff is not
+to be hurried."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah&mdash;let&mdash;me&mdash;see&mdash;now! I'll kick and scream!"</p>
+
+<p>From New York Jeff had brought a mammoth
+picnic basket. To the fried chicken ordered for dinner
+he added sealed jars of pur&eacute;e of wood pigeon, of
+stuffed artichokes prepared by his club chef; caviar
+and anchovies; a marvelous nightmare-creating fruit
+cake to go with the whipped cream; two quarts of a
+famous sherry; candied fruits in a silver box. Dinner
+was served not on the dining-porch but before the fire
+in the Barmberrys' living-room. Claire looked at the
+candied fruits, stared at Jeff rather queerly&mdash;as though
+she was really thinking of some one else&mdash;and mused:</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't know I cared so much for these foolish
+luxuries. Tonight, I'd like a bath, just a tiny bit
+scented, and a real dressing-table with a triple mirror,
+and French talc, and come down in a dinner-gown&mdash;&mdash; Oh,
+I have enjoyed the trip, Jeff. But my poor body
+does get so tired and dusty, and then you treacherously
+come along with these things that you've magicked
+out of the mountains and&mdash;&mdash; I'm not a pioneer
+woman, after all. And Henry B. is not a caveman.
+See him act idolatrously toward his soup."</p>
+
+<p>"I feel idolatrous. I'd forgotten the supreme ethical
+importance of the soup. I'll never let myself
+forget it again," said Mr. Boltwood, in the tone of
+one who has come home.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>Claire was grateful to Jeff that he did not let her
+go on being grateful. He turned the talk to Brooklyn.
+He was neat and explicit&mdash;and almost funny&mdash;in his
+description of an outdoor presentation of <i>Midsummer
+Night's Dream</i>, in which a domestic and intellectual
+lady weighing a hundred and eighty-seven stageside
+had enacted Puck. As they sat after dinner, as Claire
+shivered, he produced a knitted robe, and pulled it
+about her shoulders, smiling at her in a lonely, hungry
+way. She caught his hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Nice Jeff!" she whispered.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, my dear!" he implored. He shook his head
+in a wistful way that caught her heart, and dutifully
+went back to informing Mr. Boltwood of the true
+state of the markets.</p>
+
+<p>"Talk to Claire too!" she demanded. She stopped,
+stared. From outside she heard a nervous pit-pit-pit,
+a blurred dialogue between Mr. James Barmberry and
+another man. Into the room rambled Milt Daggett,
+dusty of unpressed blue suit, tired of eyes, and not
+too well shaved of chin, grumbling, "Thought I'd
+never catch up with you, Claire&mdash;&mdash; Why&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Oh, Milt&mdash;Mr. Daggett&mdash;&mdash; Oh, Jeff, this
+is our good friend Milt Daggett, who has helped us
+along the road."</p>
+
+<p>Jeff's lucid rimless spectacles stared at Milt's wind-reddened
+eyes; his jaunty patch-pocket outing clothes
+sniffed at Milt's sweater; his even voice followed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>
+Milt's grunt of surprise with a curt "Ah. Mr.
+Daggett."</p>
+
+<p>"Pleased meet you," faltered Milt.</p>
+
+<p>Jeff nodded, turned his shoulder on Milt, and went
+on, "The fact is, Mr. Boltwood, the whole metal
+market&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Milt was looking from one to another. Claire was
+now over her first shocked comparison of candied
+fruits with motor grease. She rose, moved toward
+Milt, murmuring, "Have you had dinner?"</p>
+
+<p>The door opened again. A pink-haired, red-faced
+man in a preposterous green belted suit lunged in,
+swept his broad felt hat in greeting, and boomed like a
+cheap actor:</p>
+
+<p>"Friends of my friend Milt, we about to dine salute
+you. Let me introduce myself as Westlake Parrott,
+better known to the vulgar as Pinky Parrott, gentleman
+adventurer, born in the conjunction of Mars and
+Venus, with Saturn ascendant."</p>
+
+<p>Jeff had ignored Milt. But at this absurd second
+intrusion on his decidedly private dinner-party he
+flipped to the center of the room and said "I beg
+your pardon!" in such a head-office manner that the
+pink-locked Mystery halted in his bombast. Claire
+felt wabbly. She had no theories as to where Milt
+had acquired a private jester, nor as to what was about
+to happen to Milt&mdash;and possibly to her incautious
+self.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVII<br />
+THE VAGABOND IN GREEN</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">As</span> Milt had headed westward from Butte, as he
+rattled peacefully along the road, conscious of
+golden haze over all the land, and the unexpectedness
+of prairie threshing-crews on the sloping fields of
+mountainsides, a man had stepped out from bushes
+beside the road, and pointed a .44 navy revolver.</p>
+
+<p>The man was not a movie bandit. He wore a green
+imitation of a Norfolk jacket, he had a broad red
+smile, and as he flourished his hat in a bow, his hair
+was a bristly pompadour of gray-streaked red that
+was almost pink. He made oration:</p>
+
+<p>"Pardon my eccentric greeting, brother of the open
+road, but I wanted you to give ear to my obsequious
+query as to how's chances on gettin' a lift? I have
+learned that obsequiousness is best appreciated when
+it is backed up by prayer and ca'tridges."</p>
+
+<p>"What's the idea? I seem to gather you'd like a
+lift. Jump in."</p>
+
+<p>"You do not advocate the Ciceronian style, I take
+it," chuckled the man as he climbed aboard.</p>
+
+<p>Milt was not impressed. Claire might have been,
+but Milt had heard politics and religion argued about
+the stove in Rauskukle's store too often to be startled<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>
+by polysyllabomania. He knew it was often the sign
+of a man who has read too loosely and too much by
+himself. He snorted. "Huh! What are you&mdash;newspaper,
+politics, law, preacher, or gambler?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, a little of all those interesting occupations.
+And ten-twent-thirt trouping, and county-fair spieling,
+and selling Dr. Thunder Rapids' Choctaw Herbal
+Sensitizer. How far y' going?"</p>
+
+<p>"Seattle."</p>
+
+<p>"Honest? Say, kid, this is&mdash;&mdash; Muh boy, we
+shall have the rare privilege of pooling adventures as
+far as Blewett Pass, four to six days' run from here&mdash;a
+day this side of Seattle. I'm going to my gold-mine
+there. I'll split up on the grub&mdash;I note from your kit
+that you camp nights. Quite all right, my boy. Pinky
+Parrott is no man to fear night air."</p>
+
+<p>He patted Milt's shoulder with patronizing insolence.
+He filled a pipe and, though the car was
+making twenty-five, he lighted the pipe with distinguished
+ease, then settled down to his steady stride:</p>
+
+<p>"In the pride of youth, you feel that you have thoroughly
+categorized me, particularly since I am willing
+to admit that, though I shall have abundance of the
+clinking iron men to buy my share of our chow, I
+chance just for the leaden-footed second to lack the
+wherewithal to pay my railroad fare back to Blewett;
+and the bumpers and side-door Pullman of the argonauts
+like me not. Too damn dusty. But your analysis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>
+is unsynthetic, though you will scarce grasp my
+paradoxical metaphor."</p>
+
+<p>"The hell I won't. I've taken both chemistry and
+rhetoric," growled Milt, strictly attending to driving,
+and to the desire to get rid of his parasite.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Oh, I see. Well, anyway: I am no mere
+nimble knight of wits, as you may take it. In fact,
+I am lord of fair acres in Arcady."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't know the burg. Montana or Idaho?"</p>
+
+<p>"Neither! In the valley of dream!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! That one. Huh!"</p>
+
+<p>"But I happen to back them up with a perfectly undreamlike
+gold-mine. Prospected for it in a canyon
+near Blewett Pass and found it, b' gum, and my lady
+wife, erstwhile fairest among the society favorites of
+North Yakima, now guards it against her consort's
+return. Straight goods. Got the stuff. Been to Butte
+to get a raise on it, but the fell khedives of commerce
+are jealous. They would hearken not. Gee, those
+birds certainly did pull the frigid mitt! So I wend my
+way back to the demure Dolores, the houri of my
+heart, and the next time I'll take a crack at the big
+guns in Seattle. And I'll sure reward you for your
+generosity in taking me to Blewett, all the long, long,
+languid, languorous way&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Too bad I got to stop couple of days at Spokane."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then you shall have the pleasure of taking
+me that far."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>"And about a week in Kalispell!"</p>
+
+<p>"'Twill discommode me, but 'pon honor, I like your
+honest simple face, and I won't desert you. Besides!
+I know a guy in Kalispell, and I can panhandle the
+sordid necessary chuck while I wait for you. Little
+you know, my cockerel, how facile a brain your 'bus
+so lightly bears. When I've cashed in on the mine,
+I'll take my rightful place among the motored gentry.
+Not merely as actor and spieler, promoter and inventor
+and soldier and daring journalist, have I played my
+r&ocirc;le, but also I am a mystic, an initiate, a clairaudient,
+a psychometrist, a Rosicrucian adept, and profoundly
+psychic&mdash;in fact, my guide is Hermes Trismegistus
+himself! I also hold a degree as doctor of mento-practic,
+and my studies in astro-biochemistry&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Gonna stop. All off. Make little coffee," said
+Milt.</p>
+
+<p>He did not desire coffee, and he did not desire to
+stop, but he did desperately desire not to inflict Pinky
+Parrott upon the Boltwoods. It was in his creed as a
+lover of motors never to refuse a ride to any one,
+when he had room. He hoped to get around his creed
+by the hint implied in stopping. Pinky's reaction to
+the hint was not encouraging:</p>
+
+<p>"Why, you have a touch of the psychic's flare! I
+could do with coffee myself. But don't trouble to
+make a fire. I'll do that. You drive&mdash;I do the camp
+work. Not but that I probably drive better than you,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>
+if you will permit me to say so. I used to do a bit
+of racing, before I took up aviation."</p>
+
+<p>"Huh! Aviation! What machine d'you fly?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, why&mdash;a biplane!"</p>
+
+<p>"Huh! What kind of motor?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, a foreign one. The&mdash;the&mdash;&mdash; It was a
+French motor."</p>
+
+<p>"Huh! What track you race on?"</p>
+
+<p>"The&mdash;&mdash; Pardon me till I build a fire for our
+<i>al fresco</i> collation, and I my driving history will unfold."</p>
+
+<p>But he didn't do either.</p>
+
+<p>After he had brought seven twigs, one piece of
+sagebrush, and a six-inch board, Pinky let Milt finish
+building the fire, while he told how much he knew
+about the mysteries of ancient Egyptian priests.</p>
+
+<p>Milt gave up hope that Pinky would become bored
+by waiting and tramp on. After one hour of conversational
+deluge, he decided to let Pinky drive&mdash;to
+make him admit that he couldn't. He was wrong.
+Pinky could drive. He could not drive well, he wabbled
+in his steering, and he killed the engine on a grade,
+but he showed something of the same dashing idiocy
+that characterized his talk. It was Milt not Pinky,
+who was afraid of their running off the road, and
+suggested resuming the wheel.</p>
+
+<p>Seven times that day Milt tried to lose him. Once
+he stopped without excuse, and merely stared up at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>
+rocks overhanging the hollowed road. Pinky was not
+embarrassed. He leaned back in the seat and sang
+two Spanish love songs. Once Milt deliberately took
+a wrong road, up a mountainside. They were lost,
+and took five hours getting back to the highway.
+Pinky loved the thrill and&mdash;in a brief address lasting
+fifteen minutes&mdash;he said so.</p>
+
+<p>Milt tried to bore him by driving at seven miles an
+hour. Pinky affectionately accepted this opportunity
+to study the strata of the hills. When they camped,
+that night, Pinky loved him like a brother, and was
+considering not stopping at Blewett Pass, to see his
+gold-mine and Dolores the lady-wife, but going clear
+on to Seattle with his playmate.</p>
+
+<p>The drafted host lay awake, and when Pinky awoke
+and delivered a few well-chosen words on the subject
+of bird-song at dawn, Milt burst out:</p>
+
+<p>"Pinky, I don't like to do it, but&mdash;&mdash; I've never
+refused a fellow a lift, but I'm afraid you'll have to
+hike on by yourself, the rest of the way."</p>
+
+<p>Pinky sat up in his blankets. "Afraid of me, eh?
+You better be! I'm a bad actor. I killed Dolores's
+husband, and took her along, see? I&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Are you trying to scare me, you poor four-flusher?"
+Milt's right hand expanded, fingers arching,
+with the joyous tension of a man stretching.</p>
+
+<p>"No. I'm just reading your thoughts. I'm telling
+you you're scared of me! You think that if I went<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>
+on, I might steal your car! You're afraid because
+I'm so suave. You aren't used to smooth ducks. You
+don't dare to let me stick with you, even for today!
+You're afraid I'd have your mis'able car by tonight!
+You don't dare!"</p>
+
+<p>"The hell I don't!" howled Milt. "If you think
+I'm afraid&mdash;&mdash; Just to show you I'm not, I'll let you
+go on today!"</p>
+
+<p>"That's sense, my boy. It would be a shame for two
+such born companions of the road to part!" Pinky
+had soared up from his blankets; was lovingly shaking
+Milt's hand.</p>
+
+<p>Milt knew that he had been tricked, but he felt
+hopeless. Was it impossible to insult Pinky? He tried
+again:</p>
+
+<p>"I'll be frank with you. You're the worst wind-jamming
+liar I ever met. Now don't reach for that
+gat of yours. I've got a hefty rock right here handy."</p>
+
+<p>"But, my dear, dear boy, I don't intend to reach for
+any crude lethal smoke-wagon. Besides, there isn't
+anything in it. I hocked the shells in Butte. I am not
+angry, merely grieved. We'll argue this out as we
+have breakfast and drive on. I can prove to you that,
+though occasionally I let my fancy color mere untutored
+fact with the pigments of a Robert J. Ingersoll&mdash;&mdash; By
+the way, do you know his spiel on
+whisky?"</p>
+
+<p>"Stick to the subject. We'll finish our arguing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>
+right now, and I'll give you breakfast, and we'll sadly
+part."</p>
+
+<p>"Merely because I am lighter of spirits than this
+lugubrious old world? No! I decline to be dropped.
+I'll forgive you and go on with you. Mind you, I am
+sensitive. I will not intrude where I am not welcome.
+Only you must give me a sounder reason than my
+diverting conversational powers for shucking me. My
+logic is even stronger than my hedonistic contempt for
+hitting the pike."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, hang it, if you must know&mdash;&mdash; Hate to say
+it, but I'd do almost anything to get rid of you. Fact
+is, I've been sort of touring with a lady and her father,
+and you would be in the way!"</p>
+
+<p>"Aaaaaaah! You see! Why, my boy, I will not
+only stick, but for you, I shall do the nimble John
+Alden and win the lady fair. I will so bedizen your
+virile, though somewhat crassly practical gifts&mdash;&mdash; Why,
+women are my long suit. They fall for&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Tut, tut, tut! You're a fool. She's no beanery
+mistress, like you're used to. She really is a lady."</p>
+
+<p>"How blind you are, cruel friend. You do not
+even see that whatever my vices may be, my social
+standing&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh&mdash;shut&mdash;up! Can't you see I'm trying to be
+kind to you? Have I simply got to beat you up before
+you begin to suspect you aren't welcome? Your social
+standing isn't even in the telephone book. And your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span>
+vocabulary&mdash;&mdash; You let too many 'kids' slip in
+among the juicy words. Have I got to lick&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Well. You're right. I'm a fliv. Shake hands,
+m' boy, and no hard feelings."</p>
+
+<p>"Good. Then I can drive on nice and alone, without
+having to pound your ears off?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly. That is&mdash;we'll compromise. You take
+me on just a few miles, into more settled country, and
+I'll leave you."</p>
+
+<p>So it chanced that Milt was still inescapably accompanied
+by Mr. Pinky Parrott, that evening, when he
+saw Claire's Gomez standing in the yard at Barmberry's
+and pulled up.</p>
+
+<p>Pinky had voluntarily promised not to use his eloquence
+on Claire, nor to try to borrow money from
+Mr. Boltwood. Without ever having quite won permission
+to stay, he had stayed. He had also carried
+out his promise to buy his half of the provisions by
+adding a five-cent bag of lemon drops to Milt's bacon
+and bread.</p>
+
+<p>When they had stopped, Milt warned, "There's
+their machine now. Seems to be kind of a hotel here.
+I'm going in and say howdy. Good-by, Pink. Glad
+to have met you, but I expect you to be gone when I
+come out here again. If you aren't&mdash;&mdash; Want granite
+or marble for the headstone? I mean it, now!"</p>
+
+<p>"I quite understand, my lad. I admire your chivalric
+delicacy. Farewell, old <i>compagnon de voyage</i>!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>Milt inquired of Mr. Barmberry whether the Boltwoods
+were within, and burst into the parlor-living-room-library.
+As he cried to Claire, by the fire,
+"Thought I'd never catch up with you," he was conscious
+that standing up, talking to Mr. Boltwood, was
+an old-young man, very suave, very unfriendly of eye.
+He had an Oxford-gray suit, unwrinkled cordovan
+shoes; a pert, insultingly well-tied blue bow
+tie, and a superior narrow pink bald spot. As he
+heard Jeff Saxton murmur, "Ah. Mr. Daggett!"
+Milt felt the luxury in the room&mdash;the fleecy robe over
+Claire's shoulders, the silver box of candy by her
+elbow, the smell of expensive cigars, and the portly
+complacence of Mr. Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>"Have you had any dinner?" Claire was asking,
+when a voice boomed, "Let me introduce myself as
+Westlake Parrott."</p>
+
+<p>Jeff abruptly took charge. He faced Pinky and
+demanded, "I beg pardon!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire's eyebrows asked questions of Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"This is a fellow I gave a lift to. Miner&mdash;I mean
+actor&mdash;well, kind of spiritualistic medium&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood, with the geniality of dinner and
+cigar, soothed, "Jeff, uh, Daggett here has saved our
+lives two distinct times, and given us a great deal of
+help. He is a motor expert. He has always refused
+to let us do anything in return but&mdash;&mdash; I noticed
+there was almost a whole fried chicken left. I wonder<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>
+if he wouldn't share it with, uh, with his acquaintance
+here before&mdash;before they make camp for the night?"</p>
+
+<p>In civil and vicious tones Jeff began, "Very glad
+to reward any one who has been of service to&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He was drowned out by Pinky's effusive, "True
+hospitality is a virtue as delicate as it is rare. We
+accept your invitation. In fact I should be glad to
+have one of those cigarros elegantos that mine olfactory&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Milt cut in abruptly, "Pink! Shut up! Thanks,
+folks, but we'll go on. Just wanted to see if you had
+got in safe. See you tomorrow, some place."</p>
+
+<p>Claire was close to Milt, her fingers on his sleeve.
+"Please, Milt! Father! You didn't make your introduction
+very complete. You failed to tell Mr. Daggett
+that this is Mr. Saxton, a friend of ours in
+Brooklyn. Please, Milt, do stay and have dinner. I
+won't let you go on hungry. And I want you to know
+Jeff&mdash;Mr. Saxton.... Jeff, Mr. Daggett is an
+engineer, that is, in a way. He's going to take an
+engineering course in the University of Washington.
+Some day I shall make you bloated copper magnates
+become interested in him.... Mrs. Barmberry.
+Mrssssssss. Barrrrrrrmberrrrrry! Oh. Oh, Mrs.
+Barmberry, won't you please warm up that other
+chicken for&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, now, that's too bad. Me and Jim have et it
+all up!" wept the landlady, at the door.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>"I'll go on," stammered Milt.</p>
+
+<p>Jeff looked at him expressionlessly.</p>
+
+<p>"You will not go on!" Claire was insisting. "Mrs.
+Barmberry, won't you cook some eggs or steak or
+something for these boys?"</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps," Jeff suggested, "they'd rather make
+their own dinner by a campfire. Must be very jolly,
+and that sort of thing."</p>
+
+<p>"Jeff, if you don't mind, this is my party, just for
+the moment!"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite right. Sorry!"</p>
+
+<p>"Milt, you sit here by the fire and get warm. I'm
+not going to be robbed of the egotistic pleasure of
+being hospitable. Everybody look happy now!"</p>
+
+<p>She got them all seated&mdash;all but Pinky. He had
+long since seated himself, by the fire, in Claire's chair,
+and he was smoking a cigar from the box which Jeff
+had brought for Mr. Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>Milt sat farthest from the fire, by the dining-table.
+He was agonizing, "This Jeff person is the real thing.
+He's no Percy in riding-breeches. He's used to
+society and nastiness. If he looks at me once more&mdash;young
+garage man found froze stiff, near Flathead
+Lake, scared look in eyes, believed to have met a
+grizzly, no signs of vi'lence. And I thought I could
+learn to mingle with Claire's own crowd! I wish I
+was out in the bug. I wonder if I can't escape?"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVIII<br />
+THE FALLACY OF ROMANCE</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">During</span> dinner Milt watched Jeff Saxton's manner
+and manners. The hot day had turned into
+a cold night. Jeff tucked the knitted robe about
+Claire's shoulders, when she returned to the fire. He
+moved quietly and easily. He kept poking up the fire,
+smiling at Claire as he did so. He seemed without
+difficulty to maintain two conversations: one with Mr.
+Boltwood about finances, one with Claire about mysterious
+persons called Fannie and Alden and Chub and
+Bobbie and Dot, the mention of whom made Milt
+realize how much a stranger he was. Once, as he
+passed by Claire, Jeff said gently, "You <i>are</i> lovely!"
+Only that, and he did not look at her. But Milt saw
+that Claire flushed, and her eyes dimmed.</p>
+
+<p>Pinky was silent till he had eaten about two-thirds
+of the total amount of fried eggs, cold lamb and ice-box
+curios. When Claire came over to see how they
+fared, Pinky removed himself, with smirking humility,
+and firmly joined himself to Jeff and Mr. Boltwood.
+He caught the subject of finance and, while Claire
+dropped down in the chair by Milt, Pinky was lecturing
+the two men from New York:</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, finance! Queen of the sociological pantheon!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span>
+I don't know how come I am so graced by Fortune as
+to have encountered in these wilds two gentlemen so
+obviously versed in the stratagems of the great golden
+game, but I will take the opportunity to give you gentlemen
+some statistics about the gold-deposits still
+existent in the Cascades and other ranges that may be
+of benefit and certainly will be a surprise to you. It
+happens that I have at the present time a mine&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Claire was whispering to Milt, "If we can get rid
+of your dreadful passenger, I do want you to meet
+Mr. Saxton. He may be of use to you some day.
+He's terribly capable, and really quite nice. Think!
+He happened to be out here, and he traced me by telephone&mdash;oh,
+he treats long-distance 'phoning as I do
+a hair-pin. He brought down the duckiest presents&mdash;divertissements
+for dinner, and that knitted robe, and
+some real Ren&eacute; Bleuzet perfume&mdash;I was all out of
+it&mdash;&mdash; And after the grime of the road&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Do you really care for things like that, all those
+awfully expensive luxuries?" begged Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course I do. Especially after small hotels."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you don't really like adventuring?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes&mdash;in its place! For one thing, it makes a
+clever dinner seem so good by contrast!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well&mdash;&mdash; Afraid I don't know much about clever
+dinners," Milt was sighing, when he was aware of
+Jeff Saxton looming down on him, demanding:</p>
+
+<p>"Daggett, would you mind trying to inform your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>
+friend that neither Mr. Boltwood nor I care to
+invest in his gold-mine? We can't seem to get that
+into his head. I don't mind being annoyed myself,
+but I really feel I must protect Mr. Boltwood."</p>
+
+<p>"What can I do?"</p>
+
+<p>"My dear sir, since you brought him here&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>It was the potassium cyanide and cracked ice and
+carpet tacks and TNT and castor oil in Jeff's "My
+dear sir" that did it. Milt discovered himself on his
+feet, bawling, "I am not your dear sir! Pinky is my
+guest, and&mdash;&mdash; Gee, sorry I lost my temper, Claire,
+terrible sorry. See you along the road. Good night.
+Pink! You take your hat! Git!"</p>
+
+<p>Milt followed Pinky out of the door, snarling, "Git
+in the car, and do it quick. I'll take you clear to
+Blewett Pass. We drive all night."</p>
+
+<p>Pinky was of great silence and tact. Milt lumped
+into the bug beside him. But he did not start the all-night
+drive. He wanted to crawl back, on his knees,
+to apologize to Claire&mdash;and to be slapped by Jeff
+Saxton. He compromised by slowly driving a quarter
+of a mile up the road, and camping there for the night.</p>
+
+<p>Pinky tried to speak words of philosophy and
+cheer&mdash;just once he tried it.</p>
+
+<p>For hours, by a small fire, Milt grieved that all his
+pride was gone in a weak longing to see Claire again.
+In the morning he did see her&mdash;putting off on the
+lake, in a motor-boat with Jeff and Mr. Barmberry.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>
+He saw the boat return, saw Jeff get into the car
+which had brought him from Kalispell, saw the farewell,
+the long handclasp, the stoop of Jeff's head, and
+Claire's quick step backward before Jeff could kiss
+her. But Claire waved to Jeff long after his car had
+started.</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>When Claire and her father came along in the
+Gomez, Milt was standing by the road. She stopped.
+She smiled. "Night of sadness and regrets? You
+were fairly rude, Milt. So was Mr. Saxton, but I've
+lectured him, and he sends his apologies."</p>
+
+<p>"I send him mine&mdash;'deed I do," said Milt gravely.</p>
+
+<p>"Then everything's all right. I'm sure we were
+all tired. We'll just forget it."</p>
+
+<p>"Morning, Daggett," Mr. Boltwood put in. "Hope
+you lose that dreadful red-headed person."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I can't, Mr. Boltwood. When Mr. Saxton
+turned on me, I swore I'd take Pinky clear through
+to Blewett Pass ... though not to Seattle, by
+golly!"</p>
+
+<p>"Foolish oaths should be broken," Claire platitudinized.</p>
+
+<p>"Claire&mdash;look&mdash;&mdash; You don't really care so terribly
+much about these little luxuries, food and fixin's
+and six-dollar-a-day-hotel junk, do you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," stoutly, "I do."</p>
+
+<p>"But not compared with mountains and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span>"Oh, it's all very well to talk, and be so superior
+about these dear old grandeurs of Nature, and the
+heroism of pioneers, and I do like a glimpse of them.
+But the niceties of life do mean something and even
+if it is weak and dependent, I shall always simply
+adore them!"</p>
+
+<p>"All these things are kind of softening." And he
+meant that she was still soft.</p>
+
+<p>"At least they're not rude!" And she meant that
+he was rude.</p>
+
+<p>"They're absolutely trivial. They shut off&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"They shut off rain and snow and dirt, and I still
+fail to see the picturesqueness of dirt! Good-by!"</p>
+
+<p>She had driven off, without looking back. She
+was heading for Seattle and the Pacific Ocean at
+forty miles an hour&mdash;and they had no engagement to
+meet either in Seattle or in the Pacific.</p>
+
+<p>Before Milt went on he completed a task on which
+he had decided the night before while he had meditated
+on the tailored impertinence of Jeff Saxton's
+gray suit. The task was to give away the Best Suit,
+that stolid, very black covering which at Schoenstrom
+had seemed suitable either to a dance or to the
+Y. P. S. C. E. The recipient was Mr. Pinky Parrott,
+who gave in return a history of charity and high
+souls.</p>
+
+<p>Milt did not listen. He was wondering, now that
+they had started, where they had started for. Certainly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>
+not for Seattle! Why not stop and see Pinky's
+gold-mine? Maybe he did have one. Even Pinky
+had to tell the truth sometimes. With a good popular
+gold-mine in his possession, Milt could buy quantities
+of clothes like Jeff Saxton's, and&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"And," he reflected, "I can learn as good manners
+as his in one hour, with a dancing lesson thrown in.
+If I didn't, I'd sue the professor!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIX<br />
+THE NIGHT OF ENDLESS PINES</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">On</span> the edge of Kootenai Canyon, feeling more like
+an aviator than like an automobilist, Claire had
+driven, and now, nearing Idaho, she had entered a
+national forest. She was delayed for hours, while she
+tried to change a casing, after a blow-out when the
+spare tire was deflated. She wished for Milt. She
+would never see him again. She was sorry. He
+hadn't meant&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>But hang it, she panted, if he admired her at all,
+he'd be here now and get on this per-fect-ly beast-ly
+casing, over which she had been laboring for a dozen
+years; and she was simply too ridiculously tired; and
+was there any respectful way of keeping Henry B.
+from beaming in that benevolent manner while she
+was killing herself; and look at those fingernails; and&mdash;oh,
+drrrrrrat that casing!</p>
+
+<p>To make the next town, after this delay, she had to
+drive for hours by night through the hulking pines of
+the national forest. It was her first long night drive.</p>
+
+<p>A few claims, with log cabins of recent settlers,
+once or twice the shack of a forest-ranger, a telephone
+in a box by the road or a rough R. F. D. box nailed
+to a pine trunk, these indicated that civilization still<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span>
+existed, but they were only melancholy blurs. She
+was in a cold enchantment. All of her was dead save
+the ability to keep on driving, forever, with no hope
+of the tedium ending. She was bewildered. She
+passed six times what seemed to be precisely the same
+forest clearing, always with the road on a tiny ridge
+to the left of the clearing, always with a darkness-stilled
+house at one end and always, in the pasture at
+the other end, a horse which neighed. She was in a
+panorama stage-scene; things moved steadily by her,
+there was a sound of the engine, and a sensation of
+steering, but she was forever in the same place, among
+the same pines, with the same scowling blackness between
+their bare clean trunks. Only the road ahead
+was clear: a one-way track, the foot-high earthy bank
+and the pine-roots beside it, two distinct ruts, and a
+roughening of strewn brown bark and pine-needles,
+which, in the beating light of the car's lamps, made
+the sandy road scabrous with little incessant shadows.</p>
+
+<p>She had never known anything save this strained
+driving on. Jeff and Milt were old tales, and untrue.
+Was it ten hours before that she had cooked dinner
+beside the road? No matter. She wasn't hungry any
+longer. She would never reach the next town&mdash;and
+she didn't care. It wasn't she, but a grim spirit which
+had entered her dead body, that kept steering, feeding
+gas, watching the road.</p>
+
+<p>In the darkness outside the funnel of light from her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span>
+lamps were shadows that leaped, and gray hands
+hastily jerked back out of sight behind tree trunks as
+she came up; things that followed her, and hidden
+men waiting for her to stop.</p>
+
+<p>As drivers will, she tried to exorcise the creeping
+fear by singing. She made up what she called her
+driving-song. It was intended to echo the hoofs of
+a fat old horse on a hard road:</p>
+
+<div class="poem" style="width: 24em;"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">The old horse trots with a jog, jog, jog,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And a jog, jog, jog; and a jog, jog, jog.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And the old road makes a little jog, jog, jog,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To the west, jog, jog; and the north, jog, jog.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">While the farmer drinks some cider from his jug, jug, jug,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">From his coy jug, jug; from his joy jug, jug.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Till he accumulates a little jag, jag, jag,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And he jigs, jigs, jigs, with his jug, jug, jug&mdash;&mdash;<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The song was a comfort, at first&mdash;then a torment.
+She drove to it, and she steered to it, and when she
+tried to forget, it sang itself in her tired brain: "Jog,
+jog, jog&mdash;oh, <i>damn</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>Her father had had a chill. Miserable, weak as a
+small boy, he had curled up on the bottom of the car,
+his head on the seat, and gone to sleep. She was
+alone. The mile-posts went by slowly. The posts
+said there was a town ahead called Pellago, but it
+never came&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>And when it did come she was too tired to care.
+In a thick dream she drove through midnight streets
+of the town. In stupid paralysis she kicked at the
+door of the galvanized-iron-covered garage. No
+answer. She gave it up. She drove down the street
+and into the yard of a hotel marked by a swing sign
+out over the plank sidewalk. She got out the traveling
+bags, awakened her father, led him up on the porch.</p>
+
+<p>The Pellago Tavern was a transformed dwelling
+house. The pillars of the porch were aslant, and the
+rain-warped boards snapped beneath her feet. She
+hesitatingly opened the door. The hallway was dark
+and musty. A sound like a moan filtered down the
+unlighted stairs.</p>
+
+<p>There seemed to be light in the room on the right.
+Trying to assure herself that her father was a protection,
+she pushed open the door. She looked into an
+airless room, scattered with rubber boots, unsavory
+old corduroy caps, tattered magazines. By the stove
+nodded a wry-mouthed, squat old woman, and a tall,
+cheaply handsome man of forty. Tobacco juice
+stained the front of his stiff-bosomed, collarless shirt.
+His hands were white but huge.</p>
+
+<p>The old woman started. "Well?"</p>
+
+<p>"I want to get two rooms for the night, please."</p>
+
+<p>The man smirked at her. The woman creaked,
+"Well, I don't know. Where d' you come from,
+heh?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>"We're motoring through."</p>
+
+<p>"Heh? Who's that man?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's my father, madam."</p>
+
+<p>"Needn't to be so hoity-toity about it, 'he's my
+father, madam!' F' that matter, that thing there is
+my husband!"</p>
+
+<p>The man had been dusting his shabby coat, stroking
+his mustache, smiling with sickly gallantry. He burbled,
+"Shut up, Teenie. This lady is all right. Give
+her a room. Number 2 is empty, and I guess Number
+7 has been made up since Bill left&mdash;if 'tain't, the sheets
+ain't been slept on but one night."</p>
+
+<p>"Where d' you come&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Now don't go shooting off a lot of questions at
+the lady, Teenie. I'll show her the rooms."</p>
+
+<p>The woman turned on her husband. He was perhaps
+twenty-five years younger; a quarter-century less
+soaked in hideousness. Her yellow, concave-sided
+teeth were bared at him, her mouth drew up on one
+side above the gums. "Pete, if I hear one word more
+out of you, out you go. Lady! Huh! Where d' you
+come from, young woman?"</p>
+
+<p>Claire was too weak to stagger away. She leaned
+against the door. Her father struggled to speak, but
+the woman hurled:</p>
+
+<p>"Wherdjuhcomfromised!"</p>
+
+<p>"From New York. Is there another hotel&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Nah, there ain't another hotel! Oh! So you come<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>
+from New York, do you? Snobs, that's what N'
+Yorkers are. I'll show you some rooms. They'll be
+two dollars apiece, and breakfast fifty cents extra."</p>
+
+<p>The woman led them upstairs. Claire wanted to
+flee, but&mdash;&mdash; Oh, she couldn't drive any farther!
+She couldn't!</p>
+
+<p>The floor of her room was the more bare in contrast
+to a two-foot-square splash of gritty ingrain
+carpet in front of the sway-backed bed. On the bed
+was a red comforter that was filthy beyond disguise.
+The yellow earthenware pitcher was cracked. The
+wall mirror was milky. Claire had been spoiled. She
+had found two excellent hotels since Yellowstone
+Park. She had forgotten how badly human beings can
+live. She protested:</p>
+
+<p>"Seems to me two dollars is a good deal to charge
+for this!"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't say two dollars. I said three! Three
+each for you and your pa. If you don't like it you
+can drive on to the next town. It's only sixteen
+miles!"</p>
+
+<p>"Why the extra dollar&mdash;or extra two dollars?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you see that carpet? These is our best
+rooms. And three dollars&mdash;&mdash; I know you New
+Yorkers. I heard of a gent once, and they charged
+him five dollars&mdash;five dol-lars!&mdash;for a room in New
+York, and a boy grabbed his valise from him and
+wanted a short-bit and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>"Oh&mdash;all&mdash;right! Can we get something to eat?"</p>
+
+<p>"Now!?"</p>
+
+<p>"We haven't eaten since noon."</p>
+
+<p>"That ain't my fault! Some folks can go gadding
+around in automobuls, and some folks has to stay at
+home. If you think I'm going to sit up all night
+cooking for people that come chassayin' in here God
+knows what all hours of the day and night&mdash;&mdash;!
+There's an all-night lunch down the street."</p>
+
+<p>When she was alone Claire cried a good deal.</p>
+
+<p>Her father declined to go out to the lunch room.
+The chill of the late ride was still on him, he croaked
+through his door; he was shivering; he was going
+right to bed.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, do, dear. I'll bring you back a sandwich."</p>
+
+<p>"Safe to go out alone?"</p>
+
+<p>"Anything's safe after facing that horrible&mdash;&mdash; I
+do believe in witches, now. Listen, dear; I'll bring
+you a hot-water bag."</p>
+
+<p>She took the bag down to the office. The landlady
+was winding the clock, while her husband yawned.
+She glared.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder if I may have some hot water for my
+father? He has a chill."</p>
+
+<p>"Stove's out. No hot water in the house."</p>
+
+<p>"Couldn't you heat some?"</p>
+
+<p>"Now look here, miss. You come in here, asking
+for meals and rooms at midnight, and you want a cut<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span>
+rate on everything, and I do what I can, but enough's
+enough!"</p>
+
+<p>The woman stalked out. Her husband popped up.
+"Mustn't mind the old girl, lady. Got a grouch.
+Well, you can't blame her, in a way; when Bill lit out,
+he done her out of four-bits! But I'll tell you!" he
+leered. "You leave me the hot-water biznai, and I'll
+heat you some water myself!"</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, but I won't trouble you. Good night."</p>
+
+<p>Claire was surprised to find a warm, rather comfortable
+all-night lunch room, called the Alaska Caf&eacute;,
+with a bright-eyed man of twenty-five in charge. He
+nodded in a friendly way, and made haste with her
+order of two ham-and-egg sandwiches. She felt adventurous.
+She polished her knife and fork on a
+napkin, as she had seen people do in lunches along the
+way. A crowd of three rubbed their noses against
+the front window to stare at the strange girl in town,
+but she ignored them, and they drifted away.</p>
+
+<p>The lunchman was cordial: "At a hotel, ma'am?
+Which one? Gee, not the Tavern?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why yes. Is there another?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure. First-rate one, two blocks over, one up."</p>
+
+<p>"The woman said the Tavern was the only hotel."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, she's an old sour-face. Don't mind her. Just
+bawl her out. What's she charging you for a room?"</p>
+
+<p>"Three dollars."</p>
+
+<p>"Per each? Gee! Well, she sticks tourists anywheres<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>
+from one buck to three. Natives get by for
+fifty cents. She's pretty fierce, but she ain't a patch on
+her husband. He comes from Spokane&mdash;nobody
+knows why&mdash;guess he was run out. He takes some
+kind of dope, and he cheats at rummy."</p>
+
+<p>"But why does the town stand either of them?
+Why do you let them torture innocent people? Why
+don't you put them in the insane hospital, where they
+belong?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's a good one!" her friend chuckled. But
+he saw it only as a joke.</p>
+
+<p>She thought of moving her father to the good hotel,
+but she hadn't the strength.</p>
+
+<p>Claire Boltwood, of Brooklyn Heights, went
+through the shanty streets of Pellago, Montana, at
+one <span class="smcapl">A.M.</span> carrying a sandwich in a paper bag which had
+recently been used for salted peanuts, and a red rubber
+hot-water bag filled with water at the Alaska
+Caf&eacute;. At the Tavern she hastened past the office door.
+She made her father eat his sandwich; she teased him
+and laughed at him till the hot-water bag had relieved
+his chill-pinched back; she kissed him boisterously,
+and started for her own room, at the far end of the
+hall.</p>
+
+<p>The lights were off. She had to feel her way, and
+she hesitated at the door of her room before she entered.
+She imagined voices, creeping footsteps,
+people watching her from a distance. She flung into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span>
+the room, and when the kindled lamp showed her
+familiar traveling bag, she felt safer. But once she
+was in bed, with the sheet down as far as possible over
+the loathly red comforter, the quiet rustled and snapped
+about her, and she could not relax. Sinking into sleep
+seemed slipping into danger, and a dozen times she
+started awake.</p>
+
+<p>But only slowly did she admit to herself that she
+actually did hear a fumbling, hear the knob of her
+door turning.</p>
+
+<p>"W-who's there?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's me, lady. The landlord. Brought you the
+hot water."</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks so much, but I don't need it now."</p>
+
+<p>"Got something else for you. Come to the door.
+Don't want to holler and wake ev'body up."</p>
+
+<p>At the door she said timorously, "Nothing else I
+want, thank you. D-don't bother me."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, I've brought you up a sandwich, girlie, all
+nice and hot, and a nip of something to take the chill
+off."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't want it, I tell you!"</p>
+
+<p>"Be a sport now! You use Pete right, and he'll use
+you right. Shame to see a lady like you not gettin'
+no service here. Open the door. Dandy sandwich!"
+The knob rattled again. She said nothing. The heel
+of her palm pressed against the door till the molding
+ate into it. The man was snorting:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>"I ain't going to all this trouble and then throw
+away a good sandwich. You asked me&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"M-must I s-shout?"</p>
+
+<p>"S-shout your fool head off!" He kicked the door.
+"Good friends of mine, 'long this end of the hall.
+Aw, listen. Just teasing. I'm not going to rob you,
+little honey bird. Laws, you could have a million
+dollars, and old Pete wouldn't take two-bits. I just
+get so darn lonely in this hick town. Like to chat to
+live ones from the big burg. I'm a city fella myself&mdash;Spokane
+and Cheyenne and everything."</p>
+
+<p>In her bare feet, Claire had run across the room,
+looked desperately out of the window. Could she
+climb out, reach her friend of the Alaska Caf&eacute;? If
+she had to&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Then she grinned. The world was rose-colored
+and hung with tinkling bells. "I love even that
+Pinky person!" she said. In the yard of the hotel,
+beside her Gomez, was a Teal bug, and two men were
+sleeping in blankets on the ground.</p>
+
+<p>She marched over to the door. She flung it open.
+The man started back. He was holding an electric,
+torch. She could not see him, but to the hovering ball
+of light she remarked, "Two men, friends of mine, are
+below, by their car. You will go at once, or I'll call
+them. If you think I am bluffing, go down and look.
+Good night!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XX<br />
+THE FREE WOMAN</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Before</span> breakfast, Claire darted down to the
+hotel yard. She beamed at Milt, who was lacing
+a rawhide patch on a tire, before she remembered that
+they were not on speaking terms. They both looked
+extremely sheepish and young. It was Pinky Parrott
+who was the social lubricant. Pinky was always on
+speaking terms with everybody. "Ah, here she is!
+The little lady of the mutinous eyes! Our colonel of
+the flivver hussars!"</p>
+
+<p>But he got no credit. Milt straightened up and
+lumbered, "Hel-lo!"</p>
+
+<p>She peeped at him and whispered, "Hel-lo!"</p>
+
+<p>"Say, oh please, Claire&mdash;&mdash; I didn't mean&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I know! Let's&mdash;let's go have breakfast."</p>
+
+<p>"Was awfully afraid you'd think we were fresh,
+but when we came in last night, and saw your car&mdash;didn't
+like the looks of the hotel much, and thought
+we'd stick around."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm so glad. Oh, Milt&mdash;yes, and you, Mr. Parrott&mdash;will
+you whip&mdash;lick&mdash;beat up&mdash;however you
+want to say it&mdash;somebody for me?"</p>
+
+<p>With one glad communal smile Milt and Pinky<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>
+curved up their wrists and made motions as of pulling
+up their sleeves.</p>
+
+<p>"But not unless I say so. I want to be a Citizeness
+Fixit. I've been good for so long. But now&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Show him to me!" and "Up, lads, and atum!"
+responded her squad.</p>
+
+<p>"Not till after breakfast."</p>
+
+<p>It was a sufficiently vile breakfast, at the Tavern.
+The feature was curious cakes whose interior was
+raw creepy dough. A dozen skilled workmen were at
+the same long table with Claire, Milt, Pinky, and Mr.
+Boltwood&mdash;the last two of whom were polite and
+scenically descriptive to each other, but portentously
+silent about gold-mines. The landlady and a slavey
+waited on table; the landlord could be seen loafing in
+the kitchen.</p>
+
+<p>Toward the end of the meal Claire insultingly
+crooked her finger at the landlady and said, "Come
+here, woman."</p>
+
+<p>The landlady stared, then ignored her.</p>
+
+<p>"Very well. Then I'll say it publicly!" Claire
+swept the workmen with an affectionate smile.
+"Gentlemen of Pellago, I want you to know from one
+of the poor tourists who have been cheated at this
+nasty place that we depend on you to do something.
+This woman and her husband are criminals, in the
+way they overcharge for hideous food and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>The landlady had been petrified. Now she charged<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>
+down. Behind her came her husband. Milt arose.
+The husband stopped. But it was Pinky who faced
+the landlady, tapped her shoulder, and launched into,
+"And what's more, you hag, if our new friends here
+have any sense, they'll run you out of town."</p>
+
+<p>That was only the beginning of Pinky's paper on
+corrections and charities. He enjoyed himself. Before
+he finished, the landlady was crying ... she
+voluntarily promised to give her boarders waffles, some
+morning, jus' soon as she could find the waffle-iron.</p>
+
+<p>With her guard about her, at the office desk, Claire
+paid one dollar apiece for the rooms, and discussion
+was not.</p>
+
+<p>Before they started, Milt had the chance to say to
+her, "I'm getting so I can handle Pinky now. Have
+to. Thinking of getting hold of his gold-mine. I
+just give him the eye, as your friend Mr. Saxton
+would, and he gets so meek&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But don't! Please understand me, Milt; I do admire
+Mr. Saxton; he is fine and capable, and really
+generous; only&mdash;&mdash; He may be just a bit snippish at
+times, while you&mdash;you're a playmate&mdash;father's and
+mine&mdash;and&mdash;&mdash; I did face that landlady, didn't I!
+I'm not soft and trivial, am I! Praise!"</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>She had driven through the panhandle of Idaho
+into Washington, through Spokane, through the writhing
+lava deposits of Moses Coulee where fruit trees<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span>
+grow on volcanic ash. Beyond Wenatchee, with its
+rows of apple trees striping the climbing fields like
+corduroy in folds, she had come to the famous climb
+of Blewett Pass. Once over that pass, and Snoqualmie,
+she would romp into Seattle.</p>
+
+<p>She was sorry that she hadn't come to know Milt
+better, but perhaps she would see him in Seattle.</p>
+
+<p>Not adventure alone was she finding, but high intellectual
+benefit in studying the names of towns in the
+state of Washington. Not Kankakee nor Kalamazoo
+nor Oshkosh can rival the picturesque fancy of Washington,
+and Claire combined the town-names in a lyric
+so emotion-stirring that it ought, perhaps, to be the
+national anthem. It ran:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Humptulips, Tum Tum, Moclips, Yelm,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Satsop, Bucoda, Omak, Enumclaw,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Tillicum, Bossburg, Chettlo, Chattaroy,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Zillah, Selah, Cowiche, Keechelus,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Bluestem, Bluelight, Onion Creek, Sockeye,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Antwine, Chopaka, Startup, Kapowsin,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Skamokawa, Sixprong, Pysht!<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Klickitat, Kittitas, Spangle, Cedonia,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Pe Ell, Cle Elum, Sallal, Chimacum,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Index, Taholah, Synarep, Puyallup,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Wallula, Wawawai, Wauconda, Washougal,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Walla Walla, Washtucna, Wahluke,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Solkulk, Newaukum, Wahkiakus,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Penawawa, Ohop, Ladd!<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>
+<span class="i0">Harrah, Olalla, Umtanum, Chuckanut,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Soap Lake, Loon Lake, Addy, Ace, Usk,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Chillowist, Moxee City, Yellepit, Cashup,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Moonax, Mabton, Tolt, Mukilteo,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Poulsbo, Toppenish, Whetstone, Inchelium,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Fishtrap, Carnation, Shine, Monte Cristo,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Conconully, Roza, Maud!<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">China Bend, Zumwalt, Sapolil, Riffle,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Touchet, Chesaw, Chew, Klum, Bly,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Humorist, Hammer, Nooksack, Oso,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Samamish, Dusty, Tiger, Turk, Dot,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Scenic, Tekoa, Nellita, Attalia,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Steilacoom, Tweedle, Ruff, Lisabeula,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Latah, Peola, Towal, Eltopia,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Steptoe, Pluvius, Sol Duc, Twisp!<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"And then," complained Claire, "they talk about
+Amy Lowell! I leave it to you, Henry B., if any union
+poet has ever written as gay a refrain as 'Ohop
+Ladd'!"</p>
+
+<p>She was not merely playing mental whist. She was
+trying to keep from worry. All the way she had heard
+of Blewett Pass; its fourteen miles of climbing, and
+the last half mile of stern pitch. On this eastern side
+of the pass, the new road was not open; there was a
+tortuous, flint-scattered trail, too narrow, in most
+places, for the passing of other cars. Claire was glad
+that Milt and Pinky were near her.</p>
+
+<p>If so many of the race of kind advisers of tourists<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span>
+had not warned her about it, doubtless she would have
+gone over the pass without difficulty. But their voluntary
+croaking sapped her nerve, and her father's.
+He kept worrying, "Do you think we better try it?"
+When they stopped at a ranch house at the foot of the
+climb, for the night, he seemed unusually tired. He
+complained of chill. He did not eat breakfast. They
+started out silent, depressed.</p>
+
+<p>He crouched in the corner of the seat. She looked
+at him and was anxious. She stopped on the first
+level space on the pass, crying, "You are perfectly
+miserable. I'm afraid of&mdash;&mdash; I think we ought to
+see a doctor."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I'll be all right."</p>
+
+<p>But she waited till Milt came pit-pattering up the
+slope. "Father feels rather sick. What shall I do?
+Turn round and drive to the nearest doctor&mdash;at Cashmere,
+I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"There's a magnolious medico ahead here on the
+pass," Pinky Parrott interrupted. "A young thing,
+but they say he's a graduate of Harvard. He's out
+here because he has some timber-claims. Look, Milt
+o' the Daggett, why don't you drive Miss Boltwood's
+'bus&mdash;make better time, and hustle the old gent up to
+the doc, and I'll come on behind with your machine."</p>
+
+<p>"Why," Claire fretted, "I hate&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>A new Milt, the boss, abrupt, almost bullying,
+snapped out of his bug. "Good idee. Jump in, Claire.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span>
+I'll take your father up. Heh, whasat, Pink? Yes, I
+get it; second turn beyond grocery. Right. On we
+go. Huh? Oh, we'll think about the gold-mine later,
+Pink."</p>
+
+<p>With the three of them wedged into the seat of the
+Gomez, and Pinky recklessly skittering after them in
+the bug, they climbed again&mdash;and lo! there was no
+climb! Unconsciously Claire had hesitated before
+dashing at each sharp upsloping bend; had lost headway
+while she was wondering, "Suppose the car went
+off this curve?" Milt never sped up, but he never
+slackened. His driving was as rhythmical as music.</p>
+
+<p>They were so packed in that he could scarcely reach
+gear lever and hand-brake. He halted on a level, and
+curtly asked, "That trap-door in the back of the car&mdash;convertible
+extra seat?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but we almost never use it, and it's stuck.
+Can't get it open."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll open it all right! Got a big screwdriver?
+Want you sit back there. Need elbow room."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps I'd better drive with Mr. Pinky."</p>
+
+<p>"Nope. Don't think better."</p>
+
+<p>With one yank he opened the trap-door, revealing a
+folding seat, which she meekly took. Back there, she
+reflected, "How strong his back looks. Funny how
+the little silvery hairs grow at the back of his neck."</p>
+
+<p>They came to a settlement and the red cedar bungalow
+of Dr. Hooker Beach. The moment Claire saw<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span>
+the doctor's thin demanding face, she trusted him. He
+spoke to Mr. Boltwood with assurance: "All you need
+is some rest, and your digestion is a little shaky. Been
+eating some pork? Might stay here a day or two.
+We're glad to have a glimpse of Easterners."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood went to bed in the Beaches' guest-room.
+Mrs. Beach gave Claire and Milt lunch, with
+thin toast and thin china, on a porch from which an
+arroyo dropped down for a hundred feet. Fir trees
+scented the air, and a talking machine played the same
+Russian music that was popular that same moment in
+New York. And the Beaches knew people who knew
+Claire.</p>
+
+<p>Claire was thinking. These people were genuine
+aristocrats, while Jeff Saxton, for all his family and
+his assumptions about life, was the eternal climber.
+Milt, who had been uncomfortable with Jeff, was
+serene and un-self-conscious with the Beaches, and the
+doctor gratefully took his advice about his stationary
+gas engine. "He's rather like the Beaches in his
+simplicity&mdash;yes, and his ability to do anything if he
+considers it worth while," she decided.</p>
+
+<p>After lunch, when the doctor and his wife had to
+trot off to a patient, Claire proposed, "Let's walk up
+to that ledge of rock and see the view, shall we, Milt?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes! And keep an eye on the road for Pinky.
+The poor nut, he hasn't showed up. So reckless; hope
+he hasn't driven the Teal off the road."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span>She crouched at the edge of a rock, where she would
+have been frightened, a month before, and looked
+across the main road to a creek in a pine-laced gully.
+He sat beside her, elbows on knees.</p>
+
+<p>"Those Beaches&mdash;their kin are judges and senators
+and college Presidents, all over New England," she
+said. "This doctor must be the grandson of the ambassador,
+I fancy."</p>
+
+<p>"Honest? I thought they were just regular folks.
+Was I nice?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course you were."</p>
+
+<p>"Did I&mdash;did I wash my paws and sit up and beg?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, you aren't a little dog. I'm that. You're the
+big mastiff that guards the house, while I run and
+yip." She was turned toward him, smiling. Her hand
+was beside him. He touched the back of it with his
+forefinger, as though he was afraid he might soil it.</p>
+
+<p>There seemed to be no reason, but he was trembling
+as he stammered, "I&mdash;I&mdash;I'm d-darn glad I didn't
+know they were anybody, or 'd have been as bad as a
+flivver driver the first time he tries a t-twelve-cylinder
+machine. G-gee your hand is little!"</p>
+
+<p>She took it back and inspected it. "I suppose it is.
+And pretty useless."</p>
+
+<p>"N-no, it isn't, but your shoes are. Why don't you
+wear boots when you're out like this?" A flicker of
+his earlier peremptoriness came into his voice. She
+resented it:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span>"My shoes are perfectly sensible! I will not wear
+those horrible vegetarian uplift sacks on my feet!"</p>
+
+<p>"Your shoes may be all right for New York, but
+you're not going to New York for a while. You've
+simply got to see some of this country while you're
+out here&mdash;British Columbia and Alaska."</p>
+
+<p>"Would be nice, but I've had enough roughing&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Chance to see the grandest mountains in the world,
+almost, and then you want to go back to tea and all
+that junk!"</p>
+
+<p>"Stop trying to bully me! You have been dictatorial
+ever since we started up&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Have I? Didn't mean to be. Though I suppose
+I usually am bullying. At least I run things. There's
+two kinds of people; those that give orders, and those
+that naturally take them; and I belong to the first one,
+and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But my dear Milt, so do I, and really&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And mostly I'd take them from you. But hang
+it, Seattle is just a day away, and you'll forget me.
+Wish I could kidnap you. Have half a mind to. Take
+you way up into the mountains, and when you got used
+to roughing it in sure-enough wilderness&mdash;say you'd
+helped me haul timber for a flume&mdash;then we'd be real
+pals. You have the stuff in you, but you still need
+toughening before&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Listen to me, Milton. You have been reading fiction,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>
+about this man&mdash;sometimes he's a lumberjack,
+and sometimes a trapper or a miner, but always he's
+frightfully hairy&mdash;and he sees a charming woman in
+the city, and kidnaps her, and shuts her up in some
+unspeakable shanty, and makes her eat nice cold boiled
+potatoes, and so naturally, she simply adores him!
+A hundred men have written that story, and it's an
+example of their insane masculine conceit, which I, as
+a woman, resent. Shakespeare may have started it,
+with his silly <i>Taming of the Shrew</i>. Shakespeare's
+men may have been real, but his women were dolls, designed
+to please some majesty. You may not know it,
+but there are women today who don't live just to please
+majesties' fancies. If a woman like me were kidnapped,
+she would go on hating the brute, or if she
+did give in, then the man would lose anyway, because
+she would have degenerated; she'd have turned into a
+slave, and lost exactly the things he'd liked in her.
+Oh, you cavemen! With your belief that you can
+force women to like you! I have more courage than
+any of you!"</p>
+
+<p>"I admit you have courage, but you'd have still
+more, if you bucked the wilds."</p>
+
+<p>"Nonsense! In New York I face every day a
+hundred complicated problems you don't know I ever
+heard of!"</p>
+
+<p>"Let me remind you that Brer Julius C&aelig;sar said
+he'd rather be mayor in a little Spanish town than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span>
+police commissioner in Rome. I'm king in Schoenstrom,
+while you're just one of a couple hundred
+thousand bright people in New York&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Really? Oh, at least a million. Thanks!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh&mdash;gee&mdash;Claire, I didn't mean to be personal,
+and get in a row and all, but&mdash;can't you see&mdash;kind of
+desperate&mdash;Seattle so soon&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Her face was turned from him; its thin profile was
+firm as silver wire. He blundered off into silence and&mdash;they
+were at it again!</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't mean to make you angry," he gulped.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you did! Bullying&mdash;&mdash; You and your men
+of granite, in mackinaws and a much-needed shave,
+trying to make a well-bred woman satisfied with a
+view consisting of rocks and stumps and socks on the
+line! Let me tell you that compared with a street
+canyon, a mountain canyon is simply dead, and yet
+these unlettered wild men&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"See here! I don't know if you're firing these adjectives
+at me, but I don't know that I'm so much
+more unlettered&mdash;&mdash; You talked about taking French
+in your finishing-school. Well, they taught American
+in mine!"</p>
+
+<p>"They would!"</p>
+
+<p>Then he was angry. "Yes, and chemistry and
+physics and Greek and Latin and history and mathematics
+and economics, and I took more or less of a
+whirl at all of them, while you were fiddling with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span>
+ribbons, and then I had to buck mechanics and business
+methods."</p>
+
+<p>"I also 'fiddled' with manners&mdash;an unfortunate
+omission in your curriculum, I take it! You have been
+reasonably rude&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"So have you!"</p>
+
+<p>"I had to be! But I trust you begin to see that even
+your strong hand couldn't control a woman's taste.
+Kidnapping! As intelligent a boy as you wanting to
+imitate these boorish movie&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a darn bit more boorish than your smart set,
+with its champagne and these orgies at country
+clubs&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You know so much about country clubs, don't
+you! The worst orgy I ever saw at one was the golf
+champion reading the beauty department in <i>Boudoir</i>.
+Would you mind backing up your statements about the
+vices of myself and my friends&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you. Oh, I didn't mean&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Then why did you&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Now you're bullying me, and you know that if the
+smart set isn't vicious, at least it's so snobbish that it
+can't see any&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Then it's wise to be snobbish, because if it did
+condescend&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I won't stand people talking about condescending&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Would you mind not shouting so?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>"Very well! I'll keep still!"</p>
+
+<p>Silence again, while both of them looked unhappy,
+and tried to remember just what they had been fighting
+about. They did not at first notice a small red car
+larruping gaily over the road beneath the ledge,
+though the driver was a pink-haired man in a green
+coat. He was almost gone before Milt choked, "It's
+Pinky!"</p>
+
+<p>"Pink! Pinky!" he bellowed.</p>
+
+<p>Pinky looked back but, instead of stopping, he sped
+up, and kept going.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXI<br />
+THE MINE OF LOST SOULS</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">"That</span> couldn't have been Pinky! Why! Why,
+the car he had was red," cried Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"Sure. The idiot's got hold of some barn paint
+somewhere, and tried to daub it over. He's trying to
+make a getaway with it!"</p>
+
+<p>"We'll chase him. In my car."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you mind?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course not. I do not give up my objections to
+the roughing philosophy, but&mdash;&mdash; You were right
+about these shoes&mdash;&mdash; Oh, don't leave me behind!
+Want to go along!"</p>
+
+<p>These sentences she broke, scattered, and totally lost
+as she scrambled after him, down the rocks. He
+halted. His lips trembled. He picked her up, carried
+her down, hesitated a second while his face&mdash;curiously
+foreshortened as she looked up at it from his big
+arms&mdash;twisted with emotion. He set her down gently,
+and she climbed into the Gomez.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed to her that he drove rather too carefully,
+too slowly. He took curves and corners evenly. His
+face was as empty of expression, as unmelodramatic,
+as that of a jitney driver. Then she looked at the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span>
+speedometer. He was making forty-eight miles an
+hour down hill and forty to thirty on upgrades.</p>
+
+<p>They were in sight of the fleeing Pinky in two miles.
+Pinky looked back; instantly was to be seen pulling
+his hat low, stooping over&mdash;the demon driver. Milt
+merely sat more erect, looked more bland and white-browed
+and steady.</p>
+
+<p>The bug fled before them on a winding shelf road.
+It popped up a curve, then slowed down. "He took it
+too fast. Poor Pink!" said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>They gained on that upslope, but as the road
+dropped, the bug started forward desperately. Another
+car was headed toward them; was drawn to the
+side of the road, in one of the occasional widenings.
+Pinky passed it so carelessly that, with crawling spine,
+Claire saw the outer wheels of the bug on the very
+edge of the road&mdash;the edge of a fifty-foot drop. Milt
+went easily past the halted car&mdash;even waved his hand
+to the waiting driver.</p>
+
+<p>This did not seem to Claire at all like the chase
+of a thief. She looked casually ahead at Pinky, as he
+whirled round an S-shaped curve on the downslope,
+then&mdash;&mdash; It was too quick to see what happened.
+The bug headed directly toward the edge of the road,
+shot out, went down the embankment, over and over.
+It lay absurdly upside-down, its muffler and brake-rods
+showing in place of the seat and hood.</p>
+
+<p>Milt quite carefully stopped the Gomez. The day<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span>
+was still&mdash;just a breathing of running water in the
+deep gully. The topsy-turvy car below them was
+equally still; no sight of Pinky, no sound.</p>
+
+<p>The gauche boy gone from him, Milt took her hand,
+pressed it to his cheek. "Claire! You're here! You
+might have gone with him, to make room&mdash;&mdash; Oh, I
+was bullying you because I was bullying myself! Trying
+to make myself tell you&mdash;but oh, you know, you
+know! Can you stand going down there? I hate to
+have you, but you may be needed."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I'll come," she whispered.</p>
+
+<p>Their crawl down the rock-rolling embankment
+seemed desperately slow.</p>
+
+<p>"Wait here," bade Milt, at the bottom.</p>
+
+<p>She looked away from the grotesque car. She had
+seen that one side of it was crumpled like paper in an
+impatient hand.</p>
+
+<p>Milt was stooping, looking under; seemed to be saying
+something. When he came back, he did not speak.
+He wiped his forehead. "Come. We'll climb back
+up. Nothing to do, now. Guess you better not try
+to help, anyway. You might not sleep well."</p>
+
+<p>He gave her his hand up the embankment, drove to
+the nearest house, telephoned to Dr. Beach. Later she
+waited while Milt and the doctor, with two other men,
+were raising the car. As she waited she thought of
+the Teal bug as a human thing&mdash;as her old friend,
+to which she had often turned in need.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span>Milt returned to her. "There is one thing for
+you to do. Before he died, Pinky asked me to go
+get his wife&mdash;Dolores, I think it is. She's up in a
+side canyon, few miles away. She may want a woman
+around. Beach will take care of&mdash;of him. Can you
+come?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course. Oh, Milt, I didn't&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"&mdash;mean you were a caveman! You're my big brother!"</p>
+
+<p>"&mdash;mean you were a snob!"</p>
+
+<p>They drove five miles along the highway, then up a
+trail where the Gomez brushed the undergrowth on
+each side as it desperately dug into moss, rain-gutted
+ruts, loose rocks, all on a vicious slant which seemed to
+push the car down again. Beside them, the mountain
+woods were sacredly quiet, with fern and lily and
+green-lit spaces. They came out in a clearing, before
+dusk. Beside the clearing was a brook, with a crude
+cradle&mdash;sign of a not very successful gold miner. Before
+a log cabin, in a sway-sided rocker, creaked a
+tall, white, flabby woman, once nearly beautiful, now
+rubbed at the edges. She rose, huddling her wrapper
+about her bosom, as they drove into the clearing and
+picked their way through stumps and briars.</p>
+
+<p>"Where you folks think you're going?" she whimpered.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, why just&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span>"I cer'nly am glad to see somebody! I been 'most
+scared to death. Been here alone two weeks now. Got
+a shotgun, but if anybody come, I guess they'd take
+it away from me. I was brought up nice, no rough-house
+or&mdash;&mdash; Say, did you folks come to see the
+gold-mine?"</p>
+
+<p>"M-mine?" babbled Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"Course not. Pinky said I was to show it, but I'm
+so sore on that low-life hound now, I swear I won't
+even take the trouble and lie about it. No more gold
+in that crick than there is in my eye. Or than there's
+flour or pork in the house!"</p>
+
+<p>The woman's voice was rising. Her gestures were
+furious. Claire and Milt stood close, their hands slipping
+together.</p>
+
+<p>"What d' you think of a man that'd go off and leave
+a lady without half enough to eat, while he gallivanted
+around, trying to raise money by gambling, when he
+was offered a good job up here? He's a gambler&mdash;told
+me he was a rich mine-owner, but never touched
+a mine in his life. Lying hound&mdash;worst talker in ten
+counties! Got a gambler's hand on him, too&mdash;I ought
+to seen it! Oh, wait till I get hold of him; just wait!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire thought of the still hand&mdash;so still&mdash;that she
+had seen under the edge of the upturned car. She tried
+to speak, while the woman raved on, wrath feeding
+wrath:</p>
+
+<p>"Thank God, I ain't really his wife! My husband<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span>
+is a fine man&mdash;Mr. Kloh&mdash;Dlorus Kloh, my name is.
+Mr. Kloh's got a fine job with the mill, at North
+Yakima. Oh, I was a fool! This gambler Pinky Parrott,
+he comes along with his elegant ways, and he
+hands me out a swell line of gab, and I ups and leaves
+poor Kloh, and the kid, and the nicest kid&mdash;&mdash; Say,
+please, could you folks take me wherever you're going?
+Maybe I could get a job again&mdash;used to was a good
+waitress, and I ain't going to wait here any longer for
+that lying, cheating, mean-talking&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Mrs. Kloh, please don't! He's dead!" wailed
+Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"Dead? Pinky? Oh&mdash;my&mdash;God! And I won't
+ever see him, and he was so funny and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She threw herself on the ground; she kicked her
+heels; she tore at her loosely caught, tarnished blonde
+hair.</p>
+
+<p>Claire knelt by her. "You mustn't&mdash;you mustn't&mdash;we'll&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Damn you, with your smug-faced husband there,
+and your fine auto and all, butting into poor folks'
+troubles!" shrieked Dlorus.</p>
+
+<p>Claire stumbled to her feet, stood with her clenched
+right hand to her trembling lips, cupping it with her
+nervous left hand. Her shoulders were dejected.
+Milt pleaded, "Let's hike out. I don't mind decent
+honest grease, but this place&mdash;look in at table! Dirty
+dishes&mdash;&mdash; And gin bottles on the floor!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>"Desert her? When she needs me so?" Claire
+started forward, but Milt caught her sleeve, and admired,
+"You were right! You've got more nerve
+than I have!"</p>
+
+<p>"No. I wouldn't dare if&mdash;&mdash; I'm glad you're here
+with me!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire calmed the woman; bound up her hair;
+washed her face&mdash;which needed it; and sat on the log
+doorstep, holding Dlorus's head in her lap, while
+Dlorus sobbed, "Pinky&mdash;dead! Him that was so
+lively! And he was so sweet a lover, oh, so sweet.
+He was a swell fellow; my, he could just make you
+laugh and cry, the way he talked; and he was so
+educated, and he played the vi'lin&mdash;he could do anything&mdash;and
+athaletic&mdash;he would have made me rich.
+Oh, let me alone. I just want to be alone and think
+of him. I was so bored with Kloh, and no nice dresses
+or nothin', and&mdash;I did love the kid, but he squalled so,
+just all the time, and Pinky come, and he was so
+funny&mdash;&mdash; Oh, let me alone!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire shivered, then, and the strength seemed to
+go from the steady arms that had supported Dlorus's
+head. Dusk had sneaked up on them; the clearing was
+full of swimming grayness, and between the woman's
+screams, the woods crackled. Each time Dlorus spoke,
+her screech was like that of an animal in the woods,
+and round about them crept such sinister echoes that
+Milt kept wanting to look back over his shoulder.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span>"Yes," sighed Claire at last, "perhaps we'd better
+go."</p>
+
+<p>"If you go, I'll kill myself! Take me to Mr. Kloh!
+Oh, he was&mdash;&mdash; My husband, Mr. Kloh. Oh, so
+good. Only he didn't understand a lady has to have
+her good times, and Pink danced so well&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Dlorus sprang up, flung into the cabin, stood in the
+dimness of the doorway, holding a butcher knife and
+clamoring, "I will! I'll kill myself if you leave me!
+Take me down to Mr. Kloh, at North Yakima, tonight!"</p>
+
+<p>Milt sauntered toward her.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you get flip, young man! I mean it!
+And I'll kill you&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Most unchivalrously, quite out of the picture of
+gray grief, Milt snapped, "That'll be about enough
+of you! Here! Gimme that knife!"</p>
+
+<p>She dropped the knife, sniveling, "Oh Gawd, somebody's
+always bullying me! And all I wanted was a
+good time!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire herded her into the cabin. "We'll take you
+to your husband&mdash;tonight. Come, let's wash up, and
+I'll help you put on your prettiest dress."</p>
+
+<p>"Honest, will you?" cried the woman, in high
+spirits, all grief put aside. "I got a dandy China
+silk dress, and some new white kid shoes! My, Mr.
+Kloh, he won't hardly know me. He'll take me back.
+I know how to handle him. That'll be swell, going<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span>
+back in an automobile. And I got a new hair-comb,
+with genuine Peruvian diamonds. Say, you aren't
+kidding me along?"</p>
+
+<p>In the light of the lantern Milt had kindled, Claire
+looked questioningly at him. Both of them shrugged.
+Claire promised, "Yes. Tonight. If we can make
+it."</p>
+
+<p>"And will you jolly Mr. Kloh for me? Gee, I'll be
+awfully scared of him. I swear, I'll wash his dishes
+and everything. He's a good man. He&mdash;&mdash; Say, he
+ain't seen my new parasol, neither!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXII<br />
+ACROSS THE ROOF OF THE WORLD</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Claire</span> dressed Dlorus, cooked a dinner of beet
+greens, potatoes, and trout; and by bullying and
+great sweetness kept Dlorus from too many trips to
+the gin bottle. Milt caught the trout, cut wood, locked
+in a log shed Pinky's forlorn mining-tools. They
+started for North Yakima at eight of the evening, with
+Dlorus, back in the spare seat, alternately sobbing and
+to inattentive ears announcing what she'd say to the
+Old Hens.</p>
+
+<p>Milt was devoted to persuading the huge cat of a
+car to tiptoe down the slippery gouged ruts of the
+road, and Claire's mind was driving with him. Every
+time he touched the foot-brake, she could feel the
+strain in the tendons of her own ankle.</p>
+
+<p>A mile down the main road they stopped at a store-post-office
+to telephone back to Mr. Boltwood and Dr.
+Beach. On the porch was a man in overalls and laced
+boots. He was lean and quick-moving. As he raised
+his head, and his spectacles flashed, Claire caught Milt's
+arm and gasped, "Oh, my dear, I'm in a beautiful
+state of nerves. For a moment I thought that was
+Jeff Saxton. I bet it is his astral body!"</p>
+
+<p>"And you thought he was going to forbid your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>
+running away on this fool expedition, and you were
+scared," chuckled Milt, as they sat in the car.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course I was! And I still am! I know what
+he'll say afterward! He <i>is</i> here, reasoning with me.
+Oughtn't I to be sensible? Oughtn't I to have you
+leave me at the Beaches' before you start&mdash;jolly jaunt
+to take a strange woman to her presumably homicidal
+husband! Why am I totally lacking in sense? Just
+listen to what Jeff is saying!"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course you ought to go back, and let me drive
+alone. Absolutely insane, your&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But you would like me to go along, wouldn't
+you!"</p>
+
+<p>"Like you to? It's our last ride together, and that
+bloomin' old Browning never thought of a ride together
+by midnight over the roof of the world! No,
+it's really our first ride together, and tomorrow&mdash;you're
+gone."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I sha'n't be gone, but&mdash;&mdash;" Addressing herself
+to the astounded overalled man on the porch, she
+declared, "You're quite right, Jeff. And Milt is
+wrong. Insane adventure. Only, it's wonderful to
+be young enough to do insane adventures. Falling
+down abyssy places is so much more interesting than
+bridge. I'm going&mdash;going&mdash;going!... Milt, you telephone."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you think you better?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, siree! Father would forbid me. Try not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>
+to get him&mdash;just tell Dr. Beach where we're going,
+and hang up, and scoot!"</p>
+
+<p>All night they drove; down the Pacific side of
+Blewett Pass; down the sweeping spirals to a valley.
+Dlorus drowsed in the extra seat. Claire's sleepy
+head was fantastically swaying. She was awakened
+by an approaching roar and, as though she sat at a
+play, she watched a big racing machine coming toward
+them, passing them with two wheels in the ditch. She
+had only a thunderous glimpse of the stolid driver; a
+dark, hooded, romantic figure, like a sailor at the
+helm in a storm.</p>
+
+<p>Milt cried, "Golly! May be a transcontinental
+racer! Be in New York in five days&mdash;going night
+and day&mdash;take mud at fifty an hour&mdash;crack mechanic
+right from the factory&mdash;change tires in three minutes&mdash;people
+waiting up all night to give him gasoline
+and a sandwich! That's my idea of fun!"</p>
+
+<p>Studying Milt's shadowed face, Claire considered,
+"He could do it, too. Sitting there at the wheel,
+taking danger and good road with the same steadiness.
+Oh, he's&mdash;well, anyway, he's a dear boy."</p>
+
+<p>But what she said was:</p>
+
+<p>"Less dramatic things for you, now, Milt. Trigonometry
+is going to be your idea of fun; blueprints
+and engineering books."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I know. I'm going to do it. Do four
+years' work in three&mdash;or two. I'll tack pages of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span>
+formulas on the wall, in my bum hallroom, and study
+'em while I'm shaving. Oh, I'll be the grind! But
+learn to dance the fox-trot, though! If America gets
+into the war, I'll get into the engineering corps, and
+come back to school afterward."</p>
+
+<p>"Will the finances&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll sell my garage, by mail. Rauskukle will take
+it. He won't rob me of more than a thousand dollars
+on price&mdash;not much more."</p>
+
+<p>"You're going to love Seattle. And we'll have some
+good tramps while I'm there, you and I."</p>
+
+<p>"Honestly? Will you want to?"</p>
+
+<p>"Do you suppose for one second I'd give up my
+feeling of free air? If you don't come and get me,
+I'll call on you and make you come!"</p>
+
+<p>"Warn you I'll probably be living over some
+beanery."</p>
+
+<p>"Probably. With dirty steps leading up to it. I'll
+sweep the steps. I'll cook supper for you. I can do
+things, can't I! I did manage Dlorus, didn't I!"</p>
+
+<p>He was murmuring, "Claire, dear!" when she
+changed her tone to the echo of Brooklyn Heights,
+and hurried on, "You do understand, don't you!
+We'll be, uh, good friends."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes." He drove with much speed and silence.</p>
+
+<p>Though they were devouring the dark road, though
+roadside rocks, caught by the headlights, seemed to
+fly up at them, though they went on forever, chased<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>
+by a nightmare, Claire snuggled down in security.
+Her head drooped against his shoulder. He put his
+arm about her, his hand about her waist. She sleepily
+wondered if she ought to let him. She heard herself
+muttering, "Sorry I was so rude when you were so
+rude," and her chilly cheek discovered that the smooth-worn
+shoulder of his old blue coat was warm, and she
+wondered some more about the questions of waists
+and hands and&mdash;&mdash; She was asleep.</p>
+
+<p>She awoke, bewildered to find that dawn was slipping
+into the air. While she had slept Milt had taken
+his arm from about her and fished out a lap-robe for
+her. Behind them, Dlorus was slumbering, with her
+soft mouth wide open. Claire felt the luxury of the
+pocket of warmth under the lap-robe; she comfortably
+stretched her legs while she pictured Milt driving on
+all the night, rigid, tireless, impersonal as the engineer
+of a night express.</p>
+
+<p>They came into North Yakima at breakfast time,
+and found the house of Mr. Kloh, a neat, bare, drab
+frame box, with tight small front and back yards.
+Dlorus was awake, and when she wasn't yawning, she
+was enjoying being hysterical.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Boltwood," she whined, "you go in and
+jolly him up."</p>
+
+<p>Milt begged, "Better let me do it, Claire."</p>
+
+<p>They looked squarely at each other. "No, I think
+I'd better," she decided.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span>"Right, Claire, but&mdash;I wish I could do more things
+for you."</p>
+
+<p>"I know!"</p>
+
+<p>He lifted her stiff, cold little body from the car.
+His hands under her arms, he held her on the running-board
+an instant, her eyes level with his. "Little
+sister&mdash;plucky little sister!" he sighed. He lowered
+her to the ground.</p>
+
+<p>Claire knocked at the back door. To it came a
+bald, tired man, in an apron wet at the knees. The
+kitchen floor was soaped, and a scrubbing-brush rode
+amid the seas. A rather dirty child clung to his
+hand. "Trying to clean up, ma'am. Not very good
+at it. I hope you ain't the Cruelty to Children lady.
+Willy looks mussed, but fact is, I just can't get time
+to wash the clothes, but he means a terrible lot to me.
+What was it? Will you step in?"</p>
+
+<p>Claire buttoned the child's rompers before she spoke.
+Then:</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Kloh, I want to be perfectly honest with you.
+I've had word from your wife. She's unhappy, and
+she loves and admires you more than any other man in
+the world, and I think she would come back&mdash;misses
+the child so."</p>
+
+<p>The man wiped his reddened hands. "I don't
+know&mdash;&mdash; I don't wish her no harm. Trouble was,
+I'm kind of pokey. I guess I couldn't give her any
+good times. I used to try to go to dances with her,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span>
+but when I'd worked late, I'd get sleepy and&mdash;&mdash; She's
+a beautiful woman, smart 's a whip, and I guess
+I was too slow for her. No, she wouldn't never come
+back to me."</p>
+
+<p>"She's out in front of the house now&mdash;waiting!"</p>
+
+<p>"Great C&aelig;sar's ghost, and the floor not scrubbed!"
+With a squawk of anxiety he leaped on the scrubbing-brush,
+and when Milt and Dlorus appeared at the door,
+Mr. Kloh and Miss Claire Boltwood were wiping up
+the kitchen floor.</p>
+
+<p>Dlorus looked at them, arms akimbo, and sighed,
+"Hello, Johnny, my, ain't it nice to be back, oh, you
+had the sink painted, oh, forgive me, Johnny, I was
+a bad ungrateful woman, I don't care if you don't
+never take me to no more dances, hardly any, Willy
+come here, dear, oh, he is such a sweet child, my, his
+mouth is so dirty, will you forgive me, Johnny, is my
+overcoat in the moth-balls?"</p>
+
+<p>When Mr. Kloh had gone off to the mill&mdash;thrice
+returning from the gate to kiss Dlorus and to thank
+her rescuers&mdash;Claire sat down and yawningly lashed
+off every inch of Dlorus's fair white skin:</p>
+
+<p>"You're at it already; taking advantage of that
+good man's forgiveness, and getting lofty with him,
+and rather admiring yourself as a spectacular sinner.
+You are a lazy, ignorant, not very clean woman, and
+if you succeed in making Mr. Kloh and Willy happy,
+it will be almost too big a job for you. Now if I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>
+come back from Seattle and find you misbehaving
+again&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Dlorus broke down. "You won't, miss! And I
+will raise chickens, like he wanted, honest I will!"</p>
+
+<p>"Then you may let me have a room to take a
+nap in, and perhaps Mr. Daggett could sleep in there
+on the sofa, and we'll get rested before we start
+back."</p>
+
+<p>Both Milt and Dlorus meekly followed the boss.</p>
+
+<p>It was noon before Milt and Claire woke, and discovered
+that Dlorus had prepared for them scrambled
+eggs and store celery, served on an almost clean table-cloth.
+Mr. Kloh came home for lunch, and while
+Dlorus sat on his lap in the living-room, and repeated
+that she had been a "bad, naughty, 'ittle dirl&mdash;what
+did the fellows say at the mill?" Milt and Claire
+sat dumpily on the back porch, regarding scenery
+which featured of seven tin cans, a broken patent
+washing-machine, and a rheumatic pear tree.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose we ought to start," groaned Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"I have about as much nerve as a rabbit, and as
+much punch as a bale of hay," Milt admitted.</p>
+
+<p>"We're like two children that have been playing
+too long."</p>
+
+<p>"But don't want to go home!"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite! Though I don't think much of your idea
+of a playhouse&mdash;those tin cans. But it's better than
+having to be grown-up."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span>In the midst of which chatter they realized that Mr.
+Henry B. Boltwood and Dr. Hooker Beach had come
+round the corner of the house, and were gaping at
+them.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIII<br />
+THE GRAEL IN A BACK YARD IN YAKIMA</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">"I must</span> say that you two have chosen a fine
+pastoral scene!" observed Mr. Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>"Hhhhhhhhow did you get here?" gasped Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"Auto 'bus over Blewett Pass, train here from
+Ellensburg. That woman&mdash;everything all right?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, everything's fine. We were just starting
+back, sir," implored Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"Huh!"</p>
+
+<p>"Awfully sorry, sir, to take Claire on such a
+hike&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't blame you particularly. When that young
+woman gets an idea into her head, the rest of us are
+pawns. Why, even me&mdash;she's dragged me all over the
+Rocky Mountains. And I will admit, Claire, that it's
+been good for me. But I begin to feel human again,
+and I think it's about time I took charge. We'll catch
+the afternoon train for Seattle, Claire. The trip has
+been extremely interesting, but I think perhaps we'll
+call it enough. Daggett, want to get you to drive the
+Gomez on to Seattle. Beach tells me your car is
+completely wrecked. Lose any money in it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir. Had my roll in the bug. I'll have to
+go back to it and get some clothes out of it, though."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span>"Well, then, will you drive my car in? Charge
+me anywhere up to fifty dollars, if you want to&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'd rather not&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"It's a perfectly honest job&mdash;I'd do it, too quick!
+Or if your confounded pride won't let you charge
+anything, bring the car on anyway. Come, dolly, I
+have a jitney here, please observe my graceful use of
+'jitney,' and I have the bags. We'll hustle to the
+station now. No! No arguments, chick!"</p>
+
+<p>On the station platform, Claire and Milt were under
+the surveillance of Mr. Boltwood, who was extremely
+irritable as every two minutes the train was reported
+to be two minutes later. They tramped up and down,
+speaking in lowered voices, very meek but in their
+joint naughtiness very intimate.</p>
+
+<p>"That was a nice place to end a transcontinental
+drive&mdash;in the back yard of Mr. Johnny Kloh, with
+an unrestricted view of tin cans!" lamented Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"Still, your drive didn't end at Kloh's; it ended
+way up in the mountains."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood bumbled down on them: "Another
+minute late! Like to know what the matter is!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, father!"</p>
+
+<p>When Mr. Boltwood's impatiently waiting back was
+turned, Claire gripped Milt's hand, and whispered to
+him, "You see, I'm captured! I thought I was
+father's lord and chauffeur, but he sniffs the smoke
+of the ticker. In his mind, he's already back in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>
+office, running things. He'll probably turn me over to
+Jeff, for disciplining! You won't let them change me
+back into a pink-face, will you? Come to tea, at the
+Gilsons', just as soon as you reach Seattle."</p>
+
+<p>"Tea&mdash;&mdash; Now we're so near your Gilsons, I
+begin to get scared. Wouldn't know what to do. Gee,
+I've heard you have to balance a tea-cup and a sandwich
+and a hunk o' cake and a lot of conversation
+all at once! I'd spill the tea, and drop crumbs, and
+probably have the butler set on me."</p>
+
+<p>"You will not! And if you did&mdash;can't you see?&mdash;it
+wouldn't matter! It just wouldn't matter!"</p>
+
+<p>"Honestly? Claire dear, do you know why I came
+on this trip? In Schoenstrom, I heard you say you
+were going to Seattle. That moment, I decided I
+would, too, and get acquainted with you, if murder
+would do it. But, oh, I'm clumsy."</p>
+
+<p>"You've seen me clumsy, in driving. You taught
+me to get over it. Perhaps I can teach you some
+things. And we'll study&mdash;together&mdash;evenings! I'm a
+thoroughly ignorant parasite woman. Make me become
+real! A real woman!"</p>
+
+<p>"Dear&mdash;dear&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Boltwood loomed on them. "The train's coming,
+at last. We'll have a decent sleep for once, at
+the Gilsons'. I've wired them to meet us." He departed.</p>
+
+<p>"Terribly glad your father keeps coming down on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span>
+us, because it scares me so I get desperate," said Milt.
+"Golly, I think I can hear the train. I, uh, Claire,
+Claire dear&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Milt, are you proposing to me? Please hurry,
+because that is the train. Isn't it absurd&mdash;some day
+you'll have to propose all over again formally, for the
+benefit of people like father, when you and I already
+know we're partners! We've done things together,
+not just danced together! When you're an engineer,
+you'll call me, and I'll come a-running up to Alaska.
+And sometimes you'll come with me to Brooklyn&mdash;we'll
+be a couple of bombs&mdash;&mdash; There's the train.
+Oh, playmate, hurry with your engineering course!
+Hurry, hurry, hurry! Because when it's done,
+then&mdash;&mdash; Whither thou goest, there I go also! And
+you did bully me, you did, you did, and I like it,
+and&mdash;&mdash; Yes, father, the bags are right here. Telephone
+me, minute you reach Seattle, dear, and we'll
+have a private lesson in balancing tea-cups&mdash;&mdash; Yes,
+father, I have the tickets. So glad, dear, the trip
+smashed up like this&mdash;shocked me into reality&mdash;made
+me realize I've been with you every hour since I dismissed
+you, back in Dakota, and you looked at me, big
+hurt eyes, like a child, and&mdash;&mdash; Yes, father, Pullman's
+at the back. Yes, I'm coming!"</p>
+
+<p>"W-wait! D-did you know I was going to
+propose?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Ever since the Yellowstone. Been trying to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span>
+think of a nice way to refuse you. But there isn't
+any. You're like Pinky&mdash;can't get rid of you&mdash;have
+t' adopt you. Besides, I've found out&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You love me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know! How can I tell? But I do like
+to drive with my head on your shoulder and&mdash;&mdash; Yesssss,
+father, coming!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIV<br />
+HER OWN PEOPLE</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Mr. Henry B. Boltwood</span> was decorously
+asleep in a chair in the observation car, and
+Claire, on the wide back platform, sat unmoving, apparently
+devoted to agriculture and mountain scenery.
+But it might have been noted that her hand clenched
+one of the wooden supports of her camp-stool, and
+that her hunched back did not move.</p>
+
+<p>When she had turned to follow her father into the
+train, Milt had caught her shoulders and kissed her.</p>
+
+<p>For half an hour that kiss had remained, a perceptible
+warm pressure on her lips. And for half an hour
+she had felt the relief of gliding through the mountains
+without the strain of piloting, the comfort of
+having the unseen, mysterious engineer up ahead
+automatically drive for her. She had caroled to her
+father about nearing the Pacific. Her nervousness
+had expressed itself in jerky gaiety.</p>
+
+<p>But when he had sneaked away for a nap, and
+Claire could no longer hide from herself by a veil of
+chatter the big decision she had made on the station
+platform, then she was lonely and frightened&mdash;and
+very anxious to undecide the decision. She could not
+think clearly. She could see Milt Daggett only as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span>
+solemn young man in an inferior sweater, standing by
+the track in a melancholy autumnal light, waving to
+her as the train pulled out, disappearing in a dun
+obscurity, less significant than the station, the receding
+ties, or the porter who was, in places known only
+to his secretive self, concealing her baggage.</p>
+
+<p>She could only mutter in growing panic, "I'm crazy.
