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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9f57f44 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,13 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text +*.htm text +*.html text +*.png binary +*.jpg binary +*.svg text +*.pdf binary +*.bmp binary +*.zip binary +*.midi binary +*.mp3 binary diff --git a/79295-0.txt b/79295-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f713621 --- /dev/null +++ b/79295-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,481 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 79295 *** + +HOWDY! + +By Murray Leinster + +Author of “Fog,” etc. + + + They had hated for years, these old-timers, and the habit + clung. Twice each day they met in the deserted gold camp, + spoke, and parted. But the winters grew long and the rock + more barren; their hate, one day, took an unrecognizable form. + + +Once upon a time—as all good stories should begin—Eyrie was a town. A +real town, with a full complement of dance-halls, saloons, gambling +houses and a jail. Champagne came in cases over the mountain trails, to +be drunk out of tin cups or, more informally, from the bottle itself. +Ostrich feathers and pink spangled gowns, once a piano, even carefully +crated paintings for the Eyrie House, came upon the backs of burros or +in huge, lumbering wagons. + +It was named by a young Easterner and it sprang up as by magic. The +first girl baby in the camp could have gone to college in the East on +the dust and nuggets showered upon her as gifts. The first court in the +county, and the county was as large as many New England states, was held +in Eyrie. For a space, while the placer workings held good, it was a +whirlwind. Then came a period of decay, with the more prosperous +elements drifting to newer and consequently more alluring spots. + +For perhaps five years, perhaps ten, it slumbered. Only a few of the +more patient worked their cradles beside its swift stream. Here and +there a Chinaman frugally earned riches by panning the sands the +superior white man considered beneath his notice. Eyrie was a half +deserted mining camp. + +But then came the hardrock men. They came, they saw—and Eyrie was +reborn. Its earlier grandeur was forgotten in the magnificence of its +new youth. A thousand shafts dotted the hills about it. Plumes of steam +drifted from a thousand hoist engines. Again a whirlwind of activity. +Again came the champagne and the pictures and the brightly painted +ladies and the immaculate, imperturbable gentlemen who wielded +pasteboards instead of picks, and juggled chips instead of blasting +powder for their fortunes. + +And again it died. Even the Chinamen deserted it this time, having +discovered the charm of payment in gold for definite work in another’s +diggings. It died completely, now. The doors of the log cabins sagged +upon their leathern hinges. Grass grew again in its streets. Saplings +sprang up close beside the porch of the Eyrie House, thrusting aside the +rotted planking for space in which to grow. A deathly silence fell again +upon the town and all the hills about it. Its day was done, its glory +departed. Even its history was forgotten, utterly. There was nothing but +decaying, blank-windowed cabins and a sagging board building that had +once been the prideful Eyrie House to tell of the ancient times. All +else was vanished. + +And somewhere, far back in the haze of unremembered days, lay the +beginning of the enmity between Jake Trotter and Bill Weaver. No one +remains to tell the story of its beginning. Soon it will be useless to +recall it, and therefore it is wise to record it before oblivion smears +across the page. For it was a peculiar enmity. + +Alone of all the population, they remained behind. Jake Trotter was +perhaps fifty when he was left alone with his enemy. He watched the last +belated hardrock man pull out, glumly loading his worldly goods upon a +single burro. + +“Leavin’ the town to me?” he queried, with a feeble attempt at levity. + +The one who was departing, cursed. + +Jake chuckled. “No use swearin’,” he said. “The main lode ain’t been hit +yet.” + +The other turned quickly. “You got any signs?” + +Jake chuckled again. “Think I’d ha’ said anything if I had?” he queried +in his turn. + +The hardrock man grunted, cinched his last knot, and trudged away. He +was a lonely figure, making off down the valley that seemed a chasm +between its confining hills, and yet gave upon a two thousand foot drop +at its further end. Jake watched him out of sight and then grinned, +somewhat unconvincingly. It was not altogether pleasant to be completely +alone. + +He was congratulating himself, though, as he turned away. He had said +just the right thing to disarm the suspicions of the last man. He went +slowly up the deserted street. It was unspeakably desolate. Every house +empty. Doors yawning open. Posters still flaunting bright colors, +calling everyone to the High Jinks Dance Hall. And the dance hall was +empty. Already dust was gathering thickly upon its floors and the once +so brightly polished bar. Jake was alone. + +He came to a sudden halt and his eyes narrowed. A man was looking at +him, very nearly the counterpart of himself. Bushy, straggling beard, +already beginning to show a speckling of gray. Mud stained clothes. +Rough work shirt. Heavy boots. Holster at his side. Bill Weaver, the +only man in all the world Jake had despised wholeheartedly. + +“Howdy, Jake,” drawled Bill. “Looks like we got to run the town.” + +Jake spat deliberately, and looked at his sole fellow townsman with +hostile eyes. “I reckon,” he said slowly, “you’re figurin’ on spyin’ on +me.” + +Bill shook his head. “I was thinkin’ the same about you,” he meditated. +“Just thought I’d tell you I shoot awful quick if I find anybody +trailin’ me.” + +Jake’s whole body trembled a little with his hatred. “An’ I reck’n I’d +better tell you,” he said evenly, “that I’m puttin’ trap guns around my +workin’s.” + +Bill grunted. “You leave me alone, an’ I’ll leave you alone. But I’d +feel a lot better if I saw you mornin’s, so’s I’d know you wasn’t