+In-sane! Pledging myself to this boy before I know
+how he will turn out. Will he learn anything besides
+engineering? I know it&mdash;I do want to stroke his
+cheek and&mdash;his kiss frightened me, but&mdash;&mdash; Will I
+hate him when I see him with nice people? Can I
+introduce him to the Gilsons? Oh, I was mad; so
+wrought up by that idiotic chase with Dlorus, and so
+sure I was a romantic heroine and&mdash;&mdash; And I'm
+simply an indecisive girl in a realistic muddle!"</p>
+
+<p>Threatened by darkness and the sinister evening
+chill of the mountains, with the train no longer cheerfully
+climbing the rocky ridge but rumbling and snorting
+in the defiles, and startling her with agitating forward
+leaps as though the brakes had let go, she could
+not endure the bleak platform, and even less could she
+endure sitting in the chair car, eyed by the smug
+tourists&mdash;people as empty of her romance as they
+were incapable of her sharp tragedy. She balanced
+forward to the vestibule. She stood in that cold,
+swaying, darkling place that was filled with the smell
+of rubber and metal and grease and the thunderous<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span>
+clash of steel on steel; she tried to look out into the
+fleeing darkness; she tried to imagine that the train
+was carrying her away from the pursuing enemy&mdash;from
+her own weak self.</p>
+
+<p>Her father came puffing and lip-pursing and jolly,
+to take her to dinner. Mr. Boltwood had no tearing
+meditations; he had a healthy interest in soup. But
+he glanced at her, across the bright, sleek dining-table;
+he seemed to study her; and suddenly Claire saw that
+he was a very wise man. His look hinted, "You're
+worried, my dear," but his voice ventured nothing
+beyond comfortable drawling stories to which she had
+only, from the depth of her gloomy brooding, to nod
+mechanically.</p>
+
+<p>She got a great deal of satisfaction and
+horror out of watching two traveling-men after
+dinner. Milt had praised the race, and one of
+the two traveling-men, a slender, clear-faced
+youngster, was rather like Milt, despite plastered hair,
+a watch-chain slung diagonally across his waistcoat,
+maroon silk socks, and shoes of pearl buttons, gray
+tops, and patent-leather bottoms. The other man was
+a butter-ball. Both of them had harshly pompous
+voices&mdash;the proudly unlettered voices of the smoking
+compartment. The slender man was roaring:</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir, he's got a great proposition there&mdash;believe
+me, he's got a great proposition&mdash;he's got one
+great little factory there, take it from me. He can<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span>
+turn out toothpicks to compete with Michigan. He's
+simply piling up the shekels&mdash;why say, he's got a house
+with eighteen rooms&mdash;every room done different."</p>
+
+<p>Claire wondered whether Milt, when the sting and
+faith of romance were blunted, would engage in Great
+Propositions, and fight for the recognition of his&mdash;toothpicks.
+Would his creations be favorites in the
+best lunch rooms? Would he pile up shekels?</p>
+
+<p>Then her fretting was lost in the excitement of approaching
+Seattle and their host&mdash;Claire's cousin,
+Eugene Gilson, an outrageously prosperous owner of
+shingle-mills. He came from an old Brooklyn Heights
+family. He had married Eva Gontz of Englewood.
+He liked music and wrote jokey little letters and
+knew the addresses of all the best New York shops.
+He was of Her Own People, and she was near now to
+the security of his friendship, the long journey done.</p>
+
+<p>Lights thicker and thicker&mdash;a factory illuminated
+by arc-lamps,&mdash;the baggage&mdash;the porter&mdash;the eager
+trail of people in the aisle&mdash;climbing down to the platform&mdash;red
+caps&mdash;passing the puffing engine which had
+brought them in&mdash;the procession to the gate&mdash;faces
+behind a grill&mdash;Eugene Gilson and Eva waving&mdash;kisses,
+cries of "How was the trip?" and "Oh! Had
+won-derful drive!"&mdash;the huge station, and curious
+waiting passengers, Jap coolies in a gang, lumbermen
+in corks&mdash;the Gilsons' quiet car, and baggage stowed
+away by the chauffeur instead of by their own tired<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span>
+hands&mdash;streets strangely silent after the tumult of the
+train&mdash;Seattle and the sunset coast at last attained.</p>
+
+<p>Claire had forgotten how many charming, most
+desirable things there were in the world. The Gilsons
+drove up Queen Anne Hill to a bay-fronting house
+on a breezy knob&mdash;a Georgian house of holly hedge,
+French windows, a terrace that suggested tea, and a
+great hall of mahogany and white enamel with the hint
+of roses somewhere, and a fire kindled in the paneled
+drawing-room to be seen beyond the hall. Warmth
+and softness and the Gilsons' confident affection
+wrapped her around; and in contented weariness she
+mounted to a bedroom of Bakst sketches, a four-poster,
+and a bedside table with a black and orange
+electric lamp and a collection of Arthur Symons' essays.</p>
+
+<p>She sank by the bed, pitifully rubbed her cheek
+against the silk comforter that was primly awaiting her
+commands at the foot of the bed, and cried, "Oh,
+four-posters <i>are</i> necessary! I can't give them up!
+I won't! They&mdash;&mdash; No one has a right to ask me."
+She mentally stamped her foot. "I simply won't live
+in a shack and take in washing. It isn't worth it."</p>
+
+<p>A bath, faintly scented, in a built-in tub in her own
+marble bathroom. A preposterously and delightfully
+enormous Turkish towel. One of Eva Gilson's foamy
+neglig&eacute;es. Slow exquisite dressing&mdash;not the scratchy
+hopping over ingrown dirt, among ingrown smells, of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span>
+a filthy small-hotel bedroom, but luxurious wandering
+over rugs velvety to her bare feet. A languid inspection
+of the frivolous colors and curves in the drawings
+by Bakst and George Plank and Helen Dryden. A
+glance at the richness of the toilet-table, at the velvet
+curtains that shut out the common world.</p>
+
+<p>Expanding to the comfort as an orchid to cloying
+tropic airs, she drew on her sheerest chemise, her most
+frivolous silk stockings. In a dreaming enervated joy
+she saw how smooth were her arms and legs; she
+sleepily resented the redness of her wrists and the callouses
+of the texture of corduroy that scored her palms
+from holding the steering wheel.</p>
+
+<p>Yes, she was glad that she had made the experiment&mdash;but
+gladder that she was safely in from the
+long dust-whitened way, back in her own world of
+beauty; and she couldn't imagine ever trying it again.
+To think of clumping out into that world of deliberate
+and brawling crudeness&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Of one Milt Daggett she didn't think at all.</p>
+
+<p>Gorgeously sleepy&mdash;and gorgeously certain that by
+and by she would go, not to a stingy hotel bed, with
+hound-dog ribs to cut into her tired back, but to a
+feathery softness of slumber&mdash;she wavered down to
+the drawing-room, and on the davenport, by the fire,
+with Victoria chocolates by her elbow, and pillows
+behind her shoulders, she gossiped of her adventure,
+and asked for news of friends and kin back East.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>Eugene and Eva Gilson asked with pyrotechnic merriness
+about the "funny people she must have met
+along the road." With a subdued, hidden unhappiness,
+Claire found that she could not mention Milt&mdash;that
+she was afraid her father would mention Milt&mdash;to
+these people who took it for granted that all persons
+who did not live in large houses and play good games
+of bridge were either "queer" or "common"; who
+believed that their West was desirable in proportion
+as it became like the East; and that they, though
+Westerners, were as superior to workmen with hard
+hands as was Brooklyn Heights itself.</p>
+
+<p>Claire tried to wriggle out from under the thought
+of Milt while, with the Gilsons as the perfect audience,
+she improvised on the theme of wandering. With
+certain unintended exaggerations, and certain not
+quite accurate groupings of events, she described the
+farmers and cowpunchers, the incredible hotels and
+garages. Indeed they had become incredible to her
+own self. Obviously this silken girl couldn't possibly
+take seriously a Dlorus Kloh&mdash;or a young garage man
+who said "ain't."</p>
+
+<p>Eva Gilson had been in Brooklyn within the month,
+and in a passion of remembrance of home, Claire cried,
+"Oh, do tell me about everybody."</p>
+
+<p>"I had such a good time with Amy Dorrance," said
+Mrs. Gilson. "Of course Amy is a little dull, but she's
+such an awfully good sort and&mdash;&mdash; We did have the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span>
+jolliest party one afternoon. We went to lunch at
+the Ritz, and a matin&eacute;e, and we saw such an interesting
+man&mdash;Gene is frightfully jealous when I rave
+about him&mdash;I'm sure he was a violinist&mdash;simply an
+exquisite thing he was&mdash;I wanted to kiss him. Gene
+will now say, 'Why didn't you?'"</p>
+
+<p>And Gene said, "Well, why <i>didn't</i> you?" and
+Claire laughed, and her toes felt warm and pink and
+good, and she was perfectly happy, and she murmured,
+"It would be good to hear a decent violinist again.
+Oh! What had George Worlicht been doing, when
+you were home?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you think Georgie is wonderful?" fluttered
+Mrs. Gilson. "He makes me rue my thirty-six
+sad years. I think I'll adopt him. You know, he almost
+won the tennis cup at Long Branch."</p>
+
+<p>Georgie had a little mustache and an income, just
+enough income to support the little mustache, and he
+sang inoffensively, and was always winning tennis cups&mdash;almost&mdash;and
+he always said, at least once at every
+party, "The basis of <i>savoir faire</i> is knowing how to
+be rude to the right people." Fire-enamored and gliding
+into a perfumed haze of exquisite drowsiness,
+Claire saw Georgie as heroic and wise. But the firelight
+got into her eyes, and her lids wouldn't stay open,
+and in her ears was a soft humming as of a million
+bees in a distant meadow golden-spangled&mdash;and Gene
+was helping her upstairs; sleepiness submerged her like<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span>
+bathing in sweet waters; she fumbled at buttons and
+hooks and stays, let things lie where they fell&mdash;and
+of all that luxury nothing was more pleasant than the
+knowledge that she did not have to take precautions
+against the rats, mice, cockroaches, and all their obscene
+little brothers which&mdash;on some far-off fantastic
+voyaging when she had been young and foolish&mdash;she
+seemed to remember having found in her own room.
+Then she was sinking into a bed like a tide of rainbow-colored
+foam, sinking deep, deep, deep&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>And it was morning, and she perceived that the
+purpose of morning light was to pick out surfaces of
+mahogany and orange velvet and glass, and that only
+an idiot would ever leave this place and go about
+begging dirty garage men to fill her car with stinking
+gasoline and oil.</p>
+
+<p>The children were at breakfast&mdash;children surely not
+of the same species as the smeary-cheeked brats she
+had seen tumbling by roadsides along the way&mdash;sturdy
+Mason, with his cap of curls, and Virginia,
+with bobbed ash-blond hair prim about her delicate
+face. They curtsied, and in voices that actually had
+intonations they besought her, "Oh, Cousin Claire,
+would you pleasssssse tell us about drive-to-the-coast?"</p>
+
+<p>After breakfast, she went out on the terrace for the
+View.</p>
+
+<p>In Seattle, even millionaires, and the I. W. W., and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span>
+men with red garters on their exposed shirt-sleeves
+who want to give you real estate, all talk about the
+View. The View is to Seattle what the car-service,
+the auditorium, the flivver-factory, or the price of coal
+is to other cities. At parties in Seattle, you discuss the
+question of whether the View of Lake Union or the
+View of the Olympics is the better, and polite office-managers
+say to their stenographers as they enter,
+"How's your View this morning?" All real-estate
+deeds include a patent on the View, and every native
+son has it as his soundest belief that no one in Tacoma
+gets a View of Mount Rainier.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Gilson informed Claire that they had the finest
+View in Seattle.</p>
+
+<p>Below Claire was the harbor, with docks thrust far
+out into the water, and steamers alive with smoke.
+Mrs. Gilson said they were Blue Funnel Liners, loading
+for Vladivostok and Japan. The names, just the
+names, shot into Claire's heart a wistful unexpressed
+desire that was somehow vaguely connected with a
+Milt Daggett who, back in the Middlewestern mud and
+rain, had longed for purple mountains and cherry blossoms
+and the sea. But she cast out the wish, and lifted
+her eyes to mountains across the sound&mdash;not purple
+mountains, but sheer silver streaked with black, like
+frozen surf on a desolate northern shore&mdash;the
+Olympics, two-score miles away.</p>
+
+<p>Up there, one could camp, with a boy in a deteriorated<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>
+sweater singing as he watched the coffee&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Hastily she looked to the left, across the city, with
+its bright new skyscrapers, its shining cornices and
+masses of ranked windows, and the exclamation-point
+of the "tallest building outside of New York"&mdash;far
+livelier than her own rusty Brooklyn. Beyond the
+city was a dun cloud, but as she stared, far up in the
+cloud something crept out of the vapor, and hung there
+like a dull full moon, aloof, majestic, overwhelming,
+and she realized that she was beholding the peak of
+Mount Rainier, with the city at its foot like white
+quartz pebbles at the base of a tower.</p>
+
+<p>A landing-stage for angels, she reflected.</p>
+
+<p>It did seem larger than dressing-tables and velvet
+hangings and scented baths.</p>
+
+<p>But she dragged herself from the enticing path
+of that thought, and sighed wretchedly, "Oh, yes, he
+would appreciate Rainier, but how&mdash;how would he
+manage a grape-fruit? I mustn't be a fool! I
+mustn't!" She saw that Mrs. Gilson was peeping at
+her, and she made herself say adequate things about
+the View before she fled inside&mdash;fled from her sputtering
+inquiring self.</p>
+
+<p>In the afternoon they drove to Capitol Hill; they
+dropped in at various pretty houses and met the sort
+of people Claire knew back home. Between people
+they had Views; and the sensible Miss Boltwood,
+making a philosophic discovery, announced to herself,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span>
+"After all, I've seen just as much from this limousine
+as I would from a bone-breaking Teal bug. Silly to
+make yourself miserable to see things. Oh yes, I will
+go wandering some more, but not like a hobo.
+But&mdash;&mdash; What can I say to him? Good heavens,
+he may be here any time now, with our car. Oh, why&mdash;why&mdash;why
+was I insane on that station platform?"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXV<br />
+THE ABYSSINIAN PRINCE</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Snoqualmie Pass</span> lies among mountains
+prickly with rocks and burnt stumps, but the
+road is velvet, with broad saucer curves; and to Milt
+it was pure beauty, it was release from life, to soar
+up coaxing inclines and slip down easy grades in the
+powerful car. "No more Teals for me," he cried,
+in the ecstasy of handling an engine that slowed to a
+demure whisper, then, at a touch of the accelerator,
+floated up a rise, effortless, joyous, humming the booming
+song of the joy in speed. He suddenly hated the
+bucking tediousness of the Teal. The Gomez-Dep
+symbolized his own new life.</p>
+
+<p>So he came to Lake Washington, and just across it
+was the city of his long dreams, the city of the Pacific&mdash;and
+of Claire. There was no ferry in sight, and he
+rounded the lake, struck a brick pavement, rolled
+through rough woods, suburban villas, and petty
+business streets, to a region of factories and mills, with
+the funnels of ships beyond.</p>
+
+<p>And every minute he drove more slowly and became
+more uneasy.</p>
+
+<p>The pavement&mdash;the miles of it; the ruthless lumbermills,
+with their thousands of workmen quite like<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span>
+himself; the agitation of realizing that every three
+minutes he was passing a settlement larger than
+Schoenstrom; the strangeness of ships and all the
+cynical ways of the sea&mdash;the whole scene depressed
+him as he perceived how little of the world he knew,
+and how big and contemptuous of Milt Daggetts that
+world must be.</p>
+
+<p>"Huh!" he growled. "Quite some folks living
+here. Don't suppose they spend such a whale of a lot
+of time thinking about Milt Daggett and Bill McGolwey
+and Prof Jones. I guess most of these people
+wouldn't think Heinie Rauskukle's store was so gosh-awful
+big. I wasn't scared of Minneapolis&mdash;much&mdash;but
+there they didn't ring in mountains and an
+ocean on you. And I didn't have to go up on the
+hill and meet folks like Claire's relations, and figure
+out whether you shake hands catch-as-catch-can or
+Corinthian. Look at that sawmill chimney&mdash;isn't it
+nice of 'em to put the fly-screen over it so the flies
+won't get down into the flames. No, they haven't got
+much more than a million feet of lumber in that one
+pile. And here's a bum little furniture store&mdash;it
+wouldn't cost more 'n about ten times all I've got to
+buy one of those Morris chairs. Oh Gooooooosh,
+won't these houses ever stop? Say, that must be a
+jitney. The driver snickered at me. Will the whole
+town be onto me? Milt, you're a kind young fellow,
+and you know what's the matter with Heinie's differential,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span>
+but they don't need you here. Quite a few
+folks to carry on the business. Gosh, look at that
+building ahead&mdash;nine stories!"</p>
+
+<p>He had planned to stop at a hotel, to wash up, and
+to gallop to Claire. But&mdash;well&mdash;wouldn't it maybe
+be better to leave the car at a public garage, so the
+Boltwoods could get it when they wanted to? He'd
+better "just kind of look around before he tackled the
+watch-dog."</p>
+
+<p>It was the public garage which finally crushed him.
+It was a garage of enameled brick and colored tiles,
+with a plate-glass-enclosed office in which worked
+young men clad as the angels. One of them wore a
+carnation, Milt noted.</p>
+
+<p>"Huh! I'll write back and tell Ben Sittka that
+hereafter he's to wear his best-Sunday-go-to-meeting
+clothes and a milkweed blossom when he comes down
+to work at the Red Trail Garage!"</p>
+
+<p>Milt drove up the brick incline into a room
+thousands of miles long, with millions of new and
+recently polished cars standing in lines as straight as a
+running-board. He begged of a high-nosed colored
+functionary&mdash;not in khaki overalls but in maroon
+livery&mdash;"Where'll I put this boat?"</p>
+
+<p>The Abyssinian prince gave him a check, and in a
+tone of extreme lack of personal interest snapped,
+"Take it down the aisle to the elevator."</p>
+
+<p>Milt had followed the natural lines of traffic into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>
+the city; he had spoken to no one; the prince's snort
+was his welcome to Seattle.</p>
+
+<p>Meekly he drove past the cars so ebon and silvery,
+so smug and strong, that they would have regarded a
+Teal bug as an insult. Another attendant waved him
+into the elevator, and Milt tried not to look surprised
+when the car started, not forward, but upward, as
+though it had turned into an aeroplane.</p>
+
+<p>When these adventures were over, when he had had
+a shave and a shine, and washed his hands, and looked
+into a department-store window that contained ten
+billion yards of silk draped against polished satinwood,
+when he had felt unhappy over a movie theater large
+enough to contain ten times the population of Schoenstrom,
+and been cursed by a policeman for jaywalking,
+and had passed a hotel entirely full of diplomats and
+marble and caviare&mdash;then he could no longer put off
+telephoning to Claire, and humbly, in a booth meant
+for an umbrella-stand, he got the Eugene Gilson house,
+and to a female who said "Yes?" in a tone which
+made it mean "No!" he ventured, "May I speak to
+Miss Boltwood?"</p>
+
+<p>Miss Boltwood, it seemed, was out.</p>
+
+<p>He was not sorry. He was relieved. He ducked out
+of the telephone-booth with a sensation of escape.</p>
+
+<p>Milt was in love with Claire; she was to him the
+purpose of life; he thought of her deeply and tenderly
+and longingly. All the way into Seattle he had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span>
+brooded about her; remembered her every word and
+gesture; recalled the curve of her chin, and the fresh
+feeling of her hands. But Claire had suddenly become
+too big. In her were all these stores, these office
+buildings for clever lawyers and surgeons, these contemptuous
+trolley cars, these careless people in beautiful
+clothes. They were too much for him. Desperately
+he was pushing them back&mdash;back&mdash;fighting
+for breath. And she belonged with them.</p>
+
+<p>He mailed the check for the stored car to her,
+with a note&mdash;written standing before a hacked wall-desk
+in a branch post-office&mdash;which said only, "Here's
+check for the boat. Did not know whether you would
+have room for it at house. Tried to get you on phone,
+phone again just as soon as rent room etc. Hope having
+happy time, M.D."</p>
+
+<p>He went out to the university. On the trolley he
+relaxed. But he did not exultantly feel that he had
+won to the Pacific; he could not regard Seattle now
+as a magic city, the Bagdad of modern caravans, with
+Alaska and the Orient on one hand, the forests to the
+north, and eastward the spacious Inland Empire of
+the wheat. He saw it as a place where you had to
+work hard just to live; where busy policemen despised
+you because you didn't know which trolley to take;
+where it was incredibly hard to remember even the
+names of the unceasing streets; where the conductors
+said "Step lively!" and there was no room to whistle,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span>
+no time to swap stories with a Bill McGolwey at an
+Old Home lunch-counter.</p>
+
+<p>He found the university; he talked with the authorities
+about entering the engineering school; the Y. M.
+C. A. gave him a list of rooms; and, because it was
+cheap, he chose a cubbyhole in a flat over a candy
+store&mdash;a low room, which would probably keep out
+the rain, but had no other virtues. It had one bed, one
+table, one dissipated bureau, two straight bare chairs,
+and one venerable lithograph depicting a girl with
+ringlets shaking her irritating forefinger at a high-church
+kitten.</p>
+
+<p>The landlady consented to his importing an oil-stove
+for cooking his meals. He bought the stove, with a
+box of oatmeal, a jar of bacon, and half a dozen eggs.
+He bought a plane and solid geometry, and an algebra.
+At dinner time he laid the algebra beside his plate
+of anemic bacon and leaking eggs. The eggs grew
+cold. He did not stir. He was reviewing his high-school
+algebra. He went down the pages, word by
+word, steadily, quickly, absolutely concentrated&mdash;as
+concentrated as he would recently have been in a new
+problem of disordered transmission. Not once did
+he stop to consider how glorious it would be to marry
+Claire&mdash;or how terrifying it would be to marry Miss
+Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>Three hours went by before he started up, bewildered,
+rubbed his eyes, picked at the chill bacon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>
+and altogether disgusting eggs, and rambled out into
+the street.</p>
+
+<p>Again he risked the scorn of conductors and jitney
+drivers. He found Queen Anne Hill, found the residence
+of Mr. Eugene Gilson. He sneaked about it,
+slipped into the gate, prowled toward the house.
+Flabby from the intensity of study, he longed for the
+stimulus of Claire's smile. But as he stared up at the
+great squares of the clear windows, at the flare of
+white columns in the porch-lights, that smile seemed
+unreachable. He felt like a rustic at court. From the
+shelter of the prickly holly hedge he watched the
+house. It was "some kind of a party?&mdash;or what
+would folks like these call a party?" Limousines
+were arriving; he had a glimpse of silken ankles,
+frothy underskirts; heard easy laughter; saw people
+moving through a big blue and silver room; caught
+a drifting tremor of music.</p>
+
+<p>At last he saw Claire. She was dancing with a
+young man as decorative as "that confounded Saxton
+fellow" he had met at Flathead Lake, but younger
+than Saxton, a laughing young man, with curly black
+hair. For the first time in his life Milt wanted to kill.
+He muttered, "Damn&mdash;damn&mdash;DAMN!" as he saw
+the young man carelessly embracing Claire.</p>
+
+<p>His fingers tingling, his whole body yearning till
+every cell seemed a beating hammer, Milt longed just
+once to slip his hand about Claire's waist like that.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span>
+He could feel the satin of her bodice and its warmth.</p>
+
+<p>Then it seemed to him, as Claire again passed the
+window, that he did not know her at all. He had
+once talked to a girl who resembled her, but that was
+long ago. He could understand a Gomez-Dep and
+appreciate a brisk sports-suit, but this girl was of a
+world unintelligible to him. Her hair, in its dips and
+convolutions, was altogether a puzzle. "How did
+she ever fix it like that?" Her low evening dress&mdash;"what
+was it made of&mdash;some white stuff, but was it
+silk or muslin or what?" Her shoulders were startling
+in their bare powdery smoothness&mdash;"how dare that
+young pup dance with her?" And her face, that had
+seemed so jolly and friendly, floated past the window
+as pale and illusive as a wisp of fog. His longing for
+her passed into clumsy awe. He remembered, without
+resentment, that once on a hilltop in Dakota she had
+coldly forbidden him to follow her.</p>
+
+<p>With all the pleasure of martyrdom&mdash;to make quite
+sure that he should realize how complete a fool he had
+been to intrude on Miss Boltwood&mdash;he studied the
+other guests. He gave them, perhaps, a glory they did
+not have. There were girls sleek as ivory. There
+was a lean stooped man, very distinguished. There
+was a bulky man in a dinner coat, with a semi-circle
+of mustache, and eyes that even at a distance seemed
+to give impatient orders. He would be a big banker,
+or a lumberman.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>It was the easy friendliness of all of them that most
+made Milt feel like an outsider. If a servant had
+come out and ordered him away, he would have gone
+meekly ... he fancied.</p>
+
+<p>He straggled off, too solidly unhappy to think how
+unhappy he was. In his clammy room he picked up
+the algebra. For a quarter-hour he could not gather
+enough vigor to open it. In his lassitude, his elbows
+felt feeble, his fingers were ready to drop off. He
+slowly scratched the book open&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>At one o'clock he was reading algebra, his face
+still and grim. But already it seemed less heartily
+brick-red.</p>
+
+<p>He listlessly telephoned to Claire, in the morning.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello? Oh! Miss Boltwood? This is Milt Daggett."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Oh, how are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, why I'm&mdash;I've got settled. I can get into
+the engineering school all right."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad."</p>
+
+<p>"Uh, enjoying Seattle?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Oh yes. The mountains&mdash;&mdash; Do you like
+it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Oh yes. Sea and all&mdash;&mdash; Great town."</p>
+
+<p>"Uh, w-when are we going to see you? Daddy
+had to go East, left you his regards. W-when&mdash;&mdash;?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why&mdash;why I suppose you're awful&mdash;awfully busy,
+meeting people and all&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span>"Yes, I am, rather, but&mdash;&mdash;" Her hedging uncomfortable
+tone changed to a cry of distress.
+"Milt! I must see you. Come up at four this afternoon."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes!"</p>
+
+<p>He rushed to a small, hot tailor-shop. He panted
+"Press m' suit while I wait?" They gave him a
+pair of temporary trousers, an undesirable pair of
+trousers belonging to a short fat man with no taste
+in fabrics, and with these flapping about his lean legs,
+he sat behind a calico curtain, reading <i>The War Cry</i>
+and looking at a "fashion-plate" depicting nine gentlemen
+yachtsmen each nine feet tall, while the Jugoslav
+in charge unfeelingly sprinkled and ironed and patted
+his suit.</p>
+
+<p>He spent ten minutes in blacking his shoes, in his
+room&mdash;and twenty minutes in getting the blacking off
+his fingers.</p>
+
+<p>He was walking through the gate in the Gilson hedge
+at one minute to four.</p>
+
+<p>But he had reached Queen Anne Hill at three. For
+an hour he had walked the crest road, staring at the
+steamers below, alternately gripping his hands with
+desire of Claire, and timorously finally deciding that
+he wouldn't go to her house&mdash;wouldn't ever see her
+again.</p>
+
+<p>He came into the hall tremblingly expecting some
+great thing, some rending scene, and she met him with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span>
+a cool, "Oh, this is nice. Eva had some little white
+cakes made for us." He felt like a man who has asked
+for a drink of cold charged water and found it warm
+and flat.</p>
+
+<p>"How&mdash;&mdash; Dandy house," he muttered, limply
+shaking her limp hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, isn't it a darling. They do themselves awfully
+well here. I'm afraid your bluff, plain, democratic
+Westerners are a fraud. I hear a lot more about
+'society' here than I ever did in the East. The
+sets seem frightfully complicated." She was drifting
+into the drawing-room, to a tapestry stool, and Milt
+was awkwardly stalking a large wing chair, while she
+fidgeted:</p>
+
+<p>"Everybody tells me about how one poor dear
+soul, a charming lady who used to take in washing
+or salt gold-mines or something, and she came here
+a little while ago with billions and billions of
+dollars, and tried to buy her way in by shopping
+for all the charities in town, and apparently she's
+just as out of it here as she would be in London.
+You and I aren't exclusive like that, are
+we!"</p>
+
+<p>Somehow&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Her "you and I" was too kindly, as though she was
+trying to put him at ease, as though she knew he
+couldn't possibly be at ease. With a horribly elaborate
+politeness, with a smile that felt hot on his twitching<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>
+cheeks, he murmured, "Oh no. No, we&mdash;&mdash; No, I
+guess&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>If he knew what it was he guessed, he couldn't get
+it out. While he was trying to find out what had become
+of all the things there were to say in the world,
+a maid came in with an astonishing object&mdash;a small,
+red, shelved table on wheels, laden with silver vessels,
+and cake, and sandwiches that were amazingly small
+and thin.</p>
+
+<p>The maid was so starched that she creaked. She
+glanced at Milt&mdash;&mdash; Claire didn't make him so
+nervous that he thought of his clothes, but the maid
+did. He was certain that she knew that he had blacked
+his own shoes, knew how old were his clothes. He
+was urging himself, "Must get new suit tomorrow&mdash;ready-made&mdash;mustn't
+forget, now&mdash;be sure&mdash;get suit
+tomorrow." He wanted to apologize to the maid for
+existing.... He wouldn't dare to fall in love with
+the maid.... And he'd kill the man who said he
+could be fool enough to fall in love with Miss Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>He sipped his tea, and dropped sandwich crumbs,
+and ached, and panted, and peeped at the crushing
+quantities of pictures and sconces and tables and
+chairs in the room, and wondered what they did with
+all of them, while Claire chattered:</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, we weren't exclusive out on the road. Didn't
+we meet funny people though! Oh, somehow that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span>
+'funny people' sounds familiar. But&mdash;&mdash; What fun
+that morning was at&mdash;Pellago, was it? Heavens, I'm
+forgetting those beastly little towns already&mdash;that
+place where we hazed the poor landlady who overcharged
+me."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes." He was thinking of how much Claire
+would forget, now. "Yes. We certainly fixed her,
+all right. Uh&mdash;did you get the storage check for your
+car?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes, thank you. So nice of you to bother
+with it."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, nothing at all, nothing&mdash;&mdash; Nothing at all.
+Uh&mdash;&mdash; Do you like Seattle?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes. Such views&mdash;the mountains&mdash;&mdash; Do you
+like it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes. Always wanted to see the sea."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, and&mdash;&mdash; Such a well-built town."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, and&mdash;&mdash; They must do a lot of business
+here."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, they&mdash;&mdash; Oh yes, I do like Seat&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He had darted from his chair, brushed by the tea-wagon,
+ignoring its rattle and the perilous tipping of
+cups. He put his hand on her shoulder, snorted,
+"Look here. We're both sparring for time. Stop
+it. It's&mdash;it's all right, Claire. I want you to like
+me, but I'm not&mdash;I'm not like that woman you were
+telling about that's trying to butt in. I know, Lord I
+know so well what you're thinking! You're thinking<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span>
+I'm not up to the people you've been seeing last couple
+of days&mdash;not up to 'em yet, anyway. Well&mdash;&mdash; We'll
+be good friends."</p>
+
+<p>Fearless, now, his awe gone in tenderness, he lifted
+her chin, looked straight into her eyes, smiled. But
+his courage was slipping. He wanted to run and
+hide.</p>
+
+<p>He turned abruptly, grumbling, "Well, better get
+back to work now, I guess."</p>
+
+<p>Her cry was hungry: "Oh, please don't go." She
+was beside him, shyly picking at his sleeve. "I know
+what you mean. I like you for being so understanding.
+But&mdash;&mdash; I do like you. You were the perfect
+companion. Let's&mdash;&mdash; Oh, let's have a walk&mdash;and
+try to laugh again."</p>
+
+<p>He definitely did not want to stay. At this moment
+he did not love her. He regarded her as an estimable
+young woman who, for a person so idiotically reared,
+had really shown a good deal of pluck out on the road&mdash;where
+he wanted to be. He stood in the hall disliking
+his old cap while she ran up to put on a top
+coat.</p>
+
+<p>Mute, casual, they tramped out of the house together,
+and down the hill to a region of shabby old
+brown houses like blisters on the hillside. They had
+little to say, and that little was a polite reminiscence
+of incidents in which neither was interested.</p>
+
+<p>When they came back to the Gilson hedge, he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span>
+stopped at the gate, with terrific respectableness removed
+his cap.</p>
+
+<p>"Good night," she said cheerily. "Call me up soon
+again."</p>
+
+<p>He did not answer "Good night." He said "Good-by";
+and he meant it to be his last farewell. He
+caught her hand, hastily dropped it, fled down the hill.</p>
+
+<p>He was, he told himself, going to leave Seattle that
+evening.</p>
+
+<p>That, doubtless, is the reason why he ran to a
+trolley, to get to a department-store before it closed;
+and why, precipitating himself upon a startled clerk,
+he purchased a new suit of chaste blue serge, a new
+pair of tan boots (curiously like some he had seen on
+the university campus that morning) and a new hat
+so gray and conservative and felty that it might have
+been worn by Woodrow Wilson.</p>
+
+<p>He spent the evening in reading algebra and geometry,
+and in telling himself that he was beautifully not
+thinking about Claire.</p>
+
+<p>In the midst of it, he caught himself at it, and
+laughed.</p>
+
+<p>"What you're doing, my friend, is pretending you
+don't like Claire, so that you can hide from your fool
+self the fact that you're going to sneak back to see
+her the first chance you get&mdash;first time the watch-dog
+is out. Seriously now, son, Claire is impossible for
+you. No can do. Now that you've been chump<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span>
+enough to leave home&mdash;&mdash; Oh Lord, I wish I hadn't
+promised to take this room for all winter. Wish I
+hadn't matriculated at the U. But I'm here now, and
+I'll stick it out. I'll stay here one year anyway, and
+go back home. Oh! And to&mdash;&mdash; By Golly! She
+liked me!"</p>
+
+<p>He was thinking of the wild-rose teacher to whom
+he had given a lift back in Dakota. He was remembering
+her daintiness, her admiration.</p>
+
+<p>"Now there's somebody who'd make me keep climbing,
+but wouldn't think I was a poor hick. If I were
+to drive back next spring, I could find her&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVI<br />
+A CLASS IN ENGINEERING AND OMELETS</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">The</span> one thing of which Milt Daggett was certain
+was that now he had managed to crawl into the
+engineering school, he must get his degree in mechanical
+engineering. He was older than most of his classmates.
+He must hurry. He must do four years'
+work in two.</p>
+
+<p>There has never been a Freshman, not the most goggle-eyed
+and earnest of them, who has seen less of
+classmates, thought less about "outside activities,"
+more grimly centered the universe about his work.</p>
+
+<p>Milt had sold his garage, by mail, to Ben Sittka
+and Heinie Rauskukle. He had enough money to get
+through two years, with economy. His life was as
+simple and dull as it had been in Schoenstrom. He
+studied while he cooked his scrappy meals; he pinned
+mathematical formul&aelig; and mechanical diagrams on
+the wall, and pored over them while he was dressing&mdash;or
+while he was trying to break in the new shoes,
+which were beautiful, squeaky, and confoundedly
+tight.</p>
+
+<p>He was taking French and English and "composition-writing"
+in addition to engineering, and he made
+out a schedule of life as humorlessly as a girl grind<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span>
+who intends to be a Latin teacher. When he was
+not at work, or furiously running and yanking chest-weights
+in the gymnasium, he was attending concerts,
+lectures.</p>
+
+<p>Studying the life about him, he had discovered that
+the best way to save time was to avoid the lazy friendships
+of college; the pipe-smoking, yawning, comfortable,
+rather heavy, altogether pleasant wondering
+about "what'll we do next?" which occupies at least
+four hours a day for the average man in college. He
+would have liked it, as he had liked long talks about
+nothing with Bill McGolwey at the Old Home Lunch.
+But he couldn't afford it. He had to be ready to&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>That was the point at which his reflections always
+came up with a jolt. He was quite clear about the
+method of getting ready, but he hadn't the slightest
+idea of what he was getting ready for. The moment
+he had redecided to marry Claire, he saw that his only
+possible future would be celibate machinery-installing
+in Alaska; and the moment he was content with the
+prospect of an engineer's camp in Alaskan wilds, his
+thoughts went crazily fluttering after Claire.</p>
+
+<p>Despite his aloofness, Milt was not unpopular in
+his class. The engineers had few of them the interest
+in dances, athletics, college journalism, which distinguished
+the men in the academic course. They
+were older, and more conscious of a living to earn.
+And Milt's cheerful, "How's the boy?" his manner<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>
+of waving his hand&mdash;as though to a good customer
+leaving the Red Trail Garage with the generator at
+last tamed&mdash;indicated that he was a "good fellow."</p>
+
+<p>One group of collegians Milt did seek. It is true
+that he had been genuine in scorning social climbers.
+But it is also true that the men whom he sought to
+know were the university smart set. Their satisfaction
+in his allegiance would have been lessened, however,
+had they known how little he cared for what
+they thought of him, and with what cruel directness
+he was using them as models for the one purpose of
+pleasing Miss Claire Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>The American state universities admit, in a pleased
+way, that though Yale and Harvard and Princeton
+may be snobbish, the state universities are the refuge
+of a myth called "college democracy." But there is no
+university near a considerable city into which the inheritors
+of the wealth of that city do not carry all
+the local social distinctions. Their family rank, their
+place in the unwritten peerage, determines to which
+fraternity they shall be elected, and the fraternity determines
+with whom&mdash;men and girls&mdash;they shall be
+intimate. The sons and daughters of Seattle and
+Tacoma, the scions of old families running in an
+unbroken line clear back to 1880, were amiable to poor
+outsiders from the Yakima valley and the new claims
+of Idaho, but they did not often invite them to their
+homes on the two hills and the Boulevard.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span>Yet it was these plutocrats whom Milt followed;
+they whose boots and table manners, cigarettes and
+lack of interest in theology, he studied. He met them
+in his English class. He remarked "Hello, Smith,"
+and "Mornin', Jones," as though he liked them but
+didn't care a hang whether they liked him. And by
+and by he drifted into their fraternity dwelling-house,
+with a question about the next day's assignment, and
+met their friends. He sat pipe-smoking, silent, cheerful,
+and they seemed to accept him. Whenever one of
+them felt that Milt was intruding, and asked impertinent
+questions in the manner of a Pullman porter at a
+Darktown ball, Milt had a peculiar level look which
+had been known to generate courtesy even in the offspring
+of a million dollars. They found that he knew
+more about motor-cars than any of them, and as
+motor-cars were among their greater gods, they
+considered him wise. He was incomparably simple
+and unpretentious; they found his presence comfortable.</p>
+
+<p>But there is a question as to what they would have
+thought had they known that, lying awake in the
+morning, Milt unsmilingly repeated:</p>
+
+<p>"Hair always straight down at the back. Never
+rounded. Nix on clippers over the ears.</p>
+
+<p>"Matisse is a popular nut artist. Fashionable for
+the swells to laugh at him, and the fellows on the
+college papers to rave about him.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>"Blinx and Severan the swellest&mdash;the smartest
+haberdashery in the city.</p>
+
+<p>"The one way to get in Dutch is to mention labor
+leaders.</p>
+
+<p>"Never say 'Pleased to meet you.' Just look about
+halfway between bored and tol'able and say, 'How
+do you do?'"</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>All these first three weeks of his life in Seattle, he
+had seen Claire only on his first call. Twice he had
+telephoned to her. On one of these high occasions she
+had invited him to accompany the family to the
+theater&mdash;which meant to the movies&mdash;and he had
+wretchedly refused; the other time she had said that
+she might stay in Seattle all winter, and she might go
+any day, and they "must be sure to have that good
+long walk"; and he had said "oh yes," ten or twelve
+unhappy times, and had felt very empty as he hung up
+the receiver.</p>
+
+<p>Then she wrote to invite him to late Sunday breakfast
+at the Gilsons'&mdash;they made a function of it, and
+called it bruncheon. The hour was given as ten-thirty;
+most people came at noon; but Milt arrived
+at ten-thirty-one, and found only a sleepy butler in
+sight.</p>
+
+<p>He waited in the drawing-room for five minutes,
+feeling like a bill-collector. Into the room vaulted a
+medium-sized, medium-looking, amiable man, Eugene<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span>
+Gilson, babbling, "Oh, I say, so sorry to keep you
+waiting, Mr. Daggett. Rotten shame, do come have
+a bun or something, frightfully informal these
+bruncheons, play auction?"</p>
+
+<p>"Zallright&mdash;no," said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>The host profusely led him to a dining-room where&mdash;in
+English fashion, or something like English
+fashion, or anyway a close approximation to the fictional
+pictures of English fashion&mdash;kidneys and
+sausages and omelets waited in dishes on the side-board.
+Mr. Gilson poured coffee, and chanted:</p>
+
+<p>"Do try the kidneys. They're usually very fair.
+Miss Boltwood tells me that you were very good to
+her on the trip. Must have been jolly trip. You going
+to be in town some time, oh yes, Claire said you were
+in the university, engineering, wasn't it? have you ever
+seen our lumbermills, do drop around some&mdash;&mdash; Try
+the omelet before the beastly thing gets cold, do you
+mind kicking that button, we'll have some more omelet
+in&mdash;any time at the mill and I'll be glad to have
+some one show you through, how did you find the
+roads along the Red Trail?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, pretty fair," said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>Into the room precipitated Mrs. Gilson, in a
+smile, a super-sweater, and a sports skirt that would
+have been soiled by any variety of sport more
+violent than pinochle, and she was wailing as she
+came:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span>"We're disgraced, Gene, is this Mr. Daggett? how
+do you do, so good of you to come, do try the kidneys,
+they're usually quite decent, are the omelets warm, you
+might ring for some more, Gene, for heaven's sake give
+me some coffee, Miss Boltwood will be right down,
+Mr. Daggett, she told us how fortunate they were that
+they met you on the road, did you like the trip, how
+were the roads?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, they were pretty good," said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>Claire arrived, fresh and serene in white taffeta,
+and she cried prettily, "I ought to have known that
+you'd be prompt even if no one else in the world is,
+so glad you came, have you tried the kidneys, and do
+have an&mdash;oh, I see you have tried the omelets, how
+goes the work at the university?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, fine," said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>He ate stolidly, and looked pleased, and sneaked in
+a glance at his new (and still tight and still squeaky)
+tan boots to make sure that they were as well polished
+as they had seemed at home.</p>
+
+<p>From nowhere appeared a bustling weighty woman,
+purring, "Hello, hello, hello, is it possible that you're
+all up&mdash;&mdash; Mr. Daggett. Yes, do lead me to the
+kidneys."</p>
+
+<p>And a man with the gray hair of a grandfather
+and the giggle of a cash-girl bounced in clamoring,
+"Mornin'&mdash;expected to have bruncheon alone&mdash;do
+we have some bridge? Oh, good morning, Mr. Daggett,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>
+how do you like Seattle? Oh, thanks so much,
+yes, just two."</p>
+
+<p>Then Milt ceased to keep track of the conversation,
+which bubbled over the omelets, and stewed over the
+kidneys, and foamed about the coffee, and clashed
+above a hastily erected bridge table, and altogether
+sounded curiously like four cars with four quite different
+things the matter with them all being tried out
+at once in a small garage. People flocked in, and
+nodded as though they knew one another too well to
+worry about it. They bowed to him charmingly, and
+instantly forgot him for the kidneys and sausages.
+He sat looking respectable and feeling lonely, by a cup
+of coffee, till Claire&mdash;dropping the highly unreal smile
+with which she had been listening to the elderly beau's
+account of a fishing-trip he hadn't quite got around to
+taking&mdash;slipped into a chair beside him and begged,
+"Are they looking out for you, Milt?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes, thank you."</p>
+
+<p>"You haven't been to see me."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh no, but&mdash;&mdash; Working so darn hard."</p>
+
+<p>"What a strikingly original reason! But have you
+really?"</p>
+
+<p>"Honest."</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly he wanted&mdash;eternal man, forever playing
+confidential small boy to the beloved&mdash;to tell her about
+his classes and acquaintances; to get pity for his bare
+room and his home-cooking. But round them blared<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>
+the brazen interest in kidneys, and as Claire glanced
+up with much brightness at another arrival, Milt lost
+momentum, and found that there was absolutely
+nothing in the world he could say to her.</p>
+
+<p>He made a grateful farewell to the omelets and
+kidneys, and escaped.</p>
+
+<p>He walked many miles that day, trying to remember
+how Claire looked.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVII<br />
+THE VICIOUSNESS OF NICE THINGS</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">"What</span> did you think of my nice Daggett
+boy?" Claire demanded of Eva Gilson, the
+moment bruncheon was over.</p>
+
+<p>"Which one was&mdash;&mdash; Oh, the boy you met on the
+road? Why, really, I didn't notice him particularly.
+I'd rather fancied from the way you referred to him
+that he was awfully jolly and forceful, but rather
+crude. But I didn't notice him at all. He seemed
+perfectly well-bred, but slightly heavy."</p>
+
+<p>"No, he isn't that&mdash;&mdash; He&mdash;&mdash; Why did you lead
+spades?" reflected Claire.</p>
+
+<p>They were in the drawing-room, resting after the
+tact and tumult of the bruncheon. Claire had been
+here long enough now for the Gilsons to forget her
+comfortably, and be affectionate and quarrelsome and
+natural, and to admit by their worrying that even in
+their exalted social position there were things to fuss
+about.</p>
+
+<p>"I do think we ought to have invited Belle Torrens,"
+fretted Mrs. Gilson. "We've simply got to
+have her here soon."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Gilson speculated intensely, "But she's the
+dullest soul on earth, and her husband spends all his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span>
+spare time in trying to think up ways of doing me dirt
+in business. Oh, by the way, did you get the water
+tap in the blue room fixed? It's dripping all the
+time."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I forgot it."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I <i>do</i> wish you'd have it attended to. It
+simply drips all the time."</p>
+
+<p>"I know. I intended to 'phone the plumber&mdash;&mdash; Can't
+you 'phone him tomorrow, from the office?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I haven't time to bother with it. But I do
+wish you would. It keeps on dripping&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I know, it doesn't seem to stop. Well, you remind
+me of it in the morning."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm afraid I'll forget. You better make a note
+of it. If it keeps on dripping that way, it's likely to
+injure something. And I do wish you'd tell the Jap
+not to put so much parsley in the omelet. And I say,
+how would an omelet be with a butter sauce over it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no, I don't think so. An omelet ought to be
+nice and dry. Butter makes it so greasy&mdash;besides,
+with the price of butter&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But there's a richness to butter&mdash;&mdash; You'd better
+make a note about the tap dripping in the blue room
+right now, before you forget it. Oh! Why in
+heaven's name did we have Johnny Martin here? He's
+dull as ditchwater&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I know, but&mdash;&mdash; It is nice to go out to his place
+on the Point. Oh, Gene, I do wish you'd try and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span>
+remember not to talk about your business so much.
+You and Mr. Martin were talking about the price
+of lumber for at least half an hour&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing of the kind. We scarcely mentioned it.
+Oh! What car are you going to use this afternoon?
+If we get out to the Barnetts', I thought we might use
+the limousine&mdash;&mdash; Or no, you'll probably go out before
+I do, I have to read over some specifications, and
+I promised to give Will a lift, couldn't you take the
+Loco, maybe you might drive yourself, no, I forgot,
+the clutch is slipping a little, well, you might drive
+out and send the car back for me&mdash;still, there wouldn't
+hardly be time&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Listening to them as to a play, Claire suddenly desired
+to scream, "Oh, for heaven's sake quit fussing!
+I'm going up and drown myself in the blue-room tap!
+What does it matter! Walk! Take a surface car!
+Don't fuss so!"</p>
+
+<p>Her wrath came from her feeling of guilt. Yes,
+Milt had been commonplace. Had she done this to
+him? Had she turned his cheerful ignorances into a
+careful stupor? And she felt stuffy and choking and
+overpacked with food. She wanted to be out on the
+road, clear-headed, forcing her way through, an independent
+human being&mdash;with Milt not too far behind.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Gilson was droning, "I do think Mattie Vincent
+is so nice."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span>"Rather dull I'd call her," yawned Mr. Gilson.</p>
+
+<p>Mattie was the seventh of their recent guests whom
+he had called dull by now.</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all&mdash;oh, of course she doesn't dance on
+tables and quote Maeterlinck, but she does have an
+instinct for the niceties and the proprieties&mdash;her little
+house is so sweet&mdash;everything just exactly right&mdash;it
+may be only a single rose, but always chosen so carefully
+to melt into the background; and such adorable
+china&mdash;I simply die of envy every time I see her
+Lowestoft plates. And such a quiet way of reproving
+any bad taste&mdash;the time that crank university professor
+was out there, and spoke of the radical labor movement,
+and Mattie just smiled at him and said, 'If you
+don't mind, let's not drag filthy lumberjacks into the
+drawing-room&mdash;they'd hate it just as much as we
+would, don't you think, perhaps?'"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, <i>damn</i> nice china! Oh, let's hang all spinsters
+who are brightly reproving," Claire was silently raging.
+"And particularly and earnestly confound all
+nicety and discretion of living."</p>
+
+<p>She tried to break the spell of the Gilsons' fussing.
+She false-heartedly fawned upon Mr. Gilson, and inquired:</p>
+
+<p>"Is there anything very exciting going on at the
+mills, Gene?"</p>
+
+<p>"Exciting?" asked Mr. Gilson incredulously.
+"Why, how do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>"Don't you find business exciting? Why do you
+do it then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, wellllll&mdash;&mdash; Of course&mdash;&mdash; Oh, yes, exciting
+in a way. Well&mdash;&mdash; Well, we've had a jolly interesting
+time making staves for candy pails&mdash;promises
+to be wonderfully profitable. We have a new way of
+cutting them. But you wouldn't be interested in the
+machinery."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course not. You don't bore Eva with your
+horrid, headachy business-problems, do you?" Claire
+cooed, with low cunning.</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed no. Don't think a chap ought to inflict
+his business on his wife. The home should be a place
+of peace."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," said Claire.</p>
+
+<p>But she wasn't thinking "Yes." She was thinking,
+"Milt, what worries me now isn't how I can risk
+letting the 'nice people' meet you. It's how I can ever
+waste you on the 'nice people.' Oh, I'm spoiled for
+cut-glass-and-velvet afternoons. Eternal spiritual agony
+over blue-room taps is too high a price even for
+four-poster beds. I want to be driving! hiking! living!"</p>
+
+<p>That afternoon, after having agreed that Mr.
+Johnny Martin was a bore, Mr. and Mrs. Gilson decided
+to run out to the house of Mr. Johnny Martin.
+They bore along the lifeless Claire.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Martin was an unentertaining bachelor who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>
+entertained. There were a dozen supercilious young
+married people at his bayside cottage when the Gilsons
+arrived. Among them were two eyebrow-arching
+young matrons whom Claire had not met&mdash;Mrs.
+Corey and Mrs. Betz.</p>
+
+<p>"We've all heard of you, Miss Boltwood," said
+Mrs. Betz. "You come from the East, don't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," fluttered Claire, trying to be cordial.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz looked at each other in a
+motionless wink, and Mrs. Corey prodded:</p>
+
+<p>"From New York?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. Brooklyn." Claire tried not to make it too
+short.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh." The tacit wink was repeated. Mrs. Corey
+said brightly&mdash;much too brightly&mdash;"I was born in
+New York. I wonder if you know the Dudenants?"</p>
+
+<p>Now Claire knew the Dudenants. She had danced
+with that young ass Don Dudenant a dozen times. But
+the devil did enter into her and possess her, and, to
+Eva Gilson's horror, Claire said stupidly, "No-o, but
+I think I've heard of them."</p>
+
+<p>The condemning wink was repeated.</p>
+
+<p>"I hear you've been doing such interesting things&mdash;motoring
+and adventuring&mdash;you must have met some
+terrible people along the way," fished Mrs. Betz.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, everybody does seem to feel that way. But
+I'm afraid I found them terribly nice," flared Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"I always say that common people can be most<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span>
+agreeable," Mrs. Corey patronized. Before Claire
+could kill her&mdash;there wasn't any homicidal weapon
+in sight except a silver tea-strainer&mdash;Mrs. Corey had
+pirouetted on, "Though I do think that we're much
+too kind to workmen and all&mdash;the labor situation is
+getting to be abominable here in the West, and upon
+my word, to keep a maid nowadays, you have to treat
+her as though she were a countess."</p>
+
+<p>"Why shouldn't maids be like countesses? They're
+much more important," said Claire sweetly.</p>
+
+<p>It cannot be stated that Claire had spent any large
+part of her time in reading Karl Marx, leading syndicalist
+demonstrations, or hemming red internationalist
+flags, but at this instant she was a complete revolutionist.
+She could have executed Mrs. Corey and
+pretty Mrs. Betz with zeal; she disliked the entire bourgeoisie;
+she looked around for a Jap boy to call "comrade"
+and she again thought about the possibilities of
+the tea-strainer for use in assassination. She stolidly
+wore through the combined and exclamatory explanations
+of Mrs. Corey, Mrs. Betz, Mrs. Gilson, and Mr.
+Johnny Martin about the inherent viciousness of all
+maids, and when the storm was over, she said in a
+manner of honey and syrup:</p>
+
+<p>"You were speaking of the Dudenants, weren't you,
+Mrs. Corey? I do remember them now. Poor Don
+Dudenant, isn't it a pity he's such a fool? His father
+is really a very decent old bore."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span>"I," observed Mrs. Corey, in prim horror, "regard
+the Dudenants as extremely delightful people. I fancy
+we must be thinking of different families. I mean the
+Manhattan Dudenants, not the Brooklyn family."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, I meant the Manhattan family, too&mdash;the
+one that made its fortune selling shoddy woolens in the
+Civil War," caressed Claire.</p>
+
+<p>Right there, her welcome by Mrs. Corey and Mrs.
+Betz ceased; and without any of the unhappiness
+which the thought would have caused her three months
+before, Claire reflected, "How they hate me!"</p>
+
+<p>The Gilsons had a number of thoughts upon the
+subject of tact to express to Claire on the way home.
+But she, who had always smiled, who had been the
+obedient guest, shrugged and snapped, "They're
+idiots, those young women. They're impertinent
+shopgirls in good frocks. I like your Seattle. It's a
+glorious city. And I love so many of the fine, simple,
+real people I've met here. I admire your progress. I
+do know how miraculously you've changed it from a
+mining camp. But for heaven's sake don't forget the
+good common hardiness of the miners. Somehow,
+London social distinctions seem ludicrous in American
+cities that twenty years ago didn't have much but
+board sidewalks and saloons. I don't care whether
+it's Seattle or Minneapolis or Omaha or Denver, I
+refuse to worry about the Duchess of Corey and the
+Baroness Betz and all the other wonderful imitations<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span>
+of gilt. When a pair of finishing-school flappers like
+Betz and Corey try to impress me with their superiority
+to workmen, and their extreme aristocracy and
+Easternness, they make me tired. I <i>am</i> the East!"</p>
+
+<p>She had made peace with the Gilsons by night; she
+had been reasonably repentant about not playing the
+game of her hosts; but inside her eager heart she snuggled
+a warm thought. She remembered how gaily she
+had once promised, out on the road, to come to Milt's
+room and cook for him. She thought of it with homesick
+desire. His room probably wasn't particularly
+decorative, and she doubted his having an electric
+range, but it would be fun to fry eggs again, to see
+him fumbling with the dish-washing, to chatter and
+plan golden futures, and not worry about the opinions
+of Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz.</p>
+
+<p>The next afternoon the limousine was not busy and
+she borrowed it, with the handsome Greek chauffeur.</p>
+
+<p>She gave him an address not far from the university.</p>
+
+<p>He complained, "Pardon me, miss, but I think you
+have the wrong number. That block is a low quarter."</p>
+
+<p>"Probably! But that's the right number!"</p>
+
+<p>He raised his Athenian eyebrows, and she realized
+what a mistake she had made in not bringing the
+lethal tea-strainer along. When they had stopped in
+front of a cheap candy-store, he opened the door of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span>
+the car with such frigid reserve that she thought seriously
+about slapping him.</p>
+
+<p>She climbed the stingy, flapping stairs, and knocked
+at the first door in the upper hall. It was opened by a
+large apron, to which a sleepy woman was an unimportant
+attachment, and out of the mass of apron
+and woman came a yawning, "Mr. Daggett's room is
+down the hall on the right."</p>
+
+<p>Claire knocked at a door which had at various
+epochs been blue, yellow, and pink, and now was all
+three. No answer. She tried the knob, went in.</p>
+
+<p>She could not tell whether it was the barrenness
+of the room, or Milt's carefulness, that caught her.
+The uncarpeted boards of the floor were well swept.
+He had only one plate, one spoon, but they were
+scoured, and put away on newspaper-covered shelves
+in a cupboard made of a soap-box. Behind a calico
+curtain was his new suit, dismayingly neat on its
+hanger. On the edge of the iron sink primly washed
+and spread out to dry, was a tattered old rag. At
+the sight of it, at the thought of Milt solemnly washing
+dishes, the tears began to creep to her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>There was but one picture in the room&mdash;a half-tone
+of a girl, clipped from a magazine devoted to actresses.
+The name was cut off. As she wondered at it, Claire
+saw that the actress was very much like herself.</p>
+
+<p>The only other ornament was a papier-m&acirc;ch&eacute; figure
+of a cat, a cat reminiscent of the Lady Vere de Vere.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span>
+Claire picked it up. On the bottom was the price-mark&mdash;three
+cents.</p>
+
+<p>It was the price-mark that pierced her. She flung
+across the room, dropped on his creaky cot-bed,
+howled, "Oh, I've been a beast&mdash;a beast&mdash;a beast!
+All the pretty things&mdash;limousines and marble baths&mdash;thinking
+so much of them, and not wanting them for
+<i>him</i>! And he with so little, with just nothing&mdash;he
+that would appreciate jolly things so much&mdash;here in
+this den, and making it as tolerable as he can&mdash;and
+me half ashamed of him instead of fighting for
+him&mdash;&mdash; I belong with Corey and Betz. Oh, I'm so
+ashamed, so bitterly ashamed."</p>
+
+<p>She patted his bed smooth with nervous eager
+fingers.</p>
+
+<p>She scraped a pin-point of egg-yolk off a platter.</p>
+
+<p>Before she had been home five minutes she had
+written a note asking him to tea for next day.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVIII<br />
+THE MORNING COAT OF MR. HUDSON B. RIGGS</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Mr. Hudson B. Riggs</span> now enters the tale&mdash;somewhat
+tardily, and making a quick exit,
+all in a morning coat too tight about the shoulders,
+and a smile of festivity too tight about the lips. He
+looked as improbable as an undertaker's rubber-plant.
+Yet in his brief course he had a mighty effect upon
+the progress of civilization as exemplified in the social
+career of Mr. Milton Daggett.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Riggs had arrived at a golden position in
+Alaskan mining engineering by way of the farm, the
+section gang, the surveyor's chain, and prospecting;
+and his thick hands showed his evolution. His purpose
+in life was to please Mrs. Riggs, and he wasn't
+ever going to achieve his purpose in life. She wore
+spangles, and her corsets creaked, and she smiled nervously,
+and could tell in a glance quicker than the 1/100
+kodak shutter whether or not a new acquaintance was
+"worth cultivating." She had made Mr. Riggs thoroughly
+safe and thoroughly unhappy in the pursuit of
+society. He stood about keeping from doing anything
+he might want to, and he was profusely polite to young
+cubs whom he longed to have in his office&mdash;so that he
+could get even with them.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span>What Mr. Riggs wanted to do, at the third large
+tea given by Mrs. Gilson for Miss Claire Boltwood,
+was to sneak out on the sun-porch and play over the
+new records on the phonograph; but the things he had
+heard from Mrs. Riggs the last time he'd done that
+had convinced him that it was not a wise method of
+escape. So he stood by the fireplace&mdash;safe on one
+side at least&mdash;and ate lettuce sandwiches, which he
+privately called "cow feed," and listened to a shining,
+largely feminine crowd rapidly uttering unintelligible
+epigrams from which he caught only the words, "Ripping
+hand&mdash;trained nurse&mdash;whipcord&mdash;really worth
+seeing&mdash;lost the ball near the second hole&mdash;most absurd
+person&mdash;new maid&mdash;thanks so much." He was hoping
+that some one would come around and let him be
+agreeable. He knew that he stood the ride home with
+Mrs. Riggs much better after he had been agreeable
+to people he didn't like.</p>
+
+<p>What Mr. Riggs did not know was that a young
+man in uninteresting blue, who looked like a good
+tennis-player, was watching him. It wasn't because
+he detected a fellow soul in purgatory but because he
+always was obsequious outside of his office that Mr.
+Riggs bowed so profusely that he almost lost his tea-cup,
+when the young man in blue drifted to him and
+suggested, "I hear you're in the Alaskan mining-game,
+Mr. Riggs."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span>"Do you get up there much now?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, not much."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope to hit Alaska some day&mdash;I'm taking engineering
+at the U."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you? Straight?" Mr. Riggs violently set his
+cup down on a table&mdash;Mrs. Riggs would later tell
+him that he'd put it down in the wrong place, but
+never mind. He leaned over Milt and snarled, "Offer
+me a cigarette. I don't know if they smoke here, and
+I dassn't be the first to try. Say, boy, Alaska&mdash;&mdash; I
+wish I was there now! Say, it beats all hell how good
+tea can taste in a tin cup, and how wishy-washy it is
+in china. Boy, I don't know anything about you, but
+you look all right, and when you get ready to go to
+Alaska, you come to me, and I'll see if I can't give
+you a chance to go up there. But don't ever come
+back!"</p>
+
+<p>When the crowd began bubblingly to move toward
+the door, Milt prepared to move&mdash;and bubble&mdash;with
+them. Though Claire's note had sounded as though
+she was really a little lonely, at the tea she had said
+nothing to him except, "So glad you came. Do you
+know Dolly Ransome? Dolly, this is my nice Mr.
+Daggett. Take him and make him happy."</p>
+
+<p>Dolly hadn't made him in the least happy. She
+had talked about tennis; she had with some detail
+described her remarkable luck in beating one Sally
+Saunders three sets. Now Milt was learning tennis.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span>
+He was at the present period giving two hours a week
+to tennis, two to dancing, two to bridge. But he preferred
+cleaning oil-wells to any of these toilsome accomplishments,
+and it must sadly be admitted that all
+the while he was making his face bright at Dolly, he
+was wondering what would happen if he interrupted
+Dolly's gurgling, galloping, giggling multitudinousness
+by shouting, "Oh, shut up!"</p>
+
+<p>When it seemed safe to go, and he tried to look as
+though he too were oozing out to a Crane-Simplex,
+Claire slipped beside him, soft as a shadow, and whispered,
+"Please don't go. I want to talk to you.
+<i>Please!</i>" There was fluttering wistfulness in her
+voice, though instantly it was gone as she hastened
+to the door and was to be heard asserting that she did
+indeed love Seattle.</p>
+
+<p>Milt looked out into the hall. He studied a console
+with a curious black and white vase containing a
+single peacock feather, and a gold mirror shimmering
+against a gray wall.</p>
+
+<p>"Lovely stuff. I like that mirror. Like a slew in
+the evening. But it isn't worth being a slave for.
+I'm not going to be a Mr. Riggs. Poor devil, he's
+more of a servant than any of these maids. Certainly
+am sorry for that poor fish. He'll have a chance to
+take his coat off and sit down and smoke&mdash;when he's
+dead!"</p>
+
+<p>The guests were gone; the Gilsons upstairs. Claire<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span>
+came running, seized Milt's sleeve, coaxed him to the
+davenport in the drawing-room&mdash;then sighed, and
+rubbed her forehead, and looked so tired that he could
+say nothing but, "Hope you haven't been overdoing."</p>
+
+<p>"No, just&mdash;just talking too much."</p>
+
+<p>He got himself to say, "Miss Ransome&mdash;the one
+that's nuts about tennis&mdash;she's darn nice."</p>
+
+<p>"Is she?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, she's&mdash;she's&mdash;&mdash; What do you hear from
+your father?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, he's back at work."</p>
+
+<p>"Trip do him good?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, a lot."</p>
+
+<p>"Did he&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Milt! Tell me about you. What are you doing?
+What are you studying? How do you live? Do you
+really cook your own meals? Do you begin to get
+your teeth into the engineering? Oh, do tell me
+everything. I want to know, so much!"</p>
+
+<p>"There isn't a whole lot to tell. Mostly I'm getting
+back into math. Been out of touch with it. I
+find that I know more about motors than most of the
+fellows. That helps. And about living&mdash;oh, I keep
+conservative. Did you know I'd sold my garage?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I didn't, I didn't!"</p>
+
+<p>He wondered why she said it with such stooping
+shame, but he went on mildly, "Well, I got a pretty
+good price, but of course I don't want to take any<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span>
+chances on running short of coin, so I'm not splurging
+much. And&mdash;&mdash;" He looked at his nails, and whistled
+a bar or two, and turned his head away, and
+looked back with a shy, "And I'm learning to play
+bridge and tennis and stuff!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, my dear!" It was a cry of pain. She beat
+her hands for a moment before she murmured, "When
+are we going to have our lessons in dancing&mdash;and in
+making an impression on sun-specks like Dolly Ransome?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," he parried. Then, looking at her
+honestly, he confessed, "I don't believe we're ever
+going to. Claire, I can't do it. I'm no good for this
+tea game. You know how clumsy I was. I spilled
+some tea, and I darn near tripped over some woman's
+dress and&mdash;&mdash; Oh, I'm not afraid of them. Now that
+I get a good close look at this bunch, they seem pretty
+much like other folks, except maybe that one old
+dame says 'cawn't.' But I can't do the manners stunt.
+I can't get myself to give enough thought to how you
+ought to hold a tea-cup."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, those things don't matter&mdash;they don't <i>matter</i>!
+Besides, everybody likes you&mdash;only you're so terribly
+cautious that you never let them see the force and
+courage and all that wonderful sweet dear goodness
+that's in you. And as for your manners&mdash;heaven
+knows I'm no P. G. Wodehouse valet. But I'll teach
+you all I know."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span>"Claire, I appreciate it a lot but&mdash;&mdash; I'm not so
+darn sure I want to learn. I'm getting scared. I
+watched that bird named Riggs here today. He's a
+regular fellow, or he was, but now he's simply lost in
+the shuffle. I don't want to be one of the million
+ghosts in a city. Seattle is bad enough&mdash;it's so big
+that I feel like a no-see-um in a Norway pine reserve.
+But New York would be a lot worse. I don't want to
+be a Mr. Riggs."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but&mdash;I'm not a Mrs. Riggs!"</p>
+
+<p>"What do you&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He did not finish asking her what she meant. She
+was in his arms; she was whispering, "My heart is so
+lonely;" and the room was still. The low sun flooded
+the windows, swam in the mirror in the hall, but they
+did not heed, did not see its gliding glory.</p>
+
+<p>Not till there was a sound of footsteps did she burst
+from his arms, spring to her reflection in the glass of a
+picture, and shamefacedly murmur to him over her
+shoulder, "My hair&mdash;it's a terrible giveaway!"</p>
+
+<p>He had followed her; he stood with his arm circling
+her shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>She begged, "No. Please no. I'm frightened.
+Let's&mdash;oh, let's have a walk or something before you
+scamper home."</p>
+
+<p>"Look! My dear! Let's run away, and explore
+the town, and not come back till late evening."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Let's."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span>They walked from Queen Anne Hill through the
+city to the docks. There was nothing in their excited,
+childish, "Oh, see that!" and "There's a dandy car!"
+and "Ohhhhh, that's a Minnesota license&mdash;wonder
+who it is?" to confess that they had been so closely,
+so hungrily together.</p>
+
+<p>They swung along a high walk overlooking the
+city wharf. They saw a steamer loading rails and
+food for the government railroad in Alaska. They
+exclaimed over a nest of little, tarry fishing-boats.
+They watched men working late to unload Alaska
+salmon.</p>
+
+<p>They crossed the city to Jap Town and its writhing
+streets, its dark alleys and stairways lost up the hillsides.
+They smiled at black-eyed children, and found
+a Japanese restaurant, and tried to dine on raw fish
+and huge shrimps and roots soaked in a very fair
+grade of light-medium motor oil.</p>
+
+<p>With Milt for guide, Claire discovered a Christianity
+that was not of candles and shifting lights and insinuating
+music, nor of carpets and large pews and
+sound oratory, but of hoboes blinking in rows, and
+girls in gospel bonnets, and little silver and crimson
+placards of Bible texts. They stopped on a corner to
+listen to a Pentecostal brother, to an I. W. W. speaker,
+to a magnificent negro who boomed in an operatic
+baritone that the Day of Judgment was coming on
+April 11, 1923, at three in the morning.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span>In the streets of Jap Town, in cheap motion-picture
+theaters, in hotels for transient workmen, she found
+life, running swift and eager and many-colored; and
+it seemed to her that back in the house of four-posters
+and walls of subdued gray, life was smothered in the
+very best pink cotton-batting. Milt's delight in every
+picturesque dark corner, and the colloquial eloquence
+of the street-orators, stirred her. And when she saw
+a shopgirl caress the hand of a slouching beau in
+threadbare brown, her own hand slipped into Milt's
+and clung there.</p>
+
+<p>But they came shyly up to the Gilson hedge, and
+when Milt chuckled, "Bully walk; let's do it again,"
+she said only, "Oh, yes, I did like it. Very much."</p>
+
+<p>He had abruptly dropped his beautiful new felt hat.
+He was clutching her arms, demanding, "Can you
+like me? Oh my God, Claire, I can't play at love.
+I'm mad&mdash;I just live in you. You're my blood and
+soul. Can I become&mdash;the kind of man you like?"</p>
+
+<p>"My dear!" She was fiercely addressing not him
+alone but the Betzes and Coreys and Gilsons and Jeff
+Saxtons, "don't you forget for one moment that all
+these people&mdash;here or Brooklyn either&mdash;that seem so
+aloof and amused, are secretly just plain people with
+enamel on, and you're to have the very best enamel,
+if it's worth while. I'm not sure that it is&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You're going to kiss me!"</p>
+
+<p>"No! Please no! I don't&mdash;I don't understand us,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span>
+even now. Can't we be just playmates a while yet?
+But&mdash;I do like you!"</p>
+
+<p>She fled. When she reached the hall she found her
+eyelids wet.</p>
+
+<p>It was the next afternoon&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Claire was curled on the embroidered linen counterpane
+of her bed, thinking about chocolates and Brooklyn
+and driving through Yellowstone Park and corn
+fritters and satin petticoats versus <i>cr&ecirc;pe de chine</i> and
+Mount Rainier and Milt and spiritualism and manicuring,
+when Mrs. Gilson prowled into her room and demanded
+"Busy?" so casually that Claire was suspicious.</p>
+
+<p>"No. Not very. Something up?"</p>
+
+<p>"A nice party. Come down and meet an amusing
+man from Alaska."</p>
+
+<p>Claire took her time powdering her nose, and ambled
+downstairs and into the drawing-room, to
+find&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Jeff Saxton, Mr. Geoffrey Saxton, who is the height
+of Brooklyn Heights, standing by the fireplace, smiling
+at her.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIX<br />
+THE ENEMY LOVE</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">But</span> at second glance&mdash;was it Jeff? This man
+was tanned to a thick even brown in which his
+eyes were startlingly white. His hands were burned
+red; there was a scar across one of them; and he was
+standing with them cockily at his hips, all unlike the
+sleekly, noisily quiet Jeff of Brooklyn. He was in
+corduroy trousers and belted corduroy jacket, with a
+khaki-colored flannel shirt.</p>
+
+<p>But his tranquilly commanding smile was Jeff's,
+and his lean grace; and Jeff's familiar amused voice
+greeted her paralyzed amazement with:</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, pard! Ain't I met you some place in Montana?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well&mdash;where&mdash;in&mdash;the&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Just landed from Alaska. Had to run up there
+from California. How are you, little princess?"</p>
+
+<p>His hand was out to her, then both hands, beseechingly,
+but she did not run to him, as she had at Flathead
+Lake. She stalked him cautiously, and shook
+hands&mdash;much too heartily. She sought cover in the
+wing-chair and&mdash;much too cordially&mdash;she invited:</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me all about it."</p>
+
+<p>He was watching her. Already his old pursuing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span>
+determination, his steady dignity, were beginning to
+frighten her. But he calmly dropped into a straight
+chair, and obliged:</p>
+
+<p>"It's really been quite a lively journey. Didn't
+know I could like roughing-it so well. And it was real
+roughing-it, pretty much. Oh, not dangerous at all,
+but rather vigorous. I had to canoe up three hundred
+miles of a shallow river, with one Indian guide, making
+a portage every ten miles or so, and we got tipped
+over in the rapids now and then&mdash;the Big Chief almost
+got drowned once&mdash;and we camped at night in the
+original place where they invented mosquitoes&mdash;and
+one morning I shot a black bear just in time to keep
+him from eating my boots."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh!" she sighed in admiration, and "Oh!" again,
+uneasily.</p>
+
+<p>Nothing had been said about it; Jeff was the last
+person in the world to spoil his triumph by commenting
+on it; but both of them knew that they had violently
+changed places; that now it was she who was
+the limp indoor-dweller, and he who was the ruddy
+ranger; that as he had admired her at Flathead Lake,
+so now it was hers to admire, and his to be serenely
+heroic.</p>
+
+<p>She was not far from the worshiping sub-deb in
+her sighing, "How <i>did</i> you get the scar?"</p>
+
+<p>"That? Oh, nothing."</p>
+
+<p>"Please tell me."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span>"Really and truly. Nothing at all. Just a drunken
+fellow with a knife, playing the fool. I didn't have
+to touch him&mdash;quite sure he could have given me a
+frightful beating and all that sort of thing. It was the
+Big Chief who got rid of him."</p>
+
+<p>"He&mdash;cut you? With a kniiiiiife? Ohhhhhhh!"</p>
+
+<p>She ran to him, pityingly stroked the scar, looked
+down at him with filmy eyes. Then she tried to retreat,
+but he retained her hand, glanced up at her as
+though he knew her every thought. She felt weak.
+How could she escape him? "Please!" she begged
+flutteringly.</p>
+
+<p>If he held her hand another moment, she trembled,
+she'd be on his lap, in his arms&mdash;lost. And he was
+holding it. He was&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Oh, he was too old for her. Yes, and too paternal.
+But still&mdash;&mdash; Life with Jeff would be protected,
+kindly, honorable.</p>
+
+<p>Yet all the time she wanted, and stormily knew she
+wanted, to be fleeing to the boy Milt, her mate; to run
+away with him, hand in hand, discovering all the colored
+world, laughing at life, not afraid of losing dignity.
+In fear of Jeff's very kindliness and honor, she
+jerked her hand free. Then she tried to smile like
+a clever fencer.</p>
+
+<p>As she retreated to her chair she stammered, "Did
+you&mdash;&mdash; Was Alaska interesting?"</p>
+
+<p>He did not let her go, this time. Easy, cat-like for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span>
+all his dry gravity, he sauntered after her, and with
+a fine high seriousness pleaded his case:</p>
+
+<p>"Claire dear, those few weeks of fighting nature
+were a revelation to me. I'm going to have lots more
+of it. As it happens, they need me there. There's
+plenty of copper, but there's big transportation and
+employment problems that I seem better able to solve
+than the other chaps&mdash;though of course I'm an absolute
+muff when it comes to engineering problems. But
+I've had certain training and&mdash;I'm going to arrange
+things so that I get up there at least once a year. Next
+summer I'll make a much longer trip&mdash;see the mountains&mdash;oh,
+glorious mountains&mdash;and funny half-Russian
+towns, and have some fishing&mdash;&mdash; Wandering.
+The really big thing. Even finer than your superb
+plucky trip through&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Wasn't plucky! I'm a cry baby," she said, like
+a bad, contradictory little girl.</p>
+
+<p>He didn't argue it. He smiled and said "Tut!"
+and placidly catalogued her with, "You're the pluckiest
+girl I've ever seen, and it's all the more amazing
+because you're not a motion-picture Tomboy, but essentially
+exquisite&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a grub."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well, then. You're a grub. So am I. And
+I like it. And when I make the big Alaskan trip
+next year I want you to go along! Claire! Haven't
+you any idea how terribly close to me the thought of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span>
+you has been these weeks? You've guided me
+through the wilderness&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"It's&mdash;&mdash; I'm glad." She sprang up, beseeching,
+"Jeff dear, you're going to stay for tea? I must run
+up and powder my nose."</p>
+
+<p>"Not until you say you're glad to see me. Child
+dear, we've been ambling along and&mdash;&mdash; No. You
+aren't a child any more. You're a woman. And if
+I've never been quite a man, but just a dusty office-machine,
+that's gone now. I've got the wind of the
+wilderness in my lungs. Man and woman! My
+woman! That's all I'm going to say now, but&mdash;&mdash; Oh
+my God, Claire, I do need you so!"</p>
+
+<p>He drew her head to his shoulder, and for an
+instant she rested there. But as she looked up, she
+saw coming age in the granulated skin of his throat.</p>
+
+<p>"He needs me&mdash;but he'd boss me. I'd be the cunning
+child-wife, even at fifty," she worried, and
+"Hang him, it's like his superiority to beat poor Milt
+even at adventuring&mdash;and to be such a confounded
+Modest Christian Gentleman about it!"</p>
+
+<p>"You'd&mdash;you're so dreadfully managing," she
+sighed aloud.</p>
+
+<p>For the first time in all their acquaintanceship, Jeff's
+pride broke, and he held her away from him, while
+his lips were pathetic, and he mourned, "Why do you
+always try to hurt me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, my dear, I don't."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span>"Is it because you resent the decent things I have
+managed to do?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't understand."</p>
+
+<p>"If I have an idea for a party, you think I'm
+'managing.' If I think things out deeply, you say
+I'm dull."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you aren't. I didn't mean&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"What are you? A real woman, or one of these
+flirts, that love to tease a man because he's foolish
+enough to be honestly in love?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not&mdash;hon-estly I'm not, Jeff. It's&mdash;&mdash; You
+don't quite make me&mdash;&mdash; It's just that I'm not in love
+with you. I like you, and respect you terribly,
+but&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to make you love me." His clutching
+fingers hurt her arm, and somehow she was not angry,
+but stirred. "But I'm not going to try now. Forget
+the Alaskan caveman. Remember, I haven't even used
+the word 'love.' I've just chatted about fjords, or
+whatever they are, but one of these days&mdash;&mdash; No.
+I won't do it. I want to stay here in Seattle a few
+days, and take you on jolly picnics, but&mdash;&mdash; Would
+you rather I didn't even do that? I'm&mdash;&mdash;" He
+dropped her arm, kneaded his forehead with the heel
+of his palm. "I can't stand being regarded as a
+bothersome puppy. I can't stand it! I can't!"</p>
+
+<p>"Please stay, Jeff! We'll have some darling drives
+and things. We'll go up Rainier as far as we can."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span>He stayed. He was anecdotal and amusing at tea,
+that afternoon. Claire saw how the Gilsons, and two
+girls who dropped in, admired him. That made her
+uneasy. And when Mrs. Gilson begged him to leave
+his hotel and stay with them, he refused with a quick
+look at Claire that hurt her.</p>
+
+<p>"He wants me to be free. He's really so much
+more considerate than Milt. And I hurt him. Even
+his pride broke down. And I've spoiled Milt's life by
+meddling. And I've hurt the Gilsons' feelings. And
+I'm not much of a comfort to father. Oh, I'm absolutely
+no good," she agonized.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXX<br />
+THE VIRTUOUS PLOTTERS</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Mr. Geoffrey Saxton</span>, in Alaskan tan
+and New York evening clothes and Piccadilly
+poise, was talking to the Eugene Gilsons while Claire
+finished dressing for the theater.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Gilson observed, "She's the dearest thing.
+We've become awfully fond of her. But I don't
+think she knows what she wants to do with life.
+She's rather at loose ends. Who is this Daggett boy&mdash;some
+university student&mdash;whom she seems to like?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, since you speak of him&mdash;&mdash; I hadn't meant
+to, unless you did. I want to be fair to him. What
+did she tell you about him?" Jeff asked confidentially.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing, except that he's a young engineer, and
+frightfully brave and all those uncomfortable virtues,
+and she met him in Yellowstone Park or somewhere,
+and he saved her from a bear&mdash;or was it a tramp?&mdash;from
+something unnecessary, at any rate."</p>
+
+<p>"Eva, I don't want to be supercilious, but the truth
+is that this young Daggett is a rather dreadful person.
+He's been here at the house, hasn't he? How did he
+strike you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all. He's silent, and as dull as lukewarm
+tea, but perfectly inoffensive."</p>
+
+<p>"Then he's cleverer than I thought! Daggett is
+anything but dull and inoffensive, and if he can play<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span>
+that estimable r&ocirc;le&mdash;&mdash;! It seems that he is the son
+of some common workman in the Middlewest; he
+isn't an engineer at all; he's really a chauffeur or a
+taxi-driver or something; and he ran into Claire and
+Henry B. on the road, and somehow insinuated himself
+into their graces&mdash;far from being silent and commonplace,
+he appears to have some strange kind of
+charm which," Jeff sighed, "I don't understand at all.
+I simply don't understand it!</p>
+
+<p>"I met him in Montana with the most gorgeously
+atrocious person I've ever encountered&mdash;one Pinky
+Westlake, or some such a name&mdash;positively, a crook!
+He tried to get Boltwood and myself interested in the
+commonest kind of a mining swindle&mdash;hinted that we
+were to join him in cheating the public. And this
+Daggett was his partner&mdash;they actually traveled together.
+But I do want to be just. I'm not <i>sure</i> that
+Daggett was aware of his partner's dishonesty. That
+isn't what worries me about the lad. It's his utter
+impossibility. He's as crude as iron-ore. When he's
+being careful, he may manage to be inconspicuous,
+but give him the chance&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Really, I'm not exaggerating when I say that
+at thirty-five he'll be dining in his shirt-sleeves, and
+sitting down to read the paper with his shoes off and
+feet up on the table. But Claire&mdash;you know what
+a dear Quixotic soul she is&mdash;she fancies that because
+this fellow repaired a puncture or something of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span>
+sort for her on the road, she's indebted to him, and
+the worse he is, the more she feels that she must
+help him. And affairs of that kind&mdash;&mdash; Oh, it's quite
+too horrible, but there have been cases, you know,
+where girls as splendid and fine and well-bred as Claire
+herself have been trapped into low marriages by their
+loyalty to cadging adventurers!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh!" groaned Mrs. Gilson; and "Good Lord!"
+lamented Mr. Gilson, delighted by the possibility of
+tragedy; and "Really, I'm not exaggerating," said
+Jeff enthusiastically.</p>
+
+<p>"What are we going to do?" demanded Mrs. Gilson;
+while Mr. Gilson, being of a ready and inventive
+mind, exclaimed, "By Jove, you ought to kidnap her
+and marry her yourself, Jeff!"</p>
+
+<p>"I'd like to. But I'm too old."</p>
+
+<p>They beautifully assured him that he was a blithe
+young thing with milk teeth; and with a certain satisfaction
+Jeff suggested, "I tell you what we might do.
+Of course it's an ancient stunt, but it's good. I judge
+that Daggett hasn't been here at the house much.
+Why not have him here so often that Claire will
+awaken to his crudity, and get sick of him?"</p>
+
+<p>"We'll do it," thrilled Mrs. Gilson. "We'll have
+him for everything from nine-course dinners with
+Grandmother Eaton's napkins on view, to milk and
+cold ham out of the ice-box. When Claire doesn't
+invite him, I will!"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXXI<br />
+THE KITCHEN INTIMATE</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">Milt</span> had become used to the Gilson drawing-room.
+He was no longer uncomfortable in
+the presence of its sleek fatness, though at first (not
+knowing that there were such resources as interior
+decorators), he had been convinced that, to have
+created the room, the Gilsons must have known everything
+in the world. Now he glanced familiarly at
+its white paneling, its sconces like silver candlesticks,
+the inevitable davenport inevitably backed by an
+amethyst-shaded piano lamp and a table crowded with
+silver boxes and picture-frames. He liked the winsomeness
+of light upon velvet and polished wood.</p>
+
+<p>It was not the drawing-room but the kitchen that
+dismayed him.</p>
+
+<p>In Schoenstrom he had known that there must somewhere
+be beautiful "parlors," but he had trusted in
+his experience of kitchens. Kitchens, according to his
+philosophy, were small smelly rooms of bare floors,
+and provided with one oilcloth-covered table, one stove
+(the front draft always broken and propped up with
+the lid-lifter), one cupboard with panes of tin pierced
+in rosettes, and one stack of dirty dishes.</p>
+
+<p>But the Gilson kitchen had the efficiency of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span>
+laboratory and the superciliousness of a hair-dresser's
+booth. With awe Milt beheld walls of white tiles, a
+cork floor, a gas-range large as a hotel-stove, a ceiling-high
+refrigerator of enamel and nickel, zinc-topped
+tables, and a case of utensils like a surgeon's knives.
+It frightened him; it made more hopelessly unapproachable
+than ever the Alexandrian luxury of the
+great Gilsons.... The Vanderbilts' kitchen must be
+like this. And maybe King George's.</p>
+
+<p>He was viewing the kitchen upon the occasion of an
+intimate Sunday evening supper to which he had been
+yearningly invited by Mrs. Gilson. The maids were
+all out. The Gilsons and Claire, Milt and Jeff Saxton,
+shoutingly prepared their own supper. While Mrs.
+Gilson scrambled eggs and made coffee, the others
+set the table, and brought cold ham and a bowl of
+salad from the ice-box.</p>
+
+<p>Milt had intended to be a silent but deft servitor.
+When he had heard that he was to come to supper
+with the returned Mr. Geoffrey Saxton, he had first
+been panic-shaken, then resolved. He'd "let old iron-face
+Saxton do the high and mighty. Let him stand
+around and show off his clothes and adjectives, way
+he did at Flathead Lake." But he, Milt, would be "on
+the job." He'd help get supper, and calmly ignore
+Jeff's rudeness.</p>
+
+<p>Only&mdash;Jeff wasn't rude. He greeted Milt with,
+"Ah, Daggett! This is <i>so</i> nice!" And Milt had no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[312]</a></span>
+chance to help. It was Jeff who anticipated him and
+with a pleasant, "Let me get that&mdash;I'm kitchen-broke,"
+snatched up the cold ham and salad. It was
+Jeff who found the supper plates, while Milt was
+blunderingly wondering how any one family could use
+a "whole furniture-store-full of different kinds of
+china." It was Jeff who sprang to help Claire wheel
+in the tea-wagon, and so captured the chance to speak
+to her for which Milt had been maneuvering these
+five minutes.</p>
+
+<p>When they were settled, Jeff glowed at him, and
+respectfully offered, "I thought of you so often, Daggett,
+on a recent little jaunt of mine. You'd have been
+helpful."</p>
+
+<p>"Where was that?" asked Milt suspiciously (wondering,
+and waiting to see, whether you could take cold
+ham in your fingers).</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, in Alaska."</p>
+
+<p>"In&mdash;Alaska?" Milt was dismayed.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, just a business trip there. There's something
+I wish you'd advise me about."</p>
+
+<p>He was humble. And Milt was uneasy. He
+grumbled, "What's that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I've been wondering whether it would be possible
+to use wireless telephony in Alaska. But I'm such
+a dub at electricity. Do you know&mdash;&mdash; What would
+be the cost of installing a wireless telephone plant with
+a hundred-mile radius?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span>"Gee, I don't know!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, so sorry. Well, I wonder if you can tell
+me about wireless telegraphy, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I don't know anything about that either."</p>
+
+<p>Milt had desperately tried to make his answer
+gracious but somehow&mdash;&mdash; He hated this devil's
+obsequiousness more than he had his chilliness at
+Flathead Lake. He had a feeling that the Gilsons
+had delightedly kicked each other under the table;
+that, for all her unchanging smile, Claire was unhappy....
+And she was so far off, a white wraith
+floating beyond his frantic grasp.</p>
+
+<p>"It doesn't matter, really. But I didn't know&mdash;&mdash; So
+you've started in the engineering school at the
+University of Washington," Saxton was purring.
+"Have you met Gid Childers there&mdash;son of old
+Senator Childers&mdash;charming people."</p>
+
+<p>"I've seen him. He has a Stutz&mdash;no, his is the
+Mercer," sighed Milt.</p>
+
+<p>He hated himself for it, but he couldn't quite keep
+the awe out of his voice. People with Mercers&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Claire seemed to be trying to speak. She made a
+delicate, feminine, clairesque approximation to clearing
+her throat. But Jeff ignored her and with almost
+osculatory affection continued to Milt:</p>
+
+<p>"Do let me know if there's anything I can do to
+help you. We're acquainted with two or three of
+your engineering faculty at the Office. They write<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[314]</a></span>
+in about various things. Do you happen to know Dr.
+Philgren?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes. Say! He's a wonder!" Milt was betrayed
+into exclaiming.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Good chap, I believe. He's been trying to
+get a job with us. We may give him one. Just tell
+him you're a friend of mine, and that he's to give you
+any help he can."</p>
+
+<p>Milt choked on a "Thanks."</p>
+
+<p>"And&mdash;now that we're just the family here together&mdash;how
+goes the financial side? Can I be of
+any assistance in introducing you to some engineering
+firm where you could do a little work on the side? You
+could make quite a little money&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>So confoundedly affectionate and paternal&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Milt said irritably, "Thanks, but I don't need to do
+any work. I've got plenty of money."</p>
+
+<p>"How pleasant!" Saxton's voice was smooth as
+marshmallow. "You're fortunate. I had quite a
+struggle to get through Princeton."</p>
+
+<p>Wasn't Mr. Gilson contrasting Saxton's silk shirt
+with Milt's darned cotton covering, and in light of
+that contrast chuckling at Milt's boast and Saxton's
+modesty? Milt became overheated. His scalp prickled
+and his shoulder-blades were damp. As Saxton turned
+from him, and crooned to Claire, "More ham,
+honey?" Milt hated himself. He was in much of the
+dramatic but undesirable position of a man in pajamas,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[315]</a></span>
+not very good pajamas, who has been locked out in
+the hotel corridor by the slamming of his door. He
+was in the frame of mind of a mongrel, of a real
+Boys'-Dog, at a Madison Square dog-show. He had a
+faint shrewd suspicion of Saxton's game. But what
+could he do about it?</p>
+
+<p>He felt even more out of place when the family forgot
+him and talked about people of whom he had
+never heard.</p>
+
+<p>He sat alone on an extremely distant desert isle and
+ate cold ham and wished he were in Schoenstrom.</p>
+
+<p>Claire had recovered her power of speech. She
+seemed to be trying to bring him into the conversation,
+so that the family might appreciate him.</p>
+
+<p>She hesitated, and thought with creased brows, and
+brought out, "Uh, uh, oh&mdash;&mdash; Oh Milt: How much
+is gas selling at now?"...</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>Milt left that charming and intimate supper-party at
+nine. He said, "Got to work on&mdash;on my analytical
+geometry," as though it was a lie; and he threw
+"Good night" at Saxton as though he hated his kind,
+good benefactor; and when he tried to be gracious
+to Mrs. Gilson the best he could get out was, "Thanks
+f' inviting me." They expansively saw him to the
+door. Just as he thought that he had escaped, Saxton
+begged, "Oh, Daggett, I was arguing with a chap&mdash;&mdash; What
+color are Holstein-Friesian cattle? Red?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[316]</a></span>"Black and white," Milt said eagerly.</p>
+
+<p>He heard Mrs. Gilson giggle.</p>
+
+<p>He stood on the terrace wiping his forehead and,
+without the least struggle, finally and irretrievably
+admitting that he would never see Claire Boltwood or
+any of her friends again. Not&mdash;never!</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>He had received from Mrs. Gilson a note inviting
+him to share their box at the first night of a three-night
+Opera Season. He had spent half a day in trying
+to think of a courteously rude way of declining.</p>
+
+<p>A straggly little girl came up from the candy-shop
+below his room, demanding, "Say, are you Mr. Daggett?
+Say, there's some woman wants to talk to you
+on our telephone. Say, tell them we ain't supposed to
+be no messenger-office. You ain't supposed to call no
+upstairs people on our telephone. We ain't supposed
+to leave the store and go trotting all over town to&mdash;&mdash; Gee,
+a nickel, gee, thank you, don't mind what ma
+says, she's always kicking."</p>
+
+<p>On the telephone, he heard Claire's voice in an agitated,
+"Milt! Meet me down-town, at the Imperial
+Motion Picture Theater, right away. Something I've
+got to tell you. I'll be in the lobby. Hurry!"</p>
+
+<p>When he bolted in she was already in the lobby,
+agitatedly looking over a frame of "stills." She ran
+to him, hooked her fingers in his lapel, poured out,
+"They've invited you to the opera? I want you to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[317]</a></span>
+come and put it all over them. I'm almost sure there's
+a plot. They want to show me that you aren't used
+to tiaras and saxophones and creaking dowagers and
+tulle. Beat 'em! Beat 'em! Come to the opera and be
+awf'ly aloof and supercilious. You can! Yes, you can!
+And be sure&mdash;wear evening clothes. Now I've got to
+hurry."</p>
+
+<p>"B-but&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't disappoint me. I depend on you. Oh, say
+you will!"</p>
+
+<p>"I will!"</p>
+
+<p>She was gone, whisking into the Gilson limousine.
+He was in a glow at her loyalty, in a tremor of anger
+at the meddlers.</p>
+
+<p>But he had never worn evening clothes.</p>
+
+<p>He called it "a dress-suit," and before the complications
+of that exotic garb, he was flabby with
+anxiety. To Milt and to Schoenstrom&mdash;to Bill McGolwey,
+even to Prof Jones and the greasily prosperous
+Heinie Rauskukle&mdash;the dress-suit was the symbol
+and proof, the indication and manner, of sophisticated
+wealth. In Schoenstrom even waiters do not wear
+dress-suits. For one thing there aren't any waiters.
+There is one waitress at the Leipzig House, Miss
+Annie Schweigenblat, but you wouldn't expect Miss
+Schweigenblat to deal them off the arm in black
+trousers with braid down the side.</p>
+
+<p>No; a dress-suit was what the hero wore in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[318]</a></span>
+movies; and the hero in the movies, when he wasn't
+a cowpuncher, was an ex-captain of the Yale football
+team, and had chambers and a valet. You could
+tell him from the valet because he wasn't so bald. It
+is true that Milt had heard that in St. Cloud there
+were people who wore dress-suits at parties, but then
+St. Cloud was a city, fifteen or sixteen thousand.</p>
+
+<p>"How could he get away with a dress-suit? How
+could he keep from feeling foolish in a low-cut vest,
+and what the deuce would he do with the tails? Did
+you part 'em or roll 'em up, when you sat down? And
+wouldn't everybody be able to tell from his foolish
+look that he didn't belong in one?" He could hear
+A.D.T. boys and loafers in front of pool rooms
+whispering, "Look at the piker in the rented soup
+and fish!"</p>
+
+<p>For of course he'd rent one. Nobody bought them&mdash;except
+plutes like Henry B. Boltwood.</p>
+
+<p>He agitatedly walked up and down for an hour,
+peering into haberdashery windows, looking for a
+kind-faced young man. He found him, in Ye Pall
+Mall Toggery Shoppe &amp; Shoes; an open-faced young
+man who was gazing through the window as sparklingly
+as though he was thinking of going as a missionary
+to India&mdash;and liked curry. Milt ironed out
+his worried face, clumped in, demanded fraternally,
+"Say, old man, don't some of these gents' furnishings
+stores have kind of little charts that tell just what you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[319]</a></span>
+wear with dress-suits and Prince Alberts and everything?"</p>
+
+<p>"You bet," said the kind-faced young man.</p>
+
+<p>West of Chicago, "You bet" means "Rather," and
+"Yes indeed," and "On the whole I should be inclined
+to fancy that there may be some vestiges of accuracy
+in your curious opinion," and "You're a liar but I
+can't afford to say so."</p>
+
+<p>The kind-faced young man brought from behind the
+counter a beautiful brochure illustrated with photographs
+of Phoebus Apollo in what were described as
+"American Beauty Garments&mdash;neat, natty, nobby,
+new." The center pages faithfully catalogued the
+ties, shirts, cuff-links, spats, boots, hats, to wear with
+evening clothes, morning clothes, riding clothes, tennis
+costumes, polite mourning.</p>
+
+<p>As he looked it over Milt felt that his wardrobe already
+contained all these gentlemanly possessions.</p>
+
+<p>With the aid of the clerk and the chart he purchased
+a tradition-haunted garment with a plate-armor bosom
+and an opening as crooked as the Missouri River; a
+white tie which in his strong red hands looked as silly
+as a dead fish; waistcoat, pearl links, and studs. For
+the first time, except for seizures of madness during
+two or three visits to Minneapolis motor accessory
+stores, he caught the shopping-fever. The long shining counter,
+the trim red-stained shelves, the glittering cases,
+the racks of flaunting ties, were beautiful<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[320]</a></span>
+to him and beckoning. He revolved a pleasantly
+clicking rack of ties, then turned and fought his way
+out.</p>
+
+<p>He bought pumps&mdash;which cost exactly twice as much
+as the largest sum which he had allowed himself. He
+bought a newspaper, and in the want-columns found
+the advertisement:</p>
+
+<p class="center"><big>Silberfarb the Society Tailor<br />
+DRESS SUITS TO RENT<br />
+Snappiest in the City</big></p>
+
+<p>Despite the superlative snappiness of Mr. Silberfarb's
+dress-suits his establishment was a loft over a
+delicatessen, approached by a splintery stairway along
+which hung shabby signs announcing the upstairs
+offices of "J. L. &amp; T. J. O'Regan, Private Detectives,"
+"The Zenith Spiritualist Church, Messages by Rev.
+Lulu Paughouse," "The International Order of Live
+Ones, Seattle Wigwam," and "Mme. Lavourie,
+Sulphur Baths." The dead air of the hallway suggested
+petty crookedness. Milt felt that he ought to
+fight somebody but, there being no one to fight, he
+banged along the flapping boards of the second-floor
+hallway to the ground-glass door of Silberfarb the
+Society Tailor, who was also, as an afterthought
+on a straggly placard, "Pressng &amp; Cleang While U
+Wait."</p>
+
+<p>He belligerently shouldered into a low room. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[321]</a></span>
+light from the one window was almost obscured by
+racks of musty-smelling black clothes which stretched
+away from him in two dismal aisles that resembled a
+morgue of unhappy dead men indecently hung up on
+hooks. On a long, clumsily carpentered table, a small
+Jew, collarless, sweaty, unshaven, was darning trousers
+under an evil mantle gaslight. The Jew wrung out his
+hands and tried to look benevolent.</p>
+
+<p>"Want to rent a dress-suit," said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"I got just the t'ing for you!"</p>
+
+<p>The little man unfolded himself, galloped down the
+aisle, seized the first garment that came to hand, and
+came back to lay it against Milt's uncomfortable frame,
+bumbling, "Fine, mister, fy-en!"</p>
+
+<p>Milt studied the shiny-seamed, worn-buttonholed,
+limp object with dislike. Its personality was disintegrated.
+The only thing he liked about it was the
+good garage stink of gasoline.</p>
+
+<p>"That's almost worn out," he growled.</p>
+
+<p>At this sacrilege Mr. Silberfarb threw up his hands,
+with the dingy suit flapping in them like a bed-quilt
+shaken from a tenement window. He looked Milt all
+over, coldly. His red but shining eyes hinted that
+Milt was a clodhopper and no honest wearer of evening
+clothes. Milt felt humble, but he snapped, "No
+good. Want something with class."</p>
+
+<p>"Vell, that was good enough for a university professor
+at the big dance, but if you say so&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[322]</a></span>In the manner of one who is being put to an unfair
+amount of trouble, Mr. Silberfarb returned the
+paranoiac dress-suit to the rack, sighing patiently as
+he laboriously draped it on a hanger. He peered and
+pawed. He crowed with throaty triumph and brought
+back a rich ripe thing of velvet collar and cuffs. He
+fixed Milt with eyes that had become as sulky as the
+eyes of a dog in August dust.</p>
+
+<p>"Now that&mdash;you can't beat that, if you vant class,
+and it'll fit you like a glove. Oh, that's an ellllegant
+garment!"</p>
+
+<p>Shaking himself out of the spell of those contemptuous
+eyes Milt opened his brochure, studied the chart,
+and in a footnote found, "Never wear velvet collars
+or cuffs with evening coat."</p>
+
+<p>"Nope. Nix on the velvet," he remarked.</p>
+
+<p>Then the little man went mad and ran around in
+circles. He flung the ellllegant garment on the table.
+He flapped his arms, and wailed, "What do you vant?
+What do you vannnnt? That's a hundred-and-fifty-dollar
+dress-suit! That belonged to one of the richest
+men in the city. He sold it to me because he was
+going to Japan."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you can send it to Japan after him. I want
+something decent. Have you got it&mdash;or shall I go
+some place else?"</p>
+
+<p>The tailor instantly became affectionate. "How
+about a nice Tuxedo?" he coaxed.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[323]</a></span>"Nope. It says here&mdash;let me see&mdash;oh yes, here it
+is&mdash;it says here in the book that for the theater-with-ladies,
+should not wear 'dinner-coat or so-called
+Tuxedo, but&mdash;&mdash;'"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, dem fellows what writes books they don't
+know nothing. Absolute! They make it up."</p>
+
+<p>"Huh! Well, I guess I'll take my chance on them.
+The factory knows the ignition better 'n any repair-man."</p>
+
+<p>"Vell say, you're a hard fellow to please. I'll give
+you one of my reserve stock, but you got to leave me
+ten dollars deposit instead of five."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Silberfarb quite cheerfully unlocked a glass
+case behind the racked and ghostly dead; he brought
+out a suit that seemed to Milt almost decent. And it
+almost fitted when, after changing clothes in a broiling,
+boiling, reeking, gasoline-pulsing hole behind the
+racks, he examined it before a pier-glass. But he
+caught the tailor assisting the fit by bunching up a
+roll of cloth at the shoulder. Again Milt snapped, and
+again the tailor suffered and died, and to a doubting
+heathen world maintained the true gospel of "What
+do you vannnnt? It ain't stylish to have the dress-suit
+too tight! All the gents is wearing 'em loose and
+graceful." But in the end, after Milt had gone as
+far as the door, Mr. Silberfarb admitted that one dress-coat
+wouldn't always fit all persons without some
+alterations.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[324]</a></span>The coat did bag a little, and it was too long in the
+sleeves, but as Milt studied himself in his room&mdash;by
+placing his small melancholy mirror on the bureau,
+then on a chair, then on the floor, finally, to get a complete
+view, clear out in the hall&mdash;he admitted with
+stirring delight that he looked "pretty fair in the
+bloomin' outfit." His clear face, his shining hair, his
+straight shoulders, seemed to go with the costume.</p>
+
+<p>He wriggled into his top-coat and marched out of
+his room, theater-bound, with the well-fed satisfaction
+of a man who is certain that no one is giggling,
+"Look at the hand-me-downs." His pumps did alternately
+pinch his toes and rub his heels; the trousers
+cramped his waist; and he suspected that his tie had
+gone wandering. But he swaggered to the trolley,
+and sat as one rich and famous and very kind to the
+Common People, till&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Another man in evening clothes got on the car, and
+Milt saw that he wore a silk hat, and a white knitted
+scarf; that he took out and examined a pair of white
+kid gloves.</p>
+
+<p>He'd forgotten the hat! He was wearing his gray
+felt. He could risk the gloves, but the hat&mdash;the
+"stovepipe"&mdash;and the chart had said to wear one&mdash;he
+was ruined&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>He turned up the collar of his top-coat to conceal
+his white tie, tried to hide each of his feet behind the
+other to cover up his pumps; sought to change his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[325]</a></span>
+expression from that of a superior person in evening
+clothes to that of a decent fellow in honest Regular
+Clothes. Had the conductor or any of the passengers
+realized that he was a dub in a dress-suit without the
+hat?</p>
+
+<p>Once he thought that the real person in real evening
+clothes was looking at him. He turned his head
+and bore the probable insult in weak misery.</p>
+
+<p>Too feeble for anything but thick suffering he was
+dragged on toward the theater, the opera, people in
+silk hats&mdash;toward Jeff Saxton and exposure.</p>
+
+<p>But his success in bullying the tailor had taught him
+that dressing wasn't really a hidden lore to be known
+only by initiates; that some day he too might understand
+the black and white magic of clothes. His
+bruised self-consciousness healed. "I'll do&mdash;something,"
+he determined. He waited, vacuously.</p>
+
+<p>The Gilson party was not in the lobby when he
+arrived. He tore off his top-coat. He draped it over
+his felt hat, so that no one could be sure what sort
+of hat it shamefully concealed. That unveiling did
+expose him to the stare of everybody waiting in the
+lobby. He was convinced that the entire ticket-buying
+cue was glumly resenting him. Peeping down at the
+unusual white glare of his shirt-front, he felt naked
+and indecent.... "Nice kind o' vest. Must make
+'em out of old piqu&eacute; collars."</p>
+
+<p>He endured his martyrdom till his party arrived&mdash;the Gilsons,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[326]</a></span>
+Claire, Jeff Saxton, and a glittering
+young woman whose name, Milt thought, was Mrs.
+Corey.</p>
+
+<p>And Saxton wasn't wearing a high hat! He wore
+a soft one, and he didn't seem to care!</p>
+
+<p>Milt straightened up, followed them through the
+manifold dangers of the lobby, down a perilous aisle
+of uptilted scornful faces, to a red narrow corridor,
+winding stairs, a secret passage, a mysterious dark
+closet&mdash;and he walked out into a room with one
+side missing, and, on that side, ten trillion people in
+a well, and nine trillion of them staring at him and
+noticing that he'd rented his dress-suit. Hot about the
+neck, he stumbled over one or two chairs, and was
+permitted to rest in a foolish little gilt chair in the
+farthest corner.</p>
+
+<p>Once safe, he felt much better. Except that Jeff did
+put on white kid gloves, Milt couldn't see that they
+two looked so different. And neither of the two men
+in the next box wore gloves. Milt made sure of that
+comfort; he reveled in it; he looked at Claire, and in
+her loyal smile found ease.</p>
+
+<p>He snarled, "She trusts you. Forget you're a dub.
+Try to be human. Hang it, I'm no greener at the
+opera than old horsehair sofa there would be at a
+garage."</p>
+
+<p>There was something&mdash;&mdash; What was it he was
+trying to remember? Oh yes. When he'd worked in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[327]</a></span>
+the Schoenstrom flour-mill, as engineer, at eighteen,
+the owner had tried to torment him (to "get his goat,"
+Milt put it), and Milt had found that the one thing
+that would save him was to smile as though he knew
+more than he was telling. It did not, he remembered,
+make any difference whether or not the smile was
+real. If he merely looked the miller up and down, and
+smiled cynically, he was let alone.</p>
+
+<p>Why not&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Saxton was bending toward him, asking in honeyed
+respectfulness:</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you think that the new school in music&mdash;audible
+pointillage, one might call it&mdash;mistakes cacophony
+for power?"</p>
+
+<p>Milt smiled, paternally.</p>
+
+<p>Saxton waited for something more. He dug the
+nail of his right middle finger into his thumb, looked
+thoughtful, and attacked again:</p>
+
+<p>"Which do you like better: the new Italian music,
+or the orthodox German?"</p>
+
+<p>Milt smiled like two uncles watching a clever baby,
+and patronized Saxton with, "They both have their
+points."</p>
+
+<p>He saw that Claire was angry; but that the Gilsons
+and Mrs. Corey, flap-eared, gape-mouthed, forward-bending,
+were very proud of their little Jeff. He saw
+that, except for their clothes and self-conscious coiffures,
+they were exactly like a gang of cracker-box<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[328]</a></span>
+loafers at Heinie Rauskukle's badgering a new boy in
+town.</p>
+
+<p>Saxton looked bad-tempered. Then Mrs. Corey
+bustled with her face and yearned at Milt, "Do tell
+me: what is the theme of the opera tonight. I've
+rather forgotten."</p>
+
+<p>Milt ceased to smile. While all of them regarded
+him with interest he said clearly, "I haven't got the
+slightest idea. I don't know anything about music.
+Some day I hope I can get a clever woman like you to
+help me, Mrs. Corey. It must be great to know all
+about all these arts, the way you do. I wish you'd
+explain that&mdash;overture they call it, don't they?"</p>
+
+<p>For some reason, Mr. Gilson was snickering, Mrs.
+Corey flushing, Claire looking well pleased. Milt had
+tried to be insulting, but had got lost in the intricacies
+of the insult. He felt that he'd better leave it in its
+apparently safe state, and he leaned back, and smiled
+again, as though he was waiting. Mrs. Corey did not
+explain the overture. She hastily explained her second
+maid, to Mrs. Gilson.</p>
+
+<p>The opera was <i>Il Amore dei Tre Re</i>. Milt was
+bewildered. To him, who had never seen an opera, the
+convention that a girl cannot hear a man who is
+bellowing ten feet away from her, was absurd; and
+he wished that the singers would do something besides
+making their arms swim.</p>
+
+<p>He discovered that by moving his chair forward, he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[329]</a></span>
+could get within a foot of Claire. His hand slipped
+across, touched hers. She darted a startled backward
+glance. Her fingers closed tight about his, then restlessly
+snuggled inside his palm&mdash;and Milt was lost in
+enchantment.</p>
+
+<p>Stately kings of blood-red cloaks and chrysoberyls
+malevolent in crowns of ancient and massy gold&mdash;the
+quick dismaying roll of drums and the shadow of
+passing banners below a tower&mdash;a woman tall and
+misty-veiled and pale with dreams&mdash;a world of spirit
+where the soul had power over unseen dominions&mdash;this
+he saw and heard and tasted in the music. What
+the actual plot was, or the technique of the singing, he
+did not know, but it bore him beyond all reality save
+the sweet, sure happiness of Claire's nestling hand.</p>
+
+<p>He held her fingers so firmly that he could feel the
+pulse beat in them.</p>
+
+<hr class="shr" />
+
+<p>In the clamminess of his room, when the enchantment
+was gone, he said gravely:</p>
+
+<p>"How much longer can I keep this up? Sooner or
+later I bust loose and smash little Jeff one in the snoot,
+and he takes the count, and I'm never allowed to see
+Claire again. Turn the roughneck out on his ear. I
+s'pose I'm vulgar. I s'pose that fellow Michael in
+<i>Youth's Encounter</i> wouldn't talk about snoots. I
+don't care, I'll&mdash;&mdash; If I poke Saxton one&mdash;&mdash; I'm
+not afraid of the kid-glove precinct any more. My<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[330]</a></span>
+brain's as good as theirs, give it a chance. But oh,
+they're all against me. And they bust the Athletic
+Union's wrestling rule that 'striking, kicking, gouging,
+hair-pulling, butting, and strangling will not be allowed.'
+How long can I go on being good-natured?
+When I do break loose&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Slowly, beneath the moral cuff of his dress-shirt,
+Milt's fist closed in a brown, broad-knuckled lump, and
+came up in the gesture of a right to the jaw. But it
+came up only a foot. The hand opened, climbed to
+Milt's face, rubbed his temples, while he sighed:</p>
+
+<p>"Nope. Can't even do that. Bigger game now.
+Used to could&mdash;used to be able to settle things with
+a punch. But I've got to be more&mdash;oh, more diplomatic
+now. Oh Lord, how lonely I get for Bill McGolwey.
+No. That isn't true. I couldn't stand Bill
+now. Claire took all that out of me. Where am I,
+where am I? Why did I ever get a car that takes a
+36 &times; 6?"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[331]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXXII<br />
+THE CORNFIELD ARISTOCRAT</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">It</span> was an innocent little note from Jeff Saxton; a
+polite, humble little note; it said that Jeff had a
+card to the Astoria Club, and wouldn't Milt please have
+lunch with him? But Milt dropped it on the table,
+and he walked round it as though it were a dictagraph
+which he'd discovered in the table drawer after happy,
+happy, hidden hours at counterfeiting.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed more dangerous to refuse than to go. He
+browned the celebrated new shoes; he pressed the
+distinguished new trousers, with a light and quite
+unsatisfactory flatiron; he re-re-retied his best spotted
+blue bow&mdash;it persisted in having the top flaps too short,
+but the retying gave him spiritual strength&mdash;and he
+modestly clumped into the aloof brick portal of the
+Astoria Club on time.</p>
+
+<p>He had never been in a club before.</p>
+
+<p>He looked at the red tiled floor of the entrance hall;
+he stared through the hall into an immense lounge with
+the largest and softest chairs in the world, with oil
+portraits of distinguished old bucks, and ninety per
+cent. of the wealth and power of Seattle pulling its
+several mustaches, reading the P.I., and ignoring the
+lone intruder out in the hall.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[332]</a></span>A small Zulu in blue tights and brass buttons glared
+at Milt; and a large, soft, suave, insulting young man
+demanded, "Yes, sir?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. G-g-geoffrey Saxton?" ventured Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"Not in, sir." The "sir" sounded like "And you
+know it." The flaming guardian retired behind a narrow
+section of a bookkeeper's desk and ignored him.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm to meet him for lunch," Milt forlornly persisted.</p>
+
+<p>The young man looked up, hurt and annoyed at
+finding that the person was still to be dealt with.</p>
+
+<p>"If you will wait in there?" he groaned.</p>
+
+<p>Milt sat in there, which was a small blue tapestry
+room with hard chairs intended to discourage bill-collectors.
+He turned his hat round and round and
+round, till he saw Jeff Saxton, slim and straight and
+hard as the stick hooked over his arm, sailing into
+the hall. He plunged out after him, took refuge with
+him from the still unconvinced inspection of the hall-man.
+For twenty seconds, he loved Jeff Saxton.</p>
+
+<p>And Jeff seemed to adore him in turn. He solicitously
+led Milt to the hat-checking counter. He
+showed Milt the lounge and the billiard room, through
+which Milt crept with erect shoulders and easy eyes
+and a heart simply paralyzed with fear that one of
+these grizzled clubmen with clipped mustaches would
+look at him. He coaxed Milt into a grill that was a
+cross between the Chinese throne-room and a Viennese<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[333]</a></span>
+Weinstube, and he implored his friend Milt to do him
+the favor of trying the "very fair" English mutton
+chops and potatoes <i>au gratin</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"I did want to see you again before we go East,
+Daggett," he said pleasantly.</p>
+
+<p>"Th-thanks. When do you go?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm trying to get Miss Boltwood to start soon
+now. The season is opening in the East. She does like
+your fine sturdy West, as I do, but still, when we
+think of the exciting new shows opening, and the
+dances, and the touch with the great world&mdash;&mdash; Oh,
+it does make one eager to get back."</p>
+
+<p>"That's so," risked Milt.</p>
+
+<p>"We, uh&mdash;&mdash; Daggett&mdash;&mdash; In fact, I'm going
+to call you Milt, as Claire does. You don't know what
+a pleasure it has been to have encountered you.
+There's a fine keen courage about you Western chaps
+that makes a cautious old fogy like me envious. I
+shall remember meeting you with a great deal of
+pleasure."</p>
+
+<p>"Th-thanks. Been pleasure meet you."</p>
+
+<p>"And I know Claire will, too."</p>
+
+<p>Milt felt that he was being dealt with foully. He
+wanted to object to Saxton's acting as agent for Claire
+as incompetent, irrelevant, immaterial, and no foundation
+laid. But he could not see just where he was
+being led, and with Saxton glowing at him as warmly
+and greasily as the mutton chops, Milt could only smile<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[334]</a></span>
+wanly, and reflectively feel the table leg to see if it
+was loose enough to jerk out in case of need.</p>
+
+<p>Saxton was being optimistic:</p>
+
+<p>"In fact, Claire and I both hope that some day when
+you've finished your engineering course, we'll see you
+in the East. I wonder&mdash;&mdash; As I say, my dear fellow,
+I've taken the greatest fancy to you, and I do hope
+you won't think I'm too intimate if I say that I
+imagine that even in your charming friendship with
+Miss Boltwood, you've probably never learned what
+important people the Boltwoods are. I thought I'd tell
+you so that you could realize the privilege both you
+and I have in knowing them. Henry B. is&mdash;while not
+a man of any enormous wealth&mdash;regarded as one of
+the keenest intellects in New York wholesale circles.
+But beyond that, he is a scholar, and a man of the
+broadest interests. Of course the Boltwoods are too
+modest to speak of it, but he was chiefly instrumental
+in the establishment of the famous Brooklyn Symphony
+Orchestra. And his ancestors clear through&mdash;his
+father was a federal judge, and his mother's
+brother was a general in the Civil War, and afterwards
+an ambassador. So you can guess something
+of the position Claire holds in that fine, quiet, solid
+old Brooklyn set. Henry Ward Beecher himself was
+complimented at being asked to dine with the Boltwoods
+of his day, and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>No, the table leg wouldn't come loose, so it was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[335]</a></span>
+only verbally that the suddenly recovered Milt attacked:</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly is nice to have one of those old families.
+It's something like&mdash;&mdash; As you say, you and I have
+gotten pretty well acquainted along the line, so I guess
+I can say it to you&mdash;&mdash; My father and his folks came
+from that same kind of family. Father's dad was a
+judge, back in Maine, and in the war, grand-dad was
+quite friendly with Grant."</p>
+
+<p>This tribute of Milt to his grandsire was loyal but
+inaccurate. Judge Daggett, who wasn't a judge at all,
+but a J. P., had seen General Grant only once, and at
+the time the judge had been in company with all the
+other privates in the Fourteenth Maine.</p>
+
+<p>"Dad was a pioneer. He was a doctor. He had to
+give up all this easy-going stuff in order to help open
+up the West to civilization, but I guess it was worth
+it. He used to do the hardest kind of operations, on
+kitchen tables, with his driver giving the chloroform.
+I'm mighty proud of him. As you say, it's kind of
+what you might call inspiring to belong to the old
+Pilgrim aristocracy."</p>
+
+<p>Never before had Milt claimed relation to a group
+regarding which his only knowledge was the information
+derived from the red school-history to the effect
+that they all carried blunderbusses, put people in the
+stocks for whistling, and frequently said, "Why don't
+you speak for yourself, John?" But he had made his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[336]</a></span>
+boast with a clear eye and a pleasant, superior, calm
+smile.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Very interesting," grunted Saxton.</p>
+
+<p>"Would you like to see grandfather's daguerreotype?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, yes, uh, thanks, that would be very interesting&mdash;&mdash; Do
+let me see it, when&mdash;&mdash; Uh, as I
+was saying, Claire doubtless has a tremendous social
+career before her. So many people expecting her to
+marry well. Of course she has a rather unusual combination
+of charm and intelligence and&mdash;&mdash; In fact I
+think we may both be glad that&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. That's right. And the best thing about her
+is the way she can shake off all the social stuff and go
+camping and be a regular human being," Milt
+caressed.</p>
+
+<p>"Um, uh, no doubt, no doubt, though&mdash;&mdash; Of
+course, though, that isn't an inherent part of her. I
+fancy she's been rather tired by this long trip, poor
+child. Of course she isn't very strong."</p>
+
+<p>"That's right. Real pluck. And of course she'll
+get stronger by hiking. You've never seen her bucking
+a dangerous hill&mdash;I kind of feel that a person
+who hasn't seen her in the wilds doesn't know
+her."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't want to be contradictory, old man, but I
+feel on the other hand that no one who has failed to
+see her at the Junior League Dances, in a Poiret<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[337]</a></span>
+frock, can know her! Come, come! Don't know how
+we drifted into this chorus of praise of Claire! What
+I wanted to ask was your opinion of the Pierce-Arrow.
+I'm thinking of buying one. Do you think
+that&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>All the way home Milt exulted, "I put it all over
+him. I wasn't scared by the 'Don't butt into the
+aristocracy, my young friend' stuff. I lied handsome.
+But&mdash;&mdash; Darn it, now I'll have to live up to my
+New England aristocracy.... Wonder if my grand-dad's
+dad was a hired man or a wood-sawyer?...
+Ne' mine; I'm Daggett of Daggett from now on." He
+bounded up to his room vaingloriously remarking,
+"I'm there with the ancestors. I was brought up in
+the handsome city of Schoenstrom, which was founded
+by a colony of Vermont Yankees, headed by Herman
+Skumautz. I was never allowed to play with the
+Dutch kids, and&mdash;&mdash;" He opened the door. "&mdash;the
+Schoenstrom minister taught me Greek and was my
+bosom frien'&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He stopped with his heart in his ankles. Lolling
+on the bed, grinning, waving a cigarette, was Bill
+McGolwey, proprietor of the Old Home Lunch, of
+Schoenstrom, Minnesota.</p>
+
+<p>"Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwhy
+where the heck did you come from?" stammered the
+deposed aristocrat to his bosom friend Bill.</p>
+
+<p>"You old lemon-pie-faced, lollygagging, flap-footed,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[338]</a></span>
+crab-nosed son of misery, gee, but it's good to see you,
+Milt!"</p>
+
+<p>Bill was off the bed, wringing Milt's hand with
+simple joy, with perfect faith that in finding his friend
+all the troubles of life were over. And Milt was
+gloomily discovering the art of diplomacy. Bill was
+his friend, yes, but&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>It was hard enough to carry his own self.</p>
+
+<p>He pictured Jeff Saxton leering at the door, and
+while he pounded Bill's shoulder, and called him the
+name which, west of Chicago, is the token of hatred
+and of extreme gladness at meeting, he discovered that
+some one had stolen his stomach and left a piece of
+ice in its place.</p>
+
+<p>They settled down on bed and chair, Bill's ears red
+with joy, while Milt demanded:</p>
+
+<p>"How the deuce did you get here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, tell you, old hoss. Schoenstrom got so darn
+lonely after you left, and when Ben and Heinie got
+your address and bought the garage, think's I, lez go
+off on a little bum."</p>
+
+<p>Milt was realizing&mdash;and hating himself for realizing&mdash;that
+Bill's face was dirty, his hair linty, the bottoms
+of his trousers frayed masses of mud, while Bill
+chuckled:</p>
+
+<p>"I figured out maybe I could get a job here in a
+restaurant, and you and me could room together. I
+sold out my good will in the Old Home Lunch for a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[339]</a></span>
+hundred bucks. I was going to travel swell, riding the
+cushions. But Pete Swanson wanted me to go down
+to the Cities first, and we run into some pretty swift
+travelers in Minneapolis, and a couple of girls&mdash;saaaaaaay,
+kid, some class!"</p>
+
+<p>Bill winked, and Milt&mdash;Milt was rather sick. He
+knew Bill's conception of class in young women. Was
+this the fellow he had liked so well? These the ideas
+which a few months ago he had taken as natural and
+extremely amusing?</p>
+
+<p>"And I got held up in an alley off Washington
+Avenue, and they got the last twenty bones off'n me,
+and I was flatter 'n a pancake. So I says 'ish
+kabibble,' and I sneaks onto the blind baggage, and
+bums my way West. You'd 'a' died laughing to seen
+me throwing my feet for grub. Oh, I'm some panhandler!
+There was one <i>Frau</i> sicked her dog onto me,
+and I kicked him in the jaw and&mdash;&mdash; Oh, it was one
+swell hike."</p>
+
+<p>Milt was trying to ignore the voice that was raging,
+"And now he expects to live on me, after throwing
+his own money away. The waster! The hobo! He'll
+expect to meet Claire&mdash;&mdash; I'd kill him before I'd
+let him soil her by looking at her. Him and his classy
+girls!" Milt tried to hear only the other inner voice,
+which informed him, "He looks at you so trustingly.
+He'd give you his shirt, if you needed it&mdash;and he
+wouldn't make you ask for it!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[340]</a></span>Milt tried to be hearty: "What're you going to do,
+old kid?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, the first thing I'm going to do is to borrow
+ten iron-men and a pair of pants."</p>
+
+<p>"You bet! Here she is. Haven't got any extra
+pants. Tell you: Here's another five, and you can
+get the pants at the store in the next block, this side
+of the street. Hustle along now and get 'em!" He
+chuckled at Bill; he patted his arm; he sought to hurry
+him out.... He had to be alone, to think.</p>
+
+<p>But Bill kissed the fifteen dollars, carelessly rammed
+it into his pocket, crawled back on the bed, yawned,
+"What's the rush? Gosh, I'm sleepy. Say, Milt,
+whadyuh think of me and you starting a lunch-room
+here together? You got enough money out of the
+garage&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh no, noooo, gee, I'd like to, Bill, but you see,
+well, I've got to hold onto what little I've got so I can
+get through engineering school."</p>
+
+<p>"Sure, but you could cash in on a restaurant&mdash;you
+could work evenings in the dump, and there'd be a lot
+of city sports hanging around, and we'd have the time
+of our lives."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I&mdash;&mdash; I study, evenings. And I&mdash;&mdash; The
+fact is, Bill, I've met a lot of nice fellows at the university
+and I kind of go around with them."</p>
+
+<p>"Aw, how d'you get that way? Rats, you don't
+want to go tagging after them Willy-boys. Damn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[341]</a></span>
+dirty snobs. And the girls are worse. I tell you,
+Milt, these hoop-te-doodle society Janes may look all
+right to hicks like us, but on the side they raise more
+hell than any milliner's trimmer from Chi that ever
+vamped a rube burg."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you know about them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Now don't get sore. I'm telling you. I don't like
+to see any friend of mine make a fool of himself hanging
+around with a bunch that despises him because he
+ain't rich, that's all. Met any of the high-toned
+skirts?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;I&mdash;<i>have</i>!"</p>
+
+<p>"Trot 'em up and lemme give 'em the once-over."</p>
+
+<p>"We&mdash;we'll see about it. Now I got to go to a
+mathematics recitation, Bill. You make yourself comfortable,
+and I'll be back at five."</p>
+
+<p>Milt did not have to go to a recitation. He marched
+out with briskness in his step, and a book under his
+arm; but when he reached the corner, the briskness
+proved to be spurious, and the mathematics book
+proved to be William Rose Ben&eacute;t's <i>Merchants of
+Cathay</i>, which Claire had given him in the Yellowstone,
+and which he had rescued from the wrecked
+bug.</p>
+
+<p>He stood staring at it. He opened it with unhappy
+tenderness. He had been snatched from the world of
+beautiful words and serene dignity, of soaring mountains
+and companionship with Claire in the radiant<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[342]</a></span>
+morning, back to the mud and dust of Schoenstrom,
+from the opera to "city sports" in a lunch-room!
+He hated Bill McGolwey and his sneering assumption
+that Milt belonged in the filth with him. And
+he hated himself for not being enough of a genius to
+combine Bill McGolwey and Claire Boltwood. But
+not once, in his maelstrom of worry on that street
+corner, did he expect Claire to like Bill. Through all
+his youthful agonizing, he had enough common sense
+to know that though Claire might conquer a mountain
+pass, she could never be equal to the social demands
+of Schoenstrom and Bill McGolwey.</p>
+
+<p>He wandered for an hour and came back to find
+that, in a "dry" city which he had never seen before,
+the crafty Bill had obtained a quart of Bourbon, and
+was in a state of unsteady beatitude. He wanted, he
+announced, to dance.</p>
+
+<p>Milt got him into the community bathtub, and
+soused him under, but Bill's wet body was slippery,
+and Bill's merry soul was all for frolicsome gamboling,
+and he slid out of Milt's grasp, he sloshed around
+in the tub, he sprinkled Milt's sacred good suit with
+soapy water, and escaped, and in the costume of
+Adam he danced orientally in Milt's room, till he was
+seized with sleepiness and cosmic grief, and retired to
+Milt's bed in tears and nothing else.</p>
+
+<p>The room dimmed, grew dark. The street lamps
+outside sent a wan, wavery gleam into the room.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[343]</a></span>
+Evening crowds went by, and in a motion-picture
+theater a banging piano struck up. Bill breathed in
+choking snorts. Milt sat unmoving, feeling very old,
+very tired, too dumbly unhappy to be frightened of
+the dreadful coming hour when Claire and Jeff should
+hear of Bill, and discover Milt's real world.</p>
+
+<p>He was not so romantically loyal, not so inhumanly
+heroic, that it can truthfully be reported that he never
+thought of getting rid of Bill. He did think of it,
+again and again. But always he was touched by Bill's
+unsuspecting trust, and shook his head, and sank again
+into the fog.</p>
+
+<p>What was the use of trying to go ahead? Wasn't
+he, after all, merely a Bill McGolwey himself?</p>
+
+<p>If he was, he wouldn't inflict himself on Claire.</p>
+
+<p>For several minutes he gave up forever the zest of
+climbing.</p>
+
+<p>When Bill awoke, brightly solicitous about the rest
+of the quart of Bourbon, and bouncingly ready to "go
+out and have a time," Milt loafed about the streets
+with him, showing him the city. He dully cut his
+classes, next morning, and took Bill to the wharves.</p>
+
+<p>It was late in the afternoon, when they were lounging
+in the room, and Bill was admiring his new pants&mdash;he
+boasted of having bought them for three dollars,
+and pointed out that Milt had been a "galoot" to
+spend ten dollars for shoes&mdash;that some one knocked
+at the door. Sleepily expectant of his landlady, Milt<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[344]</a></span>
+opened it on Miss Claire Boltwood, Mr. and Mrs.
+Eugene Gilson, and Mr. Geoffrey Saxton.</p>
+
+<p>Saxton calmly looked past him, at Bill, smiled
+slightly, and condescended, "I thought we ought to
+call on you, so we've dropped in to beg for tea."</p>
+
+<p>Bill had stopped midway in scratching his head to
+gape at Claire. Claire returned the look, stared at
+Bill's frowsy hair, his red wrists, his wrinkled, grease-stained
+coat, his expression of impertinent stupidity.
+Then she glanced questioningly at Milt, who choked:</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes, yes, sure, glad see you, come in, get some
+tea, so glad see you, come in&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[345]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXXIII<br />
+TOOTH-MUG TEA</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">"My</span> friend Mr. McGolwey&mdash;I knew him in
+Schoenstrom&mdash;come on to Seattle for a while.
+Bill, these are some people I met along the road," Milt
+grumbled.</p>
+
+<p>"Glad to meet 'em. Have a chair. Have two
+chairs! Say, Milt, y'ought to have more chairs if
+you're going to have a bunch of swells coming to call
+on you. Ha, ha, ha! Say, I guess I better pike out
+and give the folks a chance to chin with you," Bill
+fondly offered.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, sit down," Milt snapped at him.</p>
+
+<p>They all sat down, four on the bed; and Milt's inner
+ear heard a mute snicker from the Gilsons and Saxton.
+He tried to talk. He couldn't. Bill looked at
+him and, perceiving the dumbness, gallantly helped
+out:</p>
+
+<p>"So you met the kid on the road, eh? Good scout,
+Milt is. We always used to say at Schoenstrom that
+he was the best darn hand at fixing a flivver in seven
+townships."</p>
+
+<p>"So you knew Mr. Daggett at home? Now isn't
+that nice," said Mrs. Gilson.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Knew</i> him? Saaaaay, Milt and I was brung up<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[346]</a></span>
+together. Why, him and I have bummed around together,
+and worked on farms, summers, and fished for
+bull-heads&mdash;&mdash; Ever catch a bull-head? Damnedest
+slipperiest fish you ever saw, and got horns that sting
+the stuffin's out of you and&mdash;&mdash; Say, I wonder if
+Milt's told you about the time we had at a barn-dance
+once? There was a bunch of hicks there, and I
+says, 'Say, kid, lez puncture their tires, and hide back
+of the manure pile, and watch the fun when they come
+out.' I guess maybe I was kind of stewed a little, tell
+the truth, but course Milt he don't drink much, hardly
+at all, nice straight kid if I do say so&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Bill!" Milt ordered. "We must have some tea.
+Here's six-bits. You run down to the corner grocery
+and get some tea and a little cream. Oh, you better
+buy three-four cups, too. Hustle now, son!"</p>
+
+<p>"Attaboy! Yours to command, ladies and gents,
+like the fellow says!" Bill boomed delightedly. He
+winked at Jeff Saxton, airily spun his broken hat on
+his dirty forefinger, and sauntered out.</p>
+
+<p>"Charming fellow. A real original," crooned Mrs.
+Gilson.</p>
+
+<p>"Did he know your friend Mr. Pinky?" asked
+Saxton.</p>
+
+<p>Before Milt could answer, Claire rose from the
+bed, inspected the Gilsons and Jeff with cold dislike,
+and said quietly to Milt, "The poor dear thing&mdash;he
+was dreadfully embarrassed. It's so good of you to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[347]</a></span>
+be nice to him. I believe in being loyal to your old
+friends."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, so do I!" babbled Mrs. Gilson. "It's just
+too splendid. And <i>we</i> must do something for him.
+I'm going to invite Mr. Daggett and Mr.&mdash;Mr. McGollups,
+was it?&mdash;to dinner this evening. I do want to
+hear him tell about your boyhood. It must have been
+so interesting."</p>
+
+<p>"It was," mused Milt. "It was poor and miserable.
+We had to work hard&mdash;we had to fight for whatever
+education we got&mdash;we had no one to teach us
+courtesy."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh now, with your fine old doctor father? Surely
+he was an inspiration?" Jeff didn't, this time, trouble
+to hide the sneer.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. He was. He gave up the chance to be a
+rich loafer in order to save farmers' babies for fees
+that he never got."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sure he did. I wish I'd known him. We
+need to know men like that in this pink-frosting playing
+at living we have in cities," Claire said sweetly&mdash;not
+to Milt but to Jeff.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Gilson had ignored them, waiting with the
+patience of a cat at a mouse-hole, and she went on,
+"But you haven't said you'd come, this evening.
+Do say you will. I don't suppose Mr. McGollups will
+care to dress for dinner?"</p>
+
+<p>With saccharin devotion Milt yearned back, "No,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[348]</a></span>
+Mrs. Gilson. No. Mr. McGolwey won't care to
+dress. He's eccentric."</p>
+
+<p>"But you'll make him come?"</p>
+
+<p>Milt was tactfully beginning to refuse when Gene
+Gilson at last exploded, turned purple, covered his dripping,
+too-red lips with his handkerchief.</p>
+
+<p>Then, abruptly, Milt hurled at Mrs. Gilson, "All
+right. We'll come. Bill'll be awfully funny. He's
+never been out of a jerkwater burg in his life, hardly.
+He's an amusing cuss. He thinks I'm smart! He
+loves me like a dog. Oh, he's rich! Ha, ha, ha!"</p>
+
+<p>Milt might have gone on ... if he had, Mr. and
+Mrs. Gilson would have gone away, much displeased.
+But Bill arrived, with some of the worst tea in the
+world, and four cups tastefully done in cupids' heads
+and much gilt.</p>
+
+<p>Milt made tea, ignoring them, while Bill entertained
+the Gilsons and Saxtons with Rabelaisian stories of
+threshing-time when shirts prickly with chaff and
+gritty with dust stuck to sweat-dripping backs; of the
+"funny thing" of Milt and Bill being hired to move
+a garbage-pile and "swiping" their employer's
+"mushmelons"; of knotting shirts at the swimming-hole
+so that the bawling youngsters had to "chaw
+beef"; of drinking beer in the livery-stable at Melrose;
+of dropping the water-pitcher from a St. Klopstock
+hotel window upon the head of the "constabule" and
+escaping from him across the lean-to roof.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[349]</a></span>Mrs. Gilson encouraged him; Bill sat with almost
+closed eyes, glorying in the saga of small-town life;
+Saxton and Gilson did not conceal their contemptuous
+grins.</p>
+
+<p>But Claire&mdash;&mdash; After nervously rubbing the tips of
+her thumbs with flickering agitated fingers, she had
+paid no attention to Bill and the revelation of Milt's
+rustic life; she had quietly gone to Milt, to help him
+prepare the scanty tea.</p>
+
+<p>She whispered, "Never mind, dear. I don't care.
+It was all twice as much fun as being wheeled in lacy
+prams by cranky nurses, as Jeff and I were. But I
+know how you feel. Are you ashamed of having been
+a prairie pirate?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I'm not! We were wild kids&mdash;we raised a lot
+of Cain&mdash;but I'm glad we did."</p>
+
+<p>"So am I. I couldn't stand it if you were ashamed.
+Listen to me, and remember little Claire's words of
+wisdom. These fools are trying&mdash;oh, they're so obvious!&mdash;they're
+trying to make me feel that the prim
+Miss Boltwood of Brooklyn Heights is a stranger to
+you. Well, they're succeeding in making me a
+stranger&mdash;to them!"</p>
+
+<p>"Claire! Dear! You don't mind Bill?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I do. And so do you. You've grown away
+from him."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know but&mdash;&mdash; Today has been quite a
+test."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[350]</a></span>"Yes. It has. Because if I can stand your friend
+Mr. McGolwey&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Then you do care!"</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps. And if I think that he's, oh, not much
+good, and I remember that for a long time you just
+had him to play with, then I'm all the more anxious
+to make it up to you."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't be sorry for me! I can't stand that! After
+all, it was a good town, and good folks&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No! No! I'm not sorry for you! I just mean,
+you couldn't have had so terribly much fun, after you
+were eighteen or so. Schoenstrom must have been
+a little dull, after very many years there. This stuff
+about the charm of backwoods villages&mdash;the people
+that write it seem to take jolly good care to stay in
+Long Island suburbs!"</p>
+
+<p>"Claire!" He was whispering desperately, "The
+tea's most done. Oh, my dear. I'm crazy with this
+puttering around, trying to woo you and having to
+woo the entire Gilson tribe. Let's run away!"</p>
+
+<p>"No; first I'm going to convince them that you
+are&mdash;what I know you are."</p>
+
+<p>"But you can't."</p>
+
+<p>"Huh! You wait! I've thought of the most beautiful,
+beastly cruel plan for the reduction of social
+obesity&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Then she was jauntily announcing, "Tea, my dears.
+Jeff, you get the tooth-mug. Isn't this jolly!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[351]</a></span>"Yes. Oh yes. Very jolly!" Jeff was thoroughly
+patronizing, but she didn't look offended. She made
+them drink the acid tea, and taste the chalk-like bread
+and butter sandwiches. She coaxed Bill to go on
+with his stories, and when the persistent Mrs. Gilson
+again asked the pariahs to come to dinner, Claire
+astonished Milt, and still more astonished Mrs. Gilson,
+by begging, "Oh yes, please do come, Milt."</p>
+
+<p>He consented, savagely.</p>
+
+<p>"But first," Claire added to Mrs. Gilson, "I want
+us to take the boys to&mdash;&mdash; Oh, I have the bulliest
+idea. Come, everybody. We're going riding."</p>
+
+<p>"Uh, where&mdash;&mdash;?" hinted Mr. Gilson.</p>
+
+<p>"That's my secret. Come!"</p>
+
+<p>Claire pranced to the door, herded all of them down
+to the limousine, whispered an address to the chauffeur.</p>
+
+<p>Milt didn't care much for that ride. Bill was somewhat
+too evidently not accustomed to limousines. He
+wiped his shoes, caked with red mud, upon the seat-cushions,
+and apologized perspiringly. He said, "Gee
+whillikens, that's a dandy idee, telephone to bawl the
+shuffer out with," and "Are them flowers real, the
+bokay in the vase?"</p>
+
+<p>But the Gilsons and Jeff Saxton were happy about
+it all&mdash;till the car turned from a main thoroughfare
+upon a muddy street of shacks that clung like goats to
+the sides of a high cut, a street unchanged from the
+pioneer days of Seattle.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[352]</a></span>"Good heavens, Claire, you aren't taking us to see
+Aunt Hatty, are you?" wailed Mrs. Gilson.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes, indeed. I knew the boys would like to
+meet her."</p>
+
+<p>"No, really, I don't think&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Eva, my soul, Jeff and you planned our tea
+party today, and assured me I'd be so interested in
+Milt's bachelor apartment&mdash;&mdash; By the way, I'd been
+up there already, so it wasn't entirely a surprise. It's
+my turn to lead." She confided to Milt, "Dear old
+Aunt Hatty is related to all of us. She's Gene's aunt,
+and my fourth cousin, and I think she's distantly related
+to Jeff. She came West early, and had a hard
+time, but she's real Brooklyn Heights&mdash;and she belongs
+to Gramercy Park and North Washington
+Square and Rittenhouse Square and Back Bay, too,
+though she has got out of touch a little. So I wanted
+you to meet her."</p>
+
+<p>Milt wondered what unperceived bag of cement had
+hardened the faces of Saxton and the Gilsons.</p>
+
+<p>Silent save for polite observations of Claire upon
+tight skirts and lumbering, the merry company reached
+the foot of a lurching flight of steps that scrambled up
+a clay bank to a cottage like a hen that has set too long.
+Milt noticed that Mrs. Gilson made efforts to remain
+in the limousine when it stopped, and he caught Gilson's
+mutter to his wife, "No, it's Claire's turn. Be
+a sport, Eva."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[353]</a></span>Claire led them up the badly listed steps to an unpainted
+porch on which sat a little old lady, very neat,
+very respectable, very interested, and reflectively holding
+in one ivory hand a dainty handkerchief and a
+black clay pipe.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, Claire, my dear. You've broken the relatives'
+record&mdash;you've called twice in less than a year,"
+said the little old lady.</p>
+
+<p>"How do you do, Aunt Harriet," remarked Mrs.
+Gilson, with great lack of warmth.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, Eva. Sit down on the edge of the porch.
+Those chickens have made it awful dirty, though,
+haven't they? Bring out some chairs. There's two
+chairs that don't go down under you&mdash;often." Aunt
+Harriet was very cheerful.</p>
+
+<p>The group lugubriously settled in a circle upon an
+assemblage of wind-broken red velvet chairs and
+wooden stools. They resembled the aftermath of a
+funeral on a damp day.</p>
+
+<p>Claire was the cheerful undertaker, Mrs. Gilson the
+grief-stricken widow.</p>
+
+<p>Claire waved at Milt and conversed with Aunt Hatty
+in a high brisk voice: "This is the nice boy I met
+on the road that I think I told you about, Cousin
+Hatty."</p>
+
+<p>The little old lady screwed up the delicate skin
+about her eyes, examined Milt, and cackled, "Boy,
+there's something wrong here. You don't belong with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[354]</a></span>
+my family. Why, you look like an American. You
+haven't got an imitation monocle, and I bet you can't
+talk with a New York-London accent. Why, Claire,
+I'm ashamed of you for bringing a human being into
+the Boltwood-Gilson-Saxton tomb and expecting&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Then was the smile of Mrs. Gilson lost forever.
+It was simultaneously torpedoed, mined, scuttled, and
+bombed. It went to the bottom without a ripple, while
+Mrs. Gilson snapped, "Aunt Hatty, please don't be
+vulgar."</p>
+
+<p>"Me?" croaked the little old lady. She puffed at
+her pipe, and dropped her elbows on her knees. "My,
+ain't it hard to please some folks."</p>
+
+<p>"Cousin Hatty, I want Milt to know about our
+families. I love the dear old stories," Claire begged
+prettily.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Gilson snarled. "Claire, really&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, do shut up, Eva, and don't be so bossy!"
+yelped the dear little old lady, in sudden and dismaying
+rage. "I'll talk if I want to. Have they been
+bullying you, Claire? Or your boy? I tell you, boy,
+these families are fierce. I was brought up in
+Brooklyn&mdash;went through all the schools&mdash;used to be
+able to misplay the piano and mispronounce French
+with the best of 'em. Then Gene's pa and I came
+West together&mdash;he had an idea he'd get rich robbing
+the Injuns of their land. And we went broke. I took
+in washing. I learned a lot. I learned a Gilson was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[355]</a></span>
+just the same common stuff as a red-shirt miner, when
+he was up against it. But Gene's pa succeeded&mdash;there
+was something about practically stealing a fur schooner&mdash;but
+I never was one to tattle on my kin. Anyway,
+by the time Gene come along, his pa was rich, and that
+means aristocratic.</p>
+
+<p>"This aristocracy west of Pittsburgh is just twice
+as bad as the snobbery in Boston or New York, because
+back there, the families have had their wealth
+long enough&mdash;some of 'em got it by stealing real
+estate in 1820, and some by selling Jamaica rum and
+niggers way back before the Revolutionary War&mdash;they've
+been respectable so long that they know mighty
+well and good that nobody except a Britisher is going
+to question their blue blood&mdash;and oh my, what good
+blueing third-generation money does make. But out
+here in God's Country, the marquises of milling and
+the barons of beef are still uneasy. Even their pretty
+women, after going to the best hair-dressers and
+patronizing the best charities, sometimes get scared
+lest somebody think they haven't either brains or
+breeding.</p>
+
+<p>"So they're nasty to all low pussons like you and
+me, to make sure we understand how important they
+are. But lands, I know 'em, boy. I'm kept pensioned
+up here, out of the way, but I read the social notes in
+the papers and I chuckle&mdash;&mdash; When there's a big reception
+and I read about Mrs. Vogeland's pearls, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[356]</a></span>
+her beautiful daughter-in-law, I remember how she
+used to run a boarding-house for miners&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I guess it's just as shoddy in the East if you
+go far enough back. Claire, you're a nice comforting
+body, and I hate to say it, but the truth is, your
+great-grandfather was an hostler, and made his first
+money betting on horses. Now, my, I oughtn't to tell
+that. Do you mind, dearie?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a bit. Isn't it delightful that this is such a
+democratic country, with no castes," said Claire.</p>
+
+<p>At this, the first break in the little old lady's undammable
+flood, Mrs. Gilson sprang up, yammering,
+"The rest of you may stay as long as you like, but
+if I'm to be home in time to dress for dinner&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, and I must be going," babbled Saxton.</p>
+
+<p>Milt noted that his lower lip showed white tooth-marks.</p>
+
+<p>It must be admitted that all of them rather ignored
+the little old lady for a moment. Milt was apologetically
+hinting, "I don't really think Bill and I'd better
+come to dinner this evening, Mrs. Gilson. Thanks a
+lot but&mdash;&mdash; It's kind of sudden."</p>
+
+<p>Claire again took charge. "Not at all, Milt. Of
+course you're coming. It was Eva herself who invited
+you. I'm sure she'll be delighted."</p>
+
+<p>"Charmed," said Mrs. Gilson, with the expression
+of one who has swallowed castor oil and doubts the
+unity of the universe.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[357]</a></span>There was a lack of ease about the farewells to Aunt
+Harriet. As they all turned away she beckoned Milt
+and murmured, "Did I raise the dickens? I tried to.
+It's the only solace besides smoking that a moral old
+lady can allow herself, after she gets to be eighty-two
+and begins to doubt everything they used to teach her.
+Come and see me, boy. Now get out, and, boy, beat
+up Gene Gilson. Don't be scared of his wife's hoity-toity
+ways. Just sail in."</p>
+
+<p>"I will," said Milt.</p>
+
+<p>He had one more surprise before he reached the
+limousine.</p>
+
+<p>Bill McGolwey, who had sat listening to everything
+and scratching his cheek in a puzzled way, seized Milt's
+sleeve and rumbled:</p>
+
+<p>"Good-by, old hoss. I'm not going to butt in on
+your game and get you in Dutch. Gosh, I never supposed
+you had enough class to mingle with elittys like
+this gang, but I know when I'm in wrong. You were
+too darn decent to kick me out. Do it myself. You're
+best friend I ever had and&mdash;&mdash; Good luck, old man!
+God bless you!"</p>
+
+<p>Bill was gone, running, stumbling, fleeing past Aunt
+Harriet's cottage, off into a sandy hilltop vacancy.
+The last Milt saw of him was when, on the skyline,
+Bill stopped for a glance back, and seemed to be digging
+his knuckles into his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Then Milt turned resolutely, marched down the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[358]</a></span>
+stairs, said to his hosts with a curious quietness,
+"Thank you for asking me to dinner, but I'm afraid
+I can't come. Claire, will you walk a few blocks with
+me?"</p>
+
+<p>During the half minute it had taken to descend the
+steps, Milt had reflected, with an intensity which
+forgot Bill, that he had been selfish; that he had
+thought only of the opinion of these "nice people"
+regarding himself, instead of understanding that it
+was his duty to save Claire from their enervating
+niceness. Not that he phrased it quite in this way.
+What he had been muttering was:</p>
+
+<p>"Rotten shame&mdash;me so scared of folks' clothes that
+I don't stand up to 'em and keep 'em from smothering
+Claire. Lord, it would be awful if she settled down to
+being a Mrs. Jeff Saxton. Got to save her&mdash;not for
+myself&mdash;for her."</p>
+
+<p>It may have been Aunt Harriet, it may have been
+Milt's resolution, but Mrs. Gilson answered almost
+meekly, "Well, if you think&mdash;&mdash; Would you like to
+walk, Claire?"</p>
+
+<p>As he tramped off with Claire, Milt demanded,
+"Glad to escape?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, and I'm glad you refused dinner. It really
+has been wearing, this trial by food."</p>
+
+<p>"This is the last time I'll dare to meet the Gilsons."</p>
+
+<p>"And I'll have to be going back East. I hope the
+Gilsons will forgive me, some day."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[359]</a></span>"I'm afraid you didn't win them over by Aunt
+Hatty!"</p>
+
+<p>"No. They're probably off me for life. Oh, these
+horrible social complications&mdash;worse than any real
+danger&mdash;fire or earthquake&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, these complications&mdash;they don't exist! We
+just make 'em, like we make rules for a card game.
+What the deuce do we care about the opinions of people
+we don't like? And who appointed these people to a
+fixed social position? Did the president make Saxton
+High Cockalorum of Dress-Suits or something?
+Why, these are just folks, the same as kings and coal-heavers.
+There's no army we've got to fight. There's
+just you and me&mdash;you and I&mdash;and if we stick together,
+then we have all society, we <i>are</i> all society!"</p>
+
+<p>"Ye-es, but, Milt dear, I don't want to be an outcast."</p>
+
+<p>"You won't be. In the long run, if you don't take
+these aristocrats seriously, they'll be all the more impressed
+by you."</p>
+
+<p>"No. That sounds cheering, in stories and these
+optimistic editorials in the magazines, but it isn't true.
+And you don't know how pleasant it is to be In. I've
+always been more or less on the inside, and thought
+outsiders dreadful. But&mdash;&mdash; Oh, I don't care! I
+don't care! With you&mdash;I'm happy. That's all I know
+and all I want to know. I've just grown up. I've
+just learned the greatest wisdom&mdash;to know when I'm<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[360]</a></span>
+happy. But, Milt dear&mdash;&mdash; I say this because I love
+you. Yes, I do love you. No, don't kiss me. Yes,
+it is too&mdash;&mdash; It's <i>far</i> too public. And I want to talk
+seriously. You can't have any idea how strong social
+distinctions are. Don't despise them just because you
+don't know them."</p>
+
+<p>"No. I won't. I'll learn. Probably America will
+get into the war. I'll be an engineering officer. I'll
+learn this social dope from the college-boy officers.
+And I'll come to Brooklyn with shoulder-straps and
+bells on and&mdash;&mdash; Will you be waiting?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh&mdash;yes&mdash;&mdash; But, Milt! If the war comes, you
+must be very careful not to get shot!"</p>
+
+<p>"All right, if, you insist. Good Lord, Claire. I
+don't know what put it into my head but&mdash;&mdash; Do you
+realize that a miracle has happened? We're no longer
+Miss Boltwood and a fellow named Daggett. We
+have been, even when we've liked each other, up to
+today. Always there's been a kind of fence between
+us. We had to explain and defend ourselves and
+scrap&mdash;&mdash; But now we're <i>us</i>, and the rest of the
+world has disappeared, and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And nothing else matters," said Claire.</p>
+
+<hr /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[361]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXXIV<br />
+THE BEGINNING OF A STORY</h2>
+
+<p class="cap"><span class="dcap">It</span> was the farewell to Claire and Jeff Saxton, a
+picnic in the Cascades, near Snoqualmie Falls&mdash;a
+decent and decidedly Milt-less fiesta. Mrs. Gilson was
+going to show Claire that they were just as hardy
+adventurers as that horrid Daggett person. So she
+didn't take the limousine, but merely the seven-passenger
+Locomobile with the special body.</p>
+
+<p>They were ever so rough and wild. They had no
+maid. The chauffeur was absolutely the only help to
+the Gilsons, Claire, Jeff, and the temporarily and ejaculatorily
+nature-loving Mrs. Betz in the daring task of
+setting out two folding camp-tables, covering them
+with a linen cloth, and opening the picnic basket.
+Claire had to admit that she wished that she could
+steal the picnic basket for Milt. There were vacuum
+bottles of hot coffee. There were sandwiches of
+anchovy and <i>pat&eacute; de foie gras</i>. There were cream
+cakes with almonds hidden in the suave cream, and
+there was a chicken salad with huge chunks of pure
+white meat wallowing in a sea of mayonnaise.</p>
+
+<p>When the gorging was done and the cigarettes
+brought out (the chauffeur passed a spirit lamp),
+they stretched on rubber blankets, and groaned a little,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[362]</a></span>
+and spoke well of nature and the delights of roughing
+it.</p>
+
+<p>"What is it? What's wrong? They're so&mdash;oh, so
+polite. They don't mean what they say and they don't
+dare to say what they mean. Is that it?" worried
+Claire.</p>
+
+<p>She started. She discovered that she was looking
+at a bristle of rope-colored hair and a grin projected
+from the shelter of a manzanita bush.</p>
+
+<p>"For the&mdash;&mdash;" she gasped. She was too startled to
+be able to decide what was for-the. She spoke judiciously
+to Jeff Saxton about Upper Montclair, the
+subway, and tennis. She rose to examine the mountains,
+strolled away, darted down a gully, and pounced
+on Milt Daggett with:</p>
+
+<p>"How in heaven's name&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Found out where you-all were going. Look!
+Got a bug! Rented it. Come on! Let's duck! Drive
+back with me!" At the end of the gully was a new
+Teal bug, shinier than the ancient lost chariot, but
+equally gay and uncomfortable.</p>
+
+<p>"Can't. Like to, but&mdash;&mdash; Be awfully rude to them.
+Won't do that&mdash;not more than is good for their souls&mdash;even
+for you. Now don't be sulky."</p>
+
+<p>"I won't. Nev' be sulky again, because you're
+crazy about me, and I don't have to be sulky."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I am, am I! Good heavens, the inconceivable
+conceit of the child!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[363]</a></span>She turned her back. He darted to her, caught her
+hands behind her, kissed her hair, and whispered,
+"You are!"</p>
+
+<p>"I am not!"</p>
+
+<p>"Well then, you're not. Lord, you're sweet! Your
+hair smells like cinnamon and clean kittens. You'd
+rather go bumping off in my flivver than sailing in that
+big Loco they've got there."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," defiantly, "I would, and I'm ashamed of
+myself. I'm a throw-back to my horrid ancestor, the
+betting hostler."</p>
+
+<p>"Probably. I'm a throw-back to my ancestor the
+judge. I'll train you to meet my fine friends."</p>
+
+<p>"Well&mdash;upon&mdash;my&mdash;word&mdash;I&mdash;&mdash; Oh, do stop
+being idiotic. We talk like children. You reduce me
+to the rank of a gibbering schoolgirl. And I like it!
+It's so&mdash;oh, I don't know&mdash;so darn human, I suppose.
+Now hurry&mdash;kiss me, and get out, before they suspect."</p>
+
+<p>"Listen."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll accidentally meet your car along the road.
+Invite you to ride. All right?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Do. Oh, we <i>are</i> two forlorn babes in the
+woods! G'-by."</p>
+
+<p>She sauntered back to the picnic, and observed,
+"What is that purple flower up on the mountain side?"</p>
+
+<p>The big car was sedately purring back when it was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[364]</a></span>
+insulted by an intermediate host of a machine that
+came jumping out of a side road. The vulgar driver
+hailed them with uncouth howling. The Gilsons'
+chauffeur stopped, annoyed.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, hello folks," bawled the social bandit.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh. How do you do," refuted Mrs. Gilson.</p>
+
+<p>Jeff Saxton turned a ripe purple.</p>
+
+<p>"How do you like my new bug, Claire? Awful
+little object. But I can make fifty an hour. Come and
+try it, Claire, can't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why&mdash;&mdash;" Claire was obviously shocked by the
+impropriety of the suggestion. She looked at Mrs.
+Gilson, who was breathing as though she was just
+going under the ether. Claire said doubtfully,
+"Well&mdash;&mdash; If you can get me right back to the
+house&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure," agreed Milt.</p>
+
+<p>When the Loco was gone, Milt drove the bug to
+the side of the road, yanked up the emergency brake,
+and carefully kissed the girl who was snuggled down
+into the absurd low tin-sided seat.</p>
+
+<p>"Do we have to get back soon?" he begged.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't care if we never get back. Let's shoot
+up into the mountains. Side road. Let's pretend
+we're driving across the continent again."</p>
+
+<p>Firs dashing by&mdash;rocks in the sunshine&mdash;clouds
+jaunty beyond the inviting mouth of a mountain pass&mdash;even
+the ruts and bumps and culverts&mdash;she seemed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">[365]</a></span>
+a part of them all. In the Gilsons' huge cars she had
+been shut off from the road, but in this tiny bug, so
+close to earth, she recovered the feeling of struggle,
+of triumph over difficulties, of freedom unbounded.
+And she could be herself, good or bad, ignorant or
+wise, with this boy beside her. All of which she
+expressed in the most eloquent speech she had ever
+uttered, namely:</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, <i>Milt</i>&mdash;&mdash;!"</p>
+
+<p>And, to herself, "Golly, it's such a relief not to have
+to try to be gracious and aphoristic and repartistic
+and everything with Jeff."</p>
+
+<p>And, "But I wonder if I am aphoristic and subtle?
+I wonder if when she gets the rice-powder off, Claire
+isn't a lot more like Milt than she thought?"</p>
+
+<p>And, aloud again, "Oh, this is&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Yump. It sure is," Milt agreed.</p>
+
+<p>They had turned from a side-road into a side-side-road.
+They crossed an upland valley. The fall rains
+had flooded a creek till it had cut across the road,
+washed through the thin gravel, left across the road a
+shallow violent stream. Milt stopped abruptly at its
+margin.</p>
+
+<p>"Here's where we turn back, I guess," he sighed.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh no! Can't we get across? It's only a couple
+of feet deep, and gravel bottom," insisted the restored
+adventurer.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but look at the steep bank. Never get up it."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">[366]</a></span>"I don't care. Let's try it! We can woggle around
+and dig it out somehow. I bet you two-bits we can,"
+said the delicate young woman whom Mrs. Gilson was
+protecting.</p>
+
+<p>"All right. In she goes!"</p>
+
+<p>The bug went in&mdash;shot over the bank, dipped down
+till the little hood sloped below them as though they
+were looping the loop, struck the rushing water with
+a splash which hurled yellow drops over Claire's rose
+jersey suit, lumbered ahead, struck the farther bank,
+pawed at it feebly, rose two inches, slipped back, and
+sat there with the gurgling water all around it, turned
+into a motor-boat.</p>
+
+<p>"No can do," grunted Milt. "Scared?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nope. Love it! This is a real camp&mdash;the brush
+on the bank, and the stream&mdash;listen to it chuckle under
+the running-board."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you like to camp with me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Love it."</p>
+
+<p>"Say! Gee! Never thought&mdash;&mdash; Claire! Got
+your transportation back East?"</p>
+
+<p>"My ticket? Yes. Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I'm sure you can turn it in and get a refund.
+So that's all right."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you going to let me in on the secret?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh yes, might's well. I was just wondering&mdash;&mdash; I
+don't think much of wasting all our youth waiting&mdash;&mdash; Two-three
+years in engineering school, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">[367]</a></span>
+maybe going to war, and starting in on an engineering
+job, and me lonely as a turkey in a chicken yard,
+and you doing the faithful young lady in Brooklyn&mdash;&mdash; I
+think perhaps we might get married tomorrow
+and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Good heavens, what do you&mdash;&mdash;?"</p>
+
+<p>"Do you want to go back to Brooklyn Gilsonses?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, but&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Dear, can't we be crazy once, while we're youngsters?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't bombard me so! Let me think. One must
+be practical, even in craziness."</p>
+
+<p>"I am. I have over a thousand dollars from
+the garage, and I can work evenings&mdash;as dear
+Jeff suggested! We'd have a two-by-four flat&mdash;&mdash; Claire&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, let me think. I suppose I could go to the
+university, too, and learn a little about food and babies
+and building houses and government. I need to go
+to school a lot more than you do. Besides auction
+and the piano&mdash;which I play very badly&mdash;and clothes
+and how to get hold of tickets for successful plays, I
+don't know one single thing."</p>
+
+<p>"Will you marry me, tomorrow?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, uh&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Think of Mrs. Gilson's face when she learns it!
+And Saxton, and that Mrs. Betz!"</p>
+
+<p>It was to no spoken sentence but to her kiss that she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368">[368]</a></span>
+added, "Providing we ever get the car out of this
+river, that is!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, my dear, my dear, and all the romantic ways
+I was going to propose! I had the best line about
+roses and stars and angels and everything&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"They always use those, but nobody ever proposed
+to me in a bug in a flood before! Oh! Milt! Life
+is fun! I never knew it till you kidnapped me. If
+you kiss me again like that, we'll both topple overboard.
+By the way, <i>can</i> we get the car out?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think so, if we put on the chains. We'll have to
+take off our shoes and stockings."</p>
+
+<p>Shyly, turning from him a little, she stripped off her
+stockings and pumps, while he changed from a flivver-driver
+into a young viking, with bare white neck, pale
+hair ruffled about his head, trousers rolled up above his
+straight knees&mdash;a young seaman of the crew of Eric
+the Red.</p>
+
+<p>They swung out on the running-board, now awash.
+With slight squeals they dropped into the cold stream.
+Dripping, laughing, his clothes clinging to him, he
+ducked down behind the car to get the jack under the
+back axle, and with the water gurgling about her and
+splashing its exhilarating coldness into her face, she
+stooped beside him to yank the stiff new chains over
+the rear wheels.</p>
+
+<p>They climbed back into the car, joyously raffish as
+a pair of gipsies. She wiped a dab of mud from her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_369" id="Page_369">[369]</a></span>
+cheek, and remarked with an earnestness and a naturalness
+which that Jeff Saxton who knew her so well
+would never have recognized as hers:</p>
+
+<p>"Gee, I hope the old bird crawls out now."</p>
+
+<p>Milt let in the reverse, raced the engine, started
+backward with a burst of muddy water churned up by
+the whirling wheels. They struck the bank, sickeningly
+hung there for two seconds, began to crawl up,
+up, with a feeling that at any second they would drop
+back again.</p>
+
+<p>Then, instantly, they were out on the shore and it
+was absurd to think that they had ever been boating
+down there in the stream. They washed each other's
+muddy faces, and laughed a great deal, and rubbed
+their legs with their stockings, and resumed something
+of a dull and civilized aspect and, singing sentimental
+ballads, turned back, found another road, and started
+toward a peak.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder what lies beyond the top of this climb?"
+said Claire.</p>
+
+<p>"More mountains, and more, and more, and we're
+going to keep on climbing them forever. At dawn,
+we'll still be going on. And that's our life."</p>
+
+<p>"Ye-es, providing we can still buy gas."</p>
+
+<p>"Lord, that's so."</p>
+
+<p>"Speaking of which, did you know that I have
+a tiny bit of money&mdash;it's about five thousand dollars&mdash;of
+my own?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_370" id="Page_370">[370]</a></span>"But&mdash;&mdash; That makes it impossible. Young tramp
+marrying lady of huge wealth&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No, you don't! I've accepted you. Do you think
+I'm going to lose the one real playmate I've ever had?
+It was so lonely on the Boltwoods' brown stoop till
+Milt came along and whistled impertinently and made
+the solemn little girl in frills play marbles and&mdash;&mdash; Watch
+out for that turn! Heavens, how I have to
+look after you! Is there a class in cooking at your university?
+No&mdash;do&mdash;not&mdash;kiss&mdash;me&mdash;on&mdash;a&mdash;turn!"</p>
+
+<p>This is the beginning of the story of Milt and
+Claire Daggett.</p>
+
+<p>The prelude over and the curtain risen on the actual
+play, they face the anxieties and glories of a changing
+world. Not without quarrels and barren hours, not
+free from ignorance and the discomfort of finding
+that between the mountain peaks they must for long
+gray periods dwell in the dusty valleys, they yet start
+their drama with the distinction of being able to laugh
+together, with the advantage of having discovered
+that neither Schoenstrom nor Brooklyn Heights is
+quite all of life, with the cosmic importance to the
+tedious world of believing in the romance that makes
+youth unquenchable.</p>
+
+<p class="hd1">THE END.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="bk3"><p class="center"><span class="fxl">B. M. BOWER'S NOVELS</span></p>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1">May be had wherever books are sold. <span class="sp2">Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap's list.</span></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p class="p4"><span class="sp1">CHIP OF THE FLYING U.</span> Wherein the love affairs of Chip and
+Delia Whitman are charmingly and humorously told.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE HAPPY FAMILY.</span> A lively and amusing story, dealing with
+the adventures of eighteen jovial, big-hearted Montana cowboys.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">HER PRAIRIE KNIGHT.</span> Describing a gay party of Easterners
+who exchange a cottage at Newport for a Montana ranch-house.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE RANGE DWELLERS.</span> Spirited action, a range feud between
+two families, and a Romeo and Juliet courtship make this a bright,
+jolly story.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE LURE OF THE DIM TRAILS.</span> A vivid portrayal of the
+experience of an Eastern author among the cowboys.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE LONESOME TRAIL.</span> A little branch of sage brush and the
+recollection of a pair of large brown eyes upset "Weary" Davidson's
+plans.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE LONG SHADOW.</span> A vigorous Western story, sparkling with
+the free outdoor life of a mountain ranch. It is a fine love story.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">GOOD INDIAN.</span> A stirring romance of life on an Idaho ranch.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">FLYING U RANCH.</span> Another delightful story about Chip and
+his pals.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND.</span> An amusing account of Chip
+and the other boys opposing a party of school teachers.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE UPHILL CLIMB.</span> A story of a mountain ranch and of a
+man's hard fight on the uphill road to manliness.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE PHANTOM HERD.</span> The title of a moving-picture staged in
+New Mexico by the "Flying U" boys.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX.</span> The "Flying U" boys stage
+a fake bank robbery for film purposes which precedes a real one
+for lust of gold.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE GRINGOS.</span> A story of love and adventure on a ranch in
+California.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">STARR OF THE DESERT.</span> A New Mexico ranch story of mystery
+and adventure.</p>
+
+<p class="p4"><span class="sp1">THE LOOKOUT MAN.</span> A Northern California story full of action,
+excitement and love.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4">
+<p class="p2">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, <span class="sp2">Publishers,</span> <span class="sp2">New York</span></p>
+</div>
+</div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="bk3"><p class="center"><span class="fxl"><small>STORIES OF RARE CHARM BY</small><br />
+GENE STRATTON-PORTER</span></p>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1">May be had wherever books are sold. <span class="sp2">Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap's list.</span></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p><span class="sp1">MICHAEL O'HALLORAN.</span> Illustrated by Frances Rogers.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">Michael is a quick-witted little Irish newsboy, living in Northern
+Indiana. He adopts a deserted little girl, a cripple. He also assumes
+the responsibility of leading the entire rural community upward
+and onward.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">LADDIE.</span> Illustrated by Herman Pfeifer.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">This is a bright, cheery tale with the scenes laid in Indiana. The
+story is told by Little Sister, the youngest member of a large family,
+but it is concerned not so much with childish doings as with the love
+affairs of older members of the family. Chief among them is that
+of Laddie and the Princess, an English girl who has come to live in
+the neighborhood and about whose family there hangs a mystery.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE HARVESTER.</span> Illustrated by W. L. Jacobs.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">"The Harvester," is a man of the woods and fields, and if the
+book had nothing in it but the splendid figure of this man it would
+be notable. But when the Girl comes to his "Medicine Woods,"
+there begins a romance of the rarest idyllic quality.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">FRECKLES.</span> Illustrated.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">Freckles is a nameless waif when the tale opens, but the way in
+which he takes hold of life; the nature friendships he forms in the
+great Limberlost Swamp; the manner in which everyone who meets
+him succumbs to the charm of his engaging personality; and his
+love-story with "The Angel" are full of real sentiment.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">A GIRL OF THE LIMBERLOST.</span> Illustrated.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of a girl of the Michigan woods; a buoyant, loveable
+type of the self-reliant American. Her philosophy is one of love and
+kindness towards all things; her hope is never dimmed. And by
+the sheer beauty of her soul, and the purity of her vision, she wins from
+barren and unpromising surroundings those rewards of high courage.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">AT THE FOOT OF THE RAINBOW.</span> Illustrations in colors.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">The scene of this charming love story is laid in Central Indiana.
+The story is one of devoted friendship, and tender self-sacrificing
+love. The novel is brimful of the most beautiful word painting of
+nature, and its pathos and tender sentiment will endear it to all.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE SONG OF THE CARDINAL.</span> Profusely illustrated.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">A love ideal of the Cardinal bird and his mate, told with delicacy
+and humor.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4">
+<p class="p2">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, <span class="sp2">Publishers,</span> <span class="sp2">New York</span></p>
+</div></div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="bk3"><p class="center"><span class="fxl">ZANE GREY'S NOVELS</span></p>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1">May be had wherever books are sold. <span class="sp2">Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap's list.</span></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p><span class="sp1">THE LIGHT OF WESTERN STARS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A New York society girl buys a ranch which becomes the center of frontier warfare.
+Her loyal superintendent rescues her when she is captured by bandits. A
+surprising climax brings the story to a delightful close.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE RAINBOW TRAIL</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of a young clergyman who becomes a wanderer in the great western
+uplands&mdash;until at last love and faith awake.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">DESERT GOLD</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story describes the recent uprising along the border, and ends with the finding
+of the gold which two prospectors had willed to the girl who is the story's heroine.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">RIDERS OF THE PURPLE SAGE</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A picturesque romance of Utah of some forty years ago when Mormon authority
+ruled. The prosecution of Jane Withersteen is the theme of the story.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE LAST OF THE PLAINSMEN</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">This is the record of a trip which the author took with Buffalo Jones, known as the
+preserver of the American bison, across the Arizona desert and of a hunt in "that
+wonderful country of deep ca&ntilde;ons and giant pines."</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE HERITAGE OF THE DESERT</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A lovely girl, who has been reared among Mormons, learns to love a young New
+Englander. The Mormon religion, however, demands that the girl shall become
+the second wife of one of the Mormons&mdash;Well, that's the problem of this great story.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE SHORT STOP</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The young hero, tiring of his factory grind, starts out to win fame and fortune as
+a professional ball player. His hard knocks at the start are followed by such success
+as clean sportsmanship, courage and honesty ought to win.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">BETTY ZANE</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">This story tells of the bravery and heroism of Betty, the beautiful young sister of
+old Colonel Zane, one of the bravest pioneers.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE LONE STAR RANGER</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">After killing a man in self defense, Buck Duane becomes an outlaw along the
+Texas border. In a camp on the Mexican side of the river, he finds a young girl held
+prisoner, and in attempting to rescue her, brings down upon himself the wrath of her
+captors and henceforth is hunted on one side by honest men, on the other by outlaws.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE BORDER LEGION</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">Joan Randle, in a spirit of anger, sent Jim Cleve out to a lawless Western mining
+camp, to prove his mettle. Then realizing that she loved him&mdash;she followed him out.
+On her way, she is captured by a bandit band, and trouble begins when she shoots
+Kells, the leader&mdash;and nurses him to health again. Here enters another romance&mdash;when
+Joan, disguised as an outlaw, observes Jim, in the throes of dissipation. A gold
+strike, a thrilling robbery&mdash;gambling and gun play carry you along breathlessly.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p><span class="sp1">THE LAST OF THE GREAT SCOUTS,</span><br />
+<span class="sp2">By Helen Cody Wetmore and Zane Grey</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The life story of Colonel William F. Cody, "Buffalo Bill" as told by his sister and
+Zane Grey. It begins with his boyhood in Iowa and his first encounter with an Indian.
+We see "Bill" as a pony express rider, then near Fort Sumter as Chief of
+the Scouts, and later engaged in the most dangerous Indian campaigns. There is
+also a very interesting account of the travels of "The Wild West" Show. No character
+in public life makes a stronger appeal to the imagination of America than
+"Buffalo Bill," whose daring and bravery made him famous.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4">
+<p class="p2">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, <span class="sp2">Publishers,</span> <span class="sp2">New York</span></p>
+</div></div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="bk3"><p class="center"><span class="fxl"><small>NOVELS OF FRONTIER LIFE BY</small><br />
+WILLIAM <span class="smcap">MacLEOD</span> RAINE</span></p>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1">May be had wherever books are sold. <span class="sp2">Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap's list.</span></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p><span class="sp1">MAVERICKS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A tale of the western frontier, where the "rustler" abounds. One of the sweetest
+love stories ever told.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">A TEXAS RANGER</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">How a member of the border police saved the life of an innocent man, followed a
+fugitive to Wyoming, and then passed through deadly peril to ultimate happiness.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">WYOMING</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">In this vivid story the author brings out the turbid life of the frontier with all its
+engaging dash and vigor.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">RIDGWAY OF MONTANA</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The scene is laid in the mining centers of Montana, where politics and mining industries
+are the religion of the country.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">BUCKY O'CONNOR</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">Every chapter teems with wholesome, stirring adventures, replete with the dashing
+spirit of the border.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">CROOKED TRAILS AND STRAIGHT</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A story of Arizona; of swift-riding men and daring outlaws; of a bitter feud between
+cattle-men and sheep-herders.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">BRAND BLOTTERS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A story of the turbid life of the frontier with a charming love interest running
+through its pages.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">STEVE YEAGER</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A story brimful of excitement, with enough gun-play and adventure to suit anyone.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">A DAUGHTER OF THE DONS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A Western story of romance and adventure, comprising a vivacious and stirring
+tale.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE HIGHGRADER</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A breezy, pleasant and amusing love story of Western mining life.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE PIRATE OF PANAMA</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A tale of old-time pirates and of modern love, hate and adventure.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE YUKON TRAIL</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A crisply entertaining love story in the land where might makes right.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE VISION SPLENDID</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">In which two cousins are contestants for the same prizes; political honors and the
+hand of a girl.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE SHERIFF'S SON</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The hero finally conquers both himself and his enemies and wins the love of a
+wonderful girl.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4">
+<p class="p2">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, <span class="sp2">Publishers,</span> <span class="sp2">New York</span></p>
+</div></div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="bk3"><p class="center"><span class="fxl">JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD'S<br />
+<small>STORIES OF ADVENTURE</small></span></p>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1">May be had wherever books are sold. <span class="sp2">Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap's list.</span></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p><span class="sp1">KAZAN</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The tale of a "quarter-strain wolf and three-quarters husky"
+torn between the call of the human and his wild mate.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">BAREE, SON OF KAZAN</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of the son of the blind Grey Wolf and the gallant
+part he played in the lives of a man and a woman.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE COURAGE OF CAPTAIN PLUM</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of the King of Beaver Island, a Mormon colony,
+and his battle with Captain Plum.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE DANGER TRAIL</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A tale of snow, of love, of Indian vengeance, and a mystery
+of the North.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE HUNTED WOMAN</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A tale of the "end of the line," and of a great fight in the
+"valley of gold" for a woman.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE FLOWER OF THE NORTH</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of Fort o' God, where the wild flavor of the wilderness
+is blended with the courtly atmosphere of France.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE GRIZZLY KING</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of Thor, the big grizzly who lived in a valley where
+man had never come.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">ISOBEL</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A love story of the Far North.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE WOLF HUNTERS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A thrilling tale of adventure in the Canadian wilderness.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE GOLD HUNTERS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of adventure in the Hudson Bay wilds.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE COURAGE OF MARGE O'DOONE</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">Filled with exciting incidents in the land of strong men and
+women.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">BACK TO GOD'S COUNTRY</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A thrilling story of the Far North. The great Photoplay was
+made from this book.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4">
+<p class="p2">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, <span class="sp2">Publishers,</span> <span class="sp2">New York</span></p>
+</div></div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="bk3"><p class="center"><span class="fxl">RALPH CONNOR'S STORIES<br />
+<small>OF THE NORTHWEST</small></span></p>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1">May be had wherever books are sold. <span class="sp2">Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap's list.</span></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p><span class="sp1">THE SKY PILOT IN NO MAN'S LAND</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The clean-hearted, strong-limbed man of the West leaves
+his hills and forests to fight the battle for freedom in the
+old world.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">BLACK ROCK</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A story of strong men in the mountains of the West.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE SKY PILOT</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A story of cowboy life, abounding in the freshest humor,
+the truest tenderness and the finest courage.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE PROSPECTOR</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A tale of the foothills and of the man who came to them
+to lend a hand to the lonely men and women who needed a
+protector.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE MAN FROM GLENGARRY</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">This narrative brings us into contact with elemental and
+volcanic human nature and with a hero whose power breathes
+from every word.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">GLENGARRY SCHOOL DAYS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">In this rough country of Glengarry, Ralph Connor has
+found human nature in the rough.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE DOCTOR</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of a "preacher-doctor" whom big men and
+reckless men loved for his unselfish life among them.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE FOREIGNER</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A tale of the Saskatchewan and of a "foreigner" who
+made a brave and winning fight for manhood and love.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">CORPORAL CAMERON</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">This splendid type of the upright, out-of-door man about
+which Ralph Connor builds all his stories, appears again in
+this book.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4">
+<p class="p2">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, <span class="sp2">Publishers,</span> <span class="sp2">New York</span></p>
+</div></div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="bk3"><p class="center"><span class="fxl">BOOTH TARKINGTON'S NOVELS</span></p>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1">May be had wherever books are sold. <span class="sp2">Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap's list.</span></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p><span class="sp1">SEVENTEEN.</span> Illustrated by Arthur William Brown.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">No one but the creator of Penrod could have portrayed
+the immortal young people of this story. Its humor is irresistible
+and reminiscent of the time when the reader was
+Seventeen.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">PENROD.</span> Illustrated by Gordon Grant.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">This is a picture of a boy's heart, full of the lovable, humorous,
+tragic things which are locked secrets to most older
+folks. It is a finished, exquisite work.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">PENROD AND SAM.</span> Illustrated by Worth Brehm.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">Like "Penrod" and "Seventeen," this book contains
+some remarkable phases of real boyhood and some of the best
+stories of juvenile prankishness that have ever been written.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE TURMOIL.</span> Illustrated by C. E. Chambers.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">Bibbs Sheridan is a dreamy, imaginative youth, who revolts
+against his father's plans for him to be a servitor of
+big business. The love of a fine girl turns Bibbs's life from
+failure to success.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE GENTLEMAN FROM INDIANA.</span> Frontispiece.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">A story of love and politics,&mdash;more especially a picture of
+a country editor's life in Indiana, but the charm of the book
+lies in the love interest.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE FLIRT.</span> Illustrated by Clarence F. Underwood.</p>
+
+<p class="p3">The "Flirt," the younger of two sisters, breaks one girl's
+engagement, drives one man to suicide, causes the murder
+of another, leads another to lose his fortune, and in the end
+marries a stupid and unpromising suitor, leaving the really
+worthy one to marry her sister.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1"><i><big>Ask for Complete free list of G. &amp; D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction</big></i></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4">
+<p class="p2">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, <span class="sp2">Publishers,</span> <span class="sp2">New York</span></p>
+</div></div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="bk3"><p class="center"><span class="fxl">ELEANOR H. PORTER'S NOVELS</span></p>
+
+<div class="bk4"><p class="p1">May be had wherever books are sold. <span class="sp2">Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap's list.</span></p></div>
+
+<div class="bk4"><div class="bk5"><p><span class="sp1">JUST DAVID</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The tale of a loveable boy and the place he comes to
+fill in the hearts of the gruff farmer folk to whose care he
+is left.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE ROAD TO UNDERSTANDING</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A compelling romance of love and marriage.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">OH, MONEY! MONEY!</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">Stanley Fulton, a wealthy bachelor, to test the dispositions
+of his relatives, sends them each a check for $100,000,
+and then as plain John Smith comes among them to
+watch the result of his experiment.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">SIX STAR RANCH</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">A wholesome story of a club of six girls and their summer
+on Six Star Ranch.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">DAWN</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">The story of a blind boy whose courage leads him
+through the gulf of despair into a final victory gained by
+dedicating his life to the service of blind soldiers.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">ACROSS THE YEARS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">Short stories of our own kind and of our own people.