layin’ +out to watch where I go.” + +Jake nodded. “I was goin’ to say that myself,” he said grimly. “An’ you +keep to your end o’ town!” He stalked away, seething. + +Then a little comedy began, which, rather oddly, did not seem to stale +with age. At sunrise, Jake arose. He cooked his breakfast silently, and +ate it morosely. He washed his dishes with meticulous care. Then he took +down an antiquated but perfectly oiled rifle from the wall. + +He walked out of his cabin. Going to meet the man he hated. Making sure +Bill was not lying in wait to mark, each day, a little more of the path +to his workings. Glowering, he made his daily progress. + +Bill was waiting. He always was. Grinning a little, perhaps. But the +grin vanished when Jake drew near. Jake would stand no nonsense. + +Sourly, the two regarded each other. Booted, armed, whiskered, +bristling. + +Bill spoke first. “Howdy.” + +It held an intonation of purest sarcasm. Jake replied in kind. “Howdy.” + +He glared at Bill. The glare was returned. Jake turned upon his heel and +walked away. He made his way deviously to his workings. Twice he paused +to search the hills behind him, exhaustively, for any sign that Bill was +spying upon his route. At last he dived below ground. + +At night they met again. This time they did not speak. Simply stared, +hostilely, and went into their respective cabins. + +Summer passed. Fall arrived. The snow line above them crept down and +down. In two weeks it would reach the valley. Jake considered it +gloomily. + +The next morning he jerked his thumb at the encroaching blanket of +white. “Supplies,” he said grudgingly. “Go down tomorrow.” + +Bill grunted. “Yep. Was goin’ to say that myself.” + +They went down, two silent figures, bristling, avoiding all speech. All +the long day they trudged without talk. At night they camped, +wordlessly. Each cooked his own supper and ate alone. In the morning +they rolled out of their blankets at the same time. Bill blinked. Then, +“Howdy.” + +The word held an intonation of purest sarcasm. Jake replied in kind. +“Howdy.” + +He glared at Bill. The glare was returned. They loaded their burros +again and went on. + +They made their purchases separately. They spent three days in the tiny +village. Each morning, shortly after sunrise, they found each other. +Each morning they regarded each other with unwavering distaste. Each day +they avoided each other thereafter. + +They went back up in the hills. + +Winter came, and banked the valley with snowdrifts. Work was impossible. +Jake regarded a blanketed universe with completest gloom. Bill +unlimbered a mouth organ and played, alone in his cabin. The thin music, +drifting through the icy, still air, was weird in the wilderness. It was +barely audible where Jake sat listening, more like the wraith of past +gaiety in the High Jinks Dance Hall than music of the moment. + +One night it stopped. It did not come again that night, or the night +after. + +On the third day Bill was waiting, as usual. “Howdy.” The word was +friendly enough, but it was spoken in a tone calculated to give offense. + +Jake glared at him. “Mouth organ broken?” + +Bill grunted. “Yep.” + +“Let’s see.” + +Bill tossed it over. They never approached nearer than fifteen feet. +Jake picked it up and gazed hostilely at Bill. The gaze was returned. +They parted. + +It was very late that night that thin strains of music came from Jake’s +cabin. Very late, indeed. The unaccustomed noise woke Bill. Next morning +they met in the street as usual. + +Bill’s greeting held its invariable bite. Jake tossed the mouth organ +back. His own word had a sting. + +Bill picked up the mouth organ. They parted in mutual dislike. Arrived +at his cabin, Bill tried the instrument. It worked. + +Spring came again, with a rush of melted snow and mud. The stream was a +turbid torrent. Summer arrived. They went down for supplies. Each day +they exchanged precisely two words. They came back, unwavering in their +hostility. Summer passed. Then fall. Winter came once more. + +Cumbersomely, the seasons passed in their appointed course. Twin shafts, +each carefully hidden, grew deeper and deeper but no more productive. +Twin citizens of Eyrie, Jake and Bill grew somewhat more lined, and +somewhat more bent. The speckles of gray in Bill’s beard grew white, and +the black grew gray. Jake’s steps grew just a shade slower, and on the +long climb to his hidden shaft he paused more frequently to search the +hillsides behind him for a trace of Bill’s spying. If, as an incident, +the pauses made the climb easier, it was purely an incident. Jake was +not old yet. Oh, no. + +He had contrived an ingenious windlass with two ropes, by which he could +hoist his bucket and swing it away from the shaft, then dump it. It made +the work easier, but at best it was slow. Still, well worth doing. The +mother lode was below, thick, rich quartz, with the gold in speckles, +here and there even a nugget. It would run, oh, three hundred a ton, +anyway. Maybe four, or even five. Riches. Life. Like Eyrie used to be. + +But the occasional tiny fragments of riches he was able to accumulate +grew less and less. He had had a stake. Not too much, but enough to run +him for a while. Now and then he ran into a tantalizing incrop of worth +while ore—not enough to be worth mining, but ore which he could crush +himself in a makeshift mortar and wash, wastefully, for the +infinitesimal flakes of uncombined gold. For a hard day’s work he could +sometimes, with luck, get two or even three dollars’ worth of glittering +dust. + +At last even that failed him. Shamefacedly, he abandoned his workings +for a space. Far off, through the hills, there was a brooklet which even +the thrifty Chinaman had not bothered with. With deep blushes, Jake +built a cradle there. He washed out the sands, manfully, though ashamed +to be doing placer work—he, who was a hardrock man. A steady four +dollars, sometimes five. Supplies were secure. He went back, joyfully, +to his shaft. The rock was barren, here, but it was a layer overlaying +the mother lode, of course. Everyone knows just such things happen. One +must have faith. Much faith. + +They went down for supplies. Hostilely. They came back. Enemies. Fall, +winter, spring, summer. Fall, winter, spring, summer. Time passed. Eyrie +went back, more and more, to the forest from which it had been torn. + +Only once in all the years did the two hold any other converse than +their morning salutation. That was after they had been working for five +years. + +Jake had felt premonitory twinges. Snow was deep on the ground outside. +Clouds presaged a storm. The preliminary winds were whistling dismally +through the saplings among the cabins and the larger trees beyond. They +moaned creepily among the empty houses. Voices of the past. That +rustling, not the last, reluctant, ash dry leaves, but the movement of +people. That whining noise, not the wind, but music from the High Jinks. +The streets are alive with shades. They walk up and down, laughing +uproariously, though the sound is whispers. Red shirts. High boots. +Holsters and all too ready guns. Women, laughing shrilly. Gaiety——Queer +that a rabbit should scurry through the throng, unseeing and unseen. A +rabbit on Main Street! And those trees, saplings, growing before the +door of the Eyrie House. They closed the entrance, yet people do not +seem to notice. They walk through them. Bubbles bursting. Mist. Lonely, +sick pain in a cooling room. Then darkness, darkness, until the windows +grow slowly gray. + +Bill found him. He banged on the door, angrily. Jake croaked an +indistinguishable word and Bill thrust open the door and came in. Snow +whirled thickly in behind him. + +He glared at Jake, lying upon his bunk, with frost crystals from his +breath upon his blanket. “Howdy,” said Bill, with elaborate irony. + +He cast one comprehensive glance around, then went out again. He came +back in, bringing wood. He made a fire. Looked at Jake. Muttered in his +beard and flung out into the storm again. Came back with an unsavory +dose he forced upon the sick man. He cooked, for one. He fed Jake. +Without speech. + +For three days he nursed Jake in a hostile silence. Then Jake was able +to sit up. He glared at Bill’s blankets in one corner. Bill had been +forced to move in while Jake was disabled, but he had ostentatiously +brought his own food. + +“Thought you’d gone off,” said Bill, offensively, “to spy on my +workings. That’s why I came.” + +A lie. A damned lie. Even a particularly damned lie. No man in or out of +his senses would have tried to go prospecting in six feet of snow, more +or less. Jake accepted it. + +“An’ I been staying here,” concluded Bill, defiantly, “so you’d know I + wasn’t hiking off after yours. You’re the sort of son of a gun who’d + try shootin’ if you thought it.” + +Jake turned his face to the wall, and slept. + +Later, Bill produced a greasy pack of cards. “Play,” he said +offensively. “Take my mind off wanting to choke you.” + +They played cards in strict silence. For a week. Then Jake brought in an +armful of wood. Within ten minutes Bill’s blankets were gone. He, also. +That night his mouth organ sounded thinly in the solitude. + +Time—— Time—— The sun rolled overhead, dizzily. Now its path diverged to +the south, and the wild birds made haste to overtake it. It swung to the +north again and they made haste to return, joyfully. Trees put forth +green, which turned again to yellow and red and gold. The saplings +before the Eyrie House became young trees. Twin hidden shafts grew +deeper. + +Jake washed gold for his supplies and dug manfully, but a little more +slowly, through the barren rock. It was a wide streak of barren, but the +mother lode would be worth it. Never give up. Never. Bill ought to. +Digging like a fool over yonder in the hills somewhere. Washing a +stream, too. Jake had seen wet mud on his shoulders, surface mud, one +evening when there had been no rain. Fool! + +They went out for supplies. Jake was getting tired now, but he still +hated Bill. Old men, both of them. He stopped much more often on his way +to his shaft. Eyes bothering him a little, too. Had to look very +carefully to be sure Bill wasn’t spying on him. Take a good, long look. +If it rested him, too, no harm in that. He wasn’t stopping for rest, +though. Oh, no. + +The packs were slim, as they came back. Jake concealed the size of his +pack as well as he could, but it was undeniably not as full a list of +staples as he could have wished. Even beans were sort of short. He’d +only bought half his usual supply of bacon. Have to go hunting for meat. +He shouldn’t have got in that poker game. He used to play a good stiff +hand, too. Foolish. Foolish. + +But Bill’s pack was slimmer. Bill was a fool. Hadn’t been washing +enough. Spending too much time in that crazy shaft of his. Nothing under +it. Silly to dig. Not like Jake’s shaft. The mother lode was under that. +Bill would be hard put, all summer. Worse, in winter. + +Summer. Glamorous green. Rippling water. Then fall again. Jake took down +his rifle and went out hunting. More time lost from his mining. He got +two deer. He would jerk them. Wouldn’t have to buy any bacon, this time. +A plan was forming in his mind, dimly. Bill was a fool. He couldn’t wash +out enough to buy supplies for winter. Jake could. He had just enough. +His stream was panning less, now. Somehow, he didn’t seem to put as much +through the rocker. Had to rest so much—probably from eating fish +instead of meat. Not age. Certainly not. + +He heard a shot, dimly. Two days later, he heard another. Bill. What was +he hunting for? Thought he was bent on sinking that crazy shaft of his—— + +Jake broke the tacit compact. He spied on Bill. And Bill was jerking +meat for the winter. Jerking a lot of it. Too much. He probably hadn’t +got enough dust to pay even for a good supply of flour. Fool. + +There was much meditation. Jake hated Bill, certainly. Hated him like +poison. But you couldn’t let a man starve right in your own town, no +matter how much you hated him. And Bill would certainly starve before he +would accept anything from Jake. + +Jake spied again. He found Bill’s placer works. A cradle, so arranged +that a part of the stream flowed through it. Wooden riffles at the +bottom. A spill at the lower end. The heap of sand and clay that Bill +was planning to wash out. + +Carefully, Jake spilled a little pile of gleaming yellow over the heap. +When Bill washed that out, he’d find enough dust in the clean-up to give +him beans and flour for the winter. He’d think it was a pocket he’d +struck. Something like that. You couldn’t let a man starve, even if you +hated him. He, Jake, was all right. He’d have plenty of jerked meat. + +He erased his footsteps carefully and returned to the deserted town. +Bill came in a little later. They looked at each other, the picture of +hostility personified. They went each into his separate cabin. Night +fell. + +It was a long distance to Jake’s placer stream. Jake had kept out a +little, of course, but most of his dust had gone to keep Bill from +starving, during the winter. They would be starting down for supplies in +a week or so, now, though, and if he could get a little extra to buy +some more blankets—! Somehow, winters seemed to get colder, these past +few years. + +He walked painfully the last yards and saw his rocker and cradle, and +his gravel heap to be washed. He was a hardrock man, but one had to have +supplies, to get down to the mother lode. He’d wash out a little more +dust—— + +He suddenly stiffened. Some woodsman’s sixth sense told him that +something was wrong. Someone had been here. He searched, and found +tell-tale scratches upon the ground. He searched further, and found +footprints, incompletely erased. Bill! + +Jake raged. Spying on him! He’d always hated Bill. Spying! + +He worked that day in a fury. There would be a reckoning when they met +that night. Spying! He’d shoot the liver out of the son of a gun! + +And at nightfall he drained the cradle, picked out the last lumps of +larger gravel, carefully swept off the remaining sand—and blinked. His +clean up was huge, for him. Five, six ounces or more! Maybe he’d struck +a pocket, or the stream was going to be a bonanza or— He remembered the +morning’s discoveries. Bill—— + +The long hike home was a time of meditation. Bill, his enemy, salting +his gravel pile to give him dust. Bill, who hated him. Bill, who had +insulted him, whom he had insulted, every day for years. + +He was walking firmly when he got to the place where he would meet Bill. +He understood it all, now. Bill had seen his slim pack of supplies. Bill +had thought, as he had thought of Bill, that he was unable to wash out +enough dust to outfit himself for the winter. Bill had jerked meat for +his own use, to spare the dust for a winter’s supply of beans and flour +and bacon for Jake, whom he hated. + +Hated! They’d hated each other for years. Funny how they’d looked out +for each other. Bill nursing him, defiantly. He mending Bill’s mouth +organ, venomously. + +Bill was waiting. Bill was looking at him queerly. + +Jake’s eyes blazed. “You son of a gun!” he cried furiously. “Spying on +me! Salting my gravel heap!” The fury suddenly died out of his voice. +“Bill, what’d you do that for?” + +And Bill, his enemy; Bill, with deep lines and weather marks upon his +features; Bill, whose hair was white save that in a few narrowing spaces +it was streaked with gray—— Bill flushed a fiery, bricky red. He looked +like a schoolboy, ashamed at having been caught. + +He stammered, and then suddenly he burst out. “What’d you salt mine for? +I’d a mind to kill you for it!” + +Jake stared at him, helpless. His enemy—“I thought—” He stopped. “I +lost most o’ my dust in a poker game, last trip out. That’s why my packs +were light.” + +“So did I,” Bill told him, defiantly. “I thought you weren’t pannin’ +out.” + +They stared at each other, two old men, who had hated each other for +years. Presently, Jake said slowly, “Bill, what’d we fuss about, +anyway?” + +“Durned if I know,” said Bill angrily. + +Silence again. After a long time Jake spoke once more. “Say, Bill,” he +said diffidently, “supposin’ we both move in the Eyrie House? Needn’t +keep but one fire, then. Save time.” + +“I was thinkin’ that myself,” Bill grinned. “Say,” he added suddenly. +“Remember them card games we had when you were sick?” + +Jake nodded. Bill rubbed his hands. + +The next morning Bill rolled out of his blankets. Jake had just wakened +and was staring up at the ceiling, happily. They were in the Eyrie +House. Bill looked over at his ancient enemy. + +“Howdy,” he said maliciously. + +Jake gazed at him. It was a tense moment. + +“You go to hell,” he said recklessly, “you old son of a gun!” + +And happiness, at that sign of amity, began to reign. + + +[Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in West Magazine, +January 20, 1926. It is believed to be in the public domain in the +United States; copyright status may differ in other countries.] + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 79295 *** diff --git a/79295-h/79295-h.htm b/79295-h/79295-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e62cc30 --- /dev/null +++ b/79295-h/79295-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,539 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> + <meta charset="utf-8"> +<title>Howdy! | Project Gutenberg</title> + <link href="images/cover.jpg" rel="icon" type="image/x-cover"> +<style> + body { + margin: 0; + padding: 16px; + max-width: 40em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; + font-size: 18px; + line-height: 1.2; + } + p { + margin: 0; + text-indent: 1.5em; + } + p.ni { + text-indent: 0; + } + @media (max-width: 480px) { + body { + font-size: 16px; + padding: 12px; + } + } + hr.tb { + border:none; border-bottom:1px solid black; + margin-top:1em; margin-bottom: 1em; width: 40%; + } + h1 { + text-align: center; font-weight: normal; + font-size: 1.4em; margin-bottom:0; + } + .transcriber-note { + margin: 1.5em 0; padding: 0.9em 1.1em; border: 1px solid #b9b2a3; + background: #f7f3ea; font-size: 0.95em; line-height: 1.25; + } + .transcriber-note-title { + margin: 0 0 0.6em 0; font-size: 1em; letter-spacing: 0.02em; + text-transform: uppercase; text-align: center; + } + </style> +</head> + +<body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 79295 ***</div> + +<figure style="text-align:center; width:60%; margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto"> +<img src="images/illus-fpc.jpg" alt="" style="max-width:100%; height:auto" aria-hidden="true"> +</figure> + +<div style="text-align:center"> +<h1>HOWDY!