+Contains some of the best writing Mrs. Porter has done.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE TANGLED THREADS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">In these stories we find the concentrated charm and
+tenderness of all her other books.</p>
+
+<p><span class="sp1">THE TIE THAT BINDS</span></p>
+
+<p class="p3">Intensely human stories told with Mrs. Porter's wonderful
+talent for warm and vivid character drawing.</p></div></div>
+
+<div class="bk4">
+<p class="p2">Grosset &amp; Dunlap, <span class="sp2">Publishers,</span> <span class="sp2">New York</span></p>
+</div></div>
+
+<div class="trn"><b>Transcriber's Note:</b>
+Dialect spellings have been retained. Inconsistent hyphenation, except when
+used for emphasis, has been standardised.
+Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note.</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Free Air, by Sinclair Lewis
+
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+</pre>
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+</body>
+</html>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Free Air, by Sinclair Lewis
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Free Air
+
+Author: Sinclair Lewis
+
+Release Date: September 30, 2008 [EBook #26732]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FREE AIR ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by K Nordquist, Stephen Blundell and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+       FREE AIR
+
+
+          BY
+    SINCLAIR LEWIS
+
+      AUTHOR OF
+    THE JOB, ETC.
+
+
+       [Device]
+
+
+   GROSSET & DUNLAP
+ PUBLISHERS  NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+      COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY
+ HARCOURT, BRACE AND HOWE, INC.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+ CHAPTER                                                         PAGE
+       I  MISS BOLTWOOD OF BROOKLYN IS LOST IN THE MUD              3
+      II  CLAIRE ESCAPES FROM RESPECTABILITY                       10
+     III  A YOUNG MAN IN A RAINCOAT                                21
+      IV  A ROOM WITHOUT                                           36
+       V  RELEASE BRAKES--SHIFT TO THIRD                           49
+      VI  THE LAND OF BILLOWING CLOUDS                             66
+     VII  THE GREAT AMERICAN FRYING PAN                            74
+    VIII  THE DISCOVERY OF CANNED SHRIMPS AND HESPERIDES           85
+      IX  THE MAN WITH AGATE EYES                                 101
+       X  THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE HILLSIDE ROAD               112
+      XI  SAGEBRUSH TOURISTS OF THE GREAT HIGHWAY                 119
+     XII  THE WONDERS OF NATURE WITH ALL MODERN IMPROVEMENTS      129
+    XIII  ADVENTURERS BY FIRELIGHT                                138
+     XIV  THE BEAST OF THE CORRAL                                 149
+      XV  THE BLACK DAY OF THE VOYAGE                             154
+     XVI  THE SPECTACLES OF AUTHORITY                             165
+    XVII  THE VAGABOND IN GREEN                                   176
+   XVIII  THE FALLACY OF ROMANCE                                  188
+     XIX  THE NIGHT OF ENDLESS PINES                              194
+      XX  THE FREE WOMAN                                          205
+     XXI  THE MINE OF LOST SOULS                                  219
+    XXII  ACROSS THE ROOF OF THE WORLD                            228
+   XXIII  THE GRAEL IN A BACK YARD IN YAKIMA                      237
+    XXIV  HER OWN PEOPLE                                          242
+     XXV  THE ABYSSINIAN PRINCE                                   254
+    XXVI  A CLASS IN ENGINEERING AND OMELETS                      270
+   XXVII  THE VICIOUSNESS OF NICE THINGS                          279
+  XXVIII  THE MORNING COAT OF MR. HUDSON B. RIGGS                 290
+    XXIX  THE ENEMY LOVE                                          300
+     XXX  THE VIRTUOUS PLOTTERS                                   307
+    XXXI  THE KITCHEN INTIMATE                                    310
+   XXXII  THE CORNFIELD ARISTOCRAT                                331
+  XXXIII  TOOTH-MUG TEA                                           345
+   XXXIV  THE BEGINNING OF A STORY                                361
+
+
+
+
+FREE AIR
+
+
+
+
+FREE AIR
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+MISS BOLTWOOD OF BROOKLYN IS LOST IN THE MUD
+
+
+When the windshield was closed it became so filmed with rain that Claire
+fancied she was piloting a drowned car in dim spaces under the sea. When
+it was open, drops jabbed into her eyes and chilled her cheeks. She was
+excited and thoroughly miserable. She realized that these Minnesota
+country roads had no respect for her polite experience on Long Island
+parkways. She felt like a woman, not like a driver.
+
+But the Gomez-Dep roadster had seventy horsepower, and sang songs. Since
+she had left Minneapolis nothing had passed her. Back yonder a truck had
+tried to crowd her, and she had dropped into a ditch, climbed a bank,
+returned to the road, and after that the truck was not. Now she was
+regarding a view more splendid than mountains above a garden by the
+sea--a stretch of good road. To her passenger, her father, Claire
+chanted:
+
+"Heavenly! There's some gravel. We can make time. We'll hustle on to the
+next town and get dry."
+
+"Yes. But don't mind me. You're doing very well," her father sighed.
+
+Instantly, the dismay of it rushing at her, she saw the end of the patch
+of gravel. The road ahead was a wet black smear, criss-crossed with
+ruts. The car shot into a morass of prairie gumbo--which is mud mixed
+with tar, fly-paper, fish glue, and well-chewed, chocolate-covered
+caramels. When cattle get into gumbo, the farmers send for the
+stump-dynamite and try blasting.
+
+It was her first really bad stretch of road. She was frightened. Then
+she was too appallingly busy to be frightened, or to be Miss Claire
+Boltwood, or to comfort her uneasy father. She had to drive. Her frail
+graceful arms put into it a vicious vigor that was genius.
+
+When the wheels struck the slime, they slid, they wallowed. The car
+skidded. It was terrifyingly out of control. It began majestically to
+turn toward the ditch. She fought the steering wheel as though she were
+shadow-boxing, but the car kept contemptuously staggering till it was
+sideways, straight across the road. Somehow, it was back again, eating
+into a rut, going ahead. She didn't know how she had done it, but she
+had got it back. She longed to take time to retrace her own cleverness
+in steering. She didn't. She kept going.
+
+The car backfired, slowed. She yanked the gear from third into first.
+She sped up. The motor ran like a terrified pounding heart, while the
+car crept on by inches through filthy mud that stretched ahead of her
+without relief.
+
+She was battling to hold the car in the principal rut. She snatched the
+windshield open, and concentrated on that left rut. She felt that she
+was keeping the wheel from climbing those high sides of the rut, those
+six-inch walls of mud, sparkling with tiny grits. Her mind snarled at
+her arms, "Let the ruts do the steering. You're just fighting against
+them." It worked. Once she let the wheels alone they comfortably
+followed the furrows, and for three seconds she had that delightful
+belief of every motorist after every mishap, "Now that this particular
+disagreeableness is over, I'll never, never have any trouble again!"
+
+But suppose the engine overheated, ran out of water? Anxiety twanged at
+her nerves. And the deep distinctive ruts were changing to a complex
+pattern, like the rails in a city switchyard. She picked out the track
+of the one motor car that had been through here recently. It was marked
+with the swastika tread of the rear tires. That track was her friend;
+she knew and loved the driver of a car she had never seen in her life.
+
+She was very tired. She wondered if she might not stop for a moment.
+Then she came to an upslope. The car faltered; felt indecisive beneath
+her. She jabbed down the accelerator. Her hands pushed at the steering
+wheel as though she were pushing the car. The engine picked up, sulkily
+kept going. To the eye, there was merely a rise in the rolling ground,
+but to her anxiety it was a mountain up which she--not the engine, but
+herself--pulled this bulky mass, till she had reached the top, and was
+safe again--for a second. Still there was no visible end of the mud.
+
+In alarm she thought, "How long does it last? I can't keep this up.
+I--Oh!"
+
+The guiding tread of the previous car was suddenly lost in a mass of
+heaving, bubble-scattered mud, like a batter of black dough. She fairly
+picked up the car, and flung it into that welter, through it, and back
+into the reappearing swastika-marked trail.
+
+Her father spoke: "You're biting your lips. They'll bleed, if you don't
+look out. Better stop and rest."
+
+"Can't! No bottom to this mud. Once stop and lose momentum--stuck for
+keeps!"
+
+She had ten more minutes of it before she reached a combination of
+bridge and culvert, with a plank platform above a big tile drain. With
+this solid plank bottom, she could stop. Silence came roaring down as
+she turned the switch. The bubbling water in the radiator steamed about
+the cap. Claire was conscious of tautness of the cords of her neck in
+front; of a pain at the base of her brain. Her father glanced at her
+curiously. "I must be a wreck. I'm sure my hair is frightful," she
+thought, but forgot it as she looked at him. His face was unusually
+pale. In the tumult of activity he had been betrayed into letting the
+old despondent look blur his eyes and sag his mouth. "Must get on," she
+determined.
+
+Claire was dainty of habit. She detested untwisted hair, ripped gloves,
+muddy shoes. Hesitant as a cat by a puddle, she stepped down on the
+bridge. Even on these planks, the mud was three inches thick. It
+squidged about her low, spatted shoes. "Eeh!" she squeaked.
+
+She tiptoed to the tool-box and took out a folding canvas bucket. She
+edged down to the trickling stream below. She was miserably conscious of
+a pastoral scene all gone to mildew--cows beneath willows by the creek,
+milkweeds dripping, dried mullein weed stalks no longer dry. The bank of
+the stream was so slippery that she shot down two feet, and nearly went
+sprawling. Her knee did touch the bank, and the skirt of her gray
+sports-suit showed a smear of yellow earth.
+
+In less than two miles the racing motor had used up so much water that
+she had to make four trips to the creek before she had filled the
+radiator. When she had climbed back on the running-board she glared down
+at spats and shoes turned into gray lumps. She was not tearful. She was
+angry.
+
+"Idiot! Ought to have put on my rubbers. Well--too late now," she
+observed, as she started the engine.
+
+She again followed the swastika tread. To avoid a hole in the road
+ahead, the unknown driver had swung over to the side of the road, and
+taken to the intensely black earth of the edge of an unfenced cornfield.
+Flashing at Claire came the sight of a deep, water-filled hole,
+scattered straw and brush, debris of a battlefield, which made her
+gaspingly realize that her swastikaed leader had been stuck and--
+
+And instantly her own car was stuck.
+
+She had had to put the car at that hole. It dropped, far down, and it
+stayed down. The engine stalled. She started it, but the back wheels
+spun merrily round and round, without traction. She did not make one
+inch. When she again killed the blatting motor, she let it stay dead.
+She peered at her father.
+
+He was not a father, just now, but a passenger trying not to irritate
+the driver. He smiled in a waxy way, and said, "Hard luck! Well, you did
+the best you could. The other hole, there in the road, would have been
+just as bad. You're a fine driver, dolly."
+
+Her smile was warm and real. "No. I'm a fool. You told me to put on
+chains. I didn't. I deserve it."
+
+"Well, anyway, most men would be cussing. You acquire merit by not
+beating me. I believe that's done, in moments like this. If you'd like,
+I'll get out and crawl around in the mud, and play turtle for you."
+
+"No. I'm quite all right. I did feel frightfully strong-minded as long
+as there was any use of it. It kept me going. But now I might just as
+well be cheerful, because we're stuck, and we're probably going to stay
+stuck for the rest of this care-free summer day."
+
+The weariness of the long strain caught her, all at once. She slipped
+forward, sat huddled, her knees crossed under the edge of the steering
+wheel, her hands falling beside her, one of them making a faint brushing
+sound as it slid down the upholstery. Her eyes closed; as her head
+drooped farther, she fancied she could hear the vertebrae click in her
+tense neck.
+
+Her father was silent, a misty figure in a lap-robe. The rain streaked
+the mica lights in the side-curtains. A distant train whistled
+desolately across the sodden fields. The inside of the car smelled
+musty. The quiet was like a blanket over the ears. Claire was in a hazy
+drowse. She felt that she could never drive again.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+CLAIRE ESCAPES FROM RESPECTABILITY
+
+
+Claire Boltwood lived on the Heights, Brooklyn. Persons from New York
+and other parts of the Middlewest have been known to believe that
+Brooklyn is somehow humorous. In newspaper jokes and vaudeville it is so
+presented that people who are willing to take their philosophy from
+those sources believe that the leading citizens of Brooklyn are all
+deacons, undertakers, and obstetricians. The fact is that North
+Washington Square, at its reddest and whitest and fanlightedest,
+Gramercy Park at its most ivied, are not so aristocratic as the section
+of Brooklyn called the Heights. Here preached Henry Ward Beecher. Here,
+in mansions like mausoleums, on the ridge above docks where the good
+ships came sailing in from Sourabaya and Singapore, ruled the lords of a
+thousand sails. And still is it a place of wealth too solid to emulate
+the nimble self-advertising of Fifth Avenue. Here dwell the
+fifth-generation possessors of blocks of foundries and shipyards. Here,
+in a big brick house of much dignity, much ugliness, and much
+conservatory, lived Claire Boltwood, with her widower father.
+
+Henry B. Boltwood was vice-president of a firm dealing in railway
+supplies. He was neither wealthy nor at all poor. Every summer, despite
+Claire's delicate hints, they took the same cottage on the Jersey Coast,
+and Mr. Boltwood came down for Sunday. Claire had gone to a good school
+out of Philadelphia, on the Main Line. She was used to gracious leisure,
+attractive uselessness, nut-center chocolates, and a certain wonder as
+to why she was alive.
+
+She wanted to travel, but her father could not get away. He consistently
+spent his days in overworking, and his evenings in wishing he hadn't
+overworked. He was attractive, fresh, pink-cheeked, white-mustached, and
+nerve-twitching with years of detail.
+
+Claire's ambition had once been babies and a solid husband, but as
+various young males of the species appeared before her, sang their
+mating songs and preened their newly dry-cleaned plumage, she found that
+the trouble with solid young men was that they were solid. Though she
+liked to dance, the "dancing men" bored her. And she did not understand
+the district's quota of intellectuals very well; she was good at
+listening to symphony concerts, but she never had much luck in
+discussing the cleverness of the wood winds in taking up the main motif.
+It is history that she refused a master of arts with an old violin, a
+good taste in ties, and an income of eight thousand.
+
+The only man who disturbed her was Geoffrey Saxton, known throughout the
+interwoven sets of Brooklyn Heights as "Jeff." Jeff Saxton was
+thirty-nine to Claire's twenty-three. He was clean and busy; he had no
+signs of vice or humor. Especially for Jeff must have been invented the
+symbolic morning coat, the unwrinkable gray trousers, and the moral
+rimless spectacles. He was a graduate of a nice college, and he had a
+nice tenor and a nice family and nice hands and he was nicely successful
+in New York copper dealing. When he was asked questions by people who
+were impertinent, clever, or poor, Jeff looked them over coldly before
+he answered, and often they felt so uncomfortable that he didn't have to
+answer.
+
+The boys of Claire's own age, not long out of Yale and Princeton, doing
+well in business and jumping for their evening clothes daily at
+six-thirty, light o' loves and admirers of athletic heroes, these lads
+Claire found pleasant, but hard to tell apart. She didn't have to tell
+Jeff Saxton apart. He did his own telling. Jeff called--not too often.
+He sang--not too sentimentally. He took her father and herself to the
+theater--not too lavishly. He told Claire--in a voice not too
+serious--that she was his helmed Athena, his rose of all the world. He
+informed her of his substantial position--not too obviously. And he was
+so everlastingly, firmly, quietly, politely, immovably always there.
+
+She watched the hulk of marriage drifting down on her frail speed-boat
+of aspiration, and steered in desperate circles.
+
+Then her father got the nervous prostration he had richly earned. The
+doctor ordered rest. Claire took him in charge. He didn't want to
+travel. Certainly he didn't want the shore or the Adirondacks. As there
+was a branch of his company in Minneapolis, she lured him that far away.
+
+Being rootedly of Brooklyn Heights, Claire didn't know much about the
+West. She thought that Milwaukee was the capital of Minnesota. She was
+not so uninformed as some of her friends, however. She had heard that in
+Dakota wheat was to be viewed in vast tracts--maybe a hundred acres.
+
+Mr. Boltwood could not be coaxed to play with the people to whom his
+Minneapolis representative introduced him. He was overworking again, and
+perfectly happy. He was hoping to find something wrong with the branch
+house. Claire tried to tempt him out to the lakes. She failed. His
+nerve-fuse burnt out the second time, with much fireworks.
+
+Claire had often managed her circle of girls, but it had never occurred
+to her to manage her executive father save by indirect and pretty
+teasing. Now, in conspiracy with the doctor, she bullied her father. He
+saw gray death waiting as alternative, and he was meek. He agreed to
+everything. He consented to drive with her across two thousand miles of
+plains and mountains to Seattle, to drop in for a call on their
+cousins, the Eugene Gilsons.
+
+Back East they had a chauffeur and two cars--the limousine, and the
+Gomez-Deperdussin roadster, Claire's beloved. It would, she believed, be
+more of a change from everything that might whisper to Mr. Boltwood of
+the control of men, not to take a chauffeur. Her father never drove, but
+she could, she insisted. His easy agreeing was pathetic. He watched her
+with spaniel eyes. They had the Gomez roadster shipped to them from New
+York.
+
+On a July morning, they started out of Minneapolis in a mist, and as it
+has been hinted, they stopped sixty miles northward, in a rain, also in
+much gumbo. Apparently their nearest approach to the Pacific Ocean would
+be this oceanically moist edge of a cornfield, between Schoenstrom and
+Gopher Prairie, Minnesota.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Claire roused from her damp doze and sighed, "Well, I must get busy and
+get the car out of this."
+
+"Don't you think you'd better get somebody to help us?"
+
+"But get who?"
+
+"Whom!"
+
+"No! It's just 'who,' when you're in the mud. No. One of the good things
+about an adventure like this is that I must do things for myself. I've
+always had people to do things for me. Maids and nice teachers and you,
+old darling! I suppose it's made me soft. Soft--I would like a soft
+davenport and a novel and a pound of almond-brittle, and get all sick,
+and not feel so beastly virile as I do just now. But----"
+
+She turned up the collar of her gray tweed coat, painfully climbed
+out--the muscles of her back racking--and examined the state of the rear
+wheels. They were buried to the axle; in front of them the mud bulked in
+solid, shiny blackness. She took out her jack and chains. It was too
+late. There was no room to get the jack under the axle. She remembered
+from the narratives of motoring friends that brush in mud gave a firmer
+surface for the wheels to climb upon.
+
+She also remembered how jolly and agreeably heroic the accounts of their
+mishaps had sounded--a week after they were over.
+
+She waded down the road toward an old wood-lot. At first she tried to
+keep dry, but she gave it up, and there was pleasure in being defiantly
+dirty. She tramped straight through puddles; she wallowed in mud. In the
+wood-lot was long grass which soaked her stockings till her ankles felt
+itchy. Claire had never expected to be so very intimate with a
+brush-pile. She became so. As though she were a pioneer woman who had
+been toiling here for years, she came to know the brush stick by
+stick--the long valuable branch that she could never quite get out from
+under the others; the thorny bough that pricked her hands every time she
+tried to reach the curious bundle of switches.
+
+Seven trips she made, carrying armfuls of twigs and solemnly dragging
+large boughs behind her. She patted them down in front of all four
+wheels. Her crisp hands looked like the paws of a three-year-old boy
+making a mud fort. Her nails hurt from the mud wedged beneath them. Her
+mud-caked shoes were heavy to lift. It was with exquisite self-approval
+that she sat on the running-board, scraped a car-load of lignite off her
+soles, climbed back into the car, punched the starter.
+
+The car stirred, crept forward one inch, and settled back--one inch. The
+second time it heaved encouragingly but did not make quite so much
+headway. Then Claire did sob.
+
+She rubbed her cheek against the comfortable, rough, heather-smelling
+shoulder of her father's coat, while he patted her and smiled, "Good
+girl! I better get out and help."
+
+She sat straight, shook her head. "Nope. I'll do it. And I'm not going
+to insist on being heroic any longer. I'll get a farmer to pull us out."
+
+As she let herself down into the ooze, she reflected that all farmers
+have hearts of gold, anatomical phenomena never found among the snobs
+and hirelings of New York. The nearest heart of gold was presumably
+beating warmly in the house a quarter of a mile ahead.
+
+She came up a muddy lane to a muddy farmyard, with a muddy cur yapping
+at her wet legs, and geese hissing in a pool of purest mud serene. The
+house was small and rather old. It may have been painted once. The barn
+was large and new. It had been painted very much, and in a blinding red
+with white trimmings. There was no brass plate on the house, but on the
+barn, in huge white letters, was the legend, "Adolph Zolzac, 1913."
+
+She climbed by log steps to a narrow frame back porch littered with
+parts of a broken cream-separator. She told herself that she was simple
+and friendly in going to the back door instead of the front, and it was
+with gaiety that she knocked on the ill-jointed screen door, which
+flapped dismally in response.
+
+"_Ja?_" from within.
+
+She rapped again.
+
+"_Hinein!_"
+
+She opened the door on a kitchen, the highlight of which was a table
+heaped with dishes of dumplings and salt pork. A shirt-sleeved man, all
+covered with mustache and calm, sat by the table, and he kept right on
+sitting as he inquired:
+
+"Vell?"
+
+"My car--my automobile--has been stuck in the mud. A bad driver, I'm
+afraid! I wonder if you would be so good as to----"
+
+"I usually get t'ree dollars, but I dunno as I vant to do it for less
+than four. Today I ain'd feelin' very goot," grumbled the
+golden-hearted.
+
+Claire was aware that a woman whom she had not noticed--so much smaller
+than the dumplings, so much less vigorous than the salt pork was
+she--was speaking: "_Aber_, papa, dot's a shame you sharge de poor young
+lady dot, when she drive by _sei_ self. Vot she t'ink of de Sherman
+people?"
+
+The farmer merely grunted. To Claire, "Yuh, four dollars. Dot's what I
+usually charge sometimes."
+
+"Usually? Do you mean to say that you leave that hole there in the road
+right along--that people keep on trying to avoid it and get stuck as I
+was? Oh! If I were an official----"
+
+"Vell, I dunno, I don't guess I run my place to suit you smart
+alecks----"
+
+"Papa! How you talk on the young lady! Make shame!"
+
+"--from the city. If you don't like it, you stay _bei_ Mineapolis! I
+haul you out for t'ree dollars and a half. Everybody pay dot. Last mont'
+I make forty-five dollars. They vos all glad to pay. They say I help
+them fine. I don't see vot you're kickin' about! Oh, these vimmins!"
+
+"It's blackmail! I wouldn't pay it, if it weren't for my father sitting
+waiting out there. But--go ahead. Hurry!"
+
+She sat tapping her toe while Zolzac completed the stertorous task of
+hogging the dumplings, then stretched, yawned, scratched, and covered
+his merely dirty garments with overalls that were apparently woven of
+processed mud. When he had gone to the barn for his team, his wife came
+to Claire. On her drained face were the easy tears of the slave women.
+
+"Oh, miss, I don't know vot I should do. My boys go on the public
+school, and they speak American just so goot as you. Oh, I vant man lets
+me luff America. But papa he says it is an _Unsinn_; you got the money,
+he says, nobody should care if you are American or Old Country people. I
+should vish I could ride once in an automobile! But--I am so 'shamed, so
+'shamed that I must sit and see my _Mann_ make this. Forty years I been
+married to him, and pretty soon I die----"
+
+Claire patted her hand. There was nothing to say to tragedy that had
+outlived hope.
+
+Adolph Zolzac clumped out to the highroad behind his vast,
+rolling-flanked horses--so much cleaner and better fed than his wisp of
+a wife. Claire followed him, and in her heart she committed murder and
+was glad of it. While Mr. Boltwood looked out with mild wonder at
+Claire's new friend, Zolzac hitched his team to the axle. It did not
+seem possible that two horses could pull out the car where seventy
+horsepower had fainted. But, easily, yawning and thinking about dinner,
+the horses drew the wheels up on the mud-bank, out of the hole and----
+
+The harness broke, with a flying mess of straps and rope, and the car
+plumped with perfect exactness back into its bed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+A YOUNG MAN IN A RAINCOAT
+
+
+"Huh! Such an auto! Look, it break my harness a'ready! Two dollar that
+cost you to mend it. De auto iss too heavy!" stormed Zolzac.
+
+"All right! All right! Only for heaven's sake--go get another harness!"
+Claire shrieked.
+
+"Fife-fifty dot will be, in all." Zolzac grinned.
+
+Claire was standing in front of him. She was thinking of other drivers,
+poor people, in old cars, who had been at the mercy of this
+golden-hearted one. She stared past him, in the direction from which she
+had come. Another motor was in sight.
+
+It was a tin beetle of a car; that agile, cheerful, rut-jumping model
+known as a "bug"; with a home-tacked, home-painted tin cowl and tail
+covering the stripped chassis of a little cheap Teal car. The lone
+driver wore an old black raincoat with an atrocious corduroy collar, and
+a new plaid cap in the Harry Lauder tartan. The bug skipped through mud
+where the Boltwoods' Gomez had slogged and rolled. Its pilot drove up
+behind her car, and leaped out. He trotted forward to Claire and Zolzac.
+His eyes were twenty-seven or eight, but his pink cheeks were twenty,
+and when he smiled--shyly, radiantly--he was no age at all, but eternal
+boy. Claire had a blurred impression that she had seen him before, some
+place along the road.
+
+"Stuck?" he inquired, not very intelligently. "How much is Adolph
+charging you?"
+
+"He wants three-fifty, and his harness broke, and he wants two
+dollars----"
+
+"Oh! So he's still working that old gag! I've heard all about Adolph. He
+keeps that harness for pulling out cars, and it always busts. The last
+time, though, he only charged six bits to get it mended. Now let me
+reason with him."
+
+The young man turned with vicious quickness, and for the first time
+Claire heard pidgin German--German as it is spoken between Americans who
+have never learned it, and Germans who have forgotten it:
+
+"_Schon sex_ hundred times _Ich hoere_ all about the way you been doing
+autos, Zolzac, you _verfluchter Schweinhund_, and I'll set the sheriff
+on you----"
+
+"Dot ain'd true, maybe _einmal die Woche kommt_ somebody and _Ich muss
+die Arbeit immer lassen und in die Regen ausgehen, und seh' mal_ how
+_die_ boots _sint mit_ mud covered, two dollars it don't pay for _die_
+boots----"
+
+"Now that's enough-plenty out of you, _seien die_ boots _verdammt_, and
+_mach' dass du fort gehst_--muddy boots, hell!--put _mal ein_ egg in
+_die_ boots and beat it, _verleicht_ maybe I'll by golly arrest you
+myself, _weiss du_! I'm a special deputy sheriff."
+
+The young man stood stockily. He seemed to swell as his somewhat muddy
+hand was shaken directly at, under, and about the circumference of,
+Adolph Zolzac's hairy nose. The farmer was stronger, but he retreated.
+He took up the reins. He whined, "Don't I get nothing I break de
+harness?"
+
+"Sure. You get ten--years! And you get out!"
+
+From thirty yards up the road, Zolzac flung back, "You t'ink you're
+pretty damn smart!" That was his last serious reprisal.
+
+Clumsily, as one not used to it, the young man lifted his cap to Claire,
+showing straight, wiry, rope-colored hair, brushed straight back from a
+rather fine forehead. "Gee, I was sorry to have to swear and holler like
+that, but it's all Adolph understands. Please don't think there's many
+of the folks around here like him. They say he's the meanest man in the
+county."
+
+"I'm immensely grateful to you, but--do you know much about motors? How
+can I get out of this mud?"
+
+She was surprised to see the youngster blush. His clear skin flooded.
+His engaging smile came again, and he hesitated, "Let me pull you out."
+
+She looked from her hulking car to his mechanical flea.
+
+He answered the look: "I can do it all right. I'm used to the
+gumbo--regular mud-hen. Just add my power to yours. Have you a
+tow-rope?"
+
+"No. I never thought of bringing one."
+
+"I'll get mine."
+
+She walked with him back toward his bug. It lacked not only top and
+side-curtains, but even windshield and running-board. It was a toy--a
+card-board box on toothpick axles. Strapped to the bulging back was a
+wicker suitcase partly covered by tarpaulin. From the seat peered a
+little furry face.
+
+"A cat?" she exclaimed, as he came up with a wire rope, extracted from
+the tin back.
+
+"Yes. She's the captain of the boat. I'm just the engineer."
+
+"What is her name?"
+
+Before he answered the young man strode ahead to the front of her car,
+Claire obediently trotting after him. He stooped to look at her front
+axle. He raised his head, glanced at her, and he was blushing again.
+
+"Her name is Vere de Vere!" he confessed. Then he fled back to his bug.
+He drove it in front of the Gomez-Dep. The hole in the road itself was
+as deep as the one on the edge of the cornfield, where she was stuck,
+but he charged it. She was fascinated by his skill. Where she would for
+a tenth of a second have hesitated while choosing the best course, he
+hurled the bug straight at the hole, plunged through with sheets of
+glassy black water arching on either side, then viciously twisted the
+car to the right, to the left, and straight again, as he followed the
+tracks with the solidest bottoms.
+
+Strapped above the tiny angle-iron step which replaced his running-board
+was an old spade. He dug channels in front of the four wheels of her
+car, so that they might go up inclines, instead of pushing against the
+straight walls of mud they had thrown up. On these inclines he strewed
+the brush she had brought, halting to ask, with head alertly lifted from
+his stooped huddle in the mud, "Did you have to get this brush
+yourself?"
+
+"Yes. Horrid wet!"
+
+He merely shook his head in commiseration.
+
+He fastened the tow-rope to the rear axle of his car, to the front of
+hers. "Now will you be ready to put on all your power as I begin to
+pull?" he said casually, rather respectfully.
+
+When the struggling bug had pulled the wire rope taut, she opened the
+throttle. The rope trembled. Her car seemed to draw sullenly back. Then
+it came out--out--really out, which is the most joyous sensation any
+motorist shall ever know. In excitement over actually moving again, as
+fast as any healthy young snail, she drove on, on, the young man ahead
+grinning back at her. Nor did she stop, nor he, till both cars were
+safe on merely thick mud, a quarter of a mile away.
+
+She switched off the power--and suddenly she was in a whirlwind of dizzy
+sickening tiredness. Even in her abandonment to exhaustion she noticed
+that the young man did not stare at her but, keeping his back to her,
+removed the tow-rope, and stowed it away in his bug. She wondered
+whether it was tact or yokelish indifference.
+
+Her father spoke for the first time since the Galahad of the tin bug had
+come: "How much do you think we ought to give this fellow?"
+
+Now of all the cosmic problems yet unsolved, not cancer nor the future
+of poverty are the flustering questions, but these twain: Which is
+worse, not to wear evening clothes at a party at which you find every
+one else dressed, or to come in evening clothes to a house where, it
+proves, they are never worn? And: Which is worse, not to tip when a tip
+has been expected; or to tip, when the tip is an insult?
+
+In discomfort of spirit and wetness of ankles Claire shuddered, "Oh
+dear, I don't believe he expects us to pay him. He seems like an awfully
+independent person. Maybe we'd offend him if we offered----"
+
+"The only reasonable thing to be offended at in this vale of tears is
+not being offered money!"
+
+"Just the same---- Oh dear, I'm so tired. But good little Claire will
+climb out and be diplomatic."
+
+She pinched her forehead, to hold in her cracking brain, and wabbled out
+into new scenes of mud and wetness, but she came up to the young man
+with the most rain-washed and careless of smiles. "Won't you come back
+and meet my father? He's terribly grateful to you--as I am. And may
+we---- You've worked so hard, and about saved our lives. May I pay you
+for that labor? We're really much indebted----"
+
+"Oh, it wasn't anything. Tickled to death if I could help you."
+
+He heartily shook hands with her father, and he droned, "Pleased to meet
+you, Mr. Uh."
+
+"Boltwood."
+
+"Mr. Boltwood. My name is Milt--Milton Daggett. See you have a New York
+license on your car. We don't see but mighty few of those through here.
+Glad I could help you."
+
+"Ah yes, Mr. Daggett." Mr. Boltwood was uninterestedly fumbling in his
+money pocket. Behind Milt Daggett, Claire shook her head wildly,
+rattling her hands as though she were playing castanets. Mr. Boltwood
+shrugged. He did not understand. His relations with young men in cheap
+raincoats were entirely monetary. They did something for you, and you
+paid them--preferably not too much--and they ceased to be. Whereas Milt
+Daggett respectfully but stolidly continued to be, and Mr. Henry
+Boltwood's own daughter was halting the march of affairs by asking
+irrelevant questions:
+
+"Didn't we see you back in--what was that village we came through back
+about twelve miles?"
+
+"Schoenstrom?" suggested Milt.
+
+"Yes, I think that was it. Didn't we pass you or something? We stopped
+at a garage there, to change a tire."
+
+"I don't think so. I was in town, though, this morning. Say, uh, did you
+and your father grab any eats----"
+
+"A----"
+
+"I mean, did you get dinner there?"
+
+"No. I wish we had!"
+
+"Well say, I didn't either, and--I'd be awfully glad if you folks would
+have something to eat with me now."
+
+Claire tried to give him a smile, but the best she could do was to lend
+him one. She could not associate interesting food with Milt and his
+mud-slobbered, tin-covered, dun-painted Teal bug. He seemed satisfied
+with her dubious grimace. By his suggestion they drove ahead to a spot
+where the cars could be parked on firm grass beneath oaks. On the way,
+Mr. Boltwood lifted his voice in dismay. His touch of nervous
+prostration had not made him queer or violent; he retained a touching
+faith in good food.
+
+"We might find some good little hotel and have some chops and just some
+mushrooms and peas," insisted the man from Brooklyn Heights.
+
+"Oh, I don't suppose the country hotels are really so awfully good," she
+speculated. "And look--that nice funny boy. We couldn't hurt his
+feelings. He's having so much fun out of being a Good Samaritan."
+
+From the mysterious rounded back of his car Milt Daggett drew a tiny
+stove, to be heated by a can of solidified alcohol, a frying pan that
+was rather large for dolls but rather small for square-fingered hands, a
+jar of bacon, eggs in a bag, a coffee pot, a can of condensed milk, and
+a litter of unsorted tin plates and china cups. While, by his request,
+Claire scoured the plates and cups, he made bacon and eggs and coffee,
+the little stove in the bottom of his car sheltered by the cook's
+bending over it. The smell of food made Claire forgiving toward the fact
+that she was wet through; that the rain continued to drizzle down her
+neck.
+
+He lifted his hand and demanded, "Take your shoes off!"
+
+"Uh?"
+
+He gulped. He stammered, "I mean--I mean your shoes are soaked through.
+If you'll sit in the car, I'll put your shoes up by the engine. It's
+pretty well heated from racing it in the mud. You can get your stockings
+dry under the cowl."
+
+She was amused by the elaborateness with which he didn't glance at her
+while she took off her low shoes and slipped her quite too thin black
+stockings under the protecting tin cowl. She reflected, "He has such a
+nice, awkward gentleness. But such bad taste! They're really quite good
+ankles. Apparently ankles are not done, in Teal bug circles. His sisters
+don't even have limbs. But do fairies have sisters? He is a fairy. When
+I'm out of the mud he'll turn his raincoat into a pair of lordly white
+wings, and vanish. But what will become of the cat?"
+
+Thus her tired brain, like a squirrel in a revolving cage, while she sat
+primly and scraped at a clot of rust on a tin plate and watched him put
+on the bacon and eggs. Wondering if cats were used for this purpose in
+the Daggett family, she put soaked, unhappy Vere de Vere on her feet, to
+her own great comfort and the cat's delight. It was an open car, and the
+rain still rained, and a strange young man was a foot from her tending
+the not very crackly fire, but rarely had Claire felt so domestic.
+
+Milt was apparently struggling to say something. After several bobs of
+his head he ventured, "You're so wet! I'd like for you to take my
+raincoat."
+
+"No! Really! I'm already soaked through. You keep dry."
+
+He was unhappy about it. He plucked at a button of the coat. She turned
+him from the subject. "I hope Lady Vere de Vere is getting warm, too."
+
+"Seems to be. She's kind of demanding. She wanted a little car of her
+own, but I didn't think she could keep up with me, not on a long hike."
+
+"A little car? With her paws on the tiny wheel? Oh--sweet! Are you going
+far, Mr. Daggett?"
+
+"Yes, quite a ways. To Seattle, Washington."
+
+"Oh, really? Extraordinary. We're going there, too."
+
+"Honest? You driving all the way? Oh, no, of course your father----"
+
+"No, he doesn't drive. By the way, I hope he isn't too miserable back
+there."
+
+"I'll be darned. Both of us going to Seattle. That's what they call a
+coincidence, isn't it! Hope I'll see you on the road, some time. But I
+don't suppose I will. Once you're out of the mud, your Gomez will simply
+lose my Teal."
+
+"Not necessarily. You're the better driver. And I shall take it easy.
+Are you going to stay long in Seattle?" It was not merely a polite
+dinner-payment question. She wondered; she could not place this
+fresh-cheeked, unworldly young man so far from his home.
+
+"Why, I kind of hope---- Government railroad, Alaska. I'm going to try
+to get in on that, somehow. I've never been out of Minnesota in my life,
+but there's couple mountains and oceans and things I thought I'd like
+to see, so I just put my suitcase and Vere de Vere in the machine, and
+started out. I burn distillate instead of gas, so it doesn't cost much.
+If I ever happen to have five whole dollars, why, I might go on to
+Japan!"
+
+"That would be jolly."
+
+"Though I s'pose I'd have to eat--what is it?--pickled fish? There's a
+woman from near my town went to the Orient as a missionary. From what
+she says, I guess all you need in Japan to make a house is a bottle of
+mucilage and a couple of old newspapers and some two-by-fours. And you
+can have the house on a purple mountain, with cherry trees down below,
+and----" He put his clenched hand to his lips. His head was bowed. "And
+the ocean! Lord! The ocean! And we'll see it at Seattle. Bay, anyway.
+And steamers there--just come from India! Huh! Getting pretty darn
+poetic here! Eggs are done."
+
+The young man did not again wander into visions. He was all briskness as
+he served her bacon and eggs, took a plate of them to Mr. Boltwood in
+the Gomez, gouged into his own. Having herself scoured the tin plates,
+Claire was not repulsed by their naked tinniness; and the coffee in the
+broken-handled china cup was tolerable. Milt drank from the top of a
+vacuum bottle. He was silent. Immediately after the lunch he stowed the
+things away. Claire expected a drawn-out, tact-demanding farewell, but
+he climbed into his bug, said "Good-by, Miss Boltwood. Good luck!" and
+was gone.
+
+The rainy road was bleakly empty without him.
+
+It did not seem possible that Claire's body could be nagged into going
+on any longer. Her muscles were relaxed, her nerves frayed. But the
+moment the Gomez started, she discovered that magic change which every
+long-distance motorist knows. Instantly she was alert, seemingly able to
+drive forever. The pilot's instinct ruled her; gave her tireless eyes
+and sturdy hands. Surely she had never been weary; never would be, so
+long as it was hers to keep the car going.
+
+She had driven perhaps six miles when she reached a hamlet called St.
+Klopstock. On the bedraggled mud-and-shanty main street a man was
+loading crushed rock into a truck. By him was a large person in a
+prosperous raincoat, who stepped out, held up his hand. Claire stopped.
+
+"You the young lady that got stuck in that hole by Adolph Zolzac's?"
+
+"Yes. And Mr. Zolzac wasn't very nice about it."
+
+"He's going to be just elegant about it, now, and there ain't going to
+be any more hole. I think Adolph has been keeping it muddy--throwing in
+soft dirt--and he made a good and plenty lot out of pulling out
+tourists. Bill and I are going down right now and fill it up with stone.
+Milt Daggett come through here--he's got a nerve, that fellow, but I
+did have to laugh--he says to me, 'Barney----' This was just now. He
+hasn't more than just drove out of town. He said to me, 'Barney,' he
+says, 'you're the richest man in this township, and the banker, and you
+got a big car y'self, and you think you're one whale of a political
+boss,' he says, 'and yet you let that Zolzac maintain a private ocean,
+against the peace and damn horrible inconvenience of the Commonwealth of
+Minnesota----' He's got a great line of talk, that fellow. He told me
+how you got stuck--made me so ashamed--I been to New York myself--and
+right away I got Bill, and we're going down and hold a donation and
+surprise party on Adolph and fill that hole."
+
+"But won't Adolph dig it out again?"
+
+The banker was puffy, but his eyes were of stone. From the truck he took
+a shotgun. He drawled, "In that case, the surprise party will include an
+elegant wake."
+
+"But how did---- Who is this extraordinary Milt Daggett?"
+
+"Him? Oh, nobody 'specially. He's just a fellow down here at
+Schoenstrom. But we all know him. Goes to all the dances, thirty miles
+around. Thing about him is: if he sees something wrong, he picks out
+some poor fellow like me, and says what he thinks."
+
+Claire drove on. She was aware that she was looking for Milt's bug. It
+was not in sight.
+
+"Father," she exclaimed, "do you realize that this lad didn't tell us he
+was going to have the hole filled? Just did it. He frightens me. I'm
+afraid that when we reach Gopher Prairie for the night, we'll find he
+has engaged for us the suite that Prince Collars and Cuffs once slept
+in."
+
+"Hhhhmm," yawned her father.
+
+"Curious young man. He said, 'Pleased to meet you.'"
+
+"Huuuuhhm! Fresh air makes me so sleepy."
+
+"And---- Fooled you! Got through that mudhole, anyway! And he said----
+Look! Fields stretch out so here, and not a tree except the
+willow-groves round those farmhouses. And he said 'Gee' so many times,
+and 'dinner' for the noon meal. And his nails---- No, I suppose he
+really is just a farm youngster."
+
+Mr. Boltwood did not answer. His machine-finish smile indicated an
+enormous lack of interest in young men in Teal bugs.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+A ROOM WITHOUT
+
+
+Gopher Prairie has all of five thousand people. Its commercial club
+asserts that it has at least a thousand more population and an
+infinitely better band than the ridiculously envious neighboring town of
+Joralemon. But there were few signs that a suite had been engaged for
+the Boltwoods, or that Prince Collars and Cuffs had on his royal tour of
+America spent much time in Gopher Prairie. Claire reached it somewhat
+before seven. She gaped at it in a hazy way. Though this was her first
+prairie town for a considerable stay, she could not pump up interest.
+
+The state of mind of the touring motorist entering a strange place at
+night is as peculiar and definite as that of a prospector. It is
+compounded of gratitude at having got safely in; of perception of a new
+town, yet with all eagerness about new things dulled by weariness; of
+hope that there is going to be a good hotel, but small expectation--and
+absolutely no probability--that there really will be one.
+
+Claire had only a blotched impression of peaked wooden buildings and
+squatty brick stores with faded awnings; of a red grain elevator and a
+crouching station and a lumberyard; then of the hopelessly muddy road
+leading on again into the country. She felt that if she didn't stop at
+once, she would miss the town entirely. The driving-instinct sustained
+her, made her take corners sharply, spot a garage, send the Gomez
+whirling in on the cement floor.
+
+The garage attendant looked at her and yawned.
+
+"Where do you want the car?" Claire asked sharply.
+
+"Oh, stick it in that stall," grunted the man, and turned his back.
+
+Claire glowered at him. She thought of a good line about rudeness.
+But--oh, she was too tired to fuss. She tried to run the car into the
+empty stall, which was not a stall, but a space, like a missing tooth,
+between two cars, and so narrow that she was afraid of crumpling the
+lordly fenders of the Gomez. She ran down the floor, returned with a
+flourish, thought she was going to back straight into the stall--and
+found she wasn't. While her nerves shrieked, and it did not seem
+possible that she could change gears, she managed to get the Gomez
+behind a truck and side-on to the stall.
+
+"Go forward again, and cramp your wheel--sharp!" ordered the garage man.
+
+Claire wanted to outline what she thought of him, but she merely
+demanded, "Will you kindly drive it in?"
+
+"Why, sure. You bet," said the man casually. His readiness ruined her
+inspired fury. She was somewhat disappointed.
+
+As she climbed out of the car and put a hand on the smart bags strapped
+on a running-board, the accumulated weariness struck her in a shock. She
+could have driven on for hours, but the instant the car was safe for the
+night, she went to pieces. Her ears rang, her eyes were soaked in fire,
+her mouth was dry, the back of her neck pinched. It was her father who
+took the lead as they rambled to the one tolerable hotel in the town.
+
+In the hotel Claire was conscious of the ugliness of the poison-green
+walls and brass cuspidors and insurance calendars and bare floor of the
+office; conscious of the interesting scientific fact that all air had
+been replaced by the essence of cigar smoke and cooking cabbage; of the
+stares of the traveling men lounging in bored lines; and of the lack of
+welcome on the part of the night clerk, an oldish, bleached man with
+whiskers instead of a collar.
+
+She tried to be important: "Two rooms with bath, please."
+
+The bleached man stared at her, and shoved forward the register and a
+pen clotted with ink. She signed. He took the bags, led the way to the
+stairs. Anxiously she asked, "Both rooms are with bath?"
+
+From the second step the night clerk looked down at her as though she
+were a specimen that ought to be pinned on the corks at once, and he
+said loudly, "No, ma'am. Neither of 'em. Got no rooms vacant with bawth,
+or bath either! Not but what we got 'em in the house. This is an
+up-to-date place. But one of 'm's took, and the other has kind of been
+out of order, the last three-four months."
+
+From the audience of drummers below, a delicate giggle.
+
+Claire was too angry to answer. And too tired. When, after miles of
+stairs, leagues of stuffy hall, she reached her coop, with its iron bed
+so loose-jointed that it rattled to a breath, its bureau with a list to
+port, and its anemic rocking-chair, she dropped on the bed, panting, her
+eyes closed but still brimming with fire. It did not seem that she could
+ever move again. She felt chloroformed. She couldn't even coax herself
+off the bed, to see if her father was any better off in the next room.
+
+She was certain that she was not going to drive to Seattle. She wasn't
+going to drive anywhere! She was going to freight the car back to
+Minneapolis, and herself go back by train--Pullman!--drawing-room!
+
+But for the thought of her father she would have fallen asleep, in her
+drenched tweeds. When she did force the energy to rise, she had to
+support herself by the bureau, by the foot of the bed, as she moved
+about the room, hanging up the wet suit, rubbing herself with a slippery
+towel, putting on a dark silk frock and pumps. She found her father
+sitting motionless in his room, staring at the wall. She made herself
+laugh at him for his gloomy emptiness. She paraded down the hall with
+him.
+
+As they reached the foot of the stairs, the old one, the night clerk
+leaned across the desk and, in a voice that took the whole office into
+the conversation, quizzed, "Come from New York, eh? Well, you're quite a
+ways from home."
+
+Claire nodded. She felt shyer before these solemnly staring traveling
+men than she ever had in a box at the opera. At the double door of the
+dining-room, from which the cabbage smell steamed with a lustiness
+undiminished by the sad passing of its youth, a man, one of the
+average-sized, average-mustached, average business-suited,
+average-brown-haired men who can never be remembered, stopped the
+Boltwoods and hawed, "Saw you coming into town. You've got a New York
+license?"
+
+She couldn't deny it.
+
+"Quite a ways from home, aren't you?"
+
+She had to admit it.
+
+She was escorted by a bouncing, black-eyed waitress to a table for four.
+The next table was a long one, at which seven traveling men, or local
+business men whose wives were at the lake for the summer, ceased trying
+to get nourishment out of the food, and gawped at her. Before the
+Boltwoods were seated, the waitress dabbed at non-existent spots on
+their napkins, ignored a genuine crumb on the cloth in front of Claire's
+plate, made motions at a cup and a formerly plated fork, and bubbled,
+"Autoing through?"
+
+Claire fumbled for her chair, oozed into it, and breathed, "Yes."
+
+"Going far?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Where do you live?"
+
+"New York."
+
+"My! You're quite a ways from home, aren't you?"
+
+"Apparently."
+
+"Hamnegs roasbeef roaspork thapplesauce frypickerel springlamintsauce."
+
+"I--I beg your pardon."
+
+The waitress repeated.
+
+"I--oh--oh, bring us ham and eggs. Is that all right, father?"
+
+"Oh--no--well----"
+
+"You wanted same?" the waitress inquired of Mr. Boltwood.
+
+He was intimidated. He said, "If you please," and feebly pawed at a
+fork.
+
+The waitress was instantly back with soup, and a collection of china
+gathered by a man of much travel, catholic interests, and no taste. One
+of the plates alleged itself to belong to a hotel in Omaha. She pushed
+a pitcher of condensed milk to the exact spot where it would catch Mr.
+Boltwood's sleeve, brushed the crumb from in front of Claire to a
+shelter beneath the pink and warty sugar bowl, recovered a toothpick
+which had been concealed behind her glowing lips, picked for a while,
+gave it up, put her hands on her hips, and addressed Claire:
+
+"How far you going?"
+
+"To Seattle."
+
+"Got any folks there?"
+
+"Any---- Oh, yes, I suppose so."
+
+"Going to stay there long?"
+
+"Really---- We haven't decided."
+
+"Come from New York, eh? Quite a ways from home, all right. Father in
+business there?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What's his line?"
+
+"I beg pardon?"
+
+"What's his line? Ouch! Jiminy, these shoes pinch my feet. I used to
+could dance all night, but I'm getting fat, I guess, ha! ha! Put on
+seven pounds last month. Ouch! Gee, they certainly do pinch my toes.
+What business you say your father's in?"
+
+"I didn't say, but---- Oh, railroad."
+
+"G. N. or N. P.?"
+
+"I don't think I quite understand----"
+
+Mr. Boltwood interposed, "Are the ham and eggs ready?"
+
+"I'll beat it out and see." When she brought them, she put a spoon in
+Claire's saucer of peas, and demanded, "Say, you don't wear that silk
+dress in the auto, do you?"
+
+"No."
+
+"I should think you'd put a pink sash on it. Seems like it's kind of
+plain--it's a real pretty piece of goods, though. A pink sash would be
+real pretty. You dark-complected ladies always looks better for a touch
+of color."
+
+Then was Claire certain that the waitress was baiting her, for the
+amusement of the men at the long table. She exploded. Probably the
+waitress did not know there had been an explosion when Claire looked
+coldly up, raised her brows, looked down, and poked the cold and salty
+slab of ham, for she was continuing:
+
+"A light-complected lady like me don't need so much color, you notice my
+hair is black, but I'm light, really, Pete Liverquist says I'm a blonde
+brunette, gee, he certainly is killing that fellow, oh, he's a case, he
+sure does like to hear himself talk, my! there's Old Man Walters, he
+runs the telephone exchange here, I heard he went down to St. Cloud on
+Number 2, but I guess he couldn't of, he'll be yodeling for friend soup
+and a couple slabs of moo, I better beat it, I'll say so, so long."
+
+Claire's comment was as acid as the pale beets before her, as bitter as
+the peas, as hard as the lumps in the watery mashed potatoes:
+
+"I don't know whether the woman is insane or ignorant. I wish I could
+tell whether she was trying to make me angry for the benefit of those
+horrid unshaven men, or merely for her private edification."
+
+"By me, dolly. So is this pie. Let's get some medium to levitate us up
+to bed. Uh--uh---- I think perhaps we'd better not try to drive clear to
+Seattle. If we just went through to Montana?--or even just to Bismarck?"
+
+"Drive through with the hotels like this? My dear man, if we have one
+more such day, we stop right there. I hope we get by the man at the
+desk. I have a feeling he's lurking there, trying to think up something
+insulting to say to us. Oh, my dear, I hope you aren't as beastly tired
+as I am. My bones are hot pokers."
+
+The man at the desk got in only one cynical question, "Driving far?"
+before Claire seized her father's arm and started him upstairs.
+
+For the first time since she had been ten--and in a state of naughtiness
+immediately following a pronounced state of grace induced by the pulpit
+oratory of the new rector of St. Chrysostom's--she permitted herself the
+luxury of not stopping to brush her teeth before she went to bed. Her
+sleep was drugged--it was not sleep, but an aching exhaustion of the
+body which did not prevent her mind from revisualizing the road, going
+stupidly over the muddy stretches and sharp corners, then becoming
+conscious of that bed, the lump under her shoulder blades, the slope to
+westward, and the creak that rose every time she tossed. For at least
+fifteen minutes she lay awake for hours.
+
+Thus Claire Boltwood's first voyage into democracy.
+
+It was not so much that the sun was shining, in the morning, as that a
+ripple of fresh breeze came through the window. She discovered that she
+again longed to go on--keep going on--see new places, conquer new roads.
+She didn't want all good road. She wanted something to struggle against.
+She'd try it for one more day. She was stiff as she crawled out of bed,
+but a rub with cold water left her feeling that she was stronger than
+she ever had been; that she was a woman, not a dependent girl. Already,
+in the beating prairie sun-glare, the wide main street of Gopher Prairie
+was drying; the mud ruts flattening out. Beyond the town hovered the
+note of a meadow lark--sunlight in sound.
+
+"Oh, it's a sweet morning! Sweet! We will go on! I'm terribly excited!"
+she laughed.
+
+She found her father dressed. He did not know whether or not he wanted
+to go on. "I seem to have lost my grip on things. I used to be rather
+decisive. But we'll try it one more day, if you like," he said.
+
+When she had gaily marched him downstairs, she suddenly and unhappily
+remembered the people she would have to face, the gibing questions she
+would have to answer.
+
+The night clerk was still at the desk, as though he had slept standing.
+He hailed them. "Well, well! Up bright and early! Hope you folks slept
+well. Beds aren't so good as they might be, but we're kind of planning
+to get some new mattresses. But you get pretty good air to sleep in.
+Hope you have a fine hike today."
+
+His voice was cordial; he was their old friend; faithful watcher of
+their progress. Claire found herself dimpling at him.
+
+In the dining-room their inquisitional acquaintance, the waitress,
+fairly ran to them. "Sit down, folks. Waffles this morning. You want to
+stock up for your drive. My, ain't it an elegant morning! I hope you
+have a swell drive today!"
+
+"Why!" Claire gasped, "why, they aren't rude. They care--about people
+they never saw before. That's why they ask questions! I never thought--I
+never thought! There's people in the world who want to know us without
+having looked us up in the Social Register! I'm so ashamed! Not that the
+sunshine changes my impression of this coffee. It's frightful! But that
+will improve. And the people--they were being friendly, all the time.
+Oh, Henry B., young Henry Boltwood, you and your godmother Claire have
+a lot to learn about the world!"
+
+As they came into the garage, their surly acquaintance of the night
+before looked just as surly, but Claire tried a boisterous "Good
+morning!"
+
+"Mornin'! Going north? Better take the left-hand road at Wakamin. Easier
+going. Drive your car out for you?"
+
+As the car stood outside taking on gas, a man flapped up, spelled out
+the New York license, looked at Claire and her father, and inquired,
+"Quite a ways from home, aren't you?"
+
+This time Claire did not say "Yes!" She experimented with, "Yes, quite a
+ways."
+
+"Well, hope you have a good trip. Good luck!"
+
+Claire leaned her head on her hand, thought hard. "It's I who wasn't
+friendly," she propounded to her father. "How much I've been losing.
+Though I still refuse to like that coffee!"
+
+She noticed the sign on the air-hose of the garage--"Free Air."
+
+"There's our motto for the pilgrimage!" she cried.
+
+She knew the exaltation of starting out in the fresh morning for places
+she had never seen, without the bond of having to return at night.
+
+Thus Claire's second voyage into democracy.
+
+While she was starting the young man who had pulled her out of the mud
+and given her lunch was folding up the tarpaulin and blankets on which
+he had slept beside his Teal bug, in the woods three miles north of
+Gopher Prairie. To the high-well-born cat, Vere de Vere, Milt Daggett
+mused aloud, "Your ladyship, as Shakespeare says, the man that gets cold
+feet never wins the girl. And I'm scared, cat, clean scared."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+RELEASE BRAKES--SHIFT TO THIRD
+
+
+Milt Daggett had not been accurate in his implication that he had not
+noticed Claire at a garage in Schoenstrom. For one thing, he owned the
+garage.
+
+Milt was the most prosperous young man in the village of Schoenstrom.
+Neither the village itself nor the nearby _Strom_ is really _schoen_.
+The entire business district of Schoenstrom consists of Heinie
+Rauskukle's general store, which is brick; the Leipzig House, which is
+frame; the Old Home Poolroom and Restaurant, which is of old logs
+concealed by a frame sheathing; the farm-machinery agency, which is
+galvanized iron, its roof like an enlarged washboard; the church; the
+three saloons; and the Red Trail Garage, which is also, according to
+various signs, the Agency for Teal Car Best at the Test, Stonewall Tire
+Service Station, Sewing Machines and Binders Repaired, Dr. Hostrum the
+Veterinarian every Thursday, Gas Today 27c.
+
+The Red Trail Garage is of cement and tapestry brick. In the office is a
+clean hardwood floor, a typewriter, and a picture of Elsie Ferguson. The
+establishment has an automatic rim-stretcher, a wheel jack, and a
+reputation for honesty.
+
+The father of Milt Daggett was the Old Doctor, born in Maine, coming to
+this frontier in the day when Chippewas camped in your dooryard, and
+came in to help themselves to coffee, which you made of roasted corn.
+The Old Doctor bucked northwest blizzards, read Dickens and Byron,
+pulled people through typhoid, and left to Milt his shabby old medicine
+case and thousands of dollars--in uncollectible accounts. Mrs. Daggett
+had long since folded her crinkly hands in quiet death.
+
+Milt had covered the first two years of high school by studying with the
+priest, and been sent to the city of St. Cloud for the last two years.
+His father had meant to send him to the state university. But Milt had
+been born to a talent for machinery. At twelve he had made a telephone
+that worked. At eighteen he was engineer in the tiny flour mill in
+Schoenstrom. At twenty-five, when Claire Boltwood chose to come tearing
+through his life in a Gomez-Dep, Milt was the owner, manager,
+bookkeeper, wrecking crew, ignition expert, thoroughly competent
+bill-collector, and all but one of the working force of the Red Trail
+Garage.
+
+There were two factions in Schoenstrom: the retired farmers who said
+that German was a good enough language for anybody, and that taxes for
+schools and sidewalks were yes something crazy; and the group who
+stated that a pig-pen is a fine place, but only for pigs. To this
+second, revolutionary wing belonged a few of the first generation, most
+of the second, and all of the third; and its leader was Milt Daggett. He
+did not talk much, normally, but when he thought things ought to be
+done, he was as annoying as a machine-gun test in the lot next to a
+Quaker meeting.
+
+If there had been a war, Milt would probably have been in it--rather
+casual, clearing his throat, reckoning and guessing that maybe his men
+might try going over and taking that hill ... then taking it. But all of
+this history concerns the year just before America spoke to Germany; and
+in this town buried among the cornfields and the wheat, men still
+thought more about the price of grain than about the souls of nations.
+
+On the evening before Claire Boltwood left Minneapolis and adventured
+into democracy, Milt was in the garage. He wore union overalls that were
+tan where they were not grease-black; a faded blue cotton shirt; and the
+crown of a derby, with the rim not too neatly hacked off with a dull
+toad-stabber jack-knife.
+
+Milt smiled at his assistant, Ben Sittka, and suggested, "Well, _wie
+geht 's mit_ the work, eh? Like to stay and get the prof's flivver out,
+so he can have it in the morning?"
+
+"You bet, boss."
+
+"Getting to be quite a mechanic, Ben."
+
+"I'll say so!"
+
+"If you get stuck, come yank me out of the Old Home."
+
+"Aw rats, boss. I'll finish it. You beat it." Ben grinned at Milt
+adoringly.
+
+Milt stripped off his overalls and derby-crown, and washed his big, firm
+hands with gritty soft soap. He cleaned his nails with a file which he
+carried in his upper vest pocket in a red imitation morocco case which
+contained a comb, a mirror, an indelible pencil, and a note-book with
+the smudged pencil addresses of five girls in St. Cloud, and a
+memorandum about Rauskukle's car.
+
+He put on a twisted brown tie, an old blue serge suit, and a hat which,
+being old and shabby, had become graceful. He ambled up the street. He
+couldn't have ambled more than three blocks and have remained on the
+street. Schoenstrom tended to leak off into jungles of tall corn.
+
+Two men waved at him, and one demanded, "Say, Milt, is whisky good for
+the toothache? What d' you think! The doc said it didn't do any good.
+But then, gosh, he's only just out of college."
+
+"I guess he's right."
+
+"Is that a fact! Well, I'll keep off it then."
+
+Two stores farther on, a bulky farmer hailed, "Say, Milt, should I get
+an ensilage cutter yet?"
+
+"Yuh," in the manner of a man who knows too much to be cocksure about
+anything, "I don't know but what I would, Julius."
+
+"I guess I vill then."
+
+Minnie Rauskukle, plump, hearty Minnie, heiress to the general store,
+gave evidence by bridling and straightening her pigeon-like body that
+she was aware of Milt behind her. He did not speak to her. He ducked
+into the door of the Old Home Poolroom and Restaurant.
+
+Milt ranged up to the short lunch counter, in front of the pool table
+where two brick-necked farm youngsters were furiously slamming balls and
+attacking cigarettes. Loose-jointedly Milt climbed a loose-jointed high
+stool and to the proprietor, Bill McGolwey, his best friend, he yawned,
+"You might poison me with a hamburger and a slab of apple, Mac."
+
+"I'll just do that little thing. Look kind of grouchy tonight, Milt."
+
+"Too much excitement in this burg. Saw three people on the streets all
+simultaneously to-once."
+
+"What's been eatin' you lately?"
+
+"Me? Nothing. Only I do get tired of this metropolis. One of these days
+I'm going to buck some bigger place."
+
+"Try Gopher Prairie maybe?" suggested Mac, through the hiss and steam of
+the frying hamburger sandwich.
+
+"Rats. Too small."
+
+"Small? Why, there's darn near five thousand people there!"
+
+"I know, but--I want to tackle some sure-nuff city. Like Duluth or New
+York."
+
+"But what'd you do?"
+
+"That's the devil of it. I don't know just what I do want to do. I could
+always land soft in a garage, but that's nothing new. Might hit Detroit,
+and learn the motor-factory end."
+
+"Aw, you're the limit, Milt. Always looking for something new."
+
+"That's the way to get on. The rest of this town is afraid of new
+things. 'Member when I suggested we all chip in on a dynamo with a gas
+engine and have electric lights? The hicks almost died of nervousness."
+
+"Yuh, that's true, but---- You stick here, Milt. You and me will just
+nachly run this burg."
+
+"I'll say! Only---- Gosh, Mac, I would like to go to a real show, once.
+And find out how radio works. And see 'em put in a big suspension
+bridge!"
+
+Milt left the Old Home rather aimlessly. He told himself that he
+positively would not go back and help Ben Sittka get out the prof's car.
+So he went back and helped Ben get out the prof's car, and drove the
+same to the prof's. The prof, otherwise professor, otherwise mister,
+James Martin Jones, B.A., and Mrs. James Martin Jones welcomed him
+almost as noisily as had Mac. They begged him to come in. With Mr.
+Jones he discussed--no, ye Claires of Brooklyn Heights, this garage man
+and this threadbare young superintendent of a paintbare school, talking
+in a town that was only a comma on the line, did not discuss
+corn-growing, nor did they reckon to guess that by heck the constabule
+was carryin' on with the Widdy Perkins. They spoke of fish-culture,
+Elihu Root, the spiritualistic evidences of immortality, government
+ownership, self-starters for flivvers, and the stories of Irvin Cobb.
+
+Milt went home earlier than he wanted to. Because Mr. Jones was the only
+man in town besides the priest who read books, because Mrs. Jones was
+the only woman who laughed about any topics other than children and
+family sickness, because he wanted to go to their house every night,
+Milt treasured his welcome as a sacred thing, and kept himself from
+calling on them more than once a week.
+
+He stopped on his way to the garage to pet Emil Baumschweiger's large
+gray cat, publicly known as Rags, but to Milt and to the lady herself
+recognized as the unfortunate Countess Vere de Vere--perhaps the only
+person of noble ancestry and mysterious past in Milt's acquaintance. The
+Baumschweigers did not treat their animals well; Emil kicked the bay
+mare, and threw pitchforks at Vere de Vere. Milt saluted her and
+sympathized:
+
+"You have a punk time, don't you, countess? Like to beat it to
+Minneapolis with me?"
+
+The countess said that she did indeed have an extraordinarily punk time,
+and she sang to Milt the hymn of the little gods of the warm hearth.
+Then Milt's evening dissipations were over. Schoenstrom has movies only
+once a week. He sat in the office of his garage ruffling through a
+weekly digest of events. Milt read much, though not too easily. He had
+no desire to be a poet, an Indo-Iranian etymologist, a lecturer to
+women's clubs, or the secretary of state. But he did rouse to the
+marvels hinted in books and magazines; to large crowds, the mechanism of
+submarines, palm trees, gracious women.
+
+He laid down the magazine. He stared at the wall. He thought about
+nothing. He seemed to be fumbling for something about which he could
+deliciously think if he could but grasp it. Without quite visualizing
+either wall or sea, he was yet recalling old dreams of a moonlit wall by
+a warm stirring southern sea. If there was a girl in the dream she was
+intangible as the scent of the night. Presently he was asleep, a not at
+all romantic figure, rather ludicrously tipped to one side in his office
+chair, his large solid shoes up on the desk.
+
+He half woke, and filtered to what he called home--one room in the
+cottage of an oldish woman who had prejudices against the perilous night
+air. He was too sleepy to go through any toilet save pulling off his
+shoes, and achieving an unconvincing wash at the little stand, whose
+crackly varnish was marked with white rings from the toothbrush mug.
+
+"I feel about due to pull off some fool stunt. Wonder what it will be?"
+he complained, as he flopped on the bed.
+
+He was up at six, and at a quarter to seven was at work in the garage.
+He spent a large part of the morning in trying to prove to a customer
+that even a Teal car, best at the test, would not give perfect service
+if the customer persisted in forgetting to fill the oil-well, the
+grease-cups, and the battery.
+
+At three minutes after twelve Milt left the garage to go to dinner. The
+fog of the morning had turned to rain. McGolwey was not at the Old Home.
+Sometimes Mac got tired of serving meals, and for a day or two he took
+to a pocket flask, and among his former customers the cans of prepared
+meat at Rauskukle's became popular. Milt found him standing under the
+tin awning of the general store. He had a troubled hope of keeping Mac
+from too long a vacation with the pocket flask. But Mac was already
+red-eyed. He seemed only half to recognize Milt.
+
+"Swell day!" said Milt.
+
+"Y' bet."
+
+"Road darn muddy."
+
+"I should worry. Yea, bo', I'm feelin' good!"
+
+At eleven minutes past twelve a Gomez-Dep roadster appeared down the
+road, stopped at the garage. To Milt it was as exciting as the
+appearance of a comet to a watching astronomer.
+
+"What kind of a car do you call that, Milt?" asked a loafer.
+
+"Gomez-Deperdussin."
+
+"Never heard of it. Looks too heavy."
+
+This was sacrilege. Milt stormed, "Why, you poor floof, it's one of the
+best cars in the world. Imported from France. That looks like a
+special-made American body, though. Trouble with you fellows is, you're
+always scared of anything that's new. Too--heavy! Huh! Always wanted to
+see a Gomez--never have, except in pictures. And I believe that's a New
+York license. Let me at it!"
+
+He forgot noon-hunger, and clumped through the rain to the garage. He
+saw a girl step from the car. He stopped, in the doorway of the Old
+Home, in uneasy shyness. He told himself he didn't "know just what it is
+about her--she isn't so darn unusually pretty and yet--gee---- Certainly
+isn't a girl to get fresh with. Let Ben take care of her. Like to talk
+to her, and yet I'd be afraid if I opened my mouth, I'd put my foot in
+it."
+
+He was for the first time seeing a smart woman. This dark, slender,
+fine-nerved girl, in her plain, rough, closely-belted, gray suit, her
+small black Glengarry cocked on one side of her smooth hair, her little
+kid gloves, her veil, was as delicately adjusted as an aeroplane engine.
+
+Milt wanted to trumpet her exquisiteness to the world, so he growled to
+a man standing beside him, "Swell car. Nice-lookin' girl, kind of."
+
+"Kind of skinny, though. I like 'em with some meat on 'em," yawned the
+man.
+
+No, Milt did not strike him to earth. He insisted feebly, "Nice clothes
+she's got, though."
+
+"Oh, not so muchamuch. I seen a woman come through here yesterday that
+was swell, though--had on a purple dress and white shoes and a hat big
+'s a bushel."
+
+"Well, I don't know, I kind of like those simple things," apologized
+Milt.
+
+He crept toward the garage. The girl was inside. He inspected the
+slope-topped, patent-leather motoring trunk on the rack at the rear of
+the Gomez-Dep. He noticed a middle-aged man waiting in the car. "Must be
+her father. Probably--maybe she isn't married then." He could not get
+himself to shout at the man, as he usually did. He entered the garage
+office; from the inner door he peeped at the girl, who was talking to
+his assistant about changing an inner tube.
+
+That Ben Sittka whom an hour ago he had cajoled as a promising child he
+now admired for the sniffing calmness with which he was demanding,
+"Want a red or gray tube?"
+
+"Really, I don't know. Which is the better?" The girl's voice was
+curiously clear.
+
+Milt passed Claire Boltwood as though he did not see her; stood at the
+rear of the garage kicking at the tires of a car, his back to her. Over
+and over he was grumbling, "If I just knew one girl like that---- Like a
+picture. Like--like a silver vase on a blue cloth!"
+
+Ben Sittka did not talk to the girl while he inserted the tube in the
+spare casing. Only, in the triumphant moment when the parted ends of the
+steel rim snapped back together, he piped, "Going far?"
+
+"Yes, rather. To Seattle."
+
+Milt stared at the cobweb-grayed window. "Now I know what I was planning
+to do. I'm going to Seattle," he said.
+
+The girl was gone at twenty-nine minutes after twelve. At twenty-nine
+and a half minutes after, Milt remarked to Ben Sittka, "I'm going to
+take a trip. Uh? Now don't ask questions. You take charge of the garage
+until you hear from me. Get somebody to help you. G'-by."
+
+He drove his Teal bug out of the garage. At thirty-two minutes after
+twelve he was in his room, packing his wicker suitcase by the method of
+throwing things in and stamping on the case till it closed. In it he
+had absolutely all of his toilet refinements and wardrobe except the
+important portion already in use. They consisted, according to faithful
+detailed report, of four extra pairs of thick yellow and white cotton
+socks; two shirts, five collars, five handkerchiefs; a pair of
+surprisingly vain dancing pumps; high tan laced boots; three suits of
+cheap cotton underclothes; his Sunday suit, which was dead black in
+color, and unimaginative in cut; four ties; a fagged toothbrush, a comb
+and hairbrush, a razor, a strop, shaving soap in a mug; a not very clean
+towel; and nothing else whatever.
+
+To this he added his entire library and private picture gallery,
+consisting of Ivanhoe, Ben-Hur, his father's copy of Byron, a wireless
+manual, and the 1916 edition of Motor Construction and Repairing: the
+art collection, one colored Sunday supplement picture of a princess
+lunching in a Provence courtyard, and a half-tone of Colonel Paul Beck
+landing in an early military biplane. Under this last, in a pencil
+scrawl now blurred to grayness, Milt had once written, "This what Ill be
+aviator."
+
+What he was to wear was a piercing trouble. Till eleven minutes past
+twelve that day he had not cared. People accepted his overalls at
+anything except a dance, and at the dances he was the only one who wore
+pumps. But in his discovery of Claire Boltwood he had perceived that
+dressing is an art. Before he had packed, he had unhappily pawed at the
+prized black suit. It had become stupid. "Undertaker!" he growled.
+
+With a shrug which indicated that he had nothing else, he had exchanged
+his overalls for a tan flannel shirt, black bow tie, thick pigskin
+shoes, and the suit he had worn the evening before, his best suit of two
+years ago--baggy blue serge coat and trousers. He could not know it, but
+they were surprisingly graceful on his wiry, firm, white body.
+
+In his pockets were a roll of bills and an unexpectedly good gold watch.
+For warmth he had a winter ulster, an old-fashioned turtle-neck sweater,
+and a raincoat heavy as tarpaulin. He plunged into the raincoat, ran
+out, galloped to Rauskukle's store, bought the most vehement cap in the
+place--a plaid of cerise, orange, emerald green, ultramarine, and five
+other guaranteed fashionable colors. He stocked up with food for
+roadside camping.
+
+In the humping tin-covered tail of the bug was a good deal of room, and
+this he filled with motor extras, a shotgun and shells, a pair of
+skates, and all his camping kit as used on his annual duck-hunting trip
+to Man Trap Lake.
+
+"I'm a darned fool to take everything I own but---- Might be gone a
+whole month," he reflected.
+
+He had only one possession left--a check book, concealed from the
+interested eye of his too maternal landlady by sticking it under the
+stair carpet. This he retrieved. It showed a balance of two hundred
+dollars. There was ten dollars in the cash register in the office, for
+Ben Sittka. The garage would, with the mortgage deducted, be worth
+nearly two thousand. This was his fortune.
+
+He bolted into the kitchen and all in one shout he informed his
+landlady, "Called out of town, li'l trip, b'lieve I don't owe you
+an'thing, here's six dollars, two weeks' notice, dunno just when I be
+back."
+
+Before she could issue a questionnaire he was out in the bug. He ran
+through town. At his friend McGolwey; now loose-lipped and wabbly,
+sitting in the rain on a pile of ties behind the railroad station, he
+yelled, "So long, Mac. Take care yourself, old hoss. Off on li'l trip."
+
+He stopped in front of the "prof's," tooted till the heads of the
+Joneses appeared at the window, waved and shouted, "G'-by, folks. Goin'
+outa town."
+
+Then, while freedom and the distant Pacific seemed to rush at him over
+the hood, he whirled out of town. It was two minutes to one--forty-seven
+minutes since Claire Boltwood had entered Schoenstrom.
+
+He stopped only once. His friend Lady Vere de Vere was at the edge of
+town, on a scientific exploring trip in the matter of ethnology and
+field mice. She hailed him, "Mrwr? Me mrwr!"
+
+"You don't say so!" Milt answered in surprise. "Well, if I promised to
+take you, I'll keep my word." He vaulted out, tucked Vere de Vere into
+the seat, protecting her from the rain with the tarpaulin winter
+radiator-cover.
+
+His rut-skipping car overtook the mud-walloping Gomez-Dep in an hour,
+and pulled it out of the mud.
+
+Before Milt slept that night, in his camp three miles from Gopher
+Prairie, he went through religious rites.
+
+"Girl like her, she's darn particular about her looks. I'm a sloppy
+hound. Used to be snappier about my clothes when I was in high school.
+Getting lazy--too much like Mac. Think of me sleeping in my clothes last
+night!"
+
+"Mrwr!" rebuked the cat.
+
+"You're dead right. Fierce is the word. Nev' will sleep in my duds
+again, puss. That is, when I have a reg'lar human bed. Course camping,
+different. But still---- Let's see all the funny things we can do to
+us."
+
+He shaved--two complete shaves, from lather to towel. He brushed his
+hair. He sat down by a campfire sheltered between two rocks, and fought
+his nails, though they were discouragingly crammed with motor grease.
+Throughout this interesting but quite painful ceremony Milt kept up a
+conversation between himself as the World's Champion Dude, and his cat
+as Vallay. But when there was nothing more to do, and the fire was low,
+and Vere de Vere asleep in the sleeve of the winter ulster, his
+bumbling voice slackened; in something like agony he muttered:
+
+"But oh, what's the use? I can't ever be anything but a dub! Cleaning my
+nails, to make a hit with a girl that's got hands like hers! It's a long
+trail to Seattle, but it's a darn sight longer one to being--being--well,
+sophisticated. Oh! And incidentally, what the deuce am I going to do in
+Seattle if I do get there?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE LAND OF BILLOWING CLOUDS
+
+
+Never a tawny-beached ocean has the sweetness of the prairie slew.
+Rippling and blue, with long grass up to its edge, a spot of dancing
+light set in the miles of rustling wheat, it retains even in July, on an
+afternoon of glare and brazen locusts, the freshness of a spring
+morning. A thousand slews, a hundred lakes bordered with rippling barley
+or tinkling bells of the flax, Claire passed. She had left the
+occasional groves of oak and poplar and silver birch, and come out on
+the treeless Great Plains.
+
+She had learned to call the slews "pugholes," and to watch for ducks at
+twilight. She had learned that about the pugholes flutter choirs of
+crimson-winged blackbirds; that the ugly brown birds squatting on
+fence-rails were the divine-voiced meadow larks; that among the humble
+cowbird citizens of the pastures sometimes flaunted a scarlet tanager or
+an oriole; and that no rose garden has the quaint and hardy beauty of
+the Indian paint brushes and rag babies and orange milkweed in the
+prickly, burnt-over grass between roadside and railway line.
+
+She had learned that what had seemed rudeness in garage men and hotel
+clerks was often a resentful reflection of her own Eastern attitude
+that she was necessarily superior to a race she had been trained to call
+"common people." If she spoke up frankly, they made her one of their
+own, and gave her companionable aid.
+
+For two days of sunshine and drying mud she followed a road flung
+straight across flat wheatlands, then curving among low hills. Often
+there were no fences; she was so intimately in among the grain that the
+fenders of the car brushed wheat stalks, and she became no stranger, but
+a part of all this vast-horizoned land. She forgot that she was driving,
+as she let the car creep on, while she was transported by Armadas of
+clouds, prairie clouds, wisps of vapor like a ribbed beach, or mounts of
+cumulus swelling to gold-washed snowy peaks.
+
+The friendliness of the bearing earth gave her a calm that took no heed
+of passing hours. Even her father, the abstracted man of affairs, nodded
+to dusty people along the road; to a jolly old man whose bulk rolled and
+shook in a tiny, rhythmically creaking buggy, to women in the small
+abrupt towns with their huge red elevators and their long, flat-roofed
+stores.
+
+Claire had discovered America, and she felt stronger, and all her days
+were colored with the sun.
+
+She had discovered, too, that she could adventure. No longer was she
+haunted by the apprehension that had whispered to her as she had left
+Minneapolis. She knew a thrill when she hailed--as though it were a
+passing ship--an Illinois car across whose dust-caked back was a banner
+"Chicago to the Yellowstone." She experienced a new sensation of common
+humanness when, on a railway paralleling the wagon road for miles, the
+engineer of a freight waved his hand to her, and tooted the whistle in
+greeting.
+
+Her father was easily tired, but he drowsed through the early afternoons
+when a none-too-digestible small-town lunch was as lead within him.
+Despite the beauty of the land and the joy of pushing on, they both had
+things to endure.
+
+After lunch, it was sometimes an agony to Claire to keep awake. Her eyes
+felt greasy from the food, or smarted with the sun-glare. In the still
+air, after the morning breeze had been burnt out, the heat from the
+engine was a torment about her feet; and if there was another car ahead,
+the trail of dust sifted into her throat. Unless there was traffic to
+keep her awake, she nodded at the wheel; she was merely a part of a
+machine that ran on without seeming to make any impression on the
+prairie's endlessness.
+
+Over and over there were the same manipulations: slow for down hill,
+careful of sand at the bottom, letting her out on a smooth stretch,
+waving to a lonely farmwife in her small, baked dooryard, slow to pass a
+hay-wagon, gas for up the next hill, and repeat the round all over
+again. But she was joyous till noon; and with mid-afternoon a new
+strength came which, as rose crept above the golden haze of dust,
+deepened into serene meditation.
+
+And she was finding the one secret of long-distance driving--namely,
+driving; keeping on, thinking by fifty-mile units, not by the ten-mile
+stretches of Long Island runs; and not fretting over anything whatever.
+She seemed charmed; if she had a puncture--why, she put on the spare. If
+she ran out of gas--why, any passing driver would lend her a gallon.
+Nothing, it seemed, could halt her level flight across the giant land.
+
+She rarely lost her way. She was guided by the friendly trail
+signs--those big red R's and L's on fence post and telephone pole,
+magically telling the way from the Mississippi to the Pacific.
+
+Her father's occasional musing talk kept her from loneliness. He was a
+good touring companion. Motoring is not the best occasion for epigrams,
+satire, and the Good One You Got Off at the Lambs' Club last night. Such
+verbiage on motor trips invariably results in the mysterious finding of
+the corpse of a strange man, well dressed, hidden beside the road.
+Claire and her father mumbled, "Good farmhouse--brick," or "Nice view,"
+and smiled, and were for miles as silent as the companionable sky.
+
+She thought of the people she knew, especially of Jeff Saxton. But she
+could not clearly remember his lean earnest face. Between her and Jeff
+were sweeping sunny leagues. But she was not lonely. Certainly she was
+not lonely for a young man with a raincoat, a cat, and an interest in
+Japan.
+
+No singer after a first concert has felt more triumphant than Claire
+when she crossed her first state-line; rumbled over the bridge across
+the Red River into North Dakota. To see Dakota car licenses everywhere,
+instead of Minnesota, was like the sensation of street signs in a new
+language. And when she found a good hotel in Fargo and had a real bath,
+she felt that by her own efforts she had earned the right to enjoy it.
+
+Mr. Boltwood caught her enthusiasm. Dinner was a festival, and in iced
+tea the peaceful conquistadores drank the toast of the new Spanish Main;
+and afterward, arm in arm, went chattering to the movies.
+
+In front of the Royal Palace, Pictures, 4 Great Acts Vaudeville 4, was
+browsing a small, beetle-like, tin-covered car.
+
+"Dad! Look! I'm sure--yes, of course, there's his suitcase--that's the
+car of that nice boy--don't you remember?--the one that pulled us out of
+the mud at--I don't remember the name of the place. Apparently he's
+keeping going. I remember; he's headed for Seattle, too. We'll look for
+him in the theater. Oh, the darling, there's his cat! What was the funny
+name he gave her--the Marchioness Montmorency or something?"
+
+Lady Vere de Vere, afraid of Fargo and movie crowds, but trusting in her
+itinerant castle, the bug, was curled in Milt Daggett's ulster, in the
+bottom of the car. She twinkled her whiskers at Claire, and purred to a
+stroking hand.
+
+With the excitement of one trying to find the address of a friend in a
+strange land Claire looked over the audience when the lights came on
+before the vaudeville. In the second row she saw Milt's stiffish,
+rope-colored hair--surprisingly smooth above an astoundingly clean new
+tan shirt of mercerized silk.
+
+He laughed furiously at the dialogue between Pete-Rosenheim &
+Larose-Bettina, though it contained the cheese joke, the mother-in-law
+joke, and the joke about the wife rifling her husband's pockets.
+
+"Our young friend seems to have enviable youthful spirits," commented
+Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"Now, no superiority! He's probably never seen a real vaudeville show.
+Wouldn't it be fun to take him to the Winter Garden or the Follies for
+the first time!... Instead of being taken by Jeff Saxton, and having the
+humor, oh! so articulately explained!"
+
+The pictures were resumed; the film which, under ten or twelve different
+titles, Claire had already seen, even though Brooklyn Heights does not
+devote Saturday evening to the movies. The badman, the sheriff--an aged
+party with whiskers and boots--the holdup, the sad eyes of the sheriff's
+daughter--also an aged party, but with a sunbonnet and the most
+expensive rouge--the crook's reformation, and his violent adherence to
+law and order; this libel upon the portions of these United States lying
+west of longitude 101 deg. Claire had seen too often. She dragged her father
+back to the hotel, sent him to bed, and entered her room--to find a
+telegram upon the bureau.
+
+She had sent her friends a list of the places at which she would be
+likely to stop. The message was from Jeff Saxton, in Brooklyn. It
+brought to her mind the steady shine of his glasses--the most expensive
+glasses, with the very best curved lenses--as it demanded:
+
+    "Received letter about trip surprised anxious will tire you out
+    fatigue prairie roads bad for your father mountain roads dangerous
+    strongly advise go only part way then take train.       GEOFFREY."
+
+She held the telegram, flipping her fingers against one end of it as she
+debated. She remembered how the wide world had flowed toward her over
+the hood of the Gomez all day. She wrote in answer:
+
+    "Awful perils of road, two punctures, split infinitive, eggs at
+    lunch questionable, but struggle on."
+
+Before she sent it she held council with her father. She sat on the foot
+of his bed and tried to sound dutiful. "I don't want to do anything
+that's bad for you, daddy. But isn't it taking your mind away from
+business?"
+
+"Ye-es, I think it is. Anyway, we'll try it a few days more."
+
+"I fancy we can stand up under the strain and perils. I think we can
+persuade some of these big farmers to come to the rescue if we encounter
+any walruses or crocodiles among the wheat. And I have a feeling that if
+we ever get stuck, our friend of the Teal bug will help us."
+
+"Probably never see him again. He'll skip on ahead of us."
+
+"Of course. We haven't laid an eye on him, along the road. He must have
+gotten into Fargo long before we did. Now tomorrow I think----"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE GREAT AMERICAN FRYING PAN
+
+
+It was Claire's first bad day since the hole in the mud. She had started
+gallantly, scooting along the level road that flies straight west of
+Fargo. But at noon she encountered a restaurant which made eating seem
+an evil.
+
+That they might have fair fame among motorists the commercial club of
+Reaper had set at the edge of town a sign "Welcome to Reaper, a Live
+Town--Speed Limit 8 Miles perhr." Being interpreted, that sign meant
+that if you went much over twenty miles an hour on the main street,
+people might glance at you; and that the real welcome, the only
+impression of Reaper that tourists were likely to carry away, was the
+welcome in the one restaurant. It was called the Eats Garden. As Claire
+and her father entered, they were stifled by a belch of smoke from the
+frying pan in the kitchen. The room was blocked by a huge lunch counter;
+there was only one table, covered with oil cloth decorated with
+venerable spots of dried egg yolk.
+
+The waiter-cook, whose apron was gravy-patterned, with a border and
+stomacher of plain gray dirt, grumbled, "Whadyuhwant?"
+
+Claire sufficiently recovered to pick out the type from the fly specks
+on the menu, and she ordered a small steak and coffee for her father;
+for herself tea, boiled eggs, toast.
+
+"Toast? We ain't got any toast!"
+
+"Well, can't you make it?"
+
+"Oh, I suppose I could----"
+
+When they came, the slices of toast were an inch thick, burnt on one
+side and raw on the other. The tea was bitter and the eggs watery. Her
+father reported that his steak was high-test rawhide, and his
+coffee--well, he wasn't sure just what substitute had been used for
+chicory, but he thought it was lukewarm quinine.
+
+Claire raged: "You know, this town really has aspirations. They're
+beginning to build such nice little bungalows, and there's a fine clean
+bank---- Then they permit this scoundrel to advertise the town among
+strangers, influential strangers, in motors, by serving food like this!
+I suppose they think that they arrest criminals here, yet this
+restaurant man is a thief, to charge real money for food like this----
+Yes, and he's a murderer!"
+
+"Oh, come now, dolly!"
+
+"Yes he is, literally. He must in his glorious career have given chronic
+indigestion to thousands of people--shortened their lives by years.
+That's wholesale murder. If I were the authorities here, I'd be
+indulgent to the people who only murder one or two people, but imprison
+this cook for life. Really! I mean it!"
+
+"Well, he probably does the best he----"
+
+"He does not! These eggs and this bread were perfectly good, before he
+did black magic over them. And did you see the contemptuous look he gave
+me when I was so eccentric as to order toast? Oh, Reaper, Reaper, you
+desire a modern town, yet I wonder if you know how many thousands of
+tourists go from coast to coast, cursing you? If I could only hang that
+restaurant man--and the others like him--in a rope of his own hempen
+griddle cakes! The Great American Frying Pan! I don't expect men
+building a new town to have time to read Hugh Walpole and James Branch
+Cabell, but I do expect them to afford a cook who can fry eggs!"
+
+As she paid the check, Claire tried to think of some protest which would
+have any effect on the obese wits of the restaurant man. In face of his
+pink puffiness she gave it up. Her failure as a Citizeness Fixit sent
+her out of the place in a fury, carried her on in a dusty whirl till the
+engine spat, sounded tired and reflective, and said it guessed it
+wouldn't go any farther that day.
+
+Now that she had something to do, Claire became patient. "Run out of
+gas. Isn't it lucky I got that can for an extra gallon?"
+
+But there was plenty of gas. There was no discernible reason why the
+car should not go. She started the engine. It ran for half a minute and
+quit. All the plugs showed sparks. No wires were detached in the
+distributor. There was plenty of water, and the oil was not clogged. And
+that ended Claire's knowledge of the inside of a motor.
+
+She stopped two motorists. The first was sure that there was dirt on the
+point of the needle valve, in the carburetor. While Claire shuddered
+lest he never get it back, he took out the needle valve, wiped it, put
+it back--and the engine was again started, and again, with great
+promptness, it stopped.