</h1> +<div style='font-size:1.2em'>By Murray Leinster</div> +<div style='margin-bottom:1.4em'><i>Author of “Fog,” etc.</i></div> +</div> + +<blockquote> +<div> +They had hated for years, these old-timers, and the habit clung. Twice +each day they met in the deserted gold camp, spoke, and parted. But the +winters grew long and the rock more barren; their hate, one day, took an +unrecognizable form. +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="ni">Once upon a time—as all good stories should begin—Eyrie was a town. A +real town, with a full complement of dance-halls, saloons, gambling +houses and a jail. Champagne came in cases over the mountain trails, to +be drunk out of tin cups or, more informally, from the bottle itself. +Ostrich feathers and pink spangled gowns, once a piano, even carefully +crated paintings for the Eyrie House, came upon the backs of burros or +in huge, lumbering wagons.</p> + +<p>It was named by a young Easterner and it sprang up as by magic. The +first girl baby in the camp could have gone to college in the East on +the dust and nuggets showered upon her as gifts. The first court in the +county, and the county was as large as many New England states, was held +in Eyrie. For a space, while the placer workings held good, it was a +whirlwind. Then came a period of decay, with the more prosperous +elements drifting to newer and consequently more alluring spots.</p> + +<p>For perhaps five years, perhaps ten, it slumbered. Only a few of the +more patient worked their cradles beside its swift stream. Here and +there a Chinaman frugally earned riches by panning the sands the +superior white man considered beneath his notice. Eyrie was a half +deserted mining camp.</p> + +<p>But then came the hardrock men. They came, they saw—and Eyrie was +reborn. Its earlier grandeur was forgotten in the magnificence of its +new youth. A thousand shafts dotted the hills about it. Plumes of steam +drifted from a thousand hoist engines. Again a whirlwind of activity. +Again came the champagne and the pictures and the brightly painted +ladies and the immaculate, imperturbable gentlemen who wielded +pasteboards instead of picks, and juggled chips instead of blasting +powder for their fortunes.</p> + +<p>And again it died. Even the Chinamen deserted it this time, having +discovered the charm of payment in gold for definite work in another’s +diggings. It died completely, now. The doors of the log cabins sagged +upon their leathern hinges. Grass grew again in its streets. Saplings +sprang up close beside the porch of the Eyrie House, thrusting aside the +rotted planking for space in which to grow. A deathly silence fell again +upon the town and all the hills about it. Its day was done, its glory +departed. Even its history was forgotten, utterly. There was nothing but +decaying, blank-windowed cabins and a sagging board building that had +once been the prideful Eyrie House to tell of the ancient times. All +else was vanished.</p> + +<p>And somewhere, far back in the haze of unremembered days, lay the +beginning of the enmity between Jake Trotter and Bill Weaver. No one +remains to tell the story of its beginning. Soon it will be useless to +recall it, and therefore it is wise to record it before oblivion smears +across the page. For it was a peculiar enmity.</p> + +<p>Alone of all the population, they remained behind. Jake Trotter was +perhaps fifty when he was left alone with his enemy. He watched the last +belated hardrock man pull out, glumly loading his worldly goods upon a +single burro.</p> + +<p>“Leavin’ the town to me?” he queried, with a feeble attempt at levity.</p> + +<p>The one who was departing, cursed.</p> + +<p>Jake chuckled. “No use swearin’,” he said. “The main lode ain’t been hit +yet.”</p> + +<p>The other turned quickly. “You got any signs?”</p> + +<p>Jake chuckled again. “Think I’d ha’ said anything if I had?” he queried +in his turn.</p> + +<p>The hardrock man grunted, cinched his last knot, and trudged away. He +was a lonely figure, making off down the valley that seemed a chasm +between its confining hills, and yet gave upon a two thousand foot drop +at its further end. Jake watched him out of sight and then grinned, +somewhat unconvincingly. It was not altogether pleasant to be completely +alone.</p> + +<p>He was congratulating himself, though, as he turned away. He had said +just the right thing to disarm the suspicions of the last man. He went +slowly up the deserted street. It was unspeakably desolate. Every house +empty. Doors yawning open. Posters still flaunting bright colors, +calling everyone to the High Jinks Dance Hall. And the dance hall was +empty. Already dust was gathering thickly upon its floors and the once +so brightly polished bar. Jake was alone.</p> + +<p>He came to a sudden halt and his eyes narrowed. A man was looking at +him, very nearly the counterpart of himself. Bushy, straggling beard, +already beginning to show a speckling of gray. Mud stained clothes. +Rough work shirt. Heavy boots. Holster at his side. Bill Weaver, the +only man in all the world Jake had despised wholeheartedly.</p> + +<p>“Howdy, Jake,” drawled Bill. “Looks like we got to run the town.”</p> + +<p>Jake spat deliberately, and looked at his sole fellow townsman with +hostile eyes. “I reckon,” he said slowly, “you’re figurin’ on spyin’ on +me.”</p> + +<p>Bill shook his head. “I was thinkin’ the same about you,” he meditated. +“Just thought I’d tell you I shoot awful quick if I find anybody +trailin’ me.”</p> + +<p>Jake’s whole body trembled a little with his hatred. “An’ I reck’n I’d +better tell you,” he said evenly, “that I’m puttin’ trap guns around my +workin’s.”</p> + +<p>Bill grunted. “You leave me alone, an’ I’ll leave you alone. But I’d +feel a lot better if I saw you mornin’s, so’s I’d know you wasn’t layin’ +out to watch where I go.”