+
+The second Good Samaritan knew that one of the wires in the distributor
+must be detached and, though she assured him that she had inspected
+them, he looked pityingly at her smart sports-suit, said, "Well, I'll
+just take a look," and removed the distributor cover. He also scratched
+his head, felt of the fuses under the cowl, scratched his cheek, poked a
+finger at the carburetor, rubbed his ear, said, "Well, uh----" looked to
+see if there was water and gas, sighed, "Can't just seem to find out
+what's the trouble," shot at his own car, and escaped.
+
+Claire had been highly grateful and laudatory to both of them--but she
+remained here, ten miles from nowhere. It was a beautiful place. Down a
+hill the wheat swam toward a village whose elevator was a glistening
+tower. Mud-hens gabbled in a slew, alfalfa shone with unearthly green,
+and bees went junketing toward a field of red clover. But she had the
+motorist's fever to go on. The road behind and in front was very long,
+very white--and very empty.
+
+Her father, out of much thought and a solid ignorance about all of
+motoring beyond the hiring of chauffeurs and the payment of bills,
+suggested, "Uh, dolly, have you looked to see if these, uh---- Is the
+carburetor all right?"
+
+"Yes, dear; I've looked at it three times, so far," she said, just a
+little too smoothly.
+
+On the hill five miles to eastward, a line of dust, then a small car. As
+it approached, the driver must have sighted her and increased speed. He
+came up at thirty-five miles an hour.
+
+"Now we'll get something done! Look! It's a bug--a flivver or a Teal or
+something. I believe it's the young man that got us out of the mud."
+
+Milt Daggett stopped, casually greeted them: "Why, hello, Miss Boltwood.
+Thought you'd be way ahead of me some place!"
+
+"Mrwr," said Vere de Vere. What this meant the historian does not know.
+
+"No; I've been taking it easy. Mr., Uh--I can't quite remember your
+name----"
+
+"Milt Daggett."
+
+"There's something mysterious the matter with my car. The engine will
+start, after it's left alone a while, but then it stalls. Do you
+suppose you could tell what it is?"
+
+"I don't know. I'll see if I can find out."
+
+"Then you probably will. The other two men knew everything. One of them
+was the inventor of wheels, and the other discovered skidding. So of
+course they couldn't help me."
+
+Milt added nothing to her frivolity, but his smile was friendly. He
+lifted the round rubber cap of the distributor. Then Claire's faith
+tumbled in the dust. Twice had the wires been tested. Milt tested them
+again. She was too tired of botching to tell him he was wasting time.
+
+"Got an oil can?" he hesitated.
+
+Through a tiny hole in the plate of the distributor he dripped two drops
+of oil--only two drops. "I guess maybe that's what it needed. You might
+try her now, and see how she runs," he said mildly.
+
+Dubiously Claire started the engine. It sang jubilantly, and it did not
+stop. Again was the road open to her. Again was the settlement over
+there, to which it would have taken her an hour to walk, only six
+minutes away.
+
+She stopped the engine, beamed at him--there in the dust, on the quiet
+hilltop. He said as apologetically as though he had been at fault,
+"Distributor got dry. Might give it a little oil about once in six
+months."
+
+"We are so grateful to you! Twice now you've saved our lives."
+
+"Oh, I guess you'd have gone on living! And if drivers can't help each
+other, who can?"
+
+"That's a good start toward world-fellowship, I suppose. I wish we could
+do---- Return your lunch or---- Mr. Daggett! Do you read books? I
+mean----"
+
+"Yes I do, when I run across them."
+
+"Mayn't I gi--lend you these two that I happen to have along? I've
+finished them, and so has father, I think."
+
+From the folds of the strapped-down top she pulled out Compton
+Mackenzie's _Youth's Encounter_, and Vachel Lindsay's _Congo_. With a
+curious faint excitement she watched him turn the leaves. His blunt
+fingers flapped through them as though he was used to books. As he
+looked at _Congo_, he exclaimed, "Poetry! That's fine! Like it, but I
+don't hardly ever run across it. I---- Say---- I'm terribly obliged!"
+
+His clear face lifted, sun-brown and young and adoring. She had not
+often seen men look at her thus. Certainly Jeff Saxton's painless
+worship did not turn him into the likeness of a knight among banners.
+Yet the good Geoffrey loved her, while to Milt Daggett she could be
+nothing more than a strange young woman in a car with a New York
+license. If her tiny gift could so please him, how poor he must be. "He
+probably lives on some barren farm," she thought, "or he's a penniless
+mechanic hoping for a good job in Seattle. How white his forehead is!"
+
+But aloud she was saying, "I hope you're enjoying your trip."
+
+"Oh yes. I like it fine. You having a good time? Well---- Well, thanks
+for the books."
+
+She was off before him. Presently she exclaimed to Mr. Boltwood: "You
+know--just occurs to me--it's rather curious that our young friend
+should be so coincidental as to come along just when we needed him."
+
+"Oh, he just happened to, I suppose," hemmed her father.
+
+"I'm not so sure," she meditated, while she absently watched another
+member of the Poultry Suicide Club rush out of a safe ditch, prepare to
+take leave for immortality, change her fowlish mind, flutter up over the
+hood of the car, and come down squawking her indignities to the
+barnyard. "I'm not so sure about his happening---- No. I wonder if he
+could possibly---- Oh no. I hope not. Flattering, but---- You don't
+suppose he could be deliberately following us?"
+
+"Nonsense! He's a perfectly decent young chap."
+
+"I know. Of course. He probably works hard in a garage, and is terribly
+nice to his mother and sisters at home. I mean---- I wouldn't want the
+dear lamb to be a devoted knight, though. Too thankless a job."
+
+She slowed the car down to fifteen an hour. For the first time she began
+to watch the road behind her. In a few minutes a moving spot showed in
+the dust three miles back. Oh, naturally; he would still be behind her.
+Only---- If she stopped, just to look at the scenery, he would go on
+ahead of her. She stopped for a moment--for a time too brief to indicate
+that anything had gone wrong with her car. Staring back she saw that the
+bug stopped also, and she fancied that Milt was out standing beside it,
+peering with his palm over his eyes--a spy, unnatural and disturbing in
+the wide peace.
+
+She drove on a mile and halted again; again halted her attendant. He was
+keeping a consistent two to four miles behind, she estimated.
+
+"This won't do at all," she worried. "Flattering, but somehow----
+Whatever sort of a cocoon-wrapped hussy I am, I don't collect scalps. I
+won't have young men serving me--graft on them--get amusement out of
+their struggles. Besides--suppose he became just a little more friendly,
+each time he came up, all the way from here to Seattle?... Fresh.... No,
+it won't do."
+
+She ran the car to the side of the road.
+
+"More trouble?" groaned her father.
+
+"No. Just want to see scenery."
+
+"But---- There's a good deal of scenery on all sides, without stopping,
+seems to me!"
+
+"Yes, but----" She looked back. Milt had come into sight; had paused to
+take observations. Her father caught it:
+
+"Oh, I see. Pardon me. Our squire still following? Let him go on ahead?
+Wise lass."
+
+"Yes. I think perhaps it's better to avoid complications."
+
+"Of course." Mr. Boltwood's manner did not merely avoid Milt; it
+abolished him.
+
+She saw Milt, after five minutes of stationary watching, start forward.
+He came dustily rattling up with a hail of "Distributor on strike
+again?" so cheerful that it hurt her to dismiss him. But she had managed
+a household. She was able to say suavely:
+
+"No, everything is fine. I'm sure it will be, now. I'm afraid we are
+holding you back. You mustn't worry about us."
+
+"Oh, that's all right," breezily. "Something might go wrong. Say, is
+this poetry book----"
+
+"No, I'm sure nothing will go wrong now. You mustn't feel responsible
+for us. But, uh, you understand we're very grateful for what you have
+done and, uh, perhaps we shall see each other in Seattle?" She made it
+brightly interrogatory.
+
+"Oh, I see." His hands gripped the wheel. His cheeks had been too
+ruddily tinted by the Dakota sun to show a blush, but his teeth caught
+his lower lip. He had no starter on his bug; he had in his embarrassment
+to get out and crank. He did it quietly, not looking at her. She could
+see that his hand trembled on the crank. When he did glance at her, as
+he drove off, it was apologetically, miserably. His foot was shaking on
+the clutch pedal.
+
+The dust behind his car concealed him. For twenty miles she was silent,
+save when she burst out to her father, "I do hope you're enjoying the
+trip. It's so easy to make people unhappy. I wonder---- No. Had to be
+done."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE DISCOVERY OF CANNED SHRIMPS AND HESPERIDES
+
+
+On the morning when Milt Daggett had awakened to sunshine in the woods
+north of Gopher Prairie, he had discovered the golden age. As mile on
+mile he jogged over new hills, without having to worry about getting
+back to his garage in time to repair somebody's car, he realized that
+for the past two years he had forced himself to find contentment in
+building up a business that had no future.
+
+Now he laughed and whooped; he drove with one foot inelegantly and
+enchantingly up on the edge of the cowl; he made Lady Vere de Vere bow
+to astounded farmers; he went to the movies every evening--twice, in
+Fargo; and when the chariot of the young prince swept to the brow of a
+hill, he murmured, not in the manner of a bug-driver but with a stinging
+awe, "All that big country! Ours to see, puss! We'll settle down some
+day and be solid citizens and raise families and wheeze when we walk,
+but---- All those hills to sail over and---- Come on! Lez sail!"
+
+Milt attended the motion pictures every evening, and he saw them in a
+new way. As recently as one week before he had preferred those earnest
+depictions in which hard-working, moral actors shoot one another, or
+ride the most uncomfortable horses up mountainsides. But now, with a
+mental apology to that propagandist of lowbrowism, the absent Mac, he
+chose the films in which the leading men wore evening clothes, and no
+one ever did anything without being assisted by a "man." Aside from the
+pictures Milt's best tutors were traveling men. Though he measured every
+cent, and for his campfire dinners bought modest chuck steaks, he had at
+least one meal a day at a hotel, to watch the traveling men.
+
+To Claire, traveling men were merely commercial persons in hard-boiled
+suits. She identified them with the writing-up of order-slips on long
+littered writing-tables, and with hotels that reduced the delicate arts
+of dining and sleeping to gray greasiness. But Milt knew traveling men.
+He knew that not only were they the missionaries of business,
+supplementing the taking of orders by telling merchants how to build up
+trade, how to trim windows and treat customers like human beings; but
+also that they, as much as the local ministers and doctors and teachers
+and newspapermen, were the agents in spreading knowledge and justice. It
+was they who showed the young men how to have their hair cut--and to
+wash behind the ears and shave daily; they who encouraged villagers to
+rise from scandal and gossip to a perception of the Great World, of
+politics and sports, and some measure of art and science.
+
+Claire, and indeed her father and Mr. Jeff Saxton as well, had vaguely
+concluded that because drummers were always to be seen in soggy hotels
+and badly connecting trains and the headachy waiting-rooms of stations,
+they must like these places. Milt knew that the drummers were martyrs;
+that for months of a trip, all the while thinking of the children back
+home, they suffered from landlords and train schedules; that they were
+Claire's best allies in fighting the Great American Frying Pan; that
+they knew good things, and fought against the laziness and impositions
+of people who "kept hotel" because they had failed as farmers; and that
+when they did find a landlord who was cordial and efficient, they went
+forth mightily advertising that glorious man. The traveling men, he
+knew, were pioneers in spats.
+
+Hence it was to the traveling men, not to supercilious tourists in
+limousines, that Milt turned for suggestions as to how to perform the
+miracle of changing from an ambitious boy into what Claire would
+recognize as a charming man. He had not met enough traveling men at
+Schoenstrom. They scooped up what little business there was, and escaped
+from the Leipzig House to spend the night at St. Cloud or Sauk Centre.
+
+In the larger towns in Minnesota and Dakota, after evening movies,
+before slipping out to his roadside camp Milt inserted himself into a
+circle of traveling men in large leather chairs, and ventured, "Saw a
+Gomez-Dep with a New York license down the line today."
+
+"Oh. You driving through?"
+
+"Yes. Going to Seattle."
+
+That distinguished Milt from the ordinary young-men-loafers, and he was
+admitted as one of the assembly of men who traveled and saw things and
+wondered about the ways of men. It was good talk he heard; too much of
+hotels, and too many tight banal little phrases suggesting the solution
+of all economic complexities by hanging "agitators," but with this, an
+exciting accumulation of impressions of Vancouver and San Diego, Florida
+and K. C.
+
+"That's a wonderful work farm they have at Duluth," said one, and the
+next, "speaking of that, I was in Chicago last week, and I saw a
+play----"
+
+Milt had, in his two years of high school in St. Cloud, and in his
+boyhood under the genial but abstracted eye of the Old Doctor, learned
+that it was not well thought of to use the knife as a hod and to plaster
+mashed potatoes upon it, as was the custom in Mac's Old Home Lunch at
+Schoenstrom. But the arts of courteously approaching oysters, salad, and
+peas were rather unfamiliar to him. Now he studied forks as he had once
+studied carburetors, and he gave spiritual devotion to the nice eating
+of a canned-shrimp cocktail--a lost legion of shrimps, now two thousand
+miles and two years away from their ocean home.
+
+He peeped with equal earnestness at the socks and the shirts of the
+traveling men. Socks had been to him not an article of faith but a
+detail of economy. His attitude to socks had lacked in reverence and
+technique. He had not perceived that socks may be as sound a symbol of
+culture as the 'cello or even demountable rims. He had been able to
+think with respect of ties and damp pique collars secured by gold
+safety-pins; and to the belted fawn overcoat that the St. Klopstock
+banker's son had brought back from St. Paul, he had given jealous
+attention. But now he graduated into differential socks.
+
+By his campfire, sighing to the rather somnolent Vere de Vere, he
+scornfully yanked his extra pairs of thick, white-streaked, yellow
+cotton socks from the wicker suitcase, and uttered anathema:
+
+"Begone, ye unworthy and punk-looking raiment. I know ye! Ye werst a
+bargain and two pairs for two bits. But even as Adolph Zolzac and an
+agent for flivver accessories are ye become in my eyes, ye generation of
+vipers, ye clumsy, bag-footed, wrinkle-sided gunny-sacking ye!"
+
+Next day, in the woods, a happy hobo found that the manna-bringing
+ravens had left him four pairs of good socks.
+
+Five quite expensive pairs of silk and lisle socks Milt purchased--all
+that the general merchant at Jeppe had in stock. What they lost in
+suitability to touring and to private laundering at creeks, they gained
+as symbols. Milt felt less shut out from the life of leisure. Now, in
+Seattle, say, he could go into a good hotel with less fear of the
+clerks.
+
+He added attractive outing shirts, ties neither too blackly dull nor too
+flashily crimson, and a vicious nail-brush which simply tore out the
+motor grease that had grown into the lines of his hands. Also he added a
+book.
+
+The book was a rhetoric. Milt knew perfectly that there was an
+impertinence called grammar, but it had never annoyed him much. He knew
+that many persons preferred "They were" to "They was," and were nervous
+in the presence of "ain't." One teacher in St. Cloud had buzzed
+frightfully about these minutiae. But Milt discovered that grammar was
+only the beginning of woes. He learned that there were such mental
+mortgages as figures of speech and the choice of synonyms. He had always
+known, but he had never passionately felt that the invariable use of
+"hell," "doggone," and "You bet!" left certain subtleties unexpressed.
+Now he was finding subtleties which he had to express.
+
+As joyously adventurous as going on day after day was his
+experimentation in voicing his new observations. He gave far more
+eagerness to it than Claire Boltwood had. Gustily intoning to Vere de
+Vere, who was the perfect audience, inasmuch as she never had anything
+to say but "Mrwr," and didn't mind being interrupted in that, he
+clamored, "The prairies are the sea. In the distance they are kind of
+silvery--no--they are dim silver; and way off on the skyline are the
+Islands of the--of the---- Now what the devil was them, were those,
+islands in the mythology book in high school? Of the--Blessed? Great
+snakes' boots, you're an ignorant cat, Vere! Hesperyds? No! Hesperides!
+Yea, bo'! Now that man in the hotel: 'May I trouble you for the train
+guide? Thanks so much!' But how much is so much?"
+
+As Claire's days were set free by her consciousness of sun and brown
+earth, so Milt's odyssey was only the more valorous in his endeavor to
+criticize life. He saw that Mac's lunch room had not been an altogether
+satisfactory home; that Mac's habit of saying to dissatisfied customers,
+"If you don't like it, get out," had lacked something of courtesy.
+Staring at towns along the way, Milt saw that houses were not merely
+large and comfortable, or small and stingy; but that there was an
+interesting thing he remembered hearing his teachers call "good taste."
+
+He was not the preoccupied Milt of the garage but a gay-eyed gallant,
+the evening when he gave a lift to the school-teacher and drove her from
+the district school among the wild roses and the corn to her home in the
+next town. She was a neat, tripping, trim-sided school-teacher of
+nineteen or twenty.
+
+"You're going out to Seattle? My! That's a wonderful trip. Don't you get
+tired?" she adored.
+
+"Oh, no. And I'm seeing things. I used to think everything worth while
+was right near my own town."
+
+"You're so wise to go places. Most of the boys I know don't think there
+is any world beyond Jimtown and Fargo."
+
+She glowed at him. Milt was saying to himself, "Am I a fool? I probably
+could make this girl fall in love with me. And she's better than I am;
+so darn neat and clean and gentle. We'd be happy. She's a nice comfy
+fire, and here I go like a boob, chasing after a lone, cold star like
+Miss Boltwood, and probably I'll fall into all the slews from hell to
+breakfast on the way. But---- I'd get sleepy by a comfy fire."
+
+"Are you thinking hard? You're frowning so," ventured the
+school-teacher.
+
+"Didn't mean to. 'Scuse!" he laughed. One hand off the steering wheel,
+he took her hand--a fresh, cool, virginal hand, snuggling into his,
+suddenly stirring him. He wanted to hold it tighter. The lamenting
+historian of love's pilgrimage must set down the fact that the pilgrim
+for at least a second forgot the divine tread of the goddess Claire, and
+made rapid calculation that he could, in a pinch, drive from Schoenstrom
+to the teacher's town in two days and a night; that therefore courtship,
+and this sweet white hand resting in his, were not impossible. Milt
+himself did not know what it was that made him lay down the hand and
+say, so softly that he was but half audible through the rattle of the
+engine:
+
+"Isn't this a slick, mean to say glorious evening? Sky rose and then
+that funny lavender. And that new moon---- Makes me think of--the girl
+I'm in love with."
+
+"You're engaged?" wistfully.
+
+"Not exactly but---- Say, did you study rhetoric in Normal School? I
+have a rhetoric that's got all kind of poetic extracts, you know, and
+quotations and everything, from the big writers, Stevenson and all.
+Always been so practical, making a garage pay, never thought much about
+how I said things as long as I could say 'No!' and say it quick. 'Cept
+maybe when I was talking to the prof there. But it's great sport to see
+how musical you can make a thing sound. Words. Like Shenandoah. Gol-lee!
+Isn't that a wonderful word? Makes you see old white mansion, and
+mocking birds---- Wonder if a fellow could be a big engineer, you know,
+build bridges and so on, and still talk about, oh, beautiful things?
+What d' you think, girlie?"
+
+"Oh, I'm sure you could!"
+
+Her admiration, the proximity of her fragrant slightness, was pleasant
+in the dusk, but he did not press her hand again, even when she
+whispered, "Good night, and thank you--oh, thank you."
+
+If Milt had been driving at the rate at which he usually made his
+skipjack carom over the roads about Schoenstrom, he would by now have
+been through Dakota, into Montana. But he was deliberately holding down
+the speed. When he had been tempted by a smooth stretch to go too
+breathlessly, he halted, teased Vere de Vere, climbed out and, sitting
+on a hilltop, his hands about his knees, drenched his soul with the
+vision of amber distances.
+
+He tried so to time his progress that he might always be from three to
+five miles behind Claire--distant enough to be unnoticed, near enough to
+help in case of need. For behind poetic expression and the use of forks
+was the fact that his purpose in life was to know Claire.
+
+When he was caught, when Claire informed him that he "mustn't worry
+about her"; when, slowly, he understood that she wasn't being neighborly
+and interested in his making time, he wanted to escape, never to see her
+again.
+
+For thirty miles his cheeks were fiery. He, most considerate of roadmen,
+crowded a woman in a flivver, passed a laboring car on an upgrade with
+such a burst that the uneasy driver bumped off into a ditch. He hadn't
+really seen them. Only mechanically had he got past them. He was
+muttering:
+
+"She thought I was trying to butt in! Stung again! Like a small boy in
+love with teacher. And I thought I was so wise! Cussed out Mac--blamed
+Mac--no, damn all the fine words--cussed out Mac for being the village
+rumhound. Boozing is twice as sensible as me. See a girl, nice
+dress--start for Seattle! Two thousand miles away! Of course she bawled
+me out. She was dead right. Boob! Yahoo! Goat!"
+
+He caught up Vere de Vere, rubbed her fur against his cheek while he
+mourned, "Oh, puss, you got to be nice to me. I thought I'd do big
+things. And then the alarm clock went off. I'm back in Schoenstrom. For
+keeps, I guess. I didn't know I had feelings that could get hurt like
+this. Thought I had a rhinoceros hide. But---- Oh, it isn't just feeling
+ashamed over being a fool. It's that---- Won't ever see her again. Not
+once. Way I saw her through the window, at that hotel, in that blue
+silky dress--that funny long line of buttons, and her throat. Never have
+dinner--lunch--with her by the road----"
+
+In the reaction of anger he demanded of Vere de Vere, "What the deuce do
+I care? If she's chump enough to chase away a crack garage man that's
+gone batty and wants to work for nothing, let her go on and hit some
+crook garage and get stuck for an entire overhauling. What do I care?
+Had nice trip; that's all I wanted. Never did intend to go clear to
+Seattle, anyway. Go on to Butte, then back home. No more fussing about
+fool table-manners and books, and I certainly will cut out tagging
+behind her! No, sir! Nev-er again!"
+
+It was somewhat inconsistent to add, "There's a bully place--sneak in
+and let her get past me again. But she won't catch me following next
+time!"
+
+While he tried to keep up his virtuous anger, he was steering into an
+abandoned farmyard, parking the car behind cottonwoods and neglected
+tall currant bushes which would conceal it from the road.
+
+The windows of the deserted house stared at him; a splintered screen
+door banged in every breeze. Lichens leered from the cracks of the
+porch. The yard was filled with a litter of cottonwood twigs, and over
+the flower garden hulked ragged weeds. In the rank grass about the slimy
+green lip of the well, crickets piped derisively. The barn-door was
+open. Stray kernels of wheat had sprouted between the spokes of a rusty
+binder-wheel. A rat slipped across the edge of the shattered manger. As
+dusk came on, gray things seemed to slither past the upper windows of
+the house, and somewhere, under the roof, there was a moaning. Milt was
+sure that it was the wind in a knothole. He told himself that he was
+absolutely sure about it. And every time it came he stroked Vere de Vere
+carefully, and once, when the moaning ended in the slamming of the
+screen door, he said, "Jiminy!"
+
+This boy of the unghostly cylinders and tangible magnetos had never
+seen a haunted house. To toil of the harvest field and machine shop and
+to trudging the sun-beaten road he was accustomed, but he had never
+crouched watching the slinking spirits of old hopes and broken
+aspirations; feeble phantoms of the first eager bridegroom who had come
+to this place, and the mortgage-crushed, rust-wheat-ruined man who had
+left it. He wanted to leap into the bug and go on. Yet the haunt of
+murmurous memories dignified his unhappiness. In the soft, tree-dimmed
+dooryard among dry, blazing plains it seemed indecent to go on growling
+"Gee," and "Can you beat it?" It was a young poet, a poet rhymeless and
+inarticulate, who huddled behind the shield of untrimmed currant bushes,
+and thought of the girl he would never see again.
+
+He was hungry, but he did not eat. He was cramped, but he did not move.
+He picked up the books she had given him. He was quickened by the
+powdery beauty of _Youth's Encounter_; by the vision of laughter and
+dancing steps beneath a streaky gas-glow in the London fog; of youth not
+"roughhousing" and wanting to "be a sport," yet in frail beauty and
+faded crimson banners finding such exaltation as Schoenstrom had never
+known. But every page suggested Claire, and he tucked the book away.
+
+In Vachel Lindsay's _Congo_, in a poem called "The Santa Fe Trail," he
+found his own modern pilgrimage from another point of view. Here was
+the poet, disturbed by the honking hustle of passing cars. But Milt
+belonged to the honking and the hustle, and it was not the soul of the
+grass that he read in the poem, but his own sun-flickering flight:
+
+    Swiftly the brazen car comes on.
+    It burns in the East as the sunrise burns.
+    I see great flashes where the far trail turns.
+    Butting through the delicate mists of the morning,
+    It comes like lightning, goes past roaring,
+    It will hail all the windmills, taunting, ringing,
+    On through the ranges the prairie-dog tills--
+    Scooting past the cattle on the thousand hills.
+    Ho for the tear-horn, scare-horn, dare-horn,
+    Ho for the gay-horn, bark-horn, bay-horn.
+
+Milt did not reflect that if the poet had watched the Teal bug go by, he
+would not have recorded a scare-horn, a dare-horn, or anything mightier
+than a yip-horn. Milt saw himself a cross-continent racer, with the
+envious poet, left behind as a dot on the hill, celebrating his passing.
+
+"Lord!" he cried. "I didn't know there were books like these! Thought
+poetry was all like Longfellow and Byron. Old boys. Europe. And rhymed
+bellyachin' about hard luck. But these books--they're me." Very
+carefully: "No; they're I! And she gave 'em to me! I will see her again!
+But she won't know it. Now be sensible, son! What do you expect?
+Oh--nothing. I'll just go on, and sneak in one more glimpse of her to
+take back with me where I belong."
+
+Half an hour after Claire had innocently passed his ambush, he began to
+follow her. But not for days was he careless. If he saw her on the
+horizon he paused until she was out of sight. That he might not fail her
+in need, he bought a ridiculously expensive pair of field glasses, and
+watched her when she stopped by the road. Once, when both her right rear
+tire and the spare were punctured before she could make a town, Milt
+from afar saw her patch a tube, pump up the tire in the dust. He ached
+to go to her aid--though it cannot be said that hand-pumping was his
+favorite July afternoon sport.
+
+Lest he encounter her in the streets, he always camped to the eastward
+of the town at which she spent the night. After dusk, when she was
+likely to end the day's drive in the first sizable place, he hid his bug
+in an alley and, like a spy after the papers, sneaked into each garage
+to see if her car was there.
+
+He would stroll in, look about vacuously, and pipe to the suspicious
+night attendant, "Seen a traveling man named Smith?" Usually the garage
+man snarled, "No, I ain't seen nobody named Smith. An'thing else I can
+do for you?" But once he was so unlucky as to find the long-missing Mr.
+Smith!
+
+Mr. Smith was surprised and insistent. Milt had to do some quick lying.
+During that interview the cement floor felt very hard under his
+fidgeting feet, and he thought he heard the garage man in the office
+telephoning, "Don't think he knows Smith at all. I got a hunch he's that
+auto thief that was through here last summer."
+
+When Claire did not stop in the first town she reached after twilight,
+but drove on by dark, he had to do some perilous galloping to catch up.
+The lights of a Teal are excellent for adornment, but they have no
+relation to illumination. They are dependent upon a magneto which is
+dependent only upon faith.
+
+Once, skittering along by dark, he realized that the halted car which he
+had just passed was the Gomez. He thought he heard a shout behind him,
+but in a panic he kept going.
+
+To the burring motor he groaned, "Now I probably never will see her
+again. Except that she thinks I'm such a pest that I dassn't let her
+know I'm in the same state, I sure am one successful lover. As a Prince
+Charming I win the Vanderbilt Cup. I'm going ahead backwards so fast
+I'll probably drop off into the Atlantic over the next hill!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE MAN WITH AGATE EYES
+
+
+When her car had crossed the Missouri River on the swing-ferry between
+Bismarck and Mandan, Claire had passed from Middle West to Far West. She
+came out on an upland of virgin prairie, so treeless and houseless, so
+divinely dipping, so rough of grass, that she could imagine buffaloes
+still roving. In a hollow a real prairie schooner was camped, and the
+wandering homestead-seekers were cooking dinner beside it. From a quilt
+on the hay in the wagon a baby peeped, and Claire's heart leaped.
+
+Beyond was her first butte, its sharp-cut sides glittering yellow, and
+she fancied that on it the Sioux scout still sat sentinel, erect on his
+pony, the feather bonnet down his back.
+
+Now she seemed to breathe deeper, see farther. Again she came from
+unbroken prairie into wheat country and large towns.
+
+Her impression of the new land was not merely of sun-glaring breadth.
+Sometimes, on a cloudy day, the wash of wheatlands was as brown and
+lowering and mysterious as an English moor in the mist. It dwarfed the
+far-off houses by its giant enchantment; its brooding reaches changed
+her attitude of brisk, gas-driven efficiency into a melancholy that was
+full of hints of old dark beauty.
+
+Even when the sun came out, and the land was brazenly optimistic, she
+saw more than just prosperity. In a new home, house and barn and
+windmill square-cornered and prosaic, plumped down in a field with wheat
+coming up to the unporticoed door, a habitation unshadowed, unsheltered,
+unsoftened, she found a frank cleanness, as though the inhabitants
+looked squarely out at life, unafraid. She felt that the keen winds
+ought to blow away from such a prairie-fronting post of civilization all
+mildew and cowardice, all the mummy dust of ancient fears.
+
+These were not peasants, these farmers. Nor, she learned, were they the
+"hicks" of humor. She could never again encounter without fiery
+resentment the Broadway peddler's faith that farmers invariably say
+"Waal, by heck." For she had spent an hour talking to one Dakota farmer,
+genial-eyed, quiet of speech. He had explained the relation of alfalfa
+to soil-chemistry; had spoken of his daughter, who taught economics in a
+state university; and asked Mr. Boltwood how turbines were hitched up on
+liners.
+
+In fact, Claire learned that there may be an almost tolerable state of
+existence without gardenias or the news about the latest Parisian
+imagists.
+
+She dropped suddenly from the vast, smooth-swelling miles of wheatland
+into the tortured marvels of the Bad Lands, and the road twisted in the
+shadow of flying buttresses and the terraced tombs of maharajas. While
+she tried to pick her way through a herd of wild, arroyo-bred cattle,
+she forgot her maneuvering as she was startled by the stabbing scarlet
+of a column of rock marking the place where for months deep beds of
+lignite had burned.
+
+Claire had often given lifts to tramping harvesters and even hoboes
+along the road; had enjoyed the sight of their duffle-bags stuck up
+between the sleek fenders and the hood, and their talk about people and
+crops along the road, as they hung on the running-board. In the country
+of long hillslopes and sentinel buttes between the Dakota Bad Lands and
+Miles City she stopped to shout to a man whose plodding heavy back
+looked fagged, "Want a ride?"
+
+"Sure! You bet!"
+
+Usually her guests stepped on the right-hand running-board, beside Mr.
+Boltwood, and this man was far over on the right side of the road. But,
+while she waited, he sauntered in front of the car, round to her side,
+mounted beside her. Before the car had started, she was sorry to have
+invited him. He looked her over grinningly, almost contemptuously. His
+unabashed eyes were as bright and hard as agates. Below them, his nose
+was twisted a little, his mouth bent insolently up at one corner, and
+his square long chin bristled.
+
+Usually, too, her passengers waited for her to start the conversation,
+and talked at Mr. Boltwood rather than directly to her. But the bristly
+man spat at her as the car started, "Going far?"
+
+"Ye-es, some distance."
+
+"Expensive car?"
+
+"Why----"
+
+"'Fraid of getting held up?"
+
+"I hadn't thought about it."
+
+"Pack a cannon, don't you?"
+
+"I don't think I quite understand."
+
+"Cannon! Gun! Revolver! Got a revolver, of course?"
+
+"W-why, no." She spoke uncomfortably. She was aware that his twinkling
+eyes were on her throat. His look made her feel unclean. She tried to
+think of some question which would lead the conversation to the less
+exclamatory subject of crops. They were on a curving shelf road beside a
+shallow valley. The road was one side of a horseshoe ten miles long. The
+unprotected edge of it dropped sharply to fields forty or fifty feet
+below.
+
+"Prosperous-looking wheat down there," she said.
+
+"No. Not a bit!" His look seemed to add, "And you know it--unless you're
+a fool!"
+
+"Well, I didn't----"
+
+"Make Glendive tonight?"
+
+"At least that far."
+
+"Say, lady, how's the chance for borrowin' a couple of dollars? I was
+workin' for a Finnski back here a ways, and he did me dirt--holdin' out
+my wages on me till the end of the month."
+
+"Why, uh----"
+
+It was Claire, not the man, who was embarrassed.
+
+He was snickering, "Come on, don't be a tightwad. Swell car--poor man
+with no eats, not even a two-bits flop for tonight. Could yuh loosen up
+and slip me just a couple bones?"
+
+Mr. Boltwood intervened. He looked as uncomfortable as Claire. "We'll
+see. It's rather against my principles to give money to an able-bodied
+man like you, even though it is a pleasure to give you a ride----"
+
+"Sure! Don't cost you one red cent!"
+
+"--and if I could help you get a job, though of course---- Being a
+stranger out here---- Seems strange to me, though," Mr. Boltwood
+struggled on, "that a strong fellow like you should be utterly
+destitute, when I see all these farmers able to have cars----"
+
+Their guest instantly abandoned his attitude of supplication for one of
+boasting: "Destitute? Who the hell said I was destitute, heh?" He was
+snarling across Claire at Mr. Boltwood. His wet face was five inches
+from hers. She drew her head as far back as she could. She was sure that
+the man completely appreciated her distaste, for his eyes popped with
+amusement before he roared on:
+
+"I got plenty of money! Just 'cause I'm hoofin' it---- I don't want no
+charity from nobody! I could buy out half these Honyockers! I don't need
+none of no man's money!" He was efficiently working himself into a rage.
+"Who you calling destitute? All I wanted was an advance till pay day!
+Got a check coming. You high-tone, kid-glove Eastern towerists want to
+watch out who you go calling destitute. I bet I make a lot more money
+than a lot of your four-flushin' friends!"
+
+Claire wondered if she couldn't stop the car now, and tell him to get
+off. But--that snapping eye was too vicious. Before he got off he would
+say things--scarring, vile things, that would never heal in her brain.
+Her father was murmuring, "Let's drop him," but she softly lied, "No.
+His impertinence amuses me."
+
+She drove on, and prayed that he would of himself leave his uncharitable
+hosts at the next town.
+
+The man was storming--with a very meek ending: "I'm tellin' you! I can
+make money anywhere! I'm a crack machinist.... Give me two-bits for a
+meal, anyway."
+
+Mr. Boltwood reached in his change pocket. He had no quarter. He pulled
+out a plump bill-fold. Without looking at the man, Claire could vision
+his eyes glistening and his chops dripping as he stared at the hoard.
+Mr. Boltwood handed him a dollar bill. "There, take that, and let's
+change the subject," said Mr. Boltwood testily.
+
+"All right, boss. Say, you haven't got a cartwheel instead of this
+wrapping paper, have you? I like to feel my money in my pocket."
+
+"No, sir, I have not!"
+
+"All right, boss. No bad feelin's!"
+
+Then he ignored Mr. Boltwood. His eyes focused on Claire's face. To
+steady himself on the running-board he had placed his left hand on the
+side of the car, his right on the back of the seat. That right hand slid
+behind her. She could feel its warmth on her back.
+
+She burst out, flaring, "Kindly do not touch me!"
+
+"Gee, did I touch you, girlie? Why, that's a shame!" he drawled, his
+cracked broad lips turning up in a grin.
+
+An instant later, as they skipped round a bend of the long, high-hung
+shelf road, he pretended to sway dangerously on the running-board, and
+deliberately laid his filthy hand on her shoulder. Before she could say
+anything he yelped in mock-regret, "Love o' Mike! 'Scuse me, lady. I
+almost fell off."
+
+Quietly, seriously, Claire said, "No, that wasn't accidental. If you
+touch me again, I'll stop the car and ask you to walk."
+
+"Better do it now, dolly!" snapped Mr. Boltwood.
+
+The man hooked his left arm about the side-post of the open
+window-shield. It was a strong arm, a firm grip. He seized her left
+wrist with his free hand. Though all the while his eyes grotesquely kept
+their amused sparkle, and beside them writhed laughter-wrinkles, he
+shouted hoarsely, "You'll stop hell!" His hand slid from her wrist to
+the steering wheel. "I can drive this boat's well as you can. You make
+one move to stop, and I steer her over---- Blooie! Down the bank!"
+
+He did twist the front wheels dangerously near to the outer edge of the
+shelf road. Mr. Boltwood gazed at the hand on the wheel. With a quick
+breath Claire looked at the side of the road. If the car ran off, it
+would shoot down forty feet ... turning over and over.
+
+"Y-you wouldn't dare, because you'd g-go, too!" she panted.
+
+"Well, dearuh, you just try any monkey business and you'll find out how
+much I'll gggggggo-too! I'll start you down the joy-slope and jump off,
+savvy? Take your foot off that clutch."
+
+She obeyed.
+
+"Pretty lil feet, ain't they, cutie! Shoes cost about twelve bucks, I
+reckon. While a better man than you or old moldy-face there has to hit
+the pike in three-dollar brogans. Sit down, yuh fool!"
+
+This last to Mr. Boltwood, who had stood up, swaying with the car, and
+struck at him. With a huge arm the man swept Mr. Boltwood back into the
+seat, but without a word to her father, he continued to Claire:
+
+"And keep your hand where it belongs. Don't go trying to touch that
+switch. Aw, be sensible! What would you do if the car did stop? I could
+blackjack you both before this swell-elegant vehickle lost momentum,
+savvy? I don't want to pay out my good money to a lawyer on a charge
+of--murder. Get me? Better take it easy and not worry." His hand was
+constantly on the wheel. He had driven cars before. He was steering as
+much as she. "When I get you up the road a piece I'm going to drive all
+the cute lil boys and girls up a side trail, and take all of papa's
+gosh-what-a-wad in the cunnin' potet-book, and I guess we'll kiss lil
+daughter, and drive on, a-wavin' our hand politely, and let you suckers
+walk to the next burg."
+
+"You wouldn't dare! You wouldn't dare!"
+
+"Dare? Huh! Don't make the driver laugh!"
+
+"I'll get help!"
+
+"Yep. Sure. Fact, there's a car comin' toward us. 'Bout a mile away I'd
+make it, wouldn't you? Well, dollface, if you make one peep--over the
+bank you go, both of you dead as a couplin'-pin. Smeared all over those
+rocks. Get me? And me--I'll be sorry the regrettable accident was so
+naughty and went and happened--and I just got off in time meself. And
+I'll pinch papa's poke while I'm helping get out the bodies!"
+
+Till now she hadn't believed it. But she dared not glance at the
+approaching car. It was their interesting guest who steered the Gomez
+past the other; and he ran rather too near the edge of the road ... so
+that she looked over, down.
+
+Beaming, he went on, "I'd pull the rough stuff right here, instead of
+wastin' my time as a cap'n of industry by taking you up to see the
+scenery in that daisy little gully off the road; but the whole world can
+see us along here--the hicks in the valley and anybody that happens to
+sneak along in a car behind us. Shame the way this road curves--see too
+far along it. Fact, you're giving me a lot of trouble. But you'll give
+me a kiss, won't you, Gwendolyn?"
+
+He bent down, chuckling. She could feel his bristly chin touch her
+cheek. She sprang up, struck at him. He raised his hand from the wheel.
+For a second the car ran without control. He jabbed her back into the
+seat with his elbow. "Don't try any more monkey-shines, if you know
+what's good for you," he said, quite peacefully, as he resumed steering.
+
+She was in a haze, conscious only of her father's hand fondling hers.
+She heard a quick pit-pit-pit-pit behind them. Car going to pass? She'd
+have to let it go by. She'd concentrate on finding something she
+could----
+
+Then, "Hello, folks. Having a picnic? Who's your little friend in the
+rompers?" sang out a voice beside them. It was Milt Daggett--the Milt
+who must be scores of miles ahead. His bug had caught up with them, was
+running even with them on the broad road.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE HILLSIDE ROAD
+
+
+So unexpectedly, so genially, that Claire wondered if he realized what
+was happening, Milt chuckled to the tough on the running-board, as the
+two cars ran side by side, "Bound for some place, brother?"
+
+The unwelcome guest looked puzzled. For the first time his china eyes
+ceased twinkling; and he answered dubiously: "Just gettin' a lift." He
+sped up the car with the hand-throttle. Milt accelerated equally.
+
+Claire roused; wanted to shout. She was palsied afraid that Milt would
+leave them. The last time she had seen him, she had suggested that
+leaving them would be a favor.
+
+Her guest growled at her--the words coming through a slit at the corner
+of his rowdy mouth, "Sit still, or I'll run you over."
+
+Milt innocently babbled on, "Better come ride with me, bo'. More room in
+this-here handsome coupelet."
+
+Then was the rough relieved in his uneasy tender little heart, and his
+eyes flickered again as he shouted back, not looking at Milt, "Thanks,
+bub, I'll stick by me friends."
+
+"Oh no; can't lose pleasure of your company. I like your looks. You're a
+bloomin' little island way off on the dim silver skyline." Claire
+knitted her brows. She had not seen Milt's rhetoric. "You're an island
+of Hesperyds or Hesperides. Accent on the bezuzus. Oh, yes, moondream, I
+think you better come. Haven't decided"--Milt's tone was bland--"whether
+to kill you or just have you pinched. Miss Boltwood! Switch off your
+power!"
+
+"If she does," the tough shouted, "I'll run 'em off the bank."
+
+"No, you won't, sweetheart, 'cause why? 'Cause what'll I do to you
+afterwards?"
+
+"You won't do nothin', Jack, 'cause I'd gouge your eyes out."
+
+"Why, lovesoul, d' you suppose I'd be talking up as brash as this to a
+bid, stwong man like oo if I didn't have a gun handy?"
+
+"Yuh, I guess so, lil sunbeam. And before you could shoot, I'd crowd
+your tin liz into the bank, and jam right into it! I may get killed, but
+you won't even be a grease-spot!"
+
+He was turning the Gomez from its straight course, forcing Milt's bug
+toward the high bank of earth which walled in the road on the left.
+
+While Claire was very sick with fear, then more sick with contempt, Milt
+squealed, "You win!" And he had dropped back. The Gomez was going on
+alone.
+
+There was only one thing more for Claire--to jump. And that meant death.
+
+The tough was storming, "Your friend's a crack shot--with his mouth!"
+
+The thin pit-pit-pit was coming again. She looked back. She saw Milt's
+bug snap forward so fast that on a bump its light wheels were in the
+air. She saw Milt standing on the right side of the bug holding the
+wheel with one hand, and the other hand--firm, grim, broad-knuckled
+hand--outstretched toward the tough, then snatching at his collar.
+
+The tough's grip was torn from the steering wheel. He was yanked from
+the running-board. He crunched down on the road.
+
+She seized the wheel. She drove on at sixty miles an hour. She had gone
+a good mile before she got control of her fear and halted. She saw Milt
+turn his little car as though it were a prancing bronco. It seemed to
+paw the air with its front wheels. He shot back, pursuing the late
+guest. The man ran bobbing along the road. At this distance he was no
+longer formidable, but a comic, jerking, rabbity figure, humping himself
+over the back track.
+
+As the bug whirled down on him, the tough was to be seen throwing up his
+hands, leaping from the high bank.
+
+Milt turned again and came toward them, but slowly; and after he had
+drawn up even and switched off the engine, he snatched off his violent
+plaid cap and looked apologetic.
+
+"Sorry I had to kid him along. I was afraid he really would drive you
+off the bank. He was a bad actor. And he was right; he could have licked
+me. Thought maybe I could jolly him into getting off, and have him
+pinched, next town."
+
+"But you had a gun--a revolver--didn't you, lad?" panted Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"Um, wellllll---- I've got a shotgun. It wouldn't take me more 'n five
+or ten minutes to dig it out, and put it together. And there's some
+shells. They may be all right. Haven't looked at 'em since last fall.
+They didn't get so awful damp then."
+
+"But suppose he'd had a revolver himself?" wailed Claire.
+
+"Gee, you know, I thought he probably did have one. I was scared blue. I
+had a wrench to throw at him though," confided Milt.
+
+"How did you know we needed you?"
+
+"Why back there, couple miles behind you, maybe I saw your father get up
+and try to wrestle him, so I suspected there was kind of a disagreement.
+Say, Miss Boltwood, you know when you spoke to me--way back there--I
+hadn't meant to butt in. Honest. I thought maybe as we were going----"
+
+"Oh, I know!"
+
+"--the same way, you wouldn't mind my trailing, if I didn't sit in too
+often; and I thought maybe I could help you if----"
+
+"Oh, I know! I'm so ashamed! So bitterly ashamed! I just meant---- Will
+you forgive me? You were so good, taking care of us----"
+
+"Oh, sure, that's all right!"
+
+"I fancy you do know how grateful father and I are that you were behind
+us, this time! Wasn't it a lucky accident that we'd slipped past you
+some place!"
+
+"Yes," dryly, "quite an accident. Well, I'll skip on ahead again. May
+run into you again before we hit Seattle. Going to take the run through
+Yellowstone Park?"
+
+"Yes, but----" began Claire. Her father interrupted:
+
+"Uh, Mr., uh--Daggett, was it?--I wonder if you won't stay a little
+closer to us hereafter? I was getting rather a good change out of the
+trip, but I'm afraid that now---- If it wouldn't be an insult, I'd beg
+you to consider staying with us for a consideration, uh, you know,
+remuneration, and you could----"
+
+"Thanks, uh, thank you, sir, but I wouldn't like to do it. You see, it's
+kind of my vacation. If I've done anything I'm tickled----"
+
+"But perhaps," Mr. Boltwood ardently begged the young man recently so
+abysmally unimportant, "perhaps you would consent to being my guest,
+when you cared to--say at hotels in the Park."
+
+"'Fraid I couldn't. I'm kind of a lone wolf."
+
+"Please! Pretty please!" besought Claire. Her smile was appealing, her
+eyes on his.
+
+Milt bit his knuckles. He looked weak. But he persisted, "No, you'll get
+over this scrap with our friend. By the way, I'll put the deputy onto
+him, in the next town. He'll never get out of the county. When you
+forget him---- Oh no, you can go on fine. You're a good steady driver,
+and the road's perfectly safe--if you give people the once-over before
+you pick 'em up. Picking up badmen is no more dangerous here than it
+would be in New York. Fact, there's lot more hold-ups in any city than
+in the wildest country. I don't think you showed such awfully good taste
+in asking Terrible Tim, the two-gun man, right into the parlor. Gee,
+please don't do it again! Please!"
+
+"No," meekly. "I was an idiot. I'll be good, next time. But won't you
+stay somewhere near us?"
+
+"I'd like to, but I got to chase on. Don't want to wear out the welcome
+on the doormat, and I'm due in Seattle, and---- Say, Miss Boltwood." He
+swung out of the bug, cranked up, climbed back, went awkwardly on, "I
+read those books you gave me. They're slick--mean to say, interesting.
+Where that young fellow in _Youth's Encounter_ wanted to be a bishop and
+a soldier and everything---- Just like me, except Schoenstrom is
+different, from London, some ways! I always wanted to be a brakie, and
+then a yeggman. But I wasn't bright enough for either. I just became a
+garage man. And I---- Some day I'm going to stop using slang. But it'll
+take an operation!"
+
+He was streaking down the road, and Claire was sobbing, "Oh, the lamb,
+the darling thing! Fretting about his slang, when he wasn't afraid in
+that horrible nightmare. If we could just do something for him!"
+
+"Don't you worry about him, dolly. He's a very energetic chap. And----
+Uh---- Mightn't we drive on a little farther, perhaps? I confess that
+the thought of our recent guest still in this vicinity----"
+
+"Yes, and---- Oh, I'm shameless. If Mohammed Milton won't stay with our
+car mountain, we're going to tag after him."
+
+But when she reached the next hill, with its far shining outlook, there
+was no Milt and no Teal bug on the road ahead.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+SAGEBRUSH TOURISTS OF THE GREAT HIGHWAY
+
+
+She had rested for two days in Miles City; had seen the horse-market,
+with horse-wranglers in chaps; had taken dinner with army people at Fort
+Keogh, once the bulwark against the Sioux, now nodding over the dry
+grass on its parade ground.
+
+By the Yellowstone River, past the Crow reservation, Claire had driven
+on through the Real West, along the Great Highway. The Red Trail and the
+Yellowstone Trail had joined now and she was one of the new Canterbury
+Pilgrims. Even Mr. Boltwood caught the trick of looking for licenses,
+and cried, "There's a Connecticut car!"
+
+To the Easterner, a drive from New York to Cape Cod, over asphalt, is
+viewed as heroic, but here were cars that had casually started on
+thousand-mile vacations. She kept pace not only with large cars touring
+from St. Louis or Detroit to Glacier Park and Yellowstone, but also she
+found herself companionable with families of workmen, headed for a new
+town and a new job, and driving because a flivver, bought second-hand
+and soon to be sold again, was cheaper than trains.
+
+"Sagebrush Tourists" these camping adventurers were called. Claire
+became used to small cars, with curtain-lights broken, bearing
+wash-boilers or refrigerators on the back, pasteboard suitcases lashed
+by rope to the running-board, frying pans and canvas water bottles
+dangling from top-rods. And once baby's personal laundry was seen
+flapping on a line across a tonneau!
+
+In each car was what looked like the crowd at a large
+farm-auction--grandfather, father, mother, a couple of sons and two or
+three daughters, at least one baby in the arms of each grown-up, all
+jammed into two seats already filled with trunks and baby-carriages. And
+they were happy--incredibly happier than the smart people being conveyed
+in a bored way behind chauffeurs.
+
+The Sagebrush Tourists made camp; covered the hood with a quilt from
+which the cotton was oozing; brought out the wash-boiler, did a washing,
+had dinner, sang about the fire; granther and the youngest baby
+gamboling together, while the limousinvalids, insulated from life by
+plate glass, preserved by their steady forty an hour from the commonness
+of seeing anything along the road, looked out at the campers for a
+second, sniffed, rolled on, wearily wondering whether they would find a
+good hotel that night--and why the deuce they hadn't come by train.
+
+If Claire Boltwood had been protected by Jeff Saxton or by a chauffeur,
+she, too, would probably have marveled at cars gray with dust, the
+unshaved men in fleece-lined duck coats, and the women wind-burnt
+beneath the boudoir caps they wore as motoring bonnets. But Claire knew
+now that filling grease-cups does not tend to delicacy of hands; that
+when you wash with a cake of petrified pink soap and half a pitcher of
+cold hard water, you never quite get the stain off--you merely get
+through the dust stratum to the Laurentian grease formation, and mutter,
+"a nice clean grease doesn't hurt food," and go sleepily down to dinner.
+
+She saw a dozen camping devices unknown to the East: trailers, which by
+day bobbed along behind the car like coffins on two wheels, but at night
+opened into tents with beds, an ice-box, a table; tents covering a bed
+whose head rested on the running-board; beds made-up in the car, with
+the cushions as mattresses.
+
+The Great Transcontinental Highway was colored not by motors alone. It
+is true that the Old West of the stories is almost gone; that Billings,
+Miles City, Bismarck, are more given to Doric banks than to gambling
+hells. But still are there hints of frontier days. Still trudge the
+prairie schooners; cowpunchers in chaps still stand at the doors of log
+cabins--when they are tired of playing the automatic piano; and blanket
+Indians, Blackfeet and Crows, stare at five-story buildings--when they
+are not driving modern reapers on their farms.
+
+They all waved to Claire. Telephone linemen, lolling with pipes and
+climber-strapped legs in big trucks, sang out to her; traction engine
+crews shouted; and these she found to be her own people. Only once did
+she lose contentment--when, on the observation platform of a train bound
+for Seattle, she saw a Britisher in flannels and a monocle, headed
+perhaps for the Orient. As the train slipped silkenly away, the Gomez
+seemed slow and clumsy, and the strain of driving intolerable. And that
+Britisher must be charming---- Then a lonely, tight-haired woman in the
+doorway of a tar-paper shack waved to her, and in that wistful gesture
+Claire found friendship.
+
+And sometimes in the "desert" of yet unbroken land she paused by the
+Great Highway and forgot the passion to keep going----
+
+She sat on a rock, by a river so muddy that it was like yellow milk. The
+only trees were a bunch of cottonwoods untidily scattering shreds of
+cotton, and the only other vegetation left in the dead world was
+dusty green sagebrush with lumps of gray yet pregnant earth between,
+or a few exquisite green and white flashes of the herb called
+Snow-on-the-Mountain. The inhabitants were jackrabbits, or American
+magpies in sharp black and white livery, forever trying to balance their
+huge tails against the wind, and yelling in low-magpie their opinion of
+tourists.
+
+She did not desire gardens, then, nor the pettiness of plump terraced
+hills. She was in the Real West, and it was hers, since she had won to
+it by her own plodding. Her soul--if she hadn't had one, it would
+immediately have been provided, by special arrangement, the moment she
+sat there--sailed with the hawks in the high thin air, and when it came
+down it sang hallelujahs, because the sagebrush fragrance was more
+healing than piney woods, because the sharp-bitten edges of the buttes
+were coral and gold and basalt and turquoise, and because a real person,
+one Milt Daggett, though she would never see him again, had found her
+worthy of worship.
+
+She did not often think of Milt; she did not know whether he was ahead
+of her, or had again dropped behind. When she did recall him, it was
+with respect quite different from the titillation that dancing men had
+sometimes aroused, or the impression of manicured agreeableness and
+efficiency which Jeff Saxton carried about.
+
+She always supplicated the mythical Milt in moments of tight driving.
+Driving, just the actual getting on, was her purpose in life, and the
+routine of driving was her order of the day: Morning freshness, rolling
+up as many miles as possible before lunch, that she might loaf
+afterward. The invariable two P.M. discovery that her eyes ached, and
+the donning of huge amber glasses, which gave to her lithe smartness a
+counterfeit scholarliness. Toward night, the quarter-hour of level
+sun-glare which prevented her seeing the road. Dusk, and the discovery
+of how much light there was after all, once she remembered to take off
+her glasses. The worst quarter-hour when, though the roads were an
+amethyst rich to the artist, they were also a murkiness exasperating to
+the driver, yet still too light to be thrown into relief by the lamps.
+The mystic moment when night clicked tight, and the lamps made a fan of
+gold, and Claire and her father settled down to plodding content--and no
+longer had to take the trouble of admiring the scenery!
+
+The morning out of Billings, she wondered why a low cloud so
+persistently held its shape, and realized that it was a far-off
+mountain, her first sight of the Rockies. Then she cried out, and wished
+for Milt to share her exultation. Rather earnestly she said to Mr.
+Boltwood:
+
+"The mountains must be so wonderful to Mr. Daggett, after spending his
+life in a cornfield. Poor Milt! I hope----"
+
+"I don't think you need to worry about that young man. I fancy he's
+quite able to run about by himself, as jolly as a sand-dog. And---- Of
+course I'm extremely grateful to him for his daily rescue of us from the
+jaws of death, but he was right; if he had stayed with us, it would have
+been inconvenient to keep considering him. He isn't accustomed to the
+comedy of manners----"
+
+"He ought to be. He'd enjoy it so. He's the real American. He has
+imagination and adaptability. It's a shame: all the _petits fours_ and
+Bach recitals wasted on Jeff Saxton, when a Milt Dag----"
+
+"Yes, yes, quite so!"
+
+"No, honest! The dear honey-lamb, so ingenious, and really, rather
+good-looking. But so lonely and gregarious--like a little woolly dog
+that begs you to come and play; and I slapped him when he patted his
+paws and gamboled---- It was horrible. I'll never forgive myself. Making
+him drive on ahead in that nasty, patronizing way---- I feel as if we'd
+spoiled his holiday. I wonder if he had intended to make the Yellowstone
+Park trip? He didn't----"
+
+"Yes, yes. Let's forget the young man. Look! How very curious!"
+
+They were crossing a high bridge over a railroad track along which a
+circus train was bending. Mr. Boltwood offered judicious remarks upon
+the migratory habits of circuses, and the vision of the Galahad of the
+Teal bug was thoroughly befogged by parental observations, till Claire
+returned from youthful romance to being a sensible Boltwood, and decided
+that after all, Milt was not a lord of the sky-painted mountains.
+
+Before they bent south, at Livingston, Claire had her first mountain
+driving, and once she had to ford a stream, putting the car at it,
+watching the water curve up in a lovely silver veil. She felt that she
+was conquering the hills as she had the prairies.
+
+She pulled up on a plateau to look at her battery. She noted the edge of
+a brake-band peeping beyond the drum, in a ragged line of fabric and
+copper wire. Then she knew that she didn't know enough to conquer. "Do
+you suppose it's dangerous?" she asked her father, who said a lot of
+comforting things that didn't mean anything.
+
+She thought of Milt. She stopped a passing car. The driver "guessed"
+that the brake-band was all gone, and that it would be dangerous to
+continue with it along mountain roads. Claire dustily tramped two miles
+to a ranch house, and telephoned to the nearest garage, in a town called
+Saddle Back.
+
+Whenever a motorist has delirium he mutters those lamentable words,
+"Telephoned to the nearest garage."
+
+She had to wait a tedious hour before she saw a flivver rattling up with
+the garage man, who wasn't a man at all, but a fourteen-year-old boy. He
+snorted, "Rats, you didn't need to send for me. Could have made it
+perfectly safe. Come on."
+
+Never has the greatest boy pianist received such awe as Claire gave to
+this contemptuous young god, with grease on his peachy cheeks. She did
+come on. But she rather hoped that she was in great danger. It was
+humiliating to telephone to a garage for nothing. When she came into the
+gas-smelling garage in Saddle Back she said appealingly to the man in
+charge, a serious, lip-puffing person of forty-five, "Was it safe to
+come in with the brake-band like that?"
+
+"No. Pretty risky. Wa'n't it, Mike?"
+
+The Mike to whom he turned for authority was the same fourteen-year-old
+boy. He snapped, "Heh? That? Naw! Put in new band. Get busy. Bring me
+the jack. Hustle up, uncle."
+
+While the older man stood about and vainly tried to impress people who
+came in and asked questions which invariably had to be referred to his
+repair boy, the precocious expert stripped the wheel down to something
+that looked to Claire distressingly like an empty milk-pan. Then the boy
+didn't seem to know exactly what to do. He scratched his ear a good
+deal, and thought deeply. The older man could only scratch.
+
+So for two hours Claire and her father experienced that most distressing
+of motor experiences--waiting, while the afternoon that would have been
+so good for driving went by them. Every fifteen minutes they came in
+from sitting on a dry-goods box in front of the garage, and never did
+the repair appear to be any farther along. The boy seemed to be giving
+all his time to getting the wrong wrench, and scolding the older man for
+having hidden the right one.
+
+When she had left Brooklyn Heights, Claire had not expected to have such
+authoritative knowledge of the Kalifornia Kandy Kitchen, Saddle Back,
+Montana, across from Tubbs' Garage, that she could tell whether they
+were selling more Atharva Cigarettes or Polutropons. She prowled about
+the garage till she knew every pool of dripped water in the tin pail of
+soft soap in the iron sink.
+
+She was worried by an overheard remark of the boy wonder, "Gosh, we
+haven't any more of that decent brake lining. Have to use this piece of
+mush." But when the car was actually done, nothing like a dubious brake
+could have kept her from the glory of starting. The first miles seemed
+miracles of ease and speed.
+
+She came through the mountains into Livingston.
+
+Kicking his heels on a fence near town, and fondling a gray cat, sat
+Milt Daggett, and he yelped at her with earnestness and much noise.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE WONDERS OF NATURE WITH ALL MODERN IMPROVEMENTS
+
+
+"Hello!" said Milt.
+
+"Hel-lo!" said Claire.
+
+"How dee do," said Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"This is so nice! Where's your car? I hope nothing's happened," glowed
+Claire.
+
+"No. It's back here from the road a piece. Camp there tonight. Reason I
+stopped---- Struck me you've never done any mountain driving, and
+there's some pretty good climbs in the Park; slick road, but we go up to
+almost nine thousand feet. And cold mornings. Thought I'd tip you off to
+some driving tricks--if you'd like me to."
+
+"Oh, of course. Very grateful----"
+
+"Then I'll tag after you tomorrow, and speak my piece."
+
+"So jolly you're going through the Park."
+
+"Yes, thought might as well. What the guide books call 'Wonders of
+Nature.' Only wonder of nature I ever saw in Schoenstrom was my friend
+Mac trying to think he was soused after a case of near-beer. Well----
+See you tomorrow."
+
+Not once had he smiled. His tone had been impersonal. He vaulted the
+fence and tramped away.
+
+When they drove out of town, in the morning, they found Milt waiting by
+the road, and he followed them till noon. By urgent request, he shared a
+lunch, and lectured upon going down long grades in first or second
+speed, to save brakes; upon the use of the retarded spark and the
+slipped clutch in climbing. His bug was beside the Gomez in the line-up
+at the Park gate, when the United States Army came to seal one's
+firearms, and to inquire on which mountain one intended to be killed by
+defective brakes. He was just behind her all the climb up to Mammoth Hot
+Springs.
+
+When she paused for water to cool the boiling radiator, the bug panted
+up, and with the first grin she had seen on his face since Dakota Milt
+chuckled, "The Teal is a grand car for mountains. Aside from
+overheating, bum lights, thin upholstery, faulty ignition, tissue-paper
+brake-bands, and this-here special aviation engine, specially built for
+a bumble-bee, it's what the catalogues call a powerful brute!"
+
+Claire and her father stayed at the chain of hotels through the Park.
+Milt was always near them, but not at the hotels. He patronized one of
+the chains of permanent camps.
+
+The Boltwoods invited him to dinner at one hotel, but he refused and----
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Because he was afraid that Claire would find him intrusive, Milt was
+grave in her presence. He couldn't respond either to her enthusiasm
+about canyon and colored pool--or to her rage about the tourists who,
+she alleged, preferred freak museum pieces to plain beauty; who never
+admired a view unless it was labeled by a signpost and megaphoned by a
+guide as something they ought to admire--and tell the Folks Back Home
+about.
+
+When she tried to express this social rage to Milt he merely answered
+uneasily, "Yes, I guess there's something to that."
+
+She was, he pondered, so darn particular. How could he ever figure out
+what he ought to do? No thanks; much obliged, but guessed he'd better
+not accept her invitation to dinner. Darn sorry couldn't come but----
+Had promised a fellow down at the camp to have chow with him.
+
+If in this Milt was veracious, he was rather fickle to his newly
+discovered friend; for while Claire was finishing dinner, a solemn young
+man was watching her through a window.
+
+She was at a table for six. She was listening to a man of thirty in
+riding-breeches, a stock, and a pointed nose, who bowed to her every
+time he spoke, which was so frequently that his dining gave the
+impression of a man eating grape-fruit on a merry-go-round. Back in
+Schoenstrom, fortified by Mac and the bunch at the Old Home Lunch, Milt
+would have called the man a "dude," and--though less noisily than the
+others--would have yelped, "Get onto Percy's beer-bottle pants. What's
+he got his neck bandaged for? Bet he's got a boil."
+
+But now Milt yearned, "He does look swell. Wish I could get away with
+those things. Wouldn't I look like a fool with my knees buttoned up,
+though! And there's two other fellows in dress suits. Wouldn't mind
+those so much. Gee, it must be awful where you've got so many suits of
+trick clothes you don't know which one to wear.
+
+"That fellow and Claire are talking pretty swift. He doesn't need any
+piston rings, that lad. Wonder--wonder what they're talking about?
+Music, I guess, and books and pictures and scenery. He's saying that no
+tongue or pen can describe the glories of the Park, and then he's trying
+to describe 'em. And maybe they know the same folks in New York. Lord,
+how I'd be out of it. I wish----"
+
+Milt made a toothpick out of a match, decided that toothpicks were
+inelegant in his tragic mood, and longed: "Never did see her among her
+own kind of folks till now. I wish I could jabber about music and stuff.
+I'll learn it. I will! I can! I picked up autos in three months. I----
+Milt, you're a dub. I wonder can they be talking French, maybe, or Wop,
+or something? I could get onto the sedan styles in highbrow talk as long
+as it was in American.
+
+"I could probably spring linen-collar stuff about, 'Really a delightful
+book, so full of delightful characters,' if I stuck by the rhetoric
+books long enough. But once they begin the _parlez-vous, oui, oui_, I'm
+a gone goose. Still, by golly, didn't I pick up Dutch--German--like a
+mice? Back off, son! You did not! You can talk Plattdeutsch something
+grand, as long as you keep the verbs and nouns in American. You got a
+nice character, Milt, but you haven't got any parts of speech.
+
+"Now look at Percy! Taking a bath in a finger-bowl. I never could pull
+that finger-bowl stuff; pinning your ears back and jiu-jitsing the fried
+chicken, and then doing a high dive into a little dish that ain't--that
+isn't either a wash-bowl or real good lemonade. He's a perfect lady,
+Percy is. Dabs his mouth with his napkin like a watchmaker tinkering the
+carburetor in a wrist watch.
+
+"Lookit him bow and scrape--asking her something---- Rats, he's going
+out in the lobby with her. Walks like a cat on a wet ash-pile. But----
+Oh thunder, he's all right. Neat. I never could mingle with that bunch.
+I'd be web-footed and butter-fingered. And he seems to know all that
+bunch--bows to every maiden aunt in the shop. Now if I was following
+her, I'd never see anybody but her; rest of the folks could all bob
+their heads silly, and I'd never see one blame thing except that funny
+little soft spot at the back of her neck. Nope, you're kind to your
+cat, Milt, but you weren't cut out to be no parlor-organ duet."
+
+This same meditative young man might have been discovered walking past
+the porch of the hotel, his hands in his pockets, his eyes presumably on
+the stars--certainly he gave no signs of watching Claire and the man in
+riding-breeches as they leaned over the rail, looked at mountain-tops
+filmy in starlight, while in the cologne-atomized mode, Breeches quoted:
+
+    Ah, 'tis far heaven my awed heart seeks
+    When I behold those mighty peaks.
+
+Milt could hear him commenting, "Doesn't that just get the feeling of
+the great open, Miss Boltwood?"
+
+Milt did not catch her answer. Himself, he grunted, "I never could get
+much het up about this poetry that's full of Ah's and 'tises."
+
+Claire must have seen Milt just after he had sauntered past. She cried,
+"Oh, Mr. Daggett! Just a moment!" She left Breeches, ran down to Milt.
+He was frightened. Was he going to get what he deserved for
+eavesdropping?
+
+She was almost whispering. "Save me from our friend up on the porch,"
+she implored.
+
+He couldn't believe it. But he took a chance. "Won't you have a little
+walk?" he roared.
+
+"So nice of you--just a little way, perhaps?" she sang out.
+
+They were silent till he got up the nerve to admire, "Glad you found
+some people you knew in the hotel."
+
+"But I didn't."
+
+"Oh, I thought your friend in the riding-pants was chummy."
+
+"So did I!" She rather snorted.
+
+"Well, he's a nice-looking lad. I did admire those pants. I never could
+wear anything like that."
+
+"I should hope not--at dinner! The creepy jack-ass, I don't believe he's
+ever been on a horse in his life! He thinks riding-breeches are the----"
+
+"Oh, that's it. Breeches, not pants."
+
+"--last word in smartness. Overdressing is just ten degrees worse than
+underdressing."
+
+"Oh, I don't know. Take this sloppy old blue suit of mine----"
+
+"It's perfectly nice and simple, and quite well cut. You probably had a
+clever tailor."
+
+"I had. He lives in Chicago or New York, I believe."
+
+"Really? How did he come to Schoenstrom?"
+
+"Never been there. This tailor is a busy boy. He fitted about eleventeen
+thousand people, last year."
+
+"I see. Ready mades. Cheer up. That's where Henry B. Boltwood gets most
+of his clothes. Mr. Daggett, if ever I catch you in the
+Aren't-I-beautiful frame of mind of our friend back on the porch, I'll
+give up my trip to struggle for your soul."
+
+"He seemed to have soul in large chunks. He seemed to talk pretty
+painlessly. I had a hunch you and he were discussing sculpture, anyway.
+Maybe Rodin."
+
+"What do you know about Rodin?"
+
+"Articles in the magazines. Same place you learned about him!" But Milt
+did not sound rude. He said it chucklingly.
+
+"You're perfectly right. And we've probably read the very same articles.
+Well, our friend back there said to me at dinner, 'It must be dreadful
+for you to have to encounter so many common people along the road.' I
+said, 'It is,' in the most insulting tone I could, and he just rolled
+his eyes, and hadn't an idea I meant him. Then he slickered his hair at
+me, and mooed, 'Is it not wonderful to see all these strange
+manifestations of the secrets of Nature!' and I said, 'Is it?' and he
+went on, 'One feels that if one could but meet a sympathetic lady here,
+one's cup of rejoicing in untrammeled nature----' Honest, Milt, Mr.
+Daggett, I mean, he did talk like that. Been reading books by optimistic
+lady authors. And one looked at me, one did, as if one would be willing
+to hold my hand, if I let one.
+
+"He invited me to come out on the porch and give the double O. to
+handsome mountains as illuminated by terrestrial bodies, and I felt so
+weak in the presence of his conceit that I couldn't refuse. Then he
+insisted on introducing me to a woman from my own Brooklyn, who
+condoled with me for having to talk to Western persons while motoring.
+Oh, dear God, that such people should live ... that the sniffy little
+Claire should once have been permitted to live!... And then I saw you!"
+
+Through all her tirade they had stood close together, her face visibly
+eager in the glow from the hotel; and Milt had grown taller. But he
+responded, "I'm afraid I might have been just as bad. I haven't even
+reached the riding-breeches stage in evolution. Maybe never will."
+
+"No. You won't. You'll go right through it. By and by, when you're so
+rich that father and I won't be allowed to associate with you, you'll
+wear riding-breeches--but for riding, not as a donation to the beauties
+of nature."
+
+"Oh, I'm already rich. It shows. Waitress down at the camp asked me
+whose car I was driving through."
+
+"I know what I wanted to say. Since you won't be our guest, will you be
+our host--I mean, as far as welcoming us? I think it would be fun for
+father and me to stop at your camp, tomorrow night, at the canyon,
+instead of at the hotel. Will you guide me to the canyon, if I do?"
+
+"Oh--terribly--glad!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+ADVENTURERS BY FIRELIGHT
+
+
+Neither of the Boltwoods had seen the Grand Canyon of the Colorado. The
+Canyon of the Yellowstone was their first revelation of intimidating
+depth and color gone mad. When their car and Milt's had been parked in
+the palisaded corral back of the camp at which they were to stay, they
+three set out for the canyon's edge chattering, and stopped dumb.
+
+Mr. Boltwood declined to descend. He returned to the camp for a cigar.
+The boy and girl crept down seeming miles of damp steps to an outhanging
+pinnacle that still was miles of empty airy drop above the river bed.
+Claire had a quaking feeling that this rock pulpit was going to slide.
+She thrust out her hand, seized Milt's paw, and in its firm warmth found
+comfort. Clinging to its security she followed him by the crawling path
+to the river below. She looked up at columns of crimson and saffron and
+burning brown, up at the matronly falls, up at lone pines clinging to
+jutting rocks that must be already crashing toward her, and in the
+splendor she knew the Panic fear that is the deepest reaction to
+beauty.
+
+Milt merely shook his head as he stared up. He had neither gossiped nor
+coyly squeezed her hand as he had guided her. She fell to thinking that
+she preferred this American boy in this American scene to a nimble
+gentleman saluting the Alps in a dinky green hat with a little feather.
+
+It was Milt who, when they had labored back up again, when they had sat
+smiling at each other with comfortable weariness, made her see the
+canyon not as a freak, but as the miraculous work of a stream rolling
+grains of sand for millions of years, till it had cut this Jovian
+intaglio. He seemed to have read--whether in books, or in paragraphs in
+mechanical magazines--a good deal about geology. He made it real. Not
+that she paid much attention to what he actually said! She was too busy
+thinking of the fact that he should say it at all.
+
+Not condescendingly but very companionably she accompanied Milt in the
+exploration of their camp for the night--the big dining tent, the city
+of individual bedroom tents, canvas-sided and wooden-floored, each with
+a tiny stove for the cold mornings of these high altitudes. She was awed
+that evening by hearing her waitress discussing the novels of Ibanez.
+Jeff Saxton knew the names of at least six Russian novelists, but Jeff
+was not highly authoritative regarding Spanish literature.
+
+"I suppose she's a school-teacher, working here in vacation," Claire
+whispered to Milt, beside her at the long, busy, scenically
+conversational table.
+
+"Our waitress? Well, sort of. I understand she's professor of literature
+in some college," said Milt, in a matter of fact way. And he didn't at
+all see the sequence when she went on:
+
+"There is an America! I'm glad I've found it!"
+
+The camp's evening bonfire was made of logs on end about a stake of
+iron. As the logs blazed up, the guests on the circle of benches crooned
+"Suwanee River," and "Old Black Joe," and Claire crooned with them. She
+had been afraid that her father would be bored, but she saw that, above
+his carefully tended cigar, he was dreaming. She wondered if there had
+been a time when he had hummed old songs.
+
+The fire sank to coals. The crowd wandered off to their tents. Mr.
+Boltwood followed them after an apologetic, "Good night. Don't stay up
+too late." With a scattering of only half a dozen people on the benches,
+this huge circle seemed deserted; and Claire and Milt, leaning forward,
+chins on hands, were alone--by their own campfire, among the mountains.
+
+The stars stooped down to the hills; the pines were a wall of blackness;
+a coyote yammered to point the stillness; and the mighty pile of coals
+gave a warmth luxurious in the creeping mountain chill.
+
+The silence of large places awes the brisk intruder, and Claire's voice
+was unconsciously lowered as she begged, "Tell me something about
+yourself, Mr. Daggett. I don't really know anything at all."
+
+"Oh, you wouldn't be interested. Just Schoenstrom!"
+
+"But just Schoenstrom might be extremely interesting."
+
+"But honest, you'd think I was--edging in on you!"
+
+"I know what you are thinking. The time I suggested, way back there in
+Dakota, that you were sticking too close. You've never got over it. I've
+tried to make up for it, but---- I really don't blame you. I was horrid.
+I deserve being beaten. But you do keep on punishing ra----"
+
+"Punishing? Lord, I didn't mean to! No! Honest! It was nothing. You were
+right. Looked as though I was inviting myself---- But, oh, pleassssse,
+Miss Boltwood, don't ever think for a sec. that I meant to be a
+grouch----"
+
+"Then do tell me---- Who is this Milton Daggett that you know so much
+better than I ever can?"
+
+"Well," Milt crossed his knees, caught his chin in his hand, "I don't
+know as I really do know him so well. I thought I did. I was onto his
+evil ways. He was the son of the pioneer doctor, Maine folks."
+
+"Really? My mother came from Maine."
+
+Milt did not try to find out that they were cousins. He went on, "This
+kid, Milt, went to high school in St. Cloud--town twenty times as big
+as Schoenstrom--but he drifted back because his dad was old and needed
+him, after his mother's death----"
+
+"You have no brothers or sisters?"
+
+"No. Nobody. 'Cept Lady Vere de Vere--which animal she is going to get
+cuffed if she chews up any more of my overcoat out in my tent
+tonight!... Well, this kid worked 'round, machinery mostly, and got
+interested in cars, and started a garage---- Wee, that was an awful
+shop, first one I had! In Rauskukle's barn. Six wrenches and a
+screwdriver and a one-lung pump! And I didn't know a roller-bearing from
+three-point suspension! But---- Well, anyway, he worked along, and built
+a regular garage, and paid off practically all the mortgage on it----"
+
+"I remember stopping at a garage in Schoenstrom, I'm almost sure it was,
+for something. I seem to remember it was a good place. Do you own it?
+Really?"
+
+"Ye-es, what there is of it."
+
+"But there's a great deal of it. It's efficient. You've done your job.
+That's more than most high-born aides-de-camp could say."
+
+"Honestly? Well--I don't know----"
+
+"Who did you play with in Schoenstrom? Oh, I _wish_ I'd noticed that
+town. But I couldn't tell then that---- What, uh, which girl did you
+fall in love with?"
+
+"None! Honest! None! Not one! Never fell in love----"
+
+"You're unfortunate. I have, lots of times. I remember quite enjoying
+being kissed once, at a dance."
+
+When he answered, his voice was strange: "I suppose you're engaged to
+somebody."
+
+"No. And I don't know that I shall be. Once, I thought I liked a man,
+rather. He has nice eyes and the most correct spectacles, and he is
+polite to his mother at breakfast, and his name is Jeff, and he will
+undoubtedly be worth five or six hundred thousand dollars, some day, and
+his opinions on George Moore and commercial paper are equally sound and
+unoriginal---- Oh, I ought not to speak of him, and I certainly ought
+not to be spiteful. I'm not at all reticent and ladylike, am I! But----
+Somehow I can't see him out here, against a mountain of jagged rock."
+
+"Only you won't always be out here against mountains. Some day you'll be
+back in--where is it in New York State?"
+
+"I confess it's Brooklyn--but not what you'd mean by Brooklyn. Your
+remark shows you to have subtlety. I must remember that, mustn't I! I
+won't always be driving through this big land. But---- Will I get all
+fussy and ribbon-tied again, when I go back?"
+
+"No. You won't. You drive like a man."
+
+"What has that----"
+
+"It has a lot to do with it. A garage man can trail along behind another
+car and figger out, figure out, just about what kind of a person the
+driver is from the way he handles his boat. Now you bite into the job.
+You drive pretty neat--neatly. You don't either scoot too far out of the
+road in passing a car, or take corners too wide. You won't be fussy. But
+still, I suppose you'll be glad to be back among your own folks and
+you'll forget the wild Milt that tagged along----"
+
+"Milt--or Mr. Daggett--no, Milt! I shall never, in my oldest grayest
+year, in a ducky cap by the fireplace, forget the half-second when your
+hand came flashing along, and caught that man on the running-board. But
+it wasn't just that melodrama. If that hadn't happened, something else
+would have, to symbolize you. It's that you--oh, you took me in, a
+stranger, and watched over me, and taught me the customs of the country,
+and were never impatient. No, I shan't forget that; neither of the
+Boltwoods will."
+
+In the rose-haze of firelight he straightened up and stared at her, but
+he settled into shyness again as she added:
+
+"Perhaps others would have done the same thing. I don't know. If they
+had, I should have remembered them too. But it happened that it was you,
+and I, uh, my father and I, will always be grateful. We both hope we may
+see you in Seattle. What are you planning to do there? What is your
+ambition? Or is that a rude question?"
+
+"Why, uh----"
+
+"What I mean---- I mean, how did you happen to want to go there, with a
+garage at home? You still control it?"
+
+"Oh yes. Left my mechanic in charge. Why, I just kind of decided
+suddenly. I guess it was what they call an inspiration. Always wanted a
+long trip, anyway, and I thought maybe in Seattle I could hook up with
+something a little peppier than Schoenstrom. Maybe something in Alaska.
+Always wished I were a mechanical or civil engineer so----"
+
+"Then why don't you become one? You're young---- How old are you?"
+
+"Twenty-five."
+
+"We're both children, compared with Je--compared with some men who are
+my friends. You're quite young enough to go to engineering school. And
+take some academic courses on the side--English, so on. Why don't you?
+Have you ever thought of it?"
+
+"N-no, I hadn't thought of doing it, but---- All right. I will! In
+Seattle! B'lieve the University of Washington is there."
+
+"You mean it?"
+
+"Yes. I do. You're the boss."
+
+"That's--that's flattering, but---- Do you always make up your mind as
+quickly as this?"
+
+"When the boss gives orders!"
+
+He smiled, and she smiled back, but this time it was she who was
+embarrassed. "You're rather overwhelming. You change your life--if you
+really do mean it--because a _jeune fille_ from Brooklyn is so
+impertinent, from her Olympian height of finishing-school learning, as
+to suggest that you do so."
+
+"I don't know what a _jeune fille_ is, but I do know----" He sprang up.
+He did not look at her. He paraded back and forth, three steps to the
+right, three to the left, his hands in his pockets, his voice
+impersonal. "I know you're the finest person I ever met. You're the
+kind--I knew there must be people like you, because I knew the Joneses.
+They're the only friends I've got that have, oh, I suppose it's what
+they call culture."
+
+In a long monologue, uninterrupted by Claire, he told of his affection
+for the Schoenstrom "prof" and his wife. The practical, slangy Milt of
+the garage was lost in the enthusiastic undergraduate adoring his
+instructor in the university that exists as veritably in a teacher's or
+a doctor's sitting-room in every Schoenstrom as it does in certain
+lugubrious stone hulks recognized by a state legislature as magically
+empowered to paste on sacred labels lettered "Bachelor of Arts."
+
+He broke from his revelations to plump down on the bench beside her, to
+slap his palm with his fist, and sigh, "Lord, I've been gassing on!
+Guess I bored you!"
+
+"Oh, please, Milt, please! I see it all so---- It must have been
+wonderful, the evening when Mrs. Jones read Noyes's 'Highwayman' aloud.
+Tell me--long before that--were you terribly lonely as a little boy?"
+
+Now Milt had not been a terribly lonely little boy. He had been a leader
+in a gang devoted to fighting, swimming, pickerel-spearing,
+beggie-stealing, and catching rides on freights.
+
+But he believed that he was accurately presenting every afternoon of his
+childhood, as he mused, "Yes, I guess I was, pretty much. I remember I
+used to sit on dad's doorstep, all those long sleepy summer afternoons,
+and I'd think, 'Aw, geeeeee, I--wisht--I--had--somebody--to--play--with!'
+I always wanted to make-b'lieve Robin Hood, but none of the other
+kids--so many of them were German; they didn't know about Robin Hood; so
+I used to scout off alone."
+
+"If I could only have been there, to be Maid Marian for you! We'd have
+learned archery! Lonely little boy on the doorstep!" Her fingers just
+touched his sleeve. In her gesture, the ember-light caught the crystal
+of her wrist watch. She stooped to peer at it, and her pitying
+tenderness broke off in an agitated: "Heavings! Is it that late? To bed!
+Good night, Milt."
+
+"Good night, Cl---- Miss Boltwood."
+
+"No. 'Claire,' of course. I'm not normally a first-name-snatcher, but I
+do seem to have fallen into saying 'Milt.' Night!"
+
+As she undressed, in her tent, Claire reflected, "He won't take
+advantage of my being friendly, will he? Only thing is---- I sha'n't
+dare to look at Henry B. when Milt calls me 'Claire' in that sedate
+Brooklyn Heights presence. The dear lamb! Lonely afternoons----!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+THE BEAST OF THE CORRAL
+
+
+They met in the frost-shimmering mountain morning, on their way to the
+corral, to get their cars ready before breakfast. They were shy, hence
+they were boisterous, and tremendously unreferential to campfire
+confidences, and informative about distilled water for batteries, and
+the price of gas in the Park. On Milt's shoulder rode Vere de Vere who,
+in her original way, relieved one pause by observing "Mrwr."
+
+They came in through the corral gate before any of the other motor
+tourists had appeared--and they stupidly halted to watch a bear, a
+large, black, adipose and extremely unchained bear, stalk along the line
+of cars, sniff, cock an ear at the Gomez, lumber up on its
+running-board, and bundle into the seat. His stern filled the space
+between side and top, and he was to be heard snuffing.
+
+"Oh! Look! Milt! Left box of candy on seat---- Oh, please drive him
+away!"
+
+"Me? Drive--that?"
+
+"Frighten him away. Aren't animals afraid human eye----"
+
+"Not in this park. Guns forbidden. Animals protected by U. S. Army,
+President, Congress, Supreme Court, Department of Interior, Monroe
+Doctrine, W. C. T. U. But I'll try--cautiously."
+
+"Don't you want me think you're hero?"
+
+"Ye-es, providin' I don't have to go and be one."
+
+They edged toward the car. The bear flapped his hind legs, looked out at
+the intruders, said "Oofflll!" and returned to the candy.
+
+"Shoo!" Milt answered politely.
+
+"Llooffll!"
+
+From his own bug, beside the Gomez, Milt got a tool kit, and with
+considerable brilliance as a pitcher he sent a series of wrenches at the
+agitated stern of the bear. They offended the dignity of the ward of the
+Government. He finished the cover and ribbons of the candy box, and
+started for Milt ... who proceeded with haste toward Claire ... who was
+already at the gate.
+
+Lady Vere de Vere, cat of a thousand battles, gave one frightful squawl,
+shot from Milt's shoulder and at the bear, claws out, fur electric. The
+bear carelessly batted once with its paw, and the cat sailed into the
+air. The satisfied bear strolled to the fence, shinned up it and over.
+
+"Good old Vere! That wallop must of darn near stunned her, though!" Milt
+laughed to Claire, as they trotted back into the corral. The cat did not
+move, as they came up; did not give the gallant "Mrwr" with which she
+had saluted Milt on lonely morning after morning of forlorn driving
+behind the Gomez. He picked Vere up.
+
+"She's--she's dead," he said. He was crying.
+
+"Oh, Milt---- Last night you said Vere was all the family you had. You
+have the Boltwoods, now!"
+
+She did not touch his hand, nor did they speak as they walked soberly to
+the far side of the corral, and buried Lady Vere de Vere. At breakfast
+they talked of the coming day's run, from the canyon out of the Park,
+and northward. But they had the queer, quick casualness of intimates.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was at breakfast that her father heard one Milt Daggett address the
+daughter of the Boltwoods as "Claire." The father was surprised into
+clearing his throat, and attacking his oatmeal with a zealousness
+unnatural in a man who regarded breakfast-foods as moral rather than
+interesting.
+
+While he was lighting a cigar, and Claire was paying the bill, Mr.
+Boltwood stalked Milt, cleared his throat all over again, and said,
+"Nice morning."
+
+It was the first time the two men had talked unchaperoned by Claire.
+
+"Yes. We ought to have a good run, sir." The "sir" came hard. The
+historian puts forth a theory that Milt had got it out of fiction. "We
+might go up over Mount Washburn. Take us up to ten thousand feet."
+
+"Uh, you said--didn't Miss Boltwood tell me that you are going to
+Seattle, too?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Friends there, no doubt?"
+
+Milt grinned irresistibly. "Not a friend. But I'm going to make 'em. I'm
+going to take up engineering, and some French, I guess, at the
+university there."
+
+"Ah. Really?"
+
+"Yes. Been too limited in my ambition. Don't see why I shouldn't get out
+and build railroads and power plants and roads--Siberia, Africa, all
+sorts of interesting places."
+
+"Quite right. Quite right. Uh, ah, I, oh, I---- Have you seen Miss
+Boltwood?"
+
+"I saw Miss Boltwood in the office."
+
+"Oh yes. Quite so. Uh--ah, here she is."
+
+When the Gomez had started, Mr. Boltwood skirmished, "This young man----
+Do you think you better let him call you by your Christian name?"
+
+"Why not? I call him 'Milt.' 'Mr. Daggett' is too long a handle to use
+when a man is constantly rescuing you from the perils of the deep or
+hoboes or bears or something. Oh, I haven't told you. Poor old Milt, his
+cat was killed----"
+
+"Yes, yes, dolly, you may tell me about that in due time, but let's
+stick to this social problem for a moment. Do you think you ought to be
+too intimate with him?"
+
+"He's only too self-respecting. He wouldn't take advantage----"
+
+"I'm quite aware of that. I'm not speaking on your behalf, but on his.
+I'm sure he's a very amiable chap, and ambitious. In fact---- Did you
+know that he has saved up money to attend a university?"
+
+"When did he tell you that? How long has he been planning---- I thought
+that I----"
+
+"Just this morning; just now."
+
+"Oh! I'm relieved."
+
+"I don't quite follow you, dolly, but---- Where was I? Do you realize
+what a demure tyrant you are? If you can drag me from New York to the
+aboriginal wilds, and I did _not_ like that oatmeal, what will you do to
+this innocent? I want to protect him!"
+
+"You better! Because I'm going to carve him, and paint him, and possibly
+spoil him. The creating of a man--of one who knows how to handle
+life--is so much more wonderful than creating absurd pictures or statues
+or stories. I'll nag him into completing college. He'll learn
+dignity--or perhaps lose his simplicity and be ruined; and then I'll
+marry him off to some nice well-bred pink-face, like Jeff Saxton's
+pretty cousin--who may turn him into a beastly money-grubber; and I'm
+monkeying with destiny, and I ought to be slapped, and I realize it, and
+I can't help it, and all my latent instinct as a feminine meddler is
+aroused, and--golly, I almost went off that curve!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+THE BLACK DAY OF THE VOYAGE
+
+
+That was the one black day of her voyage--black stippled with crimson.
+
+It began with the bear's invasion of the car, resulting in long
+claw-marks across the upholstery, the loss of some particularly good
+candy bought at a Park hotel, and genuine grief abiding after the
+sentimental tragedy of Vere de Vere's death. The next act was the
+ingenious loss of all power of her engine. She forgot that, before
+breakfast, Milt had filled the oil-well for her. When she stopped for
+gasoline, and the seller inquired, "Quart of oil?"--she absently nodded.
+So the cylinders filled with surplus oil, the spark-plugs were fouled,
+and the engine had the power of a sewing machine.
+
+She could not make Mount Washburn--she could not make even the slopes of
+the lower road. Now she knew the agony of the feeble car in the
+mountains--most shameful and anxious of a driver's dolors: the brisk
+start up the hill, the belief that you will keep on going this time; the
+feeling of weariness through all the car; the mad shifting of gears, the
+slipping of the clutch, and more gas, and less gas, and wondering
+whether more gas or less is the better, and the appalling knocking when
+you finally give her a lot too much gas; the remembrance, when it's too
+late, to retard the spark; the safe crawling up to the last sharp pitch,
+just fifteen feet from the summit; the car's halting; the yelp at your
+passenger, "Jump out and push!"; the painful next five feet; and the
+final death of the power just as the front wheels creep up over the
+pitch. Then the anxious putting on of brakes--holding the car with both
+foot-brake and emergency, lest it run down backward, slip off the road.
+The calf of your leg begins to ache from the pressure on the foot-brake,
+and with an unsuccessful effort to be courteous you bellow at the
+passenger, who has been standing beside the car looking deprecatory,
+"Will you please block the back wheels with a stone--hustle up, will
+you!"
+
+All this routine Claire thoroughly learned. Always Milt bumbled up, said
+cheerful things, and either hauled the Gomez over the pitch by a towline
+to his bug, or getting out, pushing on a rear fender till his neck was
+red and bulgy, gave the extra impetus necessary to get the Gomez over.
+
+"Would you mind shoving on that side, just a little bit?" he suggested
+to Mr. Boltwood, who ceased the elaborate smoking of cigars, dusted his
+hands, and gravely obeyed, while Claire was awaiting the new captain's
+command to throw on the power.
+
+"I wish we weren't under so much obligation to this young man," said Mr.
+Boltwood, after one crisis.
+
+"I know but--what can we do?"
+
+"Don't you suppose we might pay him?"
+
+"Henry B. Boltwood, if you tried to do that---- I'm not sure. Your being
+my parent might save you, but even so, I think he'd probably chase you
+off the road, clear down into that chasm."
+
+"I suppose so. Shall we have to entertain him in Seattle?"
+
+"Have to? My dear parent, you can't keep me from it! Any of the Seattle
+friends of Gene Gilson who don't appreciate that straight, fine,
+aspiring boy may go---- Not overdo it, you understand. But---- Oh, take
+him to the theater. By the way; shall we try to climb Mount Rainier
+before----"
+
+"See here, my good dolly; you stop steering me away from my feeble
+parental efforts. Do you wish to be under obligations----"
+
+"Don't mind, with Milt. He wouldn't charge interest, as Jeff Saxton
+would. Milt is, oh, he's folks!"
+
+"Quite true. But are we? Are you?"
+
+"Learning to be!"
+
+Between discussions and not making hills, Claire cleaned the spark plugs
+as they accumulated carbon from the surplus oil--or she pretended to
+help Milt clean them. The plugs were always very hot, and when you were
+unscrewing the jacket from the core, you always burned your hand, and
+wished you could swear ... and sometimes you could.
+
+After noon, when they had left the Park and entered Gardiner, Milt
+announced, "I've got to stick around a while. The key in my
+steering-gear seems to be worn. May have to put in a new one. Get the
+stuff at a garage here. If you wouldn't mind waiting, be awful glad to
+tag, and try to give a few helping hands till the oil cleans itself
+out."
+
+"I'll just stroll on," she said, but she drove away as swiftly as she
+could. Her father's worry about obligations disturbed her, and she did
+not wish to seem too troublesome an amateur to Milt. She would see him
+in Livingston, and tell him how well she had driven. The spark plugs
+kept clean enough now so that she could command more power, but----
+
+Between the Park and the transcontinental road there are many climbs
+short but severely steep; up-shoots like the humps on a scenic railway.
+To tackle them with her uncertain motor was like charging a machine-gun
+nest. She spent her nerve-force lavishly, and after every wild rush to
+make a climb, she had to rest, to rub the suddenly aching back of her
+neck. Because she was so tired, she did not take the trouble to save her
+brakes by going down in gear. She let the brakes smoke while the river
+and railroad below rose up at her.
+
+There was a long drop. How long it was she did not guess, because it was
+concealed by a curve at the top. She seemed to plane down forever. The
+brakes squealed behind. She tried to shift to first but there was a
+jarring snarl, and she could neither get into first nor back into third.
+She was running in neutral, the great car coasting, while she tried to
+slow it by jamming down the foot-brake. The car halted--and started on
+again. The brake-lining which had been wished on her at Saddle Back was
+burnt out.
+
+She had the feeling of the car bursting out from under control ... ready
+to leap off the road, into a wash. She wanted to jump. It took all her
+courage to stay in the seat. She got what pressure she could from the
+remaining band. With one hand she kept the accelerating car in the
+middle of the road; with the other she tried to pull the handle of the
+emergency brake back farther. She couldn't. She was not strong enough.
+Faster, faster, rushing at the next curve so that she could scarce steer
+round it----
+
+As quietly as she could, she demanded of her father, "Pull back on this
+brake lever, far as you can. Take both hands."
+
+"I don't understand----"
+
+"Heavens! Y' don't haft un'stand! Yank back! Yank, I tell you!"
+
+Again the car slowed. She was able to get into second speed. Even that
+check did not keep the car from darting down at thirty miles an
+hour--which pace, to one who desires to saunter down at a dignified rate
+of eighteen, is equivalent in terms of mileage on level ground to
+seventy an hour, with a drunken driver, on a foggy evening, amid
+traffic.
+
+She got the car down and, in the midst of a valley of emptiness and
+quiet, she dropped her head on her father's knee and howled.
+
+"I just can't face going down another hill! I just can't face it!" she
+sobbed.
+
+"No, dolly. Mustn't. We better---- You're quite right. This young
+Daggett is a very gentlemanly fellow. I didn't think his
+table-manners---- But we'll sit here and regard the flora and fauna till
+he comes. He'll see us through."
+
+"Yes! He will! Honestly, dad----" She said it with the first touch of
+hero-worship since she had seen an aviator loop loops. "Isn't he, oh,
+effective! Aren't you glad he's here to help us, instead of somebody
+like Jeff Saxton?"
+
+"We-ul, you must remember that Geoffrey wouldn't have permitted the
+brake to burn out. He'd have foreseen it, and have had a branch office,
+with special leased wire, located back on that hill, ready to do
+business the instant the market broke. Enthusiasm is a nice quality,
+dolly, but don't misplace it. This lad, however trustworthy he may be,
+would scarcely even be allowed to work for a man like Geoffrey Saxton.
+It may be that later, with college----"
+
+"No. He'd work for Jeff two hours. Then Jeff would give him that 'You
+poor fish!' look, and Milt would hit him, and stroll out, and go to the
+North Pole or some place, and discover an oil-well, and hire Jeff as his
+nice, efficient general manager. And---- I do wish Milt would hurry,
+though!"
+
+It was dusk before they heard the pit-pit-pit chuckling down the hill.
+Milt's casual grin changed to bashfulness as Claire ran into the road,
+her arms wide in a lovely gesture of supplication, and cried, "We been
+waiting for you so long! One of my brake-bands is burnt out, and the
+other is punk."
+
+"Well, well. Let's try to figure out something to do."
+
+She waited reverently while the local prophet sat in his bug, stared at
+the wheels of the Gomez, and thought. The level-floored,
+sagebrush-sprinkled hollow had filled with mauve twilight and creeping
+stilly sounds. The knowable world of yellow lights and security was far
+away. Milt was her only means of ever getting back to it.
+
+"Tell you what we might try," he speculated. "I'll hitch on behind you,
+and hold back in going down hill."
+
+She did not even try to help him while he again cleaned the spark plugs
+and looked over brakes, oil, gas, water. She sat on the running-board,
+and it was pleasant to be relieved of responsibility. He said nothing at
+all. While he worked he whistled that recent refined ballad:
+
+    I wanta go back to Oregon
+    And sit on the lawn, and look at the dawn.
+    Oh motheruh dear, don't leavuh me here,
+    The leaves are so sere, in the fallothe year,
+    I wanta go back to Oregugon,
+    To dearuh old Oregugon.
+
+They started, shouting optimistically to each other, lights on, trouble
+seeming over--and they stopped after the next descent, and pools of
+tears were in the corners of Claire's eyes. The holdback had not
+succeeded. Her big car, with its quick-increasing momentum, had jerked
+at the bug as though it were a lard-can. The tow-rope had stretched,
+sung, snapped, and again, in fire-shot delirium, she had gone rocking
+down hill.
+
+He drove up beside her, got out, stood at her elbow. His "I'm a bum
+inventor. We'll try somethin' else" was so careless that, in her
+nerve-twanging exhaustion she wailed, "Oh, don't be so beastly cheerful!
+You don't care a bit!"
+
+In the dusk she could see him straighten, and his voice came sharp as he
+ignored the ever-present parental background and retorted, "Somebody has
+got to be cheerful. Matter fact, I worked out the right stunt, coming
+down."
+
+Like a man in the dentist's chair, recovering between bouts, she drowsed
+and ignored the fact that in a few minutes she would again have to
+reassemble herself, become wakeful and calm, and go through quite
+impossible maneuvers of driving. Milt was, with a hatchet from his
+camping-kit, cutting down a large scrub pine. He dragged it to the Gomez
+and hitched it to the back axle. The knuckles of the branches would dig
+into the earth, the foliage catch at every pebble.
+
+"There! That anchor would hold a truck!" he shouted.
+
+It held. She went down the next two hills easily. But she was through.
+Her forearms and brain were equally numb. She appealed to Milt, "I can't
+seem to go on any more. It's so dark, and I'm so tired----"
+
+"All right. No ranch houses anywheres near, so we'll camp here, if Mr.
+Boltwood doesn't mind."
+
+Claire stirred herself to help him prepare dinner. It wasn't much of a
+dinner to prepare. Both cars had let provisions run low. They had bacon
+and petrified ends of a loaf and something like coffee--not much like
+it. Scientists may be interested in their discovery that as a substitute
+for both cream and sugar in beverages strawberry jam is a fallacy.
+
+For Mr. Boltwood's bed Milt hauled out the springy seat-cushions of both
+cars. The Gomez cushion was three inches thicker than that of the bug,
+which resulted in a mattress two stories in front with a lean-to at the
+foot, and the entire edifice highly slippery. But with a blanket from
+Milt's kit, it was sufficient. To Claire, Milt gave another blanket,
+his collection of antique overcoats, and good advice. He spoke vaguely
+of a third blanket for himself. And he had one. Its dimensions were
+thirteen by twenty inches, it was of white wool, he had bought it in
+Dakota for Vere de Vere, and many times that day he had patted it and
+whispered, "Poor old cat."
+
+Under his blankets Mr. Boltwood thought of rattlesnakes, bears,
+rheumatism, Brooklyn, his debt to Milt, and the fact that--though he
+hadn't happened to mention it to Claire--he had expected to be killed
+when the brake had burned out.
+
+Claire was drowsily happy. She had got through. She was conscious of
+rustling sagebrush, of the rapids of the Yellowstone beside her, of open
+sky and sweet air and a scorn for people in stuffy rooms, and
+comfortably ever conscious of Milt, ten feet away. She had in him the
+interest that a young physician would have in a new X-ray machine, a
+printer in a new font of type, any creator in a new outlet for his
+power. She would see to it that her Seattle cousins, the Gilsons, helped
+him to know the right people, during his university work. She herself
+would be back in Brooklyn, but perhaps he would write to her,
+write--write letters--Brooklyn--she was in Brooklyn--no, no, where was
+she?--oh, yes, camping--bad day--brakes---- No, she would not marry Jeff
+Saxton! Brooklyn--river singing--stars----
+
+And when Milt wasn't unromantically thinking of his cold back, he
+exulted. "She won't be back among her own folks till Seattle. Probably
+forget me then. Don't blame her. But till we get there, she'll let me
+play in her yard. Gee! In the morning I'll be talking to her again, and
+she's right there, right now!"
+
+In the morning they were all very stiff, but glad of the sun on
+sagebrush and river, and the boy and girl sang over breakfast. While
+Milt was gathering fuel he looked up at Claire standing against a
+background of rugged hills, her skirt and shoes still smug, but her
+jacket off, her blouse turned in at the throat, her hair blowing, her
+sleeves rolled up, one hand on her hip, erect, charged with vigor--the
+spirit of adventure.
+
+When her brake had been relined, at Livingston, they sauntered
+companionably on to Butte. And the day after Butte, when Milt was half a
+mile behind the Gomez, a pink-haired man with a large, shiny revolver
+stepped out from certain bushes, and bowed politely, and at that point
+Milt stopped.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+THE SPECTACLES OF AUTHORITY
+
+
+Over the transcontinental divide and into Butte, diamond-glittering on
+its hills in the dark; into Missoula, where there are trees and a
+university, with a mountain in everybody's backyard; through the
+Flathead Agency, where scarlet-blanketed Indians stalk out of tepees and
+the papoose rides on mother's back as in forgotten days; down to St.
+Ignatius, that Italian Alp town with its old mission at the foot of
+mountains like the wall of Heaven, Claire had driven west, then north.
+She was sailing past Flathead Lake, where fifty miles of mountain glory
+are reflected in bright waters. Everywhere were sections of flat
+wheat-plains, stirring with threshing, with clattering machinery and the
+flash of blown straw. But these miniature prairies were encircled by
+abrupt mountains.
+
+Mr. Boltwood remarked, "I'd rather have one of these homesteads and look
+across my fields at those hills than be King of England." Not that he
+made any effort to buy one of the homesteads. But then, he made no
+appreciable effort to become King of England.
+
+Claire had not seen Milt for a day and a half; not since the morning
+when both cars had left Butte. She wondered, and was piqued, and
+slightly lonely. Toward evening, when she was speculating as to whether
+she would make Kalispell--almost up to the Canadian border--she saw a
+woman run into the road from a house on the shore of Flathead Lake. The
+woman held out her hand. Claire pulled up.
+
+"Are you Miss Boltwood?"
+
+It was as startling as the same question would have been in a Chinese
+village.
+
+"W-why, yes."
+
+"Somebody trying to get you on the long-distance 'phone."
+
+"Me? 'Phone?"
+
+She was trembling. "Something's happened to Milt. He needs me!" She
+could not manage her voice, as she got the operator on the farmers'-line
+wire, and croaked, "Was some one trying to get Miss Boltwood?"
+
+"Yes. This Boltwood? Hotel in Kalispell trying to locate you, for two
+hours. Been telephoning all along the line, from Butte to Somers."
+
+"W-well, w-will you g-get 'em for me?"
+
+It was not Milt's placid and slightly twangy voice but one smoother,
+more decisive, perplexingly familiar, that finally vibrated, "Hello!
+Hello! Miss Boltwood! Operator, I can't hear. Get me a better
+connection. Miss Boltwood?"
+
+"Yes! Yes! This is Miss Boltwood!" she kept beseeching, during a long
+and not unheated controversy between the unknown and the crisp operator,
+who knew nothing of the English language beyond, "Here's your party. Why
+don't you talk? Speak louder!"
+
+Then came clearly, "Hear me now?"
+
+"Yes! Yes!"
+
+"Miss Boltwood?"
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"Oh. Oh, hello, Claire. This is Jeff."
+
+"Jess who?"
+
+"Not Jess. Jeff! Geoffrey! J-e-f-f! Jeff Saxton!"
+
+"Oh!" It was like a sob. "Why--why--but you're in New York."
+
+"Not exactly, dear. I'm in Kalispell, Montana."
+
+"But that's right near here."
+
+"So am I!"
+
+"B-but----"
+
+"Out West to see copper interests. Traced you from Yellowstone Park but
+missed you at Butte. Thought I'd catch you on road. You talking from
+Barmberry's?"
+
+The woman who had hailed her was not missing a word of a telephone
+conversation which might be relative to death, fire, elopement, or any
+other dramatic event. Claire begged of her, "Where in the world am I
+talking from, anyway?"
+
+"This is Barmberry's Inn."
+
+"Yes," Claire answered on the telephone, "I seem to be. Shall I start on
+and----"
+
+"No. Got ripping plan. Stay right where you are. Got a fast car waiting.
+Be right down. We'll have dinner. By!"
+
+A click. No answer to Claire's urgent hellos. She hung up the receiver
+very, very carefully. She hated to turn and face her audience of Mr.
+Henry B. Boltwood, Mr. James Barmberry, Mrs. James Barmberry, and four
+Barmberry buds averaging five and a quarter in age. She tried to ignore
+the Barmberrys, but their silence was noisy and interested while she
+informed her father, "It's Jeff Saxton! Out here to see copper mines.
+Telephoned along road to catch us. Says we're to wait dinner till he
+comes."
+
+"Yessum," Mrs. Barmberry contributed, "he told me if I did catch you, I
+was to have some new-killed chickens ready to fry, and some whipped
+cream---- Jim Barmberry, you go right out and finish whipping that
+cream, and don't stand there gawping and gooping, and you children, you
+scat!"
+
+Claire seized the moment of Mr. Boltwood's lordly though bewildered bow
+to their hostess, and escaped outdoors. Round the original settler's
+log-cabin were nests of shacks and tents, for bedrooms, and on a
+screened porch, looking on Flathead Lake, was the dining-room. The few
+other guests had finished supper and gone to their tents.
+
+She ambled to the lake shore, feeling feebler, more slapped and sent
+back to be a good little girl, than she had when Milt had hitched a
+forest to the back axle, three days ago. A map of her thoughts about
+Jeff Saxton would have shown a labyrinth. Now, she was muttering, "Dear
+Jeff! So thoughtful! Clever of him to find me! So good to see him
+again!" Now: "It's still distinctly understood that I am not engaged to
+him, and I'm not going to be surprised into kissing him when he comes
+down like a wolf on the fold." Now: "Jeff Saxton! Here! Makes me
+homesick for the Heights. And nice shops in Manhattan, and a really good
+play--music just before the curtain goes up." Now: "Ohhhhhh geeeeee
+whizzzzzz! I wonder if he'll let us go any farther in the car? He's so
+managerial, and dad is sure to take his side. He tried to scare us off
+by that telegram to Fargo." Now: "He'd be horrified if he knew about
+that bum brake. Milt didn't mind. Milt likes his womenfolks to be
+daring. Jeff wants his harem admiring and very reliable."
+
+She crouched on the shore, a rather forlorn figure. The peaks of the
+Mission Range, across the violet-shadowed mirror of Flathead Lake, were
+a sudden pure rose, in reflection of sunset, then stony, forbidding.
+Across the road, on the Barmberry porch, she could hear her father
+saying "Ah?" and "Indeed?" to James's stories.
+
+Up the road, a blaring horn, great lights growing momently more
+dazzling, a roar, a rush, the halting car, and out of its blurred bulk,
+a trim figure darting--Jeff Saxton--home and the people she loved, and
+the ways and days she knew best of all. He had shouted only "Is
+Miss----" before she had rushed to him, into the comfort of his arms,
+and kissed him.
+
+She backed off and tried to sound as if it hadn't happened, but she was
+quavery: "I can't believe it! It's too ridiculously wonderful to see
+you!" She retreated toward the Barmberry porch, Jeff following, his two
+hands out. They came within the range of the house lights, and Mr.
+Boltwood hailed, "Ah! Geoffrey! Never had such a surprise--nor a more
+delightful one!"
+
+"Mr. Boltwood! Looking splendid, sir! New man! William Street better
+look to its laurels when you come back and get into the game!"
+
+Then, on the lamp-lighted porch, the two men shook hands, and looked for
+some other cordial thing to do. They thought about giving each other
+cigars. They smiled, and backed away, and smiled, in the foolish,
+indeterminate way males have, being unable to take it out in kissing.
+Mr. Boltwood solved the situation by hemming, "Must trot in and wash.
+See you very soon." Mr. James Barmberry and the squad of lesser
+Barmberrys regretfully followed. Claire was alone with Jeff, and she was
+frightened. Yet she was admitting that Jeff, in his English cap and
+flaring London top-coat, his keen smile and his extreme shavedness, was
+more attractive than she had remembered.
+
+"Glad to see me?" he demanded.
+
+"Oh, rather!"
+
+"You're looking----"
+
+"You're so----"
+
+"Nice trip? You know you've sent me nothing but postcards with 'Pretty
+town,' or something equally sentimental."
+
+"Yes, it's really been bully. These mountains and big spaces simply
+inspire me." She said it rather defiantly.
+
+"Of course they do! Trouble is, with you away, we've nothing to inspire
+us!"
+
+"Do you need anything, with your office and your club?"
+
+"Why, Claire!"
+
+"I'm sorry. That was horrid of me."
+
+"Yes, it was. Though I don't mind. I'm sure we've all become meek,
+missing you so. I'm quite willing to be bullied, and reminded that I'm a
+mere T.B.M."
+
+She had got herself into it; she had to tell him that he wasn't just a
+business man; that she had "just meant" he was so practical.
+
+"But Jeff is no longer the practical one," he declared. "Think of Claire
+driving over deserts and mountains. But---- Oh, it's been so lonely for
+us. Can you guess how much? A dozen times every evening, I've turned to
+the telephone to call you up and beg you to let me nip in and see you,
+and then realized you weren't there, and I've just sat looking at the
+'phone---- Oh, other people are so dull!"
+
+"You really miss----"
+
+"I wish I were a poet, so I could tell you adequately. But you haven't
+said you missed me, Claire. Didn't you, a teeny bit? Wouldn't it have
+been tolerable to have poor old Jeff along, to drive down dangerous
+hills----"
+
+"And fill grease-cups! Nasty and stickum on the fingers!"
+
+"Yes, I'd have done that, too. And invented surprises along the way. I'm
+a fine surpriser! I've arranged for a motor-boat so we can explore the
+lake here tomorrow. That's why I had you wait here instead of coming on
+to Kalispell. Tomorrow morning, unfortunately, I have to hustle back and
+catch a train--called to California, and possibly a northern trip. But
+meantime---- By now, my driver must have sneaked my s'prises into the
+kitchen."
+
+"What are they?"
+
+"Guess."
+
+"Food. Eats. Divine eats."
+
+"Maybe."
+
+"But what? Please, sir. Claire is so hungry."
+
+"We shall see in time, my child. Uncle Jeff is not to be hurried."
+
+"Ah--let--me--see--now! I'll kick and scream!"
+
+From New York Jeff had brought a mammoth picnic basket. To the fried
+chicken ordered for dinner he added sealed jars of puree of wood pigeon,
+of stuffed artichokes prepared by his club chef; caviar and anchovies; a
+marvelous nightmare-creating fruit cake to go with the whipped cream;
+two quarts of a famous sherry; candied fruits in a silver box. Dinner
+was served not on the dining-porch but before the fire in the
+Barmberrys' living-room. Claire looked at the candied fruits, stared at
+Jeff rather queerly--as though she was really thinking of some one
+else--and mused:
+
+"I didn't know I cared so much for these foolish luxuries. Tonight, I'd
+like a bath, just a tiny bit scented, and a real dressing-table with a
+triple mirror, and French talc, and come down in a dinner-gown---- Oh, I
+have enjoyed the trip, Jeff. But my poor body does get so tired and
+dusty, and then you treacherously come along with these things that
+you've magicked out of the mountains and---- I'm not a pioneer woman,
+after all. And Henry B. is not a caveman. See him act idolatrously
+toward his soup."
+
+"I feel idolatrous. I'd forgotten the supreme ethical importance of the
+soup. I'll never let myself forget it again," said Mr. Boltwood, in the
+tone of one who has come home.
+
+Claire was grateful to Jeff that he did not let her go on being
+grateful. He turned the talk to Brooklyn. He was neat and explicit--and
+almost funny--in his description of an outdoor presentation of
+_Midsummer Night's Dream_, in which a domestic and intellectual lady
+weighing a hundred and eighty-seven stageside had enacted Puck. As they
+sat after dinner, as Claire shivered, he produced a knitted robe, and
+pulled it about her shoulders, smiling at her in a lonely, hungry way.
+She caught his hand.
+
+"Nice Jeff!" she whispered.
+
+"Oh, my dear!" he implored. He shook his head in a wistful way that
+caught her heart, and dutifully went back to informing Mr. Boltwood of
+the true state of the markets.
+
+"Talk to Claire too!" she demanded. She stopped, stared. From outside
+she heard a nervous pit-pit-pit, a blurred dialogue between Mr. James
+Barmberry and another man. Into the room rambled Milt Daggett, dusty of
+unpressed blue suit, tired of eyes, and not too well shaved of chin,
+grumbling, "Thought I'd never catch up with you, Claire---- Why----"
+
+"Oh! Oh, Milt--Mr. Daggett---- Oh, Jeff, this is our good friend Milt
+Daggett, who has helped us along the road."
+
+Jeff's lucid rimless spectacles stared at Milt's wind-reddened eyes; his
+jaunty patch-pocket outing clothes sniffed at Milt's sweater; his even
+voice followed Milt's grunt of surprise with a curt "Ah. Mr. Daggett."
+
+"Pleased meet you," faltered Milt.
+
+Jeff nodded, turned his shoulder on Milt, and went on, "The fact is, Mr.
+Boltwood, the whole metal market----"
+
+Milt was looking from one to another. Claire was now over her first
+shocked comparison of candied fruits with motor grease. She rose, moved
+toward Milt, murmuring, "Have you had dinner?"
+
+The door opened again. A pink-haired, red-faced man in a preposterous
+green belted suit lunged in, swept his broad felt hat in greeting, and
+boomed like a cheap actor:
+
+"Friends of my friend Milt, we about to dine salute you. Let me
+introduce myself as Westlake Parrott, better known to the vulgar as
+Pinky Parrott, gentleman adventurer, born in the conjunction of Mars and
+Venus, with Saturn ascendant."
+
+Jeff had ignored Milt. But at this absurd second intrusion on his
+decidedly private dinner-party he flipped to the center of the room and
+said "I beg your pardon!" in such a head-office manner that the
+pink-locked Mystery halted in his bombast. Claire felt wabbly. She had
+no theories as to where Milt had acquired a private jester, nor as to
+what was about to happen to Milt--and possibly to her incautious self.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+THE VAGABOND IN GREEN
+
+
+As Milt had headed westward from Butte, as he rattled peacefully along
+the road, conscious of golden haze over all the land, and the
+unexpectedness of prairie threshing-crews on the sloping fields of
+mountainsides, a man had stepped out from bushes beside the road, and
+pointed a .44 navy revolver.
+
+The man was not a movie bandit. He wore a green imitation of a Norfolk
+jacket, he had a broad red smile, and as he flourished his hat in a bow,
+his hair was a bristly pompadour of gray-streaked red that was almost
+pink. He made oration:
+
+"Pardon my eccentric greeting, brother of the open road, but I wanted
+you to give ear to my obsequious query as to how's chances on gettin' a
+lift? I have learned that obsequiousness is best appreciated when it is
+backed up by prayer and ca'tridges."
+
+"What's the idea? I seem to gather you'd like a lift. Jump in."
+
+"You do not advocate the Ciceronian style, I take it," chuckled the man
+as he climbed aboard.
+
+Milt was not impressed. Claire might have been, but Milt had heard
+politics and religion argued about the stove in Rauskukle's store too
+often to be startled by polysyllabomania. He knew it was often the sign
+of a man who has read too loosely and too much by himself. He snorted.
+"Huh! What are you--newspaper, politics, law, preacher, or gambler?"
+
+"Well, a little of all those interesting occupations. And
+ten-twent-thirt trouping, and county-fair spieling, and selling Dr.
+Thunder Rapids' Choctaw Herbal Sensitizer. How far y' going?"
+
+"Seattle."
+
+"Honest? Say, kid, this is---- Muh boy, we shall have the rare privilege
+of pooling adventures as far as Blewett Pass, four to six days' run from
+here--a day this side of Seattle. I'm going to my gold-mine there. I'll
+split up on the grub--I note from your kit that you camp nights. Quite
+all right, my boy. Pinky Parrott is no man to fear night air."
+
+He patted Milt's shoulder with patronizing insolence. He filled a pipe
+and, though the car was making twenty-five, he lighted the pipe with
+distinguished ease, then settled down to his steady stride:
+
+"In the pride of youth, you feel that you have thoroughly categorized
+me, particularly since I am willing to admit that, though I shall have
+abundance of the clinking iron men to buy my share of our chow, I chance
+just for the leaden-footed second to lack the wherewithal to pay my
+railroad fare back to Blewett; and the bumpers and side-door Pullman of
+the argonauts like me not. Too damn dusty. But your analysis is
+unsynthetic, though you will scarce grasp my paradoxical metaphor."
+
+"The hell I won't. I've taken both chemistry and rhetoric," growled
+Milt, strictly attending to driving, and to the desire to get rid of his
+parasite.
+
+"Oh! Oh, I see. Well, anyway: I am no mere nimble knight of wits, as you
+may take it. In fact, I am lord of fair acres in Arcady."
+
+"Don't know the burg. Montana or Idaho?"
+
+"Neither! In the valley of dream!"
+
+"Oh! That one. Huh!"
+
+"But I happen to back them up with a perfectly undreamlike gold-mine.
+Prospected for it in a canyon near Blewett Pass and found it, b' gum,
+and my lady wife, erstwhile fairest among the society favorites of North
+Yakima, now guards it against her consort's return. Straight goods. Got
+the stuff. Been to Butte to get a raise on it, but the fell khedives of
+commerce are jealous. They would hearken not. Gee, those birds certainly
+did pull the frigid mitt! So I wend my way back to the demure Dolores,
+the houri of my heart, and the next time I'll take a crack at the big
+guns in Seattle. And I'll sure reward you for your generosity in taking
+me to Blewett, all the long, long, languid, languorous way----"
+
+"Too bad I got to stop couple of days at Spokane."
+
+"Well, then you shall have the pleasure of taking me that far."
+
+"And about a week in Kalispell!"
+
+"'Twill discommode me, but 'pon honor, I like your honest simple face,
+and I won't desert you. Besides! I know a guy in Kalispell, and I can
+panhandle the sordid necessary chuck while I wait for you. Little you
+know, my cockerel, how facile a brain your 'bus so lightly bears. When
+I've cashed in on the mine, I'll take my rightful place among the
+motored gentry. Not merely as actor and spieler, promoter and inventor
+and soldier and daring journalist, have I played my role, but also I am
+a mystic, an initiate, a clairaudient, a psychometrist, a Rosicrucian
+adept, and profoundly psychic--in fact, my guide is Hermes Trismegistus
+himself! I also hold a degree as doctor of mento-practic, and my studies
+in astro-biochemistry----"
+
+"Gonna stop. All off. Make little coffee," said Milt.
+
+He did not desire coffee, and he did not desire to stop, but he did
+desperately desire not to inflict Pinky Parrott upon the Boltwoods. It
+was in his creed as a lover of motors never to refuse a ride to any one,
+when he had room. He hoped to get around his creed by the hint implied
+in stopping. Pinky's reaction to the hint was not encouraging:
+
+"Why, you have a touch of the psychic's flare! I could do with coffee
+myself. But don't trouble to make a fire. I'll do that. You drive--I do
+the camp work. Not but that I probably drive better than you, if you
+will permit me to say so. I used to do a bit of racing, before I took up
+aviation."
+
+"Huh! Aviation! What machine d'you fly?"
+
+"Why, why--a biplane!"
+
+"Huh! What kind of motor?"
+
+"Why, a foreign one. The--the---- It was a French motor."
+
+"Huh! What track you race on?"
+
+"The---- Pardon me till I build a fire for our _al fresco_ collation,
+and I my driving history will unfold."
+
+But he didn't do either.
+
+After he had brought seven twigs, one piece of sagebrush, and a six-inch
+board, Pinky let Milt finish building the fire, while he told how much
+he knew about the mysteries of ancient Egyptian priests.
+
+Milt gave up hope that Pinky would become bored by waiting and tramp on.
+After one hour of conversational deluge, he decided to let Pinky
+drive--to make him admit that he couldn't. He was wrong. Pinky could
+drive. He could not drive well, he wabbled in his steering, and he
+killed the engine on a grade, but he showed something of the same
+dashing idiocy that characterized his talk. It was Milt not Pinky, who
+was afraid of their running off the road, and suggested resuming the
+wheel.
+
+Seven times that day Milt tried to lose him. Once he stopped without
+excuse, and merely stared up at rocks overhanging the hollowed road.
+Pinky was not embarrassed. He leaned back in the seat and sang two
+Spanish love songs. Once Milt deliberately took a wrong road, up a
+mountainside. They were lost, and took five hours getting back to the
+highway. Pinky loved the thrill and--in a brief address lasting fifteen
+minutes--he said so.
+
+Milt tried to bore him by driving at seven miles an hour. Pinky
+affectionately accepted this opportunity to study the strata of the
+hills. When they camped, that night, Pinky loved him like a brother, and
+was considering not stopping at Blewett Pass, to see his gold-mine and
+Dolores the lady-wife, but going clear on to Seattle with his playmate.
+
+The drafted host lay awake, and when Pinky awoke and delivered a few
+well-chosen words on the subject of bird-song at dawn, Milt burst out:
+
+"Pinky, I don't like to do it, but---- I've never refused a fellow a
+lift, but I'm afraid you'll have to hike on by yourself, the rest of the
+way."
+
+Pinky sat up in his blankets. "Afraid of me, eh? You better be! I'm a
+bad actor. I killed Dolores's husband, and took her along, see? I----"
+
+"Are you trying to scare me, you poor four-flusher?" Milt's right hand
+expanded, fingers arching, with the joyous tension of a man stretching.
+
+"No. I'm just reading your thoughts. I'm telling you you're scared of
+me! You think that if I went on, I might steal your car! You're afraid
+because I'm so suave. You aren't used to smooth ducks. You don't dare to
+let me stick with you, even for today! You're afraid I'd have your
+mis'able car by tonight! You don't dare!"
+
+"The hell I don't!" howled Milt. "If you think I'm afraid---- Just to
+show you I'm not, I'll let you go on today!"
+
+"That's sense, my boy. It would be a shame for two such born companions
+of the road to part!" Pinky had soared up from his blankets; was
+lovingly shaking Milt's hand.
+
+Milt knew that he had been tricked, but he felt hopeless. Was it
+impossible to insult Pinky? He tried again:
+
+"I'll be frank with you. You're the worst wind-jamming liar I ever met.
+Now don't reach for that gat of yours. I've got a hefty rock right here
+handy."
+
+"But, my dear, dear boy, I don't intend to reach for any crude lethal
+smoke-wagon. Besides, there isn't anything in it. I hocked the shells in
+Butte. I am not angry, merely grieved. We'll argue this out as we have
+breakfast and drive on. I can prove to you that, though occasionally I
+let my fancy color mere untutored fact with the pigments of a Robert J.
+Ingersoll---- By the way, do you know his spiel on whisky?"
+
+"Stick to the subject. We'll finish our arguing right now, and I'll
+give you breakfast, and we'll sadly part."
+
+"Merely because I am lighter of spirits than this lugubrious old world?
+No! I decline to be dropped. I'll forgive you and go on with you. Mind
+you, I am sensitive. I will not intrude where I am not welcome. Only you
+must give me a sounder reason than my diverting conversational powers
+for shucking me. My logic is even stronger than my hedonistic contempt
+for hitting the pike."
+
+"Well, hang it, if you must know---- Hate to say it, but I'd do almost
+anything to get rid of you. Fact is, I've been sort of touring with a
+lady and her father, and you would be in the way!"
+
+"Aaaaaaah! You see! Why, my boy, I will not only stick, but for you, I
+shall do the nimble John Alden and win the lady fair. I will so bedizen
+your virile, though somewhat crassly practical gifts---- Why, women are
+my long suit. They fall for----"
+
+"Tut, tut, tut! You're a fool. She's no beanery mistress, like you're
+used to. She really is a lady."
+
+"How blind you are, cruel friend. You do not even see that whatever my
+vices may be, my social standing----"
+
+"Oh--shut--up! Can't you see I'm trying to be kind to you? Have I simply
+got to beat you up before you begin to suspect you aren't welcome? Your
+social standing isn't even in the telephone book. And your
+vocabulary---- You let too many 'kids' slip in among the juicy words.
+Have I got to lick----"
+
+"Well. You're right. I'm a fliv. Shake hands, m' boy, and no hard
+feelings."
+
+"Good. Then I can drive on nice and alone, without having to pound your
+ears off?"
+
+"Certainly. That is--we'll compromise. You take me on just a few miles,
+into more settled country, and I'll leave you."
+
+So it chanced that Milt was still inescapably accompanied by Mr. Pinky
+Parrott, that evening, when he saw Claire's Gomez standing in the yard
+at Barmberry's and pulled up.
+
+Pinky had voluntarily promised not to use his eloquence on Claire, nor
+to try to borrow money from Mr. Boltwood. Without ever having quite won
+permission to stay, he had stayed. He had also carried out his promise
+to buy his half of the provisions by adding a five-cent bag of lemon
+drops to Milt's bacon and bread.
+
+When they had stopped, Milt warned, "There's their machine now. Seems to
+be kind of a hotel here. I'm going in and say howdy. Good-by, Pink. Glad
+to have met you, but I expect you to be gone when I come out here again.
+If you aren't---- Want granite or marble for the headstone? I mean it,
+now!"
+
+"I quite understand, my lad. I admire your chivalric delicacy. Farewell,
+old _compagnon de voyage_!"
+
+Milt inquired of Mr. Barmberry whether the Boltwoods were within, and
+burst into the parlor-living-room-library. As he cried to Claire, by the
+fire, "Thought I'd never catch up with you," he was conscious that
+standing up, talking to Mr. Boltwood, was an old-young man, very suave,
+very unfriendly of eye. He had an Oxford-gray suit, unwrinkled cordovan
+shoes; a pert, insultingly well-tied blue bow tie, and a superior narrow
+pink bald spot. As he heard Jeff Saxton murmur, "Ah. Mr. Daggett!" Milt
+felt the luxury in the room--the fleecy robe over Claire's shoulders,
+the silver box of candy by her elbow, the smell of expensive cigars, and
+the portly complacence of Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"Have you had any dinner?" Claire was asking, when a voice boomed, "Let
+me introduce myself as Westlake Parrott."
+
+Jeff abruptly took charge. He faced Pinky and demanded, "I beg pardon!"
+
+Claire's eyebrows asked questions of Milt.
+
+"This is a fellow I gave a lift to. Miner--I mean actor--well, kind of
+spiritualistic medium----"
+
+Mr. Boltwood, with the geniality of dinner and cigar, soothed, "Jeff,
+uh, Daggett here has saved our lives two distinct times, and given us a
+great deal of help. He is a motor expert. He has always refused to let
+us do anything in return but---- I noticed there was almost a whole
+fried chicken left. I wonder if he wouldn't share it with, uh, with his
+acquaintance here before--before they make camp for the night?"
+
+In civil and vicious tones Jeff began, "Very glad to reward any one who
+has been of service to----"
+
+He was drowned out by Pinky's effusive, "True hospitality is a virtue as
+delicate as it is rare. We accept your invitation. In fact I should be
+glad to have one of those cigarros elegantos that mine olfactory----"
+
+Milt cut in abruptly, "Pink! Shut up! Thanks, folks, but we'll go on.
+Just wanted to see if you had got in safe. See you tomorrow, some
+place."
+
+Claire was close to Milt, her fingers on his sleeve. "Please, Milt!
+Father! You didn't make your introduction very complete. You failed to
+tell Mr. Daggett that this is Mr. Saxton, a friend of ours in Brooklyn.
+Please, Milt, do stay and have dinner. I won't let you go on hungry. And
+I want you to know Jeff--Mr. Saxton.... Jeff, Mr. Daggett is an
+engineer, that is, in a way. He's going to take an engineering course in
+the University of Washington. Some day I shall make you bloated copper
+magnates become interested in him.... Mrs. Barmberry. Mrssssssss.
+Barrrrrrrmberrrrrry! Oh. Oh, Mrs. Barmberry, won't you please warm up
+that other chicken for----"
+
+"Oh, now, that's too bad. Me and Jim have et it all up!" wept the
+landlady, at the door.
+
+"I'll go on," stammered Milt.
+
+Jeff looked at him expressionlessly.
+
+"You will not go on!" Claire was insisting. "Mrs. Barmberry, won't you
+cook some eggs or steak or something for these boys?"
+
+"Perhaps," Jeff suggested, "they'd rather make their own dinner by a
+campfire. Must be very jolly, and that sort of thing."
+
+"Jeff, if you don't mind, this is my party, just for the moment!"
+
+"Quite right. Sorry!"
+
+"Milt, you sit here by the fire and get warm. I'm not going to be robbed
+of the egotistic pleasure of being hospitable. Everybody look happy
+now!"
+
+She got them all seated--all but Pinky. He had long since seated
+himself, by the fire, in Claire's chair, and he was smoking a cigar from
+the box which Jeff had brought for Mr. Boltwood.
+
+Milt sat farthest from the fire, by the dining-table. He was agonizing,
+"This Jeff person is the real thing. He's no Percy in riding-breeches.
+He's used to society and nastiness. If he looks at me once more--young
+garage man found froze stiff, near Flathead Lake, scared look in eyes,
+believed to have met a grizzly, no signs of vi'lence. And I thought I
+could learn to mingle with Claire's own crowd! I wish I was out in the
+bug. I wonder if I can't escape?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+THE FALLACY OF ROMANCE
+
+
+During dinner Milt watched Jeff Saxton's manner and manners. The hot day
+had turned into a cold night. Jeff tucked the knitted robe about
+Claire's shoulders, when she returned to the fire. He moved quietly and
+easily. He kept poking up the fire, smiling at Claire as he did so. He
+seemed without difficulty to maintain two conversations: one with Mr.
+Boltwood about finances, one with Claire about mysterious persons called
+Fannie and Alden and Chub and Bobbie and Dot, the mention of whom made
+Milt realize how much a stranger he was. Once, as he passed by Claire,
+Jeff said gently, "You _are_ lovely!" Only that, and he did not look at
+her. But Milt saw that Claire flushed, and her eyes dimmed.
+
+Pinky was silent till he had eaten about two-thirds of the total amount
+of fried eggs, cold lamb and ice-box curios. When Claire came over to
+see how they fared, Pinky removed himself, with smirking humility, and
+firmly joined himself to Jeff and Mr. Boltwood. He caught the subject of
+finance and, while Claire dropped down in the chair by Milt, Pinky was
+lecturing the two men from New York:
+
+"Ah, finance! Queen of the sociological pantheon! I don't know how come
+I am so graced by Fortune as to have encountered in these wilds two
+gentlemen so obviously versed in the stratagems of the great golden
+game, but I will take the opportunity to give you gentlemen some
+statistics about the gold-deposits still existent in the Cascades and
+other ranges that may be of benefit and certainly will be a surprise to
+you. It happens that I have at the present time a mine----"
+
+Claire was whispering to Milt, "If we can get rid of your dreadful
+passenger, I do want you to meet Mr. Saxton. He may be of use to you
+some day. He's terribly capable, and really quite nice. Think! He
+happened to be out here, and he traced me by telephone--oh, he treats
+long-distance 'phoning as I do a hair-pin. He brought down the duckiest
+presents--divertissements for dinner, and that knitted robe, and some
+real Rene Bleuzet perfume--I was all out of it---- And after the grime
+of the road----"
+
+"Do you really care for things like that, all those awfully expensive
+luxuries?" begged Milt.
+
+"Of course I do. Especially after small hotels."
+
+"Then you don't really like adventuring?"
+
+"Oh yes--in its place! For one thing, it makes a clever dinner seem so
+good by contrast!"
+
+"Well---- Afraid I don't know much about clever dinners," Milt was
+sighing, when he was aware of Jeff Saxton looming down on him,
+demanding:
+
+"Daggett, would you mind trying to inform your friend that neither Mr.
+Boltwood nor I care to invest in his gold-mine? We can't seem to get
+that into his head. I don't mind being annoyed myself, but I really feel
+I must protect Mr. Boltwood."
+
+"What can I do?"
+
+"My dear sir, since you brought him here----"
+
+It was the potassium cyanide and cracked ice and carpet tacks and TNT
+and castor oil in Jeff's "My dear sir" that did it. Milt discovered
+himself on his feet, bawling, "I am not your dear sir! Pinky is my
+guest, and---- Gee, sorry I lost my temper, Claire, terrible sorry. See
+you along the road. Good night. Pink! You take your hat! Git!"
+
+Milt followed Pinky out of the door, snarling, "Git in the car, and do
+it quick. I'll take you clear to Blewett Pass. We drive all night."
+
+Pinky was of great silence and tact. Milt lumped into the bug beside
+him. But he did not start the all-night drive. He wanted to crawl back,
+on his knees, to apologize to Claire--and to be slapped by Jeff Saxton.
+He compromised by slowly driving a quarter of a mile up the road, and
+camping there for the night.
+
+Pinky tried to speak words of philosophy and cheer--just once he tried
+it.
+
+For hours, by a small fire, Milt grieved that all his pride was gone in
+a weak longing to see Claire again. In the morning he did see
+her--putting off on the lake, in a motor-boat with Jeff and Mr.
+Barmberry. He saw the boat return, saw Jeff get into the car which had
+brought him from Kalispell, saw the farewell, the long handclasp, the
+stoop of Jeff's head, and Claire's quick step backward before Jeff could
+kiss her. But Claire waved to Jeff long after his car had started.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When Claire and her father came along in the Gomez, Milt was standing by
+the road. She stopped. She smiled. "Night of sadness and regrets? You
+were fairly rude, Milt. So was Mr. Saxton, but I've lectured him, and he
+sends his apologies."
+
+"I send him mine--'deed I do," said Milt gravely.
+
+"Then everything's all right. I'm sure we were all tired. We'll just
+forget it."
+
+"Morning, Daggett," Mr. Boltwood put in. "Hope you lose that dreadful
+red-headed person."
+
+"No, I can't, Mr. Boltwood. When Mr. Saxton turned on me, I swore I'd
+take Pinky clear through to Blewett Pass ... though not to Seattle, by
+golly!"
+
+"Foolish oaths should be broken," Claire platitudinized.
+
+"Claire--look---- You don't really care so terribly much about these
+little luxuries, food and fixin's and six-dollar-a-day-hotel junk, do
+you?"
+
+"Yes," stoutly, "I do."
+
+"But not compared with mountains and----"
+
+"Oh, it's all very well to talk, and be so superior about these dear old
+grandeurs of Nature, and the heroism of pioneers, and I do like a
+glimpse of them. But the niceties of life do mean something and even if
+it is weak and dependent, I shall always simply adore them!"
+
+"All these things are kind of softening." And he meant that she was
+still soft.
+
+"At least they're not rude!" And she meant that he was rude.
+
+"They're absolutely trivial. They shut off----"
+
+"They shut off rain and snow and dirt, and I still fail to see the
+picturesqueness of dirt! Good-by!"
+
+She had driven off, without looking back. She was heading for Seattle
+and the Pacific Ocean at forty miles an hour--and they had no engagement
+to meet either in Seattle or in the Pacific.
+
+Before Milt went on he completed a task on which he had decided the
+night before while he had meditated on the tailored impertinence of Jeff
+Saxton's gray suit. The task was to give away the Best Suit, that
+stolid, very black covering which at Schoenstrom had seemed suitable
+either to a dance or to the Y. P. S. C. E. The recipient was Mr. Pinky
+Parrott, who gave in return a history of charity and high souls.
+
+Milt did not listen. He was wondering, now that they had started, where
+they had started for. Certainly not for Seattle! Why not stop and see
+Pinky's gold-mine? Maybe he did have one. Even Pinky had to tell the
+truth sometimes. With a good popular gold-mine in his possession, Milt
+could buy quantities of clothes like Jeff Saxton's, and----
+
+"And," he reflected, "I can learn as good manners as his in one hour,
+with a dancing lesson thrown in. If I didn't, I'd sue the professor!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE NIGHT OF ENDLESS PINES
+
+
+On the edge of Kootenai Canyon, feeling more like an aviator than like
+an automobilist, Claire had driven, and now, nearing Idaho, she had
+entered a national forest. She was delayed for hours, while she tried to
+change a casing, after a blow-out when the spare tire was deflated. She
+wished for Milt. She would never see him again. She was sorry. He hadn't
+meant----
+
+But hang it, she panted, if he admired her at all, he'd be here now and
+get on this per-fect-ly beast-ly casing, over which she had been
+laboring for a dozen years; and she was simply too ridiculously tired;
+and was there any respectful way of keeping Henry B. from beaming in
+that benevolent manner while she was killing herself; and look at those
+fingernails; and--oh, drrrrrrat that casing!
+
+To make the next town, after this delay, she had to drive for hours by
+night through the hulking pines of the national forest. It was her first
+long night drive.
+
+A few claims, with log cabins of recent settlers, once or twice the
+shack of a forest-ranger, a telephone in a box by the road or a rough R.
+F. D. box nailed to a pine trunk, these indicated that civilization
+still existed, but they were only melancholy blurs. She was in a cold
+enchantment. All of her was dead save the ability to keep on driving,
+forever, with no hope of the tedium ending. She was bewildered. She
+passed six times what seemed to be precisely the same forest clearing,
+always with the road on a tiny ridge to the left of the clearing, always
+with a darkness-stilled house at one end and always, in the pasture at
+the other end, a horse which neighed. She was in a panorama stage-scene;
+things moved steadily by her, there was a sound of the engine, and a
+sensation of steering, but she was forever in the same place, among the
+same pines, with the same scowling blackness between their bare clean
+trunks. Only the road ahead was clear: a one-way track, the foot-high
+earthy bank and the pine-roots beside it, two distinct ruts, and a
+roughening of strewn brown bark and pine-needles, which, in the beating
+light of the car's lamps, made the sandy road scabrous with little
+incessant shadows.
+
+She had never known anything save this strained driving on. Jeff and
+Milt were old tales, and untrue. Was it ten hours before that she had
+cooked dinner beside the road? No matter. She wasn't hungry any longer.
+She would never reach the next town--and she didn't care. It wasn't she,
+but a grim spirit which had entered her dead body, that kept steering,
+feeding gas, watching the road.
+
+In the darkness outside the funnel of light from her lamps were shadows
+that leaped, and gray hands hastily jerked back out of sight behind tree
+trunks as she came up; things that followed her, and hidden men waiting
+for her to stop.
+
+As drivers will, she tried to exorcise the creeping fear by singing. She
+made up what she called her driving-song. It was intended to echo the
+hoofs of a fat old horse on a hard road:
+
+    The old horse trots with a jog, jog, jog,
+    And a jog, jog, jog; and a jog, jog, jog.
+    And the old road makes a little jog, jog, jog,
+    To the west, jog, jog; and the north, jog, jog.
+    While the farmer drinks some cider from his jug, jug, jug,
+    From his coy jug, jug; from his joy jug, jug.
+    Till he accumulates a little jag, jag, jag,
+    And he jigs, jigs, jigs, with his jug, jug, jug----
+
+The song was a comfort, at first--then a torment. She drove to it, and
+she steered to it, and when she tried to forget, it sang itself in her
+tired brain: "Jog, jog, jog--oh, _damn_!"
+
+Her father had had a chill. Miserable, weak as a small boy, he had
+curled up on the bottom of the car, his head on the seat, and gone to
+sleep. She was alone. The mile-posts went by slowly. The posts said
+there was a town ahead called Pellago, but it never came----
+
+And when it did come she was too tired to care. In a thick dream she
+drove through midnight streets of the town. In stupid paralysis she
+kicked at the door of the galvanized-iron-covered garage. No answer. She
+gave it up. She drove down the street and into the yard of a hotel
+marked by a swing sign out over the plank sidewalk. She got out the
+traveling bags, awakened her father, led him up on the porch.
+
+The Pellago Tavern was a transformed dwelling house. The pillars of the
+porch were aslant, and the rain-warped boards snapped beneath her feet.
+She hesitatingly opened the door. The hallway was dark and musty. A
+sound like a moan filtered down the unlighted stairs.
+
+There seemed to be light in the room on the right. Trying to assure
+herself that her father was a protection, she pushed open the door. She
+looked into an airless room, scattered with rubber boots, unsavory old
+corduroy caps, tattered magazines. By the stove nodded a wry-mouthed,
+squat old woman, and a tall, cheaply handsome man of forty. Tobacco
+juice stained the front of his stiff-bosomed, collarless shirt. His
+hands were white but huge.
+
+The old woman started. "Well?"
+
+"I want to get two rooms for the night, please."
+
+The man smirked at her. The woman creaked, "Well, I don't know. Where d'
+you come from, heh?"
+
+"We're motoring through."
+
+"Heh? Who's that man?"
+
+"He's my father, madam."
+
+"Needn't to be so hoity-toity about it, 'he's my father, madam!' F' that
+matter, that thing there is my husband!"
+
+The man had been dusting his shabby coat, stroking his mustache, smiling
+with sickly gallantry. He burbled, "Shut up, Teenie. This lady is all
+right. Give her a room. Number 2 is empty, and I guess Number 7 has been
+made up since Bill left--if 'tain't, the sheets ain't been slept on but
+one night."
+
+"Where d' you come----"
+
+"Now don't go shooting off a lot of questions at the lady, Teenie. I'll
+show her the rooms."
+
+The woman turned on her husband. He was perhaps twenty-five years
+younger; a quarter-century less soaked in hideousness. Her yellow,
+concave-sided teeth were bared at him, her mouth drew up on one side
+above the gums. "Pete, if I hear one word more out of you, out you go.
+Lady! Huh! Where d' you come from, young woman?"
+
+Claire was too weak to stagger away. She leaned against the door. Her
+father struggled to speak, but the woman hurled:
+
+"Wherdjuhcomfromised!"
+
+"From New York. Is there another hotel----"
+
+"Nah, there ain't another hotel! Oh! So you come from New York, do you?
+Snobs, that's what N' Yorkers are. I'll show you some rooms. They'll be
+two dollars apiece, and breakfast fifty cents extra."
+
+The woman led them upstairs. Claire wanted to flee, but---- Oh, she
+couldn't drive any farther! She couldn't!
+
+The floor of her room was the more bare in contrast to a two-foot-square
+splash of gritty ingrain carpet in front of the sway-backed bed. On the
+bed was a red comforter that was filthy beyond disguise. The yellow
+earthenware pitcher was cracked. The wall mirror was milky. Claire had
+been spoiled. She had found two excellent hotels since Yellowstone Park.
+She had forgotten how badly human beings can live. She protested:
+
+"Seems to me two dollars is a good deal to charge for this!"
+
+"I didn't say two dollars. I said three! Three each for you and your pa.
+If you don't like it you can drive on to the next town. It's only
+sixteen miles!"
+
+"Why the extra dollar--or extra two dollars?"
+
+"Don't you see that carpet? These is our best rooms. And three
+dollars---- I know you New Yorkers. I heard of a gent once, and they
+charged him five dollars--five dol-lars!--for a room in New York, and a
+boy grabbed his valise from him and wanted a short-bit and----"
+
+"Oh--all--right! Can we get something to eat?"
+
+"Now!?"
+
+"We haven't eaten since noon."
+
+"That ain't my fault! Some folks can go gadding around in automobuls,
+and some folks has to stay at home. If you think I'm going to sit up all
+night cooking for people that come chassayin' in here God knows what all
+hours of the day and night----! There's an all-night lunch down the
+street."
+
+When she was alone Claire cried a good deal.
+
+Her father declined to go out to the lunch room. The chill of the late
+ride was still on him, he croaked through his door; he was shivering; he
+was going right to bed.
+
+"Yes, do, dear. I'll bring you back a sandwich."
+
+"Safe to go out alone?"
+
+"Anything's safe after facing that horrible---- I do believe in witches,
+now. Listen, dear; I'll bring you a hot-water bag."
+
+She took the bag down to the office. The landlady was winding the clock,
+while her husband yawned. She glared.
+
+"I wonder if I may have some hot water for my father? He has a chill."
+
+"Stove's out. No hot water in the house."
+
+"Couldn't you heat some?"
+
+"Now look here, miss. You come in here, asking for meals and rooms at
+midnight, and you want a cut rate on everything, and I do what I can,
+but enough's enough!"
+
+The woman stalked out. Her husband popped up. "Mustn't mind the old
+girl, lady. Got a grouch. Well, you can't blame her, in a way; when Bill
+lit out, he done her out of four-bits! But I'll tell you!" he leered.
+"You leave me the hot-water biznai, and I'll heat you some water
+myself!"
+
+"Thank you, but I won't trouble you. Good night."
+
+Claire was surprised to find a warm, rather comfortable all-night lunch
+room, called the Alaska Cafe, with a bright-eyed man of twenty-five in
+charge. He nodded in a friendly way, and made haste with her order of
+two ham-and-egg sandwiches. She felt adventurous. She polished her knife
+and fork on a napkin, as she had seen people do in lunches along the
+way. A crowd of three rubbed their noses against the front window to
+stare at the strange girl in town, but she ignored them, and they
+drifted away.
+
+The lunchman was cordial: "At a hotel, ma'am? Which one? Gee, not the
+Tavern?"
+
+"Why yes. Is there another?"
+
+"Sure. First-rate one, two blocks over, one up."
+
+"The woman said the Tavern was the only hotel."
+
+"Oh, she's an old sour-face. Don't mind her. Just bawl her out. What's
+she charging you for a room?"
+
+"Three dollars."
+
+"Per each? Gee! Well, she sticks tourists anywheres from one buck to
+three. Natives get by for fifty cents. She's pretty fierce, but she
+ain't a patch on her husband. He comes from Spokane--nobody knows
+why--guess he was run out. He takes some kind of dope, and he cheats at
+rummy."
+
+"But why does the town stand either of them? Why do you let them torture
+innocent people? Why don't you put them in the insane hospital, where
+they belong?"
+
+"That's a good one!" her friend chuckled. But he saw it only as a joke.
+
+She thought of moving her father to the good hotel, but she hadn't the
+strength.
+
+Claire Boltwood, of Brooklyn Heights, went through the shanty streets of
+Pellago, Montana, at one A.M. carrying a sandwich in a paper bag which
+had recently been used for salted peanuts, and a red rubber hot-water
+bag filled with water at the Alaska Cafe. At the Tavern she hastened
+past the office door. She made her father eat his sandwich; she teased
+him and laughed at him till the hot-water bag had relieved his
+chill-pinched back; she kissed him boisterously, and started for her own
+room, at the far end of the hall.
+
+The lights were off. She had to feel her way, and she hesitated at the
+door of her room before she entered. She imagined voices, creeping
+footsteps, people watching her from a distance. She flung into the
+room, and when the kindled lamp showed her familiar traveling bag, she
+felt safer. But once she was in bed, with the sheet down as far as
+possible over the loathly red comforter, the quiet rustled and snapped
+about her, and she could not relax. Sinking into sleep seemed slipping
+into danger, and a dozen times she started awake.
+
+But only slowly did she admit to herself that she actually did hear a
+fumbling, hear the knob of her door turning.
+
+"W-who's there?"
+
+"It's me, lady. The landlord. Brought you the hot water."
+
+"Thanks so much, but I don't need it now."
+
+"Got something else for you. Come to the door. Don't want to holler and
+wake ev'body up."
+
+At the door she said timorously, "Nothing else I want, thank you.
+D-don't bother me."
+
+"Why, I've brought you up a sandwich, girlie, all nice and hot, and a
+nip of something to take the chill off."
+
+"I don't want it, I tell you!"
+
+"Be a sport now! You use Pete right, and he'll use you right. Shame to
+see a lady like you not gettin' no service here. Open the door. Dandy
+sandwich!" The knob rattled again. She said nothing. The heel of her
+palm pressed against the door till the molding ate into it. The man was
+snorting:
+
+"I ain't going to all this trouble and then throw away a good sandwich.
+You asked me----"
+
+"M-must I s-shout?"
+
+"S-shout your fool head off!" He kicked the door. "Good friends of mine,
+'long this end of the hall. Aw, listen. Just teasing. I'm not going to
+rob you, little honey bird. Laws, you could have a million dollars, and
+old Pete wouldn't take two-bits. I just get so darn lonely in this hick
+town. Like to chat to live ones from the big burg. I'm a city fella
+myself--Spokane and Cheyenne and everything."
+
+In her bare feet, Claire had run across the room, looked desperately out
+of the window. Could she climb out, reach her friend of the Alaska Cafe?
+If she had to----
+
+Then she grinned. The world was rose-colored and hung with tinkling
+bells. "I love even that Pinky person!" she said. In the yard of the
+hotel, beside her Gomez, was a Teal bug, and two men were sleeping in
+blankets on the ground.
+
+She marched over to the door. She flung it open. The man started back.
+He was holding an electric, torch. She could not see him, but to the
+hovering ball of light she remarked, "Two men, friends of mine, are
+below, by their car. You will go at once, or I'll call them. If you
+think I am bluffing, go down and look. Good night!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+THE FREE WOMAN
+
+
+Before breakfast, Claire darted down to the hotel yard. She beamed at
+Milt, who was lacing a rawhide patch on a tire, before she remembered
+that they were not on speaking terms. They both looked extremely
+sheepish and young. It was Pinky Parrott who was the social lubricant.
+Pinky was always on speaking terms with everybody. "Ah, here she is! The
+little lady of the mutinous eyes! Our colonel of the flivver hussars!"
+
+But he got no credit. Milt straightened up and lumbered, "Hel-lo!"
+
+She peeped at him and whispered, "Hel-lo!"
+
+"Say, oh please, Claire---- I didn't mean----"
+
+"Oh, I know! Let's--let's go have breakfast."
+
+"Was awfully afraid you'd think we were fresh, but when we came in last
+night, and saw your car--didn't like the looks of the hotel much, and
+thought we'd stick around."
+
+"I'm so glad. Oh, Milt--yes, and you, Mr. Parrott--will you
+whip--lick--beat up--however you want to say it--somebody for me?"
+
+With one glad communal smile Milt and Pinky curved up their wrists and
+made motions as of pulling up their sleeves.
+
+"But not unless I say so. I want to be a Citizeness Fixit. I've been
+good for so long. But now----"
+
+"Show him to me!" and "Up, lads, and atum!" responded her squad.
+
+"Not till after breakfast."
+
+It was a sufficiently vile breakfast, at the Tavern. The feature was
+curious cakes whose interior was raw creepy dough. A dozen skilled
+workmen were at the same long table with Claire, Milt, Pinky, and Mr.
+Boltwood--the last two of whom were polite and scenically descriptive to
+each other, but portentously silent about gold-mines. The landlady and a
+slavey waited on table; the landlord could be seen loafing in the
+kitchen.
+
+Toward the end of the meal Claire insultingly crooked her finger at the
+landlady and said, "Come here, woman."
+
+The landlady stared, then ignored her.
+
+"Very well. Then I'll say it publicly!" Claire swept the workmen with an
+affectionate smile. "Gentlemen of Pellago, I want you to know from one
+of the poor tourists who have been cheated at this nasty place that we
+depend on you to do something. This woman and her husband are criminals,
+in the way they overcharge for hideous food and----"
+
+The landlady had been petrified. Now she charged down. Behind her came
+her husband. Milt arose. The husband stopped. But it was Pinky who faced
+the landlady, tapped her shoulder, and launched into, "And what's more,
+you hag, if our new friends here have any sense, they'll run you out of
+town."
+
+That was only the beginning of Pinky's paper on corrections and
+charities. He enjoyed himself. Before he finished, the landlady was
+crying ... she voluntarily promised to give her boarders waffles, some
+morning, jus' soon as she could find the waffle-iron.
+
+With her guard about her, at the office desk, Claire paid one dollar
+apiece for the rooms, and discussion was not.
+
+Before they started, Milt had the chance to say to her, "I'm getting so
+I can handle Pinky now. Have to. Thinking of getting hold of his
+gold-mine. I just give him the eye, as your friend Mr. Saxton would, and
+he gets so meek----"
+
+"But don't! Please understand me, Milt; I do admire Mr. Saxton; he is
+fine and capable, and really generous; only---- He may be just a bit
+snippish at times, while you--you're a playmate--father's and
+mine--and---- I did face that landlady, didn't I! I'm not soft and
+trivial, am I! Praise!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+She had driven through the panhandle of Idaho into Washington, through
+Spokane, through the writhing lava deposits of Moses Coulee where fruit
+trees grow on volcanic ash. Beyond Wenatchee, with its rows of apple
+trees striping the climbing fields like corduroy in folds, she had come
+to the famous climb of Blewett Pass. Once over that pass, and
+Snoqualmie, she would romp into Seattle.
+
+She was sorry that she hadn't come to know Milt better, but perhaps she
+would see him in Seattle.
+
+Not adventure alone was she finding, but high intellectual benefit in
+studying the names of towns in the state of Washington. Not Kankakee nor
+Kalamazoo nor Oshkosh can rival the picturesque fancy of Washington, and
+Claire combined the town-names in a lyric so emotion-stirring that it
+ought, perhaps, to be the national anthem. It ran:
+
+    Humptulips, Tum Tum, Moclips, Yelm,
+    Satsop, Bucoda, Omak, Enumclaw,
+    Tillicum, Bossburg, Chettlo, Chattaroy,
+    Zillah, Selah, Cowiche, Keechelus,
+    Bluestem, Bluelight, Onion Creek, Sockeye,
+    Antwine, Chopaka, Startup, Kapowsin,
+      Skamokawa, Sixprong, Pysht!
+
+    Klickitat, Kittitas, Spangle, Cedonia,
+    Pe Ell, Cle Elum, Sallal, Chimacum,
+    Index, Taholah, Synarep, Puyallup,
+    Wallula, Wawawai, Wauconda, Washougal,
+    Walla Walla, Washtucna, Wahluke,
+    Solkulk, Newaukum, Wahkiakus,
+      Penawawa, Ohop, Ladd!
+
+    Harrah, Olalla, Umtanum, Chuckanut,
+    Soap Lake, Loon Lake, Addy, Ace, Usk,
+    Chillowist, Moxee City, Yellepit, Cashup,
+    Moonax, Mabton, Tolt, Mukilteo,
+    Poulsbo, Toppenish, Whetstone, Inchelium,
+    Fishtrap, Carnation, Shine, Monte Cristo,
+      Conconully, Roza, Maud!
+
+    China Bend, Zumwalt, Sapolil, Riffle,
+    Touchet, Chesaw, Chew, Klum, Bly,
+    Humorist, Hammer, Nooksack, Oso,
+    Samamish, Dusty, Tiger, Turk, Dot,
+    Scenic, Tekoa, Nellita, Attalia,
+    Steilacoom, Tweedle, Ruff, Lisabeula,
+    Latah, Peola, Towal, Eltopia,
+      Steptoe, Pluvius, Sol Duc, Twisp!
+
+"And then," complained Claire, "they talk about Amy Lowell! I leave it
+to you, Henry B., if any union poet has ever written as gay a refrain as
+'Ohop Ladd'!"
+
+She was not merely playing mental whist. She was trying to keep from
+worry. All the way she had heard of Blewett Pass; its fourteen miles of
+climbing, and the last half mile of stern pitch. On this eastern side of
+the pass, the new road was not open; there was a tortuous,
+flint-scattered trail, too narrow, in most places, for the passing of
+other cars. Claire was glad that Milt and Pinky were near her.
+
+If so many of the race of kind advisers of tourists had not warned her
+about it, doubtless she would have gone over the pass without
+difficulty. But their voluntary croaking sapped her nerve, and her
+father's. He kept worrying, "Do you think we better try it?" When they
+stopped at a ranch house at the foot of the climb, for the night, he
+seemed unusually tired. He complained of chill. He did not eat
+breakfast. They started out silent, depressed.
+
+He crouched in the corner of the seat. She looked at him and was
+anxious. She stopped on the first level space on the pass, crying, "You
+are perfectly miserable. I'm afraid of---- I think we ought to see a
+doctor."
+
+"Oh, I'll be all right."
+
+But she waited till Milt came pit-pattering up the slope. "Father feels
+rather sick. What shall I do? Turn round and drive to the nearest
+doctor--at Cashmere, I suppose?"
+
+"There's a magnolious medico ahead here on the pass," Pinky Parrott
+interrupted. "A young thing, but they say he's a graduate of Harvard.
+He's out here because he has some timber-claims. Look, Milt o' the
+Daggett, why don't you drive Miss Boltwood's 'bus--make better time, and
+hustle the old gent up to the doc, and I'll come on behind with your
+machine."
+
+"Why," Claire fretted, "I hate----"
+
+A new Milt, the boss, abrupt, almost bullying, snapped out of his bug.
+"Good idee. Jump in, Claire. I'll take your father up. Heh, whasat,
+Pink? Yes, I get it; second turn beyond grocery. Right. On we go. Huh?
+Oh, we'll think about the gold-mine later, Pink."
+
+With the three of them wedged into the seat of the Gomez, and Pinky
+recklessly skittering after them in the bug, they climbed again--and lo!
+there was no climb! Unconsciously Claire had hesitated before dashing at
+each sharp upsloping bend; had lost headway while she was wondering,
+"Suppose the car went off this curve?" Milt never sped up, but he never
+slackened. His driving was as rhythmical as music.
+
+They were so packed in that he could scarcely reach gear lever and
+hand-brake. He halted on a level, and curtly asked, "That trap-door in
+the back of the car--convertible extra seat?"
+
+"Yes, but we almost never use it, and it's stuck. Can't get it open."
+
+"I'll open it all right! Got a big screwdriver? Want you sit back there.
+Need elbow room."
+
+"Perhaps I'd better drive with Mr. Pinky."
+
+"Nope. Don't think better."
+
+With one yank he opened the trap-door, revealing a folding seat, which
+she meekly took. Back there, she reflected, "How strong his back looks.
+Funny how the little silvery hairs grow at the back of his neck."
+
+They came to a settlement and the red cedar bungalow of Dr. Hooker
+Beach. The moment Claire saw the doctor's thin demanding face, she
+trusted him. He spoke to Mr. Boltwood with assurance: "All you need is
+some rest, and your digestion is a little shaky. Been eating some pork?
+Might stay here a day or two. We're glad to have a glimpse of
+Easterners."
+
+Mr. Boltwood went to bed in the Beaches' guest-room. Mrs. Beach gave
+Claire and Milt lunch, with thin toast and thin china, on a porch from
+which an arroyo dropped down for a hundred feet. Fir trees scented the
+air, and a talking machine played the same Russian music that was
+popular that same moment in New York. And the Beaches knew people who
+knew Claire.
+
+Claire was thinking. These people were genuine aristocrats, while Jeff
+Saxton, for all his family and his assumptions about life, was the
+eternal climber. Milt, who had been uncomfortable with Jeff, was serene
+and un-self-conscious with the Beaches, and the doctor gratefully took
+his advice about his stationary gas engine. "He's rather like the
+Beaches in his simplicity--yes, and his ability to do anything if he
+considers it worth while," she decided.
+
+After lunch, when the doctor and his wife had to trot off to a patient,
+Claire proposed, "Let's walk up to that ledge of rock and see the view,
+shall we, Milt?"
+
+"Yes! And keep an eye on the road for Pinky. The poor nut, he hasn't
+showed up. So reckless; hope he hasn't driven the Teal off the road."
+
+She crouched at the edge of a rock, where she would have been
+frightened, a month before, and looked across the main road to a creek
+in a pine-laced gully. He sat beside her, elbows on knees.
+
+"Those Beaches--their kin are judges and senators and college
+Presidents, all over New England," she said. "This doctor must be the
+grandson of the ambassador, I fancy."
+
+"Honest? I thought they were just regular folks. Was I nice?"
+
+"Of course you were."
+
+"Did I--did I wash my paws and sit up and beg?"
+
+"No, you aren't a little dog. I'm that. You're the big mastiff that
+guards the house, while I run and yip." She was turned toward him,
+smiling. Her hand was beside him. He touched the back of it with his
+forefinger, as though he was afraid he might soil it.
+
+There seemed to be no reason, but he was trembling as he stammered,
+"I--I--I'm d-darn glad I didn't know they were anybody, or 'd have been
+as bad as a flivver driver the first time he tries a t-twelve-cylinder
+machine. G-gee your hand is little!"
+
+She took it back and inspected it. "I suppose it is. And pretty
+useless."
+
+"N-no, it isn't, but your shoes are. Why don't you wear boots when
+you're out like this?" A flicker of his earlier peremptoriness came into
+his voice. She resented it:
+
+"My shoes are perfectly sensible! I will not wear those horrible
+vegetarian uplift sacks on my feet!"
+
+"Your shoes may be all right for New York, but you're not going to New
+York for a while. You've simply got to see some of this country while
+you're out here--British Columbia and Alaska."
+
+"Would be nice, but I've had enough roughing----"
+
+"Chance to see the grandest mountains in the world, almost, and then you
+want to go back to tea and all that junk!"
+
+"Stop trying to bully me! You have been dictatorial ever since we
+started up----"
+
+"Have I? Didn't mean to be. Though I suppose I usually am bullying. At
+least I run things. There's two kinds of people; those that give orders,
+and those that naturally take them; and I belong to the first one,
+and----"
+
+"But my dear Milt, so do I, and really----"
+
+"And mostly I'd take them from you. But hang it, Seattle is just a day
+away, and you'll forget me. Wish I could kidnap you. Have half a mind
+to. Take you way up into the mountains, and when you got used to
+roughing it in sure-enough wilderness--say you'd helped me haul timber
+for a flume--then we'd be real pals. You have the stuff in you, but you
+still need toughening before----"
+
+"Listen to me, Milton. You have been reading fiction, about this
+man--sometimes he's a lumberjack, and sometimes a trapper or a miner,
+but always he's frightfully hairy--and he sees a charming woman in the
+city, and kidnaps her, and shuts her up in some unspeakable shanty, and
+makes her eat nice cold boiled potatoes, and so naturally, she simply
+adores him! A hundred men have written that story, and it's an example
+of their insane masculine conceit, which I, as a woman, resent.
+Shakespeare may have started it, with his silly _Taming of the Shrew_.
+Shakespeare's men may have been real, but his women were dolls, designed
+to please some majesty. You may not know it, but there are women today
+who don't live just to please majesties' fancies. If a woman like me
+were kidnapped, she would go on hating the brute, or if she did give in,
+then the man would lose anyway, because she would have degenerated;
+she'd have turned into a slave, and lost exactly the things he'd liked
+in her. Oh, you cavemen! With your belief that you can force women to
+like you! I have more courage than any of you!"
+
+"I admit you have courage, but you'd have still more, if you bucked the
+wilds."
+
+"Nonsense! In New York I face every day a hundred complicated problems
+you don't know I ever heard of!"
+
+"Let me remind you that Brer Julius Caesar said he'd rather be mayor in a
+little Spanish town than police commissioner in Rome. I'm king in
+Schoenstrom, while you're just one of a couple hundred thousand bright
+people in New York----"
+
+"Really? Oh, at least a million. Thanks!"
+
+"Oh--gee--Claire, I didn't mean to be personal, and get in a row and
+all, but--can't you see--kind of desperate--Seattle so soon----"
+
+Her face was turned from him; its thin profile was firm as silver wire.
+He blundered off into silence and--they were at it again!
+
+"I didn't mean to make you angry," he gulped.
+
+"Well, you did! Bullying---- You and your men of granite, in mackinaws
+and a much-needed shave, trying to make a well-bred woman satisfied with
+a view consisting of rocks and stumps and socks on the line! Let me tell
+you that compared with a street canyon, a mountain canyon is simply
+dead, and yet these unlettered wild men----"
+
+"See here! I don't know if you're firing these adjectives at me, but I
+don't know that I'm so much more unlettered---- You talked about taking
+French in your finishing-school. Well, they taught American in mine!"
+
+"They would!"
+
+Then he was angry. "Yes, and chemistry and physics and Greek and Latin
+and history and mathematics and economics, and I took more or less of a
+whirl at all of them, while you were fiddling with ribbons, and then I
+had to buck mechanics and business methods."
+
+"I also 'fiddled' with manners--an unfortunate omission in your
+curriculum, I take it! You have been reasonably rude----"
+
+"So have you!"
+
+"I had to be! But I trust you begin to see that even your strong hand
+couldn't control a woman's taste. Kidnapping! As intelligent a boy as
+you wanting to imitate these boorish movie----"
+
+"Not a darn bit more boorish than your smart set, with its champagne and
+these orgies at country clubs----"
+
+"You know so much about country clubs, don't you! The worst orgy I ever
+saw at one was the golf champion reading the beauty department in
+_Boudoir_. Would you mind backing up your statements about the vices of
+myself and my friends----"
+
+"Oh, you. Oh, I didn't mean----"
+
+"Then why did you----"
+
+"Now you're bullying me, and you know that if the smart set isn't
+vicious, at least it's so snobbish that it can't see any----"
+
+"Then it's wise to be snobbish, because if it did condescend----"
+
+"I won't stand people talking about condescending----"
+
+"Would you mind not shouting so?"
+
+"Very well! I'll keep still!"
+
+Silence again, while both of them looked unhappy, and tried to remember
+just what they had been fighting about. They did not at first notice a
+small red car larruping gaily over the road beneath the ledge, though
+the driver was a pink-haired man in a green coat. He was almost gone
+before Milt choked, "It's Pinky!"
+
+"Pink! Pinky!" he bellowed.
+
+Pinky looked back but, instead of stopping, he sped up, and kept going.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+THE MINE OF LOST SOULS
+
+
+"That couldn't have been Pinky! Why! Why, the car he had was red," cried
+Claire.
+
+"Sure. The idiot's got hold of some barn paint somewhere, and tried to
+daub it over. He's trying to make a getaway with it!"
+
+"We'll chase him. In my car."
+
+"Don't you mind?"
+
+"Of course not. I do not give up my objections to the roughing
+philosophy, but---- You were right about these shoes---- Oh, don't leave
+me behind! Want to go along!"
+
+These sentences she broke, scattered, and totally lost as she scrambled
+after him, down the rocks. He halted. His lips trembled. He picked her
+up, carried her down, hesitated a second while his face--curiously
+foreshortened as she looked up at it from his big arms--twisted with
+emotion. He set her down gently, and she climbed into the Gomez.
+
+It seemed to her that he drove rather too carefully, too slowly. He took
+curves and corners evenly. His face was as empty of expression, as
+unmelodramatic, as that of a jitney driver. Then she looked at the
+speedometer. He was making forty-eight miles an hour down hill and forty
+to thirty on upgrades.
+
+They were in sight of the fleeing Pinky in two miles. Pinky looked back;
+instantly was to be seen pulling his hat low, stooping over--the demon
+driver. Milt merely sat more erect, looked more bland and white-browed
+and steady.
+
+The bug fled before them on a winding shelf road. It popped up a curve,
+then slowed down. "He took it too fast. Poor Pink!" said Milt.
+
+They gained on that upslope, but as the road dropped, the bug started
+forward desperately. Another car was headed toward them; was drawn to
+the side of the road, in one of the occasional widenings. Pinky passed
+it so carelessly that, with crawling spine, Claire saw the outer wheels
+of the bug on the very edge of the road--the edge of a fifty-foot drop.
+Milt went easily past the halted car--even waved his hand to the waiting
+driver.
+
+This did not seem to Claire at all like the chase of a thief. She looked
+casually ahead at Pinky, as he whirled round an S-shaped curve on the
+downslope, then---- It was too quick to see what happened. The bug
+headed directly toward the edge of the road, shot out, went down the
+embankment, over and over. It lay absurdly upside-down, its muffler and
+brake-rods showing in place of the seat and hood.
+
+Milt quite carefully stopped the Gomez. The day was still--just a
+breathing of running water in the deep gully. The topsy-turvy car below
+them was equally still; no sight of Pinky, no sound.
+
+The gauche boy gone from him, Milt took her hand, pressed it to his
+cheek. "Claire! You're here! You might have gone with him, to make
+room---- Oh, I was bullying you because I was bullying myself! Trying to
+make myself tell you--but oh, you know, you know! Can you stand going
+down there? I hate to have you, but you may be needed."
+
+"Yes. I'll come," she whispered.
+
+Their crawl down the rock-rolling embankment seemed desperately slow.
+
+"Wait here," bade Milt, at the bottom.
+
+She looked away from the grotesque car. She had seen that one side of it
+was crumpled like paper in an impatient hand.
+
+Milt was stooping, looking under; seemed to be saying something. When he
+came back, he did not speak. He wiped his forehead. "Come. We'll climb
+back up. Nothing to do, now. Guess you better not try to help, anyway.
+You might not sleep well."
+
+He gave her his hand up the embankment, drove to the nearest house,
+telephoned to Dr. Beach. Later she waited while Milt and the doctor,
+with two other men, were raising the car. As she waited she thought of
+the Teal bug as a human thing--as her old friend, to which she had often
+turned in need.
+
+Milt returned to her. "There is one thing for you to do. Before he died,
+Pinky asked me to go get his wife--Dolores, I think it is. She's up in a
+side canyon, few miles away. She may want a woman around. Beach will
+take care of--of him. Can you come?"
+
+"Of course. Oh, Milt, I didn't----"
+
+"I didn't----"
+
+"--mean you were a caveman! You're my big brother!"
+
+"--mean you were a snob!"
+
+They drove five miles along the highway, then up a trail where the Gomez
+brushed the undergrowth on each side as it desperately dug into moss,
+rain-gutted ruts, loose rocks, all on a vicious slant which seemed to
+push the car down again. Beside them, the mountain woods were sacredly
+quiet, with fern and lily and green-lit spaces. They came out in a
+clearing, before dusk. Beside the clearing was a brook, with a crude
+cradle--sign of a not very successful gold miner. Before a log cabin, in
+a sway-sided rocker, creaked a tall, white, flabby woman, once nearly
+beautiful, now rubbed at the edges. She rose, huddling her wrapper about
+her bosom, as they drove into the clearing and picked their way through
+stumps and briars.
+
+"Where you folks think you're going?" she whimpered.
+
+"Why, why just----"
+
+"I cer'nly am glad to see somebody! I been 'most scared to death. Been
+here alone two weeks now. Got a shotgun, but if anybody come, I guess
+they'd take it away from me. I was brought up nice, no rough-house
+or---- Say, did you folks come to see the gold-mine?"
+
+"M-mine?" babbled Milt.
+
+"Course not. Pinky said I was to show it, but I'm so sore on that
+low-life hound now, I swear I won't even take the trouble and lie about
+it. No more gold in that crick than there is in my eye. Or than there's
+flour or pork in the house!"
+
+The woman's voice was rising. Her gestures were furious. Claire and Milt
+stood close, their hands slipping together.
+
+"What d' you think of a man that'd go off and leave a lady without half
+enough to eat, while he gallivanted around, trying to raise money by
+gambling, when he was offered a good job up here? He's a gambler--told
+me he was a rich mine-owner, but never touched a mine in his life. Lying
+hound--worst talker in ten counties! Got a gambler's hand on him, too--I
+ought to seen it! Oh, wait till I get hold of him; just wait!"
+
+Claire thought of the still hand--so still--that she had seen under the
+edge of the upturned car. She tried to speak, while the woman raved on,
+wrath feeding wrath:
+
+"Thank God, I ain't really his wife! My husband is a fine man--Mr.
+Kloh--Dlorus Kloh, my name is. Mr. Kloh's got a fine job with the mill,
+at North Yakima. Oh, I was a fool! This gambler Pinky Parrott, he comes
+along with his elegant ways, and he hands me out a swell line of gab,
+and I ups and leaves poor Kloh, and the kid, and the nicest kid---- Say,
+please, could you folks take me wherever you're going? Maybe I could get
+a job again--used to was a good waitress, and I ain't going to wait here
+any longer for that lying, cheating, mean-talking----"
+
+"Oh, Mrs. Kloh, please don't! He's dead!" wailed Claire.
+
+"Dead? Pinky? Oh--my--God! And I won't ever see him, and he was so funny
+and----"
+
+She threw herself on the ground; she kicked her heels; she tore at her
+loosely caught, tarnished blonde hair.
+
+Claire knelt by her. "You mustn't--you mustn't--we'll----"
+
+"Damn you, with your smug-faced husband there, and your fine auto and
+all, butting into poor folks' troubles!" shrieked Dlorus.
+
+Claire stumbled to her feet, stood with her clenched right hand to her
+trembling lips, cupping it with her nervous left hand. Her shoulders
+were dejected. Milt pleaded, "Let's hike out. I don't mind decent honest
+grease, but this place--look in at table! Dirty dishes---- And gin
+bottles on the floor!"
+
+"Desert her? When she needs me so?" Claire started forward, but Milt
+caught her sleeve, and admired, "You were right! You've got more nerve
+than I have!"
+
+"No. I wouldn't dare if---- I'm glad you're here with me!"
+
+Claire calmed the woman; bound up her hair; washed her face--which
+needed it; and sat on the log doorstep, holding Dlorus's head in her
+lap, while Dlorus sobbed, "Pinky--dead! Him that was so lively! And he
+was so sweet a lover, oh, so sweet. He was a swell fellow; my, he could
+just make you laugh and cry, the way he talked; and he was so educated,
+and he played the vi'lin--he could do anything--and athaletic--he would
+have made me rich. Oh, let me alone. I just want to be alone and think
+of him. I was so bored with Kloh, and no nice dresses or nothin', and--I
+did love the kid, but he squalled so, just all the time, and Pinky come,
+and he was so funny---- Oh, let me alone!"
+
+Claire shivered, then, and the strength seemed to go from the steady
+arms that had supported Dlorus's head. Dusk had sneaked up on them; the
+clearing was full of swimming grayness, and between the woman's screams,
+the woods crackled. Each time Dlorus spoke, her screech was like that of
+an animal in the woods, and round about them crept such sinister echoes
+that Milt kept wanting to look back over his shoulder.
+
+"Yes," sighed Claire at last, "perhaps we'd better go."
+
+"If you go, I'll kill myself! Take me to Mr. Kloh! Oh, he was---- My
+husband, Mr. Kloh. Oh, so good. Only he didn't understand a lady has to
+have her good times, and Pink danced so well----"
+
+Dlorus sprang up, flung into the cabin, stood in the dimness of the
+doorway, holding a butcher knife and clamoring, "I will! I'll kill
+myself if you leave me! Take me down to Mr. Kloh, at North Yakima,
+tonight!"
+
+Milt sauntered toward her.
+
+"Don't you get flip, young man! I mean it! And I'll kill you----"
+
+Most unchivalrously, quite out of the picture of gray grief, Milt
+snapped, "That'll be about enough of you! Here! Gimme that knife!"
+
+She dropped the knife, sniveling, "Oh Gawd, somebody's always bullying
+me! And all I wanted was a good time!"
+
+Claire herded her into the cabin. "We'll take you to your
+husband--tonight. Come, let's wash up, and I'll help you put on your
+prettiest dress."
+
+"Honest, will you?" cried the woman, in high spirits, all grief put
+aside. "I got a dandy China silk dress, and some new white kid shoes!
+My, Mr. Kloh, he won't hardly know me. He'll take me back. I know how to
+handle him. That'll be swell, going back in an automobile. And I got a
+new hair-comb, with genuine Peruvian diamonds. Say, you aren't kidding
+me along?"
+
+In the light of the lantern Milt had kindled, Claire looked
+questioningly at him. Both of them shrugged. Claire promised, "Yes.
+Tonight. If we can make it."
+
+"And will you jolly Mr. Kloh for me? Gee, I'll be awfully scared of him.
+I swear, I'll wash his dishes and everything. He's a good man. He----
+Say, he ain't seen my new parasol, neither!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+ACROSS THE ROOF OF THE WORLD
+
+
+Claire dressed Dlorus, cooked a dinner of beet greens, potatoes, and
+trout; and by bullying and great sweetness kept Dlorus from too many
+trips to the gin bottle. Milt caught the trout, cut wood, locked in a
+log shed Pinky's forlorn mining-tools. They started for North Yakima at
+eight of the evening, with Dlorus, back in the spare seat, alternately
+sobbing and to inattentive ears announcing what she'd say to the Old
+Hens.
+
+Milt was devoted to persuading the huge cat of a car to tiptoe down the
+slippery gouged ruts of the road, and Claire's mind was driving with
+him. Every time he touched the foot-brake, she could feel the strain in
+the tendons of her own ankle.
+
+A mile down the main road they stopped at a store-post-office to
+telephone back to Mr. Boltwood and Dr. Beach. On the porch was a man in
+overalls and laced boots. He was lean and quick-moving. As he raised his
+head, and his spectacles flashed, Claire caught Milt's arm and gasped,
+"Oh, my dear, I'm in a beautiful state of nerves. For a moment I thought
+that was Jeff Saxton. I bet it is his astral body!"
+
+"And you thought he was going to forbid your running away on this fool
+expedition, and you were scared," chuckled Milt, as they sat in the car.
+
+"Of course I was! And I still am! I know what he'll say afterward! He
+_is_ here, reasoning with me. Oughtn't I to be sensible? Oughtn't I to
+have you leave me at the Beaches' before you start--jolly jaunt to take
+a strange woman to her presumably homicidal husband! Why am I totally
+lacking in sense? Just listen to what Jeff is saying!"
+
+"Of course you ought to go back, and let me drive alone. Absolutely
+insane, your----"
+
+"But you would like me to go along, wouldn't you!"
+
+"Like you to? It's our last ride together, and that bloomin' old
+Browning never thought of a ride together by midnight over the roof of
+the world! No, it's really our first ride together, and tomorrow--you're
+gone."
+
+"No, I sha'n't be gone, but----" Addressing herself to the astounded
+overalled man on the porch, she declared, "You're quite right, Jeff. And
+Milt is wrong. Insane adventure. Only, it's wonderful to be young enough
+to do insane adventures. Falling down abyssy places is so much more
+interesting than bridge. I'm going--going--going!... Milt, you
+telephone."