</p> + +<p>Jake nodded. “I was goin’ to say that myself,” he said grimly. “An’ you +keep to your end o’ town!” He stalked away, seething.</p> + +<p>Then a little comedy began, which, rather oddly, did not seem to stale +with age. At sunrise, Jake arose. He cooked his breakfast silently, and +ate it morosely. He washed his dishes with meticulous care. Then he took +down an antiquated but perfectly oiled rifle from the wall.</p> + +<p>He walked out of his cabin. Going to meet the man he hated. Making sure +Bill was not lying in wait to mark, each day, a little more of the path +to his workings. Glowering, he made his daily progress.</p> + +<p>Bill was waiting. He always was. Grinning a little, perhaps. But the +grin vanished when Jake drew near. Jake would stand no nonsense.</p> + +<p>Sourly, the two regarded each other. Booted, armed, whiskered, +bristling.</p> + +<p>Bill spoke first. “Howdy.”</p> + +<p>It held an intonation of purest sarcasm. Jake replied in kind. “Howdy.”</p> + +<p>He glared at Bill. The glare was returned. Jake turned upon his heel and +walked away. He made his way deviously to his workings. Twice he paused +to search the hills behind him, exhaustively, for any sign that Bill was +spying upon his route. At last he dived below ground.</p> + +<p>At night they met again. This time they did not speak. Simply stared, +hostilely, and went into their respective cabins.</p> + +<p>Summer passed. Fall arrived. The snow line above them crept down and +down. In two weeks it would reach the valley. Jake considered it +gloomily.</p> + +<p>The next morning he jerked his thumb at the encroaching blanket of +white. “Supplies,” he said grudgingly. “Go down tomorrow.”</p> + +<p>Bill grunted. “Yep. Was goin’ to say that myself.”</p> + +<p>They went down, two silent figures, bristling, avoiding all speech. All +the long day they trudged without talk. At night they camped, +wordlessly. Each cooked his own supper and ate alone. In the morning +they rolled out of their blankets at the same time. Bill blinked. Then, +“Howdy.”</p> + +<p>The word held an intonation of purest sarcasm. Jake replied in kind. +“Howdy.”</p> + +<p>He glared at Bill. The glare was returned. They loaded their burros +again and went on.</p> + +<p>They made their purchases separately. They spent three days in the tiny +village. Each morning, shortly after sunrise, they found each other. +Each morning they regarded each other with unwavering distaste. Each day +they avoided each other thereafter.</p> + +<p>They went back up in the hills.</p> + +<p>Winter came, and banked the valley with snowdrifts. Work was impossible. +Jake regarded a blanketed universe with completest gloom. Bill +unlimbered a mouth organ and played, alone in his cabin. The thin music, +drifting through the icy, still air, was weird in the wilderness. It was +barely audible where Jake sat listening, more like the wraith of past +gaiety in the High Jinks Dance Hall than music of the moment.</p> + +<p>One night it stopped. It did not come again that night, or the night +after.</p> + +<p>On the third day Bill was waiting, as usual. “Howdy.” The word was +friendly enough, but it was spoken in a tone calculated to give offense.</p> + +<p>Jake glared at him. “Mouth organ broken?”</p> + +<p>Bill grunted. “Yep.”</p> + +<p>“Let’s see.”</p> + +<p>Bill tossed it over. They never approached nearer than fifteen feet. +Jake picked it up and gazed hostilely at Bill. The gaze was returned. +They parted.</p> + +<p>It was very late that night that thin strains of music came from Jake’s +cabin. Very late, indeed. The unaccustomed noise woke Bill. Next morning +they met in the street as usual.</p> + +<p>Bill’s greeting held its invariable bite. Jake tossed the mouth organ +back. His own word had a sting.</p> + +<p>Bill picked up the mouth organ. They parted in mutual dislike. Arrived +at his cabin, Bill tried the instrument. It worked.</p> + +<p>Spring came again, with a rush of melted snow and mud. The stream was a +turbid torrent. Summer arrived. They went down for supplies. Each day +they exchanged precisely two words. They came back, unwavering in their +hostility. Summer passed. Then fall. Winter came once more.</p> + +<p>Cumbersomely, the seasons passed in their appointed course. Twin shafts, +each carefully hidden, grew deeper and deeper but no more productive. +Twin citizens of Eyrie, Jake and Bill grew somewhat more lined, and +somewhat more bent. The speckles of gray in Bill’s beard grew white, and +the black grew gray. Jake’s steps grew just a shade slower, and on the +long climb to his hidden shaft he paused more frequently to search the +hillsides behind him for a trace of Bill’s spying. If, as an incident, +the pauses made the climb easier, it was purely an incident. Jake was +not old yet. Oh, no.</p> + +<p>He had contrived an ingenious windlass with two ropes, by which he could +hoist his bucket and swing it away from the shaft, then dump it. It made +the work easier, but at best it was slow. Still, well worth doing. The +mother lode was below, thick, rich quartz, with the gold in speckles, +here and there even a nugget. It would run, oh, three hundred a ton, +anyway. Maybe four, or even five. Riches. Life. Like Eyrie used to be.</p> + +<p>But the occasional tiny fragments of riches he was able to accumulate +grew less and less. He had had a stake. Not too much, but enough to run +him for a while. Now and then he ran into a tantalizing incrop of worth +while ore—not enough to be worth mining, but ore which he could crush +himself in a makeshift mortar and wash, wastefully, for the +infinitesimal flakes of uncombined gold. For a hard day’s work he could +sometimes, with luck, get two or even three dollars’ worth of glittering +dust.</p> + +<p>At last even that failed him. Shamefacedly, he abandoned his workings +for a space. Far off, through the hills, there was a brooklet which even +the thrifty Chinaman had not bothered with. With deep blushes, Jake +built a cradle there. He washed out the sands, manfully, though ashamed +to be doing placer work—he, who was a hardrock man. A steady four +dollars, sometimes five. Supplies were secure. He went back, joyfully, +to his shaft. The rock was barren, here, but it was a layer overlaying +the mother lode, of course. Everyone knows just such things happen. One +must have faith. Much faith.