+
+"Don't you think you better?"
+
+"No, siree! Father would forbid me. Try not to get him--just tell Dr.
+Beach where we're going, and hang up, and scoot!"
+
+All night they drove; down the Pacific side of Blewett Pass; down the
+sweeping spirals to a valley. Dlorus drowsed in the extra seat. Claire's
+sleepy head was fantastically swaying. She was awakened by an
+approaching roar and, as though she sat at a play, she watched a big
+racing machine coming toward them, passing them with two wheels in the
+ditch. She had only a thunderous glimpse of the stolid driver; a dark,
+hooded, romantic figure, like a sailor at the helm in a storm.
+
+Milt cried, "Golly! May be a transcontinental racer! Be in New York in
+five days--going night and day--take mud at fifty an hour--crack
+mechanic right from the factory--change tires in three minutes--people
+waiting up all night to give him gasoline and a sandwich! That's my idea
+of fun!"
+
+Studying Milt's shadowed face, Claire considered, "He could do it, too.
+Sitting there at the wheel, taking danger and good road with the same
+steadiness. Oh, he's--well, anyway, he's a dear boy."
+
+But what she said was:
+
+"Less dramatic things for you, now, Milt. Trigonometry is going to be
+your idea of fun; blueprints and engineering books."
+
+"Yes. I know. I'm going to do it. Do four years' work in three--or two.
+I'll tack pages of formulas on the wall, in my bum hallroom, and study
+'em while I'm shaving. Oh, I'll be the grind! But learn to dance the
+fox-trot, though! If America gets into the war, I'll get into the
+engineering corps, and come back to school afterward."
+
+"Will the finances----"
+
+"I'll sell my garage, by mail. Rauskukle will take it. He won't rob me
+of more than a thousand dollars on price--not much more."
+
+"You're going to love Seattle. And we'll have some good tramps while I'm
+there, you and I."
+
+"Honestly? Will you want to?"
+
+"Do you suppose for one second I'd give up my feeling of free air? If
+you don't come and get me, I'll call on you and make you come!"
+
+"Warn you I'll probably be living over some beanery."
+
+"Probably. With dirty steps leading up to it. I'll sweep the steps. I'll
+cook supper for you. I can do things, can't I! I did manage Dlorus,
+didn't I!"
+
+He was murmuring, "Claire, dear!" when she changed her tone to the echo
+of Brooklyn Heights, and hurried on, "You do understand, don't you!
+We'll be, uh, good friends."
+
+"Yes." He drove with much speed and silence.
+
+Though they were devouring the dark road, though roadside rocks, caught
+by the headlights, seemed to fly up at them, though they went on
+forever, chased by a nightmare, Claire snuggled down in security. Her
+head drooped against his shoulder. He put his arm about her, his hand
+about her waist. She sleepily wondered if she ought to let him. She
+heard herself muttering, "Sorry I was so rude when you were so rude,"
+and her chilly cheek discovered that the smooth-worn shoulder of his old
+blue coat was warm, and she wondered some more about the questions of
+waists and hands and---- She was asleep.
+
+She awoke, bewildered to find that dawn was slipping into the air. While
+she had slept Milt had taken his arm from about her and fished out a
+lap-robe for her. Behind them, Dlorus was slumbering, with her soft
+mouth wide open. Claire felt the luxury of the pocket of warmth under
+the lap-robe; she comfortably stretched her legs while she pictured Milt
+driving on all the night, rigid, tireless, impersonal as the engineer of
+a night express.
+
+They came into North Yakima at breakfast time, and found the house of
+Mr. Kloh, a neat, bare, drab frame box, with tight small front and back
+yards. Dlorus was awake, and when she wasn't yawning, she was enjoying
+being hysterical.
+
+"Miss Boltwood," she whined, "you go in and jolly him up."
+
+Milt begged, "Better let me do it, Claire."
+
+They looked squarely at each other. "No, I think I'd better," she
+decided.
+
+"Right, Claire, but--I wish I could do more things for you."
+
+"I know!"
+
+He lifted her stiff, cold little body from the car. His hands under her
+arms, he held her on the running-board an instant, her eyes level with
+his. "Little sister--plucky little sister!" he sighed. He lowered her to
+the ground.
+
+Claire knocked at the back door. To it came a bald, tired man, in an
+apron wet at the knees. The kitchen floor was soaped, and a
+scrubbing-brush rode amid the seas. A rather dirty child clung to his
+hand. "Trying to clean up, ma'am. Not very good at it. I hope you ain't
+the Cruelty to Children lady. Willy looks mussed, but fact is, I just
+can't get time to wash the clothes, but he means a terrible lot to me.
+What was it? Will you step in?"
+
+Claire buttoned the child's rompers before she spoke. Then:
+
+"Mr. Kloh, I want to be perfectly honest with you. I've had word from
+your wife. She's unhappy, and she loves and admires you more than any
+other man in the world, and I think she would come back--misses the
+child so."
+
+The man wiped his reddened hands. "I don't know---- I don't wish her no
+harm. Trouble was, I'm kind of pokey. I guess I couldn't give her any
+good times. I used to try to go to dances with her, but when I'd worked
+late, I'd get sleepy and---- She's a beautiful woman, smart 's a whip,
+and I guess I was too slow for her. No, she wouldn't never come back to
+me."
+
+"She's out in front of the house now--waiting!"
+
+"Great Caesar's ghost, and the floor not scrubbed!" With a squawk of
+anxiety he leaped on the scrubbing-brush, and when Milt and Dlorus
+appeared at the door, Mr. Kloh and Miss Claire Boltwood were wiping up
+the kitchen floor.
+
+Dlorus looked at them, arms akimbo, and sighed, "Hello, Johnny, my,
+ain't it nice to be back, oh, you had the sink painted, oh, forgive me,
+Johnny, I was a bad ungrateful woman, I don't care if you don't never
+take me to no more dances, hardly any, Willy come here, dear, oh, he is
+such a sweet child, my, his mouth is so dirty, will you forgive me,
+Johnny, is my overcoat in the moth-balls?"
+
+When Mr. Kloh had gone off to the mill--thrice returning from the gate
+to kiss Dlorus and to thank her rescuers--Claire sat down and yawningly
+lashed off every inch of Dlorus's fair white skin:
+
+"You're at it already; taking advantage of that good man's forgiveness,
+and getting lofty with him, and rather admiring yourself as a
+spectacular sinner. You are a lazy, ignorant, not very clean woman, and
+if you succeed in making Mr. Kloh and Willy happy, it will be almost too
+big a job for you. Now if I come back from Seattle and find you
+misbehaving again----"
+
+Dlorus broke down. "You won't, miss! And I will raise chickens, like he
+wanted, honest I will!"
+
+"Then you may let me have a room to take a nap in, and perhaps Mr.
+Daggett could sleep in there on the sofa, and we'll get rested before we
+start back."
+
+Both Milt and Dlorus meekly followed the boss.
+
+It was noon before Milt and Claire woke, and discovered that Dlorus had
+prepared for them scrambled eggs and store celery, served on an almost
+clean table-cloth. Mr. Kloh came home for lunch, and while Dlorus sat on
+his lap in the living-room, and repeated that she had been a "bad,
+naughty, 'ittle dirl--what did the fellows say at the mill?" Milt and
+Claire sat dumpily on the back porch, regarding scenery which featured
+of seven tin cans, a broken patent washing-machine, and a rheumatic pear
+tree.
+
+"I suppose we ought to start," groaned Claire.
+
+"I have about as much nerve as a rabbit, and as much punch as a bale of
+hay," Milt admitted.
+
+"We're like two children that have been playing too long."
+
+"But don't want to go home!"
+
+"Quite! Though I don't think much of your idea of a playhouse--those tin
+cans. But it's better than having to be grown-up."
+
+In the midst of which chatter they realized that Mr. Henry B. Boltwood
+and Dr. Hooker Beach had come round the corner of the house, and were
+gaping at them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+THE GRAEL IN A BACK YARD IN YAKIMA
+
+
+"I must say that you two have chosen a fine pastoral scene!" observed
+Mr. Boltwood.
+
+"Hhhhhhhhow did you get here?" gasped Claire.
+
+"Auto 'bus over Blewett Pass, train here from Ellensburg. That
+woman--everything all right?"
+
+"Yes, everything's fine. We were just starting back, sir," implored
+Milt.
+
+"Huh!"
+
+"Awfully sorry, sir, to take Claire on such a hike----"
+
+"I don't blame you particularly. When that young woman gets an idea into
+her head, the rest of us are pawns. Why, even me--she's dragged me all
+over the Rocky Mountains. And I will admit, Claire, that it's been good
+for me. But I begin to feel human again, and I think it's about time I
+took charge. We'll catch the afternoon train for Seattle, Claire. The
+trip has been extremely interesting, but I think perhaps we'll call it
+enough. Daggett, want to get you to drive the Gomez on to Seattle. Beach
+tells me your car is completely wrecked. Lose any money in it?"
+
+"No, sir. Had my roll in the bug. I'll have to go back to it and get
+some clothes out of it, though."
+
+"Well, then, will you drive my car in? Charge me anywhere up to fifty
+dollars, if you want to----"
+
+"I'd rather not----"
+
+"It's a perfectly honest job--I'd do it, too quick! Or if your
+confounded pride won't let you charge anything, bring the car on anyway.
+Come, dolly, I have a jitney here, please observe my graceful use of
+'jitney,' and I have the bags. We'll hustle to the station now. No! No
+arguments, chick!"
+
+On the station platform, Claire and Milt were under the surveillance of
+Mr. Boltwood, who was extremely irritable as every two minutes the train
+was reported to be two minutes later. They tramped up and down, speaking
+in lowered voices, very meek but in their joint naughtiness very
+intimate.
+
+"That was a nice place to end a transcontinental drive--in the back yard
+of Mr. Johnny Kloh, with an unrestricted view of tin cans!" lamented
+Claire.
+
+"Still, your drive didn't end at Kloh's; it ended way up in the
+mountains."
+
+Mr. Boltwood bumbled down on them: "Another minute late! Like to know
+what the matter is!"
+
+"Yes, father!"
+
+When Mr. Boltwood's impatiently waiting back was turned, Claire gripped
+Milt's hand, and whispered to him, "You see, I'm captured! I thought I
+was father's lord and chauffeur, but he sniffs the smoke of the ticker.
+In his mind, he's already back in the office, running things. He'll
+probably turn me over to Jeff, for disciplining! You won't let them
+change me back into a pink-face, will you? Come to tea, at the Gilsons',
+just as soon as you reach Seattle."
+
+"Tea---- Now we're so near your Gilsons, I begin to get scared. Wouldn't
+know what to do. Gee, I've heard you have to balance a tea-cup and a
+sandwich and a hunk o' cake and a lot of conversation all at once! I'd
+spill the tea, and drop crumbs, and probably have the butler set on me."
+
+"You will not! And if you did--can't you see?--it wouldn't matter! It
+just wouldn't matter!"
+
+"Honestly? Claire dear, do you know why I came on this trip? In
+Schoenstrom, I heard you say you were going to Seattle. That moment, I
+decided I would, too, and get acquainted with you, if murder would do
+it. But, oh, I'm clumsy."
+
+"You've seen me clumsy, in driving. You taught me to get over it. Perhaps
+I can teach you some things. And we'll study--together--evenings! I'm a
+thoroughly ignorant parasite woman. Make me become real! A real woman!"
+
+"Dear--dear----"
+
+Mr. Boltwood loomed on them. "The train's coming, at last. We'll have a
+decent sleep for once, at the Gilsons'. I've wired them to meet us." He
+departed.
+
+"Terribly glad your father keeps coming down on us, because it scares
+me so I get desperate," said Milt. "Golly, I think I can hear the train.
+I, uh, Claire, Claire dear----"
+
+"Milt, are you proposing to me? Please hurry, because that is the train.
+Isn't it absurd--some day you'll have to propose all over again
+formally, for the benefit of people like father, when you and I already
+know we're partners! We've done things together, not just danced
+together! When you're an engineer, you'll call me, and I'll come
+a-running up to Alaska. And sometimes you'll come with me to
+Brooklyn--we'll be a couple of bombs---- There's the train. Oh,
+playmate, hurry with your engineering course! Hurry, hurry, hurry!
+Because when it's done, then---- Whither thou goest, there I go also!
+And you did bully me, you did, you did, and I like it, and---- Yes,
+father, the bags are right here. Telephone me, minute you reach Seattle,
+dear, and we'll have a private lesson in balancing tea-cups---- Yes,
+father, I have the tickets. So glad, dear, the trip smashed up like
+this--shocked me into reality--made me realize I've been with you every
+hour since I dismissed you, back in Dakota, and you looked at me, big
+hurt eyes, like a child, and---- Yes, father, Pullman's at the back.
+Yes, I'm coming!"
+
+"W-wait! D-did you know I was going to propose?"
+
+"Yes. Ever since the Yellowstone. Been trying to think of a nice way to
+refuse you. But there isn't any. You're like Pinky--can't get rid of
+you--have t' adopt you. Besides, I've found out----"
+
+"You love me?"
+
+"I don't know! How can I tell? But I do like to drive with my head on
+your shoulder and---- Yesssss, father, coming!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+HER OWN PEOPLE
+
+
+Mr. Henry B. Boltwood was decorously asleep in a chair in the
+observation car, and Claire, on the wide back platform, sat unmoving,
+apparently devoted to agriculture and mountain scenery. But it might
+have been noted that her hand clenched one of the wooden supports of her
+camp-stool, and that her hunched back did not move.
+
+When she had turned to follow her father into the train, Milt had caught
+her shoulders and kissed her.
+
+For half an hour that kiss had remained, a perceptible warm pressure on
+her lips. And for half an hour she had felt the relief of gliding
+through the mountains without the strain of piloting, the comfort of
+having the unseen, mysterious engineer up ahead automatically drive for
+her. She had caroled to her father about nearing the Pacific. Her
+nervousness had expressed itself in jerky gaiety.
+
+But when he had sneaked away for a nap, and Claire could no longer hide
+from herself by a veil of chatter the big decision she had made on the
+station platform, then she was lonely and frightened--and very anxious
+to undecide the decision. She could not think clearly. She could see
+Milt Daggett only as a solemn young man in an inferior sweater,
+standing by the track in a melancholy autumnal light, waving to her as
+the train pulled out, disappearing in a dun obscurity, less significant
+than the station, the receding ties, or the porter who was, in places
+known only to his secretive self, concealing her baggage.
+
+She could only mutter in growing panic, "I'm crazy. In-sane! Pledging
+myself to this boy before I know how he will turn out. Will he learn
+anything besides engineering? I know it--I do want to stroke his cheek
+and--his kiss frightened me, but---- Will I hate him when I see him with
+nice people? Can I introduce him to the Gilsons? Oh, I was mad; so
+wrought up by that idiotic chase with Dlorus, and so sure I was a
+romantic heroine and---- And I'm simply an indecisive girl in a
+realistic muddle!"
+
+Threatened by darkness and the sinister evening chill of the mountains,
+with the train no longer cheerfully climbing the rocky ridge but
+rumbling and snorting in the defiles, and startling her with agitating
+forward leaps as though the brakes had let go, she could not endure the
+bleak platform, and even less could she endure sitting in the chair car,
+eyed by the smug tourists--people as empty of her romance as they were
+incapable of her sharp tragedy. She balanced forward to the vestibule.
+She stood in that cold, swaying, darkling place that was filled with the
+smell of rubber and metal and grease and the thunderous clash of steel
+on steel; she tried to look out into the fleeing darkness; she tried to
+imagine that the train was carrying her away from the pursuing
+enemy--from her own weak self.
+
+Her father came puffing and lip-pursing and jolly, to take her to
+dinner. Mr. Boltwood had no tearing meditations; he had a healthy
+interest in soup. But he glanced at her, across the bright, sleek
+dining-table; he seemed to study her; and suddenly Claire saw that he
+was a very wise man. His look hinted, "You're worried, my dear," but his
+voice ventured nothing beyond comfortable drawling stories to which she
+had only, from the depth of her gloomy brooding, to nod mechanically.
+
+She got a great deal of satisfaction and horror out of watching two
+traveling-men after dinner. Milt had praised the race, and one of the
+two traveling-men, a slender, clear-faced youngster, was rather like
+Milt, despite plastered hair, a watch-chain slung diagonally across his
+waistcoat, maroon silk socks, and shoes of pearl buttons, gray tops, and
+patent-leather bottoms. The other man was a butter-ball. Both of them
+had harshly pompous voices--the proudly unlettered voices of the smoking
+compartment. The slender man was roaring:
+
+"Yes, sir, he's got a great proposition there--believe me, he's got a
+great proposition--he's got one great little factory there, take it from
+me. He can turn out toothpicks to compete with Michigan. He's simply
+piling up the shekels--why say, he's got a house with eighteen
+rooms--every room done different."
+
+Claire wondered whether Milt, when the sting and faith of romance were
+blunted, would engage in Great Propositions, and fight for the
+recognition of his--toothpicks. Would his creations be favorites in the
+best lunch rooms? Would he pile up shekels?
+
+Then her fretting was lost in the excitement of approaching Seattle and
+their host--Claire's cousin, Eugene Gilson, an outrageously prosperous
+owner of shingle-mills. He came from an old Brooklyn Heights family. He
+had married Eva Gontz of Englewood. He liked music and wrote jokey
+little letters and knew the addresses of all the best New York shops. He
+was of Her Own People, and she was near now to the security of his
+friendship, the long journey done.
+
+Lights thicker and thicker--a factory illuminated by arc-lamps,--the
+baggage--the porter--the eager trail of people in the aisle--climbing
+down to the platform--red caps--passing the puffing engine which had
+brought them in--the procession to the gate--faces behind a
+grill--Eugene Gilson and Eva waving--kisses, cries of "How was the
+trip?" and "Oh! Had won-derful drive!"--the huge station, and curious
+waiting passengers, Jap coolies in a gang, lumbermen in corks--the
+Gilsons' quiet car, and baggage stowed away by the chauffeur instead of
+by their own tired hands--streets strangely silent after the tumult of
+the train--Seattle and the sunset coast at last attained.
+
+Claire had forgotten how many charming, most desirable things there were
+in the world. The Gilsons drove up Queen Anne Hill to a bay-fronting
+house on a breezy knob--a Georgian house of holly hedge, French windows,
+a terrace that suggested tea, and a great hall of mahogany and white
+enamel with the hint of roses somewhere, and a fire kindled in the
+paneled drawing-room to be seen beyond the hall. Warmth and softness and
+the Gilsons' confident affection wrapped her around; and in contented
+weariness she mounted to a bedroom of Bakst sketches, a four-poster, and
+a bedside table with a black and orange electric lamp and a collection
+of Arthur Symons' essays.
+
+She sank by the bed, pitifully rubbed her cheek against the silk
+comforter that was primly awaiting her commands at the foot of the bed,
+and cried, "Oh, four-posters _are_ necessary! I can't give them up! I
+won't! They---- No one has a right to ask me." She mentally stamped her
+foot. "I simply won't live in a shack and take in washing. It isn't
+worth it."
+
+A bath, faintly scented, in a built-in tub in her own marble bathroom. A
+preposterously and delightfully enormous Turkish towel. One of Eva
+Gilson's foamy negligees. Slow exquisite dressing--not the scratchy
+hopping over ingrown dirt, among ingrown smells, of a filthy
+small-hotel bedroom, but luxurious wandering over rugs velvety to her
+bare feet. A languid inspection of the frivolous colors and curves in
+the drawings by Bakst and George Plank and Helen Dryden. A glance at the
+richness of the toilet-table, at the velvet curtains that shut out the
+common world.
+
+Expanding to the comfort as an orchid to cloying tropic airs, she drew
+on her sheerest chemise, her most frivolous silk stockings. In a
+dreaming enervated joy she saw how smooth were her arms and legs; she
+sleepily resented the redness of her wrists and the callouses of the
+texture of corduroy that scored her palms from holding the steering
+wheel.
+
+Yes, she was glad that she had made the experiment--but gladder that she
+was safely in from the long dust-whitened way, back in her own world of
+beauty; and she couldn't imagine ever trying it again. To think of
+clumping out into that world of deliberate and brawling crudeness----
+
+Of one Milt Daggett she didn't think at all.
+
+Gorgeously sleepy--and gorgeously certain that by and by she would go,
+not to a stingy hotel bed, with hound-dog ribs to cut into her tired
+back, but to a feathery softness of slumber--she wavered down to the
+drawing-room, and on the davenport, by the fire, with Victoria
+chocolates by her elbow, and pillows behind her shoulders, she gossiped
+of her adventure, and asked for news of friends and kin back East.
+
+Eugene and Eva Gilson asked with pyrotechnic merriness about the "funny
+people she must have met along the road." With a subdued, hidden
+unhappiness, Claire found that she could not mention Milt--that she was
+afraid her father would mention Milt--to these people who took it for
+granted that all persons who did not live in large houses and play good
+games of bridge were either "queer" or "common"; who believed that their
+West was desirable in proportion as it became like the East; and that
+they, though Westerners, were as superior to workmen with hard hands as
+was Brooklyn Heights itself.
+
+Claire tried to wriggle out from under the thought of Milt while, with
+the Gilsons as the perfect audience, she improvised on the theme of
+wandering. With certain unintended exaggerations, and certain not quite
+accurate groupings of events, she described the farmers and cowpunchers,
+the incredible hotels and garages. Indeed they had become incredible to
+her own self. Obviously this silken girl couldn't possibly take
+seriously a Dlorus Kloh--or a young garage man who said "ain't."
+
+Eva Gilson had been in Brooklyn within the month, and in a passion of
+remembrance of home, Claire cried, "Oh, do tell me about everybody."
+
+"I had such a good time with Amy Dorrance," said Mrs. Gilson. "Of course
+Amy is a little dull, but she's such an awfully good sort and---- We did
+have the jolliest party one afternoon. We went to lunch at the Ritz,
+and a matinee, and we saw such an interesting man--Gene is frightfully
+jealous when I rave about him--I'm sure he was a violinist--simply an
+exquisite thing he was--I wanted to kiss him. Gene will now say, 'Why
+didn't you?'"
+
+And Gene said, "Well, why _didn't_ you?" and Claire laughed, and her
+toes felt warm and pink and good, and she was perfectly happy, and she
+murmured, "It would be good to hear a decent violinist again. Oh! What
+had George Worlicht been doing, when you were home?"
+
+"Don't you think Georgie is wonderful?" fluttered Mrs. Gilson. "He makes
+me rue my thirty-six sad years. I think I'll adopt him. You know, he
+almost won the tennis cup at Long Branch."
+
+Georgie had a little mustache and an income, just enough income to
+support the little mustache, and he sang inoffensively, and was always
+winning tennis cups--almost--and he always said, at least once at every
+party, "The basis of _savoir faire_ is knowing how to be rude to the
+right people." Fire-enamored and gliding into a perfumed haze of
+exquisite drowsiness, Claire saw Georgie as heroic and wise. But the
+firelight got into her eyes, and her lids wouldn't stay open, and in her
+ears was a soft humming as of a million bees in a distant meadow
+golden-spangled--and Gene was helping her upstairs; sleepiness submerged
+her like bathing in sweet waters; she fumbled at buttons and hooks and
+stays, let things lie where they fell--and of all that luxury nothing
+was more pleasant than the knowledge that she did not have to take
+precautions against the rats, mice, cockroaches, and all their obscene
+little brothers which--on some far-off fantastic voyaging when she had
+been young and foolish--she seemed to remember having found in her own
+room. Then she was sinking into a bed like a tide of rainbow-colored
+foam, sinking deep, deep, deep----
+
+And it was morning, and she perceived that the purpose of morning light
+was to pick out surfaces of mahogany and orange velvet and glass, and
+that only an idiot would ever leave this place and go about begging
+dirty garage men to fill her car with stinking gasoline and oil.
+
+The children were at breakfast--children surely not of the same species
+as the smeary-cheeked brats she had seen tumbling by roadsides along the
+way--sturdy Mason, with his cap of curls, and Virginia, with bobbed
+ash-blond hair prim about her delicate face. They curtsied, and in
+voices that actually had intonations they besought her, "Oh, Cousin
+Claire, would you pleasssssse tell us about drive-to-the-coast?"
+
+After breakfast, she went out on the terrace for the View.
+
+In Seattle, even millionaires, and the I. W. W., and men with red
+garters on their exposed shirt-sleeves who want to give you real estate,
+all talk about the View. The View is to Seattle what the car-service,
+the auditorium, the flivver-factory, or the price of coal is to other
+cities. At parties in Seattle, you discuss the question of whether the
+View of Lake Union or the View of the Olympics is the better, and polite
+office-managers say to their stenographers as they enter, "How's your
+View this morning?" All real-estate deeds include a patent on the View,
+and every native son has it as his soundest belief that no one in Tacoma
+gets a View of Mount Rainier.
+
+Mrs. Gilson informed Claire that they had the finest View in Seattle.
+
+Below Claire was the harbor, with docks thrust far out into the water,
+and steamers alive with smoke. Mrs. Gilson said they were Blue Funnel
+Liners, loading for Vladivostok and Japan. The names, just the names,
+shot into Claire's heart a wistful unexpressed desire that was somehow
+vaguely connected with a Milt Daggett who, back in the Middlewestern mud
+and rain, had longed for purple mountains and cherry blossoms and the
+sea. But she cast out the wish, and lifted her eyes to mountains across
+the sound--not purple mountains, but sheer silver streaked with black,
+like frozen surf on a desolate northern shore--the Olympics, two-score
+miles away.
+
+Up there, one could camp, with a boy in a deteriorated sweater singing
+as he watched the coffee----
+
+Hastily she looked to the left, across the city, with its bright new
+skyscrapers, its shining cornices and masses of ranked windows, and the
+exclamation-point of the "tallest building outside of New York"--far
+livelier than her own rusty Brooklyn. Beyond the city was a dun cloud,
+but as she stared, far up in the cloud something crept out of the vapor,
+and hung there like a dull full moon, aloof, majestic, overwhelming, and
+she realized that she was beholding the peak of Mount Rainier, with the
+city at its foot like white quartz pebbles at the base of a tower.
+
+A landing-stage for angels, she reflected.
+
+It did seem larger than dressing-tables and velvet hangings and scented
+baths.
+
+But she dragged herself from the enticing path of that thought, and
+sighed wretchedly, "Oh, yes, he would appreciate Rainier, but how--how
+would he manage a grape-fruit? I mustn't be a fool! I mustn't!" She saw
+that Mrs. Gilson was peeping at her, and she made herself say adequate
+things about the View before she fled inside--fled from her sputtering
+inquiring self.
+
+In the afternoon they drove to Capitol Hill; they dropped in at various
+pretty houses and met the sort of people Claire knew back home. Between
+people they had Views; and the sensible Miss Boltwood, making a
+philosophic discovery, announced to herself, "After all, I've seen just
+as much from this limousine as I would from a bone-breaking Teal bug.
+Silly to make yourself miserable to see things. Oh yes, I will go
+wandering some more, but not like a hobo. But---- What can I say to him?
+Good heavens, he may be here any time now, with our car. Oh,
+why--why--why was I insane on that station platform?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+THE ABYSSINIAN PRINCE
+
+
+Snoqualmie Pass lies among mountains prickly with rocks and burnt
+stumps, but the road is velvet, with broad saucer curves; and to Milt it
+was pure beauty, it was release from life, to soar up coaxing inclines
+and slip down easy grades in the powerful car. "No more Teals for me,"
+he cried, in the ecstasy of handling an engine that slowed to a demure
+whisper, then, at a touch of the accelerator, floated up a rise,
+effortless, joyous, humming the booming song of the joy in speed. He
+suddenly hated the bucking tediousness of the Teal. The Gomez-Dep
+symbolized his own new life.
+
+So he came to Lake Washington, and just across it was the city of his
+long dreams, the city of the Pacific--and of Claire. There was no ferry
+in sight, and he rounded the lake, struck a brick pavement, rolled
+through rough woods, suburban villas, and petty business streets, to a
+region of factories and mills, with the funnels of ships beyond.
+
+And every minute he drove more slowly and became more uneasy.
+
+The pavement--the miles of it; the ruthless lumbermills, with their
+thousands of workmen quite like himself; the agitation of realizing
+that every three minutes he was passing a settlement larger than
+Schoenstrom; the strangeness of ships and all the cynical ways of the
+sea--the whole scene depressed him as he perceived how little of the
+world he knew, and how big and contemptuous of Milt Daggetts that world
+must be.
+
+"Huh!" he growled. "Quite some folks living here. Don't suppose they
+spend such a whale of a lot of time thinking about Milt Daggett and Bill
+McGolwey and Prof Jones. I guess most of these people wouldn't think
+Heinie Rauskukle's store was so gosh-awful big. I wasn't scared of
+Minneapolis--much--but there they didn't ring in mountains and an ocean
+on you. And I didn't have to go up on the hill and meet folks like
+Claire's relations, and figure out whether you shake hands
+catch-as-catch-can or Corinthian. Look at that sawmill chimney--isn't it
+nice of 'em to put the fly-screen over it so the flies won't get down
+into the flames. No, they haven't got much more than a million feet of
+lumber in that one pile. And here's a bum little furniture store--it
+wouldn't cost more 'n about ten times all I've got to buy one of those
+Morris chairs. Oh Gooooooosh, won't these houses ever stop? Say, that
+must be a jitney. The driver snickered at me. Will the whole town be
+onto me? Milt, you're a kind young fellow, and you know what's the
+matter with Heinie's differential, but they don't need you here. Quite
+a few folks to carry on the business. Gosh, look at that building
+ahead--nine stories!"
+
+He had planned to stop at a hotel, to wash up, and to gallop to Claire.
+But--well--wouldn't it maybe be better to leave the car at a public
+garage, so the Boltwoods could get it when they wanted to? He'd better
+"just kind of look around before he tackled the watch-dog."
+
+It was the public garage which finally crushed him. It was a garage of
+enameled brick and colored tiles, with a plate-glass-enclosed office in
+which worked young men clad as the angels. One of them wore a carnation,
+Milt noted.
+
+"Huh! I'll write back and tell Ben Sittka that hereafter he's to wear
+his best-Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes and a milkweed blossom when he
+comes down to work at the Red Trail Garage!"
+
+Milt drove up the brick incline into a room thousands of miles long,
+with millions of new and recently polished cars standing in lines as
+straight as a running-board. He begged of a high-nosed colored
+functionary--not in khaki overalls but in maroon livery--"Where'll I put
+this boat?"
+
+The Abyssinian prince gave him a check, and in a tone of extreme lack of
+personal interest snapped, "Take it down the aisle to the elevator."
+
+Milt had followed the natural lines of traffic into the city; he had
+spoken to no one; the prince's snort was his welcome to Seattle.
+
+Meekly he drove past the cars so ebon and silvery, so smug and strong,
+that they would have regarded a Teal bug as an insult. Another attendant
+waved him into the elevator, and Milt tried not to look surprised when
+the car started, not forward, but upward, as though it had turned into
+an aeroplane.
+
+When these adventures were over, when he had had a shave and a shine,
+and washed his hands, and looked into a department-store window that
+contained ten billion yards of silk draped against polished satinwood,
+when he had felt unhappy over a movie theater large enough to contain
+ten times the population of Schoenstrom, and been cursed by a policeman
+for jaywalking, and had passed a hotel entirely full of diplomats and
+marble and caviare--then he could no longer put off telephoning to
+Claire, and humbly, in a booth meant for an umbrella-stand, he got the
+Eugene Gilson house, and to a female who said "Yes?" in a tone which
+made it mean "No!" he ventured, "May I speak to Miss Boltwood?"
+
+Miss Boltwood, it seemed, was out.
+
+He was not sorry. He was relieved. He ducked out of the telephone-booth
+with a sensation of escape.
+
+Milt was in love with Claire; she was to him the purpose of life; he
+thought of her deeply and tenderly and longingly. All the way into
+Seattle he had brooded about her; remembered her every word and
+gesture; recalled the curve of her chin, and the fresh feeling of her
+hands. But Claire had suddenly become too big. In her were all these
+stores, these office buildings for clever lawyers and surgeons, these
+contemptuous trolley cars, these careless people in beautiful clothes.
+They were too much for him. Desperately he was pushing them
+back--back--fighting for breath. And she belonged with them.
+
+He mailed the check for the stored car to her, with a note--written
+standing before a hacked wall-desk in a branch post-office--which said
+only, "Here's check for the boat. Did not know whether you would have
+room for it at house. Tried to get you on phone, phone again just as
+soon as rent room etc. Hope having happy time, M.D."
+
+He went out to the university. On the trolley he relaxed. But he did not
+exultantly feel that he had won to the Pacific; he could not regard
+Seattle now as a magic city, the Bagdad of modern caravans, with Alaska
+and the Orient on one hand, the forests to the north, and eastward the
+spacious Inland Empire of the wheat. He saw it as a place where you had
+to work hard just to live; where busy policemen despised you because you
+didn't know which trolley to take; where it was incredibly hard to
+remember even the names of the unceasing streets; where the conductors
+said "Step lively!" and there was no room to whistle, no time to swap
+stories with a Bill McGolwey at an Old Home lunch-counter.
+
+He found the university; he talked with the authorities about entering
+the engineering school; the Y. M. C. A. gave him a list of rooms; and,
+because it was cheap, he chose a cubbyhole in a flat over a candy
+store--a low room, which would probably keep out the rain, but had no
+other virtues. It had one bed, one table, one dissipated bureau, two
+straight bare chairs, and one venerable lithograph depicting a girl with
+ringlets shaking her irritating forefinger at a high-church kitten.
+
+The landlady consented to his importing an oil-stove for cooking his
+meals. He bought the stove, with a box of oatmeal, a jar of bacon, and
+half a dozen eggs. He bought a plane and solid geometry, and an algebra.
+At dinner time he laid the algebra beside his plate of anemic bacon and
+leaking eggs. The eggs grew cold. He did not stir. He was reviewing his
+high-school algebra. He went down the pages, word by word, steadily,
+quickly, absolutely concentrated--as concentrated as he would recently
+have been in a new problem of disordered transmission. Not once did he
+stop to consider how glorious it would be to marry Claire--or how
+terrifying it would be to marry Miss Boltwood.
+
+Three hours went by before he started up, bewildered, rubbed his eyes,
+picked at the chill bacon and altogether disgusting eggs, and rambled
+out into the street.
+
+Again he risked the scorn of conductors and jitney drivers. He found
+Queen Anne Hill, found the residence of Mr. Eugene Gilson. He sneaked
+about it, slipped into the gate, prowled toward the house. Flabby from
+the intensity of study, he longed for the stimulus of Claire's smile.
+But as he stared up at the great squares of the clear windows, at the
+flare of white columns in the porch-lights, that smile seemed
+unreachable. He felt like a rustic at court. From the shelter of the
+prickly holly hedge he watched the house. It was "some kind of a
+party?--or what would folks like these call a party?" Limousines were
+arriving; he had a glimpse of silken ankles, frothy underskirts; heard
+easy laughter; saw people moving through a big blue and silver room;
+caught a drifting tremor of music.
+
+At last he saw Claire. She was dancing with a young man as decorative as
+"that confounded Saxton fellow" he had met at Flathead Lake, but younger
+than Saxton, a laughing young man, with curly black hair. For the first
+time in his life Milt wanted to kill. He muttered, "Damn--damn--DAMN!"
+as he saw the young man carelessly embracing Claire.
+
+His fingers tingling, his whole body yearning till every cell seemed a
+beating hammer, Milt longed just once to slip his hand about Claire's
+waist like that. He could feel the satin of her bodice and its warmth.
+
+Then it seemed to him, as Claire again passed the window, that he did
+not know her at all. He had once talked to a girl who resembled her, but
+that was long ago. He could understand a Gomez-Dep and appreciate a
+brisk sports-suit, but this girl was of a world unintelligible to him.
+Her hair, in its dips and convolutions, was altogether a puzzle. "How
+did she ever fix it like that?" Her low evening dress--"what was it made
+of--some white stuff, but was it silk or muslin or what?" Her shoulders
+were startling in their bare powdery smoothness--"how dare that young
+pup dance with her?" And her face, that had seemed so jolly and
+friendly, floated past the window as pale and illusive as a wisp of fog.
+His longing for her passed into clumsy awe. He remembered, without
+resentment, that once on a hilltop in Dakota she had coldly forbidden
+him to follow her.
+
+With all the pleasure of martyrdom--to make quite sure that he should
+realize how complete a fool he had been to intrude on Miss Boltwood--he
+studied the other guests. He gave them, perhaps, a glory they did not
+have. There were girls sleek as ivory. There was a lean stooped man,
+very distinguished. There was a bulky man in a dinner coat, with a
+semi-circle of mustache, and eyes that even at a distance seemed to give
+impatient orders. He would be a big banker, or a lumberman.
+
+It was the easy friendliness of all of them that most made Milt feel
+like an outsider. If a servant had come out and ordered him away, he
+would have gone meekly ... he fancied.
+
+He straggled off, too solidly unhappy to think how unhappy he was. In
+his clammy room he picked up the algebra. For a quarter-hour he could
+not gather enough vigor to open it. In his lassitude, his elbows felt
+feeble, his fingers were ready to drop off. He slowly scratched the book
+open----
+
+At one o'clock he was reading algebra, his face still and grim. But
+already it seemed less heartily brick-red.
+
+He listlessly telephoned to Claire, in the morning.
+
+"Hello? Oh! Miss Boltwood? This is Milt Daggett."
+
+"Oh! Oh, how are you?"
+
+"Why, why I'm--I've got settled. I can get into the engineering school
+all right."
+
+"I'm glad."
+
+"Uh, enjoying Seattle?"
+
+"Oh! Oh yes. The mountains---- Do you like it?"
+
+"Oh! Oh yes. Sea and all---- Great town."
+
+"Uh, w-when are we going to see you? Daddy had to go East, left you his
+regards. W-when----?"
+
+"Why--why I suppose you're awful--awfully busy, meeting people and
+all----"
+
+"Yes, I am, rather, but----" Her hedging uncomfortable tone changed to a
+cry of distress. "Milt! I must see you. Come up at four this afternoon."
+
+"Yes!"
+
+He rushed to a small, hot tailor-shop. He panted "Press m' suit while I
+wait?" They gave him a pair of temporary trousers, an undesirable pair
+of trousers belonging to a short fat man with no taste in fabrics, and
+with these flapping about his lean legs, he sat behind a calico curtain,
+reading _The War Cry_ and looking at a "fashion-plate" depicting nine
+gentlemen yachtsmen each nine feet tall, while the Jugoslav in charge
+unfeelingly sprinkled and ironed and patted his suit.
+
+He spent ten minutes in blacking his shoes, in his room--and twenty
+minutes in getting the blacking off his fingers.
+
+He was walking through the gate in the Gilson hedge at one minute to
+four.
+
+But he had reached Queen Anne Hill at three. For an hour he had walked
+the crest road, staring at the steamers below, alternately gripping his
+hands with desire of Claire, and timorously finally deciding that he
+wouldn't go to her house--wouldn't ever see her again.
+
+He came into the hall tremblingly expecting some great thing, some
+rending scene, and she met him with a cool, "Oh, this is nice. Eva had
+some little white cakes made for us." He felt like a man who has asked
+for a drink of cold charged water and found it warm and flat.
+
+"How---- Dandy house," he muttered, limply shaking her limp hand.
+
+"Yes, isn't it a darling. They do themselves awfully well here. I'm
+afraid your bluff, plain, democratic Westerners are a fraud. I hear a
+lot more about 'society' here than I ever did in the East. The sets seem
+frightfully complicated." She was drifting into the drawing-room, to a
+tapestry stool, and Milt was awkwardly stalking a large wing chair,
+while she fidgeted:
+
+"Everybody tells me about how one poor dear soul, a charming lady who
+used to take in washing or salt gold-mines or something, and she came
+here a little while ago with billions and billions of dollars, and tried
+to buy her way in by shopping for all the charities in town, and
+apparently she's just as out of it here as she would be in London. You
+and I aren't exclusive like that, are we!"
+
+Somehow----
+
+Her "you and I" was too kindly, as though she was trying to put him at
+ease, as though she knew he couldn't possibly be at ease. With a
+horribly elaborate politeness, with a smile that felt hot on his
+twitching cheeks, he murmured, "Oh no. No, we---- No, I guess----"
+
+If he knew what it was he guessed, he couldn't get it out. While he was
+trying to find out what had become of all the things there were to say
+in the world, a maid came in with an astonishing object--a small, red,
+shelved table on wheels, laden with silver vessels, and cake, and
+sandwiches that were amazingly small and thin.
+
+The maid was so starched that she creaked. She glanced at Milt----
+Claire didn't make him so nervous that he thought of his clothes, but
+the maid did. He was certain that she knew that he had blacked his own
+shoes, knew how old were his clothes. He was urging himself, "Must get
+new suit tomorrow--ready-made--mustn't forget, now--be sure--get suit
+tomorrow." He wanted to apologize to the maid for existing.... He
+wouldn't dare to fall in love with the maid.... And he'd kill the man
+who said he could be fool enough to fall in love with Miss Boltwood.
+
+He sipped his tea, and dropped sandwich crumbs, and ached, and panted,
+and peeped at the crushing quantities of pictures and sconces and tables
+and chairs in the room, and wondered what they did with all of them,
+while Claire chattered:
+
+"Yes, we weren't exclusive out on the road. Didn't we meet funny people
+though! Oh, somehow that 'funny people' sounds familiar. But---- What
+fun that morning was at--Pellago, was it? Heavens, I'm forgetting those
+beastly little towns already--that place where we hazed the poor
+landlady who overcharged me."
+
+"Yes." He was thinking of how much Claire would forget, now. "Yes. We
+certainly fixed her, all right. Uh--did you get the storage check for
+your car?"
+
+"Oh yes, thank you. So nice of you to bother with it."
+
+"Oh, nothing at all, nothing---- Nothing at all. Uh---- Do you like
+Seattle?"
+
+"Oh yes. Such views--the mountains---- Do you like it?"
+
+"Oh yes. Always wanted to see the sea."
+
+"Yes, and---- Such a well-built town."
+
+"Yes, and---- They must do a lot of business here."
+
+"Yes, they---- Oh yes, I do like Seat----"
+
+He had darted from his chair, brushed by the tea-wagon, ignoring its
+rattle and the perilous tipping of cups. He put his hand on her
+shoulder, snorted, "Look here. We're both sparring for time. Stop it.
+It's--it's all right, Claire. I want you to like me, but I'm not--I'm
+not like that woman you were telling about that's trying to butt in. I
+know, Lord I know so well what you're thinking! You're thinking I'm not
+up to the people you've been seeing last couple of days--not up to 'em
+yet, anyway. Well---- We'll be good friends."
+
+Fearless, now, his awe gone in tenderness, he lifted her chin, looked
+straight into her eyes, smiled. But his courage was slipping. He wanted
+to run and hide.
+
+He turned abruptly, grumbling, "Well, better get back to work now, I
+guess."
+
+Her cry was hungry: "Oh, please don't go." She was beside him, shyly
+picking at his sleeve. "I know what you mean. I like you for being so
+understanding. But---- I do like you. You were the perfect companion.
+Let's---- Oh, let's have a walk--and try to laugh again."
+
+He definitely did not want to stay. At this moment he did not love her.
+He regarded her as an estimable young woman who, for a person so
+idiotically reared, had really shown a good deal of pluck out on the
+road--where he wanted to be. He stood in the hall disliking his old cap
+while she ran up to put on a top coat.
+
+Mute, casual, they tramped out of the house together, and down the hill
+to a region of shabby old brown houses like blisters on the hillside.
+They had little to say, and that little was a polite reminiscence of
+incidents in which neither was interested.
+
+When they came back to the Gilson hedge, he stopped at the gate, with
+terrific respectableness removed his cap.
+
+"Good night," she said cheerily. "Call me up soon again."
+
+He did not answer "Good night." He said "Good-by"; and he meant it to be
+his last farewell. He caught her hand, hastily dropped it, fled down the
+hill.
+
+He was, he told himself, going to leave Seattle that evening.
+
+That, doubtless, is the reason why he ran to a trolley, to get to a
+department-store before it closed; and why, precipitating himself upon a
+startled clerk, he purchased a new suit of chaste blue serge, a new pair
+of tan boots (curiously like some he had seen on the university campus
+that morning) and a new hat so gray and conservative and felty that it
+might have been worn by Woodrow Wilson.
+
+He spent the evening in reading algebra and geometry, and in telling
+himself that he was beautifully not thinking about Claire.
+
+In the midst of it, he caught himself at it, and laughed.
+
+"What you're doing, my friend, is pretending you don't like Claire, so
+that you can hide from your fool self the fact that you're going to
+sneak back to see her the first chance you get--first time the watch-dog
+is out. Seriously now, son, Claire is impossible for you. No can do. Now
+that you've been chump enough to leave home---- Oh Lord, I wish I
+hadn't promised to take this room for all winter. Wish I hadn't
+matriculated at the U. But I'm here now, and I'll stick it out. I'll
+stay here one year anyway, and go back home. Oh! And to---- By Golly!
+She liked me!"
+
+He was thinking of the wild-rose teacher to whom he had given a lift
+back in Dakota. He was remembering her daintiness, her admiration.
+
+"Now there's somebody who'd make me keep climbing, but wouldn't think I
+was a poor hick. If I were to drive back next spring, I could find
+her----"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+A CLASS IN ENGINEERING AND OMELETS
+
+
+The one thing of which Milt Daggett was certain was that now he had
+managed to crawl into the engineering school, he must get his degree in
+mechanical engineering. He was older than most of his classmates. He
+must hurry. He must do four years' work in two.
+
+There has never been a Freshman, not the most goggle-eyed and earnest of
+them, who has seen less of classmates, thought less about "outside
+activities," more grimly centered the universe about his work.
+
+Milt had sold his garage, by mail, to Ben Sittka and Heinie Rauskukle.
+He had enough money to get through two years, with economy. His life was
+as simple and dull as it had been in Schoenstrom. He studied while he
+cooked his scrappy meals; he pinned mathematical formulae and mechanical
+diagrams on the wall, and pored over them while he was dressing--or
+while he was trying to break in the new shoes, which were beautiful,
+squeaky, and confoundedly tight.
+
+He was taking French and English and "composition-writing" in addition
+to engineering, and he made out a schedule of life as humorlessly as a
+girl grind who intends to be a Latin teacher. When he was not at work,
+or furiously running and yanking chest-weights in the gymnasium, he was
+attending concerts, lectures.
+
+Studying the life about him, he had discovered that the best way to save
+time was to avoid the lazy friendships of college; the pipe-smoking,
+yawning, comfortable, rather heavy, altogether pleasant wondering about
+"what'll we do next?" which occupies at least four hours a day for the
+average man in college. He would have liked it, as he had liked long
+talks about nothing with Bill McGolwey at the Old Home Lunch. But he
+couldn't afford it. He had to be ready to----
+
+That was the point at which his reflections always came up with a jolt.
+He was quite clear about the method of getting ready, but he hadn't the
+slightest idea of what he was getting ready for. The moment he had
+redecided to marry Claire, he saw that his only possible future would be
+celibate machinery-installing in Alaska; and the moment he was content
+with the prospect of an engineer's camp in Alaskan wilds, his thoughts
+went crazily fluttering after Claire.
+
+Despite his aloofness, Milt was not unpopular in his class. The
+engineers had few of them the interest in dances, athletics, college
+journalism, which distinguished the men in the academic course. They
+were older, and more conscious of a living to earn. And Milt's cheerful,
+"How's the boy?" his manner of waving his hand--as though to a good
+customer leaving the Red Trail Garage with the generator at last
+tamed--indicated that he was a "good fellow."
+
+One group of collegians Milt did seek. It is true that he had been
+genuine in scorning social climbers. But it is also true that the men
+whom he sought to know were the university smart set. Their satisfaction
+in his allegiance would have been lessened, however, had they known how
+little he cared for what they thought of him, and with what cruel
+directness he was using them as models for the one purpose of pleasing
+Miss Claire Boltwood.
+
+The American state universities admit, in a pleased way, that though
+Yale and Harvard and Princeton may be snobbish, the state universities
+are the refuge of a myth called "college democracy." But there is no
+university near a considerable city into which the inheritors of the
+wealth of that city do not carry all the local social distinctions.
+Their family rank, their place in the unwritten peerage, determines to
+which fraternity they shall be elected, and the fraternity determines
+with whom--men and girls--they shall be intimate. The sons and daughters
+of Seattle and Tacoma, the scions of old families running in an unbroken
+line clear back to 1880, were amiable to poor outsiders from the Yakima
+valley and the new claims of Idaho, but they did not often invite them
+to their homes on the two hills and the Boulevard.
+
+Yet it was these plutocrats whom Milt followed; they whose boots and
+table manners, cigarettes and lack of interest in theology, he studied.
+He met them in his English class. He remarked "Hello, Smith," and
+"Mornin', Jones," as though he liked them but didn't care a hang whether
+they liked him. And by and by he drifted into their fraternity
+dwelling-house, with a question about the next day's assignment, and met
+their friends. He sat pipe-smoking, silent, cheerful, and they seemed to
+accept him. Whenever one of them felt that Milt was intruding, and asked
+impertinent questions in the manner of a Pullman porter at a Darktown
+ball, Milt had a peculiar level look which had been known to generate
+courtesy even in the offspring of a million dollars. They found that he
+knew more about motor-cars than any of them, and as motor-cars were
+among their greater gods, they considered him wise. He was incomparably
+simple and unpretentious; they found his presence comfortable.
+
+But there is a question as to what they would have thought had they
+known that, lying awake in the morning, Milt unsmilingly repeated:
+
+"Hair always straight down at the back. Never rounded. Nix on clippers
+over the ears.
+
+"Matisse is a popular nut artist. Fashionable for the swells to laugh at
+him, and the fellows on the college papers to rave about him.
+
+"Blinx and Severan the swellest--the smartest haberdashery in the city.
+
+"The one way to get in Dutch is to mention labor leaders.
+
+"Never say 'Pleased to meet you.' Just look about halfway between bored
+and tol'able and say, 'How do you do?'"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+All these first three weeks of his life in Seattle, he had seen Claire
+only on his first call. Twice he had telephoned to her. On one of these
+high occasions she had invited him to accompany the family to the
+theater--which meant to the movies--and he had wretchedly refused; the
+other time she had said that she might stay in Seattle all winter, and
+she might go any day, and they "must be sure to have that good long
+walk"; and he had said "oh yes," ten or twelve unhappy times, and had
+felt very empty as he hung up the receiver.
+
+Then she wrote to invite him to late Sunday breakfast at the
+Gilsons'--they made a function of it, and called it bruncheon. The hour
+was given as ten-thirty; most people came at noon; but Milt arrived at
+ten-thirty-one, and found only a sleepy butler in sight.
+
+He waited in the drawing-room for five minutes, feeling like a
+bill-collector. Into the room vaulted a medium-sized, medium-looking,
+amiable man, Eugene Gilson, babbling, "Oh, I say, so sorry to keep you
+waiting, Mr. Daggett. Rotten shame, do come have a bun or something,
+frightfully informal these bruncheons, play auction?"
+
+"Zallright--no," said Milt.
+
+The host profusely led him to a dining-room where--in English fashion,
+or something like English fashion, or anyway a close approximation to
+the fictional pictures of English fashion--kidneys and sausages and
+omelets waited in dishes on the side-board. Mr. Gilson poured coffee,
+and chanted:
+
+"Do try the kidneys. They're usually very fair. Miss Boltwood tells me
+that you were very good to her on the trip. Must have been jolly trip.
+You going to be in town some time, oh yes, Claire said you were in the
+university, engineering, wasn't it? have you ever seen our lumbermills,
+do drop around some---- Try the omelet before the beastly thing gets
+cold, do you mind kicking that button, we'll have some more omelet
+in--any time at the mill and I'll be glad to have some one show you
+through, how did you find the roads along the Red Trail?"
+
+"Why, pretty fair," said Milt.
+
+Into the room precipitated Mrs. Gilson, in a smile, a super-sweater, and
+a sports skirt that would have been soiled by any variety of sport more
+violent than pinochle, and she was wailing as she came:
+
+"We're disgraced, Gene, is this Mr. Daggett? how do you do, so good of
+you to come, do try the kidneys, they're usually quite decent, are the
+omelets warm, you might ring for some more, Gene, for heaven's sake give
+me some coffee, Miss Boltwood will be right down, Mr. Daggett, she told
+us how fortunate they were that they met you on the road, did you like
+the trip, how were the roads?"
+
+"Why, they were pretty good," said Milt.
+
+Claire arrived, fresh and serene in white taffeta, and she cried
+prettily, "I ought to have known that you'd be prompt even if no one
+else in the world is, so glad you came, have you tried the kidneys, and
+do have an--oh, I see you have tried the omelets, how goes the work at
+the university?"
+
+"Why, fine," said Milt.
+
+He ate stolidly, and looked pleased, and sneaked in a glance at his new
+(and still tight and still squeaky) tan boots to make sure that they
+were as well polished as they had seemed at home.
+
+From nowhere appeared a bustling weighty woman, purring, "Hello, hello,
+hello, is it possible that you're all up---- Mr. Daggett. Yes, do lead
+me to the kidneys."
+
+And a man with the gray hair of a grandfather and the giggle of a
+cash-girl bounced in clamoring, "Mornin'--expected to have bruncheon
+alone--do we have some bridge? Oh, good morning, Mr. Daggett, how do
+you like Seattle? Oh, thanks so much, yes, just two."
+
+Then Milt ceased to keep track of the conversation, which bubbled over
+the omelets, and stewed over the kidneys, and foamed about the coffee,
+and clashed above a hastily erected bridge table, and altogether sounded
+curiously like four cars with four quite different things the matter
+with them all being tried out at once in a small garage. People flocked
+in, and nodded as though they knew one another too well to worry about
+it. They bowed to him charmingly, and instantly forgot him for the
+kidneys and sausages. He sat looking respectable and feeling lonely, by
+a cup of coffee, till Claire--dropping the highly unreal smile with
+which she had been listening to the elderly beau's account of a
+fishing-trip he hadn't quite got around to taking--slipped into a chair
+beside him and begged, "Are they looking out for you, Milt?"
+
+"Oh yes, thank you."
+
+"You haven't been to see me."
+
+"Oh no, but---- Working so darn hard."
+
+"What a strikingly original reason! But have you really?"
+
+"Honest."
+
+Suddenly he wanted--eternal man, forever playing confidential small boy
+to the beloved--to tell her about his classes and acquaintances; to get
+pity for his bare room and his home-cooking. But round them blared the
+brazen interest in kidneys, and as Claire glanced up with much
+brightness at another arrival, Milt lost momentum, and found that there
+was absolutely nothing in the world he could say to her.
+
+He made a grateful farewell to the omelets and kidneys, and escaped.
+
+He walked many miles that day, trying to remember how Claire looked.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+THE VICIOUSNESS OF NICE THINGS
+
+
+"What did you think of my nice Daggett boy?" Claire demanded of Eva
+Gilson, the moment bruncheon was over.
+
+"Which one was---- Oh, the boy you met on the road? Why, really, I
+didn't notice him particularly. I'd rather fancied from the way you
+referred to him that he was awfully jolly and forceful, but rather
+crude. But I didn't notice him at all. He seemed perfectly well-bred,
+but slightly heavy."
+
+"No, he isn't that---- He---- Why did you lead spades?" reflected
+Claire.
+
+They were in the drawing-room, resting after the tact and tumult of the
+bruncheon. Claire had been here long enough now for the Gilsons to
+forget her comfortably, and be affectionate and quarrelsome and natural,
+and to admit by their worrying that even in their exalted social
+position there were things to fuss about.
+
+"I do think we ought to have invited Belle Torrens," fretted Mrs.
+Gilson. "We've simply got to have her here soon."
+
+Mr. Gilson speculated intensely, "But she's the dullest soul on earth,
+and her husband spends all his spare time in trying to think up ways of
+doing me dirt in business. Oh, by the way, did you get the water tap in
+the blue room fixed? It's dripping all the time."
+
+"No, I forgot it."
+
+"Well, I _do_ wish you'd have it attended to. It simply drips all the
+time."
+
+"I know. I intended to 'phone the plumber---- Can't you 'phone him
+tomorrow, from the office?"
+
+"No, I haven't time to bother with it. But I do wish you would. It keeps
+on dripping----"
+
+"I know, it doesn't seem to stop. Well, you remind me of it in the
+morning."
+
+"I'm afraid I'll forget. You better make a note of it. If it keeps on
+dripping that way, it's likely to injure something. And I do wish you'd
+tell the Jap not to put so much parsley in the omelet. And I say, how
+would an omelet be with a butter sauce over it?"
+
+"Oh, no, I don't think so. An omelet ought to be nice and dry. Butter
+makes it so greasy--besides, with the price of butter----"
+
+"But there's a richness to butter---- You'd better make a note about the
+tap dripping in the blue room right now, before you forget it. Oh! Why
+in heaven's name did we have Johnny Martin here? He's dull as
+ditchwater----"
+
+"I know, but---- It is nice to go out to his place on the Point. Oh,
+Gene, I do wish you'd try and remember not to talk about your business
+so much. You and Mr. Martin were talking about the price of lumber for
+at least half an hour----"
+
+"Nothing of the kind. We scarcely mentioned it. Oh! What car are you
+going to use this afternoon? If we get out to the Barnetts', I thought
+we might use the limousine---- Or no, you'll probably go out before I
+do, I have to read over some specifications, and I promised to give Will
+a lift, couldn't you take the Loco, maybe you might drive yourself, no,
+I forgot, the clutch is slipping a little, well, you might drive out and
+send the car back for me--still, there wouldn't hardly be time----"
+
+Listening to them as to a play, Claire suddenly desired to scream, "Oh,
+for heaven's sake quit fussing! I'm going up and drown myself in the
+blue-room tap! What does it matter! Walk! Take a surface car! Don't fuss
+so!"
+
+Her wrath came from her feeling of guilt. Yes, Milt had been
+commonplace. Had she done this to him? Had she turned his cheerful
+ignorances into a careful stupor? And she felt stuffy and choking and
+overpacked with food. She wanted to be out on the road, clear-headed,
+forcing her way through, an independent human being--with Milt not too
+far behind.
+
+Mrs. Gilson was droning, "I do think Mattie Vincent is so nice."
+
+"Rather dull I'd call her," yawned Mr. Gilson.
+
+Mattie was the seventh of their recent guests whom he had called dull by
+now.
+
+"Not at all--oh, of course she doesn't dance on tables and quote
+Maeterlinck, but she does have an instinct for the niceties and the
+proprieties--her little house is so sweet--everything just exactly
+right--it may be only a single rose, but always chosen so carefully to
+melt into the background; and such adorable china--I simply die of envy
+every time I see her Lowestoft plates. And such a quiet way of reproving
+any bad taste--the time that crank university professor was out there,
+and spoke of the radical labor movement, and Mattie just smiled at him
+and said, 'If you don't mind, let's not drag filthy lumberjacks into the
+drawing-room--they'd hate it just as much as we would, don't you think,
+perhaps?'"
+
+"Oh, _damn_ nice china! Oh, let's hang all spinsters who are brightly
+reproving," Claire was silently raging. "And particularly and earnestly
+confound all nicety and discretion of living."
+
+She tried to break the spell of the Gilsons' fussing. She
+false-heartedly fawned upon Mr. Gilson, and inquired:
+
+"Is there anything very exciting going on at the mills, Gene?"
+
+"Exciting?" asked Mr. Gilson incredulously. "Why, how do you mean?"
+
+"Don't you find business exciting? Why do you do it then?"
+
+"Oh, wellllll---- Of course---- Oh, yes, exciting in a way. Well----
+Well, we've had a jolly interesting time making staves for candy
+pails--promises to be wonderfully profitable. We have a new way of
+cutting them. But you wouldn't be interested in the machinery."
+
+"Of course not. You don't bore Eva with your horrid, headachy
+business-problems, do you?" Claire cooed, with low cunning.
+
+"Indeed no. Don't think a chap ought to inflict his business on his
+wife. The home should be a place of peace."
+
+"Yes," said Claire.
+
+But she wasn't thinking "Yes." She was thinking, "Milt, what worries me
+now isn't how I can risk letting the 'nice people' meet you. It's how I
+can ever waste you on the 'nice people.' Oh, I'm spoiled for
+cut-glass-and-velvet afternoons. Eternal spiritual agony over blue-room
+taps is too high a price even for four-poster beds. I want to be
+driving! hiking! living!"
+
+That afternoon, after having agreed that Mr. Johnny Martin was a bore,
+Mr. and Mrs. Gilson decided to run out to the house of Mr. Johnny
+Martin. They bore along the lifeless Claire.
+
+Mr. Martin was an unentertaining bachelor who entertained. There were a
+dozen supercilious young married people at his bayside cottage when the
+Gilsons arrived. Among them were two eyebrow-arching young matrons whom
+Claire had not met--Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz.
+
+"We've all heard of you, Miss Boltwood," said Mrs. Betz. "You come from
+the East, don't you?"
+
+"Yes," fluttered Claire, trying to be cordial.
+
+Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz looked at each other in a motionless wink, and
+Mrs. Corey prodded:
+
+"From New York?"
+
+"No. Brooklyn." Claire tried not to make it too short.
+
+"Oh." The tacit wink was repeated. Mrs. Corey said brightly--much too
+brightly--"I was born in New York. I wonder if you know the Dudenants?"
+
+Now Claire knew the Dudenants. She had danced with that young ass Don
+Dudenant a dozen times. But the devil did enter into her and possess
+her, and, to Eva Gilson's horror, Claire said stupidly, "No-o, but I
+think I've heard of them."
+
+The condemning wink was repeated.
+
+"I hear you've been doing such interesting things--motoring and
+adventuring--you must have met some terrible people along the way,"
+fished Mrs. Betz.
+
+"Yes, everybody does seem to feel that way. But I'm afraid I found them
+terribly nice," flared Claire.
+
+"I always say that common people can be most agreeable," Mrs. Corey
+patronized. Before Claire could kill her--there wasn't any homicidal
+weapon in sight except a silver tea-strainer--Mrs. Corey had pirouetted
+on, "Though I do think that we're much too kind to workmen and all--the
+labor situation is getting to be abominable here in the West, and upon
+my word, to keep a maid nowadays, you have to treat her as though she
+were a countess."
+
+"Why shouldn't maids be like countesses? They're much more important,"
+said Claire sweetly.
+
+It cannot be stated that Claire had spent any large part of her time in
+reading Karl Marx, leading syndicalist demonstrations, or hemming red
+internationalist flags, but at this instant she was a complete
+revolutionist. She could have executed Mrs. Corey and pretty Mrs. Betz
+with zeal; she disliked the entire bourgeoisie; she looked around for a
+Jap boy to call "comrade" and she again thought about the possibilities
+of the tea-strainer for use in assassination. She stolidly wore through
+the combined and exclamatory explanations of Mrs. Corey, Mrs. Betz, Mrs.
+Gilson, and Mr. Johnny Martin about the inherent viciousness of all
+maids, and when the storm was over, she said in a manner of honey and
+syrup:
+
+"You were speaking of the Dudenants, weren't you, Mrs. Corey? I do
+remember them now. Poor Don Dudenant, isn't it a pity he's such a fool?
+His father is really a very decent old bore."
+
+"I," observed Mrs. Corey, in prim horror, "regard the Dudenants as
+extremely delightful people. I fancy we must be thinking of different
+families. I mean the Manhattan Dudenants, not the Brooklyn family."
+
+"Oh, yes, I meant the Manhattan family, too--the one that made its
+fortune selling shoddy woolens in the Civil War," caressed Claire.
+
+Right there, her welcome by Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz ceased; and without
+any of the unhappiness which the thought would have caused her three
+months before, Claire reflected, "How they hate me!"
+
+The Gilsons had a number of thoughts upon the subject of tact to express
+to Claire on the way home. But she, who had always smiled, who had been
+the obedient guest, shrugged and snapped, "They're idiots, those young
+women. They're impertinent shopgirls in good frocks. I like your
+Seattle. It's a glorious city. And I love so many of the fine, simple,
+real people I've met here. I admire your progress. I do know how
+miraculously you've changed it from a mining camp. But for heaven's sake
+don't forget the good common hardiness of the miners. Somehow, London
+social distinctions seem ludicrous in American cities that twenty years
+ago didn't have much but board sidewalks and saloons. I don't care
+whether it's Seattle or Minneapolis or Omaha or Denver, I refuse to
+worry about the Duchess of Corey and the Baroness Betz and all the other
+wonderful imitations of gilt. When a pair of finishing-school flappers
+like Betz and Corey try to impress me with their superiority to workmen,
+and their extreme aristocracy and Easternness, they make me tired. I
+_am_ the East!"
+
+She had made peace with the Gilsons by night; she had been reasonably
+repentant about not playing the game of her hosts; but inside her eager
+heart she snuggled a warm thought. She remembered how gaily she had once
+promised, out on the road, to come to Milt's room and cook for him. She
+thought of it with homesick desire. His room probably wasn't
+particularly decorative, and she doubted his having an electric range,
+but it would be fun to fry eggs again, to see him fumbling with the
+dish-washing, to chatter and plan golden futures, and not worry about
+the opinions of Mrs. Corey and Mrs. Betz.
+
+The next afternoon the limousine was not busy and she borrowed it, with
+the handsome Greek chauffeur.
+
+She gave him an address not far from the university.
+
+He complained, "Pardon me, miss, but I think you have the wrong number.
+That block is a low quarter."
+
+"Probably! But that's the right number!"
+
+He raised his Athenian eyebrows, and she realized what a mistake she had
+made in not bringing the lethal tea-strainer along. When they had
+stopped in front of a cheap candy-store, he opened the door of the car
+with such frigid reserve that she thought seriously about slapping him.
+
+She climbed the stingy, flapping stairs, and knocked at the first door
+in the upper hall. It was opened by a large apron, to which a sleepy
+woman was an unimportant attachment, and out of the mass of apron and
+woman came a yawning, "Mr. Daggett's room is down the hall on the
+right."
+
+Claire knocked at a door which had at various epochs been blue, yellow,
+and pink, and now was all three. No answer. She tried the knob, went in.
+
+She could not tell whether it was the barrenness of the room, or Milt's
+carefulness, that caught her. The uncarpeted boards of the floor were
+well swept. He had only one plate, one spoon, but they were scoured, and
+put away on newspaper-covered shelves in a cupboard made of a soap-box.
+Behind a calico curtain was his new suit, dismayingly neat on its
+hanger. On the edge of the iron sink primly washed and spread out to
+dry, was a tattered old rag. At the sight of it, at the thought of Milt
+solemnly washing dishes, the tears began to creep to her eyes.
+
+There was but one picture in the room--a half-tone of a girl, clipped
+from a magazine devoted to actresses. The name was cut off. As she
+wondered at it, Claire saw that the actress was very much like herself.
+
+The only other ornament was a papier-mache figure of a cat, a cat
+reminiscent of the Lady Vere de Vere. Claire picked it up. On the
+bottom was the price-mark--three cents.
+
+It was the price-mark that pierced her. She flung across the room,
+dropped on his creaky cot-bed, howled, "Oh, I've been a beast--a
+beast--a beast! All the pretty things--limousines and marble
+baths--thinking so much of them, and not wanting them for _him_! And he
+with so little, with just nothing--he that would appreciate jolly things
+so much--here in this den, and making it as tolerable as he can--and me
+half ashamed of him instead of fighting for him---- I belong with Corey
+and Betz. Oh, I'm so ashamed, so bitterly ashamed."
+
+She patted his bed smooth with nervous eager fingers.
+
+She scraped a pin-point of egg-yolk off a platter.
+
+Before she had been home five minutes she had written a note asking him
+to tea for next day.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+THE MORNING COAT OF MR. HUDSON B. RIGGS
+
+
+Mr. Hudson B. Riggs now enters the tale--somewhat tardily, and making a
+quick exit, all in a morning coat too tight about the shoulders, and a
+smile of festivity too tight about the lips. He looked as improbable as
+an undertaker's rubber-plant. Yet in his brief course he had a mighty
+effect upon the progress of civilization as exemplified in the social
+career of Mr. Milton Daggett.
+
+Mr. Riggs had arrived at a golden position in Alaskan mining engineering
+by way of the farm, the section gang, the surveyor's chain, and
+prospecting; and his thick hands showed his evolution. His purpose in
+life was to please Mrs. Riggs, and he wasn't ever going to achieve his
+purpose in life. She wore spangles, and her corsets creaked, and she
+smiled nervously, and could tell in a glance quicker than the 1/100
+kodak shutter whether or not a new acquaintance was "worth cultivating."
+She had made Mr. Riggs thoroughly safe and thoroughly unhappy in the
+pursuit of society. He stood about keeping from doing anything he might
+want to, and he was profusely polite to young cubs whom he longed to
+have in his office--so that he could get even with them.
+
+What Mr. Riggs wanted to do, at the third large tea given by Mrs. Gilson
+for Miss Claire Boltwood, was to sneak out on the sun-porch and play
+over the new records on the phonograph; but the things he had heard from
+Mrs. Riggs the last time he'd done that had convinced him that it was
+not a wise method of escape. So he stood by the fireplace--safe on one
+side at least--and ate lettuce sandwiches, which he privately called
+"cow feed," and listened to a shining, largely feminine crowd rapidly
+uttering unintelligible epigrams from which he caught only the words,
+"Ripping hand--trained nurse--whipcord--really worth seeing--lost the
+ball near the second hole--most absurd person--new maid--thanks so
+much." He was hoping that some one would come around and let him be
+agreeable. He knew that he stood the ride home with Mrs. Riggs much
+better after he had been agreeable to people he didn't like.
+
+What Mr. Riggs did not know was that a young man in uninteresting blue,
+who looked like a good tennis-player, was watching him. It wasn't
+because he detected a fellow soul in purgatory but because he always was
+obsequious outside of his office that Mr. Riggs bowed so profusely that
+he almost lost his tea-cup, when the young man in blue drifted to him
+and suggested, "I hear you're in the Alaskan mining-game, Mr. Riggs."
+
+"Oh yes."
+
+"Do you get up there much now?"
+
+"No, not much."
+
+"I hope to hit Alaska some day--I'm taking engineering at the U."
+
+"Do you? Straight?" Mr. Riggs violently set his cup down on a
+table--Mrs. Riggs would later tell him that he'd put it down in the
+wrong place, but never mind. He leaned over Milt and snarled, "Offer me
+a cigarette. I don't know if they smoke here, and I dassn't be the first
+to try. Say, boy, Alaska---- I wish I was there now! Say, it beats all
+hell how good tea can taste in a tin cup, and how wishy-washy it is in
+china. Boy, I don't know anything about you, but you look all right, and
+when you get ready to go to Alaska, you come to me, and I'll see if I
+can't give you a chance to go up there. But don't ever come back!"
+
+When the crowd began bubblingly to move toward the door, Milt prepared
+to move--and bubble--with them. Though Claire's note had sounded as
+though she was really a little lonely, at the tea she had said nothing
+to him except, "So glad you came. Do you know Dolly Ransome? Dolly, this
+is my nice Mr. Daggett. Take him and make him happy."
+
+Dolly hadn't made him in the least happy. She had talked about tennis;
+she had with some detail described her remarkable luck in beating one
+Sally Saunders three sets. Now Milt was learning tennis. He was at the
+present period giving two hours a week to tennis, two to dancing, two to
+bridge. But he preferred cleaning oil-wells to any of these toilsome
+accomplishments, and it must sadly be admitted that all the while he was
+making his face bright at Dolly, he was wondering what would happen if
+he interrupted Dolly's gurgling, galloping, giggling multitudinousness
+by shouting, "Oh, shut up!"
+
+When it seemed safe to go, and he tried to look as though he too were
+oozing out to a Crane-Simplex, Claire slipped beside him, soft as a
+shadow, and whispered, "Please don't go. I want to talk to you.
+_Please!_" There was fluttering wistfulness in her voice, though
+instantly it was gone as she hastened to the door and was to be heard
+asserting that she did indeed love Seattle.
+
+Milt looked out into the hall. He studied a console with a curious black
+and white vase containing a single peacock feather, and a gold mirror
+shimmering against a gray wall.
+
+"Lovely stuff. I like that mirror. Like a slew in the evening. But it
+isn't worth being a slave for. I'm not going to be a Mr. Riggs. Poor
+devil, he's more of a servant than any of these maids. Certainly am
+sorry for that poor fish. He'll have a chance to take his coat off and
+sit down and smoke--when he's dead!"
+
+The guests were gone; the Gilsons upstairs. Claire came running, seized
+Milt's sleeve, coaxed him to the davenport in the drawing-room--then
+sighed, and rubbed her forehead, and looked so tired that he could say
+nothing but, "Hope you haven't been overdoing."
+
+"No, just--just talking too much."
+
+He got himself to say, "Miss Ransome--the one that's nuts about
+tennis--she's darn nice."
+
+"Is she?"
+
+"Yes, she's--she's---- What do you hear from your father?"
+
+"Oh, he's back at work."
+
+"Trip do him good?"
+
+"Oh, a lot."
+
+"Did he----"
+
+"Milt! Tell me about you. What are you doing? What are you studying? How
+do you live? Do you really cook your own meals? Do you begin to get your
+teeth into the engineering? Oh, do tell me everything. I want to know,
+so much!"
+
+"There isn't a whole lot to tell. Mostly I'm getting back into math.
+Been out of touch with it. I find that I know more about motors than
+most of the fellows. That helps. And about living--oh, I keep
+conservative. Did you know I'd sold my garage?"
+
+"Oh, I didn't, I didn't!"
+
+He wondered why she said it with such stooping shame, but he went on
+mildly, "Well, I got a pretty good price, but of course I don't want to
+take any chances on running short of coin, so I'm not splurging much.
+And----" He looked at his nails, and whistled a bar or two, and turned
+his head away, and looked back with a shy, "And I'm learning to play
+bridge and tennis and stuff!"
+
+"Oh, my dear!" It was a cry of pain. She beat her hands for a moment
+before she murmured, "When are we going to have our lessons in
+dancing--and in making an impression on sun-specks like Dolly Ransome?"
+
+"I don't know," he parried. Then, looking at her honestly, he confessed,
+"I don't believe we're ever going to. Claire, I can't do it. I'm no good
+for this tea game. You know how clumsy I was. I spilled some tea, and I
+darn near tripped over some woman's dress and---- Oh, I'm not afraid of
+them. Now that I get a good close look at this bunch, they seem pretty
+much like other folks, except maybe that one old dame says 'cawn't.' But
+I can't do the manners stunt. I can't get myself to give enough thought
+to how you ought to hold a tea-cup."
+
+"Oh, those things don't matter--they don't _matter_! Besides, everybody
+likes you--only you're so terribly cautious that you never let them see
+the force and courage and all that wonderful sweet dear goodness that's
+in you. And as for your manners--heaven knows I'm no P. G. Wodehouse
+valet. But I'll teach you all I know."
+
+"Claire, I appreciate it a lot but---- I'm not so darn sure I want to
+learn. I'm getting scared. I watched that bird named Riggs here today.
+He's a regular fellow, or he was, but now he's simply lost in the
+shuffle. I don't want to be one of the million ghosts in a city. Seattle
+is bad enough--it's so big that I feel like a no-see-um in a Norway pine
+reserve. But New York would be a lot worse. I don't want to be a Mr.
+Riggs."
+
+"Yes, but--I'm not a Mrs. Riggs!"
+
+"What do you----"
+
+He did not finish asking her what she meant. She was in his arms; she
+was whispering, "My heart is so lonely;" and the room was still. The low
+sun flooded the windows, swam in the mirror in the hall, but they did
+not heed, did not see its gliding glory.
+
+Not till there was a sound of footsteps did she burst from his arms,
+spring to her reflection in the glass of a picture, and shamefacedly
+murmur to him over her shoulder, "My hair--it's a terrible giveaway!"
+
+He had followed her; he stood with his arm circling her shoulder.
+
+She begged, "No. Please no. I'm frightened. Let's--oh, let's have a walk
+or something before you scamper home."
+
+"Look! My dear! Let's run away, and explore the town, and not come back
+till late evening."
+
+"Yes. Let's."
+
+They walked from Queen Anne Hill through the city to the docks. There
+was nothing in their excited, childish, "Oh, see that!" and "There's a
+dandy car!" and "Ohhhhh, that's a Minnesota license--wonder who it is?"
+to confess that they had been so closely, so hungrily together.
+
+They swung along a high walk overlooking the city wharf. They saw a
+steamer loading rails and food for the government railroad in Alaska.
+They exclaimed over a nest of little, tarry fishing-boats. They watched
+men working late to unload Alaska salmon.
+
+They crossed the city to Jap Town and its writhing streets, its dark
+alleys and stairways lost up the hillsides. They smiled at black-eyed
+children, and found a Japanese restaurant, and tried to dine on raw fish
+and huge shrimps and roots soaked in a very fair grade of light-medium
+motor oil.
+
+With Milt for guide, Claire discovered a Christianity that was not of
+candles and shifting lights and insinuating music, nor of carpets and
+large pews and sound oratory, but of hoboes blinking in rows, and girls
+in gospel bonnets, and little silver and crimson placards of Bible
+texts. They stopped on a corner to listen to a Pentecostal brother, to
+an I. W. W. speaker, to a magnificent negro who boomed in an operatic
+baritone that the Day of Judgment was coming on April 11, 1923, at three
+in the morning.
+
+In the streets of Jap Town, in cheap motion-picture theaters, in hotels
+for transient workmen, she found life, running swift and eager and
+many-colored; and it seemed to her that back in the house of
+four-posters and walls of subdued gray, life was smothered in the very
+best pink cotton-batting. Milt's delight in every picturesque dark
+corner, and the colloquial eloquence of the street-orators, stirred her.
+And when she saw a shopgirl caress the hand of a slouching beau in
+threadbare brown, her own hand slipped into Milt's and clung there.
+
+But they came shyly up to the Gilson hedge, and when Milt chuckled,
+"Bully walk; let's do it again," she said only, "Oh, yes, I did like it.
+Very much."
+
+He had abruptly dropped his beautiful new felt hat. He was clutching her
+arms, demanding, "Can you like me? Oh my God, Claire, I can't play at
+love. I'm mad--I just live in you. You're my blood and soul. Can I
+become--the kind of man you like?"
+
+"My dear!" She was fiercely addressing not him alone but the Betzes and
+Coreys and Gilsons and Jeff Saxtons, "don't you forget for one moment
+that all these people--here or Brooklyn either--that seem so aloof and
+amused, are secretly just plain people with enamel on, and you're to
+have the very best enamel, if it's worth while. I'm not sure that it
+is----"
+
+"You're going to kiss me!"
+
+"No! Please no! I don't--I don't understand us, even now. Can't we be
+just playmates a while yet? But--I do like you!"
+
+She fled. When she reached the hall she found her eyelids wet.
+
+It was the next afternoon----
+
+Claire was curled on the embroidered linen counterpane of her bed,
+thinking about chocolates and Brooklyn and driving through Yellowstone
+Park and corn fritters and satin petticoats versus _crepe de chine_ and
+Mount Rainier and Milt and spiritualism and manicuring, when Mrs. Gilson
+prowled into her room and demanded "Busy?" so casually that Claire was
+suspicious.
+
+"No. Not very. Something up?"
+
+"A nice party. Come down and meet an amusing man from Alaska."
+
+Claire took her time powdering her nose, and ambled downstairs and into
+the drawing-room, to find----
+
+Jeff Saxton, Mr. Geoffrey Saxton, who is the height of Brooklyn Heights,
+standing by the fireplace, smiling at her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+THE ENEMY LOVE
+
+
+But at second glance--was it Jeff? This man was tanned to a thick even
+brown in which his eyes were startlingly white. His hands were burned
+red; there was a scar across one of them; and he was standing with them
+cockily at his hips, all unlike the sleekly, noisily quiet Jeff of
+Brooklyn. He was in corduroy trousers and belted corduroy jacket, with a
+khaki-colored flannel shirt.
+
+But his tranquilly commanding smile was Jeff's, and his lean grace; and
+Jeff's familiar amused voice greeted her paralyzed amazement with:
+
+"Hello, pard! Ain't I met you some place in Montana?"
+
+"Well--where--in--the----"
+
+"Just landed from Alaska. Had to run up there from California. How are
+you, little princess?"
+
+His hand was out to her, then both hands, beseechingly, but she did not
+run to him, as she had at Flathead Lake. She stalked him cautiously, and
+shook hands--much too heartily. She sought cover in the wing-chair
+and--much too cordially--she invited:
+
+"Tell me all about it."
+
+He was watching her. Already his old pursuing determination, his steady
+dignity, were beginning to frighten her. But he calmly dropped into a
+straight chair, and obliged:
+
+"It's really been quite a lively journey. Didn't know I could like
+roughing-it so well. And it was real roughing-it, pretty much. Oh, not
+dangerous at all, but rather vigorous. I had to canoe up three hundred
+miles of a shallow river, with one Indian guide, making a portage every
+ten miles or so, and we got tipped over in the rapids now and then--the
+Big Chief almost got drowned once--and we camped at night in the
+original place where they invented mosquitoes--and one morning I shot a
+black bear just in time to keep him from eating my boots."
+
+"Oh!" she sighed in admiration, and "Oh!" again, uneasily.
+
+Nothing had been said about it; Jeff was the last person in the world to
+spoil his triumph by commenting on it; but both of them knew that they
+had violently changed places; that now it was she who was the limp
+indoor-dweller, and he who was the ruddy ranger; that as he had admired
+her at Flathead Lake, so now it was hers to admire, and his to be
+serenely heroic.
+
+She was not far from the worshiping sub-deb in her sighing, "How _did_
+you get the scar?"
+
+"That? Oh, nothing."
+
+"Please tell me."
+
+"Really and truly. Nothing at all. Just a drunken fellow with a knife,
+playing the fool. I didn't have to touch him--quite sure he could have
+given me a frightful beating and all that sort of thing. It was the Big
+Chief who got rid of him."
+
+"He--cut you? With a kniiiiiife? Ohhhhhhh!"
+
+She ran to him, pityingly stroked the scar, looked down at him with
+filmy eyes. Then she tried to retreat, but he retained her hand, glanced
+up at her as though he knew her every thought. She felt weak. How could
+she escape him? "Please!" she begged flutteringly.
+
+If he held her hand another moment, she trembled, she'd be on his lap,
+in his arms--lost. And he was holding it. He was----
+
+Oh, he was too old for her. Yes, and too paternal. But still---- Life
+with Jeff would be protected, kindly, honorable.
+
+Yet all the time she wanted, and stormily knew she wanted, to be fleeing
+to the boy Milt, her mate; to run away with him, hand in hand,
+discovering all the colored world, laughing at life, not afraid of
+losing dignity. In fear of Jeff's very kindliness and honor, she jerked
+her hand free. Then she tried to smile like a clever fencer.
+
+As she retreated to her chair she stammered, "Did you---- Was Alaska
+interesting?"
+
+He did not let her go, this time. Easy, cat-like for all his dry
+gravity, he sauntered after her, and with a fine high seriousness
+pleaded his case:
+
+"Claire dear, those few weeks of fighting nature were a revelation to
+me. I'm going to have lots more of it. As it happens, they need me
+there. There's plenty of copper, but there's big transportation and
+employment problems that I seem better able to solve than the other
+chaps--though of course I'm an absolute muff when it comes to
+engineering problems. But I've had certain training and--I'm going to
+arrange things so that I get up there at least once a year. Next summer
+I'll make a much longer trip--see the mountains--oh, glorious
+mountains--and funny half-Russian towns, and have some fishing----
+Wandering. The really big thing. Even finer than your superb plucky trip
+through----"
+
+"Wasn't plucky! I'm a cry baby," she said, like a bad, contradictory
+little girl.
+
+He didn't argue it. He smiled and said "Tut!" and placidly catalogued
+her with, "You're the pluckiest girl I've ever seen, and it's all the
+more amazing because you're not a motion-picture Tomboy, but essentially
+exquisite----"
+
+"I'm a grub."
+
+"Very well, then. You're a grub. So am I. And I like it. And when I make
+the big Alaskan trip next year I want you to go along! Claire! Haven't
+you any idea how terribly close to me the thought of you has been these
+weeks? You've guided me through the wilderness----"
+
+"It's---- I'm glad." She sprang up, beseeching, "Jeff dear, you're going
+to stay for tea? I must run up and powder my nose."
+
+"Not until you say you're glad to see me. Child dear, we've been ambling
+along and---- No. You aren't a child any more. You're a woman. And if
+I've never been quite a man, but just a dusty office-machine, that's
+gone now. I've got the wind of the wilderness in my lungs. Man and
+woman! My woman! That's all I'm going to say now, but---- Oh my God,
+Claire, I do need you so!"
+
+He drew her head to his shoulder, and for an instant she rested there.
+But as she looked up, she saw coming age in the granulated skin of his
+throat.
+
+"He needs me--but he'd boss me. I'd be the cunning child-wife, even at
+fifty," she worried, and "Hang him, it's like his superiority to beat
+poor Milt even at adventuring--and to be such a confounded Modest
+Christian Gentleman about it!"
+
+"You'd--you're so dreadfully managing," she sighed aloud.
+
+For the first time in all their acquaintanceship, Jeff's pride broke,
+and he held her away from him, while his lips were pathetic, and he
+mourned, "Why do you always try to hurt me?"
+
+"Oh, my dear, I don't."
+
+"Is it because you resent the decent things I have managed to do?"
+
+"I don't understand."
+
+"If I have an idea for a party, you think I'm 'managing.' If I think
+things out deeply, you say I'm dull."
+
+"Oh, you aren't. I didn't mean----"
+
+"What are you? A real woman, or one of these flirts, that love to tease
+a man because he's foolish enough to be honestly in love?"
+
+"I'm not--hon-estly I'm not, Jeff. It's---- You don't quite make me----
+It's just that I'm not in love with you. I like you, and respect you
+terribly, but----"
+
+"I'm going to make you love me." His clutching fingers hurt her arm, and
+somehow she was not angry, but stirred. "But I'm not going to try now.
+Forget the Alaskan caveman. Remember, I haven't even used the word
+'love.' I've just chatted about fjords, or whatever they are, but one of
+these days---- No. I won't do it. I want to stay here in Seattle a few
+days, and take you on jolly picnics, but---- Would you rather I didn't
+even do that? I'm----" He dropped her arm, kneaded his forehead with the
+heel of his palm. "I can't stand being regarded as a bothersome puppy. I
+can't stand it! I can't!"
+
+"Please stay, Jeff! We'll have some darling drives and things. We'll go
+up Rainier as far as we can."
+
+He stayed. He was anecdotal and amusing at tea, that afternoon. Claire
+saw how the Gilsons, and two girls who dropped in, admired him. That
+made her uneasy. And when Mrs. Gilson begged him to leave his hotel and
+stay with them, he refused with a quick look at Claire that hurt her.
+
+"He wants me to be free. He's really so much more considerate than Milt.
+And I hurt him. Even his pride broke down. And I've spoiled Milt's life
+by meddling. And I've hurt the Gilsons' feelings. And I'm not much of a
+comfort to father. Oh, I'm absolutely no good," she agonized.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+THE VIRTUOUS PLOTTERS
+
+
+Mr. Geoffrey Saxton, in Alaskan tan and New York evening clothes and
+Piccadilly poise, was talking to the Eugene Gilsons while Claire
+finished dressing for the theater.
+
+Mrs. Gilson observed, "She's the dearest thing. We've become awfully
+fond of her. But I don't think she knows what she wants to do with life.
+She's rather at loose ends. Who is this Daggett boy--some university
+student--whom she seems to like?"
+
+"Well, since you speak of him---- I hadn't meant to, unless you did. I
+want to be fair to him. What did she tell you about him?" Jeff asked
+confidentially.
+
+"Nothing, except that he's a young engineer, and frightfully brave and
+all those uncomfortable virtues, and she met him in Yellowstone Park or
+somewhere, and he saved her from a bear--or was it a tramp?--from
+something unnecessary, at any rate."
+
+"Eva, I don't want to be supercilious, but the truth is that this young
+Daggett is a rather dreadful person. He's been here at the house, hasn't
+he? How did he strike you?"
+
+"Not at all. He's silent, and as dull as lukewarm tea, but perfectly
+inoffensive."
+
+"Then he's cleverer than I thought! Daggett is anything but dull and
+inoffensive, and if he can play that estimable role----! It seems that
+he is the son of some common workman in the Middlewest; he isn't an
+engineer at all; he's really a chauffeur or a taxi-driver or something;
+and he ran into Claire and Henry B. on the road, and somehow insinuated
+himself into their graces--far from being silent and commonplace, he
+appears to have some strange kind of charm which," Jeff sighed, "I don't
+understand at all. I simply don't understand it!
+
+"I met him in Montana with the most gorgeously atrocious person I've
+ever encountered--one Pinky Westlake, or some such a name--positively, a
+crook! He tried to get Boltwood and myself interested in the commonest
+kind of a mining swindle--hinted that we were to join him in cheating
+the public. And this Daggett was his partner--they actually traveled
+together. But I do want to be just. I'm not _sure_ that Daggett was
+aware of his partner's dishonesty. That isn't what worries me about the
+lad. It's his utter impossibility. He's as crude as iron-ore. When he's
+being careful, he may manage to be inconspicuous, but give him the
+chance----
+
+"Really, I'm not exaggerating when I say that at thirty-five he'll be
+dining in his shirt-sleeves, and sitting down to read the paper with his
+shoes off and feet up on the table. But Claire--you know what a dear
+Quixotic soul she is--she fancies that because this fellow repaired a
+puncture or something of the sort for her on the road, she's indebted
+to him, and the worse he is, the more she feels that she must help him.