</p> + +<p>They went down for supplies. Hostilely. They came back. Enemies. Fall, +winter, spring, summer. Fall, winter, spring, summer. Time passed. Eyrie +went back, more and more, to the forest from which it had been torn.</p> + +<p>Only once in all the years did the two hold any other converse than +their morning salutation. That was after they had been working for five +years.</p> + +<p>Jake had felt premonitory twinges. Snow was deep on the ground outside. +Clouds presaged a storm. The preliminary winds were whistling dismally +through the saplings among the cabins and the larger trees beyond. They +moaned creepily among the empty houses. Voices of the past. That +rustling, not the last, reluctant, ash dry leaves, but the movement of +people. That whining noise, not the wind, but music from the High Jinks. +The streets are alive with shades. They walk up and down, laughing +uproariously, though the sound is whispers. Red shirts. High boots. +Holsters and all too ready guns. Women, laughing shrilly. Gaiety——Queer +that a rabbit should scurry through the throng, unseeing and unseen. A +rabbit on Main Street! And those trees, saplings, growing before the +door of the Eyrie House. They closed the entrance, yet people do not +seem to notice. They walk through them. Bubbles bursting. Mist. Lonely, +sick pain in a cooling room. Then darkness, darkness, until the windows +grow slowly gray.</p> + +<p>Bill found him. He banged on the door, angrily. Jake croaked an +indistinguishable word and Bill thrust open the door and came in. Snow +whirled thickly in behind him.</p> + +<p>He glared at Jake, lying upon his bunk, with frost crystals from his +breath upon his blanket. “Howdy,” said Bill, with elaborate irony.</p> + +<p>He cast one comprehensive glance around, then went out again. He came +back in, bringing wood. He made a fire. Looked at Jake. Muttered in his +beard and flung out into the storm again. Came back with an unsavory +dose he forced upon the sick man. He cooked, for one. He fed Jake. +Without speech.</p> + +<p>For three days he nursed Jake in a hostile silence. Then Jake was able +to sit up. He glared at Bill’s blankets in one corner. Bill had been +forced to move in while Jake was disabled, but he had ostentatiously +brought his own food.</p> + +<p>“Thought you’d gone off,” said Bill, offensively, “to spy on my +workings. That’s why I came.”</p> + +<p>A lie. A damned lie. Even a particularly damned lie. No man in or out of +his senses would have tried to go prospecting in six feet of snow, more +or less. Jake accepted it.</p> + +<p>“An’ I been staying here,” concluded Bill, defiantly, “so you’d know I + wasn’t hiking off after yours. You’re the sort of son of a gun who’d + try shootin’ if you thought it.”</p> + +<p>Jake turned his face to the wall, and slept.</p> + +<p>Later, Bill produced a greasy pack of cards. “Play,” he said +offensively. “Take my mind off wanting to choke you.”</p> + +<p>They played cards in strict silence. For a week. Then Jake brought in an +armful of wood. Within ten minutes Bill’s blankets were gone. He, also. +That night his mouth organ sounded thinly in the solitude.</p> + +<p>Time—— Time—— The sun rolled overhead, dizzily. Now its path diverged to +the south, and the wild birds made haste to overtake it. It swung to the +north again and they made haste to return, joyfully. Trees put forth +green, which turned again to yellow and red and gold. The saplings +before the Eyrie House became young trees. Twin hidden shafts grew +deeper.</p> + +<p>Jake washed gold for his supplies and dug manfully, but a little more +slowly, through the barren rock. It was a wide streak of barren, but the +mother lode would be worth it. Never give up. Never. Bill ought to. +Digging like a fool over yonder in the hills somewhere. Washing a +stream, too. Jake had seen wet mud on his shoulders, surface mud, one +evening when there had been no rain. Fool!</p> + +<p>They went out for supplies. Jake was getting tired now, but he still +hated Bill. Old men, both of them. He stopped much more often on his way +to his shaft. Eyes bothering him a little, too. Had to look very +carefully to be sure Bill wasn’t spying on him. Take a good, long look. +If it rested him, too, no harm in that. He wasn’t stopping for rest, +though. Oh, no.</p> + +<p>The packs were slim, as they came back. Jake concealed the size of his +pack as well as he could, but it was undeniably not as full a list of +staples as he could have wished. Even beans were sort of short. He’d +only bought half his usual supply of bacon. Have to go hunting for meat. +He shouldn’t have got in that poker game. He used to play a good stiff +hand, too. Foolish. Foolish.</p> + +<p>But Bill’s pack was slimmer. Bill was a fool. Hadn’t been washing +enough. Spending too much time in that crazy shaft of his. Nothing under +it. Silly to dig. Not like Jake’s shaft. The mother lode was under that. +Bill would be hard put, all summer. Worse, in winter.</p> + +<p>Summer. Glamorous green. Rippling water. Then fall again. Jake took down +his rifle and went out hunting. More time lost from his mining. He got +two deer. He would jerk them. Wouldn’t have to buy any bacon, this time. +A plan was forming in his mind, dimly. Bill was a fool. He couldn’t wash +out enough to buy supplies for winter. Jake could. He had just enough. +His stream was panning less, now. Somehow, he didn’t seem to put as much +through the rocker. Had to rest so much—probably from eating fish +instead of meat. Not age. Certainly not.</p> + +<p>He heard a shot, dimly. Two days later, he heard another. Bill. What was +he hunting for? Thought he was bent on sinking that crazy shaft of his——</p> + +<p>Jake broke the tacit compact. He spied on Bill. And Bill was jerking +meat for the winter. Jerking a lot of it. Too much. He probably hadn’t +got enough dust to pay even for a good supply of flour. Fool.</p> + +<p>There was much meditation. Jake hated Bill, certainly. Hated him like +poison. But you couldn’t let a man starve right in your own town, no +matter how much you hated him. And Bill would certainly starve before he +would accept anything from Jake.</p> + +<p>Jake spied again. He found Bill’s placer works. A cradle, so arranged +that a part of the stream flowed through it. Wooden riffles at the +bottom. A spill at the lower end. The heap of sand and clay that Bill +was planning to wash out.</p> + +<p>Carefully, Jake spilled a little pile of gleaming yellow over the heap. +When Bill washed that out, he’d find enough dust in the clean-up to give +him beans and flour for the winter. He’d think it was a pocket he’d +struck. Something like that. You couldn’t let a man starve, even if you +hated him. He, Jake, was all right. He’d have plenty of jerked meat.</p> + +<p>He erased his footsteps carefully and returned to the deserted town. +Bill came in a little later. They looked at each other, the picture of +hostility personified. They went each into his separate cabin. Night +fell.</p> + +<p>It was a long distance to Jake’s placer stream. Jake had kept out a +little, of course, but most of his dust had gone to keep Bill from +starving, during the winter. They would be starting down for supplies in +a week or so, now, though, and if he could get a little extra to buy +some more blankets—! Somehow, winters seemed to get colder, these past +few years.</p> + +<p>He walked painfully the last yards and saw his rocker and cradle, and +his gravel heap to be washed. He was a hardrock man, but one had to have +supplies, to get down to the mother lode. He’d wash out a little more +dust——</p> + +<p>He suddenly stiffened. Some woodsman’s sixth sense told him that +something was wrong. Someone had been here. He searched, and found +tell-tale scratches upon the ground. He searched further, and found +footprints, incompletely erased. Bill!</p> + +<p>Jake raged. Spying on him! He’d always hated Bill. Spying!</p> + +<p>He worked that day in a fury. There would be a reckoning when they met +that night. Spying! He’d shoot the liver out of the son of a gun!</p> + +<p>And at nightfall he drained the cradle, picked out the last lumps of +larger gravel, carefully swept off the remaining sand—and blinked. His +clean up was huge, for him. Five, six ounces or more! Maybe he’d struck +a pocket, or the stream was going to be a bonanza or— He remembered the +morning’s discoveries. Bill——</p> + +<p>The long hike home was a time of meditation. Bill, his enemy, salting +his gravel pile to give him dust. Bill, who hated him. Bill, who had +insulted him, whom he had insulted, every day for years.</p> + +<p>He was walking firmly when he got to the place where he would meet Bill. +He understood it all, now. Bill had seen his slim pack of supplies. Bill +had thought, as he had thought of Bill, that he was unable to wash out +enough dust to outfit himself for the winter. Bill had jerked meat for +his own use, to spare the dust for a winter’s supply of beans and flour +and bacon for Jake, whom he hated.</p> + +<p>Hated! They’d hated each other for years. Funny how they’d looked out +for each other. Bill nursing him, defiantly. He mending Bill’s mouth +organ, venomously.</p> + +<p>Bill was waiting. Bill was looking at him queerly.</p> + +<p>Jake’s eyes blazed. “You son of a gun!” he cried furiously. “Spying on +me! Salting my gravel heap!” The fury suddenly died out of his voice. +“Bill, what’d you do that for?”</p> + +<p>And Bill, his enemy; Bill, with deep lines and weather marks upon his +features; Bill, whose hair was white save that in a few narrowing spaces +it was streaked with gray—— Bill flushed a fiery, bricky red. He looked +like a schoolboy, ashamed at having been caught.</p> + +<p>He stammered, and then suddenly he burst out. “What’d you salt mine for? +I’d a mind to kill you for it!”</p> + +<p>Jake stared at him, helpless. His enemy—“I thought—” He stopped. “I +lost most o’ my dust in a poker game, last trip out. That’s why my packs +were light.”</p> + +<p>“So did I,” Bill told him, defiantly. “I thought you weren’t pannin’ +out.”</p> + +<p>They stared at each other, two old men, who had hated each other for +years. Presently, Jake said slowly, “Bill, what’d we fuss about, +anyway?”</p> + +<p>“Durned if I know,” said Bill angrily.</p> + +<p>Silence again. After a long time Jake spoke once more. “Say, Bill,” he +said diffidently, “supposin’ we both move in the Eyrie House? Needn’t +keep but one fire, then. Save time.”</p> + +<p>“I was thinkin’ that myself,” Bill grinned. “Say,” he added suddenly. +“Remember them card games we had when you were sick?”</p> + +<p>Jake nodded. Bill rubbed his hands.</p> + +<p>The next morning Bill rolled out of his blankets. Jake had just wakened +and was staring up at the ceiling, happily. They were in the Eyrie +House. Bill looked over at his ancient enemy.</p> + +<p>“Howdy,” he said maliciously.</p> + +<p>Jake gazed at him. It was a tense moment.</p> + +<p>“You go to hell,” he said recklessly, “you old son of a gun!”</p> + +<p>And happiness, at that sign of amity, began to reign.</p> + +<div class="transcriber-note"> + <div class="transcriber-note-title">Transcriber’s Note</div> + <div>This story appeared in <i>West Magazine</i>, January 20, 1926. It is + believed to be in the public domain in the United States; copyright + status may differ in other countries.</div> +</div> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 79295 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/79295-h/images/cover.jpg b/79295-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f06beac --- /dev/null +++ b/79295-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/79295-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg b/79295-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..dd3f75c --- /dev/null +++ b/79295-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6c72794 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This book, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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