+And affairs of that kind---- Oh, it's quite too horrible, but there have
+been cases, you know, where girls as splendid and fine and well-bred as
+Claire herself have been trapped into low marriages by their loyalty to
+cadging adventurers!"
+
+"Oh!" groaned Mrs. Gilson; and "Good Lord!" lamented Mr. Gilson,
+delighted by the possibility of tragedy; and "Really, I'm not
+exaggerating," said Jeff enthusiastically.
+
+"What are we going to do?" demanded Mrs. Gilson; while Mr. Gilson, being
+of a ready and inventive mind, exclaimed, "By Jove, you ought to kidnap
+her and marry her yourself, Jeff!"
+
+"I'd like to. But I'm too old."
+
+They beautifully assured him that he was a blithe young thing with milk
+teeth; and with a certain satisfaction Jeff suggested, "I tell you what
+we might do. Of course it's an ancient stunt, but it's good. I judge
+that Daggett hasn't been here at the house much. Why not have him here
+so often that Claire will awaken to his crudity, and get sick of him?"
+
+"We'll do it," thrilled Mrs. Gilson. "We'll have him for everything from
+nine-course dinners with Grandmother Eaton's napkins on view, to milk
+and cold ham out of the ice-box. When Claire doesn't invite him, I
+will!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+THE KITCHEN INTIMATE
+
+
+Milt had become used to the Gilson drawing-room. He was no longer
+uncomfortable in the presence of its sleek fatness, though at first (not
+knowing that there were such resources as interior decorators), he had
+been convinced that, to have created the room, the Gilsons must have
+known everything in the world. Now he glanced familiarly at its white
+paneling, its sconces like silver candlesticks, the inevitable davenport
+inevitably backed by an amethyst-shaded piano lamp and a table crowded
+with silver boxes and picture-frames. He liked the winsomeness of light
+upon velvet and polished wood.
+
+It was not the drawing-room but the kitchen that dismayed him.
+
+In Schoenstrom he had known that there must somewhere be beautiful
+"parlors," but he had trusted in his experience of kitchens. Kitchens,
+according to his philosophy, were small smelly rooms of bare floors, and
+provided with one oilcloth-covered table, one stove (the front draft
+always broken and propped up with the lid-lifter), one cupboard with
+panes of tin pierced in rosettes, and one stack of dirty dishes.
+
+But the Gilson kitchen had the efficiency of a laboratory and the
+superciliousness of a hair-dresser's booth. With awe Milt beheld walls
+of white tiles, a cork floor, a gas-range large as a hotel-stove, a
+ceiling-high refrigerator of enamel and nickel, zinc-topped tables, and
+a case of utensils like a surgeon's knives. It frightened him; it made
+more hopelessly unapproachable than ever the Alexandrian luxury of the
+great Gilsons.... The Vanderbilts' kitchen must be like this. And maybe
+King George's.
+
+He was viewing the kitchen upon the occasion of an intimate Sunday
+evening supper to which he had been yearningly invited by Mrs. Gilson.
+The maids were all out. The Gilsons and Claire, Milt and Jeff Saxton,
+shoutingly prepared their own supper. While Mrs. Gilson scrambled eggs
+and made coffee, the others set the table, and brought cold ham and a
+bowl of salad from the ice-box.
+
+Milt had intended to be a silent but deft servitor. When he had heard
+that he was to come to supper with the returned Mr. Geoffrey Saxton, he
+had first been panic-shaken, then resolved. He'd "let old iron-face
+Saxton do the high and mighty. Let him stand around and show off his
+clothes and adjectives, way he did at Flathead Lake." But he, Milt,
+would be "on the job." He'd help get supper, and calmly ignore Jeff's
+rudeness.
+
+Only--Jeff wasn't rude. He greeted Milt with, "Ah, Daggett! This is _so_
+nice!" And Milt had no chance to help. It was Jeff who anticipated him
+and with a pleasant, "Let me get that--I'm kitchen-broke," snatched up
+the cold ham and salad. It was Jeff who found the supper plates, while
+Milt was blunderingly wondering how any one family could use a "whole
+furniture-store-full of different kinds of china." It was Jeff who
+sprang to help Claire wheel in the tea-wagon, and so captured the chance
+to speak to her for which Milt had been maneuvering these five minutes.
+
+When they were settled, Jeff glowed at him, and respectfully offered, "I
+thought of you so often, Daggett, on a recent little jaunt of mine.
+You'd have been helpful."
+
+"Where was that?" asked Milt suspiciously (wondering, and waiting to
+see, whether you could take cold ham in your fingers).
+
+"Oh, in Alaska."
+
+"In--Alaska?" Milt was dismayed.
+
+"Yes, just a business trip there. There's something I wish you'd advise
+me about."
+
+He was humble. And Milt was uneasy. He grumbled, "What's that?"
+
+"I've been wondering whether it would be possible to use wireless
+telephony in Alaska. But I'm such a dub at electricity. Do you know----
+What would be the cost of installing a wireless telephone plant with a
+hundred-mile radius?"
+
+"Gee, I don't know!"
+
+"Oh, so sorry. Well, I wonder if you can tell me about wireless
+telegraphy, then?"
+
+"No, I don't know anything about that either."
+
+Milt had desperately tried to make his answer gracious but somehow----
+He hated this devil's obsequiousness more than he had his chilliness at
+Flathead Lake. He had a feeling that the Gilsons had delightedly kicked
+each other under the table; that, for all her unchanging smile, Claire
+was unhappy.... And she was so far off, a white wraith floating beyond
+his frantic grasp.
+
+"It doesn't matter, really. But I didn't know---- So you've started in
+the engineering school at the University of Washington," Saxton was
+purring. "Have you met Gid Childers there--son of old Senator
+Childers--charming people."
+
+"I've seen him. He has a Stutz--no, his is the Mercer," sighed Milt.
+
+He hated himself for it, but he couldn't quite keep the awe out of his
+voice. People with Mercers----
+
+Claire seemed to be trying to speak. She made a delicate, feminine,
+clairesque approximation to clearing her throat. But Jeff ignored her
+and with almost osculatory affection continued to Milt:
+
+"Do let me know if there's anything I can do to help you. We're
+acquainted with two or three of your engineering faculty at the Office.
+They write in about various things. Do you happen to know Dr.
+Philgren?"
+
+"Oh yes. Say! He's a wonder!" Milt was betrayed into exclaiming.
+
+"Yes. Good chap, I believe. He's been trying to get a job with us. We
+may give him one. Just tell him you're a friend of mine, and that he's
+to give you any help he can."
+
+Milt choked on a "Thanks."
+
+"And--now that we're just the family here together--how goes the
+financial side? Can I be of any assistance in introducing you to some
+engineering firm where you could do a little work on the side? You could
+make quite a little money----"
+
+So confoundedly affectionate and paternal----
+
+Milt said irritably, "Thanks, but I don't need to do any work. I've got
+plenty of money."
+
+"How pleasant!" Saxton's voice was smooth as marshmallow. "You're
+fortunate. I had quite a struggle to get through Princeton."
+
+Wasn't Mr. Gilson contrasting Saxton's silk shirt with Milt's darned
+cotton covering, and in light of that contrast chuckling at Milt's boast
+and Saxton's modesty? Milt became overheated. His scalp prickled and his
+shoulder-blades were damp. As Saxton turned from him, and crooned to
+Claire, "More ham, honey?" Milt hated himself. He was in much of the
+dramatic but undesirable position of a man in pajamas, not very good
+pajamas, who has been locked out in the hotel corridor by the slamming
+of his door. He was in the frame of mind of a mongrel, of a real
+Boys'-Dog, at a Madison Square dog-show. He had a faint shrewd suspicion
+of Saxton's game. But what could he do about it?
+
+He felt even more out of place when the family forgot him and talked
+about people of whom he had never heard.
+
+He sat alone on an extremely distant desert isle and ate cold ham and
+wished he were in Schoenstrom.
+
+Claire had recovered her power of speech. She seemed to be trying to
+bring him into the conversation, so that the family might appreciate
+him.
+
+She hesitated, and thought with creased brows, and brought out, "Uh, uh,
+oh---- Oh Milt: How much is gas selling at now?"...
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Milt left that charming and intimate supper-party at nine. He said, "Got
+to work on--on my analytical geometry," as though it was a lie; and he
+threw "Good night" at Saxton as though he hated his kind, good
+benefactor; and when he tried to be gracious to Mrs. Gilson the best he
+could get out was, "Thanks f' inviting me." They expansively saw him to
+the door. Just as he thought that he had escaped, Saxton begged, "Oh,
+Daggett, I was arguing with a chap---- What color are Holstein-Friesian
+cattle? Red?"
+
+"Black and white," Milt said eagerly.
+
+He heard Mrs. Gilson giggle.
+
+He stood on the terrace wiping his forehead and, without the least
+struggle, finally and irretrievably admitting that he would never see
+Claire Boltwood or any of her friends again. Not--never!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+He had received from Mrs. Gilson a note inviting him to share their box
+at the first night of a three-night Opera Season. He had spent half a
+day in trying to think of a courteously rude way of declining.
+
+A straggly little girl came up from the candy-shop below his room,
+demanding, "Say, are you Mr. Daggett? Say, there's some woman wants to
+talk to you on our telephone. Say, tell them we ain't supposed to be no
+messenger-office. You ain't supposed to call no upstairs people on our
+telephone. We ain't supposed to leave the store and go trotting all over
+town to---- Gee, a nickel, gee, thank you, don't mind what ma says,
+she's always kicking."
+
+On the telephone, he heard Claire's voice in an agitated, "Milt! Meet me
+down-town, at the Imperial Motion Picture Theater, right away. Something
+I've got to tell you. I'll be in the lobby. Hurry!"
+
+When he bolted in she was already in the lobby, agitatedly looking over
+a frame of "stills." She ran to him, hooked her fingers in his lapel,
+poured out, "They've invited you to the opera? I want you to come and
+put it all over them. I'm almost sure there's a plot. They want to show
+me that you aren't used to tiaras and saxophones and creaking dowagers
+and tulle. Beat 'em! Beat 'em! Come to the opera and be awf'ly aloof and
+supercilious. You can! Yes, you can! And be sure--wear evening clothes.
+Now I've got to hurry."
+
+"B-but----"
+
+"Don't disappoint me. I depend on you. Oh, say you will!"
+
+"I will!"
+
+She was gone, whisking into the Gilson limousine. He was in a glow at
+her loyalty, in a tremor of anger at the meddlers.
+
+But he had never worn evening clothes.
+
+He called it "a dress-suit," and before the complications of that exotic
+garb, he was flabby with anxiety. To Milt and to Schoenstrom--to Bill
+McGolwey, even to Prof Jones and the greasily prosperous Heinie
+Rauskukle--the dress-suit was the symbol and proof, the indication and
+manner, of sophisticated wealth. In Schoenstrom even waiters do not wear
+dress-suits. For one thing there aren't any waiters. There is one
+waitress at the Leipzig House, Miss Annie Schweigenblat, but you
+wouldn't expect Miss Schweigenblat to deal them off the arm in black
+trousers with braid down the side.
+
+No; a dress-suit was what the hero wore in the movies; and the hero in
+the movies, when he wasn't a cowpuncher, was an ex-captain of the Yale
+football team, and had chambers and a valet. You could tell him from the
+valet because he wasn't so bald. It is true that Milt had heard that in
+St. Cloud there were people who wore dress-suits at parties, but then
+St. Cloud was a city, fifteen or sixteen thousand.
+
+"How could he get away with a dress-suit? How could he keep from feeling
+foolish in a low-cut vest, and what the deuce would he do with the
+tails? Did you part 'em or roll 'em up, when you sat down? And wouldn't
+everybody be able to tell from his foolish look that he didn't belong in
+one?" He could hear A.D.T. boys and loafers in front of pool rooms
+whispering, "Look at the piker in the rented soup and fish!"
+
+For of course he'd rent one. Nobody bought them--except plutes like
+Henry B. Boltwood.
+
+He agitatedly walked up and down for an hour, peering into haberdashery
+windows, looking for a kind-faced young man. He found him, in Ye Pall
+Mall Toggery Shoppe & Shoes; an open-faced young man who was gazing
+through the window as sparklingly as though he was thinking of going as
+a missionary to India--and liked curry. Milt ironed out his worried
+face, clumped in, demanded fraternally, "Say, old man, don't some of
+these gents' furnishings stores have kind of little charts that tell
+just what you wear with dress-suits and Prince Alberts and everything?"
+
+"You bet," said the kind-faced young man.
+
+West of Chicago, "You bet" means "Rather," and "Yes indeed," and "On the
+whole I should be inclined to fancy that there may be some vestiges of
+accuracy in your curious opinion," and "You're a liar but I can't afford
+to say so."
+
+The kind-faced young man brought from behind the counter a beautiful
+brochure illustrated with photographs of Phoebus Apollo in what were
+described as "American Beauty Garments--neat, natty, nobby, new." The
+center pages faithfully catalogued the ties, shirts, cuff-links, spats,
+boots, hats, to wear with evening clothes, morning clothes, riding
+clothes, tennis costumes, polite mourning.
+
+As he looked it over Milt felt that his wardrobe already contained all
+these gentlemanly possessions.
+
+With the aid of the clerk and the chart he purchased a tradition-haunted
+garment with a plate-armor bosom and an opening as crooked as the
+Missouri River; a white tie which in his strong red hands looked as
+silly as a dead fish; waistcoat, pearl links, and studs. For the first
+time, except for seizures of madness during two or three visits to
+Minneapolis motor accessory stores, he caught the shopping-fever. The
+long shining counter, the trim red-stained shelves, the glittering
+cases, the racks of flaunting ties, were beautiful to him and
+beckoning. He revolved a pleasantly clicking rack of ties, then turned
+and fought his way out.
+
+He bought pumps--which cost exactly twice as much as the largest sum
+which he had allowed himself. He bought a newspaper, and in the
+want-columns found the advertisement:
+
+ Silberfarb the Society Tailor
+      DRESS SUITS TO RENT
+     Snappiest in the City
+
+Despite the superlative snappiness of Mr. Silberfarb's dress-suits his
+establishment was a loft over a delicatessen, approached by a splintery
+stairway along which hung shabby signs announcing the upstairs offices
+of "J. L. & T. J. O'Regan, Private Detectives," "The Zenith Spiritualist
+Church, Messages by Rev. Lulu Paughouse," "The International Order of
+Live Ones, Seattle Wigwam," and "Mme. Lavourie, Sulphur Baths." The dead
+air of the hallway suggested petty crookedness. Milt felt that he ought
+to fight somebody but, there being no one to fight, he banged along the
+flapping boards of the second-floor hallway to the ground-glass door of
+Silberfarb the Society Tailor, who was also, as an afterthought on a
+straggly placard, "Pressng & Cleang While U Wait."
+
+He belligerently shouldered into a low room. The light from the one
+window was almost obscured by racks of musty-smelling black clothes
+which stretched away from him in two dismal aisles that resembled a
+morgue of unhappy dead men indecently hung up on hooks. On a long,
+clumsily carpentered table, a small Jew, collarless, sweaty, unshaven,
+was darning trousers under an evil mantle gaslight. The Jew wrung out
+his hands and tried to look benevolent.
+
+"Want to rent a dress-suit," said Milt.
+
+"I got just the t'ing for you!"
+
+The little man unfolded himself, galloped down the aisle, seized the
+first garment that came to hand, and came back to lay it against Milt's
+uncomfortable frame, bumbling, "Fine, mister, fy-en!"
+
+Milt studied the shiny-seamed, worn-buttonholed, limp object with
+dislike. Its personality was disintegrated. The only thing he liked
+about it was the good garage stink of gasoline.
+
+"That's almost worn out," he growled.
+
+At this sacrilege Mr. Silberfarb threw up his hands, with the dingy suit
+flapping in them like a bed-quilt shaken from a tenement window. He
+looked Milt all over, coldly. His red but shining eyes hinted that Milt
+was a clodhopper and no honest wearer of evening clothes. Milt felt
+humble, but he snapped, "No good. Want something with class."
+
+"Vell, that was good enough for a university professor at the big dance,
+but if you say so----"
+
+In the manner of one who is being put to an unfair amount of trouble,
+Mr. Silberfarb returned the paranoiac dress-suit to the rack, sighing
+patiently as he laboriously draped it on a hanger. He peered and pawed.
+He crowed with throaty triumph and brought back a rich ripe thing of
+velvet collar and cuffs. He fixed Milt with eyes that had become as
+sulky as the eyes of a dog in August dust.
+
+"Now that--you can't beat that, if you vant class, and it'll fit you
+like a glove. Oh, that's an ellllegant garment!"
+
+Shaking himself out of the spell of those contemptuous eyes Milt opened
+his brochure, studied the chart, and in a footnote found, "Never wear
+velvet collars or cuffs with evening coat."
+
+"Nope. Nix on the velvet," he remarked.
+
+Then the little man went mad and ran around in circles. He flung the
+ellllegant garment on the table. He flapped his arms, and wailed, "What
+do you vant? What do you vannnnt? That's a hundred-and-fifty-dollar
+dress-suit! That belonged to one of the richest men in the city. He sold
+it to me because he was going to Japan."
+
+"Well, you can send it to Japan after him. I want something decent. Have
+you got it--or shall I go some place else?"
+
+The tailor instantly became affectionate. "How about a nice Tuxedo?" he
+coaxed.
+
+"Nope. It says here--let me see--oh yes, here it is--it says here in the
+book that for the theater-with-ladies, should not wear 'dinner-coat or
+so-called Tuxedo, but----'"
+
+"Oh, dem fellows what writes books they don't know nothing. Absolute!
+They make it up."
+
+"Huh! Well, I guess I'll take my chance on them. The factory knows the
+ignition better 'n any repair-man."
+
+"Vell say, you're a hard fellow to please. I'll give you one of my
+reserve stock, but you got to leave me ten dollars deposit instead of
+five."
+
+Mr. Silberfarb quite cheerfully unlocked a glass case behind the racked
+and ghostly dead; he brought out a suit that seemed to Milt almost
+decent. And it almost fitted when, after changing clothes in a broiling,
+boiling, reeking, gasoline-pulsing hole behind the racks, he examined it
+before a pier-glass. But he caught the tailor assisting the fit by
+bunching up a roll of cloth at the shoulder. Again Milt snapped, and
+again the tailor suffered and died, and to a doubting heathen world
+maintained the true gospel of "What do you vannnnt? It ain't stylish to
+have the dress-suit too tight! All the gents is wearing 'em loose and
+graceful." But in the end, after Milt had gone as far as the door, Mr.
+Silberfarb admitted that one dress-coat wouldn't always fit all persons
+without some alterations.
+
+The coat did bag a little, and it was too long in the sleeves, but as
+Milt studied himself in his room--by placing his small melancholy mirror
+on the bureau, then on a chair, then on the floor, finally, to get a
+complete view, clear out in the hall--he admitted with stirring delight
+that he looked "pretty fair in the bloomin' outfit." His clear face, his
+shining hair, his straight shoulders, seemed to go with the costume.
+
+He wriggled into his top-coat and marched out of his room,
+theater-bound, with the well-fed satisfaction of a man who is certain
+that no one is giggling, "Look at the hand-me-downs." His pumps did
+alternately pinch his toes and rub his heels; the trousers cramped his
+waist; and he suspected that his tie had gone wandering. But he
+swaggered to the trolley, and sat as one rich and famous and very kind
+to the Common People, till----
+
+Another man in evening clothes got on the car, and Milt saw that he wore
+a silk hat, and a white knitted scarf; that he took out and examined a
+pair of white kid gloves.
+
+He'd forgotten the hat! He was wearing his gray felt. He could risk the
+gloves, but the hat--the "stovepipe"--and the chart had said to wear
+one--he was ruined----
+
+He turned up the collar of his top-coat to conceal his white tie, tried
+to hide each of his feet behind the other to cover up his pumps; sought
+to change his expression from that of a superior person in evening
+clothes to that of a decent fellow in honest Regular Clothes. Had the
+conductor or any of the passengers realized that he was a dub in a
+dress-suit without the hat?
+
+Once he thought that the real person in real evening clothes was looking
+at him. He turned his head and bore the probable insult in weak misery.
+
+Too feeble for anything but thick suffering he was dragged on toward the
+theater, the opera, people in silk hats--toward Jeff Saxton and
+exposure.
+
+But his success in bullying the tailor had taught him that dressing
+wasn't really a hidden lore to be known only by initiates; that some day
+he too might understand the black and white magic of clothes. His
+bruised self-consciousness healed. "I'll do--something," he determined.
+He waited, vacuously.
+
+The Gilson party was not in the lobby when he arrived. He tore off his
+top-coat. He draped it over his felt hat, so that no one could be sure
+what sort of hat it shamefully concealed. That unveiling did expose him
+to the stare of everybody waiting in the lobby. He was convinced that
+the entire ticket-buying cue was glumly resenting him. Peeping down at
+the unusual white glare of his shirt-front, he felt naked and
+indecent.... "Nice kind o' vest. Must make 'em out of old pique
+collars."
+
+He endured his martyrdom till his party arrived--the Gilsons, Claire,
+Jeff Saxton, and a glittering young woman whose name, Milt thought, was
+Mrs. Corey.
+
+And Saxton wasn't wearing a high hat! He wore a soft one, and he didn't
+seem to care!
+
+Milt straightened up, followed them through the manifold dangers of the
+lobby, down a perilous aisle of uptilted scornful faces, to a red narrow
+corridor, winding stairs, a secret passage, a mysterious dark
+closet--and he walked out into a room with one side missing, and, on
+that side, ten trillion people in a well, and nine trillion of them
+staring at him and noticing that he'd rented his dress-suit. Hot about
+the neck, he stumbled over one or two chairs, and was permitted to rest
+in a foolish little gilt chair in the farthest corner.
+
+Once safe, he felt much better. Except that Jeff did put on white kid
+gloves, Milt couldn't see that they two looked so different. And neither
+of the two men in the next box wore gloves. Milt made sure of that
+comfort; he reveled in it; he looked at Claire, and in her loyal smile
+found ease.
+
+He snarled, "She trusts you. Forget you're a dub. Try to be human. Hang
+it, I'm no greener at the opera than old horsehair sofa there would be
+at a garage."
+
+There was something---- What was it he was trying to remember? Oh yes.
+When he'd worked in the Schoenstrom flour-mill, as engineer, at
+eighteen, the owner had tried to torment him (to "get his goat," Milt
+put it), and Milt had found that the one thing that would save him was
+to smile as though he knew more than he was telling. It did not, he
+remembered, make any difference whether or not the smile was real. If he
+merely looked the miller up and down, and smiled cynically, he was let
+alone.
+
+Why not----
+
+Saxton was bending toward him, asking in honeyed respectfulness:
+
+"Don't you think that the new school in music--audible pointillage, one
+might call it--mistakes cacophony for power?"
+
+Milt smiled, paternally.
+
+Saxton waited for something more. He dug the nail of his right middle
+finger into his thumb, looked thoughtful, and attacked again:
+
+"Which do you like better: the new Italian music, or the orthodox
+German?"
+
+Milt smiled like two uncles watching a clever baby, and patronized
+Saxton with, "They both have their points."
+
+He saw that Claire was angry; but that the Gilsons and Mrs. Corey,
+flap-eared, gape-mouthed, forward-bending, were very proud of their
+little Jeff. He saw that, except for their clothes and self-conscious
+coiffures, they were exactly like a gang of cracker-box loafers at
+Heinie Rauskukle's badgering a new boy in town.
+
+Saxton looked bad-tempered. Then Mrs. Corey bustled with her face and
+yearned at Milt, "Do tell me: what is the theme of the opera tonight.
+I've rather forgotten."
+
+Milt ceased to smile. While all of them regarded him with interest he
+said clearly, "I haven't got the slightest idea. I don't know anything
+about music. Some day I hope I can get a clever woman like you to help
+me, Mrs. Corey. It must be great to know all about all these arts, the
+way you do. I wish you'd explain that--overture they call it, don't
+they?"
+
+For some reason, Mr. Gilson was snickering, Mrs. Corey flushing, Claire
+looking well pleased. Milt had tried to be insulting, but had got lost
+in the intricacies of the insult. He felt that he'd better leave it in
+its apparently safe state, and he leaned back, and smiled again, as
+though he was waiting. Mrs. Corey did not explain the overture. She
+hastily explained her second maid, to Mrs. Gilson.
+
+The opera was _Il Amore dei Tre Re_. Milt was bewildered. To him, who
+had never seen an opera, the convention that a girl cannot hear a man
+who is bellowing ten feet away from her, was absurd; and he wished that
+the singers would do something besides making their arms swim.
+
+He discovered that by moving his chair forward, he could get within a
+foot of Claire. His hand slipped across, touched hers. She darted a
+startled backward glance. Her fingers closed tight about his, then
+restlessly snuggled inside his palm--and Milt was lost in enchantment.
+
+Stately kings of blood-red cloaks and chrysoberyls malevolent in crowns
+of ancient and massy gold--the quick dismaying roll of drums and the
+shadow of passing banners below a tower--a woman tall and misty-veiled
+and pale with dreams--a world of spirit where the soul had power over
+unseen dominions--this he saw and heard and tasted in the music. What
+the actual plot was, or the technique of the singing, he did not know,
+but it bore him beyond all reality save the sweet, sure happiness of
+Claire's nestling hand.
+
+He held her fingers so firmly that he could feel the pulse beat in them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the clamminess of his room, when the enchantment was gone, he said
+gravely:
+
+"How much longer can I keep this up? Sooner or later I bust loose and
+smash little Jeff one in the snoot, and he takes the count, and I'm
+never allowed to see Claire again. Turn the roughneck out on his ear. I
+s'pose I'm vulgar. I s'pose that fellow Michael in _Youth's Encounter_
+wouldn't talk about snoots. I don't care, I'll---- If I poke Saxton
+one---- I'm not afraid of the kid-glove precinct any more. My brain's
+as good as theirs, give it a chance. But oh, they're all against me. And
+they bust the Athletic Union's wrestling rule that 'striking, kicking,
+gouging, hair-pulling, butting, and strangling will not be allowed.' How
+long can I go on being good-natured? When I do break loose----"
+
+Slowly, beneath the moral cuff of his dress-shirt, Milt's fist closed in
+a brown, broad-knuckled lump, and came up in the gesture of a right to
+the jaw. But it came up only a foot. The hand opened, climbed to Milt's
+face, rubbed his temples, while he sighed:
+
+"Nope. Can't even do that. Bigger game now. Used to could--used to be
+able to settle things with a punch. But I've got to be more--oh, more
+diplomatic now. Oh Lord, how lonely I get for Bill McGolwey. No. That
+isn't true. I couldn't stand Bill now. Claire took all that out of me.
+Where am I, where am I? Why did I ever get a car that takes a 36 x 6?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+THE CORNFIELD ARISTOCRAT
+
+
+It was an innocent little note from Jeff Saxton; a polite, humble little
+note; it said that Jeff had a card to the Astoria Club, and wouldn't
+Milt please have lunch with him? But Milt dropped it on the table, and
+he walked round it as though it were a dictagraph which he'd discovered
+in the table drawer after happy, happy, hidden hours at counterfeiting.
+
+It seemed more dangerous to refuse than to go. He browned the celebrated
+new shoes; he pressed the distinguished new trousers, with a light and
+quite unsatisfactory flatiron; he re-re-retied his best spotted blue
+bow--it persisted in having the top flaps too short, but the retying
+gave him spiritual strength--and he modestly clumped into the aloof
+brick portal of the Astoria Club on time.
+
+He had never been in a club before.
+
+He looked at the red tiled floor of the entrance hall; he stared through
+the hall into an immense lounge with the largest and softest chairs in
+the world, with oil portraits of distinguished old bucks, and ninety per
+cent. of the wealth and power of Seattle pulling its several mustaches,
+reading the P.I., and ignoring the lone intruder out in the hall.
+
+A small Zulu in blue tights and brass buttons glared at Milt; and a
+large, soft, suave, insulting young man demanded, "Yes, sir?"
+
+"Mr. G-g-geoffrey Saxton?" ventured Milt.
+
+"Not in, sir." The "sir" sounded like "And you know it." The flaming
+guardian retired behind a narrow section of a bookkeeper's desk and
+ignored him.
+
+"I'm to meet him for lunch," Milt forlornly persisted.
+
+The young man looked up, hurt and annoyed at finding that the person was
+still to be dealt with.
+
+"If you will wait in there?" he groaned.
+
+Milt sat in there, which was a small blue tapestry room with hard chairs
+intended to discourage bill-collectors. He turned his hat round and
+round and round, till he saw Jeff Saxton, slim and straight and hard as
+the stick hooked over his arm, sailing into the hall. He plunged out
+after him, took refuge with him from the still unconvinced inspection of
+the hall-man. For twenty seconds, he loved Jeff Saxton.
+
+And Jeff seemed to adore him in turn. He solicitously led Milt to the
+hat-checking counter. He showed Milt the lounge and the billiard room,
+through which Milt crept with erect shoulders and easy eyes and a heart
+simply paralyzed with fear that one of these grizzled clubmen with
+clipped mustaches would look at him. He coaxed Milt into a grill that
+was a cross between the Chinese throne-room and a Viennese Weinstube,
+and he implored his friend Milt to do him the favor of trying the "very
+fair" English mutton chops and potatoes _au gratin_.
+
+"I did want to see you again before we go East, Daggett," he said
+pleasantly.
+
+"Th-thanks. When do you go?"
+
+"I'm trying to get Miss Boltwood to start soon now. The season is
+opening in the East. She does like your fine sturdy West, as I do, but
+still, when we think of the exciting new shows opening, and the dances,
+and the touch with the great world---- Oh, it does make one eager to get
+back."
+
+"That's so," risked Milt.
+
+"We, uh---- Daggett---- In fact, I'm going to call you Milt, as Claire
+does. You don't know what a pleasure it has been to have encountered
+you. There's a fine keen courage about you Western chaps that makes a
+cautious old fogy like me envious. I shall remember meeting you with a
+great deal of pleasure."
+
+"Th-thanks. Been pleasure meet you."
+
+"And I know Claire will, too."
+
+Milt felt that he was being dealt with foully. He wanted to object to
+Saxton's acting as agent for Claire as incompetent, irrelevant,
+immaterial, and no foundation laid. But he could not see just where he
+was being led, and with Saxton glowing at him as warmly and greasily as
+the mutton chops, Milt could only smile wanly, and reflectively feel
+the table leg to see if it was loose enough to jerk out in case of need.
+
+Saxton was being optimistic:
+
+"In fact, Claire and I both hope that some day when you've finished your
+engineering course, we'll see you in the East. I wonder---- As I say, my
+dear fellow, I've taken the greatest fancy to you, and I do hope you
+won't think I'm too intimate if I say that I imagine that even in your
+charming friendship with Miss Boltwood, you've probably never learned
+what important people the Boltwoods are. I thought I'd tell you so that
+you could realize the privilege both you and I have in knowing them.
+Henry B. is--while not a man of any enormous wealth--regarded as one of
+the keenest intellects in New York wholesale circles. But beyond that,
+he is a scholar, and a man of the broadest interests. Of course the
+Boltwoods are too modest to speak of it, but he was chiefly instrumental
+in the establishment of the famous Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra. And his
+ancestors clear through--his father was a federal judge, and his
+mother's brother was a general in the Civil War, and afterwards an
+ambassador. So you can guess something of the position Claire holds in
+that fine, quiet, solid old Brooklyn set. Henry Ward Beecher himself was
+complimented at being asked to dine with the Boltwoods of his day,
+and----"
+
+No, the table leg wouldn't come loose, so it was only verbally that the
+suddenly recovered Milt attacked:
+
+"Certainly is nice to have one of those old families. It's something
+like---- As you say, you and I have gotten pretty well acquainted along
+the line, so I guess I can say it to you---- My father and his folks
+came from that same kind of family. Father's dad was a judge, back in
+Maine, and in the war, grand-dad was quite friendly with Grant."
+
+This tribute of Milt to his grandsire was loyal but inaccurate. Judge
+Daggett, who wasn't a judge at all, but a J. P., had seen General Grant
+only once, and at the time the judge had been in company with all the
+other privates in the Fourteenth Maine.
+
+"Dad was a pioneer. He was a doctor. He had to give up all this
+easy-going stuff in order to help open up the West to civilization, but
+I guess it was worth it. He used to do the hardest kind of operations,
+on kitchen tables, with his driver giving the chloroform. I'm mighty
+proud of him. As you say, it's kind of what you might call inspiring to
+belong to the old Pilgrim aristocracy."
+
+Never before had Milt claimed relation to a group regarding which his
+only knowledge was the information derived from the red school-history
+to the effect that they all carried blunderbusses, put people in the
+stocks for whistling, and frequently said, "Why don't you speak for
+yourself, John?" But he had made his boast with a clear eye and a
+pleasant, superior, calm smile.
+
+"Oh! Very interesting," grunted Saxton.
+
+"Would you like to see grandfather's daguerreotype?"
+
+"Oh, yes, yes, uh, thanks, that would be very interesting---- Do let me
+see it, when---- Uh, as I was saying, Claire doubtless has a tremendous
+social career before her. So many people expecting her to marry well. Of
+course she has a rather unusual combination of charm and intelligence
+and---- In fact I think we may both be glad that----"
+
+"Yes. That's right. And the best thing about her is the way she can
+shake off all the social stuff and go camping and be a regular human
+being," Milt caressed.
+
+"Um, uh, no doubt, no doubt, though---- Of course, though, that isn't an
+inherent part of her. I fancy she's been rather tired by this long trip,
+poor child. Of course she isn't very strong."
+
+"That's right. Real pluck. And of course she'll get stronger by hiking.
+You've never seen her bucking a dangerous hill--I kind of feel that a
+person who hasn't seen her in the wilds doesn't know her."
+
+"I don't want to be contradictory, old man, but I feel on the other hand
+that no one who has failed to see her at the Junior League Dances, in a
+Poiret frock, can know her! Come, come! Don't know how we drifted into
+this chorus of praise of Claire! What I wanted to ask was your opinion
+of the Pierce-Arrow. I'm thinking of buying one. Do you think that----"
+
+All the way home Milt exulted, "I put it all over him. I wasn't scared
+by the 'Don't butt into the aristocracy, my young friend' stuff. I lied
+handsome. But---- Darn it, now I'll have to live up to my New England
+aristocracy.... Wonder if my grand-dad's dad was a hired man or a
+wood-sawyer?... Ne' mine; I'm Daggett of Daggett from now on." He
+bounded up to his room vaingloriously remarking, "I'm there with the
+ancestors. I was brought up in the handsome city of Schoenstrom, which
+was founded by a colony of Vermont Yankees, headed by Herman Skumautz. I
+was never allowed to play with the Dutch kids, and----" He opened the
+door. "--the Schoenstrom minister taught me Greek and was my bosom
+frien'----"
+
+He stopped with his heart in his ankles. Lolling on the bed, grinning,
+waving a cigarette, was Bill McGolwey, proprietor of the Old Home Lunch,
+of Schoenstrom, Minnesota.
+
+"Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwhy where the heck did you come from?"
+stammered the deposed aristocrat to his bosom friend Bill.
+
+"You old lemon-pie-faced, lollygagging, flap-footed, crab-nosed son of
+misery, gee, but it's good to see you, Milt!"
+
+Bill was off the bed, wringing Milt's hand with simple joy, with perfect
+faith that in finding his friend all the troubles of life were over. And
+Milt was gloomily discovering the art of diplomacy. Bill was his friend,
+yes, but----
+
+It was hard enough to carry his own self.
+
+He pictured Jeff Saxton leering at the door, and while he pounded Bill's
+shoulder, and called him the name which, west of Chicago, is the token
+of hatred and of extreme gladness at meeting, he discovered that some
+one had stolen his stomach and left a piece of ice in its place.
+
+They settled down on bed and chair, Bill's ears red with joy, while Milt
+demanded:
+
+"How the deuce did you get here?"
+
+"Well, tell you, old hoss. Schoenstrom got so darn lonely after you
+left, and when Ben and Heinie got your address and bought the garage,
+think's I, lez go off on a little bum."
+
+Milt was realizing--and hating himself for realizing--that Bill's face
+was dirty, his hair linty, the bottoms of his trousers frayed masses of
+mud, while Bill chuckled:
+
+"I figured out maybe I could get a job here in a restaurant, and you and
+me could room together. I sold out my good will in the Old Home Lunch
+for a hundred bucks. I was going to travel swell, riding the cushions.
+But Pete Swanson wanted me to go down to the Cities first, and we run
+into some pretty swift travelers in Minneapolis, and a couple of
+girls--saaaaaaay, kid, some class!"
+
+Bill winked, and Milt--Milt was rather sick. He knew Bill's conception
+of class in young women. Was this the fellow he had liked so well? These
+the ideas which a few months ago he had taken as natural and extremely
+amusing?
+
+"And I got held up in an alley off Washington Avenue, and they got the
+last twenty bones off'n me, and I was flatter 'n a pancake. So I says
+'ish kabibble,' and I sneaks onto the blind baggage, and bums my way
+West. You'd 'a' died laughing to seen me throwing my feet for grub. Oh,
+I'm some panhandler! There was one _Frau_ sicked her dog onto me, and I
+kicked him in the jaw and---- Oh, it was one swell hike."
+
+Milt was trying to ignore the voice that was raging, "And now he expects
+to live on me, after throwing his own money away. The waster! The hobo!
+He'll expect to meet Claire---- I'd kill him before I'd let him soil her
+by looking at her. Him and his classy girls!" Milt tried to hear only
+the other inner voice, which informed him, "He looks at you so
+trustingly. He'd give you his shirt, if you needed it--and he wouldn't
+make you ask for it!"
+
+Milt tried to be hearty: "What're you going to do, old kid?"
+
+"Well, the first thing I'm going to do is to borrow ten iron-men and a
+pair of pants."
+
+"You bet! Here she is. Haven't got any extra pants. Tell you: Here's
+another five, and you can get the pants at the store in the next block,
+this side of the street. Hustle along now and get 'em!" He chuckled at
+Bill; he patted his arm; he sought to hurry him out.... He had to be
+alone, to think.
+
+But Bill kissed the fifteen dollars, carelessly rammed it into his
+pocket, crawled back on the bed, yawned, "What's the rush? Gosh, I'm
+sleepy. Say, Milt, whadyuh think of me and you starting a lunch-room
+here together? You got enough money out of the garage----"
+
+"Oh no, noooo, gee, I'd like to, Bill, but you see, well, I've got to
+hold onto what little I've got so I can get through engineering school."
+
+"Sure, but you could cash in on a restaurant--you could work evenings in
+the dump, and there'd be a lot of city sports hanging around, and we'd
+have the time of our lives."
+
+"No, I---- I study, evenings. And I---- The fact is, Bill, I've met a
+lot of nice fellows at the university and I kind of go around with
+them."
+
+"Aw, how d'you get that way? Rats, you don't want to go tagging after
+them Willy-boys. Damn dirty snobs. And the girls are worse. I tell you,
+Milt, these hoop-te-doodle society Janes may look all right to hicks
+like us, but on the side they raise more hell than any milliner's
+trimmer from Chi that ever vamped a rube burg."
+
+"What do you know about them?"
+
+"Now don't get sore. I'm telling you. I don't like to see any friend of
+mine make a fool of himself hanging around with a bunch that despises
+him because he ain't rich, that's all. Met any of the high-toned
+skirts?"
+
+"Yes--I--_have_!"
+
+"Trot 'em up and lemme give 'em the once-over."
+
+"We--we'll see about it. Now I got to go to a mathematics recitation,
+Bill. You make yourself comfortable, and I'll be back at five."
+
+Milt did not have to go to a recitation. He marched out with briskness
+in his step, and a book under his arm; but when he reached the corner,
+the briskness proved to be spurious, and the mathematics book proved to
+be William Rose Benet's _Merchants of Cathay_, which Claire had given
+him in the Yellowstone, and which he had rescued from the wrecked bug.
+
+He stood staring at it. He opened it with unhappy tenderness. He had
+been snatched from the world of beautiful words and serene dignity, of
+soaring mountains and companionship with Claire in the radiant morning,
+back to the mud and dust of Schoenstrom, from the opera to "city sports"
+in a lunch-room! He hated Bill McGolwey and his sneering assumption that
+Milt belonged in the filth with him. And he hated himself for not being
+enough of a genius to combine Bill McGolwey and Claire Boltwood. But not
+once, in his maelstrom of worry on that street corner, did he expect
+Claire to like Bill. Through all his youthful agonizing, he had enough
+common sense to know that though Claire might conquer a mountain pass,
+she could never be equal to the social demands of Schoenstrom and Bill
+McGolwey.
+
+He wandered for an hour and came back to find that, in a "dry" city
+which he had never seen before, the crafty Bill had obtained a quart of
+Bourbon, and was in a state of unsteady beatitude. He wanted, he
+announced, to dance.
+
+Milt got him into the community bathtub, and soused him under, but
+Bill's wet body was slippery, and Bill's merry soul was all for
+frolicsome gamboling, and he slid out of Milt's grasp, he sloshed around
+in the tub, he sprinkled Milt's sacred good suit with soapy water, and
+escaped, and in the costume of Adam he danced orientally in Milt's room,
+till he was seized with sleepiness and cosmic grief, and retired to
+Milt's bed in tears and nothing else.
+
+The room dimmed, grew dark. The street lamps outside sent a wan, wavery
+gleam into the room. Evening crowds went by, and in a motion-picture
+theater a banging piano struck up. Bill breathed in choking snorts. Milt
+sat unmoving, feeling very old, very tired, too dumbly unhappy to be
+frightened of the dreadful coming hour when Claire and Jeff should hear
+of Bill, and discover Milt's real world.
+
+He was not so romantically loyal, not so inhumanly heroic, that it can
+truthfully be reported that he never thought of getting rid of Bill. He
+did think of it, again and again. But always he was touched by Bill's
+unsuspecting trust, and shook his head, and sank again into the fog.
+
+What was the use of trying to go ahead? Wasn't he, after all, merely a
+Bill McGolwey himself?
+
+If he was, he wouldn't inflict himself on Claire.
+
+For several minutes he gave up forever the zest of climbing.
+
+When Bill awoke, brightly solicitous about the rest of the quart of
+Bourbon, and bouncingly ready to "go out and have a time," Milt loafed
+about the streets with him, showing him the city. He dully cut his
+classes, next morning, and took Bill to the wharves.
+
+It was late in the afternoon, when they were lounging in the room, and
+Bill was admiring his new pants--he boasted of having bought them for
+three dollars, and pointed out that Milt had been a "galoot" to spend
+ten dollars for shoes--that some one knocked at the door. Sleepily
+expectant of his landlady, Milt opened it on Miss Claire Boltwood, Mr.
+and Mrs. Eugene Gilson, and Mr. Geoffrey Saxton.
+
+Saxton calmly looked past him, at Bill, smiled slightly, and
+condescended, "I thought we ought to call on you, so we've dropped in to
+beg for tea."
+
+Bill had stopped midway in scratching his head to gape at Claire. Claire
+returned the look, stared at Bill's frowsy hair, his red wrists, his
+wrinkled, grease-stained coat, his expression of impertinent stupidity.
+Then she glanced questioningly at Milt, who choked:
+
+"Oh yes, yes, sure, glad see you, come in, get some tea, so glad see
+you, come in----"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+TOOTH-MUG TEA
+
+
+"My friend Mr. McGolwey--I knew him in Schoenstrom--come on to Seattle
+for a while. Bill, these are some people I met along the road," Milt
+grumbled.
+
+"Glad to meet 'em. Have a chair. Have two chairs! Say, Milt, y'ought to
+have more chairs if you're going to have a bunch of swells coming to
+call on you. Ha, ha, ha! Say, I guess I better pike out and give the
+folks a chance to chin with you," Bill fondly offered.
+
+"Oh, sit down," Milt snapped at him.
+
+They all sat down, four on the bed; and Milt's inner ear heard a mute
+snicker from the Gilsons and Saxton. He tried to talk. He couldn't. Bill
+looked at him and, perceiving the dumbness, gallantly helped out:
+
+"So you met the kid on the road, eh? Good scout, Milt is. We always used
+to say at Schoenstrom that he was the best darn hand at fixing a flivver
+in seven townships."
+
+"So you knew Mr. Daggett at home? Now isn't that nice," said Mrs.
+Gilson.
+
+"_Knew_ him? Saaaaay, Milt and I was brung up together. Why, him and I
+have bummed around together, and worked on farms, summers, and fished
+for bull-heads---- Ever catch a bull-head? Damnedest slipperiest fish
+you ever saw, and got horns that sting the stuffin's out of you and----
+Say, I wonder if Milt's told you about the time we had at a barn-dance
+once? There was a bunch of hicks there, and I says, 'Say, kid, lez
+puncture their tires, and hide back of the manure pile, and watch the
+fun when they come out.' I guess maybe I was kind of stewed a little,
+tell the truth, but course Milt he don't drink much, hardly at all, nice
+straight kid if I do say so----"
+
+"Bill!" Milt ordered. "We must have some tea. Here's six-bits. You run
+down to the corner grocery and get some tea and a little cream. Oh, you
+better buy three-four cups, too. Hustle now, son!"
+
+"Attaboy! Yours to command, ladies and gents, like the fellow says!"
+Bill boomed delightedly. He winked at Jeff Saxton, airily spun his
+broken hat on his dirty forefinger, and sauntered out.
+
+"Charming fellow. A real original," crooned Mrs. Gilson.
+
+"Did he know your friend Mr. Pinky?" asked Saxton.
+
+Before Milt could answer, Claire rose from the bed, inspected the
+Gilsons and Jeff with cold dislike, and said quietly to Milt, "The poor
+dear thing--he was dreadfully embarrassed. It's so good of you to be
+nice to him. I believe in being loyal to your old friends."
+
+"Oh, so do I!" babbled Mrs. Gilson. "It's just too splendid. And _we_
+must do something for him. I'm going to invite Mr. Daggett and Mr.--Mr.
+McGollups, was it?--to dinner this evening. I do want to hear him tell
+about your boyhood. It must have been so interesting."
+
+"It was," mused Milt. "It was poor and miserable. We had to work
+hard--we had to fight for whatever education we got--we had no one to
+teach us courtesy."
+
+"Oh now, with your fine old doctor father? Surely he was an
+inspiration?" Jeff didn't, this time, trouble to hide the sneer.
+
+"Yes. He was. He gave up the chance to be a rich loafer in order to save
+farmers' babies for fees that he never got."
+
+"I'm sure he did. I wish I'd known him. We need to know men like that in
+this pink-frosting playing at living we have in cities," Claire said
+sweetly--not to Milt but to Jeff.
+
+Mrs. Gilson had ignored them, waiting with the patience of a cat at a
+mouse-hole, and she went on, "But you haven't said you'd come, this
+evening. Do say you will. I don't suppose Mr. McGollups will care to
+dress for dinner?"
+
+With saccharin devotion Milt yearned back, "No, Mrs. Gilson. No. Mr.
+McGolwey won't care to dress. He's eccentric."
+
+"But you'll make him come?"
+
+Milt was tactfully beginning to refuse when Gene Gilson at last
+exploded, turned purple, covered his dripping, too-red lips with his
+handkerchief.
+
+Then, abruptly, Milt hurled at Mrs. Gilson, "All right. We'll come.
+Bill'll be awfully funny. He's never been out of a jerkwater burg in his
+life, hardly. He's an amusing cuss. He thinks I'm smart! He loves me
+like a dog. Oh, he's rich! Ha, ha, ha!"
+
+Milt might have gone on ... if he had, Mr. and Mrs. Gilson would have
+gone away, much displeased. But Bill arrived, with some of the worst tea
+in the world, and four cups tastefully done in cupids' heads and much
+gilt.
+
+Milt made tea, ignoring them, while Bill entertained the Gilsons and
+Saxtons with Rabelaisian stories of threshing-time when shirts prickly
+with chaff and gritty with dust stuck to sweat-dripping backs; of the
+"funny thing" of Milt and Bill being hired to move a garbage-pile and
+"swiping" their employer's "mushmelons"; of knotting shirts at the
+swimming-hole so that the bawling youngsters had to "chaw beef"; of
+drinking beer in the livery-stable at Melrose; of dropping the
+water-pitcher from a St. Klopstock hotel window upon the head of the
+"constabule" and escaping from him across the lean-to roof.
+
+Mrs. Gilson encouraged him; Bill sat with almost closed eyes, glorying
+in the saga of small-town life; Saxton and Gilson did not conceal their
+contemptuous grins.
+
+But Claire---- After nervously rubbing the tips of her thumbs with
+flickering agitated fingers, she had paid no attention to Bill and the
+revelation of Milt's rustic life; she had quietly gone to Milt, to help
+him prepare the scanty tea.
+
+She whispered, "Never mind, dear. I don't care. It was all twice as much
+fun as being wheeled in lacy prams by cranky nurses, as Jeff and I were.
+But I know how you feel. Are you ashamed of having been a prairie
+pirate?"
+
+"No, I'm not! We were wild kids--we raised a lot of Cain--but I'm glad
+we did."
+
+"So am I. I couldn't stand it if you were ashamed. Listen to me, and
+remember little Claire's words of wisdom. These fools are trying--oh,
+they're so obvious!--they're trying to make me feel that the prim Miss
+Boltwood of Brooklyn Heights is a stranger to you. Well, they're
+succeeding in making me a stranger--to them!"
+
+"Claire! Dear! You don't mind Bill?"
+
+"Yes. I do. And so do you. You've grown away from him."
+
+"I don't know but---- Today has been quite a test."
+
+"Yes. It has. Because if I can stand your friend Mr. McGolwey----"
+
+"Then you do care!"
+
+"Perhaps. And if I think that he's, oh, not much good, and I remember
+that for a long time you just had him to play with, then I'm all the
+more anxious to make it up to you."
+
+"Don't be sorry for me! I can't stand that! After all, it was a good
+town, and good folks----"
+
+"No! No! I'm not sorry for you! I just mean, you couldn't have had so
+terribly much fun, after you were eighteen or so. Schoenstrom must have
+been a little dull, after very many years there. This stuff about the
+charm of backwoods villages--the people that write it seem to take jolly
+good care to stay in Long Island suburbs!"
+
+"Claire!" He was whispering desperately, "The tea's most done. Oh, my
+dear. I'm crazy with this puttering around, trying to woo you and having
+to woo the entire Gilson tribe. Let's run away!"
+
+"No; first I'm going to convince them that you are--what I know you
+are."
+
+"But you can't."
+
+"Huh! You wait! I've thought of the most beautiful, beastly cruel plan
+for the reduction of social obesity----"
+
+Then she was jauntily announcing, "Tea, my dears. Jeff, you get the
+tooth-mug. Isn't this jolly!"
+
+"Yes. Oh yes. Very jolly!" Jeff was thoroughly patronizing, but she
+didn't look offended. She made them drink the acid tea, and taste the
+chalk-like bread and butter sandwiches. She coaxed Bill to go on with
+his stories, and when the persistent Mrs. Gilson again asked the pariahs
+to come to dinner, Claire astonished Milt, and still more astonished
+Mrs. Gilson, by begging, "Oh yes, please do come, Milt."
+
+He consented, savagely.
+
+"But first," Claire added to Mrs. Gilson, "I want us to take the boys
+to---- Oh, I have the bulliest idea. Come, everybody. We're going
+riding."
+
+"Uh, where----?" hinted Mr. Gilson.
+
+"That's my secret. Come!"
+
+Claire pranced to the door, herded all of them down to the limousine,
+whispered an address to the chauffeur.
+
+Milt didn't care much for that ride. Bill was somewhat too evidently not
+accustomed to limousines. He wiped his shoes, caked with red mud, upon
+the seat-cushions, and apologized perspiringly. He said, "Gee
+whillikens, that's a dandy idee, telephone to bawl the shuffer out
+with," and "Are them flowers real, the bokay in the vase?"
+
+But the Gilsons and Jeff Saxton were happy about it all--till the car
+turned from a main thoroughfare upon a muddy street of shacks that clung
+like goats to the sides of a high cut, a street unchanged from the
+pioneer days of Seattle.
+
+"Good heavens, Claire, you aren't taking us to see Aunt Hatty, are you?"
+wailed Mrs. Gilson.
+
+"Oh yes, indeed. I knew the boys would like to meet her."
+
+"No, really, I don't think----"
+
+"Eva, my soul, Jeff and you planned our tea party today, and assured me
+I'd be so interested in Milt's bachelor apartment---- By the way, I'd
+been up there already, so it wasn't entirely a surprise. It's my turn to
+lead." She confided to Milt, "Dear old Aunt Hatty is related to all of
+us. She's Gene's aunt, and my fourth cousin, and I think she's distantly
+related to Jeff. She came West early, and had a hard time, but she's
+real Brooklyn Heights--and she belongs to Gramercy Park and North
+Washington Square and Rittenhouse Square and Back Bay, too, though she
+has got out of touch a little. So I wanted you to meet her."
+
+Milt wondered what unperceived bag of cement had hardened the faces of
+Saxton and the Gilsons.
+
+Silent save for polite observations of Claire upon tight skirts and
+lumbering, the merry company reached the foot of a lurching flight of
+steps that scrambled up a clay bank to a cottage like a hen that has set
+too long. Milt noticed that Mrs. Gilson made efforts to remain in the
+limousine when it stopped, and he caught Gilson's mutter to his wife,
+"No, it's Claire's turn. Be a sport, Eva."
+
+Claire led them up the badly listed steps to an unpainted porch on which
+sat a little old lady, very neat, very respectable, very interested, and
+reflectively holding in one ivory hand a dainty handkerchief and a black
+clay pipe.
+
+"Hello, Claire, my dear. You've broken the relatives' record--you've
+called twice in less than a year," said the little old lady.
+
+"How do you do, Aunt Harriet," remarked Mrs. Gilson, with great lack of
+warmth.
+
+"Hello, Eva. Sit down on the edge of the porch. Those chickens have made
+it awful dirty, though, haven't they? Bring out some chairs. There's two
+chairs that don't go down under you--often." Aunt Harriet was very
+cheerful.
+
+The group lugubriously settled in a circle upon an assemblage of
+wind-broken red velvet chairs and wooden stools. They resembled the
+aftermath of a funeral on a damp day.
+
+Claire was the cheerful undertaker, Mrs. Gilson the grief-stricken
+widow.
+
+Claire waved at Milt and conversed with Aunt Hatty in a high brisk
+voice: "This is the nice boy I met on the road that I think I told you
+about, Cousin Hatty."
+
+The little old lady screwed up the delicate skin about her eyes,
+examined Milt, and cackled, "Boy, there's something wrong here. You
+don't belong with my family. Why, you look like an American. You
+haven't got an imitation monocle, and I bet you can't talk with a New
+York-London accent. Why, Claire, I'm ashamed of you for bringing a human
+being into the Boltwood-Gilson-Saxton tomb and expecting----"
+
+Then was the smile of Mrs. Gilson lost forever. It was simultaneously
+torpedoed, mined, scuttled, and bombed. It went to the bottom without a
+ripple, while Mrs. Gilson snapped, "Aunt Hatty, please don't be vulgar."
+
+"Me?" croaked the little old lady. She puffed at her pipe, and dropped
+her elbows on her knees. "My, ain't it hard to please some folks."
+
+"Cousin Hatty, I want Milt to know about our families. I love the dear
+old stories," Claire begged prettily.
+
+Mrs. Gilson snarled. "Claire, really----"
+
+"Oh, do shut up, Eva, and don't be so bossy!" yelped the dear little old
+lady, in sudden and dismaying rage. "I'll talk if I want to. Have they
+been bullying you, Claire? Or your boy? I tell you, boy, these families
+are fierce. I was brought up in Brooklyn--went through all the
+schools--used to be able to misplay the piano and mispronounce French
+with the best of 'em. Then Gene's pa and I came West together--he had an
+idea he'd get rich robbing the Injuns of their land. And we went broke.
+I took in washing. I learned a lot. I learned a Gilson was just the
+same common stuff as a red-shirt miner, when he was up against it. But
+Gene's pa succeeded--there was something about practically stealing a
+fur schooner--but I never was one to tattle on my kin. Anyway, by the
+time Gene come along, his pa was rich, and that means aristocratic.
+
+"This aristocracy west of Pittsburgh is just twice as bad as the
+snobbery in Boston or New York, because back there, the families have
+had their wealth long enough--some of 'em got it by stealing real estate
+in 1820, and some by selling Jamaica rum and niggers way back before the
+Revolutionary War--they've been respectable so long that they know
+mighty well and good that nobody except a Britisher is going to question
+their blue blood--and oh my, what good blueing third-generation money
+does make. But out here in God's Country, the marquises of milling and
+the barons of beef are still uneasy. Even their pretty women, after
+going to the best hair-dressers and patronizing the best charities,
+sometimes get scared lest somebody think they haven't either brains or
+breeding.
+
+"So they're nasty to all low pussons like you and me, to make sure we
+understand how important they are. But lands, I know 'em, boy. I'm kept
+pensioned up here, out of the way, but I read the social notes in the
+papers and I chuckle---- When there's a big reception and I read about
+Mrs. Vogeland's pearls, and her beautiful daughter-in-law, I remember
+how she used to run a boarding-house for miners----
+
+"Well, I guess it's just as shoddy in the East if you go far enough
+back. Claire, you're a nice comforting body, and I hate to say it, but
+the truth is, your great-grandfather was an hostler, and made his first
+money betting on horses. Now, my, I oughtn't to tell that. Do you mind,
+dearie?"
+
+"Not a bit. Isn't it delightful that this is such a democratic country,
+with no castes," said Claire.
+
+At this, the first break in the little old lady's undammable flood, Mrs.
+Gilson sprang up, yammering, "The rest of you may stay as long as you
+like, but if I'm to be home in time to dress for dinner----"
+
+"Yes, and I must be going," babbled Saxton.
+
+Milt noted that his lower lip showed white tooth-marks.
+
+It must be admitted that all of them rather ignored the little old lady
+for a moment. Milt was apologetically hinting, "I don't really think
+Bill and I'd better come to dinner this evening, Mrs. Gilson. Thanks a
+lot but---- It's kind of sudden."
+
+Claire again took charge. "Not at all, Milt. Of course you're coming. It
+was Eva herself who invited you. I'm sure she'll be delighted."
+
+"Charmed," said Mrs. Gilson, with the expression of one who has
+swallowed castor oil and doubts the unity of the universe.
+
+There was a lack of ease about the farewells to Aunt Harriet. As they
+all turned away she beckoned Milt and murmured, "Did I raise the
+dickens? I tried to. It's the only solace besides smoking that a moral
+old lady can allow herself, after she gets to be eighty-two and begins
+to doubt everything they used to teach her. Come and see me, boy. Now
+get out, and, boy, beat up Gene Gilson. Don't be scared of his wife's
+hoity-toity ways. Just sail in."
+
+"I will," said Milt.
+
+He had one more surprise before he reached the limousine.
+
+Bill McGolwey, who had sat listening to everything and scratching his
+cheek in a puzzled way, seized Milt's sleeve and rumbled:
+
+"Good-by, old hoss. I'm not going to butt in on your game and get you in
+Dutch. Gosh, I never supposed you had enough class to mingle with
+elittys like this gang, but I know when I'm in wrong. You were too darn
+decent to kick me out. Do it myself. You're best friend I ever had
+and---- Good luck, old man! God bless you!"
+
+Bill was gone, running, stumbling, fleeing past Aunt Harriet's cottage,
+off into a sandy hilltop vacancy. The last Milt saw of him was when, on
+the skyline, Bill stopped for a glance back, and seemed to be digging
+his knuckles into his eyes.
+
+Then Milt turned resolutely, marched down the stairs, said to his hosts
+with a curious quietness, "Thank you for asking me to dinner, but I'm
+afraid I can't come. Claire, will you walk a few blocks with me?"
+
+During the half minute it had taken to descend the steps, Milt had
+reflected, with an intensity which forgot Bill, that he had been
+selfish; that he had thought only of the opinion of these "nice people"
+regarding himself, instead of understanding that it was his duty to save
+Claire from their enervating niceness. Not that he phrased it quite in
+this way. What he had been muttering was:
+
+"Rotten shame--me so scared of folks' clothes that I don't stand up to
+'em and keep 'em from smothering Claire. Lord, it would be awful if she
+settled down to being a Mrs. Jeff Saxton. Got to save her--not for
+myself--for her."
+
+It may have been Aunt Harriet, it may have been Milt's resolution, but
+Mrs. Gilson answered almost meekly, "Well, if you think---- Would you
+like to walk, Claire?"
+
+As he tramped off with Claire, Milt demanded, "Glad to escape?"
+
+"Yes, and I'm glad you refused dinner. It really has been wearing, this
+trial by food."
+
+"This is the last time I'll dare to meet the Gilsons."
+
+"And I'll have to be going back East. I hope the Gilsons will forgive
+me, some day."
+
+"I'm afraid you didn't win them over by Aunt Hatty!"
+
+"No. They're probably off me for life. Oh, these horrible social
+complications--worse than any real danger--fire or earthquake----"
+
+"Oh, these complications--they don't exist! We just make 'em, like we
+make rules for a card game. What the deuce do we care about the opinions
+of people we don't like? And who appointed these people to a fixed
+social position? Did the president make Saxton High Cockalorum of
+Dress-Suits or something? Why, these are just folks, the same as kings
+and coal-heavers. There's no army we've got to fight. There's just you
+and me--you and I--and if we stick together, then we have all society,
+we _are_ all society!"
+
+"Ye-es, but, Milt dear, I don't want to be an outcast."
+
+"You won't be. In the long run, if you don't take these aristocrats
+seriously, they'll be all the more impressed by you."
+
+"No. That sounds cheering, in stories and these optimistic editorials in
+the magazines, but it isn't true. And you don't know how pleasant it is
+to be In. I've always been more or less on the inside, and thought
+outsiders dreadful. But---- Oh, I don't care! I don't care! With
+you--I'm happy. That's all I know and all I want to know. I've just
+grown up. I've just learned the greatest wisdom--to know when I'm
+happy. But, Milt dear---- I say this because I love you. Yes, I do love
+you. No, don't kiss me. Yes, it is too---- It's _far_ too public. And I
+want to talk seriously. You can't have any idea how strong social
+distinctions are. Don't despise them just because you don't know them."
+
+"No. I won't. I'll learn. Probably America will get into the war. I'll
+be an engineering officer. I'll learn this social dope from the
+college-boy officers. And I'll come to Brooklyn with shoulder-straps and
+bells on and---- Will you be waiting?"
+
+"Oh--yes---- But, Milt! If the war comes, you must be very careful not
+to get shot!"
+
+"All right, if, you insist. Good Lord, Claire. I don't know what put it
+into my head but---- Do you realize that a miracle has happened? We're
+no longer Miss Boltwood and a fellow named Daggett. We have been, even
+when we've liked each other, up to today. Always there's been a kind of
+fence between us. We had to explain and defend ourselves and scrap----
+But now we're _us_, and the rest of the world has disappeared, and----"
+
+"And nothing else matters," said Claire.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+
+THE BEGINNING OF A STORY
+
+
+It was the farewell to Claire and Jeff Saxton, a picnic in the Cascades,
+near Snoqualmie Falls--a decent and decidedly Milt-less fiesta. Mrs.
+Gilson was going to show Claire that they were just as hardy adventurers
+as that horrid Daggett person. So she didn't take the limousine, but
+merely the seven-passenger Locomobile with the special body.
+
+They were ever so rough and wild. They had no maid. The chauffeur was
+absolutely the only help to the Gilsons, Claire, Jeff, and the
+temporarily and ejaculatorily nature-loving Mrs. Betz in the daring task
+of setting out two folding camp-tables, covering them with a linen
+cloth, and opening the picnic basket. Claire had to admit that she
+wished that she could steal the picnic basket for Milt. There were
+vacuum bottles of hot coffee. There were sandwiches of anchovy and _pate
+de foie gras_. There were cream cakes with almonds hidden in the suave
+cream, and there was a chicken salad with huge chunks of pure white meat
+wallowing in a sea of mayonnaise.
+
+When the gorging was done and the cigarettes brought out (the chauffeur
+passed a spirit lamp), they stretched on rubber blankets, and groaned a
+little, and spoke well of nature and the delights of roughing it.
+
+"What is it? What's wrong? They're so--oh, so polite. They don't mean
+what they say and they don't dare to say what they mean. Is that it?"
+worried Claire.
+
+She started. She discovered that she was looking at a bristle of
+rope-colored hair and a grin projected from the shelter of a manzanita
+bush.
+
+"For the----" she gasped. She was too startled to be able to decide what
+was for-the. She spoke judiciously to Jeff Saxton about Upper Montclair,
+the subway, and tennis. She rose to examine the mountains, strolled
+away, darted down a gully, and pounced on Milt Daggett with:
+
+"How in heaven's name----"
+
+"Found out where you-all were going. Look! Got a bug! Rented it. Come
+on! Let's duck! Drive back with me!" At the end of the gully was a new
+Teal bug, shinier than the ancient lost chariot, but equally gay and
+uncomfortable.
+
+"Can't. Like to, but---- Be awfully rude to them. Won't do that--not
+more than is good for their souls--even for you. Now don't be sulky."
+
+"I won't. Nev' be sulky again, because you're crazy about me, and I
+don't have to be sulky."
+
+"Oh, I am, am I! Good heavens, the inconceivable conceit of the child!"
+
+She turned her back. He darted to her, caught her hands behind her,
+kissed her hair, and whispered, "You are!"
+
+"I am not!"
+
+"Well then, you're not. Lord, you're sweet! Your hair smells like
+cinnamon and clean kittens. You'd rather go bumping off in my flivver
+than sailing in that big Loco they've got there."
+
+"Yes," defiantly, "I would, and I'm ashamed of myself. I'm a throw-back
+to my horrid ancestor, the betting hostler."
+
+"Probably. I'm a throw-back to my ancestor the judge. I'll train you to
+meet my fine friends."
+
+"Well--upon--my--word--I---- Oh, do stop being idiotic. We talk like
+children. You reduce me to the rank of a gibbering schoolgirl. And I
+like it! It's so--oh, I don't know--so darn human, I suppose. Now
+hurry--kiss me, and get out, before they suspect."
+
+"Listen."
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"I'll accidentally meet your car along the road. Invite you to ride. All
+right?"
+
+"Yes. Do. Oh, we _are_ two forlorn babes in the woods! G'-by."
+
+She sauntered back to the picnic, and observed, "What is that purple
+flower up on the mountain side?"
+
+The big car was sedately purring back when it was insulted by an
+intermediate host of a machine that came jumping out of a side road. The
+vulgar driver hailed them with uncouth howling. The Gilsons' chauffeur
+stopped, annoyed.
+
+"Why, hello folks," bawled the social bandit.
+
+"Oh. How do you do," refuted Mrs. Gilson.
+
+Jeff Saxton turned a ripe purple.
+
+"How do you like my new bug, Claire? Awful little object. But I can make
+fifty an hour. Come and try it, Claire, can't you?"
+
+"Why----" Claire was obviously shocked by the impropriety of the
+suggestion. She looked at Mrs. Gilson, who was breathing as though she
+was just going under the ether. Claire said doubtfully, "Well---- If you
+can get me right back to the house----"
+
+"Sure," agreed Milt.
+
+When the Loco was gone, Milt drove the bug to the side of the road,
+yanked up the emergency brake, and carefully kissed the girl who was
+snuggled down into the absurd low tin-sided seat.
+
+"Do we have to get back soon?" he begged.
+
+"Oh, I don't care if we never get back. Let's shoot up into the
+mountains. Side road. Let's pretend we're driving across the continent
+again."
+
+Firs dashing by--rocks in the sunshine--clouds jaunty beyond the
+inviting mouth of a mountain pass--even the ruts and bumps and
+culverts--she seemed a part of them all. In the Gilsons' huge cars she
+had been shut off from the road, but in this tiny bug, so close to
+earth, she recovered the feeling of struggle, of triumph over
+difficulties, of freedom unbounded. And she could be herself, good or
+bad, ignorant or wise, with this boy beside her. All of which she
+expressed in the most eloquent speech she had ever uttered, namely:
+
+"Oh, _Milt_----!"
+
+And, to herself, "Golly, it's such a relief not to have to try to be
+gracious and aphoristic and repartistic and everything with Jeff."
+
+And, "But I wonder if I am aphoristic and subtle? I wonder if when she
+gets the rice-powder off, Claire isn't a lot more like Milt than she
+thought?"
+
+And, aloud again, "Oh, this is----"
+
+"Yump. It sure is," Milt agreed.
+
+They had turned from a side-road into a side-side-road. They crossed an
+upland valley. The fall rains had flooded a creek till it had cut across
+the road, washed through the thin gravel, left across the road a shallow
+violent stream. Milt stopped abruptly at its margin.
+
+"Here's where we turn back, I guess," he sighed.
+
+"Oh no! Can't we get across? It's only a couple of feet deep, and gravel
+bottom," insisted the restored adventurer.
+
+"Yes, but look at the steep bank. Never get up it."
+
+"I don't care. Let's try it! We can woggle around and dig it out
+somehow. I bet you two-bits we can," said the delicate young woman whom
+Mrs. Gilson was protecting.
+
+"All right. In she goes!"
+
+The bug went in--shot over the bank, dipped down till the little hood
+sloped below them as though they were looping the loop, struck the
+rushing water with a splash which hurled yellow drops over Claire's rose
+jersey suit, lumbered ahead, struck the farther bank, pawed at it
+feebly, rose two inches, slipped back, and sat there with the gurgling
+water all around it, turned into a motor-boat.
+
+"No can do," grunted Milt. "Scared?"
+
+"Nope. Love it! This is a real camp--the brush on the bank, and the
+stream--listen to it chuckle under the running-board."
+
+"Do you like to camp with me?"
+
+"Love it."
+
+"Say! Gee! Never thought---- Claire! Got your transportation back East?"
+
+"My ticket? Yes. Why?"
+
+"Well, I'm sure you can turn it in and get a refund. So that's all
+right."
+
+"Are you going to let me in on the secret?"
+
+"Oh yes, might's well. I was just wondering---- I don't think much of
+wasting all our youth waiting---- Two-three years in engineering school,
+and maybe going to war, and starting in on an engineering job, and me
+lonely as a turkey in a chicken yard, and you doing the faithful young
+lady in Brooklyn---- I think perhaps we might get married tomorrow
+and----"
+
+"Good heavens, what do you----?"
+
+"Do you want to go back to Brooklyn Gilsonses?"
+
+"No, but----"
+
+"Dear, can't we be crazy once, while we're youngsters?"
+
+"Don't bombard me so! Let me think. One must be practical, even in
+craziness."
+
+"I am. I have over a thousand dollars from the garage, and I can work
+evenings--as dear Jeff suggested! We'd have a two-by-four flat----
+Claire----"
+
+"Oh, let me think. I suppose I could go to the university, too, and
+learn a little about food and babies and building houses and government.
+I need to go to school a lot more than you do. Besides auction and the
+piano--which I play very badly--and clothes and how to get hold of
+tickets for successful plays, I don't know one single thing."
+
+"Will you marry me, tomorrow?"
+
+"Well, uh----"
+
+"Think of Mrs. Gilson's face when she learns it! And Saxton, and that
+Mrs. Betz!"
+
+It was to no spoken sentence but to her kiss that she added, "Providing
+we ever get the car out of this river, that is!"
+
+"Oh, my dear, my dear, and all the romantic ways I was going to propose!
+I had the best line about roses and stars and angels and everything----"
+
+"They always use those, but nobody ever proposed to me in a bug in a
+flood before! Oh! Milt! Life is fun! I never knew it till you kidnapped
+me. If you kiss me again like that, we'll both topple overboard. By the
+way, _can_ we get the car out?"
+
+"I think so, if we put on the chains. We'll have to take off our shoes
+and stockings."
+
+Shyly, turning from him a little, she stripped off her stockings and
+pumps, while he changed from a flivver-driver into a young viking, with
+bare white neck, pale hair ruffled about his head, trousers rolled up
+above his straight knees--a young seaman of the crew of Eric the Red.
+
+They swung out on the running-board, now awash. With slight squeals they
+dropped into the cold stream. Dripping, laughing, his clothes clinging
+to him, he ducked down behind the car to get the jack under the back
+axle, and with the water gurgling about her and splashing its
+exhilarating coldness into her face, she stooped beside him to yank the
+stiff new chains over the rear wheels.
+
+They climbed back into the car, joyously raffish as a pair of gipsies.
+She wiped a dab of mud from her cheek, and remarked with an earnestness
+and a naturalness which that Jeff Saxton who knew her so well would
+never have recognized as hers:
+
+"Gee, I hope the old bird crawls out now."
+
+Milt let in the reverse, raced the engine, started backward with a burst
+of muddy water churned up by the whirling wheels. They struck the bank,
+sickeningly hung there for two seconds, began to crawl up, up, with a
+feeling that at any second they would drop back again.
+
+Then, instantly, they were out on the shore and it was absurd to think
+that they had ever been boating down there in the stream. They washed
+each other's muddy faces, and laughed a great deal, and rubbed their
+legs with their stockings, and resumed something of a dull and civilized
+aspect and, singing sentimental ballads, turned back, found another
+road, and started toward a peak.
+
+"I wonder what lies beyond the top of this climb?" said Claire.
+
+"More mountains, and more, and more, and we're going to keep on climbing
+them forever. At dawn, we'll still be going on. And that's our life."
+
+"Ye-es, providing we can still buy gas."
+
+"Lord, that's so."
+
+"Speaking of which, did you know that I have a tiny bit of money--it's
+about five thousand dollars--of my own?"
+
+"But---- That makes it impossible. Young tramp marrying lady of huge
+wealth----"
+
+"No, you don't! I've accepted you. Do you think I'm going to lose the
+one real playmate I've ever had? It was so lonely on the Boltwoods'
+brown stoop till Milt came along and whistled impertinently and made the
+solemn little girl in frills play marbles and---- Watch out for that
+turn! Heavens, how I have to look after you! Is there a class in cooking
+at your university? No--do--not--kiss--me--on--a--turn!"
+
+This is the beginning of the story of Milt and Claire Daggett.
+
+The prelude over and the curtain risen on the actual play, they face the
+anxieties and glories of a changing world. Not without quarrels and
+barren hours, not free from ignorance and the discomfort of finding that
+between the mountain peaks they must for long gray periods dwell in the
+dusty valleys, they yet start their drama with the distinction of being
+able to laugh together, with the advantage of having discovered that
+neither Schoenstrom nor Brooklyn Heights is quite all of life, with the
+cosmic importance to the tedious world of believing in the romance that
+makes youth unquenchable.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+B. M. BOWER'S NOVELS
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+CHIP OF THE FLYING U. Wherein the love affairs of Chip and Delia Whitman
+are charmingly and humorously told.
+
+THE HAPPY FAMILY. A lively and amusing story, dealing with the
+adventures of eighteen jovial, big-hearted Montana cowboys.
+
+HER PRAIRIE KNIGHT. Describing a gay party of Easterners who exchange a
+cottage at Newport for a Montana ranch-house.
+
+THE RANGE DWELLERS. Spirited action, a range feud between two families,
+and a Romeo and Juliet courtship make this a bright, jolly story.
+
+THE LURE OF THE DIM TRAILS. A vivid portrayal of the experience of an
+Eastern author among the cowboys.
+
+THE LONESOME TRAIL. A little branch of sage brush and the recollection
+of a pair of large brown eyes upset "Weary" Davidson's plans.
+
+THE LONG SHADOW. A vigorous Western story, sparkling with the free
+outdoor life of a mountain ranch. It is a fine love story.
+
+GOOD INDIAN. A stirring romance of life on an Idaho ranch.
+
+FLYING U RANCH. Another delightful story about Chip and his pals.
+
+THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND. An amusing account of Chip and the other boys
+opposing a party of school teachers.
+
+THE UPHILL CLIMB. A story of a mountain ranch and of a man's hard fight
+on the uphill road to manliness.
+
+THE PHANTOM HERD. The title of a moving-picture staged in New Mexico by
+the "Flying U" boys.
+
+THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX. The "Flying U" boys stage a fake bank robbery
+for film purposes which precedes a real one for lust of gold.
+
+THE GRINGOS. A story of love and adventure on a ranch in California.
+
+STARR OF THE DESERT. A New Mexico ranch story of mystery and adventure.
+
+THE LOOKOUT MAN. A Northern California story full of action, excitement
+and love.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+STORIES OF RARE CHARM BY GENE STRATTON-PORTER
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+MICHAEL O'HALLORAN. Illustrated by Frances Rogers.
+
+Michael is a quick-witted little Irish newsboy, living in Northern
+Indiana. He adopts a deserted little girl, a cripple. He also assumes
+the responsibility of leading the entire rural community upward and
+onward.
+
+LADDIE. Illustrated by Herman Pfeifer.
+
+This is a bright, cheery tale with the scenes laid in Indiana. The story
+is told by Little Sister, the youngest member of a large family, but it
+is concerned not so much with childish doings as with the love affairs
+of older members of the family. Chief among them is that of Laddie and
+the Princess, an English girl who has come to live in the neighborhood
+and about whose family there hangs a mystery.
+
+THE HARVESTER. Illustrated by W. L. Jacobs.
+
+"The Harvester," is a man of the woods and fields, and if the book had
+nothing in it but the splendid figure of this man it would be notable.
+But when the Girl comes to his "Medicine Woods," there begins a romance
+of the rarest idyllic quality.
+
+FRECKLES. Illustrated.
+
+Freckles is a nameless waif when the tale opens, but the way in which he
+takes hold of life; the nature friendships he forms in the great
+Limberlost Swamp; the manner in which everyone who meets him succumbs to
+the charm of his engaging personality; and his love-story with "The
+Angel" are full of real sentiment.
+
+A GIRL OF THE LIMBERLOST. Illustrated.
+
+The story of a girl of the Michigan woods; a buoyant, loveable type of
+the self-reliant American. Her philosophy is one of love and kindness
+towards all things; her hope is never dimmed. And by the sheer beauty of
+her soul, and the purity of her vision, she wins from barren and
+unpromising surroundings those rewards of high courage.
+
+AT THE FOOT OF THE RAINBOW. Illustrations in colors.
+
+The scene of this charming love story is laid in Central Indiana. The
+story is one of devoted friendship, and tender self-sacrificing love.
+The novel is brimful of the most beautiful word painting of nature, and
+its pathos and tender sentiment will endear it to all.
+
+THE SONG OF THE CARDINAL. Profusely illustrated.
+
+A love ideal of the Cardinal bird and his mate, told with delicacy and
+humor.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+ZANE GREY'S NOVELS
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+THE LIGHT OF WESTERN STARS
+
+A New York society girl buys a ranch which becomes the center of
+frontier warfare. Her loyal superintendent rescues her when she is
+captured by bandits. A surprising climax brings the story to a
+delightful close.
+
+THE RAINBOW TRAIL
+
+The story of a young clergyman who becomes a wanderer in the great
+western uplands--until at last love and faith awake.
+
+DESERT GOLD
+
+The story describes the recent uprising along the border, and ends with
+the finding of the gold which two prospectors had willed to the girl who
+is the story's heroine.
+
+RIDERS OF THE PURPLE SAGE
+
+A picturesque romance of Utah of some forty years ago when Mormon
+authority ruled. The prosecution of Jane Withersteen is the theme of the
+story.
+
+THE LAST OF THE PLAINSMEN
+
+This is the record of a trip which the author took with Buffalo Jones,
+known as the preserver of the American bison, across the Arizona desert
+and of a hunt in "that wonderful country of deep canons and giant
+pines."
+
+THE HERITAGE OF THE DESERT
+
+A lovely girl, who has been reared among Mormons, learns to love a young
+New Englander. The Mormon religion, however, demands that the girl shall
+become the second wife of one of the Mormons--Well, that's the problem
+of this great story.
+
+THE SHORT STOP
+
+The young hero, tiring of his factory grind, starts out to win fame and
+fortune as a professional ball player. His hard knocks at the start are
+followed by such success as clean sportsmanship, courage and honesty
+ought to win.
+
+BETTY ZANE
+
+This story tells of the bravery and heroism of Betty, the beautiful
+young sister of old Colonel Zane, one of the bravest pioneers.
+
+THE LONE STAR RANGER
+
+After killing a man in self defense, Buck Duane becomes an outlaw along
+the Texas border. In a camp on the Mexican side of the river, he finds a
+young girl held prisoner, and in attempting to rescue her, brings down
+upon himself the wrath of her captors and henceforth is hunted on one
+side by honest men, on the other by outlaws.
+
+THE BORDER LEGION
+
+Joan Randle, in a spirit of anger, sent Jim Cleve out to a lawless
+Western mining camp, to prove his mettle. Then realizing that she loved
+him--she followed him out. On her way, she is captured by a bandit band,
+and trouble begins when she shoots Kells, the leader--and nurses him to
+health again. Here enters another romance--when Joan, disguised as an
+outlaw, observes Jim, in the throes of dissipation. A gold strike, a
+thrilling robbery--gambling and gun play carry you along breathlessly.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE LAST OF THE GREAT SCOUTS,
+
+By Helen Cody Wetmore and Zane Grey
+
+The life story of Colonel William F. Cody, "Buffalo Bill" as told by his
+sister and Zane Grey. It begins with his boyhood in Iowa and his first
+encounter with an Indian. We see "Bill" as a pony express rider, then
+near Fort Sumter as Chief of the Scouts, and later engaged in the most
+dangerous Indian campaigns. There is also a very interesting account of
+the travels of "The Wild West" Show. No character in public life makes a
+stronger appeal to the imagination of America than "Buffalo Bill," whose
+daring and bravery made him famous.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+NOVELS OF FRONTIER LIFE BY WILLIAM MACLEOD RAINE
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+MAVERICKS
+
+A tale of the western frontier, where the "rustler" abounds. One of the
+sweetest love stories ever told.
+
+A TEXAS RANGER
+
+How a member of the border police saved the life of an innocent man,
+followed a fugitive to Wyoming, and then passed through deadly peril to
+ultimate happiness.
+
+WYOMING
+
+In this vivid story the author brings out the turbid life of the
+frontier with all its engaging dash and vigor.
+
+RIDGWAY OF MONTANA
+
+The scene is laid in the mining centers of Montana, where politics and
+mining industries are the religion of the country.
+
+BUCKY O'CONNOR
+
+Every chapter teems with wholesome, stirring adventures, replete with
+the dashing spirit of the border.
+
+CROOKED TRAILS AND STRAIGHT
+
+A story of Arizona; of swift-riding men and daring outlaws; of a bitter
+feud between cattle-men and sheep-herders.
+
+BRAND BLOTTERS
+
+A story of the turbid life of the frontier with a charming love interest
+running through its pages.
+
+STEVE YEAGER
+
+A story brimful of excitement, with enough gun-play and adventure to
+suit anyone.
+
+A DAUGHTER OF THE DONS
+
+A Western story of romance and adventure, comprising a vivacious and
+stirring tale.
+
+THE HIGHGRADER
+
+A breezy, pleasant and amusing love story of Western mining life.
+
+THE PIRATE OF PANAMA
+
+A tale of old-time pirates and of modern love, hate and adventure.
+
+THE YUKON TRAIL
+
+A crisply entertaining love story in the land where might makes right.
+
+THE VISION SPLENDID
+
+In which two cousins are contestants for the same prizes; political
+honors and the hand of a girl.
+
+THE SHERIFF'S SON
+
+The hero finally conquers both himself and his enemies and wins the love
+of a wonderful girl.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD'S STORIES OF ADVENTURE
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+KAZAN
+
+The tale of a "quarter-strain wolf and three-quarters husky" torn
+between the call of the human and his wild mate.
+
+BAREE, SON OF KAZAN
+
+The story of the son of the blind Grey Wolf and the gallant part he
+played in the lives of a man and a woman.
+
+THE COURAGE OF CAPTAIN PLUM
+
+The story of the King of Beaver Island, a Mormon colony, and his battle
+with Captain Plum.
+
+THE DANGER TRAIL
+
+A tale of snow, of love, of Indian vengeance, and a mystery of the
+North.
+
+THE HUNTED WOMAN
+
+A tale of the "end of the line," and of a great fight in the "valley of
+gold" for a woman.
+
+THE FLOWER OF THE NORTH
+
+The story of Fort o' God, where the wild flavor of the wilderness is
+blended with the courtly atmosphere of France.
+
+THE GRIZZLY KING
+
+The story of Thor, the big grizzly who lived in a valley where man had
+never come.
+
+ISOBEL
+
+A love story of the Far North.
+
+THE WOLF HUNTERS
+
+A thrilling tale of adventure in the Canadian wilderness.
+
+THE GOLD HUNTERS
+
+The story of adventure in the Hudson Bay wilds.
+
+THE COURAGE OF MARGE O'DOONE
+
+Filled with exciting incidents in the land of strong men and women.
+
+BACK TO GOD'S COUNTRY
+
+A thrilling story of the Far North. The great Photoplay was made from
+this book.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+RALPH CONNOR'S STORIES OF THE NORTHWEST
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+THE SKY PILOT IN NO MAN'S LAND
+
+The clean-hearted, strong-limbed man of the West leaves his hills and
+forests to fight the battle for freedom in the old world.
+
+BLACK ROCK
+
+A story of strong men in the mountains of the West.
+
+THE SKY PILOT
+
+A story of cowboy life, abounding in the freshest humor, the truest
+tenderness and the finest courage.
+
+THE PROSPECTOR
+
+A tale of the foothills and of the man who came to them to lend a hand
+to the lonely men and women who needed a protector.
+
+THE MAN FROM GLENGARRY
+
+This narrative brings us into contact with elemental and volcanic human
+nature and with a hero whose power breathes from every word.
+
+GLENGARRY SCHOOL DAYS
+
+In this rough country of Glengarry, Ralph Connor has found human nature
+in the rough.
+
+THE DOCTOR
+
+The story of a "preacher-doctor" whom big men and reckless men loved for
+his unselfish life among them.
+
+THE FOREIGNER
+
+A tale of the Saskatchewan and of a "foreigner" who made a brave and
+winning fight for manhood and love.
+
+CORPORAL CAMERON
+
+This splendid type of the upright, out-of-door man about which Ralph
+Connor builds all his stories, appears again in this book.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+BOOTH TARKINGTON'S NOVELS
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+SEVENTEEN. Illustrated by Arthur William Brown.
+
+No one but the creator of Penrod could have portrayed the immortal young
+people of this story. Its humor is irresistible and reminiscent of the
+time when the reader was Seventeen.
+
+PENROD. Illustrated by Gordon Grant.
+
+This is a picture of a boy's heart, full of the lovable, humorous,
+tragic things which are locked secrets to most older folks. It is a
+finished, exquisite work.
+
+PENROD AND SAM. Illustrated by Worth Brehm.
+
+Like "Penrod" and "Seventeen," this book contains some remarkable phases
+of real boyhood and some of the best stories of juvenile prankishness
+that have ever been written.
+
+THE TURMOIL. Illustrated by C. E. Chambers.
+
+Bibbs Sheridan is a dreamy, imaginative youth, who revolts against his
+father's plans for him to be a servitor of big business. The love of a
+fine girl turns Bibbs's life from failure to success.
+
+THE GENTLEMAN FROM INDIANA. Frontispiece.
+
+A story of love and politics,--more especially a picture of a country
+editor's life in Indiana, but the charm of the book lies in the love
+interest.
+
+THE FLIRT. Illustrated by Clarence F. Underwood.
+
+The "Flirt," the younger of two sisters, breaks one girl's engagement,
+drives one man to suicide, causes the murder of another, leads another
+to lose his fortune, and in the end marries a stupid and unpromising
+suitor, leaving the really worthy one to marry her sister.
+
+
+_Ask for Complete free list of G. & D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction_
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+ELEANOR H. PORTER'S NOVELS
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+
+
+JUST DAVID
+
+The tale of a loveable boy and the place he comes to fill in the hearts
+of the gruff farmer folk to whose care he is left.
+
+THE ROAD TO UNDERSTANDING
+
+A compelling romance of love and marriage.
+
+OH, MONEY! MONEY!
+
+Stanley Fulton, a wealthy bachelor, to test the dispositions of his
+relatives, sends them each a check for $100,000, and then as plain John
+Smith comes among them to watch the result of his experiment.
+
+SIX STAR RANCH
+
+A wholesome story of a club of six girls and their summer on Six Star
+Ranch.
+
+DAWN
+
+The story of a blind boy whose courage leads him through the gulf of
+despair into a final victory gained by dedicating his life to the
+service of blind soldiers.
+
+ACROSS THE YEARS
+
+Short stories of our own kind and of our own people. Contains some of
+the best writing Mrs. Porter has done.
+
+THE TANGLED THREADS
+
+In these stories we find the concentrated charm and tenderness of all
+her other books.
+
+THE TIE THAT BINDS
+
+Intensely human stories told with Mrs. Porter's wonderful talent for
+warm and vivid character drawing.
+
+
+GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Note:
+
+    Dialect spellings have been retained. Inconsistent hyphenation,
+    except when used for emphasis, has been standardised. Minor
+    typographical errors have been corrected without note.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Free Air, by Sinclair Lewis
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FREE AIR ***
+
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #26732 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/26732)